Happy Birthday, Sweet Baby C!

Seven years ago tonight, after a few frustrating days of false labor and mixed signals, a full four weeks before you were due to enter the world, I finally couldn’t sit still for another minute.  I busied myself around the house, organizing the basement, and putting the finishing touches on your nursery.

At midnight I crawled into bed, and the contractions that had been teasing me for days started coming at regular intervals and with increasing intensity.

An hour later, with your brother safely in the care of a neighbor, Daddy and I found ourselves buzzing down the abandoned highway in the dead of night.  When we arrived in the ER, my contractions were two minutes apart and intense.

Another hour and an epidural later, I was resting peacefully in a dimly lit hospital room while my midwife read and Daddy dozed.

A couple hours after that, you slipped into the world, weighing only five and a half pounds, our very own Christmas miracle, and to Daddy’s delight, an unexpected last minute tax deduction.

We spent Christmas 2002 in the hospital while the rest of our family celebrated the holiday without us.  A few days later, we brought you home, and our little family of three:

became a family of four.

My, how you’ve grown!

And thankfully, so have our photography skills.

I love your kind spirit and your sense of humor.  I love your determination.  I love your imagination and your made-up songs and your silly ways.  I love how you remind me so much of myself.  You humble and delight me.  Happy birthday, sweet C.