Here's to YOU!!!

So just in case you are wondering. I have the COOLEST. MOM. EVER. Case in point. She works full time and one day a week, she "asks" to take off, to have a grandma day. I didn't realize that she actually had to "ask" for this day off and when it is transient (changes to a different day via my schedule) it is not an easy thing to do, but somehow she always manages to do it. Because that is just what my mom does.

Or when she has been at work ALL day, she will come over to see the girls just because they called and asked her to. Or she makes us dinner. Or she goes shopping to help with the wedding plans. Or she takes my cousin where he needs to go. Or she drops what she is doing to help another. Or ... well you get the point. She is always putting us (her kids) in front of most of her needs.

A few months ago my brother got married. I was trying on dresses, just after Isabella was born and well if you have ever been pregnant you know that (or maybe it is just me) that your body is shaped a little bit differently. Well I tried on this dress and there was absolutely no way the LARGER sizes were going to fit me. I was sad... so I continued to nurse and eat like crap in hopes of losing that baby weight and trying to it into a decent size dress. This was not the occasion for me to wear this dress.

Then came Mother's Day. It was the first without Daxton and I wanted to wear a pretty dress. So back to the store I went.... alas, it was not to be so this time either, however it was one size smaller than the first time. I was making progress. So I went home once again. Empty-handed. Well a few weeks later was Daxton's birthday and it just happened to fall on a Sunday. This day I wanted to really have a new dress, so off treking to the store I went. Alas, this was not to be either. So I vowed to do better.

A few days ago, my sister came home from shopping stating that she had found some good buys for her engagement pics. I was excited to see what she had found. I be darned if she didn't pull out that very same dress. (bless you it wasn't your fault). I was sad, annoyed, and mad. I can't explain why. It is just a dress. But it represented so much more to me. I vowed to go back to the store and get that dress. We can be twinners right?

Again I be darned if I didn't wake up one afternoon and there were two dresses. Hanging up in my closet. My blessed mother had gone to the store and purchased that dress for me, in the size I have tried to fit into. It still isn't a "great" size, but we are making some progress here. But my mom bought be that dress, because she knew what it meant to me. I cried. Because that is just what kind of mother she is.

Tonight we celebrated her 50th birthday. I know. She is SO young. Really. I don't make fun. I will be there someday and the "older" she gets, the "younger" I think that "old" age really is, because I am getting all that much closer to being how "old" she is. Get that? Well anyway. I wanted to do something special for her. She is always saying that she has no friends. HA!!! I proved her wrong today. I had people from all her years here in Mesa come and visit her all day long. Some people didn't think I could do it, but boy did it all work out.

Oh and you know how you have to wait until you are dead for people to remember all the great things you did in life and how wonderful you are? Well we one upped that because my mom is not ever going to die. She is going to live forever. Seriously :). So I thought we would make her a book of all our memories of her, ok not all of them, but some, and tell her how much we loved her. It was created on Blurb.com and seriously. The book turned out SO good. We didn't even get to eat before I had her open it. Each of her children, her brothers and sisters, mom, and of course her husband, my dad, wrote excerpts in this book. It is a tribute to her. It was AWESOME!!!!!!

Her siblings have requested pics. So here they are. Well they are above anyway.

HAPPY 50th BIRTHDAY TO THE BEST. MOM. EVER!!!