Happy Birthday Thea!

After over three-and-a-half years of infertility problems we really believed that Ezra was going to be our only child. And we were totally okay with this and overjoyed that we would even be parents of one child. Little did we know, however, that immediately after Ezra was weened that Gayle would be pregnant yet again. And this time it was going to be a girl!

We were in living in Louisville, Kentucky at the time and I was a full-time college student working two jobs. It would be an amazing understatement to say that things were a bit tight during that period of our lives. It was a time where we were having to trust God for everything. And now we were going to have to learn to trust Him as a family of four.

While we had Ezra's name picked out years in advance, we really struggled to come up with a girl's name. I really liked Lilly and fought pretty hard for it; Gayle liked Lydia and held fast to it. But neither of us liked the other's name they had picked out. There were two names that we were both kind of neutral toward: Anna and Thea. We had a friend in college that was named Thea and we always thought that it was a pretty and unique name.

So one afternoon, as we were at our usual name-picking stalemate, I wrote down the four names that we were considering on small pieces of paper and put them into a hat. Gayle and I then agreed that we would draw out a name and we would stick to it; that would be the name for our soon-to-be-born baby girl. She agreed, reached in the hat, and pulled out the name Thea. And so when we are asked where we got her name we can truly say that we pulled it out of a hat!  

I remember the moment that I saw Thea for the first time in the delivery room. And I remember how my heart felt when I saw her. I was now the father of a daughter; a beautiful little girl. When she came home from the hospital a few days later she had jaundice and had to spend all her time in what we called her little tanning bed with a blindfold on. And she was perfect! We would sit and watch her sleep in her little brightly lit contraption and we loved her.

Thea has not always had it easy with some of the things that God has brought her way. And she is, for good and for ill, a lot like her father. But she has always had a way of capturing my heart. Among the many other nicknames I have for her I often call her "Theadorable" because I tell her that her father adores her.

Happy birthday Thea. Know that your Father's plans are even grander and richer than the plans I have for you. And as much as I love and adore you, my love will always pale in comparison to His abounding and abundant love for you!