Our little grandson Jackie is 5 years old today! A birthday that my mother always described to a child as a whole handful (of fingers. get it?).

It’s hard to believe this little sweet baby

Is now this big boy

Here are 5 things about Jackie right now . . .

1. His favorite food is spaghetti. He also really likes grilled cheese sandwiches, ice cream, cheese and crackers, chicken nuggets, and candy. His favorite color is blue. He can also tell you the favorite colors of everyone in our immediately family.
2. He loves the outdoors. He just wants to be outside all.the.time. He’s rarely cold (he actually loves winter, which is so weird to me) and he wants to explore everything, whether he’s riding his trike or going down back with his grandpa to look for turtles, or having fun at the playground.
3. He goes to preschool 3 afternoons a week. On Fridays, I pick him up and we hang out. The first week, I took him for ice cream to celebrate. The second week, we watched Moana and he ate . . . are you ready? . . . peanut butter toast, ritz crackers with cheese, and chicken nuggets. It was like the Very Hungry Caterpillar came to life in my kitchen! This week I think we will make chocolate pudding parfaits.
4. He loves sea creatures. Sharks, octopus, all kinds of fish, coral and more. He draws them (he’s quite good) and he reads about them and he talks about them. Speaking of reading, of course he loves books. He has SO many (no surprise there, right?) and his favorite is this one that’s all about color.
5. He’s a sweet and friendly little boy. He has always been empathic (I wish you could have seen him patting Dale’s leg after the accident) and it’s really apparent now that he’s in school and making friends. He cares about everyone and his heart is so big.

Happy 5th Birthday to Jackie!

Do you remember
the 21st night of September?
If you do, then you know it’s my annual guest blogging day here at Carole Knits and it’s time for me to celebrate Carole’s birthday by giving her the day off from writing a blog post.

This year, Carole’s birthday doesn’t fall into one of those special landmark years like Sweet 16, Twenty One and Legal or 30, 40, 50, 60 . . . 100! It was, however, a year of challenges health wise for Carole. There was pain and discomfort, aches and swelling of joints, and anxiety over the fear of the unknown.

As you all know, we had a wonderful trip to Iceland a little over a year ago for Hannah and Mikey’s wedding. All was fine . . . and then it wasn’t. Carole had a hint of trouble during the trip, which included a lot of hiking, and she just thought maybe she had overdone it and hoped all would be well once we returned to our normal routine. Wrong. It just got worse . . . she couldn’t wear her rings, walking was terribly uncomfortable, in fact most movement made her miserable, and she was scared. She knew she needed more than a few Advil and so the search for answers began. Through her doctor, who recommended different specialists, and friends, who shared similar conditions with her and gave good advice and comfort, a road to recovery was established. It wasn’t always easy and there were tears and frustration, but just starting the process of figuring out what was wrong shed some light in the darkness.

She’s written about it some here and basically she discovered she has an autoimmune disorder of inflammatory arthritis. Possibly psoriatic arthritis but there’s no specific diagnosis . . . which is weird but we’ve learned that it really doesn’t matter yet since the initial treatments are all the same. Is the road to recovery complete? No, this is something that will be around for the foreseeable future. But it’s certainly much better than it was on her birthday last year and the discomfort she feels now doesn’t overwhelm her the way it did a year ago.

I think when birthdays come along that it’s nice to look back on the past year. Most are good, some are great, and some are challenging. We’ve been dealing with challenging ones lately, that’s for sure, with the passing of my brother, me getting hit by a car, struggling (along with the whole world) through a pandemic, and then Carole getting sick. But, you know, resilience is a gift and Carole has shown that she has plenty of that. She fought hard to stay positive and maintain our lifestyle and routines all through this past year, even when she was the one with the pain.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that I’m very proud of my wife and how she has handled her diagnosis and the challenges that have come along with it. In fact, I think she’s pretty remarkable and I hope you all take a minute to wish her a happy, happy birthday. I hope when we meet again on the next 21st of September that we’ll be looking back at a year of smooth sailing!

Dale

I would be remiss if I let this week pass by without telling you that our little grandson Jackie turned 4 on Monday.

I asked Jessica for a good, recent picture of him and she sent me this one. I think it captures him perfectly! He’s sweet and smart and determined. He loves his family, playing with cars, and being outdoors. Today he’s starting a weekly preschool art class that we all think he will love. He’s brought us so much joy for the last 4 years and we are an incredibly lucky family to have him in our bunch.

Happy Birthday, little bug, Nana loves you so much!

It’s that time of year again, where I write a blog post for Carole’s birthday so that she can have the day off from her blog and celebrate in style. I’m not sure I can top last year’s post but here goes anyway.

When it comes to birthdays around here, we don’t just celebrate, we also contemplate. Of course, the celebrating is a big part of what we do, not only today, but usually a few days on either side of a birthday, too. We include the typical things like family, friends, food, drink and cake, and try to work in some new adventures if possible.

The contemplating, though, is special, and it’s something we try and do regularly, on anniversaries and when the seasons change, but it’s particularly important on birthdays. We sit and talk about the things we accomplished over the past year, who we saw, where we want, etc and we think about what we want to do in the upcoming year. It’s not as formal as setting goals or writing lists (although I have a feeling Carole does that on her own) but it’s definitely a way of identifying the stuff that matters.

For Carole and I, music is always at the center or our celebrations, contemplations, and pretty much everything we do together. I don’t really understand how Spotify works and I can’t operate our Sonos system, but I’m hoping for a special playlist for tonight. First, I want to play our wedding song, Moon River, not just because we love it but also because the full moon coincides with Carole’s birthday this year. Second, it’s the last day of summer so I’m hoping for a dance on the deck to The Summer Wind as one season ends and another begins. Finally, while those two songs are among Carole’s favorites, I recently rediscovered an old favorite of mine, I’ll Never Find Another You. Tonight, I want to hold hands with Carole and wish her a Happy Birthday while that song plays in the background.

It’s a long, long journey
So stay by my side
When I walk through the storm
You’ll be my guide, be my guide
If they gave me a fortune
My pleasure would be small
I could lose it all tomorrow
And never mind at all
But if I should lose your love, dear
I don’t know what I’d do
For I know I’ll never find another you

Happy Birthday, baby, I love you forever.