Today's Birthday Boy

Y'all. I am exhausted. It's been a very full day but a good one. I'm late posting because we went to August's little birthday party tonight at the Weatherford home and it was a very, very sweet party. Hank and Rachel could not make it because Rachel was up all night last night writing a paper for her PhD program in social work and May and Michael couldn't make it because of work so it was just the Weatherfords and Lily and Lauren and the kids and us. 
The cousins had a wonderful time playing. There was pizza and there was a piñata and there were key lime pies- one for August and one for the rest of us. The boy wanted to do what Aunt May so often does on her birthday which is to ask for the same. That picture looks like no one was there watching him blow out his candles but I assure you that from the other perspective, we were cheering him on. 

Pictures. 

You can figure out what was going on in all of them. 

Eight years old, that boy is. I can't believe it. While we were eating our pizza we all went around the circle and told what we like most about August and almost everyone mentioned that we love how he is who he is and doesn't care what anyone else thinks. As Aunt Lily said, "That's very rare, August."

And it is. 

We love him so. 

And now Mr. Moon and I are home, both of us glad to be. I spent most of the day making sweet and sour pepper relish. 

The food processor and I chopped about five gazillion peppers, a head of cabbage, two large onions, and six apples. I sterilized jars and lids, salted and let the vegetables sit for two hours, drained it all, cooked them with a vinegar and sugar brine, jarred it up, canned it in a boiling water bath, and it all resulted in three quarts of the relish which I felt was an insultingly small amount of product for the work and ingredients involved. 

But that's the way it goes. I hope it's good. 

Thank all of you for your suggestions regarding leg cramps. Trust me- Mr. Moon has used and does use all of the things from pickle juice to Thera-Cramp to Hyland's cramp pills to Gator Aid to...well. All of it. This is a problem he's had his entire life and it's mostly due to the circulation situation in his legs which has never been great. It's a familial trait. His best defense is working out to keep that circulation going and he does that faithfully along with all the other things. Lily and Jessie also get leg cramps. 

Why does it always seem that our kids get the worst parts of our genetics? Nearsightedness, leg cramps, anxiety, allergies- just to name a few that we've passed on. 
But there's also tallness (not from me, obviously), a good sense of humor, and a decent level of intelligence. 
It will be interesting to see what the grandchildren seem to have gotten from the different sides of the family. Some of it I can definitely already see. Some of it will become more apparent with age. Isn't it all a beautiful and curious mystery? 

Happy birthday, darling August. I am so glad you were born. I can't imagine a world without you in it. 

Happy Friday, y'all. 

Love...Ms. MerMer Moon