My little man

My little boy is growing up. It's something I always knew would happen. In fact, for the first three years of his life I looked forward to it. (flour in the carpet, covering his sister with shaving cream, kitchen floor as a chocolate milk skating rink. All fun experiences with toddler Bry) Now? I can't believe how fast it's happening.

The fact that he's not my little boy really hit home Sunday morning. We were all supposed to be getting ready for church, crunched for time as always, when Carl and I heard Bry shouting. Normally, if Bry's shouting, something bad has happened or is in the process of happening. 90% of the time it has to do with Lauren and someone usually ends up crying. (poor Bry) Since Carl was at a critical point in his hair styling process, (according to Carl there is no stopping once the gel is in) I was the privileged investigator.

I stomped down the stairs, with wet hair, fully prepared for some serious refereeing. Instead, I found Bry standing in his bathroom -wearing nothing but his boxers. He was in front of the mirror with one arm overhead, while his opposite hand lovingly caressed his armpit. So many thoughts went through my mind at that point. Before I could ask what he was doing and why was he doing it, Bry exclaimed, "I have armpit hair!" My automatic reply was, "Well, so do I." Thankfully Bry was over the moon to have discovered hair in his armpit and wasn’t actually listening to me; he was too eager for the rest of us to share in his joy. I inspected his pit from a safe distance and couldn't see anything. Since, I wasn't about to feel an unshowered, thirteen year old's armpit, I took him upstairs. (but not before I had him put on some clothing and gave him the 'what a mother doesn't want to see' lecture. As any mother knows this varies depending on the circumstances. Just the day before, my list included boogers and anything resembling a booger. My children then spent the rest of the day finding things that resembled boogers. Good times.)

Anyway, upstairs we went. Carl was still in the bathroom so he became an active participant in the search for the elusive pit hair. After some various light angles, and some serious squinting, we finally saw the fragile wisps of our son's impending manhood. Lauren, who by then had joined us in the bathroom, scoffed and informed Bry that his show of puberty was weak. She yanked up the sleeve of her t-shirt and proudly showed off an impressive patch of dark armpit hair. After a moment of stunned silence, in which I cursed whatever gene made Carlson girls excessively hairy, I politely informed her that girls don't brag about how hairy their armpits are. Then she and I had a little talk where I introduced her to a novelty item, the razor. Church was especially spiritual after such an exciting morning.

*Please excuse my excessive use of the word armpit. I tried to find something a little less crude, but came up emtpy. Upon extensive research and study I discovered that there IS no other word for armpit. It seems that, due to the location and the fact that it is, in fact, a pit, there is no replacement. I will, as always, continue my search.)