July 31

I struggled with the image I'd use for today long before today actually arrived. There was, after all, absolutely no chance that I'd ever come up with anything impressive or meaningful enough to represent what Logan's birthday means to us. So instead of going for greatness, I went with what I know. With what it's all about, in the simplest terms possible.

This is a picture of Logan that hangs in our dining room. It's probably one of my favorite shots of any of my kids. Had I had my wits about me earlier, I would've taken this picture before we'd sliced into the cake and removed the big number 7, but it's okay. It's more than okay, I think, because it shows that life continues on for us. That we still live and eat cake and celebrate his life.

So yeah. Today. The big number seven. The lunch at Red Tractor, the balloon release at the cemetery, the old home videos from happier times, the dinner at Outback just so we could have that special brown bread that Logan talked about so much.

Mmm, they have that brown bread, right? Can I get some of that brown bread? It's pretty good. Yeah, it's pretty good.

Then candles on the cake blown out not by the birthday boy, but by the three other kids who share so many of his traits and qualities. And by Lambie, of course. Lambie, too.

There's really nothing I can say to encapsulate what it's like to celebrate your son's birthday in this kind of fashion.

But I know, in one way or another, that he's been around today. There were Corvettes and songs on the radio and feelings and thoughts that said so.

And then there's this picture that's on the wall that I see every single day and talk to some of those days. There's that too. It's not the same. It'll never ever ever be the same. But we can choose to make it good, even when it the ache is there and the pain still feels fresh. We can choose to have cake and sing happy birthday and remember.

Happy birthday, Logan. We are so thankful for you. And I'm thankful that you make me think so often of God and of Someday when my life will finally feel whole again.