Caelen

It's 1:30 AM and I can't sleep. I feel like I need to guard the house. Ron has fixed the front door so that it will lock again. It looks ugly, but it's "temporary" he said.

Anyway, I've been thinking about when our first grandson, Caelen, was born. We live 3 hours from Houston, which is where they lived at the time. My son called around midnight to say that they were on the way to the hospital. I threw some clothes into a suitcase, got in my little black Acura, put a CD in the stereo and drove 80 miles an hour all the way.

The CD I listened to over and over was the soundtrack from Don Juan DeMarco, and my favorite song on it was When You Love A Woman. I never heard that song again without remembering that middle of the night drive to Houston. :o)

I got to the hospital in plenty of time. I'm so fortunate that my daughter-in-law wanted me to be in the room for the birth of the baby. As the time drew near, I stood on one side of her and my son on the other, to support her and help her breathe during labor. Suddenly the doctor said to me, "If you want to see your grandson born, come back here." I stepped behind the doctor, and as my daughter-in-law pushed, I saw his black hair. A few more pushes, and out he came, the most beautiful baby in the world!

His daddy cried; I cried. I could hardly wait to hold him, but I stayed back, taking pictures and watching as mommy and daddy made his acquaintance. The nurses got him all cleaned and bundled into a blanket and put a little knit cap on his head. At last my son asked if I wanted to hold him.

I can't begin to describe the feeling I had, holding my first grandchild. You think that you can never love another baby as much as you love your own babies, but that is not true. Holding that tiny little baby, who looked so much like my own babies, and was the child of my child was one of the sweetest moments of my life. I held his tiny little hand in mine, and that tiny little hand held my heart, right from the beginning.

Caelen is about 3 years old in the picture in this post. It's one of my favorite pics of him.

He will be 12 years old in May. He still holds my heart in his hand, and I thank God for him.