If there’s one thing I’m sure of, it’s that when you are enduring a marathon of worry,  fear of the future (and maybe a little dread), the littlest things bring you hope (and joy and gratitude and all those other lovely offshoot emotions.) This past weekend was full of them.

Like at the children’s museum. We have a year membership which allows us to pop in for an hour here or there with zero guilt about not seeing everything or staying for half the day. Saturday was all about the marketplace. And it was the first time Gertie was just as interested as the girls. She filled I don’t know how many baskets. Hope.

Or how she is crawling literally all over the house when she wants, where she wants. Ryan was taking a shower and I heard him laugh and say “Hi Gertie!!” in the bathroom. She heard the water running and so left all of us in the room to investigate. It’s the littlest thing, like I said, but it’s such a toddlery thing. To pull up over the tub and bother you in the shower. Joy.

But the big doozy was on Monday. The girls don’t have school on that day and we recently asked to stop Gertie’s one hour of therapy so we could just sink into the day playing with each other. No cars, no getting dressed (if we don’t want to), no hurry hurry hurries. I’m proud of us for trusting that missing one hour of speech could be made up with a full day of chatty sisters and slow meals, both of which can only strengthen her speech. Hope.

This past Monday was overcast and balmy, it would rain a couple hours after we went inside. The wind was whipping through all our fir trees you see in the background. It makes the best, loudest sound. I made sure to ask Gertie to listen to it. She loves the wind.

Ruthie has declared days like Monday as her favorite. She loves the smell, she says. I do too. It felt like spring.

We were all dressed by 8am and out the door. This is when Gertie shone. She did not stop for at least an hour: walking, pausing, watching, laughing, listening. She walked around and around our cracked driveway, through the carport and into the backyard, forcing her way into the grass for a better look at the chickens. It made me entirely and fully grateful. For our house with all the pathways to walk on, for us being able to spend the day together, for Ryan working hard so I can stay at home, for all of us learning to forgive daily because of the amount of time we spend with each other, for cheers and clapping, for giving praise freely and easily, for the wind in the trees and the space in our yard, for our full bellies and dry home, for a warm bath after playing in muddy puddles…. and on and on. Once I start thanking, it all just flows continuously from one thought to the next.

It was one of our best Mondays in a while.

Let’s zoom in on her face.

She loved being in the middle of the action. Whenever I picked her up, she’d fight to go back down to hang with them.

Later, while the girls were getting ready for bed and putting tissues in their butts and hopping around us like bunnies, it made me smile that that craziness will be what surrounds Gertie as she grows up with us.