our fourth Maisie Day

Here she is. Our beautiful oldest daughter.
And look! I really did get to hold her and now I'm her mommy forever!

Some of our family were so wonderful to help get our minds off the sadness by having dinner, cake and ice cream with us. I made this "Hello Kitty" cake for her, thinking at 4 she may have really been into this classic kitty :) It's nice to have something to plan and worry about instead of thinking about how much we miss her!

We kept to tradition and spent some time at her grave, "spring cleaning" her marker, eating a picnic lunch, and letting the boys run around on all the grass.

remembering my angel

Last Saturday marked three years since our dearest angel daughter was born. After a perfect pregnancy and not-so-unusual labor, Maisie was born hypoxic, having been deprived of oxygen sometime during the 22 hours I was laboring to get her here. The fact that her heartrate never showed a problem indicates to me what a miracle she was. Chosen to stay here with our family for a brief 22 days, then return to our Heavenly Father and other family who have passed on.
While it's been 3 years since she was here and I am full of joy to be her mother, there are still mournful moments. Moments with quiet tears and memories of holding an angel in my arms. Moments when a song or a picture or a look from one of my 2 sons reminds me of the daughter I have. I am so proud to have an angel daughter. It was a miracle that she left us, a miracle that she stayed with us so long, and a blessing that we get to have her forever since our family is an eternal family, sealed together by someone with authority given him of God to do so.
I don't expect to ever forget my angel. I know she is with me. I know I will see her again. These thoughts give me great joy.

Maisie Day 2009

We celebrated Maisie's birthday this year with a farm party at our house. Lots of cousins came to join in the fun. We had a goose nest hunt, tried milking the cow, ate a pig cake and cupcakes, and told fun jokes. It was a great way to have fun on this memorable day without feeling sad.

A tradition we have on this special day is to have a picnic at Maisie's gravesite. I love this picture - I'm smiling like nothing else is happening while John is screaming his head off and Sam's looking at something interesting (seconds before he was struggling to get out of my arms, so at least he stay put!)

"Maisie Garden" sign

When Maisie died we planted a garden in her honor, to remember the life she had. It is full of daisies that bloom at different times of the year. We love it! I've wanted to paint a sign to put in it for quite some time now and FINALLY did it this week, yay! This is it :)