Eleven years ago, I went into labor on Labor Day. Today, I took him shoe-shopping in the MEN’S aisle. Despite all of the too-close-to-grown-up reminders, I am so grateful for this young man who isn’t too big to hug me in public and has taught me more about God’s inexhaustible grace than he’ll probably ever know.

We have the standard just-born snapshots and going-home pictures, but there are a few days in between that are purposely missing. Shortly after he was born, the doctors determined that his blood sugar was too low, and despite our efforts to nurse and supplement with formula, it wasn’t doing the trick to raise his sugar levels. They had to run an iv – which, on a newborn, meant putting a needle in his little head. That, my friends, is why we have no pictures from those couple of days. (How long was it, really? Two days? Three? I have no idea; I blocked it out.) I couldn’t bear to have a permanent reminder of that needle and tape stuck to my baby’s head. Praise God, the iv worked, and we were able to go home later in the week.

Then there was the day he walked all by himself down to the speech therapy classroom at the local elementary school. He looked dwarfed by the “big” kids as he bobbed along with his backpack hanging down to his knees.

Then there was his first (and only, praise God!) bleeding trip to the ER. He was standing up and playing in the bathtub when he slipped and landed on his chin on the edge of the tub. Like mother, like son: my first set of stitches was from a bathtub accident, too. (Dancing With The Stars didn’t have nuthin’ on Ang in the 1st grade! lol)  😉  He ended up not needing stitches, just glue. If I’d known, I wouldn’t have wasted four hours and a $50 copay and would have glued him up myself, but I was a frantic, inexperienced parent. What did I know? (Apparently, I still haven’t learned my lesson, since we just took the little one for a fancy superglue fix, too.)

Then there was the summer of his baptism at the lake. It was a family ordeal. What an amazing day!

Then there was the night when he found the courage that I was too numb to seek, and he prayed for my fatally injured brother, sight unseen.

Then there was the day when he took his cousins’ hands and led them through our local zoo, like a big brother duck taking little ducks under his wings.

Then there was the Why-did-God-call-me-to-this?! day when he sat next to me on the couch while I cried, patting my arm and saying, “I know it’s hard.”

There have been too many of these sort of days to recount, but through it all, he has risen to situations beyond his age and handled them with grace and unabashed faith that challenges me even now. Lord, help me fan that fire in him so that he will blaze brightly in his world.