15.

From us still here to you in heaven, happy 15th birthday, dear Kyrie!! What your family and friends would give to see you at this age!

This year, I see close friends who have daughters beginning their high school experiences, and can only wonder what it would be like for you. What you'd choose for your first-day-of-school outfit, how you might help your little sister with her hair, what your favorite subject might be. Time is a blurry, tricky thing, especially on birthdays. Grateful for every second while simultaneously wanting more. Gifts arrive and gifts grow and then gifts go. Sometimes it feels very far from when your were earthside, and at other times I am reminded that heaven really isn't as far as we think it is. 

15. There's a line in that song that says "there's still time for you." Our humanity can only fathom finite time, what's here and now vs. what is not, it seems. But I love how God works in the unseen, how He flips things around in the most beautiful ways. For you, there is time--for all time. 

Every year, I roll in the deep end of memory with your birthday post. The birthday wish every single year is that you would be right beside your parents and siblings for these milestones, traditions and rites of passage. It still feels very unfair, and I still can't change it. But you are still so loved. Loved for the time you had, for the gifts you gave and for being a reason to live with an eye on eternity.

Happy birthday, sweet girl! We love you from here to heaven!