Dear "Sweet" Sofia,

Diesiseis.

I've been in love with you for sixteen years, ten months, and 38 hours as of 2:01 pm this afternoon.

Now, you were twelve and fifteen in between that time - so I haven't always been in like with you for all of those hours.  But I've loved you.

The day we brought you home I remember thinking, wait... they're just gonna GIVE her to me?  No home check, no paper signing, no manuals?  Just:  here's a baby - try not to break her.  And I have tried.

Through your third year when you decided to flip the Brat switch and seemingly forever lose the docile button.

Through your sixth year when you realized we weren't kidding about a second sister.

When you were ten and really started honing your argument skills.

That twelfth year when I was pretty certain one of us would be brought up on charges.

Fourteen.  When you decided, after some serious restructuring, that we could be a team.

When you became a blonde at fifteen (not my favorite phase, but I remind myself daily that it's better than slamming doors and throwing things).

And last week when, after leaving a banquet honoring your academic prowess, you said:  "I know where I want to live: California.  The weather is perfect and I've seen in pictures that they have little like guest houses, so you can come too."  It's the first time your plans included me since I was barbie number three in your marathon lay on the floor and change tiny outfits a million times phase.  I was so thankful it was dark enough in the car that you couldn't see my watery eyes - the sigh and eye roll would've really ruined our moment.

They call this one Sweet sixteen.  I'm not buying it, though.  I'm guessing it's like the terrible twos that really weren't terrible at all.  Because, my first love, you are not sweet.  You are strong and smart and beautiful and mildly addicted to potatoes like your mama.  You are capable and thoughtful and the coolest kid Eva has ever met.  You are impressive and frustrating and difficult, all the things Maya strives for.  You are freaking blonde .  And you are unbreakable.

I couldn't be more proud and amazed by most of that.

Always,

Mama

Dear Eva,

Genuine heart.  Generous spirit.  Wicked left foot.  Honest eyes.  Gym teacher style.  Smiles for miles.  Corny sense of humor.  Beautiful girl.

Thank you for not giving up and for believing in yourself almost as fiercely as those who love you.  Thank you for letting me watch from the sidelines as you become a little more yourself every day.  Thank you for eating everything I put in front of you - except roasted broccoli, because you can't be perfect.  Thank you for loving me.

Your sisters always say that you're my favorite and that I think you do no wrong.  They're only a little wrong.  You are not perfect, my love.  Your ridiculous use of the words "bruh" and "lit" are all the evidence I need of that.  You are, however, so immeasurably wonderful that the lines are often blurred.  

Thank you for being such a bad liar that you usually give up halfway through.  Thank you for being the calming voice I hear when I come a little too close to crossing a line.  Thank you for still getting excited for driveway soccer.  And, thank you for the patience you show when I'm not able to go out and play.

Eva, your thirteen years have been full of sunshine and love.  Thank you for bringing that to all of us.  We could not love you more if you put on a real shirt more than once a month.  May this year show you more laughter than you will ever get from your silly google jokes.  And may you always remember our song.

You are my sunshine.  My only sunshine.

Always,

Mama

Job #1, check.

There's a jar that sits on our kitchen table marked "Family dinner questions".  It's been a staple of every dinner for a couple of years now.  We fill it with questions that provoke conversations (not the standard yes/no answers I got way too frequently before the jar appeared) and it can only be done when we are all at home (hence, a complete family conversation).  The questions are anything from "if you could create your own school, what would it be like?" to "if you could invent your own ice cream flavor, what would it be?" to "what do you think your parents were like when they were kids?".  Simple questions that often provoke some giggles and sometimes some disagreements.

The other night, the question was: "Who do you trust the most and why?"

Unanimously. 

Simultaneously.

And within a breath of the question being read.

"Mama."

I'm not much of a smiler.  I'm not much of a blusher.  Hell, I'm not much of a self-prider.

But I was all three in the minutes that followed.  Honestly, I'm feeling all of it as I write this.

My people aren't hurting in the love and support categories.  They are all incredible human beings, and that means they attract those kind of people to them.  My girls are surrounded by people who would, and have, dropped everything to help them.  There have been times when I felt the failure of doing the wrong thing for these, my completely right daughters.  There have been many nights when I broke under the pressure of trying to keep up with their needs and dreams.

And the moments when it is shown to me that they don't mind my frequent missteps flabbergast me every single time.

They trust me.  Most of all.

They have options, and they choose me.  They have evidence of my complete ineptitude, and they choose me.  No one has ever done that before - chosen me.  And I cannot imagine a better veteran victory.

These girls don't always like me.  They may not always respect my dinner choices.  They could, one day, not pick me for driveway soccer.  But they trust me more than anyone else on earth.

I must be doing something right.

The man. The myth. The legend.

It's Father's Day.  Honestly, not a big deal around this house.  For reasons too painful and numerous and confusing to parse out.

But there's this guy.

He's side-splitting funny.

He's honorable and generous.

He's reliable and kind and caring.

He makes the absolute best Caesar dressing.

He's never, not one single time in my whole lotta years, let me down.

He loves my girls as if they were the most impressive little people on earth.

He's always got a box full of Pirelli swag to hand out to the least automotive people he knows.

And, he is the only person to ever think, let alone say, that I am easy to love.

Happy Father's Day, Uncle Pat.

Thank you for letting Aunt Baba mother me.  Thank you for insisting on calling me Sari Sue despite the fact that I'm now old as dirt.  Thank you for being the only man my mother could tell her boyfriends "Don't talk to Sarah like that in front of him - he won't allow it."  Thank you for respecting my actions as a mama even when you thought (probably fairly) I was being too strict.  Thank you for waiting till I left the room to give them ice cream anyway.  Thank you for FaceTime conversations and one night in town quick lunches.  Thank you for loving me.

I couldn't be luckier.

Always,

Sarah

Anonymity turns your insecurity into false bravery

She friended him on Instagram because she thought the request came from a kid at school.  I have told them, from the time I granted supervised access to social media, not to friend anyone they didn't know in real life.  The only exception being, of course, Harry Potter.  Obviously, a wizard is an important ally in this muggle world.

So she allowed a kid she thought she recognized to follow her on Instagram.  Harmless because she posts pictures like 

And 

So what harm could come from showing her perspective to the world, right?

Wrong, of course.

Enter this person

This person went on a two day campaign of tagging my child in memes like "ugliest person on the Internet".  This person who, it turns out, has never met my child.  This person who, it turns out, actually lives in Texas.  This person who, it turns out, is just too far out of my range of annihilation.  

He hurt my child.  Obviously for no reason and obviously out of insecurity and inferiority.  But none of that mattered to the big brown eyes that poured out pleas for help.

So I researched.  I enlisted help from anyone I thought could give it.  I waited impatiently.  And all I could discover was his location and complete lack of responsibility.  The Internet offered him anonymity and he used it to interfere with my child.  To wander into her days and cause her to doubt things everyone who actually knows her tells her in real life.

Because that's what we do, right?  We, the "good" guys, allow the opinions of salt shakers (his Instagram profile) to shape our views.  While the bad guys hide on their neighbor's wifi and spew ignorance and judgements.  We set aside what we know to be true for things that maybe could be true because why else would a stranger say it to me.  

We give power to the simple minded and the weak.  We give our power to the unworthy and the cowardly.  Until we realize that those living in the shadows are there because we put them there.  They are living in the shadows of the rest of us who can stand tall enough in the light to cast a hiding place for the inconsequential and the insignificant.

My child doesn't stand in the light for this punk to hide behind her.  She stands there because that's where she belongs.

I can't talk to this person's parents, but I can tell my child exactly the same thing I would've told them.

He is nothing on the map of my kid's life and will be forgotten by next month.  As he should be.  But if I ever see him in real life, the shadows won't help him.

If you give a kid a box

If you give a kid a box, her eyes will light up and she will excitedly empty it of its goodies.  Then one of her sisters will use her best manners to ask to keep the box.  And the kid will say "ok" while she trots off with the goodies.  Then, out of nowhere, the other sister will declare the box is hers.

That kid will decide to create a getaway in the box. 

When the first sister cries foul, she will say mean, though basically true, things about the stowaway.

Then that sister will smack the stowaway on what she presumes to be the forehead.

This will cause the oldest sister to strike back using her words - as mama always taught her.

Finally, the manners using, sweet hearted middle sister will wrestle the box away and take her final revenge (?).

All because you gave a box to a kid who missed all the fun because she was off with the goodies and didn't recognize the value of the box.

The end.

Dear Maya,

Words fail, my littlest love.  

To define you.

To describe my love for you.

To characterize everything that you are.

I know because I tried.  I decorated your bedroom door last night in nothing but words I intended to capture you.  I got to forty seven before I gave up.  

Because you are so much.  You are every one of the basic qualities that all of the greats embody - smart, funny, beautiful, good.  And, you are all the important character traits of any good cartoon villain - wily, brilliant, ornery, and oh so very charming.

My love,  you have always been more.  And, every year, I find undiscovered territory through your eyes.  Challenging heights and breathtaking vistas.  Indescribable pride and unfathomable storylines.  Being your mama is, to put it simply, the source of most of my gray hair and almost all of my laugh lines.

Whether they're from your patient teachers, your impatient sisters, your many admirers or your exasperated mama, all stories begin with the same sentence :  "I love her, but you won't believe what Maya did."

We do believe it though.  Because, at nine years old, you are simply more than other kids.  Not better or worse, just more.

And we would have you no other way.  No matter how unbelievably ornery you are proven to be, you continue to be soft and loving.  Brave and strong.  Genuine and full of love.

More than forty seven words.  More than I could have ever dreamed of.  Undefinable and free from anyone's simplification of who you should be.

Happy birthday to the girl who overflows my patience and my heart.  Thank you for never giving me rest or calm.  I remain grateful you allow me to bask in your shine.

Always,

Mama