Four girls.
I could never have imagined the number of comments that four little girls could spur from the mouths of total strangers.
While I always try my best to hang onto life’s grace toward others, especially with unwelcome words flying my way, my heart wants to scream back, “Well, I feel sorry that you won’t have the chance to get to know them. Because these girls? They are destined to be world-changers. And I’m sure you’ll see them in the spotlight one day.”
But most of the time, I simply hold my tongue and smile. Responding with what good, little girls they are, with huge hearts. Because in my soul I know, my husband has things under control.
You see, if you scroll back over a dozen years, sitting at our late-June wedding reception, you could have been witness to our best man’s speech. Thanking us for our unconditional friendship. And wishing us all the luck in the world with growing our very own basketball team. A boys’ basketball team, that is.
Boys.
Boy, did we think we knew best.
We agreed upon five.
Enough for our own team.
But in the words of my husband, now an expert in all things girls, he will be the first to tell you that God works in some of the most mysterious ways imaginable. And wow, did He teach us a beautiful life lesson. In the form of four game-changing girls.
We found out we were pregnant with our first babe after a year of trying. The best Christmas Eve gift ever . . . a positive pregnancy test. We yearned for happy-and-healthy, not focusing on gender. Fast forward four months to our mid-pregnancy ultrasound, and lo and behold: girl number one. I will never forget our car ride home that afternoon. Complete silence. Hands held. But my husband didn’t speak a word. When I finally asked him if he was OK, his response? “I am fine. I just have absolutely no idea what to do with a girl.”
But he learned. My goodness, did he learn. Quickly. And in the six years that followed—you guessed it, three more girls. Each ultrasound? Instead of silence, the room was filled with smiles, jokes and lots of laughs. There was no denying God’s plans were so much different than our own.
God had given us four incredible gifts.
A motherly, artistic perfectionist.
A bold, brave creator with the world at her heels.
A bouncing cheerleader, whose smile the world would be sure to know.
And a quiet cuddle-bug…who is leaps-and-bounds ahead of her sisters at her age.
And my husband?
He fell into the role of having four “Daddy’s girls” with breathtaking grace and ease that shocked even me, after 15 years of being together. He had a mission, and that mission was to show these girls they can do anything in the world—and to show the world that these girls can do anything.
And wow, has he blown this goal out of the water.
He is, perhaps, the greatest teacher they will ever have in life.
Who will challenge your girl comments any minute of the day.
These girls have absolutely absorbed the world through their daddy.
Creating a “how-to” list that has earned an endless reputation:
- How to use power tools
- How to outdo her sisters in number of pull-ups from a rafter
- How to chip a golf ball
- How to dive from the diving board, fearlessly
- How to plant and tend to a garden
- How to drive a golf cart
- How to climb the front-yard oak
- How to master the art of lake-tubing
- How to throw a football
- How to catch a toad
- How to repair drywall
- How to make Saturday-morning blueberry pancakes
- How to can pickles, banana peppers, and jalapenos
- How to spot weeds versus flowers
- How to find the perfect s’more stick
- How to shoot a bb gun
- How to avoid poison ivy while playing hide-n-seek in the pine trees
- How to build a bridge out of wood scraps on the rainiest of days
You name it, he will take the time to teach them.
Sweet friends, please do yourself and others a favor. Next time you see a family of all or mostly girls, keep your comments to yourself. Instead, simply smile. Perhaps offer a compliment in place of a joke, knowing that most likely, they have things completely under control, respectfully passing on any stranger’s advice and raising their very own family of girl game-changers . . . who are already preparing to tackle the world with their fierce, brave, smart, bold, and kindhearted ways.
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