My Dad

My all-time favorite picture of my Dad. He was laughing and crying when we told him about Finn. :)

Yesterday-my sister posted a picture of my beautiful niece playing with her daddy. She was putting make-up on him.It, of course, made me think of my dad. This is something that I vividly remember about childhood. Now, I was never a huge one for make-up (I'm still really not), but I remember nail polish. I remember my dad letting "us girls" put nail polish on his toenails. Bright pink nail polish, neon green nail polish...really, whatever nail polish that we wanted!



He would let us do his hair, he would walk down the cat-walk for us in crazy outfits. He would make up elaborate story lines for my My Little Ponies. He would tell me crazy stories about "Kool Cat" He still does this...with his grandchildren. Not more than a few months ago, he and Ava put on a fashion show, and Papa strutted down the catwalk in front of the entire family. Or last summer, Ava convinced him that we should play "the dancing game"--which, coincidentally was a game created by Randy (OF COURSE!) where you have to dance in the car and whoever the judge says "wins" gets a point. Well, my dad REALLY wanted to win the dancing game...so he stopped the car, got out of the car, ran in front of the car and danced for all of our street to see! It was hilariously awesome.



All I could think of is...I hope Finn thinks of me this way. I hope my children will look back and see that I didn't care what anyone else thought. I hope they see that my goal was to make them laugh and love and experience life. I hope (so much) that they will remember smiles and laughter and happiness. And, obviously, there will be times that they feel sad, angry, hopeless...but I hope these times are few and far between.

But here's what I know. If he ends up with half of the happy memories of ME and Randy that I have of my dad (and he's only 60--he's got a lot of living left!), then he'll be a pretty lucky boy!

Jealousy is the new black.

Lately, I feel like I spend a lot of time wasting energy on jealousy. I don't know what it is. I mean, inherently, I wouldn't change anything about my life. But I have my moments--moments of being a huge bitch. Most of the time, I keep those moments kept tightly to myself, and I feel like I do a pretty good job. But they are there.

- I look at the gorgeous mom--completely put together, and skinny...and I kind of hate her sometimes. Even when I have no idea who she is. Even when I know that I could be fit and slim, but my laziness stops me from it.

- I look at the pregnant bellies, and even though I know it's not the right time--I feel sad.

- I look at other photographers, who are where I want to be, who have everything that I want, and I feel angry. Angry at myself, angry at my situation, angry that I don't have the funds/time (excuses? I don't know) to make it happen at this very moment.

- I look at other people's big, beautiful homes with brand new EVERYTHING, and I feel sad that I can't have that.

What a waste of time. What a complete and utter waste of energy. Because these people have great things, but so do I. I have GREAT, AMAZING, WONDERFUL things and people and love. So much love that sometimes I write crazy, cheesy, emotional things like this. I look at my gorgeous, smiling son and I realize that I have been given so much more than I could ever possibly ask for. I look at my husband, who--has his moments--but is a wonderful man and a FANTASTIC husband. I look at my family and friends, and home, and dog, and life and I see so much beauty. And I'm wasting my time with jealousy? Get it together.

Here's the other thing. Just because I don't have every single thing I want in life, doesn't mean that I won't--someday. Someday I WILL be constantly employed as a photographer--not just weekends, but all the time. Someday I will (hopefully) have more children. Someday I will get off my lazy ass and make my fitness goals a reality. I can change anything I want to.

How's that for Susie Sunshine?

The Soundtrack of my life...

"Feel the music, we're dancing to the beat
1,2,3 gotta move my feet.
4,5,6 come on let's go
'cause Elmo likes to rock and roll
Elmo likes to rock and roll baby.

This is the soundtrack to my life. And it's okay with me.

These past few weeks have been so hectic, and there are so many blog entries running through my head, and I don't know where and when to write it all down. So I'm going to go with a bulleted list. How's that for a good writer?

- Finn had "surgery" on February 10th. I put surgery in quotation marks because it was more just a basic procedure, but he was put under and they made an incision and put tubes in his ears, so I am calling it a surgery. Because to me it felt traumatic and difficult and it was surgery in my head. He did fantastically, and was adorable. Here I'll prove it.



Gah! He's so cute.


- I've been yo-yoing diet-wise lately. However, yesterday I weighed in at my lowest yet, down 16.1 pounds down from Christmas. I think it's still pretty impressive, though I've slowed down quite a bit. I really want to start running again, and I'm hoping that will happen this weekend, but you all know that I tend to make lofty goals, and then not reach them (how sad does that sound written out for all to see? What a horrible attribute).

- The last week has been terribly hectic, and the next two weeks will be even worse. In some ways I can't wait for spring break to get here, in others I can wait a bit longer. I started teaching an ACT prep class one night a week. I know, I know you are saying im an idiot- but I have my reasons. One of the main reasons is because I thought I could make those long nights at the pub and double things up and make some extra money at the same time. So that means one night a week for the last two weeks I havent gotten home until 9:30. Then, its also a Paragon deadline (yearbook), so that means there are all these added work nights, most of which I have to bring Finn with for all/some of it. Next week is a Crier week (newspaper), and the week after is another ACT class, and a field trip. Its all just never-ending, and a lot of the time utterly exhausting. Sometimes I wonder if this is how life will feel forever from now on, and then I wonder if so--will I miss it when it's not like this? Because that's how my masochistic mind works.

- I started a blog titled "Dear student" this week that talked about a variety of things that annoyed me about students in general, but it got out of hand quickly and I had to stop! However, it was totally hilarious...and I want to publish it. Maybe I'll have enough guts sometime soon.

- Finns birthday party was awesome, if I do say so myself! It was so fantastic, and there were only a few "I wish I had..." moments!

- Other than these things the last few weeks have been uneventful, and I've enjoyed listening to Elmo rock, Ernie rap and Finn play with all his birthday toys! He is so incredibly fun right now. It honestly just keeps getting better and better!

Feeling healthy and getting clean.
We're takin' a bath, ya know what I mean?
The bubbles scrub-a-dub and we're in the tub.
Cleaning up rubber ducky and all our toes.

This morning.

It was a three-day weekend this past weekend. But for me, it's not. I never get 3 day weekends. On Monday my yearbook kids trekked into school, and I kissed Finn goodbye and left him with Grandma. It left a bit of a sour taste in my mouth because...I don't want to be in school on a 45 degree February day, but I was.

THEN--I got everything ready for today--cleaned the breast pump, got Finn and I's clothes out, made lunch, got diapers ready for Finn, got everything ready to go. I thought "this week WILL start off well, even though I'm in for another 14 hour day tomorrow," I woke up after a somewhat-good night of sleep (only one wake up in the middle of the night), and I felt okay. We got dressed, and I tried to carry 200,000 things downstairs to the garage at the same time.

It didn't work.

I dropped...watermelon and hummus all over the front stairs.

Suffice it to say....

F*&* F*^% F&*(!!!!

It was not a good start to the week.

Dreaming of babies...

Okay, so at lunch today I began feeling a little glum. There are two pregnant women in my department. One has had two children already, and one this is her first child. They spent the entire lunch period (in one way or another) complaining about pregnancy.

Please don't misunderstand me--I understand that it is hard. I also understand that--compared to others--my pregnancy was a cake-walk. I understand that not everyone has the same amount of love for pregnancy that I do. However, it has always irritated me when people complain about pregnancy, because you should be happy--happy that you are having a baby, and happy that your baby is healthy.

And, it was hard for me to listen to today...for several reasons.

1. I am overly emotional, and I've accepted that
2. Because they were talking about things that I knew the answers to, but didn't want to be a know-it-all, so I didn't answer.
3. Because I had a dream that I was pregnant this week, and I (stupidly) let myself really think about it and dream about a baby.


I know it's silly. I am aware that I am being irrational. Randy and I are NOT trying to get pregnant, not even a little bit, but I'm also in this weird place where I am sad that my baby isn't a "baby" anymore, so I am emotional about it.

So...I am sorry I'm complaining. I know it's crazy, but today I am using this blog as a real journal, and it made me sad. It made me really sad.

Weird, right?

Blogging

I cannot write a blog anymore. Because I cannot put down The Hunger Games Trilogy (for the third time all the way through).

I'll be back after I finish it.

It's been a rough week :(

My baby is not a baby.

I haven't written here for a while. It's been a while for a reason, because I don't know what to say.

I don't know how to be eloquent about Finn's first birthday. I can't recount all the wonderful-ness that surrounded it. I can tell you how on his actual birthday Randy and I took off work and took him to the aquarium, and gave him a cupcake, and blew up like a hundred balloons and filled the kitchen with them. I could tell you how he loved his gifts. I could tell you about his wonderful birthday party. How I felt like I accomplished just what I wanted, and everyone had a wonderful time--most importantly Finn. The place was perfect, the food was great, the company was phenomenal. I could tell you about every detail of that party. I could tell you about the fact that I finished his baby book yesterday, and sent it off to printer.

I could tell you all of this, and it sounds great, but I don't know that it fully expresses how I feel about the fact that he is ONE. He is a toddler (I know, I know--he's been walking for 2 months now, so I am aware that he's been toddling for a long while, but it's OFFICIAL now).

Sometimes I can't remember what life was like before him. I remember snippets. I remember sleeping (blissfully) through the night, and hanging out with Randy, and seeing movie after movie with Chrisanne. But I can't SEE any of it.

It's weird because I feel like my life wasn't really complete until he was here. Like I didn't matter as much, and then he came. The night before the biggest snowstorm in the last 50 years, he came into this world and turned my life upside down in the best way possible.

This year has been...so full. Full is the best way to describe it. There have been so many amazing times. So many wonderful firsts, and seconds, and "stills." And I love each and every one of them.

I think that that is a great way to describe him. He makes me feel "full." Mostly of love.

I am so thankful for him, I am so thankful for the "fullness" that he has brought me throughout his first year on earth.

I hope I get to experience so many more full years with him.





#cheesy much? Sorry about my hashtag overuse.

Oh and P.S. I've been just doing okay with the whole diet thing...really wishy-washy on and off. I am trying to get back on the wagon, and need encouragement.