Well...it's here. Happy 1st birthday, Jeremiah!!

I've been pretending like it wasn't coming all week but it's here and it's really not that bad. This morning it took me forever to get a slideshow together - I finally had to limit myself to two photos per month. But how do you capture your baby's first year in 24 photos? It was difficult.

God has used Jeremiah to teach Shawn and I so many things. First, that it is possible to love another human so much that there aren't words to describe it. Second, that no matter how much I love Jeremiah, that God loves him more - it is so overwhelming to even try to imagine that love. When I think about God sending Jesus to die for our sins, and then I think about sending Jeremiah on a similar mission...I selfishly couldn't do it. God loved US enough to send His Son...WOW.

(Stealing from Kristi here)
Dearest Jeremiah, I doubt you remember this but I'm the one who carried you in my body for 9 or so months. 12 months ago today, you decided to make your entrance into the world. At 112pm on 6/27/07, our world was completely rocked by you - coming into the world screaming and hollering and perfect. You had a conehead, you had a bent foot from it being shoved into my ribs, you were all purple but don't you know you were the most beautiful thing I had ever seen in my life?

The first three months were rough - you cried. A lot. I still remember - they say you forget but I sure haven't! We survived the acid reflux, the hospital stay for a seizure, RSV...all of that. Do you remember when I'd walk you to sleep for naps and for bedtime? I'm sure you don't. But I do. I'd play the same song on repeat over and over - funny that I don't remember what it is now, though. I would sing to you or pray silently for you...I'd think about things like what it would be like at your wedding and we danced the 'mother/son' dance. What you'd be like and if I'd remember holding you while we danced. I'd think about Mary, the mother of Jesus, and if she held you like I held you, what she felt like feeling her little baby's chest rise against hers and if she thought about how one day she'd have to let Him go.

One day I decided I couldn't walk you to sleep anymore and let you cry. It was hard, but so worth it! Now you put yourself to sleep and 'tell' us that you want to go to bed by going to the foot of the stairs. You have amazed me in more ways than you know and you're only a year old! Part of me is excited for the journey ahead of us - you growing up and becoming even more independent and moving away from me - and part of me yearns for that little baby that slept on my chest. Happy birthday, my little love!