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Blink and it's passed you by. Faster than you can imagine. 1,825 days in seconds. Time compacted to memory and One Perfect Day.
And at the same time, it's hard to remember life Before - what things were like in those years when you didn't know him, when he wasn't there to hold your hand or kiss your face, when his wasn't the voice you listened for on the telephone or the warmth you looked forward to at the end of the day. Life with him has been blissful and rewarding - exactly how it should be when you're married to your best friend.
Happy fifth, love.
And not in an DUDE I JUST LOVED HIM IN THE SAINT AND I WANTED TO HURT ELIZABETH SHUE WITH HER DUMB OVER-THE-KNEE SOCKS, but more in a WAS SO HOT AND NOW... NOT SO MUCH way.
I clicked on this link on MSN's hotmail page, and read about the Was Hot, Is Now Not celebrities. It's just so sad. And then I started thinking about my recent descent into Less Than Stellar Blog Posts (so says I) and realized that a big ole picture of The Creamery could accompany the smarmy pics of Tom Cruise and the horrific mug shot of Nick Nolte (OH THE HUMANITY).
How does one rescue a Blog Gone Wrong? Is there some kind of Blog Life Coach I can hire? A new diet of tomatoes and lemonade? How about yoga? Is pilates a little too passe? Should The Creamery be training for a marathon? Or should I be considering more drastic measures like Blog Plastic Surgery?
Help me, internets. I'd hate to have to consider a career in boxing.
(And in other news - I am doing Pre-Thanksgiving Stressing, with the turkey! and the stuffing! and the yams! and the salad! and the pie! and the gravy! and the entertaining! and the table setting! and the house cleaning! Tell me: how do you handle stress? I tend to get very very very irritable --it's really fun for Chip-- and then I force him to stay up late into the night with me as we clean like mad. Being married to me is FUN.)
Apparently, if you stop worrying about a cat's dreadlocks, they will eventually all migrate from her wooly body to various parts of the house. I found one on the kitchen floor yesterday that was the size of Boston. Later I checked to see if Phoebe even had any hair left on her thigh and as I ran my hands down her fuzzy body I realized that the colony of dreadlocks had just up and gone. At that time she still had three or so, but after a recent petting session (just a few minutes ago), she's down to ONE. Who knew?
Apparently, it's not a good idea to attempt a ill-timed Dye Job on your friend Kate's hair while both children (one hers, one mine) are still conscious. Doing the dye job during this ill-conceived threat zone called "should be nap time, but isn't" will result in two children crying their eyes out and literally PAWING AT THEIR MOTHER'S PANT LEGS while the mothers (both quite occupied, thankyouverymuch) go from Concerned and Reassuring Cooing to Concern with a Hint of Rising Stress to Absolute Bedlam to Hysterical Laughter at the Sheer Absurdity. The laughter was cathartic but no less helpful to the crying infants. At one point Kate was standing in her living room, hair smooshed and covered in hair dye, holding both babies (one under each arm) as the kids cried, Kate's mouth a perfect O. I was in the kitchen at the time, maniacally trying to get those stupid gloves off my hands so I could rush to help. Proper hair maintenance and motherhood are mutually exclusive. Who knew?
Apparently, an 8-month-old baby defies the laws of physics and gravity, especially when said infant is having her diaper changed. Who knew?
Apparently, a cat who is told to stay off the bed because the husband is having some wicked kind of freak allergy attack is incapable of staying OFF the bed. I kicked her off no less than twenty-five times in a half hour. (Yes, that means she tried to jump back up as soon as I pushed her off. The memory of a gnat, that one.) Who knew?
Apparently, a wonderfully freakishly fabulously Good Day requires an equally horrific one for balance. Who knew?
Apparently, measuring cups are the most coveted toy in the house (second only to the cell phone). Who knew?
Apparently, a freakish rush to make baby food that results in a freezer crammed with tiny towers of ziploc storage containers will not encourage your husband to agree when you say that you're going to be buying more of those ziploc containers. Who knew?
Apparently, it's Friday. Who knew?
There's something about these Thursday Thrift posts that is very clinical. I know they aren't very entertaining... they feel like my own personal Public Service Messages, and to be honest I don't know how to make them anything other than that: something you sit through that's sandwiched between the Kleenex and the toilet cleaner commercials, before Eli Stone comes back on. YES, I just likened my weekly blog entries to those The More You Know things. The More You Know: less literacy and mentoring tips and more discussions of holders/goers and questions about high school. Huh.
THIS Thursday I'm talking about dialing down the holiday insanity, and to that end, I'm going to make these thrift posts a more slightly more occasional Thursday thing. (I'm playing with my own stubborn streak, if you want to know: as soon as I tell myself that I don't have to do it, I'll be a hundred times more excited about doing it. Annnnnd that's how a person uses reverse psychology on HERSELF.) So there you go: my first tip for reducing holiday stress: give yourself permission to say no, to do something else, to walk away.
It sounds like a lot of people are trying to reduce their buying this Christmas, and I'm all for that. When I look around at the sheer volume of STUFF we have--- it's embarrassing. Chip and I have agreed that we're not giving each other any gifts that aren't handmade. This year we're focusing on Alice, and the best part about that is that she has no frame of reference (or for that matter, real memory) for what Christmas is supposed to be. I have a sneaking suspicion that she's going to be awfully excited about the boxes and paper strewn around the living room come Christmas morning, and all too willing to ignore any actual GIFTS.
For quite some time now, we've alternated who we give to and who we receive from among the siblings in both of our families. There's a little chart that shows each year - who gives to whom, and boy it helps to simplify the gift giving.
When it comes to stockings, I've long believed that they should contain a lot of everyday items that you need anyway: each Christmas Chip has been greeted with a stocking full of toothpaste, deodorant, gum, maybe the occasional matchbox car or something else fun and inexpensive. We usually get an orange in the toe. This comes from my childhood Christmases.
It sounds like a lot of you are trying to reduce the holiday expense and consumption using these types of ideas. I talked to someone on Sunday who is going to a soup kitchen on Thanksgiving with her family: when we have so much, doesn't it make sense to help some folks who are making do with far less?
What I want to call for is a return to enjoying this time of year for it's magic, it's wonder, it's warmth, it's ability to bring people together for no other reason than we're family. I don't remember what I got for Christmas last year, but I can tell you who I was with, and I can tell you that it was wonderful for just that reason.
In the end, dialing down Holiday Crazy is probably one of the easiest things to do, even if it isn't easy to write about. It's a whole bunch of stuff that everyone already knows: give thanks for your loved ones, enjoy the bits that you have and don't worry about what you don't, be grateful that you are here, show someone else that you care, take time to give back, feel the magic of the season and know it's a reminder that we can have peace on earth, good will to men (and women)-- if we let it, if we live it, and we can have it all year 'round.
Enjoy the holidays this year, my friends.
As I'm writing this I'm fighting the great and terrible desire to PEE. I have a theory that the world can be divided into two groups of people: Holders and Goers. I, my friends, am a devout HOLDER, which was severely tested when I was pregnant with Bean. For nine months I wondered how all those Goers do it all the time - all those trips to the bathroom, all that time spent trouncing up and back when they could just as easily (so say the Holders) group four trips into one. As any good mother will tell you, however (and listen up to this one, my never-been-pregnant-readers), it's not like the Holding Muscle returns immediately after you give birth. Nope. I wondered for a while if I was going to have to start listening more closely to those Depends commercials. But like so many things, the Holding Muscle returned in due time (cue rising Angelic Choir) and I'm firmly back in the Holding Camp.
Yes, still holding.
Today was a Good Day. A Good Day that should be capitalized because it was so Good. I love those, by the way: the Good Days, when things seem to be exactly as they should be (or at least close enough). Alice and I didn't do a ton of errands, which was nice, and we stayed home and baked cupcakes for the delightful Angela (birthday). We were supposed to go out and deliver the cupcakes after Miss Alice's afternoon nap, but guess who slept a marathon TWO HOURS??? (And to show proper gratitude for this blessed event, I won't be expecting it again for about 53 days.) I've trained myself to get absolutely everything that I can get done in thirty minutes because that's the Magic Window for Alice's naps: if we pass by the Magic Window and sleeping is still occurring, we quietly approach the Hour Magic Window. If we somehow (miracle, miracle) pass by the Hour Magic Window, I know we're in for a very long and restful nap. So. After I put Bean's sleeping self in her crib, I usually RUN: to the bathroom (holder!), to the kitchen (eat!), to the living room (clean up!), to the dishwasher (load!/unload!), to the computer (check! email!/check! blogs!), to some task (laundry! cleaning! cooking! working!).... and then... I don't know what to do with myself. Well, that's not exactly accurate. I am NEVER bored. I always have something to do: I can just spend a half-hour figuring out WHAT I want to do. Like I think: knitting? sewing? reading? brushing the cats? writing a blog entry? contemplate world peace?... and then it's been 30 minutes and I haven't done any of those things. Today, however, was magic because I not only got all my stuff done in the 30-minute-window, but I also knew EXACTLY what I wanted to do with any time left over, which was to do some serious knitting. Yes, I'm making another hat. It's an addiction, I tell you.
There is usually a time during an Exceptionally Long Nap when I start to wonder if Bean is actually still breathing - and then I'll contemplate for a few moments, thinking OH MY GOODNESS WHAT IF SOMETHING HAS HAPPENED AND I LOOK BACK AND THINK HOW I WAS JUST SITTING ON THE COUCH KNITTING WHEN MY BABY WAS HANGING BY HER ANKLES OUT THE SECOND STORY WINDOW? and then I go check on the baby. I went through this cycle twice today, and both times her little body was crammed up against the side of the crib with her face buried into the crib bumper. My, that little girl likes to have her face buried, let me tell you. We usually end up bringing her into bed with us in the wee hours of the morning and nine times out of ten she rolls over to Chip and buries her face in his pillow. Or his armpit. Whatever's handy. I've also caught her sleeping ON HER FACE, which, meh-- I'm not so new of a parent anymore to worry about it. She is usually chugging away at her paci during those faceplant times, and that gives me some comfort, like--if she needs to breathe she'll roll herself back to a more breath-friendly position.
When Chip came home tonight we were STILL having a Good Day, which turned into a Good Night and all is right with the world, let me tell you! Laughs were had, baths were given, bottles were consumed, and now Chip and I are doing our nightly ritual of computer laptop stuff until we both turn them off and have Us Time. And can I tell you how much I love Us Time?
Good night, dearies-- please tell me: Are you a Holder or a Goer?
(Yes, still holding - but not for much longer!)
