_ As we end 2011 and begin a new year I look back to our special family celebration taking place on Erin’s Angel Day, April 25, 2011.  We were fortunate to have all our immediately family together in St. Louis for Easter.  We flew from Austin and Kevin and Catherine came from California.  We gathered at Megan, Jeremy, and Colin’s home in Rock Hill to celebrate this important Holy Day.  But it was especially important this year because it occurred just the day before Erin’s Angel Day! 

To honor and remember her, we bought pink and white balloons on Monday to release at Tilles Park near Megan’s home.  We gathered in the late morning with our balloons and each of us shared a personal memory of Erin, wrote a message to her on our balloons (even 20 month old Colin!), and then released them carrying our messages to her on that rainy day.  It was an especially meaningful day to us and the photo we took is shared with you on this website.  It is not often we are all together at the same time and place but Erin brought us together that day!

We love you Erin and think of you every single day!  You are our daughter, our sister, our Aunt, our friend, our hero, and we love you more today than ever!

    On May 14 Tim and I were blessed to be invited to the 4th presentation of the Erin Crowley Scholarship given away each year now to a Central Texas senior who is on the way to college.  The Ronald McDonald House Charities with the Central Texas Co-op of McDonald’s Restaurant Owners fund and sponsor this new scholarship initiated in 2008 in honor of Erin who was a recipient of one of their 25 Scholar Awards in 2007, the year she passed away.  The organization was so impressed with her story and life that they created this special $4,000 scholarship in her memory.  Each year since 2008, the inaugural year, we are invited to the award dinner to present the scholarship. 

          This year Erin Green (can you believe it!) was awarded the scholarship.  It was an amazing coincidence that she has the same name as Erin.  All applicants receive numbers for the reviewing process.  It gave me goose bumps to know her name was Erin.  She is such a sweet girl; a senior from Bowie high school in Austin and she wants to be a teacher.  She will attend UT Austin in the fall.

          Tim and I were honored to be there.  We were invited to speak briefly and used the opportunity to impress upon the young people there that whatever they strive for in life that they should always remember the importance of family.  Their lives will influence and touch many so they should also live with that in mind.  Every day will provide an opportunity for them to make an impression with all whom they come in contact; often in ways they will never know.  These lessons we have learned through Erin and how she did just that during her short life and illness.

          We stayed afterwards at the bar outside at the Hyatt and had a drink in Erin’s honor and enjoyed recalling family stories and gazing at the beautiful skyline as the sun set.  We both felt Erin was there with us once again.

          Love to all!
            -Debbie
P.S.  Erin’s Bird of Paradise is still living and making new leaves!!  I am thrilled!!

Dear Friends and Family,
We hope this Easter season was joyful for you and yours. It is unfathomable that Erin left us four years ago as she graduated high school. We wish we could be celebrating her college graduation as well, but God had other plans for her.

Through your generosity we have kept her spirit alive by supporting Ronald McDonald House, Dell Children’s Hospital and St. Michael’s Academy. All of these were so meaningful to her in her short time with us and we are honored to continue the work she started. We sincerely appreciate your past contributions and ask for your continued support.

In closing, please know we continue to keep you in our thoughts and prayers. The support and compassion shown since Erin passed away sustains and comforts our family. As we journey through our daily lives we always remember a verse she lived by every day:

‘Be kinder than necessary, for everyone you meet
is fighting some kind of battle’

May God bless you and yours always...
Tim and Debbie Crowley
---------------------------
(From the Austin American Statesman on April 24, 2011)
In Memory of Erin Elizabeth Crowley
September 13, 1988 - April 25, 2007

"TO HONOR YOU"
To honor you, I get up every day and take a breath,
And start another day without you in it.

To honor you, I laugh and love with those who knew your smile
And the way your eyes twinkled with mischief and secret knowledge.

To honor you, I take the time to appreciate everyone I love.
I know now there is no guarantee of days or hours spent in their presence.

To honor you, I listen to music you would have liked
And sing at the top of my lungs, with the windows rolled down.

To honor you, I take chances, say what I feel, hold nothing back,
Risk making a fool of myself, dance every dance.

You were my light, my heart, my gift of love from the very highest source.
So every day, I vow to make a difference, share a smile, live, laugh and love.
Now I live for us both, so all I do, I do to honor you.

By: Connie F. Kiefer Byrd
In loving memory of  Jordan Alexander Kiefer ( 8/24/88-12/13/05)

We want to share a small miracle story with you that we have enjoyed the last two years:

When I was pregnant with Erin in July of 1988 (she was born on September 13, 1988) Tim and I went to a convention in Hawaii.  I wanted to bring back something lasting as a souvenir so I chose a small pre-packaged flower bulb of a Bird of Paradise to plant when I got home.  Erin was born 2 months later and over time I began to refer to the plant as Erin’s plant.  Megan and Kevin also had their own different plants given on or around the years they were born. Their plants eventually died after many years.  But Erin’s Bird of Paradise thrived.  The only problem is that it NEVER bloomed despite the fact that it grew larger each year.

But on September 16, 2009, three days after what would have been Erin’s 21st birthday and after 21 years of dormancy, it bloomed for the first time! There were four beautiful orange flowers.  Of course we feel Erin’s (and God’s) hand in this.  What a gift we were given.  The blooms lasted well into the winter until the first freeze.

Thinking this may have been only a once in a lifetime occurrence, I didn’t hold out much hope of another fall blooming.  But Erin had other plans.  In September of 2010, a year later, it bloomed again and this time added an additionally bloom – five this time!  We enjoyed them so much and took so many pictures.  We have posted some of the photos at this site.

Who would have imagined the significance of returning from Hawaii 21 years ago with a Bird of Paradise and what that would come to mean to our family today!  We truly do have a Bird of Paradise in Erin!

The winter of 2010-2011 was harsher than usual with many freezing nights.  We covered and uncovered the flower many nights but it sustained considerable damage from the cold.  This spring I split the plant and repotted it.  We don’t know what will happen this fall, but we hope and pray that this special outward sign of our sweet Bird in Paradise, Erin, will bloom again one day!