Fourteen

This one. Today she is fourteen and lovely and nearly as tall as me. This year she will begin high school and learn to drive. And it only just now seems reasonable to me that I should have a five year old, but I look over and I have a young woman. And it seems just yesterday that she was sitting on the couch watching Dora the Explorer and Blue’s Clues with her eyes watering because she would.not.blink. And how does this wonderful world spin so fast?

Sidenote and unrelated fact about the above picture: Grace is now babysitting for that swim instructor’s two year old son. How time flies….

This child is our guinea pig child – the first born that is one constant experiment in parenting do’s and don’t’s. And we’ve learned so much and we have so much left to learn and the next several years will bring a whole new level of education as we navigate goals and plans and new freedoms and responsibilities and the inevitable interest in and of the opposite sex.

But for today we give thanks for the gift of this girl – the first of our five. She remains steadfast, responsible, strong, more than a little stubborn sometimes, funny, incredibly artistic, smart, and with a heart captivated by Haiti. This mama heart is not ready for the letting go that the next few years will bring, but God has plans for her. Big, good, wonderful, beautiful plans for her life. And she is His to use.