Aunt Traci (and Maddie)

While Marcus was on his surf trip, his younger sister, Traci, came through town. She was traveling to a wedding with her one-year-old daughter, Madelyn (Maddie), and I was very glad that she could stop in for a couple of nights and spend some time with us. And despite the fact that Traci was in the midst of morning sickness and taking a cross-country trip alone with a toddler, we had a very good time together. Traci is one of those rare people who, no matter what is going on in her life, she can quickly and cheerfully step out of her own world and into someone else's. And that is just one of the reasons that it is always enjoyable to have her around :)

While I'm on the subject, I'd like to take a few paragraphs to highlight the many, many ways that Traci has been a blessing to our family, especially since we became parents. Traci lived in Gainesville with us when I was pregnant with Caleb, and she helped me shop, decorate and paint his nursery. On the day he was born, she was the first person to visit/hold him in the hospital (except for Mimi, Marcus and I, who were all present at the birth).

Eight weeks later, Traci gave up two of her weeks off to babysit Caleb at our house so that I could go back to work for the end of the school year (did I mention that this was just a few weeks before her wedding?). She plugged along every day with little Caleb, even though he spent the whole two weeks protesting breast milk from a bottle. And she patiently put up with my myriad of instructions. She seemed to really understand, though not yet a mother herself, how hard it was for me to leave him. After she and Josh got married and moved to Tampa, she continued to be a devoted aunt. She and Josh were the only family who were able to drive to Gainesville for Caleb's first birthday party.

When Ethan was born, even though she and Josh had received some tragic news that very morning, they drove up to Gainesville and celebrated with us, keeping their sadness to themselves so as not to put a shadow on Ethan's big day.

A couple of months after Ethan was born, Traci basically saved my sanity by giving up another week of her life to help us move from Gainesville to Birmingham. She drove one of our cars (with Caleb and our dogs in it) so that I could drive the other car (with 2-month-old Ethan) and Marcus could drive the moving van. And then she spent a full week helping us unload, unpack, and take care of our kids. By the time she left, our house looked like we'd been moved in for months. (I have to admit, I felt very sad and a little guilty that I couldn't do the same for her when she moved houses last summer, with Maddie just a couple of months old. I thought about it, but concluded that, with Caleb and Ethan in tow, there was very little I could do except add to the chaos.) Anyway, from the days (almost ten years ago) that Traci and I were both students at Harding all the way through today, she has consistently been such a blessing to me and my family.