A Baby No Longer...

Well, my youngest son turned 21 yesterday.  I think it's safe to say that he's a baby no longer...but he's always going to be MY baby.

Sometimes, I am almost at a loss as to how I can adequately put into words just how wonderful this son is.  I love to write about him; this post from two years ago, on the occasion of his birthday, is a favorite of mine. 

You will think I am exaggerating and seeing things through incredibly opaque and decidedly rose-colored glasses when I tell you that he has given his father and me pretty much complete joy (with pretty much no requirement for disciplinary measures) his entire life.  (Aside from a year-long phase of throwing temper tantrums periodically, from age 3 to age 4--but you can hardly count that.  And he went into that brief lion's phase as docile as a lamb, then came out the other end as sweet and compliant as ever.) 

This son never acted like the spoiled baby--even though when he came along, we had four older boys ages 5 through 9, and he could have played the baby card to the hilt.  Instead, he couldn't wait to be "one of the guys"; to be in on his big brothers' teasing jokes; to follow in his heroes' footsteps in all things--playing football and lacrosse and attending the same high school where they'd made a name for the Pearl family.  He idolized them and used them as his role models, in his humility never knowing that in his own right, he is a role model for any young man.  He is the most even-keeled, sweet, obedient, hard-working, responsible, intelligent, funny kid.  He's never the loudest person in the room, but he makes friends wherever he goes.  I think his peers are drawn to his genuine goodness. 

This son of mine would probably be embarrassed if he read this (but I doubt he will, because he's not a regular follower of my blog--which is perhaps the only weakness in his character--he he he); but truly, he is a rare soul.  He was always more grown up-acting than his age.  As a small boy, he seemed like an old sage trapped in a wee child's body.  As a middle-schooler, I can't count the number of times on a Friday night that he would ask his dad or me if we would be able to drive him over to church for Confession the next afternoon; then after he turned 16 and got his driver's license, I can't count the number of times he would appear all cleaned up, wearing khakis and a nice polo shirt on a Saturday afternoon, ready to drive himself over to Confession.  And this urge to receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation on a regular basis was--and is--just part of his make-up, because it's not like we were ever constantly on his back to do it.

I say this about my boys a lot--about different ones at different times--but when I grow up, I want to be just like my youngest son.

We were able to Face-time with him yesterday, before he went out for the night to enjoy a legal alcoholic beverage or two with his 21-and-over buddies at school, and the conversation started with a dose of humor.  My husband and I said "Happy Birthday!"--and with a big smile on his cute mug our boy responded automatically, "Yeah, Happy Birthday!  Woops, I mean...ha ha."  We all started to laugh about his faux pas and we quoted comedian Brian Regan: "You don't know how to use the 'you, too' phrase!"  It was so funny. 

Wait, you do know what I'm talking about, right?  If not, here's a YouTube clip of one of our favorite comedians (Jim Gaffigan being the other), a nice Irish Catholic boy whose humor is absolutely G-rated and absolutely hilarious.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2-5mDyCKac

Here's a picture of the almost all-grown-up birthday boy from this past Christmas, with his dear old dad.

Well, I hope you enjoyed reading about my adorable son and listening to that adorable comedy sketch.  Now I'm off to be a loyal wife and watch the Patriots-Broncos game with my hubby.  I hope you've got plans as exciting as ours on this restful Sunday afternoon.

And I hope you're rooting for Tom Brady today (although I know it's hard not to root for that sweet Southern boy, Peyton--he's supposed to be the enemy here in NE, but I secretly like him way more than I should).

And hey, take luck!

Life is Good (Better Than I Deserve!)

Have I got any readers left?  Have you all stopped coming by my little "String of Pearls," sick and tired of never ever seeing anything new posted on here?

It used to be that blogging was as much a part of my daily life as drinking coffee, but that sure hasn't been the case lately!  I'm on the road too much these days--and although I lug my ginormous, heavy old laptop hither and yon, whether I'm traveling by car or by plane (because my husband and I are never home long enough to get my new smaller, lighter laptop loaded and ready to go!), I rarely get around to using it for the purpose of blogging. Actually doing stuff, instead of spending my time telling you about the stuff I'm doing--or stuff I'm thinking about doing, or stuff that I did twenty years ago, or stuff that I wish I had the guts to do--has been getting in the way, I guess.  That is a sign, I believe, that life has been very full...and very good.

My husband and I drove out to South Bend over the long Labor Day weekend to visit our youngest son, and also to meet up with my husband's seven siblings and various and sundry members of their families.  We always try to get together for at least one Notre Dame home game every season, and this was the weekend everyone was able to make it. It was the 2013 "Pearl-a-Palooza," an event that gets more epic with each passing year. We rented a big house, had a big tailgater before and after the game, and basically just enjoyed being together, laughing, talking, and drinking an adult beverage or two.

We got to see the Irish win their Saturday opener against Temple, handily.  During his outdoor comedy show on the South Quad Thursday night, comedian Jim Gaffigan made fun of the fact that we were playing Temple, which is hardly a football powerhouse; but still, it was a W.  Gaffigan joked, "Was DeVry not available?"  (What a great show!  My husband and I arrived a few hours beforehand, after our 16-hour road trip--with plenty of time pull up a good patch of grass fairly close to the stage, along with our youngest son and some other family members.)

Okay, let's see.  What else can I tell you about the weekend?  Oh, yeah...by now you've probably heard about the souvenir soda cups from the game.

Notre Dame is taking some good ribbing all over the Internet, but that's okay. We are the Fig-Thing Irish! We are fans of all things fig!  Go, fig, win!

Our son, who is a junior out there this year, thinks the students should just run with it--you know, make t-shirts with a picture of the ND leprechaun's head, arms, and legs poking out of a Fig Newton body, or something along those lines.  If we laugh at ourselves, ND-haters won't get any satisfaction out of making fun of us over this unfortunate typo/editing disaster.

Sheesh--typos!  They are absolutely the bane of my existence.  Now they're the bane of ND fans' existence as well.  But you have to pick your battles, and you can't fig about every little thing.  Sometimes you just have to put down your dukes, laugh, and move on.

It sure was great to see my baby boy out at Our Lady's university.

I love that kid.  Can you tell I love that kid?  (He's funny, isn't he?)

It was also great to do some shopping for my grand-babies: cheerleading uniforms for the twins and a polo dress for Little Gal.  I'd say we've got them all outfitted for the ND-Air Force game a few weeks from now. That's the next game we plan to attend, out at the AF Academy in CO--which is literally minutes from where our little sweeties live.  Papa and I will be killing two birds with one stone when we head out west on that trip.

Do you think we're trying to brainwash our grandchildren?  (And is there anything wrong with that?)

I almost got a chance to meet up with South Bend native Katrina, whose blog is called "Cedars & Tiny Flowers," but our plans fell through.  I'm hoping when we go back out to ND for the Oklahoma game she and I will be able to make it work out.  That would be wild to meet a blogger I admire but have only known on-line up to this point.

So you see, life is good.  I'm a lucky, lucky lady, and don't I know it.  I'm traveling a lot these days to see my far-flung chicks, but I'm fortunate that my husband's airline career provides us with a way to do that without going into the poor house.

That's it for now, but before I go I just want to say thank you to my blogging friend Sarah Therese over at "Footprints on My Heart."  Aside from writing for her personal blog, Sarah has also joined other young Catholic women bloggers at "The Catholic Young Woman," and today she posted a great review of Finding Grace on that site.  If you'd like to read it, just click on this link:
http://catholicyoungwoman.blogspot.com/2013/09/finding-grace.html.

Again, thanks, Sarah Therese.  And thanks, too, for the "Scrumptious Blog Award" nomination!  (My cup runneth over!)  I will work on that in the coming days.  :)