It’s May and we are less than a month away from my twin sons’ High School Graduation.  How did that happen and why does time seem to speed up when you most want it to slow down?! My first article about our senior year was called “I just don’t want Summer to end and Senior Year to Begin,” so I am naming this one “I just don’t want Senior year to end and Summer to Begin.”

I started this year sad because I was focused on it being a series of lasts and anxious because senior year is a lot of work!  But Jack and Jared got all their college applications turned in the first part of the school year (yay!) and both know where they are going to college now (different ones, of course).  They have been enjoying their senior year to the max and believe me there is no sadness on their part.  The year has been full of football games,  homecoming activities, theater productions, and senior banquets.   I’ve savored every moment and attended every event (at least everything they would allow me to attend) and shed more than a few tears along the way.  My husband and I have loved watching both my sons grow and mature in this last year of their high school careers.  They are so different from each other despite being twins, unique and special in their own way and we are so proud of the wonderful young men that they have become.  We take credit for none of it and are constantly amazed how lucky we are to be the parents of these two amazing boys.

So here we are – the last month of senior year and it all went by way too fast.  It seems like yesterday that they were 5 years old and starting kindergarten.   My little boys are 18 years old now and considered to be adults (seriously, if you have teenagers, you know how crazy that concept is).  We made it.  I never dropped them on their head when they were babies, I never lost them in the store (my husband did a couple of times), and I hope I didn’t annoy them too much with my fretting over silly things (they weren’t silly to me).  Through the tears I have come to accept that we have arrived and it’s time for me to start letting go and accepting that things will never be the same again, our family will change and be forever different than it was before.  I know that I will continue to fret and worry about them but now it’s up to them to take care of themselves (Remember, guys, you’re adults now!).

Last year my word for the year was focus.  I wanted to focus on the boys’ senior year and making the most of their last year in our home.   After much thought I decided that my word for this year is evolve.  Here is the definition I found for evolve:  Evolve comes from the Latin word ēvolvere, “to unroll,” Evolve describes a development that is taking its time to reach its final destination. Think change with a speed limit.  Jack and Jared will be evolving from high school students to college students and everything that goes with that transition will be rolling out at warp speed in the next few months.   I see endless possibilities ahead for them and I am so excited for them to realize their dreams, to spread their wings, etc. (you get the idea).   But not only will my sons be evolving, so will my husband and I.  I am evolving from the mother of school age children to the mother of college students and I am trying to visualize what that will look like.   After they graduate I will have time to do more writing, volunteering, and I will finally take those art lessons I have always wanted to pick up again but the time constraints of career and motherhood haven’t allowed it.  My husband and I can have more date nights, spend time with friends, and travel more!  It actually sounds kind of fun when I think about it (I feel guilty now)!

So in this last month of our senior year instead of being sad about all the endings,  I am really going to try to concentrate on new beginnings.  I really am.  Check back with me in a month and see how I’m doing.