(This post is part of my response to the BlogHer August challenge. The prompt for the month is “hot”)

Look at this cutie! Is it any wonder that my siblings often said that she was going to be the “payback child”? They were sure she would pay me back for everything I had ever done wrong in my life. It was something about the sparkle in her eyes.

Today is my daughter’s birthday. I think somehow that her birthday makes me feel older than my own birthday.  It is one thing to think that the years are passing quickly and another to have the count of candles on her cake increasing so rapidly.

My “baby” is 25 today. She has toddled, walked, made it through grade school, eked her way through high school, flew beautifully through college and sailed through graduate school.  She is amazing. She has studied in foreign countries, interned with a sheriff’s department, interned with the Department of Children and Family Services and worked with foster parents. She is a force to be reckoned with.  She tells stories of what we humans can do to each other (especially what can be done to children) and she believes that she can help.

I admire her.

With Grandma and Grampa after high school graduation

She was named after my Mom. She had a wonderful relationship with her. It was always fun to see them together. She would usually ask my mom if she had had a “kegger” lately. My mom would laugh and say “of course.”  They were buddies. (And sometimes I was the bad guy…)

But how on earth did she get to be 25?

Family is the most important thing in her life. She met a wonderful man who completely agrees with her. They spend a lot of their time with family because they think that is the way it should be.

So, let’s raise a glass of cheer for my daughter’s 25^th birthday.

I swear I got married at the age of 10.

Thanks for reading!