Sacrifice and Grace

I mess up... a lot. I'm a human like everyone else and I'm far from perfect. Some days I can barely hold things together. In moments of frustration and failure, I look at my baby girl, smiling at me or sleeping peacefully and I see true perfection. She doesn't know right or wrong. She doesn't remember yesterday or have any concept of tomorrow. She is here now and she is simply and beautifully perfect. And I see grace - floods of grace, overwhelming me, more than I can comprehend. This gorgeous creation, this small miracle is mine to hold.
I do not deserve her. Some days I feel like I'm doing so much. I'm getting up early to feed her, changing her diaper twice in a row since she won't stop pooping, doing load after load of laundry. But none of these things could ever earn the responsibility I have to care for her. Nothing I do can possibly merit the picture of perfection sleeping peacefully in her swing as I write. What overwhelms me the most is that God trusted me with her. I have screwed up so many times, yet instead of having responsibilities taken away, I am given this amazing girl. She is innocent and untainted by the world and I'm supposed to raise her? How do I do that? How can I be trusted with that?
It is only grace. Grace each morning when she cracks a wide smile as I pick her up out of her crib, and grace every time she falls asleep in my arms. Grace allows me to comfort her with just a touch and it is grace that gives me each precious day with my baby. I have no other explanation - only grace, and it's a beautiful thing.