Happy Birthday David!!!!

Happy 36th Birthday to my middle child, William David Bain. It was May 6, 1974 and I was thrilled to have a boy! In fact, I wanted and prayed for 4 boys so we could have a basketball team - I would be the 5th member, not Bill; he was always out buying antiques somewhere! What is the country song about sometimes "God's greatest gifts are unanswered prayers"?!! As it turned out, one boy was quite enough! David was home 3 days and then was in Texas Children's Hospital for 10 days with meningitis. God's grace got us through this and many more adventures in his lifetime!

David was a cute, white-headed, wild, energetic dare devil all of his life and now has two boys just like him. What goes around, comes around! He couldn't have cared less about girls, dressing up, Sunday School, choir at church, long car trips, piano lessons or school in general. He was most active at bed/bath time and the only reason he liked books was because it meant I had to read more and this postponed finally going to bed! He wasn't too high on swimming lessons. On the 2nd day of swim lessons I told him to go get ready and he said, "I already had it". I guess one day was good enough for him.

He loved his sisters, Jenny and Jaime, cars, boots, jeans with back pockets, puppies, all sports, dirt piles, his fort in the back yard, hanging Jaime's Cabbage Patch dolls by a rope from the balcony, cereal at 3:00 a.m. every night, his neighborhood buddies, drums, his snake "Lars", his grandparents and his cousins; in fact, he and Melissa got into much mischief, some of which, if printed, would probably incarcerate both of them! She was one year older than him and equally immature. His other cousin, Robyn, was older and more grounded than her sister! His girlfriend when he was young was Jennifer Turner; I asked him once who his girlfriend was and he said, "Turnerfer". That is what we still call her to this day. They once tried to find gold in a hill of dirt in our back yard while playing cowboys! One Valentine's day he was making cookies with me - one of those few days he was actually in the house and I knew where he was - he asked me, "when you fall in love, can you get up?" (Guess that depends on how hard you fall!!) I always hoped he would not really wear my wedding gown at his wedding!!

I asked him once what he wanted to be when he grew up and he said, "A doctor so I can see people naked" or "a fireman so I can start fires"! Where did I go wrong??? He left a note on the front door once that said, "Jenny, the house key is in the gas grill." To see the difference in he and Jenny....while they were gone one night, Jenny asked if I could tape President Bush's speech and Dave wanted me to tape "Bart Simpson". Unfortunately, he is his mother's child; I'd rather see Bart than Bush!

He was in several Christmas pageants at church and he liked those because he didn't have to sit still and listen; he could run wild through the church when it wasn't his turn on stage. I had to pay him 25 cents the first year to go on stage and be a pilgrim. The year before he was baby Jesus. One year he played the piano and one year was in a dance. He probably never told any of his friends about his pageant days! He told me once that Joan Brunson, the church pianist, was lucky because she didn't have to sing in the choir! After reading a Bible story one night, I asked him "where did Adam and Eve go when they got kicked out of the Garden of Eden?" and he said, "I don't know; I guess out to eat". Probably was a good answer! Like I said, he wasn't too high on church and I don't know that he learned much! He asked me once, "when I get married, do I have to marry a Baptist?" In a prayer at dinner one night he thanked God for Halloween and told God not to drive fast or the cops would get him!! He saw Bill Daniels (pageant Jesus) in a pickup one day and said, "I didn't know Jesus drove a truck?"

Dave loved being outside and loved all things physical. He was pretty coordinated and learned to ride a 2-wheel bike at age 3. He played football at 6 and was the shortest one on the team. I think he made one tackle but he loved the "costume" and helmet. He played baseball, basketball, snow and water skied and loved skateboarding. Bill and he and all the skaters built a half-pipe ramp in the driveway and they played on that all summer until the mean men in the homeowner's association made them take it down. The skaters all came over at midnight and tore it down with hammers and loud music!! They didn't go down easily! It was called "skate or die" and one mother wrote a permission slip that said, "Ozzie has my permission to skate or die"!! No one did; in fact there were never any broken bones!

Not on the skate ramp anyway! There were several other instances of broken bones, stitches, operations and bandaids. He had stitches early on from jumping off the dryer into the trash sack and cut his toe on a tin can lid! Being the loving mother that I am, I told Bill to just put a bandaid on it!! A little too much blood for that! He broke his collar bone twice; once on a dirt bike and once in football. His biggest collision was on a street bike when he ran into the back of a parked car - thank the Lord he had a helmet on! As he lay on the curb, bleeding everywhere he told the ambulance driver "not to tell my mother". It was a tad obvious. Broken jaw, split lip, broken tooth, blood clot in the cheek, face black and swollen....let's just say he got many strange looks in public! I tried to act like I didn't know him! Six months later he looked pretty normal again, thanks to Dr. Lee and God's grace! (I could have shown you much worse pictures!)

This didn't really slow him down much that summer; he even made baseball All-stars with his mouth wired shut. One his most favorite things to do is dirt bikes! He has even instilled this into his two boys. They rode from the time they were 4 and 5 years old. Grandma doesn't like it and it keeps me on my knees!! He has bungy jumped with Jenny over the Guadalupe River, raced go carts, para sailed, jumped off the roof of the house into the pool, rode 4 wheelers all over the farm, shot a deer, snakes, a wild boar and some animal that looks like a deer called a nalgae! They beautifully adorn the walls of my house and his! Suz and I are thrilled! He played basketball, football and ran track at Taylor High School. Football was his favorite but he didn't like cutting his mullet off before two-a-days!!

Upon graduation, it was time to think college. He really didn't know where he wanted to go and I asked him if he'd like to go see some schools and he said, "Oh, mom; I don't care if it's got any trees!" He eventually went to Texas Tech with his best friend, "Duke", a chocolate lab, and graduated later on with a degree in advertising. Bill and I also gave Suzanne a degree in advertising because we figure she had as many hours in his degree as he did!! Thank you, Suz!

Dave met Suz at a New Year's eve party his senior year in high school. He came in that night and said, "Mom, can I go to early church so I can meet Suzanne at the hotel?" I said, "Who is Suzanne and why are you meeting her at a hotel?!" It was all legit; she was in town with her family for her sister's wedding. Until now, remember, he could have cared less!! Suddenly, he cared!! They dated for 7 years, on and off, and were married July 10, 1999. She is the best thing that has ever happened to him!! He now is the wild father of 2 wild boys, Jackson and Charlie, and one sweet little girl, Camryn. He works with Bill now in construction and has to remodel churches a lot and help run an antique store! I told him I never thought he would be in "church work" or antiques!! He is a sweet, wonderful son, husband and daddy and I thank God every day that he is mine!! His life has been wild and fun and has kept me closer to God than I could have ever imagined!! Happy Birthday Dave - I love you!!

Happy Birthday Jaime!!!

Happy birthday to my youngest today, Jaime Brooke Bain!!! It was March 20, 1979, the first day of spring, and it was raining cats and dogs! Jaime is the perfect example of God's sense of humor - we were not going to have any more children after Jenny (7) and David (5)....yeah, right!! I thought I had a really bad case of the flu or something.....the flu came 8 months later weighing 7 lbs, 5 oz with the biggest blue eyes you have ever seen. She is not unloved - just unplanned and I am glad God surprised us that wet spring day!

Jaime is sweet, easy-going, lovable, kind, self-sufficient, flexible and was definitely the easiest of the three to raise. She had to be....She was dragged from one thing to another, ate a million hot dogs at everyone's ball games, took naps in the back seat of the car and took the fall for many pranks and mischevious adventures of her sister but mostly her brother! She once was run over by David on the 4-wheeler and it broke her toe. She told me she ran into the curb barefooted because he threatened her if she told me the truth! After asking me for something once, David said, "no" and this 3-year-old responded with, David, you're not "a mother". He was griping one night, at one of my finer meals, at the dinner table that there wasn't a chicken leg left and she told him, "well tough; just eat a body"!! I even forgot her once at the church nursery one Wednesday night after choir and drove all the way home! She was 3 months old and I had gotten out of the "baby mode" and it simply slipped my mind that I had another child. My good friend, Trevelyn, brought her home to me! Jaime reminds me of this often when she wants something!

She always wanted to know "why is the 2nd act of this Christmas Pageant always about the Lord?" I asked her once what she thought God looked like and she said "He has dark hair, a beard and wears sandals and a cape"! Sounds like a gothic Superman. She also asked while eating her sandwich, "Does God like crust?" I told her yes (who knows?) "Well, I like God but I don't like crust"!! In the first grade, she came home and told me she got her name on the board because "when the teacher got really mad, she was going to count to 3 and she said "one" and I said "two"!!

Jaime took piano for about 3 months so we didn't have to endure a piano recital like the other two. She skipped ballet, gymnastics,(see cartwheel picture to understand why!), swim team, etc and went straight to basketball and softball. I loved every minute of it. I hung on the fence at a 100 ball parks across the nation and took 10,000 pictures. She became a pitcher because our team didn't have one and luckily she was really good. She only got beaned in the head a couple of times and in my loving way, if it wasn't bleeding too badly, I made her carry on. When she came home from school, we'd skip English, math and science homework to go pitch in the side yard; because I didn't have shin guards, my legs got beaned and now they look like the Battle of Gettysburg - I soon purchased some shin guards but it was too late.
She won most valuable pitcher at 10 years old and it continued through high school and ASA summer ball. She was All-Greater Houston her senior year and won Taylor MVP 4 years in a row. She was asked to play in college but she was tired of the life of skinned knees, funny tan lines and running around the country playing at wee hours of the morning. She once played in the state Regionals at the Baylor Baseball Park where Bill played. This picture is at that park with Jaime, Bill and his Baylor coach, Dutch Schroeder. I was sad she quit but she was ready to "move on". We had some great memories and laughs through all those years and we grew very close because of all the time we spent together. She also ran track, played volleyball and was on the THS basketball team 4 years. No wonder she was tired of it and ready to move on!!

She loved high school and had many friends. One of her best friends was Joy Keating and they are still close today - sharing memories and laughing and helping each other raise babies. They were on the winning powder puff football team. Jaime broke up this pass to help win but Joy was the star! She kicked a 30 yard field goal to win. Jaime was the "holder" and was scared to death!!

Several years later she graduated from Southwest Texas and started her teaching career. She has taught first grade and third grade and now understands why her mom/coach said the things she said to students and their parents, why she was always tired and why she was not at home much! After not having seen each other for several days, one night I found a note in the kitchen and it said, "Dear family, if you are still alive, I have gone to bed."

One of the most important parts of Jaime's life is her dog, Dexter, an 11 year old black lab that has lived with me for 9 years!! Now the most important parts of her life are husband Michael, a Nebraska Husker, and her one year old (almost) daughter, Keely!! She has big blue eyes just like Jaime and looks just like her baby pictures. I hope she grows up to be just as sweet and a great pitcher too! I'd like to hang on a few more fences before I go! I love you, Jaime! Thanks for being such a great daughter - You have brought us much joy!!!

Happy Birthday Jenny Bain!!

This post is dedicated to the birthday of my oldest offspring. On Feb 4, 1972, Jennifer Paige Bain came kicking and screaming into this cruel world and instantly it became a better place. She took her good time and waited until evening but it was worth the wait. She is a fun, happy, sweet daughter and I am thankful God blessed Bill and I with Jenny! She weighed 7 lb 4 oz and I had not a clue what to do with her. The hospital told us after 3 days that we had stayed as long as our insurance would let us and it was time to leave!! They gave us Jenny but they didn't give us a manual as to what to do next! So we got in our fine small orange Vega and drove to our new home on the west side of Houston ready to parent this child into adulthood. Thank heavens for my sister, mom and a few close friends. I learned how to fold diapers, sterilize bottles, burp, clean up spit up and the art of creeping down the hall so she wouldn't wake up! That was a gift God had to give me because until then I could have slept through a tornado!

Jenny was your typical kid running around, messing up stuff, falling down and bleeding, pulling all of the kleenex out of the box, pulling the dog's ear and asking "where's daddy?" all day....I wondered the same thing! Why did he get to leave all day and only come home when it was time to play for 15 minutes and then put her in bed!! She was precocious and had an answer for everything. She told David once, "Come on and play with me; I'll let you be second!" How kind! Once during a bad storm she asked me, "who is going to take care of us?" and in my fine Christian wisdom I told her "God would". About 10 minutes later she walked to the back door and said, "when is God going to get here?" She was 3 years old then and sometimes at 63, I'm asking the same question. She even asked me one time, "Mom, can I tell you something without you just saying 'Well, tough'?" That will make you step back and think for a second.

She told David once that the reason the lady in front of us could take the Lord's Supper was because "she has already been crucified!" She also wanted to know who God's wife was? Her dream job when she grew up was to work at the cleaners or the "Film and Photo" drive-thru! This was the same child that saw me vacuuming the floor and ask me "who's coming for dinner?" I'm sure I deserved this but spoken by your 5 year old makes you think bad thoughts!!

My 3 children have been in every lesson and sport known to man except ice skating. My niece did that and I knew right there that those hours were much too early for this old girl!!! Jenny was in a little of everything.....dancing, gymnastics, cheerleading, softball, tennis, volleyball, basketball, track, soccer, choir, piano just to name a few. She was definitely better at some that others. The tennis coach ask me once if she perhaps was left-handed because she wasn't very good right handed...that would be no!

She played basketball all during Junior High and I even bribed her with a new Laura Ashley dress to play in High School. After I bought it and she wore it once, she quit basketball. She still owes me for that dress!! I am not bitter, however!! One summer she tried the swim team. She went to the pool, dived in, swam one length of the pool and got out and said, "this is not for me!" We left...that was fine with me....swim meets are really long! The soccer picture here.....that is the closest the ball got to her all season....I actually think the ball accidentally hit her leg once; she was a one-season wonder!

In Jr High she ran track...she was pretty fast for a white girl but when your district is mostly non-white, well, let's just say she didn't win a lot of ribbons! She loved volleyball and cheerleading in Jr Hi and High School. Speaking from her mother/coach of 17 years, I think she was best suited for these sports. She was also very graceful at water skiing!! She once sang the "Good Ole Baylor Line" at a fellowship at church when she was three. Bill took her to a rather large Baylor Letterman's banquet in Houston a few weeks later and she wouldn't sing a note. He was so embarrassed; they left and when they got to the car she said, "Ok, I'll do it now". She didn't get the chance and I think he told me he left her on the curb for a while!! I don't know where I was but I'm glad I wasn't there! She was in the "Sound of Music" at church and was also baby Jesus in the FBC Pageant; she cried a lot. She was in several piano recitals and it brought us to tears....not because we were so proud but because I gave up 3rd row, Houston Rockets' playoff tickets to hear her play "Theme from E.T." - or was that David?

Jenny enjoyed Taylor High School, graduating with Honor Cords, whatever that might mean....it means she is smarter than me....her team won the all-important Powder Puff football game that was played against the boys playing on one leg and after graduating went off to Baylor for years of fun and I don't-want-to-know-what-else!!!

She joined Kappa Alpha Theta and spent lots of time and money there making lots of good friends and memories. Jen also acquired a cat during her Baylor days. "Gorby" was a great friend and he even came home to live with us for a few years....just like my other two children who have "left" their animals for me to raise. Gorby didn't eat near as much as the two labs!!


She found the love of her life at BU, Shannon Johnston and they were married in January of 1996 in Houston. They have given us two wonderful granddaughters, Allie and Kate. The only thing I can say about Shannon that was not exactly on my plan was his moving my girls to Louisiana! As long as he lets me visit as often as I want to drive 4 hours to "who dat" country, I guess I'll let them stay....like I have any say in this!!

Jenny is a mother's dream. She is Godly, compassionate, caring and a friend to all....she is not only my daughter but one of my best friends! Thank you, Jenny, for being mine. I know you will feel the same way about your girls as the way I do.....take advantage of all the time you have with them because before you know it, you'll be paying for a wedding ...or two! Happy Birthday to Jenny - one of God's greatest gifts!!