How could I have known?

Six years ago this night I lay my head down on my pillow after kissing those tiny foreheads of Blake's and Allison's. I closed my eyes and I'm sure I whispered some sort of prayer. I usually did. But...how could I have known that just a few hours prior to that prayer being said one of my most heartfelt prayers had already been answered? How could I have known that a tiny, precious, miraculous baby girl lay in a NICU just a couple of miles away from my home waiting for me to come for her? How could I have known?

I woke up that next morning and went about my day doing those things that I usually did. I remember Dave came home for lunch and we had a normal, nothing special kind of meal, but if I had only known how our lives would be changed in just a few hours then I might have planned something special. How could I have known?

I loaded the car that afternoon with an ice chest and Blake's bat bag. I was hurrying to get Allie's hair fixed and get Blake in uniform. I had planned to leave for the Bomber's big pre- season tournament the moment Dave pulled in from the office. How could I have known that God had a different plan for my life that day? How could I have known?

The phone rang a little after 4pm and a sort of familiar voice was on the other end. "Do you have a moment to sit down?" I lied, "Sure, I do". How could I have known that very phone call would change our lives? How could I have known that our daughter had been born the night before? I think if I had known I would have lived my life a little differently that day. I think, but how could I have known she way lying all alone, so fragile, so new, so amazing? How could I have known?

That night things didn't go exactly as we had planned, but how could I have known that God was at work behind the scenes? I didn't get to peek through a nursery window at our daughter. I didn't get to see her face. I didn't get to meet her or hold her or kiss her. No, it would be three LONG weeks before any of that took place. In the tears that fell on my pillow that night how could I have known that God in all His wisdom was at work? Laying it out according to His plans to prosper her and give her a future? How could I have known? I didn't have His eyes and I didn't possess His knowledge. I only KNEW that she was mine. I only KNEW the pain of being denied her. I only KNEW that some how, some way this was the child Dave and I had waited for. Had longed for. Had prayed for. How could I have known that our path to her and her path to us would be laid out by the very hands of the God Who created her? How could I have known?

How could I have known that 6 years later I would be remembering some of the most exciting, most painful, most confusing nights of our lives? How could I have known that in those long nights that we waited and prayed and pleaded for her and for His will to be done that He would be growing us into who we HAD to be in order to be called her mommy and daddy? How could I have known? I couldn't see. I didn't understand. I didn't know.

How could I have known that the road ahead wouldn't just be filled with giggles and coos? How could I have known that she would spend the next 6 months of her life in a NICU bed hundreds of miles away from her nursery? How could I have known that I would travel those highways day after day after and sit night after sleepless night next to her tiny incubator just waiting to bring her home? How could I have known?

How could I have known the lengths I would go to for one of my children? How could I have known how deep a mother's love truly is? How could I have seen the AWESOMENESS of our God without those days spent in that NICU? HOW?

Tonight I listen to her giggles and tears fall. How could I have known how incredibly special it would be to celebrate her life? How could I have known? 6 years! Another year after being told it would never come? How could I have known that she would make it to this day? How could I have known that when I brought my frail, dying, fragile 5 year old baby home last August that she would defy the odds and that her life would once again announce to this world, "Not yet, He's not finished with me yet, not yet."

How could I have known that our Father would use the birth, the life, the story of a tiny baby girl to grow and mold and change the hearts of this family? How could I have known? I wanted, I needed, I prayed for a what I thought would be a beautiful, perfect baby, but how could I have known what He had in store for us was SO MUCH MORE than our hearts could have EVER conceived? How could I have known that her tiny, broken, not perfect body would be the instrument He used in our lives to bring us to our knees?

Ashley Kate, I knew I loved you before I ever met you, but how could I have known how amazing it would feel to be loved BY YOU? I couldn't. Only He knew. What I didn't know He did, and does, and always will. May my eyes not lose sight of that, may my heart not grow weary of it, may my life NEVER be the same because of it. Happy, happy birthday baby gherkin. You my sweet girl...how could I have ever known?