Happy Birthday to my Momma

My sweet mother is 55 today. I couldn't have asked for a better mom. Believe me, I did ask once or twice when I was a teenager, but I'm glad it didn't work out.
- When we were growing up, my mom would make us any kind of birthday cake we wanted and I think my brothers really tested the bounds of her ability. Regardless, it always made us feel really special.
- If you ever want to be so embarrassed, yet laugh so hard, take my mom to play air hockey. She screams and yells through the whole game.
- My mom loves to play those video games where you sit on something, like a motorcycle and play. She screams on those too.
- When we were little and it would snow on the car, we were frequently too late for the bus to properly brush all the snow off. She'd drive down the road and say she was in Star Wars hitting "Tide Fighters". She'd make sound effects and swerve a little to make us all laugh on our little drive. Come to think of it, that was probably pretty unsafe.
- Mom would take all five of us to town on Saturdays and we usually had to eat out during the excursion. Always pinching her pennies, she never spent more than a buck on each of us. We had Burger Buddies at Burger King, Chicken Little sandwiches at KFC and plain hamburgers at Artic Circle. Then, oh miracle of miracles, the value menu came out at Taco Bell and they had items for .59, .79, .99 cents. If you got something that was .59, you could have two things, cuz she's nice like that.
- She can make anything or fix anything with her sewing machine. We will see stuff in the store and in an effort to save us money she'll say, "Oh I can make that, " and usually she can.
- She's a great example to me of service. There isn't anything (well, within the bounds of the law) that she won't do for someone else.
- My mom is a terrific grandma. From the moment Natalee was born it was like she forgot about the rest of us. With the addition of each grandchild, this problem has gotten worse. She'll do anything with them and they are so lucky to have a grandma that will play and be silly with them. I never knew how important this would be to me, but it's invaluable!