Rain

The rain has finally come.  It is cleansing and refreshing and I am so happy and grateful it is here.  

It comes at a bitter sweet time for me, for I lost a dear friend this weekend very unexpectedly.  Her loss has reminded me that life is very precious, and that God is great to put people in our lives for a purpose.  She was one of my oldest friends.  We walked down the greenbelt on the first day of kindergarten together - starting our lives in a big new school, and also starting a life long friendship.  Unfortunately, her life was taken was too early.  I will miss her terribly.  She was a kind and gentle person, very generous, and full of love.  It had been a few years since I had last visited with her, but we had kept up through all of these technological gizmos like facebook and linkedin.  I did get to see her before she was taken from us last week - to say goodbye - and I am most grateful for that.  She was a beautiful soul, and she is in a better place now with our maker.

At times like this, I thank God for all of the gifts He has given me, for all of the people He has surrounded me with to love me and allow me to love them.  I look at my children in a different light, not just as my children but as God's gifts to me who will teach me to be a better person, who will eventually grow up to be contributing adults, and have their own experiences and hopefully fond memories of childhood.  I hope that they have friends that are life long as I do, and that fill their lives with love and cherished memories.

The rain is refreshing and cleansing.  I feel my friend has sent it to us.  The earth is refreshed, and my hurting heart is as well.  I will miss you Kat.  

Things you thought you'd never hear from your child

After a battle of the willpowers over cleaning up the playtime mess, and finally getting lunch on the table....

Me: "Annie, stop playing with your cheese stick and eat your lunch."

Annie grumbles something incoherent

Me: "What?"

Annie: "I said you sound just like Nana!"

Me: "Okay. (sigh) Eat your lunch."

But...what I really wanted to say was "oh yea?!? Well you just try this cr@p with Nana and see how far you get!"

Hrmph. Nana would whip you into shape in a heartbeat, my child.

On a side note, she did eventually eat all of her lunch and requested more cheese... This time American cheese slices. Yuck. Whoever came up with those was just desperate for product with maximum cost savings. Must have been a Great Depression thing or something.

On a second side note, curdled milk in a sippy cup is just gross. I relish the day when I can dispose of all sippy cups.

Hmmmmmm

Convo at dinner tonight at Molina's:

Annie: "Mama, do you have a boyfriend?"

Me: "No" (wondering where she came up with that idea and where this is headed...)

Annie: "Well, I do. Do you know who it is?"

Me: "Is it Hampton?" (the adorable, smart, handsome and well behaved boy in her preschool class)

Annie: "Yep! He's my boyfriend. I'm gonna marry him."

Will: "I have a boyfriend too!"

(slight look of concern on my face)

Annie: "No Will. You have a girlfriend. She's in your class."

Will: "Oh. Okay."

Moving on down the road

The highway of life is full of twists and turns, some of them precarious and along steep cliffs, and sometimes you go down a road you never thought you would and it is scary and daunting.  But if you have faith in God and your good sense, at the end of that road you might find yourself in a better place than from where you came.

We only get one shot at this life, I believe.  I want to live my life with a smile on my face, and I want to pass the memory of that smile down to my children.  I hope that when they are grown and I am gone, that they will remember that their mom was happy every day of her life, loved people and most of all loved them with all of her heart. 

Last night, my three year old baby boy, Will, was squiggley and wiggley at bed time.  I offered to sing him a song to calm him down and get him to close his eyes.  I started into the first verse, and he stopped me after one line and said... "Mama, I know this song.  I want to sing it to you."  And so he did.  In the sweetest most beautiful voice I have ever heard.

Jesus loves me, this I know
For the Bible tells me so
Little ones to Him belong
They are weak but He is strong

Yes, Jesus loves me
Yes, Jesus loves me
Yes, Jesus loves me
The Bible tells me so

Love never ending

Me: "Annie, I love you so much."

Annie: (slightly irritated) "Mom, why do you always tell me that? You tell me every night at bedtime. I already KNOW that."

Me: "Well, I don't want you to ever forget it!"

Annie: "I won't! Hrumph."

Adacadabra... Or something like that

Annie's vocabulary is expanding by the second. She's continually surprising me with new 'big girl' phrases and words. She's also brought home some not-so-nice words like butt, stupid, shutup - and the latest one last night was 'dumpy head'. I'm not certain where that one came from or what it means, but when it came out during bathtime last night, she and I both knew it wasn't a nice thing to say...or in this case sing!

So after some redirection, she was singing new songs (composed by Annie herself) about her day and how much she loved me and bathtime and her friends and boys.... What? You heard me. Boys. OMG. My five year old is a tween.

So abracadabra (or adadacabra as Annie says), I have gone from preschool parent to having to really pay attention to what comes out of Missy Moo's mouth!

What's next? She'll probably ask for an iPhone so she can tweet.

It's all relative

[The scene:  me in the bath this morning, shaving my legs; Annie sitting on the edge of the tub, conversing about life]

Annie - "Mama, what are you doing?"

Me - "Shaving my legs."

Annie - "Why?"

Me - "Because that's what mommies do." (yea, i know... but what else am I supposed to say?  to lure men into our wicked web?)

Annie - "I want to do that.  Can I do that?"

Me - "When you get older like mommy, you can shave your legs."

Annie - "Like when I'm 40?... 60?.... 90?" (ouch, that hurt)  "Or even like when I'm 20?"

Me - "Yes, like 20.  When you are 20, you can shave your legs."

Slow burn

It's been three years since I bore my last child, and 5 since my first. I am not one of those people who's body instantly snapped back into perfect pre-baby condition, so for 5 years I've been struggling to lose as much as I could hope for towards prenatal status. That 55 lbs I put on with Annie was brutal to say the least. She has turned out pretty cute so I can't complain about that outcome.


In 2010, I lost and kept off 8 lbs. Not a tremendous feat, and not without many trips to the gym associated with it, but nevertheless, not quite there yet.

So for 2011, I hope to keep up the trend and lose another 7-8 lbs. That will put me right back at pre-Annie status and hopefully be a continuation of a healthy eating regimen that has been the cause of most of my weight loss.

I promise you, I still eat bacon, drink beer, and have a sweet every so often... But I've taught myself to stop eating when I'm not hungry, and eat healthy green things as a main staple (bacon being a special treat). What a difference it's made!

On a side note, my wonderful personal trainer at the Y has been politely harassing me to come back in... Which I will do soon, I promise Joy ;).