growing up...

There's nothing like a little spark of a girl to remind one of the simpler things in life, is there? I have had the honor of watching Kelsie Overby today and that little girl just brings a huge smile to my face over and over again. She is a ray of sunshine on a cloudy day! But as I worked, having help from this little one, who industriously vaccuumed, ran down the hallway, and offered to dust (for a price, that is, gotta love it), I kept thinking about the little girl that my little granddaughter Lucy will be one day, and I got very excited. I love that I can be a grandmother to her that she will, with lots of loving disipline, want to be around. I love that maybe, just maybe, she will be still living next door when she is old enough to run over to our house, shouting my name, well, shouting "grandma!!!" and coming to share something with me. I love that some day I will get to bake cookies with her, teach her what I know, as her grammy, about Jesus, and be someone she can come to to help her understand her mommy. It is also in this time that I keep thinking about Aaron and his impending graduation from high school. Wasn't it just yesterday that we were thinking about Matt graduating? Wasn't it just a few days ago when I was holding my own little baby? Now, in these days, holding our little one, it just won't register in my brain that our kids were ever as little as she! I long to remember the way they felt in my arms when all I see are these great big amazing adults that I so adore. In one way, my heart aches, aches for the days of PB and J and apple slices, and in one way, I feel so honored to have raised, alongside the MOST amazing man in the world, some of the most incredible adults I have ever had the honor to know. I know, at the point when my youngest child walks into the gym in his cap and gown, I will have a choice, to celebrate and rejoice in his accomplishments or to mourn the loss of his last days in school and in our home. I can tell you this, as I have watched our children graduate, I have done both, celebrate, for them, for all they are and have done, and I mourn, for me, for all I have and all that will no longer be. I celebrate because I have done all that I can to be the best mom that I can be and I mourn because my time that I have become so very familiar with, is over. I can also tell you this, one can cry and celebrate.

Enough of that, gotta leave room for that later. :o)