Happy birthday to my MIL

April is my favorite month because of the weather, the flowers, the birthdays, and Easter. I missed noting that my Uncle Greg's birthday was the day after mine, and on April 25, my niece Morgan will turn 11. Today, however, is my mother-in-law's birthday. Sarita will have to tell you herself how old she is; I can't remember and it's not proper to ask a lady her age. When I was in high school and college, I enrolled in several Spanish classes. In each class, you have to choose a Spanish name, so my name was always Sarita. In fact, I still have a couple of friends that call me that. So it was pretty funny that not only are our birthdays so close together, so are our names. Sarita was raised in Chandler, Texas, a suburb of the metropolitan Tyler area. She's familiar with rural life, so last year when Claire's pet chicken pooped on her head, she didn't even get upset. She's got lots of crazy stories about animals around the house and yard. Until a few years ago, Sarita was a special education teacher for high schoolers. Not only was she dealing with all the angst that comes with that age group, she was teaching the emotionally disturbed students. That alone qualifies her for sainthood in my book. I admire Sarita for her thoughtfulness and generosity. She never lets anything go to waste and always thinks of who could use something she has. A stale roll is given to the kids to feed ducks with, and old sweaters are packed up for the homeless. She's a huge scrapbooker and saves all her little clippings and unused stickers for the kids to use with crafts. She also sends off for free samples and passes them around the family and gives the leftovers to the homeless. Even her magazine subscriptions don't go to waste. She and Adam's dad, Stan, live in Grapevine, and she used to drive all the way to John Peter Smith to take her already read magazines so the waiting room would always have current magazines. Now that her health isn't what it used to be, she saves all her magazines for me to take to church for homeless ladies to read. At my house, we have a special drawer we call "Grandma's drawer." After I cut my coupons, I put the leftovers in there and when Sarita and I see each other, we exchange bags of coupons and other items. She always has a bag going for each family member, and you never know what you're going to find inside. Mine always has coupons, duck bread, random canned goods, and whatever she got free in the mail she couldn't use. In the family I was raised in, holidays were strictly family time. So the first time I saw that Stan and Sarita had invited extra people to their Christmas celebration, I must be honest and say that I was a little taken aback. But then I realized that the cashier at Wal-Mart didn't have anywhere else to go on Christmas Eve and how kind and generous it is to invite strangers and casual friends to celebrate with your family. Now every year I look forward to whoever shows up because it always makes it interesting. Sarita is always thinking about others. I also love how down to earth she is. There is not a bone of pretension in her body, so many people easily relate to her. Last week, she and Stan celebrated 37 years of marriage and today she celebrates 25 years of life. Yeah, I know the math doesn't add up, but just go with it. Happy birthday, Sarita, my favorite mother-in-law!