Oh, my McKenna.  I don’t even know where to start with her sometimes.  She’s so frustrating and I know it’s just going to get worse as she gets older.  I thought I had a few more “attitude free” years but NOPE!  I ask her to do something and she huffs and puffs and slams her door.  She throws herself on the floor in a fit of crying and screaming.  I constantly hear “ughs”, “humpfs”, and “uuughs” out of her and it’s not getting better.

But, aside from the McKenna that makes me want to pull out my hair and run screaming into the street, there’s the sweet Kenna that I don’t want to see grow up.   She can tell the most wonderful stories, tell the most awfully unfunny jokes (but you gotta laugh!) and give some of the best hugs I’ve ever been lucky enough to receive.

She always used to ask me when she would become a big sister.  When she was old enough I finally told her that she was a big sister already.  I remember her looking at me like I had grown a 2nd head, she didn’t understand.  I told her the story of Jackson, told her that Momma was pregnant before but her baby brother was in heaven along with her big sister.  Somehow, in her 5-year-old mind, she understood.  She hugged me as I cried telling ther the story.  She’s even seen her baby brother’s picture.  I won’t let her see Avery’s picture yet.  Avery had been gone longer than Jackson, so she looked “dead”.  I don’t want her to see that and feel that pain; not yet, not ever.  But Jackson looked asleep and she asked to see him, so I said ok.  She handled it very well.  I told her that he looked just like her, just like Avery did too, and now just like Jaylon.  She smiled and handed back the picture and wiped a tear from my cheek.

She’s always been the “motherly” type.  That became even more apparent when Jaylon was born.  She wanted to hold him, feed him, change him, get him dressed and even bathe him.  She even changed his diaper when he was a few weeks old!  I didn’t realize it until she exclaimed how proud she was, and honestly she did damn good!

Jaylon loves it when his Big Sister comes into the room.  He smiles and jumps or giggles or just makes happy baby sounds.  It melts my heart because I know how much she wanted to be a Big Sister to a baby on earth.

I say all the time how much Jay has completed our family; that he is what we needed.  But honestly, I think he completed McKenna more than we’ll ever know!