Chris Stapleton’s Wife Turned His B-Day Into Throwback Thurs.

Chris Stapleton turned 43 on Thursday (April 15), but it was his fans who got the gifts, courtesy of his wife. Morgane Stapleton opened up the country superstar’s old photo albums and shared her findings in honor of his big day.

Baby-faced Chris ready for a day of hunting? Check. Teenage Chris in a suit? Check (multiple times over). Sports team portraits from his days playing baseball, basketball and more? Check, check and check.

What’s perhaps most incredible about Morgane’s treasure trove of photos is that we (gasp!) can actually see Stapleton’s chin and cheeks! His long, slightly unruly beard is nowhere to be found — heck, he’s never sporting much more than a light mustache in these old photos.

All told, Morgane shared dozens of photos via both Instagram and Instagram Stories (see them all below). “I hope y’all will enjoy this as much as I do,” she wrote as she shared the first batch, and, honestly, we probably enjoyed it even more than she did.

“This guy … My sweetheart … You make everything better. I love you more than I know how to say,” Morgane writes. “Thank you for sharing your world with me. I wouldn’t trade a single day.”

Married since 2007, the Stapletons have five children: Wayland and Ada are their oldest son and daughter, respectively, but they are also the parents of twin boys, Macon and Samuel, who were born in 2018, and a fifth child, a son, born in 2019.

The couple keep their children out of the spotlight for the most part, but Morgane did divulge a couple of small details about them in her birthday posts for her husband: first, that Wayland inherited one particularly retro suit from his father, and second, that four of their five children look more like him than like her.

Here’s What Chris Stapleton Looked Like Before Country Stardom (and Before His Beard):