Celebrating: Maya is a Teenager!

We are celebrating my niece's 13th birthday today! 

Her birth was the first I witnessed. Before I had even heard of the word "doula", let alone become one. What a long birth it was, too, only one birth in my doula career matched it! We set up shop at the hospital and it was a place of celebration. The whole family filled the waiting room, friends too. My mother-in-law brought us a picnic for the birthing room. I still cannot listen to this song without getting choked up. We listened to it all throughout that birth. (re: the link...I love that she is singing it at the Grammy's a few days before Maya's birth!)

 My sister's pregnancy was not planned, and was...hmmm...controversial in my family, shall we say? But this babe was meant to be with us. We all raised this girl in her early years. She taught me how to be a Mama before I became one. She taught my sister a whole lot too. Dare I say she changed the course of her life. 

Now Maya is an amazing big sister,  giving Brynn all the love and attention and care that we lavished on her all those years ago. She's such a great kid. I cannot believe she is a Teenager!!

at the Folk Fest with us this past summer...

I made her a cheesecake. The mother of all cheesecakes, by way of The Barefoot Contessa. That woman knows her way around a dessert! 2 1/2 pounds of cream cheese, a boatload of organic sugar and eggs,  and frozen raspberries from our garden. And love, of course. She deserves it.

We love you, Maya Papaya!

xoxoxoxo