October 16th is a day I will both celebrate becoming a mother and silently grieve the wickedness that is growing up. It feels like he crept up on us in the night, this boy that has eclipsed the baby I thought I shared my days with. This boy who won't let me carry him, who puts his underwear on backwards everyday, who requests a knife with his meals to try and fork and knife each bite like a man, who tells me he IS a man when standing on his tip toes, who I knew had one foot out the door the minute we laid eyes on him.

(*This was just a family walk one morning...none of these images are staged, I came to capture the fog, he came to rock.)

A few weeks ago on the eve before Henry's third birthday, I sat going through my photos on Instagram, and I felt full of love for him, the life he has given to us, and the people he is turning us into. I have been following our family's journey on Instagram pretty much since I became pregnant with him and it reads like our not-so-private little life journal. In it, I see so much I take for granted, so much free, out of thin air, joy we get each day because he is ours. His confidence, strength and will are ever present in everything he does, and serve him well in getting what he wants, and not to so much in giving his mother's poor heart a rest. But perhaps more persistent than all the steam that propels him forward, is his giggling joy that seems to pull people into orbit about him. I pray both of these sides to our boy only grow as he does, and that in the middle of all his go-go-going he remembers to stop and appriciate where he is once in awhile. I will--watching with hands clutched to my chest, and orbiting proudly. Isn't that what we do as parents? With our tools in place, we orbit them...always.

Happy third birthday Henry Porter. The world is yours son.