When I was in high school I hated babysitting kids. In fact I only babysat a couple of times through Jr high and into my Freshman year. I needed big bucks if I was going to put myself off the social scene on a perfectly good Friday night. My Mom made me watch these kids that I didn't know for the summer between my Freshman and Sophomore year. Every Monday and Tuesday I had to wake myself up at 6:00am and go and babysit for this family. It wasn't fun, but I got down all the talk shows that I loved to watch and helped myself to all their Schwans frozen food. One day the pesky little brats asked to walk up the road to the old man's house with a swimming pool. They wanted to go for a swim. I avoided the subject for a good hour, but they finally cornered me and I had to take them up the road. It was straight uphill and I was hot! We finally got there and there was this really pretty tan blond lady in a bikini with a little boy swimming. (Little boy is exhibit A to the left) She said hi and told me her name was Sheri and this was her son Jared and he was 5. She was super cool and didn't seem like a mom at all. We sat and talked while we watched the kids swim. Sheri then asked me if I would like to babysit for her. I was all over it, the only time I was super excited to babysit for anyone! She then dropped the bombshell and told me that she had 3 other kids and Jared was her oldest!!! Shea her next son was 2 1/2 and she had twin Jace and Aubrey that were 9 months old. Wow! She also let me know that this was her dad's house and they had a brand new house in the woods. Looking back now we both laugh, what possible made her think that all 96 pounds of me could take on 4 kids! But I did and I fell in love with them. Not to mention, they paid $40 for 4 hours! I was in the money! They became my second family. I even had my own Christmas stocking at their house with my name stitched on it. And the greatest of all things great in Rosieland, they took me to Disneyland. (Nevermind that Pirates was closed...I'm over it...but I have a great picture of me pouting by the closed
sign!) After I graduated, I stopped having them pay me and I just did it for free. All 4 of them were in our wedding and all 4 of them have been invested in my kids' lives.
Last summer I needed babysitters and well lets say I had 4 very qualified babysitters that love my kids to pieces. (Jared was 16, Shea 13, Jace and Aubrey 11.) Payton was scared of Jared becasue, well he's 6'3 and quiet. He kept telling Sheri,"I don't like that big Jerry kid". LOL! Jared will be forever known now as 'That big Jerry kid'!
Jared is now a senior in high school and wide reciever on the Banks football team. He towers over me, but is the sweetest kid! I'm telling you all this because he shares his birthday with a very special lady....my Stella Rose. Jared was thrilled when he found out he was an Uncle....affectionately Uncle Jerry. After every football game he comes off the field, past the girls asking him for a ride to Taco Bell and he picks up my baby girl and holds her. Then he takes his time with Payton and then Chloe, much to the dismay of the hot and bothered teenage girls that can wait to go to Taco Bell, OR better yet get their own darn car and leave my Jared alone!! In my eyes he will always be that 5 year old boy swimming at his Grandpa's pool.
