ONE

Yesterday was Isla's first birthday.

The morning paper read...

Johnston, Isla Michaela - In loving memory of our beautiful baby girl, born into Heaven on June 30th, 2009, born onto earth July 1st, 2009.

A year has passed without you,
And we have found hope anew,
But no time will heal our hearts,
From the pain of losing you.

You, our precious child,
Our beautiful baby “Bean”,
With Mommy’s nose and Daddy’s toes,
A beauty never to be seen.

Our love for you is endless,
We miss you more each day,
While others have forgotten,
In our hearts forever you stay.

Loving you and missing you always, Mommy and Daddy xoxo

And we decorated the cemetery with balloons. One for each precious little life ended too soon...




and with donations made in their honour, we will purchase an oxygen monitor for the NICU, which we hope will help save other little ones and spare their parents this unbearable pain.

There were special balloons for the birthday girl of course, and more money donated to research into fetal and maternal health in her name...

Then we rushed back to the lake and joined the party on the beach*...

The sky lit up with fireworks...

and we wrote her name in lights...

A birthday just isn't a birthday without cake, so we did that too and sang a little "Happy Birthday To You"...

Happy First Birthday Bean. We love you and miss you. xoxoxo

*July 1st is Canada Day, our nations birthday and a national holiday. To us it is and always will be "Isla Day" so we like to imagine that people gather to watch fireworks in honour of her.