All because

Several weeks ago it was my birthday. I turned 27. I still don't think I'm ready for that, but I'm optimistically hoping that 27 will be better than any other year previously. It didn't get off to a very auspicious start, I have to say. I was quite quite ill the day before and spend it in bed, so on my birthday I was not up for the planned dinner or dessert, so we postponed the larger amount of celebrating until the weekend. We took Saturday and decided that after skate lessons we would head downtown Charleston. The day didn't go exactly as planned but it was still an amazing day and I felt so blessed. We had lunch at this restaurant that I had heard lots about from friends. The food was yummy, though not spectacular, but the atmosphere was very fun and the girls actually ate their food. Our waitress told us that we had a beautiful family after seeing all of our kids.






After stuffing ourselves on tacos we decided to take the trolley down to the battery and take a house tour that is part of our plantation membership. Having not ever worked the trolley system before, we sat at the wrong bus stop for 30 minutes and by the time we made it down to the battery, the house was already closed. Oh well, another day and time and a lesson well learned.





We decided to take a stroll along the sea wall. The weather was so perfect. Very warm, but not hot, lots of breeze of the harbor and lovely sunshine. As we walked along the girls had to stop every time they found a stone of stick and toss it over the side and into the water. I got very lost in watching them and remembering taking a walk along this very same wall, hand in hand with my sweetheart on a very windy chilly November day 9 1/2 years previously. I was in awe over these little beings who mean everything to their dad and I, who hadn't even been alive at the time and that saying "all because two people fell in love" kept coming to mind. These 3 people who are each so unique and have all brought us an immense amount of joy and love are here in front of me because just a few years previously a man had gotten up the courage to ask "Will you marry me?" of a young girl and she said "yes!" and the rest just happen, because 2 people fell in love.
Now, I know that kids are a product of marriage and even not of marriage and babies are born every day, but to just take a moment and contemplate it and see them with my own eyes in a place where Mike and I had been standing, looking out to sea and trying to find Fort Sumter and Fort Moultrie, playing together and knowing that 9 years ago while I had hoped and prayed for babies, I could never have imagined these exact specific little children and it made me want to cry, and kiss them, and have more babies, and kiss them some more, and cry some more. Extremely overwhelming with the enormity of it all. (Yes, I'm crazy. I know.)





After we finished our walk on the battery wall, we walked over to the park where I had played on vacation as a little girl and then to the gazebo in the park where Mike asked me to be his wife. We had to tell the story to Olivia again. Kissing, and blushing, and holding hands. Sometimes I forget how much history we have here.






We caught the trolley again to take us back to our car and got a grand tour of Charleston in the process. I think we all enjoyed the bus ride for the sheer novelty and newness of it, plus the fact that we didn't have to walk from one end of Charleston to the other!
It was a really wonderful day and I was so thankful to have spent it with my sweet loves, big and small.

I've been thinking

Hello blog world and blog friends. It's been a while.
I kind of miss you. Miss this place. Miss the joy. Miss the friendships.
But my heart's not been in the right place, I've been dealing with some issues, not pretty fun issues but heart ugly, weed pulling, soul searching, tear crying issues. Maybe some post baby syndrome, a little desperate, a lot sleep deprived. So a step back, a step away seemed like a good idea. Time to reevaluate, check myself, my motives, my heart.

Being confronted daily with your own internal ugliness is a hard thing. Makes you cringe and makes you want to hide away from it. I'm hoping that maybe by coming back, trying again that I can confront what's bothering me and chop it's ugly head off and move on.
I really hope that is the case.
I've been thinking about my reasons for starting to blog in the 1st place, those many years ago. I wanted friendship and a community. I was a young mother with a toddler at home all day with very few friends and none my age or with kids my daughters age. I also started it to keep our far away family up-to-date with pictures of Olivia and our daily life. Somewhere along the line, I sort of lost track of one of those reasons and the other seems to have somewhat slipped away, unwillingly, from me.

Time, perhaps, to rewind. Start the tape again. Maybe, just maybe, put in a different tape.
Listen to a different tune.
Maybe, look inside myself for what I'm searching for instead of waiting for other outside people to fill it.
Because if I wait for someone else, I maybe left waiting all my life.

Part of me is very sad, a dream or a hope lost. Or if not lost, then set aside for the time being.
I read a quote a while ago that said, "Sometimes we expect more from others because we would be willing to do that much for them" and I had to add "or because we have done that much for them" because I have felt that way so much in the past few months. And when your heart hurts because of pain, real or imagined, caused by other people, your tendency is to shut down. But when that pain is possibly caused mostly in your own head and you walk away from the situation without ever saying anything and they don't. even. know. Who are you hurting besides yourself?

So, time to stop hurting myself. Time to step back into doing something that I love to do, and maybe this time, make it better and more about me doing what I need to do for my own self than doing what is always about other.
Sounds selfish, right? Maybe. But I so hope not. Not really. Not in the long run.
I hope I'm back. For good. For better. For myself and not for anything else.

And who knows? Maybe this time I'll find what I'm looking for.

#8

Somewhere along the line, my baby turn 8. How did this happen and where have those years gone??? I look at her and see a girl, almost eye to eye with me, a head full of dreams, a love for big words, and a wild spirit inside. She wants to go to New York and be a famous writer (thank you, Little Women!) yet she wants to stay at home and be a mommy, "just like you" she says. She pushes buttons that I didn't even know I had and sends me to the edge of my limit almost daily but she has the biggest heart for people and especially babies and pregnant ladies (midwife in the making?) She can read for hours on end, anything from H. A. Rey and Richard Scary to Rudyard Kipling and Carolyn Keene. She generally has 4-5 books all going at the same time. She's passionate about history and science. She loves to help cook and pretends to dance like Shirley Temple (generally in our driveway while all the neighbors are out.) She is feisty and full of energy. Her smile is like a sun ray. I get so tickled when I see her wink at me across the room (yes, I do know who she got that from) and she has an affinity for making her little sister scream. She's obessed at the moment with figure skating and starts lessons next Saturday. She thinks boys are "crazy and naughty" yet she spends a lot of time playing with them. She plays hard with her "best" friend and they stick to each other like glue, holding hands and whispering in each others ear, giggling, and even with a secret hand shake.

We were so blessed 8 years ago to have her join our little family. She made us go from "you and me" to "us." Our first baby, our first everything. What a ride it's been. God's been so gracious.

birthday muffins

cupcake topper mess

toppers and labels

play dough party favors

birthday gifts

unwrapping

wrappings and ribbon

before it was packed up to take to the park

coconut cake, topped

gf cupcakes for our gluten intolerant friends

plates, napkins, straws, and favors

a happy birthday girl

crazy candles

all lit up (and I don't mean the cake)

March 10 on 10

I actually remembered it was the 10th this morning and I actually took 10 pictures during the day. Such an accomplishment for me. :) Maybe I can do it again next month. We'll see.













7:10 - 1st thing of the day is always a diaper change
8:10 - building castles with the blocks
9:10 - breakfast making
10:10 - baby boy taking a nap
11:10 - cutting out a quilt from vintage sheets
12:10 - Daddy enjoying snuggle time with Samuel during lunch
1:10 - new TOM's
2:10 - a treat at Starbuck's
I took a break here while we were at Target and the grocery store.
5:10 - signs of spring in the neighborhood
6:10 - dinner cooking, Chinese chicken soup