Happy birthday Jeric!

My "original" baby is 19 years old today!!!  I remember taking care of Jeric as a baby and thinking that when he grew up, he was gonna be the smartest and sweetest boy ever ... and that's exactly the case!!!  Jeric is so talented with his writing and he's incredibly loving.  That trait has stuck with him all these years ...  we are so blessed to have him in our family.  Even though we give him a hard time on various things (it's more for fun than anything else), he has grown up into such a fine young man.  Any girl should consider herself seriously blessed to have him as a boyfriend/husband.  I'm so proud of him and am so excited to witness more growth throughout the upcoming years.  I love that Zoe loves him, too!  She plays with him differently than how she plays with everyone else.  It's like she knows that he's the next youngest person there and they have some kind of secret bond =).  I really miss being a second mom to Jeric.  When I got married, I had to slowly step away from that role and step into my new role as "wife" ... and now that I'm a mom, I've stepped even further away from that role to him ... but I hope he knows that me stepping away from the "mom" role to him only allows me to step back into "sister" and "friend".  Life does that, I guess ... because it's constantly changing -- because you're constantly changing -- it allows you to evolve into different roles in peoples lives.  It allows you to love people in lots of different ways.  I hope Jeric knows that I'm still here for him and will always be here for him ... second to my mom, I'm probably one of his biggest fans.  I KNOW he'll continue to be amazing in the years to come ... his best days are definitely still yet to come.

To celebrate his special day, my family went to mass where afterward, Monsignor Kevin gave him a special birthday blessing.  After, we all ate at Souplantation (family favorite) ... and after that, mom got him a NEW CAR!  He ended up getting a Scion ... the beetle was on it's last leg and mom wanted to make sure he had a safe car to drive around.  Talk about blessed!!!  

Happy birthday Jeric!!! May you always know your worth and how much you are loved and admired by your family and so many others!!  God has a wonderful plan for your life -- keep your eyes, ears and most importantly, your heart open to His voice and you will not be led astray ...