April 7th

April 7th marked 7 whole years without my daddy. I cannot believe it has been that long since I’ve talked to him, laughed with him, hugged him or told him that I love him. It makes me so sad to think of all the big things he has missed in the past 7 years…us moving to a new house and then building a house, all the big milestones for Ava like starting kindergarten and every year in between, and the biggest thing he missed out on was meeting Zoe and watching her grow. I know he is in Heaven and he is no longer suffering and could not be happier but we miss him so much here. He told us that we had the hard job in being the ones left here, he was going to be with Jesus, which was wonderful and easy but we had would be here with the pain and grief. That is so true. The past 7 years have been filled with so many wonderful things but those moments/events are always filled with mixed emotions because of the person missing. Zoe’s birthday is one of those days that is filled with so many emotions. We are so excited to celebrate our girl who brings so much joy to our lives and brings happiness to a very hard day. But, in the middle of our celebrating, we are grieving and missing my daddy so much. I know I say it every year but I am so thankful that God redeemed that day for us and gave us something to celebrate. I am so thankful Zoe has a connection to my dad even though she never met him. She shares something special with him and that makes me so happy in the midst of the grief.

Zoe girl, Grampie loved you even though he knew he would never meet you. He was the best Grampie to his girls and I hate that you never got to spend time with him. I hate that he never got to goof off with you or spoil you like he did with Ava and Piper. I hate that they didn’t get many years with him. But, I love that you know who Grampie was. You recognize him in pictures. You talk about missing him all the time. You talk about how it isn’t fair that Ava got to meet him and baby girl that is so true, it isn’t fair. I am so thankful that we’ve been able to keep his memory so alive that you feel like you know him. We promise to always keep him alive in our memories because he was something special! And we know that we will see him again one day and that gives us hope.