Link-O-Rama
You Know It’s Time to Lose Weight When…
You have to lie down to show off your new beaded belt buckle
The car tilts downward on your side
You have to “rock” a few times to get up out of your chair
You get scared your belly button might come untied
Your kids use you as shade when you take them to the park
okay. OKAY. The only one I’ve ACTUALLY experienced was the park thing.
But it’s a SIGN, people. America has gotten FAT (and I’m one of them)
But NO MORE!!! My husband has begun a new chapter in his life by starting his own business. It’s time I took my life back and lost some of this weight I’ve been hanging on to for reasons I couldn’t possibly explain! There’s no reason for me to be overweight and out of shape (other than I’m L-A-Z-Y).
But that’s going to CHANGE.
Starting right now. Today. You heard it first from me, people!
I’m going to do IT. Just Nike It.
DO it. Cowboy up. Grab life by the horns. Hang on tight, world…cause today is a new day…and this time next year, I’m gonna be lighter and a whole lot brighter.
Watch me shine.
I Dare You.
Anniversary Gone Wrong
The traditional gift for a 5th wedding anniversary is “wood”. Well, that’s what I was given…but it was DEAD wood. I didn’t even see it coming. And it wasn’t my husband’s fault. He didn’t see it coming either.
We were supposed to go to the local “Friends of the Library booksale” preview last night for our anniversary “date”. (I know…we’re wierd) We had had it planned for over a month. Well, I knew there was no way we’d make it together, because at the end of last week, my husband booked an appointment for that night (he’s in sales) at 8:00 p.m. He didn’t have much of a choice…the people needed to rebook from a previous time and that was the only night he had open (because he was saving it for ME) and so he just KNEW I wouldn’t mind…you understand, don’t you? Yes, honey. I smile a fake smile and put on a cheery face to hide my disappointment. He tells me he’s married to the greatest woman in the world…and he’s going to find a way to make it up to me.
And he does. A group of our friends are having a get together on Saturdayevening, he tells me. Why don’t we get a babysitter and we’ll go to the barbeque? Just you and me…we’ll have fun. I agree with him…I can’t remember the last time just the two of us went out as a couple. It had to be before we had Abby, who is 18 months old now. That is entirely TOO long. And we’ve recently made a lot of new friends since he’s begun his own business….so this is GREAT. All week, I look forward to the thought of Saturday. I lined of a babysitter, cleaned the house (you know, the kind of cleaning you do when you KNOW someone is going to be snooping – and our babysitter does snoop), even folded the laundry and PUT it AWAY!!!!
And then yesterday. Boom! Out of the blue…all our plans down the toilet. It seems the company he currently works for (he’s not free of them yet – still trying to get his new business up to speed so it will support us) has re-ordered the schedules…took one of his guys and moved him to days…so now my dear husband has to close every night of the week, beginning Saturday. There go our plans for Saturday night. This stinks. There go our plans for all of next week, when he had set appointments to garner new business (he works the new business at night right now)….there goes his chance to help out at our church’s VBS…our corporate meeting with the BIG guy on Tuesday …I could go on, but I think you get the idea.
I spent most of my day in a pretty foul mood (tells me I need to read my Bible more!!!)…snapping at the kids for the slightest little thing…walking around with a snarl on my face…expecting to hear some more crappy news at any moment. I decided to remedy it…I was STILL going to go ahead with our original plans sans Floy…I was GOING to the book sale.
We signed up to receive notices about when the friends of the library had book sales…paid $18 fee to have “advance” notice and garner the ability to go in for a “preview” the night before things went on sale to the public and buy whatever we wanted. Last night was to be my first time going before the place was entirely packed out. I called our babysitter and asked her if she was available for a couple of hours (she was) so I picked her up and was out the door at 7 for the book sale. I got downtown, all excited, parked the car, and then noticed the lights were off, nobody was home….there was some dude in painter’s pants on a scaffold in front of the building doing touch-ups. What the? Hey…it was par for the course for my day…so I headed home. Then, deciding the day was NOT going to be a complete waste, I called the babysitter, told her to get the kids’s shoes on and have them ready, because we were all going to Sonic for hot fudge sundaes! (I really needed some chocolate)
We went to Sonic and I ordered the sundaes…I asked for EXTRA hot fudge on mine….didn’t get it…(surprise, surprise)…gave them my credit card (which is one of those stupid mini ones…that are about 1/2 the size of a read card and almost totally USELESS)…and proceeded to wait 45 minutes while they held my card hostage trying to get it to work. I didn’t have cash…they didn’t take checks…I was going to have to call someone to post $11 bail for me at Sonic! I couldn’t believe it! The card has always worked before….I asked her what she was typing in. She told me the number on the back of the card…it keeps saying declined. (Okay, my credit isn’t that great, but I KNOW there’s room on this card for $11 worth of sundaes!) I looked on the back and realized that she was typing in the 3 digit security code as well as the 16 digit account number….that’s why it was declining. She went back for another try and came out smiling, all apologies…
It’s okay…I say, trying to smile my best fake smile. (Inside I’m so so tired of this day…just let me go HOME) We took the babysitter home and then we went home. Still determined not to let this day end on a sour note, I decided to make sock puppets with the kids (hey..it was only 9:50, I reasoned. We spent the next hour and a half giggling together on the couches, sewing buttons on socks and making crazy hair-do’s on the puppets. Man, I love my kids. For that matter, I love my husband.
But there’s nothing quite like laughing with your kids and spending time with them doing….nothing. Watching their eyes light up when they smile. It made my whole day better. They are the reason I am here….not because I want to go to a stupid bar-b-que with friends…I can do that anyday…they won’t always be little, and God knew just what I needed. So He gave me yesterday….a little test to see how I’d do.
I’m quite sure I failed this one test, but I hope to pass the final exam…maybe next year will be better. I don’t know. But one thing I am sure of is that even though yesterday was stinky, today is a new day. Here I come, world…
Graduation was a thing of the past
I was
free
at
last.
Long summer days and even longer summer nights
spent
on the beach
around
the
fire.
Staying out all night
seeing
my
mom
the
next morning
after
she
spent
a sleepless
night
worrying.
How I long to be 18 again…
to erase those 20 years from my mother’s face and see her young again.
To see her stand up straight without pain…
to wipe away the cobwebs of uncertainty
that have grown
in
her
mind.
I don’t want to be young again to do things over…
I want to have my mom back
the
way
she
was
when I was young.
I miss her laugh most of all.
Home School Blues
Ask any mother who homeschools and I’m sure she will tell you that by the end of the year, she’s ready for a B R E A K. Such is the story for me…
I begin every year with the very best of intentions, new white binders, well-thought out lesson plans, and even WANTING to homeschool. This year, we joined a co-op and got together with them once a month for activities. As a family, we go on planned outings to local attractions to increase the kids’ awareness of our culture and art; and once a month or so – we even take a trip (completely unplanned) by picking a spot on the map and driving there for the day. The only catch is it has to be within a 3-4 hr drive. Along the way, we stop to check out anything “cool” or “interesting” as deemed by someone in the car. Once, Katie had us stop to study the mating habits of the horse…she thought the horses were fighting (Mom…why is that one horse beating the other one with his hooves?). Of course, I had to explain what was actually happening and then she was REALLY interested…it led to a unit study on horses.
At the beginning of the year, we begin our school day around 7:30 am…by the end of the year, I’m lucky if I can get her jump-started by 10! At the beginning of the year (when the curriculum is mainly reviewfrom last year), we LOVE it…because we know SO much. At the end of the year, when we are reviewing what we’ve learned this year, we HATE it…because we forget SO much. At the beginning of the year, we do science experiments with unabandoned glee….at the end of the year, we gleely abandon our science experiments.
Where have I gone wrong? I never wanted to homeschool my kids….it just sort of…happened. I’m glad we chose homeschooling. Really. I am. I know you probably don’t believe me. But it takes me back to being a kid in a way. I remember those feelings of restlessness…summer is coming. SUMMER is coming! Summer IS coming! Summer is COMING! My daugher has them. She knows. She’s a smart kid.
After all, she’s homeschooled. And we can DO it! Yes, we can!
Next year will be better, I tell myself. Only one week left….hold on, mom, you’re almost there.
I begin every year with the very best of intentions, new white binders, well-thought out lesson plans, and even WANTING to homeschool. This year, we joined a co-op and got together with them once a month for activities. As a family, we go on planned outings to local attractions to increase the kids’ awareness of our culture and art; and once a month or so – we even take a trip (completely unplanned) by picking a spot on the map and driving there for the day. The only catch is it has to be within a 3-4 hr drive. Along the way, we stop to check out anything “cool” or “interesting” as deemed by someone in the car. Once, Katie had us stop to study the mating habits of the horse…she thought the horses were fighting (Mom…why is that one horse beating the other one with his hooves?). Of course, I had to explain what was actually happening and then she was REALLY interested…it led to a unit study on horses.
At the beginning of the year, we begin our school day around 7:30 am…by the end of the year, I’m lucky if I can get her jump-started by 10! At the beginning of the year (when the curriculum is mainly reviewfrom last year), we LOVE it…because we know SO much. At the end of the year, when we are reviewing what we’ve learned this year, we HATE it…because we forget SO much. At the beginning of the year, we do science experiments with unabandoned glee….at the end of the year, we gleely abandon our science experiments.
Where have I gone wrong? I never wanted to homeschool my kids….it just sort of…happened. I’m glad we chose homeschooling. Really. I am. I know you probably don’t believe me. But it takes me back to being a kid in a way. I remember those feelings of restlessness…summer is coming. SUMMER is coming! Summer IS coming! Summer is COMING! My daugher has them. She knows. She’s a smart kid.
After all, she’s homeschooled. And we can DO it! Yes, we can!
Next year will be better, I tell myself. Only one week left….hold on, mom, you’re almost there.
It’s not what you think. Honest.
It’s really a security blanket. We all have one of some kind, whether it shows or not. His is just
d
i
i
f
f
e
r
e
n
t .
Oh, I know what you’re thinking…I thought it too. It all started when I was still working. I was the office manager for my brother’s machine shop. I was able to take him to work with me every day – he had a playpen in the corner of the office and he had free reign to go where ever he wished within the confines of the front of the building. He saw his daddy every day for lunch and would sometimes cry for long periods after he left to go back to work.
My husband was beside himself because he felt so badly about leaving AJ and considered not even coming to visit at lunch anymore because of the conflict it was causing. That’s when he came up the “THE PLAN”.
Now, keep in mind, our oldest daughter, Katie was not allowed to keep her “silky” blanket past the age of four…my husband thought it was ridiculous to have her walking about in public fingering the silk pajama top I had given her as a means of pacifying her. And, all in all, I agree with him. The stares we sometimes attracted when people realized what it was prompted me to cut the straps off and sew it into a square so it wouldn’t be so obvious.
Floy’s “PLAN” was to give our 9 month old son an old pair of khaki pants that he didn’t wear anymore. It wasn’t a silk blankie, he reasoned with himself. It was “cool”…”manly”…not a pacifier by any means. My husband referred to them as “daddy’s britches” and AJ took to them like a duck to water. They instantly became a part of him…he had to have them whenever we left the house…he cried for hours if we forgot them.
We learned not to forget them.
At church, the ladies keeping nursery couldn’t understand what he was asking for and would tell me my son was “cussin’ again”. I’d explain for the ten thousandth time that he was really asking for his “daddy britch” and not calling them a choice word. I don’t think they believed me.
He couldn’t live without them. At bedtime, he’d ask, “where’s my daddy britch?”
See the picture? AJ is three and still going strong with what he still calls his “daddy britch”…he’s soon to be four. They are a little more worse for the wear…the bottom halves of the legs are gone now (I cut them off because they were ratty anyway) and they are starting to rip in odd places… but they are still his favorite.
He loves them like the little boy in the “Velveteen Rabbit” story. He worries about them when they are not near. He asks about them often when we are away from home if he doesn’t have them.
They are his and he
l
o
v
e
s
them.
I love him and this time I don’t think we are going to be in such a rush to make one of our children give up their blankie. Oh, I know it’s probably not PC to allow him to hold on to the things…and I can just hear my mom and others clucking their tongues right now.
But this is my reason. He’s doesn’t know Jesus personally yet. He’s still terrified of the dark…of things that go
B
U
M
P
in the night.
Why am I going to take away the only thing that (besides my husband and I) makes him feel secure? I know in time, he’ll learn that Jesus is the only One who can keep him safe and the “daddy britch” will be a thing of the past. While I look forward to the day he gets saved, I will always look back and see my sweet, precious boy holding his “daddy britch”.