My 14th birthday, Crustaches, & Cannibalism

Everyone in our family has a birthday in August. Taylor’s is the 7th, mine is the 9th, and Beckett’s is the 22nd. Also, when we were adopting our dog, Mack, they told us his birthday is the 5th. 5, 7, 9, 22.

August is an expensive month for us.

Last year I made a birthday hat that I made everyone in our family wear on their designated day of birth.

I did it again this year because it’s highly entertaining to me for some reason, especially since Mack was terrified of the balloons.

Now the hat is sitting in the corner anxiously awaiting next Wednesday when Beckett can wear it. (Next Wednesday, the 22nd. The day of Beckett’s birth. I could hyperventilate just thinking about how fast this year has gone.)

my new kicks.	.

For my birthday, Taylor gave me new running shoes and a verbal commitment to run a half marathon with me this year, something I’ve been pestering him to do since the half I ran 2 years ago…you know, the one on August 15th in Texas where dozens of people were carted off by ambulances because of the ridiculous temperatures. I never claimed to be a genius.

Anyway, I love the shoes. I read somewhere that neon makes you run faster, like a gazelle, so clearly that’s what I chose.

Speaking of getting older…

A man walked up to my friends and I (all 20-something college graduates/young professionals) at church last week and said, “Hey – you girls look about the right age! This is my daughter. She’s 14. Going into 9th grade…”

Hold up. 

14? 9th grade?

Sweet girl needed to know where the youth group was meeting and he thought for sure we were headed that way. You know, to attend our high school Bible class.

So, happy birthday to me. I hope 14 is a solid year for me! Maybe I can get my braces off before school starts.

Crustaches

The crustache happened this week, mostly because I have awesome friends who surprise me with awesome presents.

So, thanks Sydney. From this day forward, our family will never eat sandwiches, pancakes, or cookies the same. I’m even considering mustached salad leaves, but I’ll cross that bridge when I get to it.

In a post in the near future, I’m going to discuss the joys of early toddlerhood…the fact that your baby’s sweet vocal chords begin to hit notes higher than you imagined were humanly possible, the ways in which they noodle leg and/or dive headfirst out of your arms so they can walk unassisted at somewhere around 1 mile-per-decade pace, the sudden shift in strangers’ attitudes toward your precious peach…it’s all fun and games when they’re itty bitty and their fussing is barely audible. It’s not quite as endearing when their shrieking causes internal bleeding.

{Totally unrelated: does anyone know the return/exchange policy of labor & delivery?}

For now, I’ll leave you with this nugget: Crowded shopping mall. Mom drank too much Diet Coke at lunch. Can’t find the bathroom. Baby is walking, laughing and shrieking with delight in himself. 15 minutes later…only a foot from where we started. Mom picks up baby to speed up the process. Baby flips out, sinks teeth into Mom’s arm. (…Mom pops baby on the mouth then looks around to make sure a bystander didn’t dial the Child Protective Services hotline…)

If there was ever any doubt that his teeth were properly installed, I think the hole in my arm lays that question to rest.

When I thought of all the things parenting entailed, I didn’t expect “suffer physical pain” to be on the list. Nor did I expect such a rabid, cannibalistic, precious, angel-faced child.

Welcome to toddlerhood. It’s going to be a crazy, possibly bloody, definitely painful, totally worthwhile ride.  (…right?!)