This. This is what makes me happy.

If you're not a fan of mushy posts, turn around right now. This might be one of those.

But not that mushy, because you know, I'm not a very mushy person. In fact, mushiness embarrasses me. (I know he wishes it didn't though.)

After a weekend like this one, I realize how much I love this man.

Not because anything spectacular or romantically wonderful happened. On the contrary, it was a weekend full of things that kept us busy or apart. But in those few short moments that we sat side by side, I knew this is what happiness feels like. Not like the sunshine and rainbows and flowers growing beneath our feet kind. It's the kind that comes through facing challenges and worries and disappointments. The kind that comes through perseverance and encouragement and understanding. The kind that comes from facing all the joys and junk of life.

Together.

don't hate…but it's more pictures of that one place again.
that one place we like to visit whenever we can.
hint: it starts with a d and ends with land.

source

I always forget how old I am.
I usually ask Jeff to tell me my age. And then he says, "I don't know. How old am I?"
Sounds like something we should be doing at 90, doesn't it?

This year I didn't ask though. I knew.
35 was here.
No longer 30 and not yet 40.
Somewhere in the middle.
Not quite as flexible. A few more creaky bones.
Just kind of in the middle.
I'm not a young mother. I'm not a seasoned mother.
I'm right here in the middle.
I've got a lot to learn. And I've got just a little experience under my belt.
After 35 years and 7 days, it feels pretty good to be…

in the middle.

They showed up at the door with their chainsaws ready. Politely, they informed me they were here to cut down the tree. My insides started to ache. I wasn't expecting them so soon.

I let them in through the back gate and went inside. Peeking through the window blinds, I watched as they inspected the area and stared up at the tree making their plan of attack. Darn that tree! Why did its roots have to do so much damage? I didn't want to get rid of it. But leaving it there could have resulted in a much bigger disaster.

There I sat pacing, stewing, worrying about a tree. A tree! I've never considered myself a tree hugger per se, but at that very moment I wanted to run out into the backyard and beg for its freedom. Birkenstocks and all.

Silly me.

I stood and watched as they cut down every limb. Then I called Jeff and bawled my eyes out. It was gone. I felt like a little girl watching my woobie get sucked up in the vacuum cleaner. My security blanket was taken…and the only thing left behind was a view of my neighbor in his bedroom riding a cross-trainer.

Long after they had left, I finally pulled myself together. I pulled together that silly little girl crying at the back window and told her that woobies aren't around forever. And that sometimes trees aren't either.

So, goodbye tree. Thanks for your shade, your strength, your security, and even the birds you housed that has some serious diarrhea. We had some good times together, but still, I'll miss you.

Come to think of it, maybe it wasn't really you that needed a hug. It was me.

It's been a while…a while since my voice has been here. I've missed it.

It's been a while since I've poured out my voice into writing. Not that I haven't tried. I've probably sat down on more than twenty occasions in the past 6 months to spill out the contents of my heart and mind and left with it all still inside me. I'm not quite sure why. Maybe I've been afraid of what might come out.

Yes. That's probably it.

I've been afraid that hearing my real voice would be a little painful. Too focused on the negative. Too not what I want to hear or to be heard. Yes. Now that I think about it. That's exactly what's been holding me back.  

At the beginning of the year, I set a goal. A goal that seemed insurmountable but one that I wanted to achieve or at least take a good stab at. My goal was to change my thoughts. I have been feeling for a while that my pessimism was getting a little too cozy with me. I knew I need to give it a swift kick in the pants before it moved in to stay.

So I embarked on a thought replacement strategy that seemed do-able. I identified the times of day and places when I knew I was more susceptible to the negative/self-defeating thoughts and committed to kick out the bad thought with a good one. I loved the idea of being on offense with my thoughts instead of on defense. It was a great plan. And I was on my way to big changes. Things were going well.

Isn't it interesting though, how in life, you can go in one day from feeling like everything is so organized, under control, like you can conquer the world–only to wake up the next day feeling that everything is impossible and that you'd be best to curl up in a corner and give up?

Seems like once I made a decision to change, everything became harder. Everything became heavier. Motherhood seemed like a battlefield and I was a constant casualty. Admittedly, I found myself feeling like I'd have been better off to never even attempted a change. Because now I could see how bad I was failing at it. After a while, I gave up. Plain and simple. I curled up in that corner and just gave up.   

Then recently I was reminded of this…

“That which you persist in doing becomes easy . . . not that the nature of the thing has changed, but your power and ability to do has increased.” Heber J. Grant

So this is me today. I'm back after being down. I'm up to try this again. I'm ready to face the impossible.

I'm ready to hear my voice. (And thank you for coming here to listen to it).

Oh wow…i stumbled upon a new find today that I absolutely love! These hearts were made by Leslie at A Creative Mint. All I can say is brilliant, adorable, cute, crafty, and amazing. Her blog is my new eye candy. And these are truly happy hearts!

I've been debating on whether to keep going with Tara's six people project this year. I think I'm going to. It really was such a great way to document and reflect on what is happening in our lives. But I'd like to change it up somehow. I just haven't figured that part out yet.

Well, the six people didn't quite happen during the month of January. But it almost did. I was about to take a picture when a gentlemen walked by and asked if I wanted him to take it of all of us. In a split second, my mind recreated the scene from European Vacation and I said no thanks. How silly is that? What are the chances that the guy was going to take off with my camera? Oh well. I think I learned a lesson to just let people who are trying to be nice…be nice.

So, January.

2011 rolled in with not a whole lot of changes. I've never been great at the whole resolution thing. Last year I think I resolved to keep my bathroom counter clean. That lasted all of one week. One week! This year I resolved to not resolve. But by the end of January I started to feel stagnant. Like I do need to change something. To progress. Otherwise I'm just missing the point. I think my hesitation is that the things I need to change feel almost impossible. Impossible to do alone. But I am not alone.

The good news is that I've started on the path. More on that later.

In the middle of the month, we were able to take a quick weekend off to California. We hit up the usual spots again. Beach, Friends, Mickey. It never gets old. It feels a little bit like going home. Call me crazy but sometimes I like driving on the 405 or navigating through the spaghetti bowl freeways. Sometimes is the key word here. But I can't wait to go back and do it all again. 

The rest of the month was filled with the regular routines plus coughs and colds. I'm ready to be done with runny noses over here. No, really. Please have mercy and let us be done. 🙂 Other than all that, it's been good. We're moving forward and it's all good.