Leftovers . . .

Spring is right around the corner.
Really.
I can feel it in the air.
Smell it blowing through my open windows.
Feel it when I walk outside and the sun hits just so.
Spring makes me giddy!
Really.
I think Josiah is on the mend, and so, we will return to school tomorrow.
Today, we got caught up on his schoolwork and I got caught up on laundry.
There's that "L" word again.
Yep. I kicked my laundry's butt today. But I am under no delusions. It will be back with a vengence . . . tomorrow.
All in all, it was a productive day.
Isaac, who will be 12 in June, is working on some noticeable facial hair. He is so proud of this fact.
I look at him and think . . . well . . . I'm not ready to think about him being able to shave yet at all . . .let alone needing to!
I remember the day I had him. He was soooo little.
And that was just yesterday . . . wasn't it?
'Fraid not.
Almost a dozen years have gone by.
Wow.
Almost a dozen years have gone by . . . (Patti, I'm having a Brittney Murphy moment here).
It's amazing and wonderful to watch him growing into a young man . . . and yet, sometimes my arms ache to hold him as a baby again.
I remember holding him up on my shoulder when he was a newborn (Or fairly new. He was in the hospital the first few weeks of his life, fighting to live. And live he did.), his face right next to mine, his baby breath on my cheek. I remember thinking, "I will never forget this moment for as long as I live."
Holding my first baby. My fine, strong son. 
It was like no other feeling in the world.
And it feels like just yesterday and a million years ago all at the same time.
Anyway, when Isaac got into the car after school today he said, "Mom, the little kids are starting to realize I'm growing a mustache."
Did he really say "mustache" to me . . . about himself?
Apparently, one of the younger kids pointed out that Isaac has dark hair growing on his upper lip.
It made his day.
And him telling me about it made mine!

Another nice thing about today . . . my friend Kerri came over for dinner this evening.
We had leftovers of Sunday's pasta and meatballs.
When I put the bowl of pasta on the table, Daniel said in an awed voice, "Mom, that's beautiful . . . "
"What's beautiful? The pasta?
"Yeah . . ."
And so it was.

 Grandpa's pasta . . . it keeps giving and giving and giving . . . just like Grandpa!
We had a good time.
Isaac told us about the younger kids noticing his "mustache."
Joe was smiling, but, if I know Joe at all, he was saying to himself . . . "Don't grow up too fast, bud."
Here are some pics of the young 'uns in hats, taken during our time at home together.

 My handsome little men.
Don't grow up too fast.