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The year I turned seven must have been a hard one financially for my parents. Either that, or they were trying a year of "practical" gifts. The morning after the big party, I remember walked to the bus stop and it was bright and cold and I could see my breath freeze in the air. The neighbor boys were waiting at the end of their gravel driveway-- the ones who came over nearly every day and asked my mom, "Can the girls come out and play?" Their mom shuffled over to me, her hands in her pockets and her shoulders hunched up around her neck in a futile effort to keep her neck and ears warm.

"So! What did you get for your birthday yesterday?! Anything exciting?"
I shuffled. To her, it probably looked like I was trying to keep warm, but in reality, I was trying to think of how I could phrase what gifts I had gotten without sounding like #1) we were poor or #2) my parents were way.too.practical.

"Well, I got one Berenstain Bears book-- you know that one about too much birthday? And these purple gloves. See? Oh! My big gift was a bird feeder with bird seed...."

Sherri smiled and said, "What fun gifts! Here comes the bus, better head on down the driveway!"

I put one plastic pink book in front of the other and thought, "Three gifts... Sherri must think we are poor!" Little did Sherri know, I had *actually* received four gifts, but had kept the fourth inside my little pigtailed head. It embarrassed me, and I would rather have Sherri think I had only 3 gifts than to reveal the unmentionable fourth. I skipped onto the bus, and found a seat in the sea of snowpants and snowcoats.

Tomorrow I will turn 25. In my husband's words, if I live to be 100-- my life is 1/4 over. 75-- 1/3 over. 50-- 1/2 over. (He loves to put things into perspective.)

As I was rocking baby J tonight after his bottle, I held him extra close, and breathed in his sweet little baby breath. What a year this has been. 24 possible could be the best year of my life thus far. I don't know if I will receive any gifts, and if I do, in what category they will fall. All I know is that I have had some of the best moments that I could not have ever bought myself in the past year. J's birth, H's love, My hubby working hard on our house. It is a blessed life.

Now that I am an adult, my request for gifts are becoming increasingly practical as the years go by. I don't need much, I have everything physically I need, and my heart is full of moments that are better than any gift that could be found in a store. However, if I did receive something tangible, I would even be happy now days with the fourth gift I received on my seventh birthday-- a package of underware.