Fingerprints of an Angel: Sunday Snippet- A Catholic Carnival

This morning I woke up and took a look around at what needed to get done around the house. There seems to be thousands of things I could do all day long, but today I decided to tackle the fingerprints. Any mom understands what I am talking about. Just go to a house where little kids reside and you will see their loving marks all over everything from the walls to the kitchen appliances. As I began scrubbing down the different surfaces my mind began to wander. I try to say prayers for different people as I do house work, and it seemed fitting to pray for my children while I was cleaning their love marks.


It wasn’t too long ago that I wondered if I’d ever have fingerprints to clean up. I suffered a miscarriage on January 3, 2008. I cannot even begin to explain how horrendous it was. It was my first pregnancy so I went from being surprised to be pregnant and super excited to thinking about what the future holds with my new baby to having it all shatter in one simple moment. It was a pretty miserable few months of recovery.


Today as I washed fingerprints away I began thinking about my sweet baby Emily. Eliza calls Emily her guardian angel, and in a way I think Emily is my guardian angel as well. Whenever I begin thinking about all this “work” my kids have made for me it takes just a simple thought about Emily to remind me how blessed I really am. I don’t think I’d be the mother I am today if it wasn’t for Emily.


There’s that old saying “everything happens for a reason”. I got that one A LOT after I lost Emily. I wanted to punch every person that said it to me--even though I know they meant well. I don’t like that saying to this day. There is no reason that a mother should ever lose a child. I think the saying should be “awful things happen to a lot of people, try to learn from those things and make the world a better place from those lessons.”


There are a lot of lessons that I learned from losing Emily, I could write pages and pages about those lessons. Emily continues to teach me to this day. I would love to wash Emily’s fingerprints off of my walls and kitchen appliances. Instead I get her angel fingerprints on my heart and it’s my job to live the lesson of losing her to make this world a better place.


The next time you get angry at your children or upset that they made another mess for you to clean up--stop and count your blessings. They might just have an angel whispering in their ear.


Emily Marie Graefnitz was celebrated each and every day she lived. Help me celebrate her life by giving your kids some extra love today.