Happy Fourteenth Birthday to Our Jacob Brian!

Dear Jacob,

Remember how last year I mentioned in my birthday letter to you that high school was looming, and it was looming LARGE?  Well, in less than two weeks you’ll enter the doors, and I am unwell even thinking about it.  That happened even faster than I could have ever imagined it would.  These last 14 years have flown by, and I can hardly believe that we may only have four years left with you under the same roof depending on where you decide to go to college.

But enough of all that… today we celebrate! 

FOURTEEN.  Oh my.  At 14, you are considerate, kind, creative, inquisitive, witty, and so incredibly humble.  You were truly blessed with the best of both worlds – logic and creativity.  I don’t think I’ve ever known anyone who was as evenly right-brained and left-brained as you!  It’s wild! 

You are excellent at math, and schoolwork comes easily to you… your class load for your freshman year looks intimidating, but we are confident that you will handle it with ease and grace.  Rather than taking a regular elective this year (PE, robotics, art, improv, etc.), you chose to double up on your math classes because you, “want to take as many math classes as (you) possibly can in high school.” 

Color me impressed, buddy, because that is not something that I was ever striving to do.  As a matter of fact, I was always striving to do the opposite – I wanted to take as few math classes as humanly possible.

And speaking of math and schoolwork, all of your hard work paid off this past year – your list of awards and accolades in eighth grade was truly impressive, and we can’t wait to see what you do in high school!

But not only do you enjoy academics and learning how everything works, you love to build with Lego, you love to create origami, and you have made some of the most intricate pieces I have ever seen.  You can draw.  You are a masterful piano player.  And you can now pick up the guitar and play a bit just from sitting in on a few of Olivia’s lessons.  It’s truly amazing to watch you toggle back-and-forth between your creative side and your analytical side. 

You also still love to play golf, and you intend to play for the high school this year, so that’s exciting!  We’re hoping that playing at a high school level is something you’ll continue to enjoy, and in the coming years, maybe, just maybe, Daddy will have some serious competition in you.  ;o)

Out of all of those things, though, piano is still my favorite thing that you do… and it’s your favorite thing, too… aside from playing video games, that is!  Ha!  Your piano playing never ceases to amaze me.  You go and sit at your keyboard multiple times per day, and I cannot even tell you how happy it makes me to hear those sweet notes floating through the house.  You play everything from Clair de Lune to Minecraft, and you do all of it beautifully. 

You just wrapped up your third year of lessons, and I’m not sure how much longer you will have to take lessons because it seems that you can play even the most complicated of songs.  As I’ve said before, your talent for piano is a gift straight from God, and I pray that you still love to play it as much as you do now when you’re 88 years old. 

Back to video games – you are SUPER passionate about them, and you still love Minecraft and any Zelda game.  Your Pokemon obsession is still going strong, too, and your card collection has grown exponentially this past year. 

Your friend group at school hasn’t changed – you, WJ, Alex, Jack, Julian, and Ethan – and you’re the six best friends that anyone could have.  (And one day when you’re older, we’ll show you that movie so you can understand that reference.  Hehe.)  Now that most of you have phones, you all have a big group chat that y’all talk in regularly, and occasionally y’all will do a big video chat as well.  As the six of you enter high school together (yes, you are all staying together!), I pray that all of you continue to make good decisions, that you lift each other up, and that you create wonderful memories these next four years that you’ll always be able to revisit when you’re older.

You are also close with Noah and Mack, the kids of my friends – and I can’t even tell you how happy that makes me!  The three of you get together often and you text a lot when you’re not together.  We have poker nights once a month with all of them, and those are always one of your favorite nights of the whole month because y’all get to nerd out over Pokemon and Minecraft and all the things you all have in common.

Your very bestest friend in the whole world, though, and the one who you spend the most time with is still your sister.  Y’all are two peas in a pod when you’re together.  Literally inseparable.  And you get along, like, 99% of the time.  It is truly unbelievable.  And it is truly the biggest blessing. 

Some other random facts about you – you love all of the teenage slang like “6-7” and “Lebron” and anything “Italian brainrot” (we are going to look back at this 20 years from now and be like, “What on earth does that even mean?!”  I actually already ask this daily.  Haha.). 

Your favorite music to listen to is instrumental music, specifically, the music from Minecraft.  It’s surprisingly beautiful, and there are tons of choices, so you could listen forever.  And you do! 

You still hate the heat, and you literally only own two long-sleeve shirts (one for school because it’s required for Mass days, and one for fancy occasions outside of school) because you wear short-sleeves and shorts year-round.  If it dips below 40 degrees, you’ll throw on your school hoodie, but other than that, you won’t touch pants or long-sleeves.  You are still more of an indoor kid than an outdoor kid, and you’d much rather be doing something creative or analytical than anything active.

You’re still a picky eater – BIG SIGGGGHHHH – but you’ve eaten more this summer than usual, so I think you’re going through a growth spurt.  We just measured you for the first time since February, and you’ve grown an inch, and I’m pretty sure that full inch just happened these last few weeks.  One morning a couple of weeks ago, I looked at you, and it looked like you had literally grown overnight.

You still open up to me and talk to me a lot, and I love it.  I hope that high school doesn’t take that away from us.  I know teenagers sometimes get a bad rap, but so far, I don’t understand that at all, because you’ve just gotten more and more fun the older you’ve gotten.  And you’re so very respectful to everyone. 

We are so excited about the upcoming year, and we wish you all the best!  I know that I’ll be typing your 15th birthday letter all too soon, and I don’t even want to think about that right now because that means that you’ll be old enough to get a learner’s permit and drive.  And as I always say every time that conversation comes up –

NO.

Haha.  I’m soooo not ready for any of that.  But I know that time will come, and it’ll be here before I can blink. 

I just love you so much, Boo, and I’m so very grateful that God sent you to me all those years ago.  My beautiful rainbow baby.  My beautiful boy.

Happy 14th birthday!!  Let’s go eat some Chipotle!

Love,

Mommy