My baby girl is 8!

Happy 8th birthday to my beautiful second baby girl, my Rosalita!

I never got to play with Barbies as a child. Rosy finds it funny that I'm loving it now.

Happy birthday is my victory song

The back of my purple Survivor t-shirt from the American Cancer Society's Relay for Life says, "Happy birthday is our victory song." Surviving cancer has forever altered how I feel about aging. I will never be one of those women who is 29 forever. Every milestone reached is celebrated, because it could have been missed if my cancer hadn't been caught early, or my surgery had gone poorly, or my cancer wasn't sensitive to the treatments I received.

Everyday miracle. A birthday. Breakfast in bed from my 4 sweet children, who parade in with bagels and coffee on a cutting board tray, and Clementine slices arranged to make the numbers "34".

My morning devotions tell me that the time of singing has come. I am practicing living in the moment, being mindful of the moment, not letting my mind drag me off into the unknown future. This allows me to experience the joy of these verses, because in THIS moment, they are True, "See! The winter is past; the rains are over and gone. Flowers appear on the earth; the season of singing has come."

Perhaps this is the way you fight depression best: one battle, one day, one moment at a time. Stake your sword in the ground and claim this moment for joy. I can do that, one moment at a time. The insurmountable future is what I cannot face, as the rest of my life disappears like a timeline in the fog. Here, in the moment I can see, it is clear and bright and beautiful. I am 34. I have made it to 5 years post-diagnosis. Today is a victory, and I'm singing my freedom song right along with those who sing Happy Birthday over me.

Thank you, Lord, for today - this moment. Yes, the season of singing has come.

Joining community on the prompt, "Ordinary"

The next stage, like it or not

My youngest turned 5 the other day. I still think of him as my baby, and I might always. After all, he is my baby, the youngest of my brood.

It's easier in many ways, this stage of our family. It's easier to find a sitter without a baby in the house, there's no one peeing on the floor, I don't have to arrange my life around breastfeeding breaks. Yet my arms ache. There is a sense of completeness missing when I look at our family. I wonder how much of it is the one baby, the one who would be my youngest, the one I never got to hold. Am I missing him when I see our family? Do other women who've miscarried feel this way?

I talk to Aaron about it, and he isn't with me in the missing. He is happy to be "done" with toddlers. I wonder how that impacts our dreams of adoption? I still stop by Reece's Rainbow often, looking at the photos, dreaming of bringing one of them home. Sadness strikes - dozens of countries won't allow us to adopt because of my history of depression. Anger creeps in - do they really think those babies are better lying in cribs, malnourished, unheld, eventually to "age out" of the orphanage and die in a mental institution just because they are physically or mentally disabled? Would I be that horrible of a mother to those children?

I try to make peace with my youngest being 5. I hold him, and he stretches well over half my body length. He is getting so big, and so not a baby any longer.

I pray for peace, too. All those orphans have a father - the Father of the fatherless (Psalm 68:5). Try to turn the lament to praise for what God has given, however incomplete it feels.

And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God. Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think. (Ephesians 3:18-20)

My lonely heart is made for two

It beats too slowly without you

Tonight the sky is burning blue

Horizon cuts right into you

You'll be the moon I'll be the sea

And you can shine your light on me

I'm calling your name

But you won't listen

Tonight was made for two

But there's one heart missing

One heart missing

~One Heart Missing, Grace Potter & the Nocturnals~

How about you? Do you struggle to feel your family is complete? Do you long for another baby? Does your husband feel the same, or is he relieved to be progressing to "the next stage" of parenthood?

In the 3 extra years

Life, when it is going smoothly, is often a quiet thing. Illness slipped in quietly, too - insidious, 3 years ago. One day, Amelia was just Amelia. Slowly over the course of two weeks, she slept more and more each day, until she was never awake, and we were plunged into a hospital environment talking about a coma and a brain infection and a 50/50 chance that she would ever wake up again (see "Amelia's Illness" on the top menu above for more info on all Amelia has conquered to be here thriving today).

Life with Amelia today is anything but quiet. From her husky voice that is often at shouting pitch to her body always in motion, she is bundle of energy that never shuts off. Her body is loud and bold and intrepid. She never does anything in the expected fashion. So too was her 6th birthday. She wanted to go to a water park, where she conquered all the "big kid" slides. She wanted her annual "Celebration of Life" instead of a birthday party. Usually that means a sing-along by the campfire, but this year it was bone dry, chill-you-to-the-core cold, and blustering windy.

And so, instead of quiet around the crackling fire in the dark, we had 15 people filling our house to the brim with laughter and sing-alongs, dancing, a magic show thanks to Katy, parlor tricks, mountains of gift wrap, and two giant French Silk pies - the only dessert our sugar-phobic newly minted 6 year old will eat.

We had horned beasts and hugs.

Tears and lots of stories told from those awful memories of such a different October in 2009.

We had a houseful of yellow and owls everywhere.

We had grandparents reading cards, a 6 year old sucking her Nuksy, and an almost nephew filling his mama's lap inside her womb.

We had family of all kinds.

Our cup runneth over with the love of it all.

That she can balance on a skateboard.

That she can teach her little brother and has learned - again - how to share with him.

It was truly a Celebration of Life. Three unexpected years that we've kept this treasure here on earth. We never knew how to celebrate a milestone until Amelia was regaining lost ones. We never knew how to celebrate a life until it was given back to us. We never knew how to roll with the punches until we were punched and punched again. We never understood the depths of the unconditional love you have for these little people until it was stretched thin by the demands of illness and it's lingering effects. We never knew how to switch ourselves from survival mode into thriver mode. We never knew how to appreciate the million little "goods" that are sandwiched between the bad, however big and all-encompassing the bad may seem. It is true that no trial goes unwasted, no opportunity is lost. That He grows us faster and stronger in the rainstorms of life than in the ease of the dry summer warmth. 

We may long for the easy path, but it is in the hills and valleys of life's forests that we find the beauty of the path Christ trod laid out before us.

The heart at peace gives life to the body. (Proverbs 14:30)

Part of Fried Okra and Joy in This Journey's Monday blog hop on Parenting 

**I apologize for my long silence on the blog. The end of September and beginning of October, I am literally lecturing or teaching EVERY class meeting of my 3 team-taught courses, so I am working, eating, and sleeping Powerpoints, grading, and prepping assignments. Sometimes I have 4 separate lectures to prepare for in one single day. Overwhelming? Yes! BUT, this teaching thing has turned my inner light on. God made me for this. I love it. Hands down, I KNOW He designed me to do this. Pray that my contract gets extended another year this spring!!! And give me two weeks, and I'll be back to blogging as normal (I hope!!)