This Goes Out to the One(s) I Love

Tomorrow I travel without my family. And, since I am such an optimistic person who never considers worst-case scenarios as the most likely outcome in any situation, I have been thinking about what my kids would remember about me if I died during my travels. What sort of legacy would I leave for them? Would they know how much I love them, or would Mason just remember how the last day we spent together involved me throwing away a gift he was given by his grandpa and the trauma that caused his tender little heart? Thinking these thoughts as I shopped for some last minute, handle these things before I go items tonight at Target got me feeling all sentimental, which made me want to write a blog post for the ones I love. You know, in case I die this weekend.

To Mason - my little Shugah Boogah. You came along way before we meant to start a family. I spent the first several months of my pregnancy with you scared out of my mind that I was going to be a mom so much sooner than I ever expected. Despite the timing being slightly off, I would not change it even if I could. You are an amazing little man . . . so kind, so sweet, so tender. You are smart, though you don't know as much as you think you do (not yet anyway). I admire your compassion and empathy, especially how naturally both seem to come for you. You make me laugh every single day, as well as melt my heart with your sweet spirit. When I need a hug, you are always happy to oblige. I hope that never changes. I love how seriously you take your role as Marissa's big brother. The way you look out for her well-being, the way you really want to teach her how to do things, and how gentle you are with her is amazing to me. The fact that you never showed jealousy towards her, even though her entrance into our family totally rocked your tiny world, really speaks to how loving and accepting you really are. I also love how you really wish you could have more siblings despite Dad's strongest attempts to convince you that more siblings would mean fewer presents for you at Christmas, less time with Mom and Dad in your day-to-day and other things that would sway pretty much any other five year old out there. I feel blessed every day that I get to be your mother.

To Marissa -my Little Princess. A few weeks ago, Grandma Rachac and I were talking about how amazing I find it that you are such a girly girl given that I never was. You are such a princess, but you are my "Paper Bag Princess". You like dressing fancy and feeling beaUtiful, but you have no problem getting out in the dirt, digging for worms or wrestling with your brother and dad. You'd be the first one to go out and save the one you love from any dragons there might be in the world, and I admire that about you. Distracting you from something you have set your sights on is basically impossible. You are determined, strong and persistent, but you are also charming, silly and fun. I am thoroughly enjoying the phase you are in now, as your sense of humor develops and emerges. I appreciate how sweet you are with little ones -- like our friend Marissa and your cousin Adrian -- and your love of animals is so sweet. You know to be gentle and kind, and you are already showing a great deal of empathy for those around you. You are confident and strong, and I admire you for that. I feel so lucky to be your mom.

To Landon. You are a fantastic husband and amazing father. I admire you. I respect you. I feel blessed to be your wife. You make me laugh like no one else, and you are the first person I want to spend time with every day. You have made me a better person, and you make me want to keep pushing to improve. Thank you for loving me. I am grateful to have you by my side.

I love you all more than I could ever properly express. I can't believe how blessed I am to be part of your lives, and am so, so grateful for each of you.

Ode to Love

I feel compelled to write a post this Valentine's Day, even though I'm generally not all that into this particular holiday. It always felt contrived and a bit disappointing, but I'm feeling the love today. This week is going to be the best week ever, all because of people who love me.

Tomorrow, Landon is taking me to see CAKE, my long-time favorite band, live in The City (also known as San Francisco). I haven't seen Cake since I was in college, which I realized this weekend has been nearly *cough*ten*cough* years. We don't normally exchange gifts because we are too pragmatic and generally just prefer to buy what we want for ourselves. But, when I saw that Cake would be performing in SF the week of Valentine's Day, I subtly implied that perhaps tickets to one of their concerts would be a nice gift (and by subtly imply, I mean, sent him an email that read, "Wanna get tickets to Cake for my Valentine's Day present?"). He quickly picked up on my hints and suggested that I buy the tickets myself using his credit card. Aren't we soooo romantic? And since Landon's mom loves us and her grandchildren (but mostly her grandchildren) soooo much, she will be driving straight to our house from work so we can make it to The City in time for the show. Feeling the love!

Then, on Thursday, my BFF (is it okay for a 30 year old woman to use that acronym?) is flying me up to spend a long weekend with her in Seattle. She booked a sweet hotel in the heart of the city for us to use as our home base for a long overdue, girls only weekend. She booked tickets to a show, but I think we're gonna spend a lot of time just hanging out and enjoying being together. I can't wait to get to spend some time with her! My mom and Landon's mom will both spend a couple of days with the kids so I can be gone for 5 (FIVE!) days.

So, I'm feeling lucky. I'm feeling loved. I'm feeling excited and grateful and really, really excited. Did I mention how excited I am? Best. Week. Ever!

WoooHooo!

Once upon a time, I went to a party. I had fun at that party. Lots of fun. Too much fun, in fact, such that I was rather sick in the night. The next day was Halloween, and even though I still felt rather sick, as the mother of two small children, I had to suck it up and take them trick or treating. So I did. And they had fun. And I sucked it up. There was no one to blame for my stupidity of the previous evening aside from myself, and I certainly wasn't going to let it interfere with my parental duties.

After we finished trick or treating, and the kiddos had nice full buckets of candy, I set my very expensive, very loved camera on the small sliver of seat between Rissa's car seat and the door as I buckled her in. I forgot about it completely, shut the door, and went home. Upon opening the door to let Rissa out, my camera fell onto the concrete floor of our garage. And it broke, but not visibly. It just didn't work anymore.

After much self-kicking for my wide array of stupid decisions in such a short period of time, I sat down and figured out how to send my camera into the company with whom I had purchased an extended warranty at the time I bought my camera. There were a few issues that made me not feel particularly hopeful that my camera would be repaired under the warranty, particularly the part where the warranty didn't cover damage from dropping the camera on concrete. Still, it was only going to cost the price of shipping the camera to their facilities, so I thought I at least ought to try. I didn't have another $1500 to shell out to get myself a new camera.

I shipped the camera in, and after several long months, including all the holidays and the various important moments associated with them, I received a package containing my completely repaired camera (for only about $20 in shipping both ways)! HOORAY!

So today, I am super duper grateful that Landon's cousin encouraged me to buy an extended warranty when I bought my camera. I am super duper grateful that I followed his advice. Finally, I am super duper grateful that my camera is all fixed and working so I can start taking photos of my beautiful kids again! WoooHooo!

Cheepies

Something that is nice about your kids learning how to talk is getting to really understand their little brains. You get to see how they take in information, absorb it and analyze it. You get to see how they think and make connections. And, you get to see how their sense of humor works. Lately, we have been enjoying a lot of Marissa's developing sense of humor. She latches onto a lot of what Mason does and says that makes her laugh and repeats ad nauseam, regardless of the response from her "audience". She spent the last week saying "green mac and cheese!" incredulously at totally random times in a voice that sounded an awful lot like an impression of Mason. I still don't get that joke, but it cracked her up for a long time. When doing or saying silly things, she often tells me, "I'm weird," or "I'm just being weird." That always makes me smile.
A couple of days ago, we were "reading" a vocabulary book about animals. When we got to the ducklings, she clearly couldn't remember what they were called. I think she was going for "chicks", but instead called them, "cheeps".
I said, "What are those?"
She said hopefully, "Cheepies?"
Then we all laughed.
We have read that same book at nap and bed time every day since then, and even though I have told her the proper name and given her the out of "baby ducks", when we get to the ducklings, she calls them "cheepies" and laughs at her tiny joke.
That Rissa is cute. I am sure glad she came to live at my house.