You need to make hay while the sun shines.

I still remember the magic of the American Girl store in Chicago like it was yesterday. My mom, grandma, sister, and I made the trip together, and in my little-girl eyes, that place was nothing short of a dream. Towering displays, endless dolls, matching outfits, it was like stepping into a storybook. But what really stuck with me wasn’t the shopping. It was teatime. We sat down with our dolls for a dainty little tea service, complete with tiny sandwiches, sweet treats, and fancy pink lemonade. I felt so grown-up and so full of joy, like the whole day had been made just for us.

Looking back now, it’s wild how something so simple became so significant. That day didn’t have fireworks or anything flashy, it just had love. The kind of love that shows up in the details: in the way my grandma smiled, the way my mom let us linger in the doll salon, the way we all laughed over how “ladylike” we were trying to be. It was one of those golden moments you don’t realize is golden until you’re much older, flipping through the memory like a faded postcard from a perfect day.

As my mom would always say, “You need to make hay while the sun shines.” I didn’t understand it then, but now I get it. That day was sunshine, and we made the most of every second. Life doesn’t pause for us to notice when it’s giving us something beautiful, so when it does, we soak it in, we sip the tea, we smile with our people, and we make the hay.