No More Babies

Today is bittersweet for me. It marks the day that I officially have no more "children." My youngest girl becomes a legal adult today as she turns 18 at 8:16 this morning. I cannot believe that 18 years have passed since I traveled to Henrico Doctors Hospital very early on a snowy Thursday morning for a planned C-section due to the fact that the delivery of her older sister 3 1/2 years prior had not been an easy one. She received one arrangement of yellow roses and a balloon and almost no visitors as  the blizzard of 1996 had hit. The yellow roses came from my sweet Daddy. In fact the name on the floral card decided how we would spell her name. Her name is Georgia, but we call her Georgi. Most people spell it with an "e" on the end, but as the story goes, when the clerk at the florist asked my father how to spell her name, he didn't know. She suggested that leaving off the "e" had a lot of personality and flair, and that is the way it has always been. It could not suit her more perfectly. She has tons of personality and fabulous flair. She is talented and entertaining, and she keeps all of us in stitches with all of her different characters and voices. I often think how much my father would love her humor, and I can hear him laughing and see his smile.
She is a true beauty inside and out! I look at her in awe, and sometimes cannot believe that I created her. She has dealt with adversity all of her life as we became a single parent household when her father left us just after she turned 2. She has never known anything but financial struggle, but you would never know it. She is giving and kind and compassionate, and she has never used the adversity as an excuse to behave badly or whine or fail. She has taught me more than I could ever have imagined, and I treasure her insight and her unique view of the world. She has opened my eyes to things that I never would have seen. I often say that we are the same person, and in many ways we are, but at 18, she is already a better person than I would have ever dreamed of becoming when I was her age.
People say you fall in love with a child as soon as they are placed in your arms. I don't know if it was that way for me, but every day has been an adventure. We have had our ups and downs, mostly ups, but my love grows deeper and deeper as the years pass, and I didn't think it would be possible for my love to be any bigger, but it just keeps evolving as we walk our journey together as Mother and daughter and more importantly best friends. My sweet, sweet, girl, I cannot wait to see how you tackle the world! But always know that I will be right here by your side not to hover but to be here if you need me. Happy, happy birthday! I am so blessed to have you in my life! All my love to you today and always!