A Most Marvelous Memory

It has been a disappointing couple of days.

So to cheer myself up, this is going to be about a day that was definitely NOT disappointing.

First, a little background:
(Yes, this could be involved. You may want to use the restroom and freshen up your drink.)

I have this amazing friend, Julie. I met her seventeen years ago. I was actually friends with her aunt and uncle first. That's an interesting story, too. For another time.

So seventeen years ago, I was just out of college. Brian and I had been married a little over a year and we had a baby.

It's a long story, but we wound up staying with Julie's parents for several weeks while we waited for an apartment to be ready. She was a nursing student at the time and needed to do a case study on a young family for a class.

Enter us. A young family.

Poor Julie! I'm sure she just wanted to ask us a few questions and be on her merry way.

But no. I met her and I decided I wanted her for my friend. So when she asked if she could come over and interview us for her paper, I said "SURE!! And then why don't you and John (her then boyfriend, now husband) stay for dinner and cards or something!"

Again, poor girl! Here's this sweet college kid who just got roped into eating dinner and spending her evening with these married people. And I really didn't know how to cook!

Anyway...the project required several interviews. Which I subversively turned into dinner and card dates. :o)

And I guess eventually we grew on them, because a little over a year later, when she called to tell me she was engaged, she asked me to be a bridesmaid.

She's been this amazing friend. There isn't enough blog space to document all of the amazing that both she and John have been to me and my family, but one of the ways that she is so amazing is the love she lavishes on my children.

Seventeen years of it.

One of the coolest things she does is make a special date with each of my kids for their birthdays. They go out to dinner just with her and do something fun together. As the years have gone by, John has joined in when they take the boys and they go as a foursome. I don't remember when this tradition started, exactly, but I'm pretty sure it was long enough ago that carseats and possibly diaper bags were involved.

Ever since she started this, I have been anxiously awaiting the day that I would get to reciprocate. Take her child on a special date for his/her birthday.

And I had to wait a Really. Long. Time.

Finally, this year, my wait was over. Julie's beautiful daughter celebrated her first birthday a few weeks ago.

So we went out for her birthday. Julie and me and all of our girls.

And because I've been waiting a Really. Long. Time. And because I'm moving to California (Stupid California), we chose something that was probably more for the "biggs" than for the "lovely little." Although, she seemed to have a good time.

A trip to "Build-a-Bear"!

Waiting to eat lunch. One has to fortify before all of our fun!

Coloring like a big girl!

WOW!! THIS is a malt??? I can't believe you've been keeping this from me all this time!

I'll bet it tastes just as good from my fingers as it does from the straw. You were done with this, right, Mom?

At our destination!! Which one should we choose?

I think this one!

I guess we all need one!

Oooh! Pretty!!

Ready to "Build" my Bunny!

Giving her heart a kiss!

Wow! That turned out bigger than I expected! :o)

Birthday celebrations wear us out!!

In My Perfect Life

I would be doing this on my day off:

But instead, I am doing this:

Yes. That is my arm in the back of my toilet. My job in the whole "Project Remodel The Bathroom So Hopefully Our House Will Appraise For Enough For a Down Payment on a Grossly Overpriced Cottage in California" was to figure out how to get all of the standing water out of the toilet. Mission accomplished. The toilet is now in a spot of honor on our driveway.

I'm sure my neighbors are thrilled.

I know I am.

At least it isn't snowing.

With Friends Like These...

Normally, your friends take you out on your birthday. Possibly buy you drinks. Get you inappropriately funny cards.

Not if your friends are the owners/coaches at a CrossFit Box. Then you get this:

A birthday WOD (Workout Of the Day)-- Multiple forms of Pain and Suffering in various numerical increments that correspond to your birth date, your age, or some combination of the two.

Thanks to this lovely gift, I am feeling every bit of 40 years old and then some! :o)

Happy Spring?

I wonder if God thinks that the only way to get me on board with the whole "move to California" thing is to make it permanently winter here in the Sunflower State.

Except it isn't permanently winter.  Mother Nature is a horrible tease.  This weekend was beautiful.  I even regretted wearing capris to Youngest Son's baseball scrimmage as opposed to shorts.

Yesterday morning...at 5 am...it was 77 degrees.  It was uncomfortably hot at the gym.  By noon...it was 47.  By 5:30...37.

This morning, we woke up to this:

And this:

And a quarter of our Bradford Pear in the neighbor's yard.  

Thanks to the help of my two sons and youngest daughter, it is now all (more or less) on our driveway.

And I would not at all be surprised to see a faun, or a lamp post, or a White Witch in a sledge, as I am starting to worry that  it will always be winter.  Always winter and never Christmas.

My Eeyore Kind of Day

"There are those who will wish you good morning. If it is a good morning. Which I doubt." ~Eeyore, Winnie the Pooh

I know. Winnie the Pooh is a children's book. Written for six-year-olds. Which is totally appropriate for today's post. Because I feel like a six-year-old today.



And sometimes this blog is all about keeping it real.

I'm having an Eeyore kind of day.

It's gloomy outside. And 38 degrees. And April, for heaven's sake!

I have a cold settling in my chest and a kink in my back that I feel Every. Time. I Breathe. This is annoying at best and painful at worst.

It's state assessment time. This always raises my blood pressure. High stakes tests drive me crazy! I go from feeling like I'm actually making a difference to feeling like I the worst teacher in the world as I watch those scores roll in.

I have to travel an hour each way to administer state assessments this week. I'll have to leave before 7am and I won't get home until after 6 pm. My children get to fend for themselves during that time. This makes me feel like a "rock star" mom.

I'm getting an ulcer thinking about all of the things I have to do to get this house ready to sell.

I have to plan a graduation party. I have no idea where to begin.

People are disappointing me. Family...Friends...People I thought were my friends. I am certain I am disappointing them as well.

My son's dog is "Marley" at his best and "Cujo" at his worst. People tell me he'll be better at three. He might not make it to three.

My son is rarely ever here. Which makes the above mentioned dog "my dog." I don't like dogs.

It is incredibly unfair that in order for me to fit into my clothes or even give a mediocre performance at the gym, I have to be uber-meticulous about what I put into my mouth when it doesn't seem like anyone else around me has to.

I'm tired of saying the same things over and over: "Put your dishes in the dishwasher." "Hang up your towels." "Clean up that mess." "Stop calling him/her a ________." "Is your homework done?" I feel like a nag. And a broken record.


It's gonna be hard for me to get to the gym this week. This irritates me.

I don't really even want to go to the gym this week. This irritates me even more.



My son had a double-header baseball game tonight. It was beyond cold. Sitting out in that did nothing for the above-mentioned cold.



I can still only press 60 pounds. No matter what I do...that upper body strength just isn't getting any better.



It was cloudy today with a chance of rain. For those of you that know my youngest daughter...that meant a melt-down before dance class and a panicked phone call on the way. I had to tell her for the millionth time that it probably wasn't even going to RAIN, let alone tornado. I wasn't as nice as I could be about it.



I miss Better Half. I miss his friendship, but I also miss him being able to help me with all of the above stuff.



But his texts indicate that he's not having that stellar of a day, either.



It must be a family thing.



"That Accounts for a Good Deal," said Eeyore gloomily. "It Explains Everything. No Wonder."