We were both exhausted the moment we met.

She was tiny and had wavy black hair; her newborn cry was piercing and filled the halls of the floor. For months I’d been terrified and anxious about her arrival, but seeing her, holding her, meeting my daughter took the anxiety away in an instant.

My daughter. She was mine and I was hers. And neither of us had any idea where to go, or where we would go, from that moment when we first met.

Our early days in the hospital are now a blur, but I remember the boredom and the surreality of it all. While I was recovering from becoming a mother, the Pledge of Allegiance was declared unconstitutional and I fell in love with a squeaky little newborn.

During pregnancy, many first-time mothers focus on getting through labor and delivery, bringing a baby home to a decorated room and dressing the baby in cute clothes. Many of us don’t think about things like how we’ll handle it the first time they cut our $100 comforter, paint things with nail polish or cut their own hair. We don’t think strategy, discipline and longevity in the lessons we’re trying to pass on to our children. For many of us, it’s all about a newborn and not about the child, the adult that this teeny baby will grow to become.

As your child grows, as she learns and becomes more independent, her future becomes one of your biggest concerns. It is the root of every lesson, every ounce of discipline, every hug and every compliment. You hope, you pray that she becomes the kind of person of whom you’ll be proud.

My tiny, screaming baby turned eight today. She still has chubby cheeks and is loud, her feet still look the same, but she no longer resembles the baby who made me a mother.

These days she wants to grow up too fast and I am trying to hold on to her childhood as best I can.

We honored her with a weekend of celebrations. She spent the night with my parents on Friday, enjoying time alone with her grandparents. She went shopping for shoes and clothes and had her fingernails and toenails painted iridescent purple; she came home with bedazzled, light-up shoes and a plastic ‘Birthday Girl’ tiara. This morning she opened her birthday cards and we brought ice cream cake and marble loaf to church; there she received wonderfully thoughtful gifts from the Cross family.

Afterward, we went to my parents’ house to swim. After a few hours I let her open her gifts. She was enthralled with her barbies and didn’t notice the shiny new surprise making its way toward her.

Finally, I had to let her know she still had another gift to open.

“I do? Where?” she asked.

“Look toward your left …”

“That’s awwwwwesommmmme! That’s the bike I wanted!” She was thrilled beyond words which, in turn, thrilled me. Making your children happy never gets old.

Bicycles and barbies and big girl things, this is what you get when you turn eight.

We also had a family dinner at IHOP, then came home to ride bikes and take bubble baths. As a special treat, she gets to sleep with me tonight, just as she did the first night after she was born. I want to cuddle her, hug her, kiss the top of her head as much as I can before she outgrows this.

Having her was one of the best things I’ve ever done.

Related posts:

1. On Motherhood When I became a mother for the first time, I...
2. Gosh – I am lovin’ Gosh – I am lovin’ me some water lately! I...
3. Time I am smitten. ♥ I know I definitely have my...