Happy Birthday GiGi!

I am lucky enough to have two living grandmothers.

Two grandmothers who have been a very active and important part of my life since the day I was born.

Two grandmothers who were there as I celebrated my Bat Mitzvah. As I graduated from high school and then college. As I became engaged, bought my first home, and got married.

And as I became a mom, blessing each of them with their first great-grandchild, the Mad Hatter.

How special that their first grandchild (and a granddaughter at that) give them the title of Great-Grandmother?

To them, yes very special.

To me, even more special.

The Mad Hatter has been an amazing source of love and pride to two great-grandmothers - Mimi (my dad's mom) and GiGi (mom's mom).

They are not just great-grandmothers. They are GREAT great-grandmothers.

And the love she has received could never be measured in words.

I feel so blessed and grateful to have two grandmothers, both in relatively good health and quite active for their ages.

If I did not tell you they were 85 and 83 respectively, you would never believe me, as they are both strong, beautiful, independent women who have taken good care of themselves and lived good lives.

They are a source of pride to me, and I can only hope to age with the same grace, beauty, and wisdom they have both displayed and provided.

To call MH lucky is an understatement.

Not everyone has great-grandparents.

Not everyone has grandparents. In fact, DH never even knew his.

It is very important to me that MH spend as much time with her great-grandmothers as possible. The older I get, the more glaringly apparent it becomes that there is nothing in life you can take for granted, and you need to make every moment count.

Our family is very close. We're not a huge family, but there is no lack of love, caring, or incredible closeness.

Together, we celebrate the good times and share the difficult ones, and I can only hope that our years together as an expanded family have only just really started.

GiGi lives in Florida from October through June, and although she returns to RI a couple of times a year, our visits are limited. With every visit, MH has changed and grown, and become more of a little girl than the baby we so clearly remember joining our family as though it were yesterday.

We look forward to the summertime, when we know we'll get to spend more time together.

GiGi came home last week, and as luck would have it, had a birthday this week. Of course, there is no better reason to get together for a celebratory dinner.



Happy Birthday GiGi! As MH would say (while putting her pretend finger "candle" to her lips to show you how to do it) "Blow out the candles and make a wish!"

Our wish for you is continued good health and many more birthdays celebrated together.

That, and my amazing gift of being able to color coordinate my child to anyone, without even knowing what that anyone (in this case YOU) will be wearing!

We love you!