on me: Pants: Gap. (last summer, similar.) Graphic Tee: Old Navy. Sweater: Loft. (similar.) Shoes: JCrew Factory. Bag: Kenneth Cole Reaction. (via Ross.-I know!) (similar.)
On Ava: Jacket, Jeans, Top. Shoes: Walmart. (couldn’t help myself, they’re sparkly.)
Ava turned 18 months on Sunday. 18 months with this little cherub, and I wonder how she ever wasn’t part of our family. I can’t even fathom it now.
Do you know what I love most about having babies? How their personalities write themselves onto your heart and change you. Every addition to our family changes not just the dynamic, but me as a mother. The way I feel about being a parent, the way I see myself and my children. If you’ve been reading for a while, you know that having Ava wasn’t easy. It took us a long time to conceive her, and when we finally did, it felt like such a miracle. Then mid-pregnancy, they told us there might be something wrong with her. Spina bifida or possibly something else. “Just let me keep this baby,” I thought to myself, because losing a baby was something I knew I could never handle. She was such a miracle to me when she was born, perfect and plump. The baby with the “cheeks” the nurses called her. And I started to appreciate what a miracle all my children are. The fact that getting the first three here was so easy. We didn’t even have to try, they just came; perfect, healthy, not a single complication…
When Ava was just shy of five months old I started feeling sick. I thought I had the flu, I was sure that must be it. Pregnancy was next to impossible. But you know, the human body doesn’t always make sense. All that work to get Ava here and then Ruby just happened. I know she wasn’t an accident, that she was meant to be part of our family, just a heavenly part. The first week after we buried her, I wanted to drive over to the cemetery and dig her up. I couldn’t bare the thought of her tiny body buried in the cold ground. Which sounds irrational and morbid unless you’ve got a mother’s heart. I feel that I am so physically aware of my children at all times. It’s one of those surprises of motherhood, how intense that physical connection is with your children. How natural it is for me to want to kiss and cuddle them all the time. Even my bigger kids. Even though my boys roll their eyes when I hug them now, even though they act embarrassed. I feel that they are as much a part of who I am as any other aspect of my being. When I think about Ruby now, her tiny body, her expression, the only one I would ever see of her, how fragile she was in my hands, and how her spirit is still very alive, I feel bitter sweet joy. I know she’s happy where she is, I can feel it. I feel her all the time; I feel her touching my spirit, and she too is changing me as a mother and a human.
Ava is my sunshine. Pure joy. Her mini Craig face, her baby mullet that I just can’t bring myself to cut, her spunk, her fearless spirit, her aversion to hair pretties. Every day of discovery with her makes me grateful. Grateful for who she is, who her siblings are, and who I imagine Ruby will be. Being their mother has challenged and stretched me, it’s given me a better sense of humor, it’s helped me learn to let go, but mostly, it’s taught me just how beautiful the world can be.