Yowza. Eek. Gasp. WHAT?! 2 months! Are you joking?!
I have much to post about. So much so that I will have to break the posts up into month long accounts of whats going on. We are all good-Lizzie is a little joker and is running me raged (and turns 2! in 2 weeks....wwwhhhaattt?!?!?!). Until I get my act together...here is our little bathing beauty at the beach last week...
For the past month I have had "blog" on my to-do list. Everyday I see it, and I think "Hmmm...I need to be writing down some of Lizzie's life" and then something gets in the way. And then every time I see "Blog" on the to-do list again anxiety creeps up and I think.."I AM PAYING FOR THIS DAMN SITE WHY AM I NOT USING IT?!?!" Mommies can't win for loosing can they?
A brief re-cap...Easter was great. My parents came in and Lizzie was spoiled to death. I kept thinking that the next child or grandchild doesn't have a chance because everyone gives her entirely too much (but, hey-the benefits of being the oldest! I sure did enjoy it!). She got one of those cars we all had as a kid, I remember thinking I was so big as I "drove" my car up and down the drive way. She hasn't mastered the feet pushing thing-but she is getting the hang of it. We have all been battling serious allergies-Lizzie unfortunately has it the worst. We are on daily breathing treatments-both rescue & maintenance-and on Zyrtec. I have had moments of anger at her birth mom-a first for me really-because I am pretty certain she was a smoker. But a good friend of mine pointed out to me that "its always nice to blame something or someone". Very true. Work is absolutely insane and Michael is essentially working 2 jobs to gear up for his company taking off this summer. We haven't had a lot of quality time together, and I have realized how desperately we need that in our lives. I hope that once one job ends, we can be together more. Although that gives me a whole new set of anxieties. Lizzie is growing everyday-and is constantly changing. Her vocab is rocketing into space and her comprehension of her surroundings astounds me. Her personality is starting to show...and although I have always thought she would be totally out going like moi, I am seeing that she is quite shy and reserved about new things (much like her Da-Da, frankly). This is a learning experience for me. She sings ALL-THE-TIME and does a pretty hilarious version of Twinkle, Twinkle & Ring around the Roses. At night we can hear her singing to herself and I am certain it is the sweetest noise in the whole world. She has also turned into to quite the little Mama. She loves babies. Loves them. And is currently obsessed with Baby Go-gan, Taliban, and Aaa-wee. Her nurturing side is so adorable, and yet sometimes frustrating when she throws a tantrum when I dare to take a baby out of her clutches. Shy-maybe, stubborn-absolutely.
Michael indulged me and watched Lizzie for 4 days as I went to Miami to visit a childhood friend. It was heavenly. I relaxed and just took in every spare moment I had. Those mommy-free trips are CRUCIAL to ones' mental health. I highly recommend everyone try and do it!
Besides that...well...I am failing miserably in every other facet of my life. My friendships-my workouts-my extended family-my church life-everything is just taking a back seat while our world is spinning in a zillion different directions. Somedays I feel like I have control over things (you know the days I work out, make dinner, fold some laundry and actually call a friend or two), and then WHAM! here we go spinning again. For the most part things are great-but I do long for the days when things are slower. I hope that by then end to middle of May we are there again.Is this how life will be all the time with children? Wait...don't answer that :).
Many thanks for everyone's encouraging posts. There are times when just hearing some validating really turns a girl's mood around.
I have been tagged...so here goes nothin'...
Let others know a little more about yourself, repost this as your name followed by “ology.” I am going to tag Raven, Anna, Kimmie, Kembree, Angy and Courtney.
FOODOLOGY:
What is your salad dressing of choice? Balsamic or a Good Greek
What is your favorite sit-down restaurant? Tomato Head in K-Vegas
What is your favorite fast food restaurant? Chick-fil-A
What food could you eat every day for two weeks and not get sick of? Mexican-particularly a spicy cheese dip & salsa
What are your pizza toppings of choice? fresh mozzarella & pesto
How many televisions are in your house? embarrassingly...3, and yes they all get used.
What color cell phone do you have? red
BIOLOGY:
Are you right-handed or left-handed? Right
Have you ever had anything removed from your body? now THIS is a funny question! where do I begin.....let's just say my plumbing is a lot faster than anyone else's plumbing-and I have some wicked battle scars.
What is the last heavy item you lifted? Lizzie the Viking
Have you ever been knocked unconscious? yep
Have you ever fainted? again, funny.
BULLCRAPOLOGY:
If it were possible, would you want to know the day you were going to die? No.
If you could change your name, what would you change it to? I love the name Quinn. Kind of artsy & yet very strong. Michael took it off the "girl name" list when we were adopting Lizzie.
How many pairs of flip flops do you own? 3
Last person you talked to? Kimmie
FAVORITOLOGY:
Season? Fall
Holiday? Christmas
Day of the week? Thursday
Month? October
Color? Green
Drink? N-fat Latte. Not from the beloved SB.
Alcoholic? Winter time-red vino, Spring time-Gin & tonic, Summer time-Miller High Life baby! (My drink choices change w/ the season).
CURRENTOLOGY:
Missing someone? Yes...good friends on the West Coast :(
What are you listening to? another medical drama that freaks me out on NBC
What are you watching? above
Worrying about? for once...not a lot. I do have this nagging worry in the back of my mind about Michael starting his own business...details, details.
What’s the last movie you saw? "Hurt Locker"
Do you smile often? Yeah :)
If you could change your eye color what would it be? I one time met this girl a water park (when I was like in 8th grade) who literally had the most piercing green eyes I have ever seen. I would choose those, for sure.
What’s on your wish list for your birthday? oh wow-I guess when all your extra cash goes to clothing a kiddo, you don't think of yourself. Dreaming big? A new car. Dreaming realistic? A nice va-cay w/ my little family (we will already be at the beach at my birthday).
Can you do a chin-up? Lord no.
Does the future make you more nervous or excited? A little of both.
Have you been in a car wreck? yes
Have you caused a car wreck? yes
Do you have an accent? Who this girl? No way, ya'll!
Last time you cried? Last week
Plans tonight? Vacuum-then sleep!
Have you ever felt like you hit rock bottom? Yes.
Name three things you bought yesterday? Groceries, a goodie at Swooziesand a Diet Coke from a gas station
Have you met someone who changed your life? Yes, everyday,
For the better or worse? better-but that doesn't usually serve me well..
How did you bring in the New Year? Pizza w/ friends & babies in & out of the oven ;)
Would you go back in time if you were given the chance? hmmmm....not sure...
What songs do you sing in the shower? "Listen to your heart...take a listen cause it's calling for you...Listen to your heart" laugh now. thanks.
Have you held hands with someone today? Lizzie-boo :)
Who was the last person you took a picture of? see above
Are most of the friends in your life new or old? a mix
Do you like pulpy orange juice? love it
Last time you ate peanut butter and jelly? 2 weeks ago
What were you doing at 12 a.m. last night? Sleeping.
What was the first thing you thought of when you woke up? Springing forward can kiss my butt!
I have come up with a zillion different posts for the past couple of weeks for the blog. Until lately, I had felt pretty down in the dumps about life-not ours necessarily, but people I know or don't know. I have known several women struggling with fertility or adoption that have not gotten the news they deserve and I have a close friend who lost her sister in a tragic car accident 2 weeks ago. All very sad things. I also faced my dim and distant friend-"the jealous fertility monster" recently. I found myself getting pretty jealous over the second round of kiddos being born-not really sure why, because we aren't ready to adopt anytime soon, but I felt sad that our family "plan" will take a lot of planning and money to see through. That when I envisioned my family 5 years ago, I saw myself giving birth in a pool of water, breast feeding my children till they were toddlers, and having my children exactly 3 years apart. I found myself being pretty defiant when folks would ask me when we were adopting again, I would answer abruptly "Well if you have 20,000 dollars then we can adopt tomorrow!" And this was noone's fault, and the questions were most certainly not wrong to ask. Just unfortunately & fortunately, the planing and expense will be a part of our life. The jealousy, the sadness and the grief for others were all things swirling around in my head. And I realize that I need a place to talk about it, a place were I won't feel judged or wrong, and a place were I can just air all these thoughts out and move on. But something was stopping me and I couldn't really put my finger on it. I had literally written 3 or 4 posts and just couldn't hit the publish button. I didn't know what was stopping me...not until...today. Today is the 2 year anniversary of the day I received THE email telling me that we had been chosen as the forever family by L. Today is the day that a woman decided to fulfill my dreams of being a mother and give Michael & I the greatest gift possible. I remember this day as if it were yesterday and have read the email over & over again with tears in my eyes. And I think I now know why I couldn't hit publish-because I am a lucky woman. A lucky woman who gets mad & sad & angry & happy & jealous over the state of affairs and the state of fertility. And I realized this morning as I was sending goodies & snacks to Lizzie's class to celebrate in her "Match Day", that we are MEANT for this track in life. That although it takes planning & some hard work, this is what we are meant to do.
I have never shared the email publicly, but I think I will now. I will share this email as a sign of hope for those friends of mine that feel lost & alone. Your baby is out there, and maybe our others are too...
Hi C2----
Don't let this email lead you to believe that you can stop working on that profile.
A prospective birth mom in ** has authorized me to match her with you and The Tax Man. However, I still think she would like to see your profile within the next few weeks.
L, age 38, is due in June 2008 with a full Caucasian baby of unknown gender. The birth father split when he found out she was pregnant. He has no interest in the baby. (That is good because ** has a putative father registry. That means that if he does not register with the state and claim paternity by the time the petition for adoption is filed, he has no right to object to the adoption.) I don't know much about birth father except that L said he is 6'4" and "gorgeous." But, a jerk.
L has three grown or almost grown boys from prior relationships. She now lives by herself and works full-time at a warehouse. I have been working with her for about three to four weeks. I have her proof of pregnancy.
L's prenatal care has been limited. Her other children are very healthy and she is very healthy. L has fine blonde hair, green eyes, fair complexion. She is 5'6" and weighs about 150 pounds. She has an athletic build.
She does not feel that she is financially capable of caring for a baby. I think, in some ways, she just does not want to start raising children again, especially as a single mom.
L wants to meet the adoptive parents at the hospital. After that, however, she does not want contact. She does want to see and hold the baby (which is very healthy).
She just got her Medicaid card last week. So, she is going to schedule a doctor's appointment, get a sonogram, etc. She says the baby moves a lot. She is trying to eat healthy food and is taking prenatal vitamins. (She only realized she was pregnant about a week before she called me.)
L has not asked for any living expenses.
L has a very supportive friend who lives next to her. I've talked to her, too. She said that L is a little flaky but is an okay person who knows that she has to place this baby for adoption.
In **, you can finalize before returning to TN. You would be there for about two weeks after the birth before the final hearing. I routinely work with a wonderful attorney there who I have already informed about this situation.
What do you think?
Happy (day after) Valentine's Day! We all had a great day. Lizzie spent the night with her Grandma, as Michael & I enjoyed a wonderful dinner here. It is funny-every time we go out to eat at a nice restaurant, we inevitably order fish for me and some sort of steak for Michael. Old habits are hard to break. Michael promises me a choice of place to eat for both Valentines & my birthday, and I like to try out new places all over Nashville. I am not a fan of chain restaurants, so I like to try local spots. Mid Town was delish!
It is snowing again, and like my friend Raven, I am so ready for it to melt. I mean, this is Tennessee, we don't do SNOW!
I forgot to do Real Simple's "list" this month, so here goes.....
What's the most surprising thing about love?
I think the one thing that surprises me the most about love is that it is unconditional. No matter how crabby your attitude is or how rough the waters of life may be, the love that someone feels for you stays the same. I guess that is why you tend to snap the hardest at the folks you love.
How do you get yourself out of a funk?
Sad to admit, especially since we are trying to save money, but I am a huge fan of some therapy shopping. The high you get off of a new outfit-there is nothing like it! I also love to end a day of splurging with a nice dinner-spend! spend! spend!
Before I die, I'd like to:
Meet the President at the White House-preferably this one, and NOT a certain woman from Alaska, but meeting our nation's leader in his home would be pretty awesome.
If you could change places with one person for one day who would it be?
Speaking of Real Simple...I would love to be the editor of that magazine. And the woman that runs it seems so cool and fun. I would love to be around all that creativity and energy.
Call the news...I actually completed a task! GASP! We had some "serious" snow (serious for the South, anyway) and it gave me time to pause and think "Maybe instead of watching the Food Network and putting Lizzie in time-out, I should organize this damn pantry!". So voila. I did. And I can't believe it. I was pretty nervous because I have zero to no ability to spatially conceptualize anything, but I emptied everything out, threw out some 3 year old graham cracker crumbs, and then started to put things back in the pantry in a neat & organized order. Wahoo! And Mr. Anal Retentive himself was pleasantly surprised. Next on the list..our hallway closets. Ugh...these are very bad. I actually call them the black holes. I have no idea what I will pull out of these closets....maybe beer from the late '90's? My goal is to clean out one closet a month. I am putting off our walk-in closet until I have made my way around the house. So, it might be 2020 before I get to it.
I also had my first, of which I am sure will be many, mean mommy incidents this past weekend. Lizzie and I were climbing the walls this weekend-cooped up for too long, not enough to occupy either of us in the house, I was waiting for my monthly visitor to stop by, and well...just the oh-so-difficult stage of a toddler, all accumulated into me screaming to Michael "HELP! I am loosing my temper and she IS DRIVING ME NUTS!". He rescued me and I had to go have some quite zen moment in my bedroom. Lizzie is my little doodle bug, and I love her deeply, but this whining-teething-wanh-wanh stage grades on my nerves at times. It was during this weekend that I also realized that I do not have the patience to be a stay-at-home momma and that I continue to bow to all my pals that can pull this off. It is HARD work! When Lizzie was a baby, like a year ago, I sometimes longed for just staying at home with her and snuggling and watching "The Ellen Show"; but those fantasies are long gone. You don't sit when you are at home...EVER. Send me to work please where I can play my fav tunes on pandora, answer emails, sip coffee, play on facebook and plan parties (oh and work too...yadda yadda). It was funny-the whole family got out on Sunday and Oscar the baby turned back into my sweet little muffin! She is SO ike me...deprive us of socializing and we shrivel up like raisins. After realizing our need to get out, I began to search for fun (and free inexpensive) things to do in Nashville with a kiddo. I found some great sites that gave me suggestions-puppets at the Downtown Library, arts & crafts at the Frist, and then of course the zoo. We will definitely be checking some of these places out.
Work is cranking up, we have a birthday boy to welcome into the 30's on Friday, and a special momma to be to celebrate with this weekend. Parties, parties, makes me happy happy :)!
I hope everyone had a fun holidays. Having Lizzie actually participate in Christmas this year was a real treat. She was a little overwhelmed at first by the deluge of gifts (a toy store has literally thrown up in our playroom) but then realized that there was some new things to play with and she was....oofff! She is pretty hilarious with her kitchen, she stirs things up and then and gives me some taste testers while saying "MMMMMMMmmmmm". Hilarious.
We celebrated Christmas Eve night with dinner at my mother-in-laws. This is a tradition that has been going on for nearly 40 years. Her entire family (4 brothers & their kiddos, wives, babies) all come to her house for Christmas Eve dinner. We were fortunate enough to have my parents come in for Christmas Eve night/Christmas morning, so they joined us as well. Lizzie was a trooper and stayed up 2 hours past her bedtime (we had to actually wake her Christmas morning) and was entertaining everyone with her "Ho-Ho-Hos" and "Ohhhhh" sound everytime she saw a present. Having my parents there for Santa really meant a lot to me, since one of the memories I hold dear is having my mom's parents, MamaLiz & PapaJim, with us every Christmas morning. My folks were also a huge hit in putting together the cottage & table & chairs. I distinctly remember a Christmas were my mom & PapaJim were putting together My Little Pony's Paradise Estate till 3 am. Payback, right? We watched It's a Wonderful LIfe and put together all the little doo-dads that went along with the cottage & table set and just enjoyed our company. I made Christmas breakfast, a tradition I hope to continue, and we all gorged on monkey bread & casserole that morning and then we got to relax and not travel anywhereon Christmas Day, which I will say is the first time I have done that in 15 years! Just mulling around the house in my PJ's and picking up wrapping paper was wonderful. On Saturday we packed up the car and hit the road to Knoxville to see my brother & his wife, grandmother, cousins & Dad. We went and saw Sherlock Holmes, which I highly recommend and ate Mexican (we were all SO over the traditional food) on Sunday and then Monday hit the road again and went to Chattanooga to see my PapaJim & his wife. It was fun but exhausting! Yesterday I literally laid on the couch and watched 5 episodes of True Blood. I am never that lazy, well OK, maybe I am, but I just didn't want to m-o-v-e. Today I forced myself to go to the gym and got my a%^ kicked by this sculpting class and I told my friend that I work out with that if I call her in 5 hours paralyzed with muscle cramps, she must come rescue me :). I am glad I went because I just felt disgusting with all the crazy eating I have been participating in.
Santa was more than good to Momma Clause this year. I got a new lens for my camera, and have been attempting to learn how to use. I plan on enlisting the support of friends on how to use it. I also got some fab boots and wonderful gift cards. I was really spoiled. Michael got an I-Touch and is totally addicted to it, although he has developed an infatuation with Bejeweled :).
I have the rest of the week off and I plan on un decorating the house and cleaning out closets. I love the start of a new year and the fresh feeling it brings. I am not one for resolutions, because I never stick to it, but this year I want to keep up what I started over the holiday and trying to remind myself that we have so much to be thankful for. See you in 2010 (has it seriously been a decade since 2000?!)
Should Old Acquaintance be forgot,
and never thought upon;
The flames of Love extinguished,
and fully past and gone:
Is thy sweet Heart now grown so cold,
that loving Breast of thine;
That thou canst never once reflect
on Old long syne.
Someone trying to find the balance in life.
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