I am going to be frank.

It is no secret how smitten I am with Willow.  How full my heart feels having this little GIRL in my life.  How perfectly complete I feel with my four sweet babes.  But, something that I rarely mention is how glad we are that she waited.  Had she not been number four, I really can’t say with certainty we would have had the chance to know all three of these amazing boys we get to spend our days with.  Please don’t judge, it is just true.  The roudy chaos they tumble around with is overwhelming, their energy is consistently a mile high in the sky- AND no matter the craze in our eyes during the daylight hours- each night when they are tucked in tight, Lee and I twinkle with pride.

Oh my Japser… third baby- third boy- thank goodness she waited.

Three years ago I stood here in this kitchen smelling blueberry crostata, feeling the muggy humid air slick on my tight pregnant belly.  I had been up all night, thinking the time was so close.  But he waited, and waited, and waited to open his eyes to the earths light.  Still more than half a day away from his arrival, I tried to busy myself with things to do.  And blueberries were so plentiful.

Today we will pick blueberries, the fruit that inevitably will remind me of this chubby cheeked sweetheart for all my days.  And surely we will make all the goodies we gorged on the days leading up to his birth.  (I’ll just have to double all the recipes now… growing boys!)

Three year olds are as daunting as they are sweet and I am sure this year will be filled with its equivalent moments.  I am grateful that I have been here before, that I will occasionally have the knowledge from past three year old moments to be able to breathe in some grace in the hard moments, and soak up the tender ones too.

Happy Birthday my sweet Jasper!