First Flight

Thought I should post a picture of Baby Girl watching the planes.

Life's good

DH reminded me that I had a blog last night. I had forgotten. Since I am probably one of two people in the world who reads it, I am not answering to an audience, I let life take over and forget.

I just got back from a women's conference in Baton Rouge. It was Baby Girl's first plane trip and it went way better than I expected. She thought flying was too cool. I had a blast spending some one-on-one time with her - it so rarely happens these days. It has brought to me an appreciation for her that I didn't have a week ago. The distance and time apart also made me love my husband and Little Man just a little more than before. Not sure how I have any more room in my heart to love more, but somehow it keeps piling up in there.

Speaking of piles, the laundry piles are getting progressively smaller. It's awesome to actually enjoy my home. For so long, we have lead a life that didn't allow us time to clean and organize - we're changing that. The dishes are always done, the laundry is getting there - I actually have floors clean enough to vacuum whenever I want to. I know where all the cordless phones are. I am almost to the point where we can start eating dinner at the dining room table again - right now it is art project central - mine and Baby Girl's. She does her play-doh and painting; I have my sewing and embroidery. But I'm working on it - slowly but surely.

SO that's all. Really, things are good. No use in making up something to say when, "Life's good" covers it.

The physical rain stopped

So, depending on where you live, you might have noticed that it has stopped raining for about a week. It has been raining almost consistently for weeks now, ruining a perfectly good summer with heavy, energy-draining humidity.

It seems as though the drops of rain falling from the heavens stopped only to allow the drop of tears to fall from my eyes. I have a pretty good perspective on things in my life, and I can typically handle a decent amount of conflict - indeed, I require a small amount to thrive. However, an alcoholic brother who is slowly killing himself, a sis-in-law who is taking the fast-track off the earth (then finding out she is pregnant by my "clipped" brother), the unending phone calls from the former and family, and the very unfortunate death of my friend's sick little boy - wow - I'm a little overwhelmed.

I will gladly welcome the physical rain back anytime....but the forecast only calls for "variable cloudiness" - WTF is variable cloudiness?

Dear Jared

I'm sorry I didn't come see you more often and I am sorry I never got to bring your "best buddy" over to see you. I was always afraid one of us would get you sick, and I never wanted to be responsible for that. If I had known how short your time with us would be, I would have done things different. Hindsight is 20/20, I know. But you have reminded me of an old lesson - time on earth is short and precious.

You might not have known it, but you brought amazing joy to a lot of people and provided a belief in miracles to the same. We know you are whole and resting now - please send some of that peace our way. Thank you for holding on so we could all say goodbye - we'll hold you in our hearts forever.

No hand is too small to touch the world. You sure touched ours.

Me + 2 kids - 1 husband = psychosis

My dear, sweet husband had to go out of town on business. I hate to complain because it only happens once, sometimes twice a year - however, this time I have TWO children to contend with instead of one. I realize how much I do depend on him to take over when he gets home from work because the work never stops around here. Little Man wants a bottle, Baby Girl needs a snack, the phone rings, Blue's Clues is over and she wants Foster's on, I come back to find she's gotten into her art box and decorated my carpet with glitter - it never ends.

I love him very much and want him home, but I think at this point, I miss him more because I am tired and need a break. My sweet little angels are becoming Hell's Angels, complete with leather chaps. Which brings me to a question - how many times can a mom be told, "Oh, it's just the terrible twos!" before she snaps?

My door

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. This certainly applies to art as I found out this weekend. DH and I volunteered at a local arts festival all weekend and got to meet some very awesome (and influential) people around here as well as look at A LOT of art. In one booth were these really, in my opinion, hideous projects where the artist had pasted faces onto wood then sewn fabric floating bodies around the"head". Basically they looked like scary, colorful hanging ghosts. On first glance, I winced and said, "NO way are those going to sell."

Sitting on steps eating a funnel cake on day 4, I saw a very happy gentleman carrying one of these prized specters away along with what I can only imagine were other "beautiful" pieces of artwork. I was wrong.

Again, it is so subjective. The one piece of artwork that I really wanted was a large photograph of a door that just happened to be taken by one of DH's friends. I had my eye on it the entire weekend, expecting that the next time we came to his booth, it would be gone. We came by often as we were helping run his booth and the one next to his. Many people commented on it, liked it, pondered out loud where this particular door was located, but no one purchased it. At the end of the festival the poor door was still sitting there and I was considering asking DH to purchase it. However, in a very sweet gesture, the artist asked DH which one I liked and offered to give it to us for helping him out. It is now proudly displayed in my living room. It is my door now.

1417 days, 0 hours, 8 minutes

I'm not a writer, an author or poet - I can barely compose a good email. Don't expect too much.

In the past three years, I married the man I love, bought a home in a great location and have given birth to two of the most awesome human beings I will ever have the privilege to know. It has been a whirlwind of nonstop activity, and for the most part, I have enjoyed every bit of it. I have been incredibly blessed and although I don't feel worthy sometimes, I am trying to live up to the blessings.

I am learning that the blessings come with surprises too. Such as yesterday when I was on the phone with my friend who had been out of town for a week. We spent about 30 minutes catching up, all the while Little Man was playing in the floor. I got off the phone and went to check on him - let's say I smelled him before I saw him. Accepting my doody duty, I grabbed the wipes and diaper and sat down on the floor by him. He was laying on his back, so I pulled him by his feet toward me - that's when I saw it. The trail of poop he had dragged behind him. I immediately got a towel to lay him on, and as I rolled him over to assess the damage, I saw he had not only pooped out of his diaper but up his back, all over his clothes and into his hair. In his hair people. That is Olympic class pooping.

I gave him a good once over, started the bath water running and heard my 2yo daughter waking up. I opened her bedroom door so she could come out when she rubbed the sleep from her eyes and went to check the water. She joined me in the bathroom and hugged me when I felt something wet against my leg. Today was a two-fer - she had peed out of her diaper overnight and was soaking wet all over her nightshirt and pants.

All of this as I was 20 minutes from walking out the door to a scheduled playdate.

In a rare turn of events, the day did get better. The playdate went better than expected, Baby Girl was too funny when she tried to put her Elmo ( Spoken: "Melmo") in my ring sling and Heroes was on last night. Nothing can go wrong when Heroes is on.