Breathe In, Breathe Out

Another weekend flew by. I keep hoping for some rest and relaxation, but none this way comes.

Friday night, I stayed at school, went out to dinner with some co-workers, worked at Freshman registration, then came home and my brother crashed on our couch. That seems like years ago.

Saturday morning, my brother and I did the SATs until 1 pm. At that point, I went with *B* to celebrate his mom's birthday at Carrabba's with some of their family. We went back to their house for an hour, then we picked Casey up at the airport to spend the night (again, on our couch).

This morning, I made the three of us homemade chocolate chip waffles. Casey and I went down to the bridal store and tried on bridesmaid's dresses. Thankfully, we found her maid-of-honor dress for my wedding. I then dropped her off with her family, then flew home to go to dinner with my family in honor of my brother getting into an honor society in college. That was where things got interesting (ugly). My brother and his girlfriend got in a fight, so he didn't get there early enough to save a table. We waited 45 minutes to be seated. Then, my grandmother complained at me because I couldn't call her back quickly enough after researching a computer problem she was having. I got over that for the most part. Then the bill came. My grandparents and my dad had a fight - not a disagreement - a loud, nasty fight about whether my grandparents were allowed to pay for their portion. My dad was trying to be nice and take all of us out to dinner. My grandparents wouldn't hear of it. The entire meal was totally ruined. No one talked to each other after that, and we left in short order.

Now, it's 8:30 pm, and I'm utterly drained. Tomorrow starts at 5:30 am. I hope I'm ready for it.

Simple Pleasure Thursday

My simple pleasure for today is...


...grass! You can finally see grass! The backyard seemed to melt magically. There was 4 inches of snow last night, and this huge gaping grass patch. On the green note, I took Momzoo's advice and put my plants outside. Look at my gorgeous herbs!

Houdini in a Fur Tuxedo

We've had Evie since Christmas, so we've only known her in the capacity of it being cold and snowy outside. Now that it's been warm out (65 today!) I'm seeing a whole new side to her personality. While I've told you of her greatest escape, she's managed to weasel her way out of the house twice yesterday and a few times over the weekend. With Wicket, you open the door with a foot in the corner, and she'll stay. Evie is the most lithe, agile creature you've ever seen. Figure skaters have nothing on her ability to jump my foot and rotate midair to make it through a 2 inch gap in the door. While I love that she's my little cat, I just might have to fatten her up to make her escape resistant.

One Step Closer

We are now officially one step closer to getting married! Today, we met with our priest. I'm happy to learn that this parish doesn't require the group classes that our friend had to take. While they offer them, they recommend instead signing up for a sponsor couple program. We'll have our own sponsor couple, and we'll meet them four or five times. They are trained in premarital counseling, and they can help us to anticipate things that we will encounter in married life. We also found out for certain that they will allow us to marry even though *B* isn't Catholic. All I had to do is promise to expose my children to the Catholic religion. I had planned on baptizing them Catholic anyway, barring some religious conversion on my part, so I wasn't worried. This step takes a load off my mind. Whew!

My plants are growing so well, and my parsley has FINALLY started to sprout. I was worried it was a bum bunch of seeds. Check out my beauties!

Lavender - this was my first to sprout, but it's fairly spindly.

Cilantro - this one got big REALLY fast.

Parsley - this finally decided it was time to show itself.

Giveaway at Adventures in Self Reliance

I've found a new blog to follow, Adventures in Self Reliance. She's giving away a Katadyn water filter. Head on over to http://selfrelianceadventures.blogspot.com/ to check it out!

Quality Versus Quantity of Life

A work friend of mine posted a video project she had to do for class. It was called Memories...and Memory. It was the juxtaposition of things we remember forever (e.g. her kids, parents) and things we always forget (e.g. keys, paying bills). I wish I could post it, but it has many of her own, personal family pictures in it. While it was only a few minutes long, it really made me think.

I tend to yearn for a full family life. Looking at the pictures of her kids when they were little (and then remembering that they're barely younger than I am) I realized that maybe we all yearn for the fullness of life that only lasts a few precious years. We live for many years, but the years we look forward to, remember, and miss most are so short.

While I recognize that, in many ways, I am not yet ready for kids, I somehow still feel I am. *B* and I have certain prerequisites for having kids. The biggest is obviously marriage, but other than that, a teacher's certification, and a masters degree, we want to be able to enjoy the time we have together as a couple. How much couple time is enough to build a strong bond and do non-kid activities? Isn't it possible to do things with kids in tow (though it can be a lot of work)?

There's a scene in When Harry Met Sally that follows this line of logic:

Sally: When Joe and I started seeing each other we wanted exactly the same thing. We wanted to live together but we didn't want to get married because every time anyone we knew got married it ruined their relationship, they practically never had sex again. It's true. It's one of those secrets that no one ever tells you. I would sit around with my girlfriends who have kids... actually this my girlfriend who has kids, Alice, and she and Garry never did it anymore. She didn't even complain about it now that I think about it. She just said it matter-of-fact-ly. She said, they were up all night, they were both exhausted all the time, the kids just took every sexual impulse they had out of them. (Pauses) Joe and I use to talk about it and we'd say, we are so lucky we have this wonderful relationship, we can have sex on the kitchen floor and not worry about the kids walking in, we can fly off to Rome on a moment's notice. And then one day I was taking Alice's little girl for the afternoon because I promised I'd take her to the circus, and, we were in the cab playing eye-spy. Eye-spy mailbox, eye-spy lamppost. And she looked out the window and she saw this man and this woman with these two little kids and the man had one of the little kids on his shoulders and she said, "I spy a family". And I started to cry. You know I just started crying. And I went home and I said, "The thing is Joe we never fly off to Rome on a moment's notice.
Harry: And the kitchen floor... Sally: Not once, it's this cold, hard Mexican ceramic tile.

It's not that *B* and I want totally different things like that. Not in the least. But, like Sally, I'm starting to feel the bedrock of my assumptions shift. I've assumed for a while we'd wait four or five years after getting married to have kids. That way, we could travel and be spontaneous. But we can't afford to travel, and we're not SO spontaneous. A couple of day trips to the beach, yes, but can't you do that with kids? How does one know when they're ready to have kids?

A Happy Birthday

My baby turned two today. Around here, we celebrate birthdays and gotcha days alike. Wicket got a fist full of treats in her food bowl and gobbled them all up. For the most part, she celebrated by sleeping in her carrier.

While Wicket has been lazing about, I've been hard at work. I made another batch of Italian bread after my first one disappeared! I made a double batch of chili with some cornbread and put it in the freezer. I made some cobbler to go in the freezer, too, but *B* got into it. Before I go to bed, I'm making chicken pot pie for tomorrow's dinner.

Over the course of the last few days, I've come up with a list of things I want to do/learn. I want to:

• take a First Aid course
• take a cooking course
  
• make my own candles
• make my own soap
• make more of my own clothes (skirts)

While I will be working this summer, these things I'd like to get done when I have a little free time.