He's in the Double-Digits Now!

My little bean was born three weeks early after a HEINOUS pregnancy that was came to be truly through the grace of God (and spiritual healing after 7 years of infertility!). He was born on Frank's birthday. Michael was such a different child than Nick and add that to the fact that there are 8 years between the two and it was like being a parent for the first time all over again!

Michael is my snuggler. Every morning when he gets up for school, he climbs in to bed with me for 15 minutes of "snuggle time" while we watch the morning news. He picks flowers for me. He still likes to hold my hand. He has this mop of curly hair that after 10 years, I still can't figure out what to do with!

Michael was born here in NC and so most of our family has only seen him a handful of times. But that doesn't phase him. While not as outgoing as Nick, Michael still loves to be with everyone and if you've got the patience, he can tell you all kinds of things that he's learned on the History Channel or the Discovery Channel. On our last visit with my grandmother, Michael told her about his coin collection and she gave him a container FILLED with pennies. You would have thought that he'd won the lottery.

He's athletically gifted although we haven't found any one sport that he is particularly interested in yet so we're waiting before signing him up for anything. He is my blue-eyed boy. My tiny bean. He is my miracle from God - literally. I prayed so long for him and I can't imagine our lives without him. As I sit here typing this, he is sitting in his room with his best friend playing the Xbox and just laughing his head off. He has the greatest laugh! When he was three, I once asked him why he was so cute. His response? Because God made me that way.

He certainly did. Happy Tenth Birthday, my little boy!

Oh, and just so that he's not left out...I didn't think he'd want to be acknowledged in the title with his age, but look who's 46! Two of my three favorite guys in the whole wide world and they share a birthday. How cool is that? I am a very blessed woman. I have had the privilege of having this wonderful man love me for more than twenty years!! Not many people can say that! Life is a roller coaster (have you seen the movie "Parenthood"?) and there is no one else in the world that I would rather ride it with than Frank. I love you, baby! You are my world and I thank God every day for you and for the unconditional love that you have given me. You are my greatest gift. Happy Birthday!

He's 18!!!

He makes me crazy like nobody's business, but he's all mine and he's 18 today!! I can still remember the first day that we brought him home from the hospital. Frank worked a 3-11 shift and my sister had been with me all day. When she went home that night (sometime around 8:00), Nick was sleeping in his cradle that we kept in the corner of the living room. I remember walking in to that room and glancing at the cradle and having a complete panic attack. I was like "Oh, my God...I'm never going to be alone for the next 18 years!"

And now that that 18 years is here is seems to have gone by in a flash. Where did my little boy go? Where is the child who used to sing to me in the car go? I remember so much of those things that he did for the first time and remember the wonder that I felt because he was my first. I remember naming him Nicholas and being sure that that was the name he would always go by. Nick was just too manly and mature. Then he was Nicky and we have arrived at Nick. Why are all of those sweet moments gone to be replaced by arguments and angst?

But I'm not going to dwell on that today. Instead I am going to focus on the man that he has grown in to. It has not been an easy road. We've frustrated each other and honestly, he is the only person alive that can make me yell in a voice that only the neighborhood dogs can hear. But he also has the ability to make me smile and laugh when I do not want to. I love just hanging out - just the two of us - because we can have the greatest conversations and laugh until we cry. He has an amazing personality and when he smiles you can't help but smile with him. He is quite truly an amazing young man.

I often feel bad that he doesn't have the pleasure of being surrounded by the type of family that I grew up with - I had AMAZING grandparents. But he takes it all in stride. He had a special bond with his great-grandmother and I know that she is looking down on him this day with pride. She loved him so much. I want him to know this day that he is loved - I know he doesn't believe it most of the time, but it is true. Everything that we do, every time we correct you, every time that we don't give you your own way, we are doing it for a reason - not just to be mean.

Happy 18th birthday, my son. I love you.

I Don't LIke Getting Older...

Okay, so I'm 41 today. It's not as fun or as magical as last year's birthday hooplah. I just feel older. Sigh. Remember when you were a kid and birthday's were a HUGE deal? That's what I want. I want to just play and be silly and have people around me doing the same thing. I don't think it's going to happen. So in honor of it being my birthday and wanting to be a kid again, I hereby quit being an adult and I thank you, Beeg, for sharing this one with me!

To Whom It May Concern:
I hereby officially tender my resignation as an adult.
I have decided I would like to accept the responsibilities of a 6 year old again.
I want to go to McDonald's and think it's a four star restaurant.
I want to think M & M's are better than money, because you can eat them.

I want to sail sticks across a fresh mud puddle and make ripples with rocks.
I want to play kickball during recess and paint with watercolors in art.
I want to lie under a big oak tree and run a lemonade stand with my friends on a hot summer day.

I want to return to a time when life was simple.
When all you knew were colors, addition and simple nursery rhymes,
but that didn't bother you, because you didn't know what you didn't know and you didn't care.
When all you knew was to be happy because you didn't know all the things that should make you worried and upset.
I want to think that the world is fair.
That everyone in it is honest and good.

I want to believe that anything is possible.
Somewhere along the way I learned too much.
I learned of nuclear weapons, war, prejudice, starvation and abused children.
I learned of lies, unhappy marriages, suffering, illness, pain and death.
I learned of a world where children knew how to kill...and did.

What happened to the time when we thought that everyone would live forever, because we didn't grasp the concept of death?
When we thought the worst thing in the world was if someone took the jump rope from us or picked us last for kickball?
I want to be oblivious to the complexity of life and be overly excited by little things once again.
I want to return to the days when reading was fun and music was clean.
When television was used to report the news or for family entertainment and not to promote sex, violence and deceit.

I would spend my afternoons climbing trees and riding my bike.
I didn't worry about time, bills or where I was going to find the money to fix my car.
I used to wonder what I was going to do or be when I grew up, not worry about what I would do if it didn't work out.
I want to live simple again.

I don't want my day to consist of:
computer crashes, mountains of paperwork, depressing news, how to survive more days in the month than there is money in the bank, doctor bills, gossip, illness and the loss of loved ones.

I want to believe in the power of:
smiles, hugs, a kind word, truth, justice, peace, dreams, the imagination, mankind and making angels in the snow.

So...here's my checkbook and my car-keys, my credit card bills and my 401K statements.
I am officially resigning from adulthood. And if you want to discuss this further, you'll have to catch me first, 'cause,

"Tag! You're it."

*Today's Examiner.com article is on the Raleigh City Museum. You can read about it HERE. Thanks!*