Our oldest child started his final year of high school yesterday.

If you look closely, you can almost see a Mona Lisa smile…

Seems like only yesterday we were putting the “McNicholas High School Class of 2018” sign in our yard when he was halfway through 8th grade, and 2018 seemed light years away. Now it’s just around the corner. College applications await… so do financial aid forms, which I hear are a real treat to fill out.

Gabriel is a great student (no, we don’t have the bumper stickers on our cars but we could). He’s a hard worker (he held down two jobs this summer and will keep one throughout the school year). He’s a safe driver (my insurance premiums are thankful for that). He’s gone from never having played a single second of organized football as a freshman to the starting right tackle on the Rockets team (see “hard worker” above). He’s come so far, so fast… yet the adventure is just beginning.

Here’s to a great senior year.