Merced River - Spring 2009

Our daughter’s birthday is this month, and we’re celebrating with a couple of her teenager friends this weekend.

I can’t believe my little girl is a teenager. I remember when she was just a little thing, we’d ask her if she knew her birthday, and she’d say “Au-gust.” In my head, I still say the date like that.

Time sure does fly. But I couldn’t ask for a more lovely development of a more lovely daughter. She has the most beautiful heart — the thing that was always most important to me. She’s grown into the kind of person who sees the lonely new girl at school and will go over and ask her to have lunch. (She’s actually done that a few times.) She goes out of her way to remove herself from pettiness and negativity at school (a tough chore — I admire her resolve). She is the friend to others who will always listen.

She’s quiet, artistic, beautiful, left-handed, a bit Bohemian, fabulous with color, funny, can eat with chopsticks like she was born doing it, is learning to play the guitar, loves children, LOVES animals, loves to bake, and just has the biggest heart you could imagine.

We’re taking her and her friends to an amusement park for some evening-hour fun. To celebrate her birth — truly a joyous day for our whole family.

We wouldn’t be the same without her.

Happy Birthday, Rene!