My son turned 1.
I knew his first birthday would make me sentimental. I expected a few tears, maybe a dramatic stare out the window, maybe a moment where I looked at him and wondered how time had the absolute nerve to keep moving.
What I did not expect was for the whole week to feel like my heart had been cracked wide open and filled with every version of him we have loved so far.
The baby we prayed for. The baby we were not sure we would ever have. The baby we brought home, tiny and new, while looking at each other like, “Are they really just going to let us leave with him?”
And now, somehow, the little boy who turned 1.
One whole year. A full trip around the sun. Three hundred sixty-five days of loving him, learning him, rocking him, feeding him, laughing at him, worrying over him, clapping for him, kissing his little cheeks and wondering how one small person could possibly take up so much space in our lives.
And our bed. And our laundry. And our camera rolls. For his actual birthday, we kept things quiet. Just my husband, me and our little boy. We took him to the mall to people watch. Some babies want toys. Mine wants to sit back like a tiny retired man and observe the general public.
Afterward, we met my mom for dinner. It was quiet and intimate and simple in the sweetest way. Just a small table full of love, watching him eat and smile and babble and be celebrated.
He did not know it was his birthday. He did not know why I kept looking at him too long. He did not know I was watching him and seeing every day that came before.
I saw the newborn days. I saw the sleepless nights. I saw the first time I held him and felt my whole life rearrange itself around his tiny body.
Now he is 1, and he is still everything. Just louder. Wigglier. Faster. Stickier.
He has favorite books, favorite games, favorite people and favorite ways to make adults behave like fools for his entertainment.
Then came his party. The big one. The loud, busy, full-house, cake-and-wrappingpaper, somebody-find-the-wet-wipes kind of celebration.
As much as I loved our quiet little birthday dinner, there was something about that party that I will carry with me for the rest of my life.
All his favorite people were under one roof. The people who loved him before they ever held him. The people who showed up for us when we were brand-new parents running on fumes. The people who have rocked him, snuggled him, played with him, cheered for his milestones and loved him like loving him was the easiest thing in the world. Because it is.
He looked around that room, and I watched it happen.
Sitting in his high chair eating his potato salad, there was this little spark of recognition, like he suddenly realized everyone around him was someone he knew. Someone safe. Someone familiar. Someone who belonged to him in that sweet, baby way.
His whole face lit up. And I nearly came undone, because how do you describe what it feels like to see your child realize he is loved?
Not just by you. Not just by the people who live in his house. But by a whole room full of people who would cheer for him, hold him, protect him, pray for him, comfort him and celebrate him just because he exists.
There he was, right in the middle of all that love, getting passed from arms to arms, snuggling into shoulders, smiling at familiar faces, soaking up affection like sunshine.
Before I ever even knew his name, before I knew his face, before I knew what his laugh would sound like, this is what I wanted. I wanted him to be loved like this.
I wanted him to have people. I wanted him to have a village. I wanted him to grow up in rooms where his arrival made faces brighten. I wanted him to know, deep in his bones, that he belongs.
And on his first birthday, I got to watch that happen. I got to watch him be loved.
There is no gift bigger than that. The toys were wonderful. The party was sweet. The cake was messy. The decorations were cute. The photos are priceless. The aftermath looked like a small birthday-themed tornado had touched down.
But the real gift was the room. The people in it. The way they looked at him. The way he looked back.
It feels impossible that a year has passed. One minute they fit in the crook of your arm, and the next they are crawling away with a stolen remote, looking back only to make sure you saw the crime.
I know there are more years coming. More birthdays. More cakes. More candles. More milestones I am not emotionally prepared for.
There will be years when he picks his own birthday theme. There will be years when he runs through the house with friends, years when he blows out his own candles, years when he is too big to be carried but I try anyway. There will be years when he rolls his eyes because I am crying.
His first birthday was not just the celebration of one year of his life.
It was the celebration of the year we became his parents. The year our house changed. The year our hearts changed. The year prayers turned into a person with frosting on his face and people to charm at the mall.
One year down. A lifetime to go. Be kind to your neighbors, Be kind to your pets, And happy birthday Jamison, Mama loves you!