It's Official! I'm a Football Mom, Too!

Today is a Banner Day in my household! It can't get much better than this!

One child a Freshman in college, another a Freshman in high school. My big fish in their little ponds have now been dumped into bigger ponds! AND my baby played in his first official High School football game!

The youngest of my three children, the smallest of my babies ... the little boy who barely weighed 7 pounds and whose little bitty legs looked like twigs when he was born has grown into a 260-pound Defensive Tackle with a size 12 shoe that any Football Mom would be proud to call her own!

We put a football helmet and pads on this child at six years old, and he has played with all his heart ever since. The game has not always been his friend ... he has been discouraged and disgruntled at times, but he always comes back to it. And that kind of perseverence can only be explained by a genuine love of the game!

Oh, and he's a pretty good kid, too!

It's Official! I'm a Hokie Mom!!

We delivered our daughter to her college dorm room tonight. A fairly painless procedure for us ... if you compare us to the thousands of other exhausted parents and students who had been =Moving In= all day. Remember, my daughter is very independent and self-sufficient ... she had already filled her car to the brim and carted =just= about everything she owns to her new address earlier in the day.

Oh, and she's very pretty, too (even if I am her mom) ... so there were plenty of "Frat Boys" available to help her unload her car.

So all we had to do was walk her to her door, kiss her good night, and tell her that we love her ... and that we are very, very proud of her.

But surprisingly, what I thought would be the easiest part of this whole "High School to College" transition with her actually turned out to be the hardest. The hardest part was coming home ... coming home, knowing that my daughter would not sleep under the same roof with us ... coming home without her, turning off the front porch lights and locking the door ... locking the door to a home that did not shelter all of my children for the night. And, until tonight, I thought I would welcome the day when my daughter grew up and didn't need us any more.

Our job is almost done. And I think we've done a pretty good job preparing this young lady for what's next.