We woke up to snow this morning … yep, the white nasty stuff.  We sang happy birthday to all three of the boys this morning before Doug headed off to work.  I was picking out clothes for Jaden and suggested he wear green and blue for the birthday boys.  He reminded me that he needed orange too.  I found some orange Halloween pumpkin socks.  He suggested orange pants.  Then I remembered we had a pair of orange sweatpants from a pumpkin costume.  So here is what Jaden picked out to wear today in honor of his brother’s birthday:

Dear heavens I hope his teachers get the drift that he dressed himself today 🙂

After I walked Jaden to the bus stop, the triplets and I had a laid back morning.  We played with the new musical instruments the boys got a their party.  I drank a pot of coffee.  By myself.  Didn’t get to shower though …  That’s ok, playing is more fun anyways.  I got the boys dressed in some new shirts … blue and green of course and snapped their 12 month photos.

We even snuck a play date in with Layla …  The three babies had a ton of fun stealing each other’s sippy cups at lunch and popping all the balloon I blew up for a mock party.

Doug has been saying since the triplets were born that he wants them to be walking before their first birthday.  I’ve said he’s freaking nuts!!!  Walking babies are much harder than crawling babies.  In just the past few days, the triplets started to stand on their own, without holding onto something.  Wouldn’t you know … Weston took a step today!  That little booger.  He got so excited with me hooting and hollering that he couldn’t stand up on his own …. he just kept bouncing.  So Doug didn’t get his whole wish … but a little bit 🙂

As I’m watching the boys play, I started watching the snow falling.  They were those huge fat flakes … the kind that make you want to dance in the snow.  I started thinking about Owen and angels … and heaven.   An image of an angel baby with big fluffy white feathered wings … what if, just what if, the angel babies were celebrating Owen’s first birthday so hard, their feathers were falling from heaven.  The snow.  You know like one of those pillow fights from the movies with the girls jumping on beds in their underwear, hitting each other with pillows and feathers exploding all over the place.

The orange marigolds I planted in memory of Owen are still in bloom.  The bright orange color showing through the falling snow was a reminder that he is here.  (these are actual photos of the plant outside our front door)

We enjoyed some more cake tonight too … Owen’s smash cake.  Along with the lit orange candle on the dinner table, it was our way of including him in our family dinner.  The boys were much more ‘dainty’ with it this time around.  They still needed baths though 🙂

Lately I’ve been having these very real experiences of feeling Owen.  I feel like a flake for admitting this.  I swear I’m not trying to go all Jerry Springer physic on you.  But I just have these feelings like he is really here.  Sometimes I want to reach out and rub my hand across the top of his head like I used to.  I can still feel it.  His hair was the smoothest of them all and his head was the roundest.  I want to kiss the top of his head like I do with Logan and Weston.  Instinct.  I do it so often, most times I don’t know I’m doing it.  Instinct.

When we were in the hospital I was in tune to these feelings.  I had time to sit and absorb.  To feel.  To think.  The rest of the world seemed to stand still while we were in this small room.  I was able to think.  Real life is nothing like the protected little hospital room.  It’s fast paced, racing time, chaos.  Time is limited and there is not silence for me to think in.  I remember searching for him … praying that Owen would come back.  Certain he was not in the child’s body that lay in my son’s hospital bed.  Leaving a light on for him, just hoping he’d find his way back to me.  I didn’t know if he would stay, but I didn’t want his spirit to leave me.  It’s been nearly 6 months before I’ve been in tune with this feeling again.  He’s just been right here … you know when something works for so long on its own, you forget what it’s like to not have it.  I haven’t felt a need to search for him.  I haven’t felt him leave me.

Until that night with the lanterns.  He left me and now he’s back.  He’s back so real I want to reach out and touch him sometimes.  Please don’t mistake this for some Hollywood type movie where the guy is talking to his dead wife and people on the street look at him like he’s nuts – talking to himself.  I have complete awareness of reality … I’m not seeing dead people.  The feeling is just strong.

As I sit on the couch with my glass of wine, typing my little heart out, I hear the triplet’s cooing and talking in bed.  What the heck is going on?  If the babies wake up in the middle of the night, they cry, yell and scream.  They don’t play.  Has Owen made a birthday visit to them?  Are Logan and Weston talking to Owen?  Am I sitting on my couch listening to my angel baby talk with my earthly babies?  Or is it just a coincidence?  Am I trying to convince myself of the things I want to believe in?

I suppose this is what faith is about.  Not always having the proof you want in order to believe what you should.  I try to listen to my heart.  If I want to believe these magical and spiritual happenings are true …. what is the harm?  If this is God’s gift to me on my boy’s birthday then who I am I to turn it away?  Thank you for these blessings.  Thank you for allowing my heart to be open and to feel the holy spirit.

It’s been a good birthday … a good birthday indeed.

Love, Mel