This morning, our family walked in the 2020 NILMDTS Virtual Remembrance Walk in honor of Astrid.
I’m incredibly grateful for the retouched images we have of her thanks to Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep.
This girl has made 10 trips around the sun! I cannot believe how fast her first decade has gone. She is an independent, loving, leader who is artistic, kind, and helpful. She gives great hugs and isn’t afraid to show emotion. I love to watch her work hard in school and sports and cannot wait to see what the coming year has in store for her. 🍁 🎃 🍁
We decorated her bedroom door with streamers and made a birthday backdrop for her video calls today. She selected an awesome t-shirt and is all smiles today. Double digits!
For dinner, she requested pancakes, bacon & scrambled eggs. Her godmother/aunt joined us. She waited all day to open her cards and presents.
Birthday cake, was red velvet. The “0” candle on the cake was from the day we brought her home from the hospital. We celebrated her “0th” birthday with the boys as a way of including them in the joy of her birth in 2010.
Thanks to Covid and distance learning, I’m not sure if my kids will have “official” school pictures. So like so many other things this year, we did something different. No uniforms, outside, and fall colors.
I’ve been knocked down a notch. I predicted that Shecklet #1 would pass me up on height by the end of summer. Summer ends in a few days and this happened…
I knew the time had to be close. Recently when he has given me a hug he hugs above my shoulders instead of me being able to hug above his.
We ordered Astrid’s grave marker today. My list of things I never thought I’d have to do keeps growing.
The granite we selected comes from South Dakota. I have extended family who live there and were a great support to me during my pregnancy and after Astrid’s death. Jake and I like the extra special connection that Astrid’s marker will have because of where the granite is from.
Due to COVID, we weren’t able to have a professional photographer come to the hospital after Astrid was born to take photos for us. We relied on my old iPhone 6S to capture the only pictures we have of our daughter. Thankfully, that worked ok. Definitely not professional quality, but I’m grateful for every one we took.
Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep (NILMDTS) is the organization we would have contacted about sending a photographer to the hospital. Instead, we were able to upload photos to them and have them retouched. What they returned to us (in an amazingly short time,) are beautiful. I cried when I saw them. They did a wonderful job softening Astrid’s skin and lightening it so we could see her delicate features. She was so beautiful.
I hope to make a photo book and not only include the retouched photos but the blog post content I wrote during my pregnancy and after. I think it would be nice to have her story in a book that we can flip through and remember her. I miss her so much!
The current pet obsession for Shecklet #4 is a hedgehog. It has been her response to every question about favorite animals or desired pet so far this school year. (She has actually liked them for longer than that.)
Tonight we were outside drawing with chalk and she found the hedgehog instructions in the animal drawing book that Nolan received back in 2011 from Great Grandma Fran, Great Uncle Steve & Great Aunt Deb. I drew the outline and we colored it in together. (I love drawing with chalk. I’m glad my kids still enjoy it so I can join them 😊)
Shecklet #2 created a little bug character (he’s in the upper left corner surrounded by black) a little year ago or so and has been drawing him ever since. He took his four page scene and expanded it over the summer. (He took this picture to show his art teacher.) He even let his siblings contribute a little bit. It’s really impressive up close!
