...As soon as Lily told me who her school principal was, I ran upstairs to get Sarah. I truly believe connections like this happen for a reason. After I asked Sarah to come downstairs to meet a new customer, I went back down to talk to Lily. For some reason, I felt like I needed to prepare her a little. She is afterall, only seven years old. I got down on my knees so I was at her eye level and told her that my daughter had Down syndrome. I asked her if she knew what that was. She did not, so I simply told her that it sometimes takes Sarah a little longer to understand things. "OK,"she replied. Within seconds, Sarah walked into the store. Lily simply put her hand out to shake Sarah's and said, "Hi, my name is Lily." My heart swelled. That's Sarah's line. How did Lily know that? Sarah, replied, "Hi, my name is Sarah."

When Sarah was able to get to school, even for just a few hours a day, Mrs. B. would make sure she was fully included in whatever the class was doing. Then when Sarah's doctor decided to try giving Sarah monthly infusions of IvIg, Mrs. B suggested that we take pictures to help the class understand what she was going through. We blogged about that HERE. Without a doubt, Mrs. B shaped the positive relationship that Sarah had with her classmates from that point on. Sadly, we lost track of Mrs. B because another school district several communities south, hired her as a principal.
That is, until Lily came into our store. Before Lily and her grandma left the store I quickly wrote a little note to Mrs. B. I included a copy of the article that appeared in the paper about the store opening. I asked Lily to deliver the note to her principal.
This weekend we had a comment left on the store's website: Dear Joyce and Sarah, Thanks for the great note. I was so happy to hear of your new venture. Sarah you are still beautiful. I read your blog...I will stop and visit your new house of fabric soon. Mrs. B.
Tears of joy here. Truly By Design. Thank you Lily for being our connector. And thank you Edna for bringing your precious granddaughter to meet us. We hope to see you again soon.