What a whirlwind week it has been. Do I also say that? Why does life never seem to slow down? In any case, here we are again at the end of another week. This week fall sports started up again. Merrick had basketball tryouts with a few different teams, Carrigan started dance and volleyball (all while feeling terrible and barely making it through most days), and Elsie started soccer. I’ll probably save pictures and a more in depth discussion of all that for next week. Today I want to talk about the biggest event of the week, Merrick’s 16th birthday.
How is it possible that Merrick is 16? For years we have told the kids they could not eat on the couch until they had a driver’s license because 16 seemed impossibly far away. And now, inexplicably, we are here. Unfortunately for Merrick, DMV appointments are ridiculously hard to come by these days so he won’t get his license for a couple of weeks, but we still celebrated him as best as we could.
On Friday, his actual birthday, we started the day off with birthday cinnamon rolls. He then had to rush off for seminary and school but I excused him from one class so he could go take an extra long lunch with his friends. After school, we went to the rec center so he could workout and shoot while I took Elsie swimming. We then went to dinner and came home for presents and his request of birthday rainbow sherbet. For his birthday he got some golf balls from his sisters, some money and gifts cards from his grandparents, some random gifts, like a new watch and sweatpants from Jeremy and I. His big gift was a shooting machine that we preordered and should hopefully be delivered this month. While I hope he felt like his birthday was special, our hands were a little tied with school and work, but we were able to make up for that yesterday.
Yesterday, Jeremy and I took Merrick and Colvin down to the U of O game in Eugene. Jeremy had gotten AMAZING tickets through work and we made a day of it. We left early to get down there so we would have time to get some lunch before heading into the stadium. The game itself was tons of fun! It was a complete blowout, we won 69 to 3, but the energy in the stadium was fantastic. After the game we went down to the field and got to exit out through the tunnel. We stopped for dinner on the way home and battled traffic along the way. In the end, it was about a 12 hour day but such a blast!
I’m so glad we had the last few days to celebrate Merrick. The last 16 years have certainly had their ups and downs but being his mom was worth every second. I hope he always knows how special he is and how much we love him.
