Emily turns 29

29 years ago today, our beautiful daughter, Emily, joined our family. It was a fun filled day. My sister in law, Cheryl, and her year old son, Keith, and I were hanging out together making cookies and trying to find our errant dog. I was having contractions but didn't really know what to do or if it was serious. I remember my Mother in Law called and I had a contraction right when I answered the phone and she was convinced that I was having the baby right then because of the strain in my voice. She called Scott at work and told him to get home. I called my Mom with updates during the day and when I called to say that the contractions were about 4 minutes apart, she told me to get to the hospital asap. I called Scott and he came and got me and we headed into the hospital. Emily was born shortly after.

I was so thrilled to be a mother. I had looked forward to it for years. During my teens I could almost always be found with a baby in my arms. If it wasn't one of my little sisters, it was one of the babies from the ward. My Dad used to check my Sunday School class every week and make me return whichever baby I had with me. You can imagine my thrill to be a mother!!

Emily was a beautiful baby. The nurse who brought her to me after she was born told me that she was the most beautiful baby that she had ever seen and she was right! She was a good baby too! The night we brought her home, she slept through the night. I woke up in a panic, but she was just slurping away on her thumb sleeping soundly.

I have posted some pictures of Emily. I could not find any of her baby pictures. They are in a box in the garage and I don't want to wait for Scott to come home and find it, but here are some of my favorites. There are a lot of pictures of Emily with other family members. That's what happens when you are the oldest. (The other reason is that last Christmas I gave each of the kids an empty photo album and a packet of pictures of them through the years and I neglected to keep many of them for myself. I am now going to have to raid the kids photo albums and make copies for myself.)

I had a plethora of pictures of Emily and Levi together and I just couldn't resist sharing a few of them. Here is Emily in different family groups. I realized that Luke isn't in any of them. He wasn't around yet!!

Emily was an energetic, creative, out going, talented, loving little girl and has kept those qualities and many more. She lightens up the room when she enters. I feel very blessed to be her mother.