Letter to my daughter

Dear Emma,

You are everything I hoped you’d be. You are hugs and kisses, moments of exasperation, sleepless nights and nights where you sleeping next to me is the best feeling in the world. You are one exploratory minute after the next, and everyday I am amazed at your capacity for learning and endless curiosity and willingness to try anything.

You have such an ability for learning.  I’d say smart, but you made mama take college courses to keep up with you, and one thing I learned is that no one is smart, that our brains have infinite capacity and you are intent on using yours and doing the best you can. You are smart because you try so hard, and have such a hunger to learn. I am proud of you.  I am so very very proud. I went to parent teacher conferences and really, the things you have to work on are things you should know at the beginning of next year.  I’m silly because I got worked up when I felt like the teacher was criticizing you, but really, she wasn’t. No one else in your class can do what you do right now. No matter how much you know you will always have room for growth. I’m grateful for a teacher who can point that out.

One part of me is really really happy you are beautiful.  You look like me, but I can tell you that you will be a thousand times more lovely that I am when you grow up. You also somehow have athletic ability, which certainly didn’t come from me.  This Saturday is your first soccer game. Your daddy will be coaching you and he’s very excited. When I see the two of you together I am forever amazed at how perfectly you belong together.

I have regretted many things in my life, but I have never for one second regretted you. Looking at you makes my regrets worthwhile, since the paths I took led me to you.

Being your mama has led me down a path to being a better, stronger person.  The thought of you was what let me leave my first marriage, since I figured out I’d never be good enough in his eyes to be a mother.  The reality of you let me leave the second marriage, because you deserve every safety and protection a child can have.  You also deserve a mother who loves herself as much as she loves you. You deserve to see your mother loved and valued. Being your mother taught me to love myself and appreciate my strengths. Being your mother has taught me my own value as a human being, and taught me to stand up for myself, and demand that I be treated well.

I work harder, I pick up more trash, I recycle more cans, and I do it for you, because I believe I’d better leave you this world I invited you to join in the best condition I can.  And I am not alone. There are other people working just as hard as I am. So when you become discouraged because you don’t feel that you can make a difference, then just try a little harder. You will never regret trying harder, but you might regret inaction. I am proud that you, at age seven, are a protector of children who need help, that you do not stand by and let other children be hurt and bullied. I hope you can always continue that, even though I know sometimes it will lead to you being hurt.   I don’t want you to be hurt. But I also never want you to stand by and watch an evil being done either. I know you are good, and I have faith in you.

Becoming your mama has changed who I am, from my religion and politics,  my sensitivity to the horrors this world contains but also to the great good it contains. Little Sweetheart, Little Bella Boo, my SnuggaBuggaBoo, my little Lovey, the world is beautiful  and full of beautiful people and I see it better because of you.

You are everything that is right with the world.  You are the solution. You are everthing I hoped you would be and you are so much more.

All my love,

Mama

Life list

So you know my life list?  Instead of adding to it, I’ve crossed one off!  This is the first one I’ve crossed off and I’m pleased with myself!

#47 Make a souffle!

I don't actually OWN a souffle pan, so this had to do- it worked well. I will decrease the baking time next time- it wasn't quite "gooey" in the center as the recipe said. But HEY, I've never made one before and YEAH! One Item crossed off my list!

Well of COURSE it’s chocolate! What? You are surprised?  Delicious!

Emma checking to see when it's going to be done.

Mmm! It was scruptious!

Buster thinks it's BULLSHIT that he doesn't get any!

He does, however, think that snuggling inbetween mom and dad is the awesomest thing ever!

Counting my blessings

Brian and I are snuggling and chatting about $$ which is tight right now.  It might have been stressful but then he said “It’s not bad being poor when I have you!”  Which is how I feel too. Last year I got a diamond ring for Christmas.  This year we are not exchanging presents, but we are still so happy.  It’s easy to be happy when you’ve got “enough”.  It’s just sometimes you have to learn what “Enough” is.  It’s taken me some time to figure it out.  I still tend to internalize things, stew on them… You’d think after three years as a team I’d know to take my worries to Brian but I forget!  I spent so long doing it myself that I forget I don’t have to.  I always feel better after we talk.

We are good.

We are healthy.

We have food.

We can pay our mortgage.

We are together, a family.

It’s hard but we can do it, hell, I even have a gym membership!  (Although having the contract sucks…) We have so much more than we need, really.  I am grateful.

Knocking on wood

Emma got the first half of the H1N1 vaccine yesterday.  And then today had a headache and a slight fever.  We were good parents and kept her home, even though she never broke 100°F and the fever was gone by noon.  She has to have another dose in a month or so, but I’m really hoping she doesn’t get it.  I don’t want it!  I think she had a slight reaction to the vaccine (it was the live virus given via a squirt up the nose, which she didn’t care for being the delicate flower that she is:)) and that was why the slight illness.  She’s not at school today, she was begging to go.  She’ll be there tomorrow. I’m very fortunate that she’s so healthy, we’ve been so lucky.  She gets the normal amounts of colds and flu’s, but she’s been on antibiotics ONCE in her life.  I’d say that’s pretty good. I’m just really hoping that we dodged that particular bullet.

I don’t sleep.  I’ve never slept well.  I listen to some meditation podcasts that I really really like but I’m a shitty meditator. My brain won’t shut up. I do this one for falling asleep and it DOES help, but it wants you to “visualize red” and I can’t just visualize red, I have imagine RED things.  But if they are not the right shade of red then I have to think of something else.  And so on and so forth from red to orange and all the way to violet.  I’m better than when I first started but it still takes me between half an hour to an hour to fall asleep.  On a good night   I so envy Brian his ability to fall asleep in 3 minutes, day or night. We will lay down for a nap and an hour later he will wake up refreshed and I? Am still awake.  Or I’ve just fallen asleep.  And that makes me cranky:)

So I’m off to listen to a podcast and the sound of a stream and hopefully sleep in the next couple of hours.

BRIAN! WALK AWAY FROM THE BLOG! (In which this blog becomes a Brian free zone until after the wedding.)

That means, honey, if you read further down this post I will have to kill you!

You don’t get to see me until our wedding day!

My wedding dress came in last week and I tried on on Saturday.

SO- I ordered Ivory.

I got diamond white.

Because the dress comes in white, diamond white, and gold- which I thought was Ivory and it’s my fault for not asking further when the girl was ordering my dress.  It SAYS Ivory on all the forms, so basically- the company saw the order, saw Ivory and didn’t bother to call and say this dress doesn’t come in Ivory.

In the long run it doesn’t matter other than the fact that I looked better in Ivory than in white- but that can be remedied by a spray tan (or a real tan, should I feel like risking cancer )

I LOVE this dress.  I love how I feel in this dress.  I feel beautiful- not something I can generally claim.

I’ve never felt like “beautiful” was a word I could honestly apply to myself- on occasion glamorous, sexy, striking, attractive…. but never beautiful. Brian tells me I’m beautiful but I FEEL beautiful in this dress!

I had a wired bustier on underneath and the dress is wired too- it was wiring over kill- when I took off the bustier later it took a couple of inches off my waist. When I go in for alterations I’ll have some boobs added so that I don’t need a bustier

I didn’t take my camera!  These are pictures from my mom’s camera phone and my mother in law took pictures which she will email later.  My hair was in a low bun (kinda) and later I put it on top of my head(kindof) so we could try on different veils.

SO!

I have the narrowest shoulders.  And I have HIPS!  Can you SEE the back of the dress? Le Sigh!

Oh, the lace! the Beaded Beaded lace! and SATIN!  God how I love that word! SATIN!

We tried on 20 different veils…. they looked nice….,

I put my hair up, and my sister grabbed a cage veil and there was a collective sigh.  guess I’m going with a cage veil.  (I’m hoping that other pics show it better)

All in all it comes as feeling kindof like a period gown…. I’m going to have a french bustle… MUST find some SHOES!  And GOD WOMAN!  do some weights for those upper arms and back!

I love this dress….

And ALSO?

Have you SEEN THE PUPPIES TODAY?

Go ye forth and admire them, I command it!

Goals

So the house we made the offer on?  Its a short sale- they’ve sent our offer onto the bank.  The bank can approve it or not and when (and if) they do the house is ours.  We are on the hook for 90 days- because it can take a long time for the bank to approve it- but if they haven’t approved it in 90 days then we are free to make offers on other houses.

I hate games, and I hate waiting games in particular but we have nothing to loose… So there you go.

We are buying a house.

Once upon a time, when I was leaving and so sad and unsure, and didn’t know where Emma and I were going to live or where we were headed, I’d pick her up and dance to “Better Life” by Keith Urban.  Because I only knew things were going to get better and where I was taking her was surely better than where we were or where we’d come from.

Well, I’ve decided that when we get the keys to our new house, whichever house it is, I’m getting Emma and taking her there and dancing in the living room to “our song”.  Claiming this new life as ours!

Hyperventilating

We are putting an offer on a house tomorrow.

Please please put good thoughts out there in the universe!

Me? I’m going to start packing. Even if we DON’T get this house? We are going to get an equally AWESOME one.

Outtakes

Brian is a fly fisherman.  He’s kinda snobby about it (In a fun not serious-way he calls the other kind “worm dunkers”- but that doesn’t apply to ocean fishers????)

Anyway, we were freezing out asses off by the river having our engagement pics taken and he reaches down, pics up a rock and hands it to me.

He says “Under the rock you can see the little nests of the bugs my fish like to eat.”

But then of course, we had to pose with “the rock”

And once again I prove that I BLINK IN EVERY PHOTO.

He makes me laugh and he makes me smile.

Christmas Recap

Christmas was awesome.  FREAKING AWESOME!

I got proposed to.  Did I mention that?  With a ring and everything.  AND I CAN’T FIND MY CAMERA!  Here is a picture from my camera phone:

We are tentatively talking about July 11th.

Brian surprised me- He’s been so grumpy about money etc, and we’d talked about waiting until after trial was done in January to get the ring etc…

He’d said he’d found some pretty earrings for me but I’d forgotten he’d told me that.  We’d opened presents first thing and I was so happy with everything I’d gotten.  I was sitting on the couch, and told him I was going to shower before we went to his parents house and he jumped up and said “I forgot one present!”  And came out with a gift bag with FISH on it.  I took out the tissue paper and there was a little white box and I said “Are these my earrings?” and then I opened it and saw it was a ring and started to sob.  I was(AM) so HAPPY!  I was laughing too.  And then he said (on one knee) “Nothing Witty, will you marry me?”  And I said “YES!”  and then cried some more.

I am SO happy.  If I had your cell number I texted you right away- sorry if I woke you up, I know it was early   I couldn’t contain my joy!

I get to spend the rest of my life with my best friend, my soul mate and the most wonderful, sweetest, most honorable, HANDSOMEST man- who loves Emma and I with all his heart. We are so so lucky!

This Christmas was also two years to the day Brian told me he loved me for the first time (Did I mention he is romantic?)!  So yes. I love Christmas.  I love Brian!  We are happy!  Thank you so so much for everyone’s good wishes, they mean the world to us!