Can I get an epidural for THIS?

Those first cuts to the apron strings. Ouch. They sting.

December 7th:

She drove away in her car. Licensed & insured. Just to school. Then she'll go to work. It's nice to not have to spend an hour picking her up from school and driving her to work and home again and then another 40 minutes this evening; back at 6 to pick her up and home again like I've been doing 2-3 times a week since October......

But I'll miss it too. We had some good talks about boys, school, life, friends. We found a new song on the radio together that made us swoon about love & romance; past (me), present (me, a hopeful her) and future (her, hopefully still me...)

We discussed at length the meaning of the lyrics: did he walk into a cafe and it's love at first sight, he instantly imagines a whole future with her or is it a couple in love meeting at a cafe and he is planning to pop the question if he can get the nerve to walk in but he's nervous because he's not sure she's ready..... and our favorite lines "you wear white and I'll wear out the words I love you and you're beautiful" and "promise me you'll always be happy by my side and I promise to sing to you when the music dies" and how he's asking her to be happy next to him no matter what, in success, in failure, in sickness, when it's hard and they're figuring things out and he's saying he'll be there for her when nobody else is and when life seems bleak. he'll do his best to bring her happiness.... and.....

Because this is what we do... we talk about everything. and we both like it.

December 8th:

we went to the bank to sign her up for a teen checking account. I still have some control over spending but she has a way to deposit her checks and pay for gas easily and start practicing being responsible, writing checks, using a debit card, etc.

December 15th:

Took her shopping at Toys R Us for her brothers. Taught her how to use her debit card. It's so natural to me. I forget how much I take for granted that she understands. She doesn't. She still needs me.

December 21st:

She drove us to the bank. She wanted help learning how to deposit her check. Ooops! We forgot deposit slips and her checking account number so we had to go inside and do it the hard way. She was embarrassed but she survived. Jacob and Mason, however, destroyed a pen and got ink all over themselves trying to pry a quarter out of the candy machines by the door BUT they were quiet while we waited in line and discussed her check depositing strategy.

Next we drove to the gas station to practice getting gas. There are so many things I assume she knows. She had withdrawn cash to pay for the gas so after we figure out which side her gas tank is on and park at the pump and make sure we get the number of the pump we walk inside together. I tell her she needs to give the $$ to the cashier and she looks at me panicky... "you didn't tell me I needed to bring the money in with me!!!" So I stand there and wait for her to run back out and get her $$ and the cashier looks at me funny and asks if she can help me and so I say "oh I'm helping my daughter figure out how to gas up her car for the first time" so when Carly walks in the cashier is grinning at her and telling her how happy she is to be part of her first gas pump experience and teases me about how I should have brought a camera. Carly sends me a little bit of a dagger glare and says "thanks mom" with a sarcastic smile as she does not particularly like this kind of attention. She likes to appear sophisticated and in control at all times, not inexperienced and "LAME" (her words not mine)

December 29th:

My 39th birthday.

I'm growing up too. This is also painful. ouch. I'm not just exactly where I want to be this year. I have some things to change, some things to learn, some things to become.

I want to be someone she can continue to learn from.

She made me some Happy Birthday cupcakes all by herself. "Warm chocolate cupcakes with molten centers" MMMM! you make a chocolate mint ganache and let it chill. Then you whip up your cupcake batter and fill your cupcake pans, placing a heaping teaspoon of the ganache on top so after they bake you end up with a lovely chocolate cupcake with a creamy, minty, chocolaty middle. She kept making little mistakes because she didn't read through the directions fully. ahhh..... she is my daughter! But they turned out all right in the end!

And you know....

I think we will too.

We're growing up.

It's painful. It's exciting. It's inevitable.

Be-boppin' Blitzen

The music teacher shares a trailer with my Academy classroom.

A few weeks ago she came into our half of the trailer and told me that the 2nd Grade was singing a song about Blitzen and she needed a child to dance out in front of the group during parts of the song.

She was thinking about Mason.....

and Did I think he would do it?????

I told her that I was pretty sure she was about to make his wildest dreams come true!

Hope you enjoy my uninhibited little Blitzen Boy.

Observations at Sizzler

Mark had planned to go to the youth activity at the church last night but plans were changed at the last minute so he ended up being unexpectedly free for the evening. With Carly and Rachel running out the door to their Young Women's Christmas party & Jacob off to 11-yr old Scouts we decided to take the little kids out to dinner at Sizzler seeing as we had 2 free Sizzler kid meals.

As usual, it was an adventure.

While in line to place our order, Mark had to do some instructing on proper restaurant etiquette.

"no jumping up and down"

"get up off the floor"

"don't point at other people's dinners"

sheesh! you'd think we never took these children out to dinner. I know it's not very often but really.....

Samantha ordered the children's steak.

Mason considered Pizza but I've tasted the pizza they sometimes put on the salad bar and told him I didn't think their pizza would be very good so he switched to the hamburger, plain- of course. Just the meat and the bun. It was an easy sell once I told him it most likely came with french fries that he could douse in ketchup.

Pretty soon we were seated at the table and the observations began.

Mason:

"This is the best night of my life!!!!"

"I know how they make their lights mom. Do you want to know how they do it mom? They turn on a flashlight and hang it upside down inside of that cover. That's how they do it"

Our drinks came. Mason took a sip of his Sierra Mist.

"ooohh! This is Spriter than normal!!!!"

Our meals came. Mason continued to talk and talk and talk. Mark gave me a desperate "does this kid ever stop talking look" and pointed out sternly that he better start eating, he hadn't even taken a bite of his hamburger. Mason turned his hamburger around so Mark could see the very small single bite taken out of one side of the burger. He shrugged his shoulders and said:

" Sometimes I like to talk more than I want to eat."

Samantha was awfully quiet. Granted she has never been as big a talker as the boy but she usually holds her own pretty good if she thinks she's got a cornered audience. She was REALLY enjoying her steak and fries. MMMM... good! There were a lot of appreciative groans of delight as she chewed and swallowed.

We ended the evening on a high note with a trip to the ice cream bar. Mason and Samantha both chose vanilla- there was some serious discussion weighing the merits of going with the cone or the bowl. Bowls won out. I mean.... where do you pile the toppings if you get a cone ?

They both beamed from the attention and the prestige of doing something utterly fantastic that the older kids were not involved in. They very maturely told me they wouldn't talk about it ALOT at home.

They kept their word. They only talked about it some.....

We got our own jello with whipped cream on it. We got a cookie. I got a steak. I got a hamburger. We both got vanilla ice cream with oreos. Their french fries are really good!

Mason saw the bummed look on Jacob's face and promptly ran to the fridge and pulled out his to-go box, took out his hamburger with the one bite taken out and broke it in half. "You take Half Jacob." Jacob said "No, no, that's ok" Mason insisted. "I want you to have some Jacob. You are my best brother"

Jacob's shrugged and accepted.

He bit, he chewed and swallowed.

"Oh man! It's still warm!"

It was a good night.