Lipstick Cover-Up

Thanks for the birthday wishes and kind words. Life has been so very kind to me and I'm trying to enjoy it without all the worry.

We've had some winter weather and I love how pretty it looks, but I hate driving in ice and snow, I truly white knuckle the wheel and try not to cry as I swerve all over. I wrecked when I was pregnant with my oldest daughter in weather like that and to this day it really scares me, I should not drive in this weather I am a nervous wreck of a danger to myself and all those around me. I'm looking into buying a home within walking distance to work just for this reason, honestly. I don't know that we'll find something habitable and affordable, so maybe we'll get very good at being "handy" around the house, or we'll just set our expectations for "quality of living arrangements" much much lower.

On that note, I'm off for my drive home, wish me luck...and if anyone else is driving near me, say a prayer, I don't want to hit or hurt anyone out there, but I'm such a nervous nellie about it, the level of how pathetic I am behind the wheel in this weather is lower than guttersnipe!

Lots of love,
lil'sis

to say the least that's what it's been like since the new year began.

I just haven't felt like I've had much to share with the blog lately, not much of interest, just the regular day to day usual stuff...busy busy busy.

I did have a birthday this week, I turned 34, and it didn't bother me. Actually got me thinking, I was talking with a friend and said that I felt better today than I did in my 20's and she thought I was joking. I really do. I'm in much better shape, physically, mentally, financially. She replied, "ok so not after you got of college, but your later 20's, before you had kids"

Nope, not then either. I had my oldest child, Emily, when I was 25, Gabriel I had a year and a half later, I was 26. Ages 27-30 were spent in a job I hated, scraping by and shuttling my very ill children to and from doctors and specialists, hospital bills and lots of ramen noodles for me and my hubby.

Then I left my horrible hell of a job, we bought a new house, the kids got healthy so to speak...things got so much better. The death of my father and my husband being sick have been the big events of my 30's, then I had Isabel and things since her birth have just made my life so full, so very blessed. I have the BEST job in the world, I volunteer with organizations that I feel truly make a difference, I have faith in so many things that I didn't in my 20's.

Somedays I feel like this foolish optimistic blabber mouth. Over involved in things and irritating to others with my perkiness.

Somedays I feel so tired, stressed and full of worry that I think I should be medicated.

Then there are the days where I'm just going through the motions, a read a blog about this recently, she was asking if there are truly intelligent people out there who are content?

I don't really know. All the moms I know put on the good face, but we all have our issues, right? the things we struggle with, the calendar that fills up and we have a hard time managing, the shuttling from event to event, playdates, school functions, birthday parties, organizing and then taking care of the house and family. It adds up on each of us.

I'm still working on what I said at new year's, being kinder to others and kinder to myself.

For today, I'm feeling good, but that nagging feeling that stays with me, "when's it going to get bad?" is still there in the back of my mind. Things are just going too well to stay that way right? The second I actually think that though I worry that saying it is going to be a self-fulfilling prophecy, and that if it wasn't going to get bad before that thought, now that I've verbalized it, things really will, the "waiting for the next shoe to drop" feeling I call it.

I like being busy and having things to do, places to go, things to finish up. I like that, I would just like to shake that feeling of, enjoy it now sister because it's all gonna end really soon. Live in the moment more, maybe that's what I need to try. Enjoy this second right now. I'll try that too.

With the holidays and all that they entail, I had to take a blog break, it was just too much to write for me. I did keep reading when I had moments, but I just didn't have this wonderful little block of time to actually do a post of my own, (and the one time I did blogger wouldn't or couldn't post, ain't that just a kick in the pants). So thankfully, I do today.

Christmas was wonderful. I had a great time with my husband and kids, and then with my family too. We had my husbands family over on the 23rd for dinner and good thing we did, we're getting dinner and hors de'vors prepped and I notice his right leg is swollen at the calf. I ask him about it and he says, "that must be why it's burning and achy" HELLO HUSBAND!!!! You have blod clotting problems remember...so his sister and her family arrives and I whisk him off to the hospital, turns out to be a spider bite of some sort?!? Must be all that work out in the woodpile he's been doing lately. Home to dinner and happy times with his sister and family. Overall, it turned out well, she did all the cooking for us in our absence and the kids loved having time with their Aunt, Uncle, and cousin without us around.

On Christmas Eve we had mass at church, it was so nice, it was the "children's mass" and prior to the service starting different parish children who play instruments each did solos of different seasonal hymns. It was so nice, these little beaming faces on the piano, and one girl on a bassoon, she was funny, one of the priests saw her coming up the stairs outside and said, "Oh, I didn't know we had an Oboe too?" and she looked at him in horror and said, "It's a bassoon! Not an oboe, they look totally different!" That she said it that way to the priest just made me laugh. After mass my mother and her husband came back to our place for dinner, it was good. They had fun, the kids enjoyed the time and I have to say I did too. My mom was fun and easygoing, which isn't usually the case when her husband is with her. I don't know that it's a permanent change, but I was glad for it.

Christmas morning was fun with my family. The kids really enjoyed the gifts with the baby ( I keep saying baby and I know she just turned 1, but she's still the baby ok) Izzy opened up everyone else's gifts, she liked the unwrapping more than the gifts. When we were done we were off to my sister's house, (Wine Girl), she lives a few hours away and this was the first time she was hosting a holiday at her home.

Well, she and her husband were amazing. All the prep for food was done, they had it all timed and what needed to be cooked when, really a true schedule and it worked out great. All the recipies used were from Cooking Light, which I love and subscribe to and encourage everyone else to as well. So all afternoon you here, "Where's the magazine?" when different dishes were being finished or worked on, I loved it. We had wine and lots of it, we played a drinking game of sorts, WineGirl, me and my mom. When different phrases were said we had to drink. We drank a LOT. Not to much that we were sick or don't remember things, or didn't enjoy the day, but we or I should say I drank more than I normally or usually do. I had a blast with everyone. Buddha Girl and her family were their, I love them so dearly and see them less often than I'd like. I was so happy that her HG could be there with us, even if my mom's husband was there too and that made it a little tense, he really did well I think.

After much rumination on this I've come to the conclusion that my mom's husband is just so introverted that functions with people are actually painful for him I think. More than just a couple of people and he is truly overwhelmed.

The kids had such a wonderful time playing with their cousins and hanging out together. Sleepovers are always high on their list of things they want to do. When we left on the 26th, we waited till after dinner and baths hoping they'd sleep for the ride. Well Gabe was asleep before we hit the interstate and he stayed asleep till we woke him to get him in the house. Emily slept too, but she lasted about 40 minutes into the ride before she was snoring. Izzy, well, she slept on and off, we just turned her carseat around and it's more sitting up than reclining like her old seat was, so she's not liking the sleeping sitting up thing, but she did for the most part sleep. It was a great ride, hubby and I talked and laughed and joked.

New Year's Eve weekend was a different animal all together. This past Friday, Izzy starts with a stomach bug, vomit, vomit, and more vomit. Saturday, Dad starts with it, Sunday Gabe and Emmy start with it. I'm living on my Zofran and Fenergan left over from my pregnancy so that one of us is upright and able to clean the kids up. We're out of pajamas, towels, blankets and sheets, I have so much laundry to do and it's hard catching up, oh yeah, and I'm back to work! Once the nausea passes I'll be ok, I've got lots of stuff at home to mend the masses from the pukes and the potty runs, I've applied more Beadreau's Butt Paste in the past 72 hours than I thought possible.

I'm ready for a nap and a vacation, puke free preferably.

So Happy New Year to you all, I do hope that 2007 brings great things for each of you. We'll all have our share of challenges to be sure, some good, some not, but I hope that we all make it to next year at this time and can look at '07 and smile a bit.

Lots of love,
lil'sis