Jacob's due date...again

This is our third year of Jacob's due date without him in our arms. It does get easier every year, but it is never easy. I wish that I spent every September and October thinking about and planning Jacob's birthday parties. Instead I have felt a heaviness now and then since October hit and didn't realize at first why. Then I did. Emily brings me so much joy and happiness, just so much. But he is still missing. I still think of him every day, really every hour.

About a week and a half ago, Ted saw some pictures of a boy on Facebook, the godson of one of his high school friends. One picture was taken at his christening and the others at his 1st birthday party and he looks so much like Emily. Someone at work looked at them and had to confirm that he wasn't, in fact, her. Ted thought of Jacob right away and wondered if that is how he would look. He came home and showed the pictures to me, worried about making me sad. They did make me sad, and still do, but I like to have an idea. Of course, Jacob might have looked nothing like this boy, but he may also have looked a lot like him.

Emily making the same face as the boy in the picture below. 

Last Tuesday, I was in line at the dollar store. Emily was in the stroller. I was holding my wallet and glanced down and saw Jacob's ultrasound picture, that I have carried in my wallet since shortly after he died. I was just mesmerized by it. He looked so old in it, so mature, even though I had that ultrasound when I was 19 weeks pregnant. I kept looking from the ultrasound picture to Emily, looking for similarities, I could barely tear my eyes away from it, but then the sadness started to get overwhelming so I forced myself too.

Emily and I went to church today and went to the garden before and after church. I dressed her in her Little Sister onesie. I didn't get overly emotional, just told him how much we love and miss him and couldn't believe that I was standing there holding my baby, finally, as I spoke to my other one. 

There are just a few flowers left in the garden. These ones caught my eye as there were 5 of them, one for each baby we have had to say goodbye to. There was a 6th that hadn't fully bloomed yet. I can read into that so much. The babies we've lost were here for as long as they were meant to be. Emily hasn't been here for her allotted time yet. I hope that time doesn't come until she is an old lady, telling stories to her grandkids about their great-grandmother. 

The flower in the back is part of another grouping. 

It has been 2 years today since I found out I was pregnant with Cub, not knowing, of course, that I would miscarry a month and a half later. 

October 14th is a very bittersweet day.