Happy Birthday, Sweet-Guini!

Steve Stanton Photography 

Guinivere Eden arrived in the wee morning hours, the ones that still feel like night.

I was in some luxurious mountain hotel on a staff retreat and had barely gone to sleep in the room-sized bed when the call came: our first granddaughter would be arriving soon. Breathlessly I re-packed all the things I’d just unpacked. How exciting!

Zooming down the mountain and across the continental divide under a sky-full of stars we went. Down, down, down and straight to the hospital where, in the first light of a sunny, stunningly beautiful day we held her,  her blond hair glistening as it caught the morning rays, grandbebe #3. Third time was most definitely a charm!

I tell Guini now, nine years later, I’d zoom down the mountain and cross great divides for her again. Anytime.

Her Indiana grandparents were on hand to help her celebrate turning 9 last week. Here she is with her older brother and younger sister, enjoying Starbucks.**

Guini is my “flower girl.” She doesn’t like tomatoes. Can you imagine that? MY granddaughter, flesh of my flesh and  she doesn’t like tomatoes! But early on, she zeroed in on flowers. Barely able to talk, we’d roam the yard and she’d stop at each variety and ask, “What’s this?” And I’d tell her and she’d try to repeat it – cutest thing ever.

So when she came for a visit and found some small flowers from the garden center I hadn’t planted yet and grabbed a small table to set up her very own flower shop, well, I knew then, like the Cowsills sang,

I saw her sitting in the rain
Raindrops falling on her
She didn’t seem to care
She sat there and smiled at me

And I knew (I knew, I knew, I knew, I knew)
She could make me happy (happy, happy)
Flowers in her hair, flowers everywhere

I love the flower girl
Oh, I don’t know just why
She simply caught my eye
I love the flower girl she seemed so sweet and kind.
She crept into my mind.

How fitting for a girl whose middle name is “Eden,” a garden God Himself planted. I once made a video for Guini using that song (when she turned 5). See it {HERE}.

She recently worked on this art project in my living room. Guini meticulously watercolored each carefully chosen hue…Every coffee table should be used for something this wonderful.**

She is content in spirit. Her soft smile is authentic – not one given to outrageous enthusiasm nor dramatic meltdowns, she is as sweet as she looks. She’s a little quieter than many of my adorable grands, but oh the rich tales she has to tell.

Her wry sense of humor is so keenly developed, her ornery way of seeing things sharper than the average 9-year-old. She aces her school work without breaking a sweat and is such an incredible big sister to Gemma and a girl who admires and finds her older brother, Gavin, to be the most hilarious friend ever.

She came over in June to help me do a ballerina cake for her little sister. I thought her little arms would tire, but she was all to happy to pipe some shell trim and makes stars. She did the whole thing!

Just recently I’ve become aware that I’m seeing glimpses of a young woman emerge. Giggling with cousins one minute, then having thoughtful conversations with me about what she wants to do with her life next, and a slight turn of her head and did I just see the grown up Guini? Time doesn’t just pass, time flies with the speed of light.

I sure do love you, Guinivere!

So of course I need to pray some blessings on you! These are things I pray for you and words I speak as gifts for you straight from heaven. Long after I am gone, you’ll always have them to come back to. If ever you need to know what your life is about and what is being put together in heaven for your benefit on earth, you can come back to this little altar of remembrance, by faith, and know that these things are yours, in Jesus’s Name! :) Amen? Amen!

“The LORD God planted a garden, eastward, in Eden…” Genesis 2

I just know Isaiah 58:11 in a scripture for you, “The LORD will guide you always, He will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your bones, and you’ll be like a well-watered garden. And like a spring of waters, whose waters just keep flowing” (paraphrased). Absolutely!

I pray your thoughtfulness and gentle spirit will be welcomed and received by good people who see you, really see you (and I hope I will always be one of those).

I pray that the fruitful garden of your life and love and joy will be shared by many and will feed and bless lots of people in this journey called life.  Just like so many of us right now even are!

I bless you with increased creativity and ability to see beauty in the simple and the simple in the complex and I really pray you will have great prosperity (enough for yourself and much to share) in doing something you completely love in life! I hope you do get to have that cupcake business, or raise horses, or have a flower shop. Whatever you want to do, Guini-Poo, I know God can bless it and make it go well for you!

AND I pray that your 4th grade year will be the most fantastic and fun school year of your life. I pray  that  the classroom you’ll spend so much time in will feel good and that the teacher will be fair; that you’ll have at least 5 favorite friends, people who are nice and encouraging and that you can be the same back. I pray that this school year will open your eyes to fascinating things and that there’ll be plenty of celebrations and festivities along the way.

I bless you, my sweet. I bless your heart and smile and your love and your kindness. I bless your awesome sense of humor and every single one of your freckles. I bless you when you come to see your Nonna and when you go home again. I bless you as a granddaughter and a girl who cares about other people. I bless your taste and I bless your style and I don’t ever want you to forget how much you are LOVED! I love you, girlie. And may this Happy-Birthday-blessing go on and on…

{{the Nonna!}}

**photos by her mommy www.maydae.com