The grand finale

Three sisters - Three January birthdays - the one in the middle - the Grand Finale!

Our January month of birthdays ends today with Janae's birthday. She is the grand finale and deservedly so! Happy birthday Janae! Janae is an amazing mother of 5 gorgeous girls. I have loved that our children are close together in age and that we are experiencing the challenges & joys of motherhood (& mothering daughters) together. Janae has taught me much when it comes to being a good mother and sister. I marvel at her strength & desire to live a good & righteous life and to impart these things to her children.

Janae was born right after my 8th birthday, and I have always felt a deep connection with her. I thought I was completely special when she was blessed and I was confirmed on the same Sunday. She was the cutest little girl with the feistiest personality. All of her older siblings loved playing with her. However, I think we all remember that when Janae was born, our family ceased going out to dinner at restaurants. The few times that we did go out to eat with baby sister Janae along ended in major disasters because of major little girl temper tantrums and food throwing. Ironically, Janae now loves to go out to eat! I have not known her to throw a tantrum (or food) in a restaurant in years.

Even when Janae was still a kid & I was a young adult, we related to each other and age never seemed to be an issue. I remember well one summer when I was home from college. I was probably about 20 & Janae 12. I was writing letters to a certain missionary (Elder Wallace) and Janae would always tell me that I was going to marry him. I would immediately refute such statements, considering that Elder Wallace and I had never even been on a date. Janae always called Brad "Pat" because she thought he looked like Pat Sajak from Wheel of Fortune. I never agreed with that, but it was all in fun, so "Pat" became our code word for Brad. Almost every night during that summer I would take my pillow & blankets into Janae's room and sleep on the floor by her bed. Before drifting off to sleep, we would talk about "Pat" and what it would be like when I married him (but I wasn't really going to marry him because we had never been on a date), and I thoroughly enjoyed bonding with my little sister at that time - sweet memories for me!

As the oldest sister, I often take the rap for being "bossy", but I have to tell you that Janae rivals any efforts I could ever make of being bossy. She was recently "bossing me around" (as a sibling would say) and I told her she was the bossy one and not me. She said, "I know, I've had too many kids & now I just boss everyone around."

Happy birthday Janae, I hope your day was great!!

And just to embarrass us all - here are those 3 sisters many moons ago!