eight is great!

Dear my Martha Kate, 

Today you are eight!  And, let me tell you, you make eight look really great!  It has been such a fun year of watching you grow.  You lost a lot of teeth this year (six!), mostly all at the same time, so for a while you couldn’t eat corn or apples, and whistling was a little tricky.  Now that your two big front teeth are in, sometimes you look so grown up!  Your personality has not stopped growing either.  You are a busy bouncing ball of sunshine.  You love to play outside and love to swing - the higher the better.  You like to climb to the top of the fort and swing from the rope to jump on the swing.  

You pick every flower, even if it’s a weed and never leave a dandelion unblown.  They are all beautiful in your eyes and you have made me see how beautiful they are too.  Most of them you give to me and I put in a vase but sometimes when I clean out my car, I find some little wilty ones in the cupholder and I think about you.  

Music makes you so happy.  We love watching you belt it out in the rearview mirror and listening to you sing when daddy plays the guitar.  You like all kinds - pop songs, country songs, daddy’s 80’s hair band songs, church songs, and you know all the words after you hear it one time.  You asked for a microphone for Christmas and sang for a solid hour while dancing on the kitchen chairs on Christmas morning.  You sang your first little solo in church this year, “This Little Light of Mine.”  It was perfect for you because we watch your little light shine all the time.  Your G-Daddy even built you a stage for your room and made it extra big so you wouldn’t fall off if the music made you move a lot. 

Your creative little mind never stops turning.  You make things and paint things and draw things constantly.  You came home from school with a Kleenex box and turned it into a guitar.  I am always looking for my stapler or my tape but it is usually gone because you have used it all with your creations.  That’s ok, I can just buy more tape!  You also like to write stories and song lyrics, and they are really good because you also draw pictures to go with them.  You love to make cards because you are so thoughtful.  I have them on little pieces of paper all over the house and they remind me of how deeply you love and how giving you are.  I love how you always make my hair look extra good in your drawings.  You are even giving to your brother and bought him a gift with your own money for his birthday.  He’s lucky to have you.  

You wrote this about yourself! "
"I also love to color and love life."

We never thought you were the athletic type, but you tried soccer this year and you were really fast!  It was really exciting to watch you fly across that field and score goals.  I think you were excited too - almost as excited as you were about the pink cleats you got to wear.  You definitely have your own sense of fashion and the soccer field proved to be no exception.  

You have loved school this year, mostly because you have learned to read really well.   You love books and most nights after you go to sleep, I come in and move all of the books off of your bed.  I enjoy reviewing your graded papers with you because you always have a good explanation for your answers, like when you wrote, “slippery” for how an object would move more easily and went on to demonstrate how if you poured sunscreen on the floor, the object would slide.  I made perfect sense to me, but school sometimes likes for you to get the answers from the paragraph instead of making up your own.  You also got a little worried about testing this year because you might not be able to out of your seat to change pencils or walk around, but the extra recess and snacks made it better.  You teach me not to take things in life so seriously and to look for the positive when you have to do hard things.  

You are also my good helper.  You are never far from my side, so you just help me with my work.  You also help me find my keys and help me to remember the snacks when we go on a trip.  I love to hear your little voice chattering away when I’m holding your hand and we are walking together.  You are overflowing with ideas and questions.  I try to answer them all because I know that’s how you learn.  Last night, we looked at the pictures from when you were born and you loved hearing stories of what you were like as a baby.  You were so tiny and feisty and so loved.  That has not changed.  

Martha Kate, you bring us such joy!  Your free spirit is so contagious and you make people around you so happy - that is such a gift!  There is so much love and life in your little forty pound body that it’s hard to contain sometimes.  It is a pleasure to watch you grow.  You are a girl with purpose and an opinion who is not afraid to make it known.  I admire your contentment and your confidence.  

You are eight.  You are great. 

I love you so very much!

Mommy

there's always donuts...

After school yesterday, I took the kids to Kroger to choose Mother’s Day cards.  After six years, it’s still tough for me to read through cards and not pick out one for my own mother, so I’m glad they can read and choose for themselves.  The compromise is a little tough when one is asking where the inappropriate cards are and the other is mesmerized by the pink glitter pop-up ones, but they moved on after being distracted by the toys and the discovery of POP TOOBS - those plastic accordion things you pull apart and they make a loud noise.  I shared my memory of how they once came in McDonald’s Happy Meals and they preceded to discover that the faster you pull the louder it gets.  So there they were whooping it up and acting like fools in the card isle while all the women were choosing sentiments for their moms.  I suddenly felt really good about where I am in life.  I soaked up their joy for a moment before I moved them onto the donut display because that’s what my mom would have done.  Let them be kids.  

Everyday I kiss them goodbye and watch them walk out the door with their backpacks.  Everyday they are a little bigger, a little older, and have a tiny bit more life experience.  Sometimes I pull them back in, hug them once more and put their faces in my hands just to take in their freckles and eyelashes.  They are growing.  This is exactly what I wanted to see.  They are lovely humans with spunk and humor and personality.   Sometime last week, I realized that I have moved from kissing boo-boos and hand holding to nurturing souls and comforting spirits.  There is always the one mean kid who  looks for someone else’s insecurities and goes after them, causing tears and crushing confidence.  There are the girls who aren’t inclusive, hurting feelings and breaking hearts.  There are the teams they won’t make, the goals they won’t score.  There are the choices they will make and the consequences that may have to come.  I know that the punk kid will grow up to be the obnoxious adult but it’s hard for an eleven year old to see that trajectory.  Kroger donuts won’t always fix it but it won’t stop me from trying.  

I hear my mother’s voice over and over as I mother my own children. She’s laughing when my girl comes downstairs in heels and a fairy dress to go swing because she thinks it will make her fly.  She’s agreeing with me that it’s not fair because he tried really hard and wants it more than the other kids.  She’s reminding me how many scraps of paper she used to pick up in my room when I’m picking confetti out of the carpet.  She’s reminding me to let them figure it out, even though it’s hard to watch.  She’s telling me that she knew they could do it when I doubted. I think how she didn’t put up with anybody’s mess, how she only needed to give us a look to make us straighten up, and how she beamed with pride at anything we accomplished.  The things she taught me are engrained in my being and not only do I hear her, I am so much her. 

Teaching was her career, but also her life.  A friend of my mom’s gave me some of her school papers a while back.  I sat and read through them - articles of her students that were recognized, her teacher evaluations, things she had written in her perfect cursive writing, and some of my report cards and grades interspersed.  I stopped on the plastic covered report for “Teacher of the Year.”  It was from 1993 and there was a picture of her on the front with big triangle hair wearing a lace collared puffy sleeve dress.  The whole thing was typed by hand on a typewriter, no less.  (The typewriter came out in my house when it was something important or “official.”  There was a bottle of white-out really handy and she reminded me over and over how she nearly failed typing in high school as she pecked away at the keys, uttering a “shoot!” here and there.)  There was no doubt hours of work in this, worthy of the report cover.  It listed her accomplishments, her family life, and then there was a page and a half of her teaching philosophy which was founded on three basic principles - consistency, honesty, and love.  

Some of my favorite things she said were, “We need to show children it’s not where you start, but where you finish that counts,” and “We need to follow through with what we promise.”  By reading this I confirmed that a) her brilliance would never be overshadowed by her 90‘s hairdo and b) my brother and I had basically spent our entire childhood inside the walls of an elementary school classroom without knowing it.  She figured if it worked at school, it would work at home or vice versa and she was probably too tired for another strategy.   

Motherhood is not what anyone expects. I was so disappointed in the “What to Expect When You’re Expecting” book that I read to about the seventh month and donated it to Goodwill.  I certainly did not expect that five years into this gig, I would figure out how to simultaneously survive and mother some toddlers.  

What you can expect as a mother is to fall completely and hopelessly in love with small humans.  You can expect to feel what they are feeling.  You can expect to envision yourself walking out to collect him from the pitcher’s mound but you grip your fingers to the seat.  You can expect find yourself mad over the money you spent on dance lessons until she puts on the costume and her whole being is transformed.  You can expect to find joy in the first frogs of the season and eating tiny sandwiches on the floor at her tea party.  You can expect to trial and error and second guess your way through eighteen years and hope that end the end you end up with an adult who loves God and loves people. You can expect to rise up and will yourself to live for the sake of their futures.  You can expect that at the end of the day you will fall back on honesty, consistency, and love.  And, when all else fails, you can expect that Kroger will have donuts.    

Happy Mother’s Day!  

kj

I DOT WUT TO

When I was in high school, I was on the school newspaper staff.  Every year, the seniors got to publish a list their likes and dislikes at the end of the year.  It was so fun to read and as staff we got to cut and paste like professionals (probably using actual scissors) as we read through them.   They were mostly inside jokes or something that alluded to something that went on in 9th grade that forever (or for at least four years) bonded so and so.  At nearly forty, it’s a good idea to have a clear understanding of what you like and don’t like so you can either do more of them or avoid them.  

My documented list of yeses officially started on my birthday.  My list of no thank yous while shorter, is pretty solid - Brussels sprouts, socks with no elastic, cockroaches, empty toilet paper rolls, artificial sweetener, etc.  A few years back when Martha Kate was in kindergarten, she apparently did not want to complete the rest of her work, so she put a big ole “X” over it and wrote the words, “I DOT WUT TO.”  (This paper is framed in my bathroom right above the portrait of Bailey's kindergarten self with a big ole erased pile of poo drawn under it.  Because that’s the kind of mother that I am). So when adding to the “no” list I always think of her big ole “X.”  I had a little extra time to think this week and as I was adding to my list, I realized that there are things that I want to draw a big ole “X” over but they just don’t go away.  Here’s a few: 

brain scans, unsolicited advice, and public restroom hand dryers

It was brain scan week.  That in itself is enough to send anyone into orbit.  This was my 7th one in 5 years so while one would think it may be old hat, it’s so not.  La-ti-da...just lie on your back and relax while you freeze to death with your head in a cage, wearing earplugs and extra face-squishing foam, and let the jack hammers draw pictures of your noggin.  While mirrors typically make a space look larger, the tiny one that is 2 inches from your eyeballs does not.  It does allow you to check your mascara application, but if you look closer it actually reflects into the imaging room so you can really freak yourself out about what they are seeing. I’m just thankful that it’s not recording real-time thoughts.  Around my second brain scan I lay there praying and remembered 2 Timothy 1:7 and that became my brain scan verse.  The “sound mind” part is subjective but the way I see it is that God does not want me to be afraid and whatever is on the other side of that picture, He has given me enough sense to make a decision about.  The good news is that mine is normal (again, subjective) and the other news is that I can’t avoid them because melanoma loves the brain and since I’ve already had it in my spine, a frightening 6 inches from there, it’s kind of necessary.  

As for unsolicited advice, or “free” advice, I’ve been the recipient of much.  These are the sentences that start with “You should...” or sometimes “Why don’t you...” (See also the unfiltered comment).  A cancer diagnosis warrants both, and truly some advice has been really sound and I get my best material from unfiltered comments.  

The tech in the MRI this week asked why I was there and when I gave her the short version, she said, 

“Well, you are way to young to be dealing with all of this.”  

Unfiltered.  

I said, “I thought so too, until I walked into the cancer clinic and didn’t see an age discrimination sign.” 

Silence.  

My exception to the unsolicited advice is when it comes from anyone over 80, because it will either be very sound and backed up by life experience or so hysterically funny that you need to hear it.  The other exception is your mama because, well, she’s earned it.  The bottom line is I can’t avoid this either, so I will use it to my advantage and just refrain from giving it.  

As for the hand dryers.  I’ve used a lot of public restrooms this week.  Those things are everywhere with no paper towel option.  You wash your hands, turn around for the towel, only to see the blower.  Your faced with a decision - push the button or walk away.  For all the racket, there should be instant evaporation, but instead they blow water (or the actual loose skin) around on your hands and then turn off, leaving you dripping and wiping on your clothes.  If you have a small child with you, the child either flaps and sprays water everywhere or wipes her hands on YOUR clothes to avoid the loud noise.  Handwashing is necessary, apparently drying is optional.  Just going to deal.  

Now, onto my appointment on Tuesday.  The short of it is that it was good, really good.  I stand in amazement that the scans are clear.  Nothing there.  I actually just pulled them up and read them once more just to be sure.  Not the tumor in my spine that had once cut off the blood flow to my spinal cord, not the one that was pressing into my airway, or the one in my diaphragm, or my adrenal gland, or the other 10 or so that were scattered around.  Nothing.  Completely melted away sometime over three years ago and I’m holding steady.  Every day is a gift, not promised, but borrowed with the intent to make the most of it.  As my doctor told me, “no one knows the curve on this” because the curve is still being written - partially by yours truly.  My hematology visit, two floors up, immediately following oncology, also good.  My leukemia remains in remission, what my hematologist refers to as a deep remission with stable molecular levels (basically the only way to find any sign of leukemia in my body is to dig through the DNA and then there’s only a tiny trace).  I achieved this milestone about six months after I was diagnosed, but it takes many people three years or so.  We discussed studies that are going on in France that may allow CML patients who are in remission to come off of the drug at some point. Frankly, I’m ok with what I’ve got going - if it ain’t broke, well you know.

So my visit was good, but one of the toughest.  A few weeks ago, I got a letter in the mail from Vanderbilt.  I get dozens of Vanderbilt envelopes - mostly because I owe them money or they want a donation.  This one was from Dr. Sosman informing his patients that he will soon be practicing at Northwestern in Chicago.  I called Stephen and asked him how he felt about it we mutually agreed upon “sick.”  Well, I was angry, but the sick and sad kind of angry.  We just walked around the house saying, “sick.” over and over, only I couldn’t really say it without tearing up.  Big ole honking “X.” 

Sometime during one of those critical life-saving treatment decision times, Dr. Sosman looked at me and said, “Let’s get you well, because I want to see you in ten years.”  I took that to heart but I also took that to mean that he would actually be the one to see me.  My thoughts that day were, “well, ok, buddy if you’re going to talk about ten years from now, I’m going to do my part.” He may not know how much that statement actually fueled my inner cockroach climbing out of the puddle of Raid, but it did.  

Immediately following receiving the letter, I sent Dr. Sosman a text that I was not happy about this and that I hoped he had negotiated my travel expenses into his new salary.  Wouldn’t you want to have me for a patient?  When he opened the door to the room the other day, he said, “I wasn’t sure you were going to come.”  Ha!  He knows me well.  It was a sad sort of visit, but very endearing.  I may or may not have been as worried about holding it together than the actual scans.  We all cried and he hugged us both about four times.  I was hoping to walk away with more clarity on what to do (or a plane ticket) but I did walk away knowing that he has invested as much into me as I have in him.  We have history.  

So, here we are faced with decisions that I DOT WUT TO make.  I wasn’t looking for a new doctor.  I wasn’t looking to continue my medical care in two cities that are not even close to each other or to the one I actually live in.  I wasn’t looking to figure out the finances and logistics of it all.  But what I do know is that it will work out.  I’m doing great medically and I’ve got time to figure it out.  What a great place to be.  God has always provided.  For 1,945 days of cancer, God has provided.  We have traveled to Nashville and home so many times and never once has a need not been met.  

I will use last week as an example.  Our trips are a two day affair.  I go up on Monday, get scans and bloodwork and then Stephen goes back with me for results on Tuesday.  Two oncologists is too much to cram into one day.  The biggest (unsolicited) question I get asked is “Why don’t you spend the night?” or “You should spend the night.”  My reasons are simple - while disrupting my life a little, it minimizes disruption for my children.  They are first, always have been.  To parent small children in the face of uncertainty, fear, and pure chaos is no small task.  We have been at this for over five years.  By God’s grace, our children are fairly well-adjusted, happy, and oh so loved.  My son who was a kindergartner when I was diagnosed, will soon go to middle school.  And, according to the picture my daughter drew in her Sunday School class this morning, she understands perseverence.  What may seem or have seemed to an outsider as a seamless transition between normal life and cancer, is really not all that seamless.  

I have sat and cried with Bailey when he was scared and we both knew that I may end up in the hospital and not back at home later that night.  I have tiptoed through many dark mornings so they wouldn’t wake up and cry with anxiety that I was leaving before school.  I have spent months building back the trust that every time their precious grandparents showed up, we were not going to medical appointments.  So, when I’m washing a baseball uniform at midnight before scan day, signing folders, writing notes for lunchboxes, and packing soccer practice clothes, it gives me peace.  And, when I walk up at the start of his baseball game and he gives me this half smile and wave from the dugout, he knows I’m there, and he’s ok.  I can give him that. When I get to kiss her and take a picture before her soccer practice and reassure her that I will see her after, she’s elated. When it’s “wear owl day” at school and he asks me where his Hooter’s shirt is and I bust out laughing, my entire extra 400 miles is totally worth it.  

And selfishly, when much of my day looks like this:

blue suede shoes because Memphis 

 I'd like to end it like this.

What’s cool is that make this happen, to allow Stephen and me to parent seamlessly, God provided an entire village.  Six different people disrupted their own lives to make ours easier - company, food, practice, dogs, kid shuffle, and lunchdates.  The rest of them are praying, waiting, hoping, and texting to see if we need anything.  The truth is that over five years into this, I have to turn down help because I have more offers than I need.  That is amazing.  So, He will provide.  He always does.  I have quit trying to understand the why and the timing and the logistics but it doesn’t keep me from wanting to draw a big old “X,” over the whole deal sometimes.  But, I am here.  I am breathing, walking, mothering, and living out this miracle I call life.  

Last Sunday, our pastor’s sermon was on how we see Jesus when we are called outside our comfort zone, and immediately following that was our Sunday School lesson on Romans 5 where Romans 5:3 was highlighted in my Bible.  So, going into scan day, it was apparent that A) I am not supposed to be comfortable and B) this has been one big fat exercise in character building.  

Awesome.  Bring it on! 

Thank you for your prayers, thank you for your encouragement, and thank you for never giving up.  Love, KJ

Because Forty.

MSU Cafeteria 1998

Stephen loves it when I write, but he loves it more when I write about him, so the best thing I can think to give him is his very own post. 

Nineteen years ago today, I was studying for some test - probably physics or something to keep my 4.0 streak alive.  (The goals I had back then...).  It was sometime after midnight when someone knocked on my window of my apartment.  By any standard of common sense I should have been scared, but instead I opened the door and let the fools in.  It was a friend and Stephen who just finished celebrating his 21st birthday and was in rare form for sure.  That was the first time we met.  He is the father of my children.  

Our friendship grew from there and he will tell you that I drove him absolutely crazy but he never gave up.  We spent hours together, rode all over campus on our bikes, and worked in the same parking lot.  I was a bank teller and every afternoon he brought the bank bags over from his store.  I could see him leave the store and walk across the parking lot.  He never went inside, just walked straight up to my window to drop them off and say “hi.”  Conveniently, he got an apartment the next semester about 26 steps from my front door.  He looked out for me - pretty much knew where I was at all times even though he pretended not to notice.  I can only pray that there's a Stephen out there for my own daughter when she goes to college.  That year, we met every day between classes outside the cafeteria at the picnic tables.  I sat there with my nose in a book and watched him run around the corner of Lee Hall and then suddenly start walking when he thought I could see him as to make sure he didn’t look too eager.  He did this for a solid year and I never told him because it was hilarious and endearing at the same time.  

Sometime that year, I decided that if we ever said we were dating that would be it.  So, that was it.  He kissed me in the parking lot of Rick’s Cafe and the rest is history.  Done.  

We got married on the hottest day in August of 2001 and the real adventure began.  Our honeymoon was in New York City - also hot, and the first of many sporting events that I would sit through sandwiched between fat men drinking beer and yelling at the bad calls.  We walked all over New York, had a blast, and really thought we were something.   We stood on the top of the World Trade Center and had our picture made but didn’t buy it because it cost too much, but sure had a good time talking about all the tourists in the kiosk pictures and their poses.  At the airport when we were leaving, Stephen opened his door and hit a van.  He was so worked up that he left our camera and our plane tickets in the taxi.  We nearly missed our flight, had to buy more tickets and we were so upset to have no pictures from our honeymoon.  Just a few days later, 911 happened and it was the first of many lessons in our married life that would teach us what really matters.  

In nineteen years, I guess you could say we have figured this all out together with a lot of help from the good Lord.  Stephen Jessop has never wavered in his devotion to me.  He is passionate about a lot of things - guitars, rock n’ roll, making sure people are happy, 80’s hair bands, grass, and grilled meat.  He is most passionate about his wife and his kids.  And, one thing is for sure, he has never given up.  I have singlehandedly through no fault of my own, dragged him through some of the most trying things a marriage could endure.  When my mother died, he cried more than anyone there - he cried for me because I was too numb to cry anymore.  

A year later, we found ourselves where no one in their married life wants to be - in an oncology office looking for options.  He took that bull by the horns and called every cancer center this side of the Pacific, begging and pleading in the way only he can.  Stephen is honest and passionate and people know it when they meet him - on the phone or in person - they just can't not like him.  He started researching cancer treatments then and hasn’t stopped.  He stopped at churches on his work route and went in to their sanctuaries to pray for his wife.  When I couldn’t walk, he had the MRI report in hand and read it to the doctors himself.  Sure, he could have walked away but instead he tattooed my name on his wrist - my signature from his 36th birthday card I gave him a few days before.  

Last year, he walked in and said we were giving back to Melanoma Research and “we” were going to do a race.  I was poorly convinced and poorly motivated but he would not give up so I joined him.  He wore us all out with race plans, but in the end our first race at $42,000 was one of the largest inaugural races they had ever had.  

Today he is 40.  I have had the pleasure of knowing and loving him over half of my life.  He has made me a better person.  I have a son that resembles him in both looks and mannerisms and a daughter that shares his passion for life and his love for music.  I have learned to love sporting events, tolerate rock n’ roll, and accept the guitar fetish.  I giggle when I see him walking out in his pajamas and rain boots to move the sprinklers so his grass stays green and lament with him in August when it’s as brown as a bail of hay.  I roll my eyes at 2 am when he goes outside to check on his Boston butt.  I smile every time I see his watch slide down on his wrist and see my signature there on his arm.  I live with gratitude that 19 years ago, he knocked on my window, found me, and never gave up.  

Happy 40th Birthday, Stephen Jessop!

I love you!

1998 or so

The famous Lee Hall

Call me

Eleven.

Eleven.  Today you are eleven!  

As I write this, I remember the cold January eleven years ago when I couldn’t wait to meet you.  I couldn’t wait to see what you looked like and to hold you in my arms.  You made me wait an extra week so I started learning to be patient really early with you - one of the best things you could teach me.

I am so proud of who you are and who I see you becoming.  This is your last year of elementary school.  I realized that this summer when you were standing in front of the school releasing Nana’s birthday balloons and it made me both happy and sad.  Next year you will go to middle school and it will be full of new and exciting adventures and more independence.  I will learn a lot more about how to be your mother.

This year, I have watched you become more responsible.  You set goals for yourself and work really hard to meet them.  You saved all of your money this year from birthdays, Christmas, leaf raking, and pulled teeth, to buy nice sunglasses and now an iPad which is awesome!  You are much more responsible with your schoolwork this year too.  And, even though you and I have spent hours studying and researching for your social studies projects on Abraham Lincoln and World War I, I wouldn’t trade my time with you for anything in the world.  I love to watch you succeed because it drives you to set higher goals for yourself and helps you have confidence that you can meet your goals.  I  know you get frustrated sometimes but it is always because you expect more for yourself and we want that for you too.  You already have a pretty good idea that life is not easy and good things come with hard work and perseverance. 

Bailey, you just crack us up.  Your sense of humor, knack for impressions, and the way you can sum up a situation - serious or humorous - in about three words is hilarious.  Nothing gets by you.  You notice how people talk, what they wear, and can give a dead-on impression of their mannerisms.  I love the little smirk that comes over your face and the look you give me when something is so funny but it’s inappropriate to laugh in public and how tickled we get later when we talk about it.  I also love how you walk in circles around the house talking to me and telling me about your day, what people did at school, and what happened on the video that you watched on TV.  You teach me how things work and remind me to slow down and pay attention to details.  

You love sports - watching them and playing them and you'd rather be outside than anywhere else.  You have become your daddy’s sidekick at Mississippi State football games and between then two of you, I’ve never seen so much anxiety over a ball and a bunch of grown men.  You also love to eat.  The kids meal days are over for us and I knew this when you ordered shrimp and grits at a nice restaurant and there were no leftovers for me to try.  You watch Food Network and plan when we can go to Guy Fieri’s featured diner.  You educate me on how to use my phone, how to work the TV, and soon you will know much more than me about how to use my computer.  It’s scary but also useful.  And, you sure do love that dog, and he knows it.  I tell him that the only thing keeping him here sometimes is his looks but it’s also because of how much you love him.  

I have watched you realize what it means to be grateful.  You are content and thankful for what you have most of the time.  You are thoughtful and make sure that everyone around you is taken care of - you did great helping your daddy with Christmas shopping this year!  Your teachers and coaches also recognize your sweet spirit and we are so proud when you are complimented on your character.  You keep a watchful eye on your sister which is extra helpful for me, even though she acts like she’s annoyed.  

Bailey, you are a joy! You know how to love, you know how to give, and you have high expectations for yourself and others.  You are honest and dependable and I am proud that you are my son.  We pray that you will grow to love God and love others as He loves us.  

Happy Eleventh Birthday!

I love you, 

Mom