Ten

 

A decade is an peculiar amount of time. (I was going to say it's "odd", but it is in fact "even" as luck would have it.) 

In so many ways, it feels like it was just last week.  In other ways, it's remarkable how much can happen and change in ten years.

Ten years.  We spent the first year of marriage anticipating our daughter.  She was born about 3 weeks after our first anniversary (if you've ever known a lady that's 38 weeks pregnant, you can imagine how romantic that first anniversary was!).  Then somehow time went by...we bought a house to bring back to life. We made a ton of fantastic friends. We watched our daughter ride her trike, then her bike through the neighborhood.  We lost a very special dog.  We gained another dog who's pretty daggum cool in her own right.  Oh we got a weird cat too (got to give Emilie a shout out).

Ten years...swine flu, the economic bubble, ice storms, emotional storms.  A lot has happened in ten years, but because we've gone through it, learned and grown together it seems like it was all just yesterday.  Being married is not all fun and games.  It's a decision to love someone every single day, to be a united family front.  Most days, that's an easy decision.  On occasion, it's not. 

But that's the point...all the good and the bad; all the wonderful and the insane...those are the things that you only have in common with your spouse. Only time can create a relationship like that. And if you try to do it right, that's what keeps making the friendship and love deeper over the years.  There's only one person that's in the trenches with you every single day.  Worrying over fevers, celebrating career successes, rinsing dishes, packing lunches.  No one else is quite as "with" you in these moments as your spouse.

I am very much looking forward to the rest of this adventure.  Happy anniversary, Kevin!  Ten years since I married you, nineteen since I met you...it has just flown by.  

 

It's always been you.

Home Again, Home Again, Jiggety Jig

It's obvious lately that the BusyBs are obsessed with the coming of spring. The past 2 days have been just gorgeous here. The kind of days that you walk outside at 10am, and bask in the lovely sunshine. Then remember that you sent your hot natured child to school in a turtleneck! Ugh! Oh well...Homey promptly shed her layers when she got home and put a bathing suit on. With a tu-tu type shenanigan on top...all this in her efforts to be a Mermaid Superhero. That's how we roll. If you don't have a super power, turn on back around. Come back when you've earned a cape.

Anyway...as I'm waiting for the forsythia and dogwood to bloom, ushering in Sister Spring, I realized that it has been eons since I have not been toiling away at work or school in the spring time. It's been many, many moons, and those moons have added up without my realizing it! But, finally, for now, I'm home. So I'm sitting in my nest, adjusting a twig here and a string there, hanging out with Homey. She is a surly beast at times, but very often we make a good team. We have been cooking together like there's no tomorrow. This is thrilling to me (once I got the hang of it). I'm not used to cooking with her. When I worked "out in the world", I cooked ahead, froze meals, and had it all worked out so that we could at least eat before 7. Surely that's enough time for a 4 year old that has to be in bed by 8.

Now, we can cook together. Which means that she is taking a moment to go get her stool or a kitchen chair so she can be part of the action. Also she is touching each individual ingredient. Is that weird? I thought so...for about 2.5 seconds until I realized that she is really interested and actually learning about what goes into our food. If she wants to see what flour feels like...go for it, Homey! If she wants to smell the vanilla every single time...great! And she's learning math...we read the recipe and she scoops out the required amount of [insert ingredient]. She's also learned to respect the kitchen. Her newest line is "When I'm a mommy, I can drink coffee, use a knife, and put my hands in the oven". Yes, Homey. Except it's questionable whether or not I should be even allowed to put my hands in the oven. I'm a little challenged with overall movement sometimes. A trait Homey seems to have inherited.

We are working together on so many other things too...we paint, we clean, we play, we imagine. She has her moments of being bossy and cross but there's no other place I'd rather be than in our nest with my surly hatchling.

God Bless Little Girls...

It is apparent to me that the reason I laugh at all the things I expect to get done in a day is because of :

<--- this.

This is Homey. She's a handful. She's very busy. And she's generally just like me. Oy! Toss together some sass, some independence, some OCD-ish cleaning up moments, and add a touch of belligerence, and you've got Homey! She's very sweet and funny. And I'm beyond glad that she is past the Terrible Two/Three's. Because that was realllly interesting.

Anyhoo...whenever I think I need to learn how to actually sew (not just know how to work the machine), finish painting something, catch up on my Real Simple magazine, or anything, really, this one is on my heels ready to break out her paint, her cooking box, or a plethora of other messy time-consuming activities. The good thing is I usually learn more from hangin' with Homey than I do doing Grown Up Things. And it's usually a lot more fun
too. God bless little girls....
Especially the ones that know all the words to the Wonder Woman theme song (more on that later...)

I know that there are amazing women out there that do more in a day with way more kidlets, but sheesh...it takes a chunk out of your time/energy. Hey, productive moms with multiple children...what's the secret, yo?