Things that are awesome about my mom

1. She always made our birthday cakes, with homemade frosting from scratch. They are the best cakes in the entire world
2. She also made Happy Birthday Jesus cakes every Christmas.

3. She read to us every single night before bed from as early as I can remember. I in fact don't remember ever learning how to read.


4. She joined the Navy after being dared to by her brother.

5. She showed me that a woman could have a career, and should work hard. She was able to support our family when my dad was between jobs for several months when I was little.
6. She (and my dad) struck a good balance between letting us know that they had high expectations of me and my sisters, without making us feel that we would lose their love if we happened to fall short. I think finding this balance was probably a hard thing to do.
7. She started doing triathlons in her 50's. and made me do them with her.

8. She can and does mispronounce every word with an origin in another language, and can laugh at herself about this.
9. growing up, she let me rearrange my room/ partially redecorate every few weeks without making a peep.
10. She let us travel as part of our educations, then decided we shouldn't have all the fun, and started going herself.


11. She can pull together a full meal for eight on a few hours notice. With like six different sides.
12. When I was growing up, I was never grounded. But if I gave her attitude or slammed the door to my room, she just took the door off for a week. (with the rationale that I was to immature to deserve a door at that time).
13. She has driven all over the state of Texas to take me and my sisters to swim meets, regattas, and soccer games.
14. She knows the entire available inventory of Costco at any given time.
15. She made up songs to sing to us when we were little.
16. She continues to make goals for knowledge or experience for herself each year. in the last few years, she has traveled to Israel, learned how to play golf, and finished several triathlons.
17. She is as bad of a dancer as I am, but does it with great joy.

18. There is love:

19. She has even worse ADD Than me.
20. She's just great. That's all there is to it.