Happy Birthday Jeff!

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I love this picture. Aside from Brooks, who will never cooperate in any picture, they all look so happy. All four of them wait for Jeff to get home from work everyday and he is greeted with screams and shouts and all manner of overwhelmingly loving bahavior. You would think it had been weeks since they'd seen him. Instead of just at breakfast. It's a good thing though. They love their dad and he loves them. Jeff has always been a good dad, but over the years he has just gotten better. He is loving and patient. He tolerates the crazy, annoying, yuck that we all dish out to him. He listens and gives advice and really tries hard to be good at this whole dad thing. I think that's the best part. It's a conscious effort. I don't always try as hard as I should. But he does. He wants to be better and he works at it. It shows us all how important we are to him. The kids see it. He apologizes when he's wrong. He helps us have family home evening and nightly prayer. He has high expectations of himself and our kids. They know this and he shows them their potential to live up to it all. I didn't know all of this when I was 21 and he was 19. I didn't know how important it would be either. But it is. And now that 19 year old boy is 36. And he is so much better than I ever knew he would be. We are so lucky!