Yesterday...

Yesterday I had a quiet day. Thursdays for me mean Ava at Nursery, and Heidi out with my Mum. They are my "space" day, my "catch up" day, my "odd jobs" day. But yesterday I had a change of plans at the last minute and found myself at a loose end.

That doesn't happen very often.

And so I pulled out my scrapbooks, set up my laptop, grabbed myself a cup of tea and began sorting.

I made a scrapbook for Ava after she was born. It holds all the mementoes of the first year of her life. Little treasures I have stored up - from scan pictures to baby bands, from hospital feeding charts, to her first plane ticket. Mixed in with all the photographs (and you know how many I take) of her first precious year of life.

Our Ava - aged 7 months

And Heidi's scrapbook has been on my to-do list for 18 months now. And its no nearer done than it was the day she was born. Or at least it wasn't. Until yesterday.
 
And then I sat down and waded through this little life. 22 months. 22 months that have packed more life experience into them than probably my 27 years that preceded them. I sorted through photos of our girls sharing their first moments together, I smiled over photos of those blissful early days of Heidi's life where she really was the dream baby, I cried over photos and memories of the uncertainty of those dark days of her illness, and my heart ached to relive it all. I rejoiced at the joy of that summer. That summer when we were slowly restored by our gracious Heavenly Father as we swam fjords and gazed over Norway's beauty.

Little Heidi - aged 4 months

Then last night, we were out with friends, and I heard a tragic story.

And I realised again how very much I have to be grateful for.

I will spend these next few weeks carefully putting together Heidi's scrapbook. One day, it will help her understand that first year of her life, I hope, and all the consequences of it. And I hope, though there will be some hard things for her to come to terms with, she will see the beauty of that year too. And see how much we, as a family, have to be thankful for.

Our little family at Heidi's dedication, we had just been discharged from hospital for the final time.

So I await the arrival of my photographs now... and I'm looking forward to finally recording that year, hard as some parts of it will be, because it has sharpened us, changed us, taught us more about the Saviour, brought us closer together as a little family.

And let's be honest. My little lady needs her scrapbook... and her Mama needs to get on with it; there'll be another one to make all too soon!