Hmmmm.....

I just want to think a bit outloud...bear with me. We are trying to go see some friends in Portland. Some really good friends whom we haven't seen in at least 4 years. We've entirely missed one of their kids' birth and childhood. The other three we've missed a great deal of their lives. Sad. So we're going. But here's the problem. It seems like it's so much work to go on vacation. What are we going to do with the dogs? The cat? The house? The BABY!! Ok, we're taking the baby, obviously. How are we supposed to bring food and formula (oh yeah, I'm not nursing any more, judge me, I dare you) and diapers and a curling iron-you know, the necessities. Oy! It just seems like it's too much to handle looking at it from this side. But a lot of things looked like they were just too big to handle, but they turned out to be ok. Just look at Shane's rising from the dead. I'm glad I didn't see that one coming.

Ok, here's another totally different train of thought. I'm so tired of being nice!!! Where has nice gotten me, really. I'm just lying to myself and to everyone else. So my "friend" totally flaked on us, again, the other night. We had invited her, them, whatever they are, to have a fun wine tasting, just like Filoli does. Well, Saturday afternoon rolls around, and we still hadn't nailed down a plan. So my dear Speedbump calls her up. Well, maybe she can and maybe she can't. She's sooooooo busy today. AAAARrrrggggghhhh! I was pissed. That's worse than flaking. It's like we have to hold our schedule open to see if we will be blessed by her presence or not. So I called her back and left a message. Have fun with whatever you're doing, we'll be doing something else, said I. I'm so proud of myself for honestly assessing the situation, being justifiably pissed off, then doing something about it. Is this a wise path to travel on? Hmmmmmm......

Obama '08

I went to pick up an Obama sign last night, but there is a statewide shortage! A good thing, I guess. So I made my own today! Pretty cute.

Gerber Baby Turned Monster

I can't believe that mere hours ago I was as so proud of my baby girl I could fly. Now I have careened back to Earth, plummeting into the planet creating a huge, ugly crater. Much like the one I just put into my wall. This morning, although she didn't nap well, was off to a great start. After Carissa's not so lengthy nap we packed off to our "neighborhood" coffee shop. Raven's Nest is halfway across town, but I wish it were in our neighborhood, does that count as a "neighborhood" coffee shop? We're really good friends with the owners, Paul and Heather. I was sooo dissapointed that Heather wasn't there, but Paul sneaked (yes, that is correct grammer) me a free coffee. Carissa and I sat on a couch in the bright morning light admiring the new art around the shop. As I snacked on my danish and sipped my coffee, Carissa happily played with my wallet, diaper bag and rice poof dish. Two ladies with toddlers came in and I could hear them whispering, "My baby never sat like that." "Mine neither." I was so proud my heart fluttered. Then I got up and paid for a newspaper. While it was only 3 feet away I could see the mommies watching Carissa to see what she would do. She just kept on playing, not crying for me or topplying off the couch, or anything! I read several sections of the paper while I finished my coffee. To those of you who don't have kids--this is an amazing feat. I could hardly believe my little munchkin was sitting with me on the couch, at Raven't Nest, while I read the paper. Incredible! AND that wasn't even the best part of my morning! This lovely middle-aged woman comes in and apparently is immediately struck by the beauty of my little girl. (Gack! I know--brag alert). She plops down in front of us and starts saying things like, "What a lot of hair she has!" "Beautiful caramel color" "Blue eyes turning brown" "She must be a picses, she looks so sensitive" "She knows what she wants" "Beautiful name, too" "She looks like she could be in a magazine" "Gerber baby" My heart soared! Someone else has seen what I see everyday...confirmed that my baby is the most beautiful baby in the world!! Ok, I'm being hyperbolic, only because she turned into Godzilla baby not less than 3 hours later. All those cat-naps today have added up into one complete catastrophe. I won't go into details, but let me just tell you that both of us were crying and one of us threw a book and now there is a hole in my living room wall. Not enough sleep makes both mommy and baby completely crazy. She's napping now, Thank you Jeebus.

The Great Pumpkin Run 2008

This morning I was lucky enough to find myself at Venetucci Farms in Colorado Springs preparing for my second ever 5K. I was determined to run the whole way and improve my previous 5 K time. What a beautiful morning! The sun was rising, a breeze was blowing, and my husband and baby were there to cheer me on. I had a great time. The run took us around a horse barn, a pig pen, around corn fields, through a field where horses were roaming freely (and almost ran us over if it had not been for a cowboy chasing them away), through trees, by Fountain Creek, then on to the finish.

After the race I had a lot of fun showing Carissa her first horse,

chickens, tractorand going to the "Farm Stand." I didn't win any prizes, but I did improve my time by 3 minutes and I ran the entire route. I even closed strong by whipping past two people on my way in. I can not tell you how good it felt to run this morning.

Life has never been the same...

I'm not kidding, this is a picture of our dining room table from about 30 minutes ago. Notice that I have two black mugs by my plate. One is from the tea I started at 6:30 this morning, unfinished. One is the coffee I shouldn't be drinking because I'm still nursing. I don't have a placemat--it's on the floor because that's where Carissa threw it. Double bibs: she's just that messy.

30 miles and ten weeks later.....

I did it! After ten weeks of running a 5K every Tuesday night with Jack Quinn's Running Club I finally got my t-shirt. Even better, I ran the entire 5K route without stopping once! I'm so flippin proud of myself. Ok, so here are the gory details.

My wonderful, supportive husband, who has a horrible head cold wanted to bring the baby to come support me as I ran my tenth Tuesday night. It was more difficult to bring the baby, definitely. I had to bring her dinner (oatmeal and peaches, butternut squash and formula), they had to find somewhere to not get in trouble while I ran, and then we had to figure out how to get the baby, husband and myself into the bar and wait to be "shirted" at her bed time. I started off way too fast. I guess I was just excited about running my tenth time, plus, everyone I was running with was zooming past me this way and that. I took particular notice of three chicks wearing heavy perfume. One of which was platinum blonde, had her hair in pigtails and was wearing a running skirt that was way to small for her well endowed behind. Jack Quinn's is a bar, as I've mentioned before, and therefore, the barflys that might be more comfortable standing around inside decide they might get noticed more if they run around outside with the rest of us who are actually serious about running. So this barfly runs past me and I think, "I'm just going to run at my own pace. My goal is to finish without stopping, not to pass people." So I keep it up. I'm running pretty slowly, not passing anyone. But then at the turn around as we are heading up a big hill I see the barflys--walking. I'm still running and run right past them. Yay! What a rush, what a feeling of accomplishment. Then not more than two minutes later they zoom right past me again. They are running way to fast and I wonder if they will be able to keep up the pace. Nope! I pass them again, and again, and finally, as I pass them for the last time I hear one of them say, "shit!" Now that felt good. It felt even better that when I finished and was cooling off with my husband and the baby we waited about 10 minutes before I see those platinum blonde pigtails sail past.

Dear Carissa,

It's been a while since I last posted, and the reason is that I am scared to write what I've been thinking of writing. I wrote a letter to my daughter a few weeks ago in my journal and I decided I wanted to write it in my blog for all of you to see. It's just that I'm scared for everyone else to see it. Will you judge me? (the hyphens are unique to my journal writing, I really do know how to use the comma and the period)

Dear Carissa,
I had a thought today-you are who you are-even now. Your eyes, your skin, your hair-they are all uniquely yours-I have no control over any of it. Your mannerisms-the way you don't care for pears but you love squash-what you laugh at-what you think is funny-the way you get up at 4 am-or all night long. That's YOU. Take it or leave it-that is who you are. I can't control that-any of it. I can't hate you for it. I will love you any way. You are my unique baby girl and I will love you for you and not begrudge you your differences. I'm sorry that that's what I've done. I've hated your differences-all the things that make you unique I've labeled as difficult and unworthy. Yes-some things are difficult-like not sleeping through the night-but that does not make up all of who you are-that does not make you unlovable.

Give me courage, dear Lord, to respect Carissa's differences and uniqueness. Give me a big love for all of her.