a birthday bicycle.

 

 

One morning Ashlyn woke up and there was a bike sitting right there in her room.  (That morning happened to be her birthday.)

She has wanted a bike just like this ever since two years ago when we saw a darling blue-green bike parked on the corner across from our favorite Saturday morning pancake stop.  For the last couple years it has been at the tippy top of her Christmas and birthday wish lists and finally on her 12th birthday she got it...

Along with breakfast bed.  And a birthday crown no less.

And an invitation to a special get-out-of-school birthday lunch date.  (She chose the Corner Bakery.  As did every working professional within a 5-mile radius.  But we had a little birthday luck and actually got a spot to sit and eat our yummy food.)

At the end of the day we had a very messy lemony cake for her to make all her birthday wishes on.

  

I have this memory from when she was about 3 years old and feeling that sense of panic that all mothers do when they realize that these little years are passing by so quickly. 

But immediately after, I felt this incredible joy that I would get to watch her grow up--that I would be the one there with her throughout all these years.  She is the little girl that introduced me to this wonderful world of motherhood.  Which has brought me more joy than anything in the world.  I love you, my Ashlyn!