Not So Subtle Product Placement

You know that part in History of Love when Alma tells us "a hundred things can change your life"?

Well this is one.

We have started preparations for our road trip.

Which, ironically, involves lots of other trips: to the bookstore, the pharmacy, the post office, the salon, and the library.  It means doing a serious shopping trip to Target and getting the car in for an oil change and general pick-me-up.

Yesterday as we were traipsing in and out of the car in the heat, Ethan begged for reprieve.

And I answered him with things like, "Just a few more stops" and "Hang in there" and "We're almost done" and "I don't want to be here either, but you don't hear me complaining" and "Do you want to go to Canada?", progressively deteriorating from peppy cheerleader to blackmailing matriarch.  It wasn't pretty.

But at the last stop, as I was filling the cart with after-sun aloe and bobby pins and (plenty of) dramamine, I found this:

Which doesn't look like much, but which changed my life last night.

(I am so not exaggerating.)

And so if you live with a man who snores and you enjoy both laying next to him all night and sleeping in peace and quiet (two of life's greatest pleasures), then this will change your life as well. 

Just think of all the ways this blog is blessing your life.

I know.

You can thank me later.

How Scrambled Eggs Can Change the World

Yesterday's post was so enjoyable, I thought I'd write another.  Just for the adverbs, if nothing else.

I talked Rachel into yoga class this morning.  I had to compromise and agree to run with her tomorrow, but I'm not thinking about that just now.  (She is very persistent.)  We nearly caught fire during warrior B, but other than that it was a lovely practice.  Though sometimes I wish there was talking in yoga.  I need to get caught up.  Rachel says that's why we need to run.  She has forgotten that I only huff through running.  Or maybe she remembers and prefers a one-sided conversation.  Me, finally, at a loss for words.

This morning while Rachel and I were moving from down dog to child pose and back again, David was leaving me a love note on the bathroom mirror.

In lipstick.  Complete with boyish drawings of lips and hearts.

There's not much that makes me happier than that.

Except maybe this:

With no warning at all, on the way to bed last night David told me that he was going to get me some chickens, so that I can have omelets and egg-salad sandwiches every day for the rest of my life.  I just stared at him.  I have been wistfully asking for a hen house of my very own for most of our marriage.  I could hardly believe it.  Dreams of a backyard with white Silkies and buff Orpingtons filled my head.  (And don't tell David, but maybe even an Ameraucana so I can have blue eggs too.)

I laughed myself to sleep and had dreams about an enormous house that we are always renovating.  (It's a recurring dream, and I know the floor plan by heart by now.  I swear I've taken the wallpaper off the walls in the master bedroom a hundred times.  But apparently, entropy works in my dreams as well.)

I thought maybe I had dreamed the part about the chickens too. 

Amazingly, I hadn't. 

This morning as I was contemplating fresh eggs for breakfast and lunch, it occurred to me that life may never be the same for either of us.

For me, of course, because I may discover that keeping chickens may not be as romantic as it seems in my head.  (Nothing usually is.)

And for David, of course, because he has never been married to a wife with steady and reasonable blood sugar levels.  It is quite possible that I could lose all my charm to protein.  

Luckily for him, I also know how to turn eggs into chocolate cake.

Just to keep things exciting.

Imagine his relief.

Q is for Quilt and Queen and Quit

My house looks like a large quilt exploded all over it.

A large quilt that was unpicked several times first.  Quilt warfare.

My mother said, "Don't worry about it."

But that is because (ha!) her house has never looked like that.  It's like a law or something. 

Yesterday I ventured out of my sewing room for an hour or so (had to get more fabric), and happened to look down and noticed bits of thread all over my breasts, which is only a turn-on to a very select group of people.  Unfortunately, my husband isn't one of them.  I asked.

So instead of ravishing me, David played secretary to me last night, sending out emails and editing the hospital benefit program.  Whenever I would say, "Could you send an email to this really important person and make it sound like I am serious and need action right away?"  he would do it, just like that.  Or if I said, "Reply to that lovely person and make it sound like I am totally excited and super grateful" he would do that too.  Let me tell you how powerful I felt.

Meanwhile, I was working on my quilt.  Adding more borders for good measure.  Because, good heavens, that is all I do, and that is all you have to do if you keep unpicking.  Which I am going to stop doing.  Soon. 

Occasionally, when I'm quilting, I stop and look at what I am doing and if you happen to walk by at one of these moments you really should say how marvelous you think it looks and how hot I look with thread all over my chest, because I really need the praise and I'm seriously this close to cracking.

David looked up from his secretarial duties and said, "Don't you think you could have stopped at that brown part.  It's getting really big."  And for the record, his eyebrows said that "really big" was actually a bad thing.

Which might have been okay if he was married to a sane, well-rested woman with no time or effort invested in said quilt. 

But he is not.

He is happily married (thank you very much) to a woman who has a nearly intimate relationship with her seam ripper these days.

Doubt reared his ugly head.  And was quickly followed by despair, angst, and freaking out.

I looked around briefly for my towel and my white flag, but they were both buried under discarded and unpicked remnants of other versions of this quilt. 

So I headed for bed.

I know when I'm beat.

This quilt has finally gotten the best of me.

Adieu, To You and You and You

You deserve better than this.

You deserve a long and lovely post featuring a picture of my new hair.

Maybe a post "by the numbers" where I talk about the 6 inches I cut off my hair and, by so doing, found myself again.

Or maybe the one I wrote in my head where O'Dell and Bernina laughed their heads off at me as I unpicked my latest quilt for the third time.

Or even one of the many conversations between CIM and RIM as I ran my kids between t-ball and orchestra and softball, all on the same night.  They've both had just about enough, and are making their disapproval known.

But it's late.

And I've been sewing for days. 

Tonight I packed up Bernina and searched madly through the fabric piles in my sewing room for my good dressmaker shears and walking foot.  Tomorrow I am off to quilt retreat.

There will be a new post here on Monday.

I'm sure it will be worth the wait.

A Must-Read

David and I spent our date night at the bookstore looking for travel guides of Victoria, British Columbia.  We have a roadtrip in mind, and the only thing David enjoys reading more than the atlas, is a really good travel guide.  He is already typing our trip itinerary, and the trip is at least four months away.  He can't help himself. 

But while David was debating the merits of Fodor's versus Frommer's, I overheard a father reading a lovely book to his daughters.  I could hear him reading: "Compassionate means..."  "Envy means..."  "Patient means..."  When they left, I sifted through their pile and found this charming picture book all about words and cookies.  Two of my favorite things. 

Since then Ethan have read and reread and reread it again and again.

Ethan's favorite part is the page on "Content."   It is so lovely.  The pictures, the words.  One of them is even "Regret," which I've always been partial to.  (The pages on "trustworthy" and "compassionate" will steal your heart.)

I recommend you read it with someone you love and find out what "Content" really feels like. 

Images from Last Night

Caleb won first place in the Medicine and Health category of his school's science fair.  His project was entitled, "Hand Sanitizers: Helpful, Harmful, or Hooey?".  He could have won first prize for alliteration too.  And as a bonus, not one of us got E. Coli poisoning.  Which is great.  On so many levels.

There is always more than one place to be on nights like this.  Savannah performed a gymnastics routine (complete with choreography) with a couple of her friends at her school's talent show.  David and I split up to support our darlings.  Luckily, everyone made it in time to see Caleb do the double fist-pump when his name was called.

And Ethan ran into a friend from school at the science fair.  She wanted to show him her ankle bracelet.  He did his best to look interested.  She also introduced him to her dad.  At this, Ethan shoved his hands in his pockets and looked at the floor and then up at me for help.  Sorry love, I cannot help you.  Girls are complicated things. 

Solving Your Depression with Gum Disease

David is on his way to see the GI doctor.  He had another painful attack last night after dinner and then I spent an hour or so asking him symptom questions from WebMd.  I'd say things like:

"Is it stabbing or throbbing?"

"Is it severe or moderate?"

And he'd say things like, "I don't know.  It just hurts, okay?" all the while sweating profusely.

"On a scale from one to ten, what is your pain level?"

He was pacing the house by now and yelled from the living room, "I don't know."

WebMd didn't know what it was, and only recommended we head to the hospital immediately.  (Thanks a lot.)

David said, "We already did that."

And just as I was about to pack him into the car regardless, it stopped.

And then David asked me about a hundred times, "What do you think it is?"  And I reminded him that while I am usually always right, I am not a doctor.  (Of course in the back of my mind, I was just the teensiest bit worried about that E. Coli colony Caleb and I have been growing.  I decided not to mention it.)  

While I was on WebMd, I saw an article about "little things that make a big difference."  And they said that brushing your teeth with your non-dominant hand can help with depression, and can actually alter your brain chemistry.  What in the world?  (About that time I started questioning whether or not we should really be getting our medical advice from the internet.)  But this morning I tried it, because while I'm not depressed, who doesn't want to be happier?  Even just a little.  The downside is that I do not think I got my teeth quite as clean.  And so while I'm happier, I may have just increased my chances of gingivitis and tooth decay.  Which is ironic, since now I'm doing so much more smiling.

  

Tales of a Prop Manager

I have a confession.

I've been grumpy for days.  Re-entry is always difficult for me.

I told several people this week, (David included), that I feel like a "prop manager."  Everybody else I live with has a big, full life that they are the stars of and I manage the props.  And when my darlings need clothes for a new scene, I wash.  Or when it's time for the dinner scene I make the dinner and set the table and we eat.  New scene, new props.  You get the idea.  This week, prop managing was especially trying with all the Christmas props and travel props and new toy props to put away.

This morning Olivia called from the school and told me she had forgotten her viola again.  The second time this week.  Could I please bring it to stage 6...she has a scene coming up later in the day that she needs it for.

And I thought, "I can't do this for another year.  We're only 9 days in and I'm done."

And then, there was a tender mercy.  Just in the nick of time.

And I do mean just.

I talked to a friend who told me about a talk she recently heard about love.  She said the returning missionary said that service without love is just servitude.

Oh.

And I could suddenly see why my job felt like servitude.  Like all I was was a prop manager.  And underpaid at that.  I wasted my week in servitude, because I forgot about why I was doing it in the first place.  Oh, love.

A week wasted.

But I'm good at rallying.

And delivering violas with a smile.

The Loneliest Day of the Year

(My fireplace this morning.)

The first Monday in January is always, for me, the loneliest day of the year.

Everyone left without a backward glance,

leaving me alone with the detritus of the holiday.

I'm not sure which one bothers me more, the leaving or the piles of detritus left in their wake.

There's no help for it, but I sure hate being alone again.

Half-Dressed

Editor's Note:  I wrote this last week (Friday morning) but never published it because I thought it was too ridiculous to share.  However, given my current state of distress and emotional instability (who me?), this post sounds downright sensible.  Now that's just plain scary.

_________________________________________

Okay, I should just be moving on.

That's what David says.  But I'm a fusser.  And I fuss the most with myself.  And I just can't seem to let things be.

Last night went okay.  I'm sure you're all dying to know. 

I had several dreams about the talk before the actual talk and in some of them it went okay and in some of them it was not so good and in some of them I was naked.

Last night I did manage to remember my dress.

Although I did forget my slip and perhaps that was the problem right there.  It was a half-dressed talk.  It could have been worse.  Naked definitely would have been worse.  But it could have been better. 

Yesterday Caleb said, "So are you ready for your talk?"

I said, "Sort of."

He said, "So that means you're done writing it, but you don't like it?"

I looked out the car window and nodded.

He said, "I thought so."

And so I want to know how can a person like me be allowed to raise human beings.  I'm only half-dressed myself.

Last night when I came home and tearily explained how it went to David he asked me how long it had been since I had eaten.  Seriously, it must by trying to be married to a half-crazy, half-dressed girl with blood sugar issues. 

Add all that to a few half-baked ideas about humanure and space station trusses made of buckypaper, and you've really got yourself a mess.