Before this year ends and Rosh Hashanah begins next week, I want to thank G-d for the most precious gift my family received this year: my niece Leyla.

We also received first my niece Emme and various new first cousins. All healthy. And I have a little brother or sister on the way shortly.

But Leyla almost didn’t make it. She had a traumatic birth. When Leyla was born, she wasn’t able to breathe.

Our first photos of her will forever be marked by breathing tubes and the NICU. But she survived. Born at a little over 5 pounds, less than two months later, she is nearly 10 pounds. She is happy, healthy, beautiful and “spirited” or okay, bossy for a baby. Bossiness runs in the family. Ask my husband.

Thank you G-d. Thank you to all the people who donated to a little girl they didn’t know just because I asked. Thank you.

I don’t think that any of my sisters and I imagined that there would be a generation after us, because we’d have to survive for it to happen. And there were so many times during our childhood where we could have, should have, given up but we got back up again and again and again. So thank you G-d for Leyla and Emme who remind us that we survived.

And here are my beautiful nieces:

Hola from Leyla!

Hola from Emme!