Last week of school!!!

Today is the last Monday of the 2010-2011 school year. It is the last Monday that I will have a third grader and a kindergartner. Somehow, not having a kindergartner AND having a fourth grader just makes them seem... so... soo BIG! Oh how I hate that! As I look forward to the full NINE WEEKS of summer that we get for the first time since Madeline has been school-age, I think back to what we've learned, even just this past week.

Dearest Madeline,
You are a sweet angel and I love you more every single day! This week brought a tough lesson for you and me. Thursday morning rolled around and even though I'd asked several times if you had your biography paper rewritten to turn in, you went to school with it not finished. I so desperately wanted to let you go in late and finish it so that it wouldn't be late. It wasn't that I wanted to let you go free of consequence but that I initially wanted to do the consequence at home... and then God spoke words to my heart that I did not want to hear. "Love and Logic. What would the logical consequences of her actions be?" Oh, it so broke my heart because I knew how much it broke yours. I talked with Mrs. Rothman and we agreed on the consequence of your being sent to the office to finish the paper because you'd simply chosen to not work at all while at school. You cried and cried about having to go to the principal's office and my heart shattered at the thought of leaving you at school crying. Every morning my goal is to get you off to school on a happy note and ready to face the day. This is the first time you've gone into JWE crying and I just hated it! "I'm not a bad kid" you said about your trip to the office. "No, sweetheart, you're not but you made a bad choice and bad choices have consequences." I know that you understood that you earned the consequences that you would face but just in case I told you again how wonderfully God made you and how proud I am of who you are... not the choice to refuse to do your work... but who you are as a person. I am proud of you Madeline. You have the most giving heart of any person I've ever met. You really are comfortable in your own skin and I wish I was more like you... especially now that it's swimsuit season! You faced your consequence, worked hard while you were there and you did not complain. Allowing you to face the logical consequence to your action taught us both. You learned that you cannot simply not work because you don't feel like it. I learned that my job is not to protect you from everything... and sometimes to let you hurt. For if I keep you from every single painful experience, you will never learn, grow or mature. I love you way too much for that!

Today you came and confessed a mistake to me. Again, I held you accountable by not letting you do what you knew you should not and then took some time to cuddle you. When you walked away you kissed me and said "You're a nice mom." You, my sweet girl, are an amazing human being and I am so grateful that I have the privilege of being your mom!

Sweet Funny Gavin,
I had so much fun with you on your field trip last Monday. It was with your third grade buddy whose name I can never remember but he was a sweet kid. It was fun to see how he took care of you throughout the day. You were in full out "Gavin mode" running full force and getting into everything. You even took a walk straight into one of the water gardens in the Climatron at the Botanical Gardens. We all laughed but you did not see as much humor until a couple of days later. You were sensitive, like you sometimes are. You certainly are a vast array of emotions at times. It's hard to know what's going to come from you but I know that whatever it is, it's coming straight from your heart... anger from a sometimes selfish heart... sadness from an embarrassed heart... silliness from a confident heart... or laughter from a full heart. No matter what it is, you always want to know the same thing "Are you accepted and loved?" I fear that you get this from me... this uncertainty about being loved. Not that I haven't loved you but that it's some weird part of my genome that you've had the misfortune to inherit... I wonder the same about your short fuse. I pray that you know that you ARE loved... and not just by me. Everywhere we go people know and adore you. From the time you began Mother's Day Out people have been stopping us at stores to say hi to you. You have an excitement and fun-loving spirit about you and people genuinely like being with you. As your mom, it's so fun to see and I just wonder what God's intention for you is. At your kindergarten program this week you said that when you grow up you want to be "an army man." I wonder if you will. You've almost always chosen a profession that protects others... firefighter, police and army man have been the most consistent. Whatever God intends for you, I pray that you'll listen to Him and follow with unwavering confidence that He created you just for that purpose and with Him, you cannot fail and I pray that you'll know that you are loved with a love that never ever ends!



So, onward we go to the summer. In four days I'll be a mom to a first grader and a fourth grader and I can't wait!

One piece at a time... it's all you can do.

"Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says." James 1:22

I remember, as a kid, going to the basement countless times to take shelter in case of a tornado but it seems like it's happening more regularly this year. For the record, I am not enjoying it but have not lost anything or anyone that I personally know to the storms so far. Crazily, it seems like it could be more of a "when" not "if" kind of thing with the number of devastating tornadoes that have happened in the last few months. I hug my people a little tighter these days but I know that there are so many that cannot do the same because their people are now gone... stolen from them in an instant. Even more have lost their homes. Last month, an area of St. Louis was hit but we were lucky; there were no fatalities. Seriously, we have been VERY lucky!

Just a few days following the tornado in St. Louis hundreds were killed in the south. I remember the next morning being on the phone with a friend and at the beginning of the ten minute conversation the death toll was 85 and by the time we finished it was 135. It continued to climb. The final count for the tornado that hit Joplin, MO yesterday is yet to be known. Again, I know that my people there are okay... well, alive and physically unharmed anyway but so many are not. Many are wailing from their great loss and I wonder what we will all do. Will we sit around and talk about how awful it is or will we do something?



Here are a few things that I know are taking place right now:

One Outfit: put together one outfit from each person in your home to donate to people in Joplin

Calvary Church is putting together a team of people to go to Joplin for the weekend, call the church for info: 636.939.4343

Donations: you can drop off bottled water, diapers, clothes, etc to Calvary Church and they will take it with them this weekend.


After last month's local tornado, I spent a day off volunteering with Service International and my sweet friends Ripper and Bo cleaning up one home that was decimated here. I was so grateful to have Ripper and Bo with me. We didn't really talk much but having a familiar face to make eye contact with between trips back and forth was really nice. We started our day on a small bus and were dropped of with the instruction to "go over the hill and you'll see what to do." We certainly did. Once on top of the hill, we found ourselves looking into the back of what was left of someone's home and right into their nursery. They changing table was still there but the crib was gone. We saw what was the first floor of one house... nothing was left but the stove and the bathtub. That house had many many people working so our small group wandered over to another house and began to just pick up one piece at a time. That's really all you could do. One might think that you'd get emotional as you pick up kids' toys, cookbooks, photographs of happy couples and the like but there simply isn't time for emotion. One piece at a time... it's all you can do.

The following pictures were taken that day with my iphone.

Dear 16 year old me...

This idea is not my own but came from Deb Schwedhelm who is a photographer now living in FL. I do not know Deb but am very often moved by things she says on her blog. Regardless, it made me think about all the many things I'd say to myself if I could speak to the 16 year old me... You see, I know that, in part, my mistakes shaped who I am now and I'm certain that God simply allowed negative things in my lives and bad decisions to take place so that I could have a greater understanding of who He is... and that REALLY DOES make it worth it. To quote my pastor, Terry Sanderson, "you don't know that Jesus is all you need until Jesus is all you've got." I've been there. I know what it means to cry out in the depths of pain just wanting relief however it may come.... though not in the same way or for the same reason for the people in this video... yet, there are just a few things I wish I'd done differently that I'll share after the video.



Dear 16 year old me,

Blue eyeshadow does not look good on you no matter how many people tell you that it brings out your blue eyes... neither does pink or green. Baggy pants that practically come all the way to your armpits do not look good on your skinny frame either... but I guess that's all they sold in 1990 so go with it. Lay off the Aqua Net. It might make for funny pictures later but you, singlehandedly, caused a hole in the ozone layer... perhaps a slight exaggeration but you're pretty hard headed. Seriously... SERIOUSLY, get out of the stinkin' tanning bed!!! You do not need to go to Aunt LaDawn's to tan for an hour so that you'll look hot at prom! Smart girls do not tan for an hour, nor do they lay out with baby oil and tin foil so stop it pale white girl! You do not have your momma's beautiful Native American skin! (For the record, you'll have to remind your 37 year old self of this too because she'll still want to be tan!)

Just two more things... You are stronger than you know because even when you don't act like it, you know from where your strength comes and it is Jesus. Never lose that as it will be your lifeline. His glory is actually why you were born, not yours. Finally, spend more time with your grandparents. You cannot even imagine how much you'll miss them when they're gone.

Huh? Tuesday letters???

Yes, Yes, Yes, I know it is Tuesday but Sunday was busy and I forgot... ;)

Dear Madeline,
On Sunday you completed your very first 5K race and received a medal for your hard work! I know that you don't like to sweat or exert energy but you did great and I am sooo proud of you! Thank you for letting me run with you... not that I gave you a choice. On Saturday you played all day with Alaina while Ben was at the hospital and were such a helper. If it didn't mean that I'd have to be pregnant and that there'd be another kid living in my house, I'd think you totally need a baby sister!

Dear Gavin,
You were so proud of Madeline after the race that you said "Sissy, you are amazing!" and my heart melted. I know that sometimes you guys fight and punch each other... and make me totally insane... but it's those moments that melt my heart. I love the way you two love each other! You have prayed so many times for your friend Ben since you found out he was at the hospital. You are not at all happy about his being there. When we left from visiting, we didn't even get to the car before you said "I miss Ben. I want him to get well and come home." The depth of your heart is vast and I know God is going to use that one day!

Dear Chris,
I love you. Thanks for taking Gavin to all of his stuff on Saturday so that we could be helpful to our friends. The size of your heart reminds me of your son's... though neither of you like for anyone to know it. In a thousand ways, you are my hero!

Extended Mother's Day...

Being a mother is a job that I take seriously. In fact, I think I take it more seriously than any other position I've held. I believe that it is a position in which I have an opportunity to influence, not only today and tomorrow, but generations to come. Seriously, how many "real world jobs" give that kind of opportunity? Sure, there are some but most simply do not. That is a reality. I pray that my efforts in this position will change future generations for the better, in a way that they will have a greater grasp on why they exist and how to live a life of purpose.

Another reality is that being a mother is, VERY OFTEN, a thankless job where you feel invisible. I do not see someone standing by the hamper to thank me when I put the clothes that I just picked up from the bedroom floor... nor do I see anyone in the bedroom to thank me either. When I scrub the toilets I do not receive a plaque that says how great a job I've done nor is there one for when I sweep the floors. The days that I've gotten in the shower to clean off the vomit that the sick child in my arms just spewed all over her and me, I didn't see anyone cheering in the corner. When a certain someone, or another someone, is throwing an outlandish fit that makes me wish desperately for a job in a cubical where I could maybe put on some headphones and listen to some nice music and just feel like I've accomplished something worthwhile, there is no one standing there to say "THIS is what it's about!"

Don't get me wrong here. My husband is wonderful and he helps around the house more than nearly any man I know and my kids are sweet and wonderful and they do say thank you for A LOT! It's still easy, though, to feel like my work around the house is for nothing. The hamper will be full again by the time the clothes get hung. They floor is dirty as soon as I sweep the pile into the dustpan. The discussions that I have with my kids will need to be had again in a few days. They will need to be reminded to put on socks, brush their teeth for the third time because they didn't get them clean the first two. They will have privileges taken away for their crummy attitudes and disrespectful faces... and then it will all happen again. And if I'm not careful to keep my mind on WHY I'M HERE and what MY PURPOSE is, it is easy to FEEL like it's for nothing. This morning, however, there were two big reminders for me that I wanted to share... just in case there are other mothers that sometimes feel like I do. The first came in a new song by Steven Curtis Chapman and you can listen to it by clicking below:

Do Everything by Steven Curtis Chapman

The second came at the very end of a message by Mark Driscoll, a pastor in Seattle, WA. Here's a short bit from his transcript:

An Example for Women

And ladies, I want you to learn from the example of Mary. She said, “I am willing to be the Lord's servant,” and what was her ministry? Wife, mother. We live in this foolish day that tells young women: flirt, date, sleep around, cohabitate, fornicate, use birth control, have an abortion because the last thing you want is to get saddled with a child; if you want to really change the world, kids will get in the way. Mary said, “Actually, I'll be a mom. I'll raise this to a boy, his name will be Jesus, and that's my gift to the world.” She also raised another boy named Jude, he wrote a book of the Bible. She raised another boy named James, he too wrote a book of the Bible and pastored the early church in Jerusalem. Do you think at the end of her life she stood back and said, “Man, I really wish I would have achieved something. You know, my one son atoned for the sins of the world, the other one pastors the church in Jerusalem that is the epicenter for world missions, and two books of the Bible are written by my sons, and oh, by the way, I was numbered among the early church and I got to see the Holy Spirit fall on Pentecost and 3,000 added later and Luke interviewed me and I made it into a few books myself”? I don't think she had any regrets being a worshiper of God and a wife and a mother.

And some of you will hear that, and because Satan whispers in your ear, you'll hear, “Ah, so Mark doesn't love women and he thinks that women should be uneducated and they should all get pregnant,” and that's, you know what, that's not what I'm saying at all. I love my daughter with all my heart, she's very smart, a great student, I've got a college fund for her, I anticipate her to do exceedingly well in school as she always has, but you know what, I don't know what the Lord's call on her life is and if she comes to me and says, “Daddy, my calling is to be a wife and mother,” what I won't say is, “Ah, I'm so sorry to hear that, I wanted great things for you.” I would say, “Praise God, like Mary, be the Lord's servant and don't despise his calling on your life, let him write the script.”

...

I am always so grateful for the privilege of being a mother. In the difficult, mundane days when it feels like we're living in "Groundhog Day" let's remember that it is a calling, a great opportunity and even though we cannot SEE someone cheering us on, giving us accolade after accolade for what we're doing, there is ONE watching and He is thankful for a job well done. We are never invisible to him! So, let's "do everything you do to the glory of the one who made you" and "let him write the script!"

Sunday Letters

Dear Madeline,
You are such a sweetheart and I love you. You always seem to know these amazing adult things to say. The other day I told you that I wasn't feeling well because I had to stop taking my allergy meds to be retested and couldn't take them for several days. You got this concerned look on your face and said "That must be really hard to feel bad for days. Is there anything I can do to make it easier?" Then the next day I asked you to help me move the dining room table so that I could start emptying the laundry room for renovation and after you said "Mom, it's great to do the kitchen and all but we need to make sure that we're thinking about God more than we are the new kitchen." Sigh. Princess, you are nine, not thirty-nine! Your heart has always been that of an older soul. You are wise beyond your years and I can only pray... desperately... that it will continue when you're a teenager!

Dear Gavin,
Not long ago you lost your first tooth. It was quite a deal too. You were just wiggling it and out it popped, started bleeding and you FREAKED! It made my heart overflow that what you wanted to make you feel better was for your mommy to rock you and read a book. This past week you had two baseball games and it was really fun to watch you yesterday... the first one was cold and windy and I don't do cold and windy well so I watched you from the car with Madeline for the last half. Today you learned a very difficult lesson. A while back you broke something of Madeline's and we told you that you'd have to pay for it. Today... because your parents are terrible about remembering to pay you your commission regularly... you got several weeks' worth and had to begin paying her. We talked more about consequences, debt and responsibility. You seemed to understand and chose to be responsible. Madeline gave you a sweet hug and told you "it's ok Buddy" and my heart melted. I do love the way you guys love each other.

Dear Chris,
Thank you for the trees that I bought myself for Mother's day! lol I love them and I appreciate that you don't get mad at me when I do things like like buy the trees that you said might have to wait. Seriously though, they were really cheap! Thank you for working out THE PERFECT BREAKFAST QUESADILLA!!!!! You have perfected it. You know what I like in my breakfast like nobody's business and it makes me fall in love with you all over again every time!

Mother's Day

Being a mother is the most wonderful and yet challenging position I have ever held. I am thankful every moment of every day that God graced me with the privilege of being Madeline and Gavin's mother. It is through them that I am encouraged, inspired, challenged... shown a mirror that reflects the true me... both the one I want to be and the one I want to erase. They bring amazing joy and laughter to every single day of my life and even though they are not perfect children, they are the perfect children for me!

As I read in 2 Timothy of where his faith began I am reminded of the critical role a mother plays. Chapter 1 verse 5 says:

I have been reminded of your sincere faith, which first lived in your grandmother Lois and in your mother Eunice and, I am persuaded, now lives in you also.


Timothy was Paul's disciple that he also called "my true son in the faith." He was very special to Paul and he goes on to say that Timothy has not been given a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline. I find it fascinating and important that Paul points out that the kind of faith that Timothy had began in his grandmother and mother. How important are we moms and you grandmother's!



So, today I want to thank a few of the moms that have been special in my life:

My own mom, Karen: Thank you for carrying me in your belly, allowing me to stretch it out and for giving me life. Without you, I wouldn't be here! :) Thank you for bandaging my boo-boos, cleaning up my blood, making me do chores, spanking me when I was bad, waking me up every day until third grade when, in my independence, I cried for an alarm clock so that I could do it myself. Thank you for letting me do it myself. It has shaped me and been an invaluable skill for me. Thank you for giving me a love of music and teaching me to sing through life. Thank you for loving me in the way that only you can! I love you!!!

My stepmom, Betty Jane: Thank you for accepting me and loving me like your own. Thank you for always answering the phone when I need to talk! You are an amazing listener and friend.

My mother-in-law, Nancy: Thank you for the wonderful example you are to me. You are incredibly thoughtful and seldom miss an opportunity to show your love. In so many ways, I want to be just like you!

Grandma Vera: I miss you. Thank you for always calling me Miss America and singing "Here she comes... Miss America" every time I walked in the room. You always made me feel pretty. Thank you for finding joy singing in the choir at church and for always letting me sleep with you when I stayed at your house. I'd give anything to sit in that tiny kitchen on Kimbrough and talk with you over a banana or organize your countless shampoo samples in the hall closet.

Grandma Houston: I think of you every day and miss you constantly. I cannot count the number of times I've wanted to ask you something this year and couldn't. I'm so glad that you're in heaven with Jesus! Thank you for teaching my dad about Jesus so that he could teach us. Thank you for the countless meals you cooked for all of us. I only wish I'd have learned how to make your gooseberry cobbler. Mine just isn't as good as yours. Of course, neither are my beans or my rolls either... or anything else! Thank you for my brand new rose of sharon shrub that grew this year from the one you gave me years ago. It's my favorite mother's day gift!

Edna: Thank you for not just believing that I can be all that Christ intended but teaching me to believe it too.



If I were to mention all of the women that have been important to me, this post would be even more ridiculously long because there are so many! To my friends and my friends' mothers, I love you and couldn't live without you!!! Thank you for the wonderful and unique example of motherhood that each of you are to me and to my kids!!!


Now, I've got to run because I've only got thirty minutes to do my hair for church! I've sacrificed my fluff to my babbling this morning! ha!

Happy Mother's Day Mothers!!!

Explaining war to my child...

I can remember almost ten years ago reading, via email, at work... in my seventh grade classroom about the World Trade Centers being hit by planes...

I read that people were jumping from the burning buildings to their death and I wanted desperately to read the online news or turn on the tv but mostly to cry, to fall on my knees and cry! Alas, I was responsible for the well-being of about 25 seventh graders at that moment and did not want to freak them out... and since I, and every other teacher, was kind of freaking out inside, it's pretty possible that they might have done the same. Seriously, they were twelve and thirteen and what we was happening was unimaginable! What I read sounded like the end of the world but I had to stay calm and had been instructed to go about the day as if nothing had happened so that the kids would hear it from their parents and not us.

In the days that passed after September 11, 2001 I was glued to the television for an unknown number of hours, just like everyone else in the world. I still remember hearing George W. Bush's voice crack when he addressed the country. I was impressed by his transparency and genuine brokenness for the families that were suffering. I remember feeling so very confused and yet, when he promised to find out who had done this, I believed that he would. Yet, I could not imagine who in the world would do such an awful thing as fly airplanes into three buildings, and attempt another, murdering thousands? Who? Who? WHO? And then we heard his name...

OSAMA BIN LADEN

Do you remember when you first heard the name? Part of me was so relieved that there was a name for this awful person and yet, it still made no sense at all.

A few weeks ago I explained to my kids that their uncle would be leaving soon to go fight in the war in Afghanistan. Gavin was excited about the helicopter Uncle Bert will fly and the guns he'll shoot. Madeline was more... well, Madeline. "Why is there a war at all Mom? It just seems stupid that he has to fight in a war. What is this war about anyway?" I realized at that moment that so much had happened since the war began that it took a moment for my brain to find that file, so to speak, on why we're there. It was seriously like something in a movie in my head. I saw scenes and heard clips of the news over the last decade... people murdered... Women raped and stoned... Saddam Hussein... Iraq... nothing made sense and then.... I remembered.

It wasn't that I'd forgotten the event of 9/11. It wasn't that I didn't still pray for the families that lost loved ones. It wasn't that the image of people leaping out of windows to their death isn't seared into my mind. It wasn't that I'd forgotten the audio tapes of all the messages left on answering machines by those who had accepted their fate. It wasn't that I'd forgotten the firefighters that raced into the flames to save others and sacrifice themselves. It wasn't that I'd forgotten that you can plainly see the different color brick when you see the Pentagon. I had not forgotten the people... or the pain but it had been sooo stinking loooonnnngg that it just took my mind through all of that to remember that our troops were sent to fight to get Osama Bin Laden and now, they have.

So, I reminded her of 9/11 and how many families' lives were changed forever because of the attack planned by Osama Bin Laden. I explained that even though bringing Bin Laden to justice wouldn't change the desperate ache in the hearts of those people or the effects of the absence of their loved one or the sickness now suffered by those whose lungs were damaged by breathing the NYC air that day or... or ... or... that it would be just. That it would be fair. To pay an earthly penalty for our actions is fair... to pay an eternal penalty for our actions is our choice.

This morning, with a hesitant heart, I told the kids that Bin Laden had been killed. Gavin punched the air in victory. I knew EXACTLY what he was feeling! Madeline asked "Mom, why did they kill him? Couldn't they have captured him?" I knew exactly what she was feeling too.

...

So, I explained that we can infer from the wealth of the family that Bin Laden was born into and his exposure to the world that he'd heard about Jesus and rejected him. Bin Laden embraced his own god... a god that cannot even be defined as the Allah of the muslim religion but himself... and death... and terror. He had been given the chance at salvation and had rejected it. I also explained that this does not end the war because beneath Bin Laden, in the chain of command, there are countless others serving that same god... just WAITING for their turn to bestow their will upon the world.

Alas, the war against evil wages on as it has since Eve took that first sinful bite.

I wish, I desperately wish that Bin Laden would have accepted Jesus, repented of all his sin, turned himself in and taken responsibility for his actions... but as far as we can know that's not the case. He is likely experiencing the punishment described in Luke 16:19-31... the punishment that I have also earned with my actions. Let us not think higher of ourselves than we ought. It is only because of Jesus that we won't taste that anguish of hell and for THAT I celebrate... but yes, Madeline, a sheep was lost forever and that serves to us as a reminder that God, alone, is the just judge and that we are to go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything Jesus commanded... and as we do, we can know that He is always with us to the very end of the age. It is only in knowing Jesus that any type of peace exists in a world that has not known the absence of war.

May the peace of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, be with the troops... specifically the one who pulled the trigger that brought worldly justice this week. The taking of a human life changes a person. May they know that they did what they were sent to do and may our country stop fighting over silly things and be united in lifting up our military men and women. They do what is unimaginable to the rest of us and they allow us to live in a land founded on true freedom.

...

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God's one and only Son. John 3:16-18

A Royal Post

Dear Princess Madeline,
Tonight we watched the Royal Wedding of Prince William and Princess Catherine, former Kate but that's apparently not formal enough to be a princess so now she is Catherine. You we so fun to watch. You LOOOOVEED her dress and had a fit over her flowers. You got so excited when she got out of the car and were obsessed to know when she actually became a princess! After all the pomp and circumstance you proved to be the wonderful grounded practical child that you are with quotes like these:

"I'm not going to have that many people at my wedding. It would take FOREVER to talk to all of them!"

"I don't think my dress will be that fancy. I doubt I'll have enough money for something like that!"

I love the simple girl that you are. You have never been attached to stuff... well, except Shishie your beloved stuffed chicken. You give everything away and always have. The other day you were looking through the Justice catalog, making a list of the things you like and threw it away when the total came to a hundred dollars. "That's just ridiculous!" you said. After we watched the wedding, I brought out my wedding gown and let you put it on. You loved the tiara and the veil. I pray that you know that it isn't snagging a guy like Prince William that will make you a princess, but the fact that you are already the daughter of the KING OF KINGS! You are a princess in the most royal family of all sweet girl!


Sir Knight in Shining Armour Gavin,
You funny funny guy! I'll get to your response to the royal wedding in a minute but first I want to say WAY TO GO on your second real hit in baseball this week! You're rocking it on the field and I am LOVING watching you! It may sound silly but washing your white baseball pants just seemed like some kind of right of passage for me. Now, your response to the wedding was classic Gavin. All you wanted to see was..... THE KISS! "When will they kiss?" you kept asking and when I asked why, your response was "because I like to watch it!" Oh my! At one point you announced "That's it! I'm marrying a princess!" I thought I'd die laughing. You sat tight and watched until they kissed and then, in perfect Gavin fashion, said "Can I go play DS now?" and you did.


MY Prince and my constant defender,
Than you for calling me "Princess" every single day for more than a decade and for loving me like one!