Go Fourth!

The fun thing about having older kids is that they become your momentum.

You create the magic when they are young and they help create magic as they get older.

(When I find 20 selfies on my phone- I know that my little ladies are feeling good about themselves.  Some girl bonding lifts spirits and inspires confidence.)

This year, my girls advocated for 4th of July outfits, hair, and nails.

So fun.

I love this family of mine.

While our younger kids partied with friends of ours, Todd and I took the two older boys to a dance with LDS youth from Syracuse, Palmyra and Rhode Island.  

I loved dancing with Todd.  He's fun to dance with- and it's so nice feeling strong enough to move!

We really enjoyed watching our boys.  We've been chaperones for years and can hardly believe we are old enough to have kids this old.

I don't feel like I'm bragging when I talk about them, perhaps it's because I have always felt so humbly blessed to be their mom.

I watched Drew include an cute, incredibly shy boy.  It was adorable watching him teach him the "lawn mower", "shopping cart", and "sprinkler" dance moves.  I'm pretty certain he learned those from Jakob who learned them from me.  Haha.

Honestly, I got teary at the end of the night when Jakob asked an adorable physically disabled girl to dance the last dance.  He looks down when he dances with me these days.  The girl he danced with was tiny.  I saw him treat her with the same respect and tender gentleness that he treats his little sisters.  My boys will be great men someday.  How grateful I am to be their mother.

Jakob isn't always sweet- we had a humdinger of an argument about screens the other day.  He's not perfect- but he is really, really good.  What a fun time of life- being a mother of teenagers.

I love living in America.

Life is so good.

Happy Weekend!