Bedbird

Oh, sweet Rooter.  For as long as I can remember you have made you way into my bed, or I into yours.  I admit my sleep is not deep, or restful, or rejuventing with you at my side but still I love to have you there.  

I generally find myself clinging to the edge of the bed when the sunrises.  My body is stiff and if you are still asleep at that point I just roll over (slooooowly) and watch you sleep with your legs are in all directions, your shirt up over your belly and your arms stretched above your precious head.  Or you are curled up on your side spooning right up to momma.  Your dad calls you a bedbird, and you are.  

For the last few months you have been wandering right in on your own.  I find you at my bedside in the middle of the night waiting to be hoisted in the big bed.  Last week while daddy was gone to Miami for work I just let you start your nights out in there.  It's really too big for just one.  The first night I found you like this.  It took me a bit to figure out where I should go, your basically taking up the whole bed.  The pillow your head is on is to keep you from falling out.  The foot rest is you head pillow.  It's really amazing with all that movement that you sleep at all.

Ps - your buddy Mr. D looks like he could use some rest, he gets taken along for the ride every night too.  Lucky but tired boy!

xoxo mom

25 Random Things About Me

1. I am nervous about sharing my time with Cadence and a new little one.
2. I would love to be able to jam out on a guitar, preferably a black or pink electric strat.
3. I wish I would have pursued volleyball more aggresively and miss playing it.
4. I travelled Europe for almost 2 months on my own the Fall after graduating High School.
5. I am completely fullfilled being Cadence's mom.
6. I am old skool in the way I raise her.
7. I have been in love with my husband since I was 17.
8. I asked him to my senior prom.
9. I have a soft spot for anything Italian.
10. Candlelight is my favorite light.
11. I love giving or receiving a handwritten letter.
12. I wish I could have met my maternal grandmother.
13. I used to have dreams with her in them.
14. I think red lipstick is fantastic and used to wear it often.
15. Maybe I was meant to live in the 1940's but I'm content to be living now.
16. I fancy red velvet cupcakes.
17. I wish I could pop and lock and glide and do the moon walk, that would be sweet.
18. I love seeking out cool antique pieces but dislike the smell of antique stores.
19. I love the smell of books.
20. My mom asked my dad to their senior prom too.
21. The sound and feel of warm sand and sea makes me feel alive.
22. I love to listen to music absurdly loud and rock out.
23. I think my voice is awesome when I rock out, eventhough I know its not.
24. I'm a romantic but not a hopeless one.
25. Since Cadence was born I pray every night and I can't wait to thank her for that someday.

The Agave Project

Happiness is......

Isn't he nice to look at!

Getting your hands dirty

Picking the right one

Having an exceptional helper

Not bad to look at either

I think we're headed back to Home Depot again today.  Its a good weekend for planting and smiling!

xoxo -Stevi

Meant to be

I cried in the Walmart garden section yesterday. My daughter was gleefully playing with the fountains and I started thinking that perhaps a fountain would be a nice addition to our backyard instead of a yellow lady banks rose mixed among the white ones that already reside on our south wall. Just a thought, but the background that goes along with the thought explains the tears.

We had a miscarriage on the last day of January. We had been trying for 3 months before we saw those double pink lines and were so excited to add to our family. My husband was especially ecstatic since he's been gunning for another little one since our first was born, he's nuts, he really is.

We decided we wanted to plant something to remember our little one by, but we have not got around to doing it. We say we haven't had the time, or the money, or its raining, etc but really I think its just the idea of having to remember that we lost someone we loved very much. And I'm crying again now.

Miscarriage is such an odd thing. The saturday it happened was surreal (I hate when people say that, but it was). It was like being under a heavy fog all day. Then you have to tell people, mostly family who were equally excited and now just don't know what to say.

Days go on and you think about it a little less, especially once the bleeding stops but its still a loss and its still there. I pray for the baby every night. The funny thing to me is that people say, it just wasn't meant to be. Obviously it wasn't otherwise I'd be through my first trimester by now but in my heart is still feels like it was meant to be. That Rooter was supposed to be a big sister in October. Its just weird and its just sad.

What else is weird to me are thoughts like this. My husband and I think at this point that we want two kids. So potentially if this wouldn't have happened we would be "done," but now we will try try again and when the next bebe blesses our family its crazy to think that had this not happened then the new little one never would have been. So I pray for out baby in heaven, and I pray for our health and fertility and for the arrival our third child as well.

Lastly, I was surprised to find out how many women I know have had miscarriages. If you know someone who has, give them a big hug they deserve it.

xoxo -Stevi

Projects

Daddy is down in Mexico visiting his family. I am happy for him. He needs to see his mom and know she is doing good (she just had stem cell work done to hopefully help with her ms). I am praying for her. I'd love to see her get stronger from this.

I always have these grandiose plans when he leaves, like cleaning out and organizing the garage. Wow would he be stoked to come home to that. But really my days aren't that much different if he's here or away. I mean he is at work most of the day and I play with Rooter most of my day, so I don't know why I think that I'll have so much more time, or will for that matter to finish the ever looming garage. Its silliness really. Besides there are so many more fun projects to do with any second of free time.

For example last time he was in New York for business, Rooterbug and I put a drop cloth down in our kitchen nook and painted her little table and chairs. I bought them off of craigslist months ago and they were awful, yellow, blue, green, red, orange just not our style but their shape was classic. Finally she and I got out some paintbrushes and got busy. In no time we had a lovely cream table and hot pink (hibiscus to be exact) chairs. Now that's fun.

What I really need to do before his plane lands on Monday is get to work on my art project for the kitchen nook. It was supposed to be his Valentine's present but it went by the wayside while we were playing with pink paint. I shouldn't be writing about this because he doesn't know about it but as of now I am a closet blogger so it would take a lot for him to come across this post. I think we're safe.

Anyway, its about a 2.5' x 4' canvas which will read "pass the bacon." You read it right, "pass the bacon." The script will be all french, calligraphyish and lovely. Its randomness folks but it has a story and it goes like this. I told him I wanted a big painting of words, I bounced some ideas off him and nothing grabbed him. I said "how about pass the bacon" as a joke but of course he loved it. My reply was that it really wasn't very romantic, but he disagreed and thought it was plenty romantic. So there it is, lovely writing and weird words, we meet in the middle.

Such a treat

It was 1:00 in the afternoon and I was thinking about putting my daughter to bed for a nap, but she does better if she goes down closer to 2:00. What to do for an hour?? Palease, doesn't making some homemade chocolate chip cookies seem like the obvious answer to that question. I will brag a little and say I'm slightly famous for these creations that look more like biscuits than cookies and are super delicious. So I pose the idea to my 2 year old who begins hopping around clapping and saying yes, yes, yes, and then stops dead in her tracks and looks me in the eyes very seriously and says "I love cookies mama." I know you do sweetheart.

We measure and we taste and we stir, or rather crank the mixer on high and let it stir for us. Seriously, if you don't have one of the kitchen aid mixers get one, they rock! We watch the butter sugar and flour transform and our fingers and lips begin to tingle with the anticipation of just one lick of that dough.

Literally everytime I make a batch of cookies I am taken back to the excited feeling I would get as a child when I knew my mom was in the kitchen making a batch. I can remember the smell of them cooking, I can remember burning my tongue trying to pop one in my mouth right out of the oven, but most of all I remember licking the cookie dough covered spoon.

While I was caught up in this fantastic sugary nostalgia today, I realized that right then, I was passing along the same splendid memory to my daugher. I love it that someday she will be with college friends, or a boyfriend, or husband or better yet standing in the kitchen covered in flour next to her little chocolate lipped baby passing along the goodness and thinking of me too. How sweet it is.

Bringing sexy back

My "sister in law" got her hair cut the other day and not so cheerily said "it just looks girl next doorish." I thought that was the look she goes for. Turns out that with this haircut she wanted to "feel sexy." Awesome, I liked her honesty in that. My first response was "well, head down to Victoria's Secret and buy a lacy thong", but she proceeded to tell me that the last thing she wanted was for her rear to be exposed. We chatted some more, then she and my brother were on their way.

I continued to think of ideas for her and later called her ever so randomly and told her to go out and order something like a side of french fries and follow it up with a glass of champagne. The frivolousness of it is smashing and its hard not to feel sexy while holding a flute of bubbles. Try it out sometime, its great. She laughed at the sheer fact that I was still thinking about the sexy thing.

The thing is that all you really need to do to feel sexy is be confident in the idea that you are sexy. Confidence goes a heck of a long way in anything you want to do, feel or be.

I can vouch for this 100%. I asked my husband at dinner that night what about me he finds to be the most sexy. Partially out of curiousity at what ridiculous thing he would say, I thought for sure it would have something to do with my bum, but also because I think women have a skewed view of what sexy really is. It didn't take him a second to answer and he said "the way I am with our daughter is my sexiest trait."

I am a mom and being a mom is not always glamorous, and definitely not "sexy" but for me there has never been another "job" I have held which I have tackled with such confidence. I am proud and fun and full of love when I am with the Rooterbug. I smile bigger, I have more patience, I swear less, and I simply want to be a better human because I have her eyes on me at all times. I know I am doing a good job with her and my confidence in that just so happens to be a turn on for my man.

Try on your confidence friends. Let go of insecurities and judge others around you a little less. If all else fails red lipstick would be my next suggestion. WHOLEHEARTEDLY wear it to the grocery store one day and own it. I guarantee that you will feel atleast a little bit sexy. You've go to own it though!