Happiness Is

I might as well get this out of the way. Lord knows I won't be able to concentrate on anything else today until I release some of this happiness that is making me want to... well, smile. Even the kids look extra special to me this morning. Oh, now... you know kids are always special, but today is extra special. I might even bake them cookies.

"The happiest days are when babies are born," Melanie from Gone With The Wind.

What is it about babies that can make even the grumpiest person smile? How does a little baby have the power to infuse so much hope into an otherwise ordinary and mundane life? I haven't even seen this little girl yet other than tiny pictures on my cell phone and bigger ones on Facebook, but I honestly feel like I could overcome anything today. If I've looked at her picture once, I've looked at it a hundred times since early (really early!) this morning. Every time I look at her, I just see a new beginning.

A beginning. Oh, how quickly those days fly by! I'm in the middle part with my own and I never quite understood until now how the moodiness of teenagers would make a mom long for the days of a toddler tantrum. Seriously. At least then a chocolate chip cookie and a cup of milk could chase the tears away. Now that same cookie and milk cup doesn't get much of a response, but we're not going to dwell on that. Because today is a happy day.

I remember when we brought our oldest home. Crammed into the backseat of a sporty Mustang sitting by a tiny baby snug in his car seat, I didn't have a clue what I was doing. A few years later we brought the middle home in the back seat of a four-door Buick Skylark. I was more confident then. And then the youngest. Well, by then we were riding in a Dodge Caravan for our been-here-done-this trip home from the hospital. Three kids. Three different vehicles. It seems like I was always in such a hurry for things to change and move on.

Now I want to pause life. I want to see little Lily just as she is today in her first day of this thing called life. I want to experience a new mama's awe of her newborn. I want to see a new daddy who can't stop smiling. And I want to see the look on a grandparent's face when they realize that the next generation has arrived. God is good.

Life doesn't pause, though, does it? It moves on at a steady pace and waits for us to realize that there are moments worth slowing down and enjoying. This is one of those moments. I won't be able to hold this new baby for another month (and you better believe that this is one trip I will not miss), but I still have her picture. I already have a box on the table perfect for shipping what I'm sure will be something pink and irresistible. Heck, I might even put up our Christmas tree today.

Wait. I take that back. I don't think I'll have to time to decorate and shop. And the shopping will have to be the top priority today.

Because today is a happy day. The day when a baby is born.