Full Hands

Reflections on 2010

2010-12-13T11:25:00.003-06:00

I've been reminded again that some friends still read my blog! As I mentioned at the beginning of the year, I use Facebook so much that I've forgotten that some people still pay attention to these old-style blogs! ;) So here goes... a very quick overview of the year.
My girls all grew a year older. That means that Brianna is 14 and in high school and attending church dances. High school has included her involvement in band, which for the past few months meant marching band, which meant lots of time at school for practices and away for competitions and at football games. I wasn't sure how she was going to like marching band; I did it for a couple of years of high school myself and had mixed feelings about it. But she absolutely loved it and has found her niche and a fun group of friends. She plays clarinet, and this is only her second year playing in band, so she really stepped up to the plate and did great despite her limited experience. Watching her perform and listening to her practice and talk about all her experiences has been very satisfying for me. I've just popped from pride. She's also got a 4.0 so far in her classes, so I'm happy for her academics. I love listening to all her stories every day. She has so much to share, and she still loves her mom and dad, which is delightful. I can't express enough how much I enjoy her and watching her turn into this amazing young woman.
Marissa turned 12 this August, which means she was able to leave Primary behind and join the ranks of the Young Women at church. She went to her first Girls' Camp in August, too, and had a great time. As always, she's a charmer and just smiles at everyone and has a great time with whatever she does. She's still quite small, so people tend to forget that she's 12. At Girls' Camp, in fact, she had other girls giving her piggyback rides on the hike! Yikes. I don't think that is what the hike is for. But she had fun, and everyone else seems to be enjoying her and watching out for her. She has a new teacher at school this year; the teacher she had for a year and half in her special class moved away to Kentucky, unfortunately. But Marissa is still doing well at school and working hard to keep learning, and has already gotten an award during one of their assemblies. She is still a ray of sunshine.
Cami turned 8 in May, which meant she was able to be baptized. A string of circumstances led to us having her baptism at home on her birthday, which was Memorial Day. So she can say, like Brianna, that she was baptized in a swimming pool. Brianna had to be baptized in someone's pool because the font was in the wing of our chapel that had had a fire; Cami just got to be baptized here in our pool for other reasons. So far, Marissa's the only one to be baptized in a font! Cami is bright and talented and doing great at school. She's been reading through a lot of library books, and she got an award at school last week at an assembly. She's just doing great and is lots of fun.
Charlotte turned 3 this April and is now talking about her next birthday, which is still several months away. She goes to a day care for two days a week so I can get things done around the house and on my website and have a little break, and she just has a great time. She talks about her school and all her friends there and what she likes to do there with her teachers. The other days of the week, she enjoys going to the gym with me. We have an established routine, and you know how kids are about routines! She is a charmer as well and uses her extreme cuteness to her advantage with everyone she meets. I don't let it sway me when she's acting up, being somewhat immune to the cute factor after all this time, though. But I thoroughly enjoy getting and giving her hugs and kisses. She loves to sing and dance and read books. She definitely keeps me on my toes.
A few activities of the year:
We went to Disneyland with the kids twice, once in January and once in June. The season pass was fun to use, and the girls had a great time. Marce and I used the passes again for our anniversary in September. We were able to ride all the rides together that we had to take turns doing with the girls who were big enough for them before. It was quite fun. It was especially nice because there was hardly anyone there when we went then, and we just zipped right through all the lines. We had more time then to just chill out and sleep in our hotel room, which is always welcome for busy parents!
In June, after the Disneyland trip, we went straight from L.A. out East. We rented a minivan for two weeks and visited Ohio, Alabama, and Kentucky. The main reason for the trip was to see my dad's grave, which I hadn't been able to visit yet. I wanted to have my whole family there with me, which is what happened. We were even able to coordinate with some other family members to come up and be at the grave at the same time, so my oldest half-brother and his wife and youngest son came, as did my mom and nephew and the oldest of my stepsiblings, L'Erin. It was so nice to be able to be there at Dad's grave together and see the gravestone that had just been put on. Also in Ohio, we visited my grandma, who is still doing great at age 94. Next, we went to our old stomping grounds in Alabama and visited friends we have missed since being here in Visalia. It was nice to be back where we lived for 10 years. I sent Marce back home to Visalia to get back to work and then took the girls to visit my mom and siblings in Kentucky. My brother and his wife had just had a new baby, so we were able to see my handsome little nephew Drake and see Ken's new house. It all worked out beautifully.
I've been working still on Rated Reads, which is coming along. I decided this summer to redesign the website to make it more attractive and functional. I hired a designer to help me to do this because I couldn't possibly have done it myself. I also did a little advertising to try to get the word out about it. I'm very pleased with the new look, and I've gotten very positive feedback. The Deseret News also contacted me this fall and asked me to write an article for them about how to find appropriate books to read, so that was published in the Mormon Times last month and got the word out a little more. Even with these improvements, it's still really slow going getting more traffic. I wish I knew how to wave a magic wand to get hundreds of people visiting the site every day, but I guess I just need to settle for slow progress.
Now it's the holiday season. It's been a long year; in many ways, as you can see, it's been a good year, but it's also been one of some personal struggles that are finally easing a bit. So I feel I'm ending the year on a good note and a hopeful one. I am enjoying the holidays and savoring the sights and smells and sounds of the season. Last year was hard, with Dad just having passed away, but this year I can feel happier and just enjoy my memories.
I wish all of you a Merry Christmas and the best for the upcoming new year.

New post for the new year

2010-02-21T22:57:00.002-06:00

I believe I wrote before I don't get on here much anymore, thanks to the evil wiles of Facebook. But I do want to post a little for those who keep up with me via this method. So hello! Happy 2010!
We have been busy this year. We took the girls to Disneyland for two days in early January before school got started up again, and then we went to Sacramento at the end of January for Marce's oldest niece's wedding in the LDS temple there. I took copious photos of both trips that can be seen on my smugmug site. There should be a link for that off to the side, right?
I have been continually trying to move forward past Dad's death, grieving, pondering, going through all his stuff, etc. I have just gotten to the point where almost all of his things have been put away somewhere in my house, which is very pleasing to me. It had been frustrating seeing the boxes just sitting around taking up space and creating clutter. I've gone through most of his possessions, some things just very briefly, enough to get them stowed in a closet, and some more closely. It's been an interesting journey all around. I've been missing him terribly. But I've been lucky, frankly, to be reminded of some of his weaknesses that made me absolutely crazy, so it's helped me to not miss him so much. It may sound crazy to some, but to those who have been in my position, you will understand what I mean.
I've been through a heckuva lot this past couple of years, and I believe I'm starting to be able to move forward now and feel like I can start fresh again. I'm doing what I can to take care of myself and my family and do what is best for us. I've made some good new friends here in our new hometown, and I'm glad we're here. I still miss our friends elsewhere, definitely, but I'm feeling more at home here. As always, I still can't wait for a future day when all the people I care about can live on one fine heavenly cul-de-sac, and not be separated by states and miles. Life has been good to me in so many ways, but some of what I am most grateful for are the wonderful relationships I've enjoyed over the years with some amazing people. You know who you are! I thank you, and I miss you!
In terms of events, I mentioned our little trips. But everyone continues to grow. Brianna will be 14 in 3 months (whoa!), and she just got braces this week. So she now sounds a little different. It's just darling to listen to her. Charlotte will be 3 soon and is getting bigger and more mature, thank goodness, and one of the coolest bits of news for her is that she began wearing panties this week. Very exciting. So she's a big girl now! Cami and Marissa are doing great and moving right along too.
I took a few weeks off of work this month to take some time to get myself ... well, centered, grounded, re-found somehow. I've got one more week to just be with myself before I go back to the newspaper. But it's been valuable time to focus on myself a bit after everything that's happened these past months.
I also was released from the Relief Society presidency and now am playing piano in Primary. I have been in R.S. for a long while now and am adjusting to a new and very different environment! But Cami and Marissa love being able to see me on their turf on Sundays, and I am glad to be getting the rust shaken off of my long-dormant piano-playing fingers.
And that's kind of the highlights. Happy February to all.

End of 2009

2009-12-27T22:15:00.006-06:00

OK, short highlights. Apparently, a handful of you still read me. So to go over the year since I've written: never sold the house in Alabama. We'd had it on the market for a year without any offers, and then we got an offer that was ridiculously low, but I felt I had no choice but to take it. We were a week away from closing when the buyer lost his job. So, back to square one. And on top of that, it had essentially been off the market for a month in the summertime. Argh. So, after another month of hoping for a buyer, I put it up for rent. Went out to see the house in person, cleaned it, checked in on it myself. Got it rented soon thereafter. So we've actually gotten a couple months of rent now.
After that was settled, I was able to kind of settle into a new thought pattern here: no more horrible worry about two mortgage payments (without being "reimbursed" for one, at least), just some worry about something going wrong I couldn't afford to fix! But I guess it was an improvement.
This was September. Girls were back in school, and I was working a couple of days a week, as I have been since May, putting together the weekly entertainment section of the newspaper. Charlotte was settled into two days a week at day care. I was eager to be able to kind of regain my sanity after what was an incredibly stressful year. I can't remember a more stressful year, at least for a while back.
I went to Utah in July, flew into Salt Lake and was met by my dad there. We drove up to Rexburg, Idaho, for my nephew's wedding there. We had some nice time to talk and just be alone together for the drive up and back to/from Salt Lake. The wedding was wonderful. In August, we all drove up to Utah for a reunion of my freshman year ward at BYU. Was fun, had a good time all getting out on the open road together and seeing the sights. The girls had done the same drive in January, so seeing it all in August was a fun change of pace! We got to stop in St. George and see my dad's new place, where he'd moved in May/June to finally retire and have a good time just doing all the stuff he enjoys.
Little did I know at the time that would be the last I'd see Dad. The next I saw him was mid-October, on life support in an ICU in Salt Lake City. He had had a somewhat "routine" angiogram that had turned into an angioplasty, and later that afternoon, he'd started bleeding in his brain. The bleeding was so bad that they couldn't stop it, and it just flooded his brain. We started getting the news on a Tuesday night, and after a few quick updates that night, we knew it was looking to be irreversible. At first, I hoped it would be stopped and that, although he'd have some damage, he'd be not quite as good as new, but OK with some therapy. After all, Marce does specialize in neurological physical therapy. But quickly, we knew it was not going to go that way. We had to make plans to drive up to Utah -- and fast.
I managed to get some sleep that night, but first thing in the morning, I started taking and making tons of phone calls to family members, letting them know what was happening, and getting an update on Dad. The bleeding had extended finally to his brain stem, and it was all over. Our job then was to get up and see him while he was still "alive" on life support. We had a long day of driving. Typically, I like to read on trips. I just couldn't do it. Not much other than talking or thinking or just kind of sitting there in shock.
We all were able to spend some time with him late that night (very very late) when we arrived and then again the next day. It was difficult to see my dad like that, looking like he had just fallen asleep on my couch after my feeding him a good dinner, but knowing that he just wasn't even really "there" anymore. But I took what I had.
He was officially declared brain dead on Oct. 15, and we were able to donate his organs -- his liver and two kidneys -- and now three people are healthy and doing well, spending time with their loved ones, because of that. I can't imagine doing anything differently, if the opportunity presents itself. It is comforting to know that he could do that for two men and one woman.
All of my siblings and I had a funeral for him in Salt Lake on Oct. 17. It was a good experience for us, and I know a great thing for my dad to see us all together. I know he could be there to see it. I didn't spend much time with him in his coffin before we closed the casket. I had some time to say goodbye while he was still somewhat alive and warm, and I just didn't want to remember him in that casket. He looked good, though, and Marce and my oldest brother, Chuck, were able to dress him in his white clothes.
My life since then has been even busier and more hectic. We've had to figure out how to navigate finances in the way of wills, and I cleared out his apartment a month after his death. It was all physically and emotionally draining, and it came on top of an unbelievably difficult year for me. The grief has almost intensified as time has gone on because it just has hit me harder that he is really gone. It probably took a week after I got home to really have everything hit, and I was just overwhelmed. Things have gotten better in that I haven't been crying horribly every day. But I have a profound sadness accompanying me everywhere I go.
And that's the facts. I have not been my usual chipper self for some time now, which grieves me even more. I hope that things will settle back down (I've said THAT before) so I can have some time to heal -- from a lot of things. I have been blessed in many little ways, with little things I didn't even know to ask for. I know that I've been watched over. But my heart just wants my dad back and doesn't know how it will ever feel whole again. I know I can't possibly be the same again. I am sure I will be happy and "myself" again sometime, but I will never be the same.
I have come to appreciate just how little I understood how it felt for others to lose someone close. I didn't anticipate losing either of my parents for a long, long time, and this hit me like a Mack truck. And I now know how much more I could have done for others I knew who were grieving. Everyone grieves differently and needs different things. But I hope that now I can at least do a little better job of listening and trying to offer whatever someone else might need in their time of grief.
I end the year on a somber note. I staged a nice Christmas for my kids this week, and I hope it was good for them. For myself, I had a hard week, and I wasn't really feeling celebratory. But next week is a new year, and I hope somewhat of a fresh start in some ways. I'm going to do some fun things with the girls, provide them some more opportunities, I hope. We're going to take them to Disneyland a few times this year with a season pass. I hope that is just one neat thing that will be fun for us all. I plan good things. I plan to take some time for myself, to be with myself alone, to ponder, to write, to regroup. I plan for greater joy for my girls and my husband.
I hope to be a better friend this year too. I have been so self-centered of some necessity this year with all that has happened, so I hope that that portion of the past is past, and I can reach out more again. To you who are reading, I look forward to talking and emailing more in the future. Here's hoping we all have time for that.

Well, still a bit peeved, I have to admit...

2009-07-12T13:51:00.002-05:00

I have somewhat gotten over the shock of having to sell our house for so low. And in a way, I've managed to be grateful (partially) and excited (a little) about at least the blessing of getting it off our hands. Marce and I went to Lowe's last weekend and spent some of the money we will be receiving on carefully planned updates for the house. A few new ceiling fans/light fixtures that will work better and look nicer, a number of odds and ends, a new screen door for the back kitchen door, and even plants. Marce warned me it was not a good time to plant annuals, but I insisted. I spent a couple of hours working on them early one morning soon after the shopping trip and was very pleased. Previously, we had just some gladiolas in the three nice little spots out front of the house, surrounded by nice rocks/boulders, and they had flowered and soon died. And for a number of weeks, that's what we had: brown, dead gladiolas. Yikes. So I planted the annuals and they looked so much nicer! Now, of course, they've wilted terribly and are not looking too happy. We also bought some bushes for right around the front walls of the house and a pretty tall jasmine for the entryway. The boxwoods, of course, look fine, but the hydrangea is wilting terribly just like the annuals. I hope that at least that stays alive and perks up eventually; I don't know what will happen with the annuals. But better than dead gladiolas, I say! Oh well.
So our trip to Lowe's was kind of my acknowledgement of celebration time. We also picked out new countertop (just a basic Formica) for the kitchen, which we've been planning on doing whenever the house sold. So we picked out something nice and were eager to get that done. Well, the installation guys came over to give an estimate, and a day later Lowe's called. The guy there is very nice and helpful. He tells me the estimate: a bit over THREE THOUSAND DOLLARS! We had been thinking it would be maybe $1600. Ha! Our kitchen is kind of wacky and complicated, with a corner sink. (Drat you, home designer from 20 years ago!! I definitely don't recommend a corner sink -- awkward, only one person can get to it at a time, etc.) So the installation is gonna cost a huge amount. Michael, the guy at Lowe's, says he'll get back in touch with me on Monday about possibly some Corian counter. If we're going to pay that much for Formica, we'd be better off paying the same or a bit more for good countertop. I had to agree.
But after thinking about it, I think we'll just have to can that project for now. It's just not in the budget, as much as I had planned on that being the big expenditure. Just not gonna happen. I'm disappointed because the counter in there now is cracked in two different spots -- foot-long cracks. But we'll just have to make do and cover them up as we've been doing.
Because we've had car issues. We had to do our scheduled 5,000-mile maintenance on the van, and it needed new tires too. Marce particularly wanted to get that done now before we drive all the way to Utah next month. So we did that and the maintenance stuff. Cost a good chunk of cash, but it had to be done. And I even had a 15% off coupon from the dealership, so it saved me some at least! Then this week, I was at work, taking my break, and running to Target and Lowe's during that time. After I came out of a short stint inside Lowe's, couldn't start the van. Jumper cables, mine and someone else's who was kind enough to help, didn't help. Tow truck did. His little self-contained box got me started. Then I had to just take the van straight to the dealership. I lost 2 1/2 hours of work time dealing with all that. Urrgh. I went back that evening for a couple of hours and got more done, even though I had just wanted to relax and kick back that evening. Had to get my pages done. So I had to then add the cost of a new battery to the van's damage done to my bank account.
Then, a mere day and a half later, we took the car in to get service done. It's been in need for a while, with a check-engine light on and just not running quite right. So, hey, let's take care of it now. I knew it wouldn't be cheap, but of course, one of the issues is going to cost us $700 to fix, along with some other less-expensive repairs. For a grand total of over $1,000. Yay. That I found out a mere half-hour before I got the call about the $3,000 countertop estimate.
Pricey week. So I'm feeling less excited about the house sale now, seeing as how I'm having to can the project I really wanted to do and still thought I could do, and having to route cash into the cars instead. URRRRrrrgggh.
I really was hoping to have some fun. The fun has been whittled down significantly, bit by bit, as time has worn on this year, and as stuff has happened just this past couple of weeks. So I'm a bit peeved again. I would say I'm a bit angry at the "universe," as they say. We've had to deal with so much crap (pardon me...) this past year that I had thought somehow it would be balanced out karmically. Somehow. But no.
So in a few weeks, we will be free of a monkey on our back in Alabama, but we will be stuck with a cracked kitchen counter and well-running cars that cost us. I wrote earlier this week on Facebook that I shuddered to think what more would happen. I'm just about full up on crappy stuff and very empty on the neat, happy, exciting stuff. OK, universe, I'm ready. Bring on the good news!!

Cause for celebration... supposedly.

2009-07-01T00:43:00.003-05:00

So I've been waiting 11 months to sell our house in Alabama. Not at any point in all these months have we gotten even one offer. Until last week. It was exciting to hear from my agent on Monday that someone had put in an offer at last! My excitement was even shorter-lived than the lifespan of a fly because I found out how low the offer was. The buyer wanted $15K less than our asking price, PLUS $5K closing costs. Eeeeeeeeek! So we countered. Had to accept the closing costs because apparently that's what's going in this real-estate market right now. But not that low of a price. Then the week went by, with no response from the buyer. There was still some other interest, however. A lady wanted to buy it but is still in the process of getting all the mounds of paperwork in order for a VA loan. I was hoping she would get it all together and be able to put in an offer, one that was reasonable. Still, no luck. Then Sunday I got a call from the agent saying we'd gotten a counter from our lowballer. He'd come up $7K, at least. But I knew even before our agent told me the breakdown that that wouldn't be what I was hoping for after all came out in the wash. We're going to end up with very little in our pockets, at least compared to what the price was, and what we spent on it 3 years ago. This guy is getting a heck of a deal.
So honestly, rather than celebrating, Marce and I both are feeling quite glum. I can speak for myself, and in many ways him as well, probably, by saying that my reigning emotion right now is anger. Disappointment is a big one, but mostly I'm angry that I don't have real cause to celebrate right now. And I've endured a really stressful year, just holding on and holding on and managing to do so mainly by holding on to the hope that there would be a good payoff at the end. And now I've reached the end of this hideously dark tunnel to find that the light isn't a big roaring bonfire but a little match struck and already popping out. It's a huge letdown, and I'm angry.
Yep, that's right.
Those of you who still read this blog on occasion, and then that part of you who just know how I appear on the outside most of the time, will probably be a bit shocked by this admission. I'm cheery, optimistic and generally am good (at least outwardly) at finding silver linings. But frankly, I'm mad. I'm hopping mad. I'm angry at Fate for her cruel twist. yeah, there are people out there in way worse situations. And I sympathize. I do. I am sorry for being selfish, but for a few days I'm holding a pity party to at least allow my anger a bit of free rein in hopes it will dissipate after a good run around the corral.
Yes, I'm glad that this huge trial will soon be over. Knock on wood. Glad that this monkey will finally be off my back. I'm a bit relieved. But I so wanted to celebrate. And a small measure of relief does not a good party make.
My main hope now is that the sale will go smoothly these next 4 or 5 weeks and that it can truly be behind us. That somehow despite the lack of festive feelings on my part right now, that eventually the stress that has haunted us for months (and this is all right on the heels of the difficult year that was brought on us by the legal and financial issues of Charlotte's adoption) will go away for a while. That we can have at least a breather, a time to enjoy life and each other and to scale back on work taken on to pay extra bills, etc., to just relax and have some fun. 'Cause we truly deserve it.
And I do hope that will be the end of my griping.
This is the pity partier, signing off.

Happy birthday to you... and you... and you... and you....

2009-06-08T01:03:00.002-05:00

Well, we made it through the May birthday juggernaut. It is now cake-free time until August. Charlotte turned 2 April 30, I turned 39 (really!) on May 14, Brianna 13 on May 16, and Cami 7 on May 31. Whew. I made cakes for everyone but myself and had little birthday parties for Charlotte and Cami. On Cami's birthday, it was warm enough weather to have a swim party with the cousins. Sure, it's California, but it still doesn't really get hot enough to swim until at least mid-May.
Right now, oddly, we're enjoying a cool spell. We even had some rainfall last week (I've heard that's rather unusual for this area once it's past April), and a storm the week before that. Mind you, it wasn't a rainstorm. Just a storm. It thundered and lightning struck all over and split the night sky -- you get the idea -- but no rain. Oh, sure, a few drops sprinkled the car, but that's about all. I do believe that's the first time I've experienced a storm without rain. We also got a lot of wind that made our backyard look like Alabama during hurricane season. Pretty weird.
As for the moment, I am thoroughly enjoying the low humidity (at least that will stay the same all summer) and the temperate weather -- 70s and low 80s. Very nice. I would be SO happy if it stayed that way all year round. Or at least all summer. I don't mind cooler temps in the winter. Of course, Marce says if I like those kind of temperatures, I should live in the Bay Area. Maybe eventually we'll make our way back up there. Just not anytime soon. I'm not moving again any time in the near or even more distant future if I have any say in the matter.
I got a red beach-cruiser-style Schwinn for my birthday. It's much like the red Schwinn I had growing up. I have now taken it for a spin twice -- once myself in the late evening last week, and then once yesterday with Brianna. She and I cruised around the downtown area of Visalia and had a delightful time. Nice weather, some pretty old houses to look at. Even ran into some friends. I have to say I really like the outdoors atmosphere around here. A lot more people are just out and about here: walking, riding bicycles, working in their yards. Perhaps one reason is that it's just not as miserably humid here as it is in Alabama. Perhaps some is just the California state of mind -- more outdoorsy, more active. I'm liking it. I like that there are bike lanes a lot of places we go. I do, however, miss the nice bicycle trail that was in Alabama. I did not have a bike all that time and so never used the trail for biking; just went on a walk a couple of times. It was very pretty and stretched for miles across a couple of states. And here I come here and buy a bike and I don't know right offhand about a similar bike trail. I am going to have to do some investigating.
It is now summer; the girls are officially out of school. For the first time in my mothering life, I am welcoming their being out. My 2-year-old has really tested me these past few months, and being home alone with her has been pretty tough. But when the older girls are home, they can help keep her busy and at least keep an eye on what she's into. So yay for no school! Yay for helpers! I have a few somewhat grand plans to try to do some fun things with them, do a little traveling, some day trips mostly; teach them to sew, teach some piano, perhaps; not sure. I'd really like to work on math with Marissa. Well, strike that. I really NEED to work on math with Marissa. I'm not eager to do so. But she needs it. She will be going to summer school during the mornings, and getting some continuing help on academics, but I am sure it would help if I sat down with her every day and worked on math. That's the optimistic side of me speaking. But the practical side knows that it won't happen. It'll just be too hectic.
Big trips will include for me a trip to Idaho for my nephew's wedding and for all of us -- even Marce! -- a trip to Provo for a reunion for my freshman ward at BYU. I'm excited about those. Should be lots of fun. I'd love to take everyone to Idaho as well, but two long car trips only 3 weeks apart are just not in the cards. The girls had to agree on this point.
I have been busy with work -- I am now working daytime at the local paper. I work about two days a week, roughly 10 to 12 hours total, laying out and editing the entertainment tabloid that is published by the paper once a week on Fridays. So I spent Wednesdays and Thursdays working on it and feverishly trying to get all the little stuff done by 3 p.m. on Thursday. I've been doing it for, oh, about 5 or 6 weeks now and I think I've gotten the hang of it finally. I'm in a nice smooth groove. It's fun and gives me a nice opportunity to edit and do some more fun layout than news. Also gets me out of the house a couple of times a week and with makeup and hair done and everything. Yes. Indeed. This week I spent two more days at the office laying out and designing a special "what to do in downtowns" section that comes out quarterly. So my week was quite full with work. I do enjoy the opportunity but the week ended up way out of balance. I did not do much cooking at all. I remedied that today by making bread and having fresh vegetables and fruit with it. Tasty and healthy, by golly.
I'm still reading up a storm and keeping up with my Rated Reads site. I am very pleased with it. I am slowly building up its "database" and working on adding new reviewers. I still get very positive feedback on what a good service it is. Just need some more visitors. I would like for it to be profitable someday, but for now it's a labor of love.
That concludes this update. It's quite lengthy. I do hope to be doing more blogging and writing as time goes by this summer.

All's swine, thank you

2009-05-01T18:18:00.002-05:00

So apparently some of you still read this blog. So here we go: a long-overdue update.
First, we've had two cases of swine flu here in our county. One was in an elementary school that my RS president's kids go to. They shut it down the past 3 days. I've been working at the paper (more on that in a minute), and we've been covering it like crazy, just like any other media outlet. I have a similar feeling to perhaps many of you who don't work at a news outlet: enough, already! There's only so much to be done about it. If you're not feeling well, stay home. If you're fine, then keep washing your hands and being careful about sickness and hygiene. And that about covers it.
On to the work. I've been working at the newspaper here, the Visalia Times-Delta, since, oh, February sometime, I think. Or early March? It's all a blur. Well, Mom came in early February, I think, for a very last-minute visit which I urged her to take since she was having ice storms and so on and had no school and no power. I had an interview. Then shortly after, the editor contacted me. I had made clear that I could not work full-time, but I was open to doing projects or part-time stuff. So I wrote one freelance piece for their monthly magazine, and then I was asked to work on the copy desk temporarily, until they got their staffing up to snuff. It was going to be for 3 weeks, so I said, sure, I'll do full-time for that amount of time. And I did. I worked from 4:30 in the afternoon until 11:30 at night, and then got up and did all my usual things at home.
First, the work was fun. Haven't done news in years, although I've technically done editing the past few years as I've worked on the book page in Anniston. So I felt a little fish-out-of-water for a couple of days but got back on the bicycle, so to speak. And I've been pedaling quite fine since and having a good time. I enjoy the work, and getting paid to keep up with the news is always nice. And I've had a lot of fun with the other copy editors. It's always refreshing to get to know new people, particularly in a setting outside of my house.
However, the hours were rough, and I insisted on trying to keep up with everything as usual, like making sure my family had real meals in my absence. I did it, but I was exhausted.
After three weeks, they needed me for longer, so I said, OK, I'll do part-time. I've done 3 days a week ever since. And that's been for, gee, 5 or 6 weeks? Hard to say. I took the week of spring break off so I could be around with the girls when they were out of school. I took Brianna down to Los Angeles to the Getty art museum, which was just lovely in architecture, views and actual art collection. We had a very nice time. I even took an hour or so to drive her by the Los Angeles Temple and down Santa Monica Boulevard through Beverly Hills, and she got to see the Hollywood sign in the hills. Not bad for one day (just drove down and back). The rest of the week was spent hanging out a bit and catching up on everything around here that felt like it had fallen apart while I was working.
Now I've managed to swing a daytime job. I'll just be working about 10 hours a week, laying out and editing their weekly entertainment tabloid. So yay for daytime! I'm procuring daycare for Charlotte two days a week so I can do that. But mostly the kids won't know much of a difference from here on out. Next week is my first week doing that new gig. Yay for me.
Speaking of Charlotte, she turned 2 yesterday. Amazing. She's doing some pottying, depending on if she wants to be serious or goof around with me. But it's cool. Yay Charlotte! She's talking a lot and being as friendly and engaging as ever. And curious. And into everything. I bought some more child locks that would keep her out of more things. We're having a small party for her tomorrow with some family, friends, and cake and sandwiches. So I will post pictures on SmugMug.
I've found a new book club. Been to several meetings now. I'm glad I've got a group to discuss literature with again. We had a meeting last night and talked up a storm about The Alchemist. Great little book. It is the third time I've read it in 15 years, and it always makes me feel jump-started on working toward my dreams.
That brings me to my other projects. I've been steadily increasing the content on Rated Reads. I've got some help from other readers/reviewers and I've got probably 40 or 50 people visiting every day. Not bad, I suppose. But I'd like lots more traffic! But I've got about 140 books on the site now, I think.
I'm still very serious about doing more writing. I've been trying to get my children's book published, but you know, publishing is a very very very very very tough business. I think I'll do better if I can get my middle readers' book or my young-adult book going and shopped around. Now I need to scrabble together some time to do some writing. Because I have nothing else to do.
I've also managed to get some good projects done around here the past few weeks. I've cleaned up, thrown out, organized more and put more junk away in some fashion. There are fewer piles in corners or on countertops. I'm very jazzed about this because I hate clutter. It's been very gratifying seeing some of it go away. It makes the house feel much better. My brain is so busy all the time that if there's clutter around me, in addition to being in my head, I do feel a little bit crazy.
On the church front, for those who are LDS, you will understand when I say I am in the Relief Society presidency in our ward here. I'm the enrichment counselor. I did this for 5 1/2 years in Alabama before we left and had a reprieve of approximately 6 months. Now I'm back in the saddle again. I'm pleased but feel ever more responsible to do something because now I'm having to just get to know everyone here first! I'm making progress, however, with learning names and finding out what everyone is like and what they do. It's responsibility but I'm glad to serve.
I make very regular posts on Facebook, so this blog has suffered. But it's a lot more interesting to write a bunch of stuff on here. Now if I can get caught up with my journal, I'll be really doing well.
We are still trying to sell our house in Alabama. It's been since July we've had it on the market. It's about time it just sells. But even though it's stressful, I do have to appreciate that at least we have a home and jobs.
The girls are doing well. We're well into birthday season for everyone, and all are excited particularly that it's about time to be able to use the swimming pool that's been lapping in the backyard since we moved in. I'm not in too great a hurry for it to get miserably hot. We had that for about five days two weeks ago and it was not pleasant. Today, however, we're actually getting some rain, which is most welcome. I'm fine with summer waiting its sweet time.
That is all for today. I'm off to work.

The update

2009-01-24T13:31:00.003-06:00

OK, so now that I've started the year (belatedly) with a fun post, here's the basic news:
Christmas was nice. December is always busy for me, being a mom, but it was particularly so because I was still trying to settle into a new house and a new routine. By the time it was a few days before Christmas, I was finally enjoying the season. And it was truly lovely here: our neighborhood was beautifully decorated, and in the foggy, hazy half-light of evenings, it was particularly gorgeous. Lights sparkled in the fog and dim and radiated softly. One evening I was walking around the neighborhood, and it felt like I was on a Hollywood soundstage: everything was just so perfectly arranged and lit for the holidays, and there was not a single car on the road (the setup of the neighborhood means there is no through traffic at all, and we're on a cul-de-sac to boot). It was just the pretty neighborhood and little ol' me. I could have broken out in a Christmas carol a la an old-style musical, or spoken a reverent soliloquy. That was a beautiful evening for me. Felt like Christmas.
The one huge difference apart from being in a totally new state and neighborhood was that we couldn't spend Christmas at my mom's house. We've done that for 10 years now, and it was a little weird not to be there. But we had our own new Christmas day and spent time together and then with the in-laws and cousins. It was quite nice and laid-back.
The day after Christmas, I took the girls to the Bay Area to visit Marce's aunt and grandma. It was a good opportunity to spread a little more Christmas cheer to some ladies who appreciated the visit.
The girls had a full three weeks off of school, so the week after New Year's, I drove them all up to Utah. We took my niece Dalessi, who's a junior in HS, with us. The drive was long and tiring, but beautiful and scenic. I wasn't at all looking forward to the driving part, seeing as how I had to do it all on my own, but I was eager to show my daughters and niece completely new territory. I've seen it but they never have: all those mountains, the great rocks and desert areas, the formations, the cities. Las Vegas was our halfway point, and they were all duly impressed with its garishness. We were able to take the time to drive down The Strip on the trip back, and it was fun to listen to all the exclamations of wonder. Cami thought it was cooler than New York City, and she did quite enjoy the Big Apple. She has asked me several times recently if we're going to get to go back to NYC anytime soon. Uh, sorry, no.
They were also fairly impressed with the scenery, at certain points. Dalessi was in awe of the mountains in Utah, and she took tons of photos. That was fun. I'd see a particularly nice view and look over and see her pulling out her camera again.
The big thing was the snow. There was quite a lot of it up there. Hey, it was January and Utah. And it snowed the day we drove up there, so there was a nice fresh big pile of it everywhere. When we arrived at my friend's house in Pleasant Grove after midnight Utah time, it took me half an hour to park my van on the uphill slope of the driveway. Here I am, wearing slip-on clogs and no jacket, at midnight in Utah, shovelling some snow and watching my friend in PJs toss salt on the driveway. It was a little crazy. I was tired and a bit punch-drunk. And then Charlotte didn't go to sleep until 2:30 a.m. Fun night!
But the girls got to play in the snow a bit, as best-equipped as I could get them with sneakers and gloves. It was refreshing to see snow on Cami's dark hair after she got hit by a snowball.
I pointed out to them all that as pretty as the snow was, give it a few days -- and then a few months-- and see how ugly the dirt-filled snowdrifts everywhere would be. And sure enough, before we left, they were able to see what I meant; there were piles of snow stained gray by road soot all on the sides of the roads and parking lots. That's the flip side to the sparkling virgin snow layered so beautifully on the mountains and people's lawns. But cool nevertheless!
I toured them around my old haunts at BYU (go Cougars!!) and Temple Square. I was absolutely thrilled to do so. I would have enjoyed having Marce along to help, but since he had to work, I was still OK doing it myself. I was a little worn out and strung out after it all, but I was SO excited to show them everywhere that had meant so much to me. I had so many defining experiences at college and on my mission that being able to share those with my beautiful, sweet daughters was a real treat and one I'd looked forward to for a while.
Now they're back in school and I'm mostly recovered from the trip. The weather is nice here, and they all have bicycles now and can run outside and play and bicycle in the cul-de-sac. It's great to be able to send them outside. It's been in the 50s and 60s, no snow in sight except for the tops of the mountains off in the distance. We've finally had some rain, which is most welcome because come spring and summer, it will be as dry as the Sahara. I'm definitely soaking it up while I have the chance. I am not looking forward to summertime. The girls will probably enjoy it, however, because they'll be able to swim in the pool. Cousins will most likely be spending a lot of time at our house, too, and we'll have a pool full of kids. That's going to be a whole other post, though, in a few months' time. For now, I'm enjoying some fog and rain.

First, the funnies

2009-01-20T16:18:00.004-06:00

Since it has been two months since my last blog, and it is now a new year (although almost three weeks in), I thought that posting my little collection of funnies would be a good start. Here goes.
First, I found this witty little piece on YouTube thanks to a publishing-biz email I subscribe to. Those of you who have tried to get published or know someone who has (if you know me, then there you are...) should find this amusing indeed. Heaven knows I did. Nice work, Macmillan!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQ78WHpGZ1o
Next, I found a very funny mis-spelling in an article by the Associated Press that ran in the Fresno Bee, which I now subscribe to. It's about cell-phone soap operas that deliver safe-sex messages to women at risk for HIV, etc. Interesting, sure. But what's hilarious is this quote: "'Women who watched the first pilot (cell-phone video) were getting upset, angry, exacerbated,' said nurse educator Rachel Jones." Notice anything wrong there? I hope you do. I sure did. I think what Jones said (and what the stupid reporter heard and wrote down wrong, and then a number of stupid, rushed editors didn't even notice) was that they were "exasperated." Good one. And what's even funnier is that it just doesn't surprise me that no one along the AP food chain caught this. A good copy editor is getting harder and harder to find.
Next is just a plain funny story run in a brief in the Bee. I found a slightly longer version on the Deseret News site. And here is the link:
http://www.deseretnews.com/article/1,5143,705277512,00.html
And there you have it for the funny news of the day. Good night and good luck and all that jazz.

Thanks be!

2008-11-26T11:35:00.002-06:00

It is now the day before Thanksgiving, and I am astonished at how time has flown these past weeks. We moved into our very own house in California on Nov. 1, and since then we have been steadily unpacking, cleaning, painting; hanging curtain rods, towel rods, pictures, etc. and generally staying pretty busy. Our garage is nearly empty of full boxes and we are almost to where we can park a car in there. Just need to get a new remote somehow. We'll have a fence around our pool next week, we have new carpet in the living room, we have a flat-screen TV mounted on the wall in our living room where little fingers cannot reach it, and things are looking good. I cannot express how wonderful it is to walk into my own bedroom, with its own master bath and my very own walk-in closet. I can find my clothes easily and am getting to where I can find bills and other important paperwork and similar stuff pretty easily too. After three-plus months of living out of suitcases and NOT being able to find things very well at all, this is a huge blessing.
We have been warmly welcomed and continue to be warmly supported by the wonderful members of our church family here in the Visalia 2nd Ward of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Their kindness and consideration have been overwhelming.
We still miss our dear friends in Alabama. This is the unfortunate part of moving -- leaving loved ones behind. My one consolation is that we now have the Internet and flat-rate long-distance to stay in touch more easily and inexpensively.
Our girls are adjusting well; Brianna is the oldest and therefore having the hardest time getting settled in to her new school, but I can say from experience that this is simply something that time will solve. In the meantime, it's a bit stinky. She does have a very cool bedroom of her own to enjoy and little things like going to see the new "Twilight" movie with her mom. :)
The weather is finally turning cooler, and I am able to make soups. I love soups. I probably still belong in cooler parts of the country, but as fate would have it, I've ended up in warm locales. As much as I enjoy cooler weather, I admit I do not miss snow.
So in honor of this wonderful holiday, here is a short list of my greatly appreciated blessings (completely abridged and not at all complete, mind you):
1. A husband who is fun, laid-back, nice to be around, helpful, supportive, understanding, cute, sweet, and many more lovely adjectives. We've enjoyed 15 years together.
2. Daughters who are beautiful, fun, delightful, generally obedient, helpful, smart, talented, and very sweet. They amaze me and impress me on a regular basis.
3. Family who are loving and supportive and unfortunately spread out across the continent.
4. Faith in God and knowing he has a plan for me and my life. The gospel that centers around Jesus Christ gives me strength and a foundation for living and has brought all good things in my life.
5. Friends. You know who you are. If you're reading this, bless you! You are
the best. I couldn't have survived this long without you. I have laughed, cried, talked myself hoarse, been comforted, been uplifted because of you. I look forward to all living on the same street in heaven one day.
6. The world around me. It's varied, it's gorgeous. It's amazing and fascinating. I have seen much of it (but not nearly enough yet) and I have been awed by its diversity and beauty.
7. Chocolate. Ice cream. And the corollary: gyms. I actually do enjoy my workouts.
8. Music, art, good films and especially good books.
9. My experiences. The cool places I've been, the things I've done, the memories I carry around with me everywhere.
10. Life. Isn't it amazing?
I have so many things to write but other things to do, but this encapsulates my life recently. It's been down, up, down, down, down, up. But it's there and it's definitely always interesting.

I Tempted Fate and Fate Won, yeahhhh

2008-10-15T23:52:00.002-05:00

OK, so I was really stupid to start making arrangements. I was even stupider to write about it. I said I was tempting Fate, didn't I? And I did. We should have closed pretty easily on this house loan on Friday, moved in on Saturday. So Monday afternoon, Tuesday, I get phone calls from the loan guy, saying the underwriters wanted more detailed info. I got up out of my sickbed (where I was hoping to actually SLEEP) and dug through the filing cabinet to find info that might help. Then I logged on to a website. I saved a PDF file and emailed it to the loan guy. Loan guy calls back, saying he got said attachment. They were wondering if I could craft a little letter to go along with that paperwork, explaining more info. Did that. OK, fine. No more nap, baby up. Kids home. No sleep. Picture me, dragging around, lying back in sickbed.
Today, I feel a little better, go to Costco, buy some shelf liner for the cupboards, etc., that I hope to be using in a few days. Yeah, sure. Noon, I email said loan officer. What's the update? Oh, he emails back later, (after a half-hour nap which wasn't nearly enough) the paperwork is all done and good to go, but now the title company is waiting for a really simple piece of paperwork from the bank who's selling the house. You'd think they'd have gotten that ready before now. But no. So we're now waiting on the bank. Ha.
So yeah, I'm starting to fall to pieces. Let's just say I'm glad no one other than some kids and sister-in-law were present to watch my breakdown. I sobbed on the phone to my husband at work, who is now feeling sick too but can't take sick time because, hey, he just started working there 6 weeks ago and hasn't qualified for that quite yet. So he's sounding like Ton Loc. If you know who that is. But a patient or coworker said that's what he sounded like, and yeah, I have to concur, he did sound like Ton Loc. A Filipino one. I blubber for 7 minutes, he listens while treating a patient, and I get off, not feeling any better; in fact, I feel worse for blubbering to him while he's sick AND trying to work. I have no one else to call. Except the satellite company and the TV installation people and the storage facility that's got our stuff in holding, and -- somehow -- all the people who have now committed to help us move on Saturday. I don't even like to think about it.
So, word of advice. Don't tempt Fate. It will always come back and bite you in the you-know-where. And unfortunately, my you-know-where is just bigger than it used to be, thanks to all the stress. My hormones are completely out of whack. I even visited an acupuncturist today, for the first time -- I'm so out of whack that conventional medicine sure as heck isn't doin' it. I've done some alternate work in the past, but today was the first I'd ever had needles stuck in my skin. Not bad. My qi is absolutely sluggish and depleted, and my heartfire or something is hot or ... not sure. But it's all bad. The tip of my tongue is red. My pulse is sluggish. I'm depleted and sluggish. So I got needles stuck in my skin in hopes that one day my qi will be happy and no longer sluggish. Maybe that will lead to less ice cream in and less you-know-what for the Fates to bite.

If we get to move in this weekend, it's going to take the bank sending that piece of paper first thing tomorrow and some moving of mountains by my hardworking real estate agent, Heather. But I could really use a miracle. Everybody, cross your fingers and say your prayers.

Almost there...

2008-10-14T12:11:00.003-05:00

So here we are, in California. We've been "living" here for two months, but it's not what I would call fully living. We've really been more in stasis or in suspended animation, so it seems. I've been sitting around waiting for ages. But now it seems that the waiting will end. We will be closing on our house purchase this week and actually moving in this weekend. (Knock on wood -- I don't want to anger the Fates by making such a bold claim...)
I've been getting things scheduled, too. Phone service, satellite, carpet installation, cleaning, etc. So exciting.
I have to note here that I am incredibly pleased, amazed, and heartened by our new ward. Our house is in the Visalia 2nd Ward boundaries, and the members of the Church in 2nd Ward are just about the friendliest, most helpful, warmest people I've seen in one group in a long time. After all we've been through these past months, it makes me feel so good to be welcomed so heartily. When we first attended church in the ward a few weeks ago (before General Conference and Stake Conference), it felt like the people in the ward were jumping over each other practically to say hello to us. And then their youth brought us cookies that week, and now that we're moving, one leader has now told Marce, "Don't worry about making any more phone calls -- we'll take care of it." I cannot express to these people what a difference this makes to me. I am eager to be of service to them once we are settled in and able to do something.
When it all comes down to it, the people in our lives are just the most important 'things' we have. "Stuff" is nice but people are just the best. I cannot say enough what deep feelings of friendship and love and gratitude I have for all the wonderful people who have blessed my life in some way or another. I look forward to one day living in one place where we won't be separated by hours and miles but can easily "stay in touch." Perhaps mansions all in one neighborhood in heaven? So this is my "shout-out" to wonderful friends. If you're reading this, you deserve this kudos. :)
And here's to moving and settling and an end to waiting. For now.

I love to wait... ha ha ha ha

2008-10-06T11:50:00.002-05:00

So, betcha thought I'd be done with waiting now, right? Wrong. House is still there, sitting, waiting for us. Closing is still a thing of the future. We're hoping that will be Friday. But that's assuming we can get a few items fixed beforehand, since we're getting an FHA loan. So closing might still be next week.... sigh. We went to Lowe's last week and ordered our beautiful new carpet for the living room and bought paint for all the rooms in the house. It's going to be lovely. We bought a Blu-Ray player and are shopping for the right TV. We've got a good place here in town that's going to mount it on the wall in the living room above the fireplace and get the system all set up for us. The TV and components will all be high above little fingers' reach. We hope. The house is going to be lovely. So exciting. Once we actually OWN it and can get in there and clean and paint and so on. It's going to be a good amount of work, but my fingers are itching to do it. After I'm done with all that painting, etc., my fingers will be curled into a claw for a good month, like they were 2 years ago after all the work we did on our house in Anniston (which is still for sale, by the way, if you know someone there looking for a gorgeous house for a reasonable price...).
Meanwhile, I sit. I wait. I try to keep myself busy, be useful. I bought a beautiful new quilt and shams for Brianna's room, which is going to look awesome. She's lucky enough to be in a room on the first floor with doors that open out onto the patio and backyard. Too bad, Brianna!
We even bought magnetic paint for the girls' rooms. This is a way cool thing. You paint it on the wall, two or three coats as a primer. Then you paint over that with a regular color paint. And the kids can just stick stuff on the wall with magnets, as if it were a giant refrigerator! No nails, no refrigerator overrun with art projects. That's going to be lots of fun.
I have been busy updating my website, Rated Reads. I'm very pleased with how it's coming along. I got good attention from the article run in the Deseret News and online Mormon Times. I've gotten some good contributors, too, so I can get many more reviews on the site now. I just added a blog and RSS feed, too. I'm excited about it. I think it's a great place for people to visit and get ideas of good books to read. I just can't wait to get in my own house and get all my books put up on shelves again! Poor things, they're sitting in boxes.
I also plan to get back to some writing soon. I started a YA book a while back and have been busily thinking on it for a while. Time to get some real writing done.
Here's to waiting...

News at last

2008-09-17T17:24:00.003-05:00

OK, so I'm no longer waiting... Well, I'm waiting for different things now. Last Friday we officially found a house. I walked through it on Thursday, put in an offer late that evening (it's bank-owned, naturally) and then got a counter-offer from the bank first thing in the morning, countered back, and then the bank actually -- DRUMROLL, PLEASE -- accepted my offer on Friday afternoon! My real estate agent called that morning with a "are you sitting down?" and then that afternoon with a "I can't believe this!". I had to agree. What with the other two houses that are short-sale/bank-owned not budging at all in all this time, this bank's rapid response and generous acceptance of our counter was astounding -- and nearly miraculous. I felt positively giddy as I pondered the idea of having an actual house to live in sometime in the definitively near future.
The giddiness has eased and increased, alternately, with paperwork to fill out and information to gather, and so on; it has increased as the paperwork has gotten mostly done. Now only a few items remain and I can almost just sit back and wait with happy anticipation to simply move in. That, and shop. Not bad. Gotta find some carpet for the living room and a new HDTV. That will truly be the fun part.
Great news is, we don't have to do much work on it. Eventually, some painting. Some cleaning right away before we move in, of course. The house has a pool, so we'll need a fence right around the pool; there's already a fence around the whole backyard, of course. I would just like to be able to send the girls out to the backyard to play without worrying about the pool situation. So that'll be the next thing.
It's just so thrilling. A house of our own. Five bedrooms, three baths, a pretty neighborhood with lots of trees and established vegetation. A quiet little cul-de-sac tucked away a few streets removed from the main drag. The girls can bike around the neighborhood. Play. I might be able to have some quiet time inside the house while they're out in the California sunshine. Aaahhh. And I think I'll do some relaxing skinny-dipping at night when I am all alone. Just me and quiet, still water. Aaahhh.
My Rated Reads site just got some good publicity this week from an article run about it in the Deseret News' Mormon Times section online. I am thrilled that lots of people have taken a good look through the site and sent emails to thank me for the work I've been doing. I knew when I came up with the idea sometime early last year that it was a really great resource. It just needed some good publicity and word of mouth. Now some readers have emailed saying they got sent a link from their moms or something similar. Now that's what I was looking for. I hope it continues. I am excited about the possibility of having lots of reviews and ratings and plenty of new material all the time for readers who would like clean books to read. So ... life is moving forward. I'm still plenty busy. But I'm not treading water anymore, or pushing a boulder uphill.
Yahooooooo!!!!

Funny Farm, CA

2008-08-21T16:25:00.002-05:00

So this area here in the Central Valley of California is agricultural. All surrounding this small city are farms and orchards -- walnuts, raisins, fruits and vegetables of all kinds. Sadly, there are lots of new housing developments fairly recently built and still being built. And apparently some walnut orchards are set to be flattened for even more development of some kind pretty soon.
So it's all about farms. I'm convinced that my new home here is about to be the Funny Farm, however. I've been holding up (I think) remarkably well over the past weeks. I've been cool and calm and resilient under a whole huge monster amount of pressure. But I'm warming up.
A week ago, we put in an offer on a home we really like that's been foreclosed on. It needs work, but we kind of like it that way. And it should be a good deal, especially for all its square footage. It's also very close to schools and church -- two or three blocks! Very cool. Lots of storage space, neat touches. Terrible paint job inside. But we can do that. Also needs a new roof. So we put in a reasonable offer, and the bank took two days to reject it outright. Put in another one. Two more days, another outright rejection. No countering. arrrrrrgggggggh!! I have also now had my children out of school for a week, thinking we'd have a contract put together by this point on the house so we could just enroll them in the right school now without having to enroll them where we're staying temporarily at the moment and then moving them. So much for that. I'm just going to have to enroll them tomorrow and be done with it.
And Marce is supposed to start working on Monday. Now, since he's a medical professional, he's supposed to have a license to practice. He had one here in California 10 years ago -- he got his first license here, in fact. Then we moved to Alabama and he got his license there, and the CA one lapsed. So we had to apply to get one here again. Well, the CA PT board has been most useless, indeed. Slow and slower. It's been a month since we submitted the application, and a week since the application fee check was cashed at our bank in Alabama. So how long will it be until he actually has a license again? I mean, really. He had one here before. He hasn't committed any felonies. Or misdemeanors, for that matter. So here we are, still no license to practice. So as of today, since he has no license, he's going to get to start working on Monday as an "aide," at a third of his pay. Yay. Then as soon as he gets his license he can work regular and get paid right.
I suppose it doesn't much matter. We don't have a house to move into, so it's not like we're going to have a house payment here anytime soon at the rate we're going. Of course, we still have a house in Alabama that's not sold yet (it's been on the market for a month, so.... ), but here we are. Homeless and a ton of slightly beat-up stuff in two big storage units, and living out of a suitcase in a house of 14 people. I'm sure that tomorrow as soon as we enroll the girls in the schools here, then we'll finally get somewhere with the bank and I'll have to transfer them in a week to the schools on the other side of town. At least there's only one unified school district. It would be worse if there were five school districts in town, like there are in Anniston. I suppose I should be grateful for the tiniest of blessings at this point. I have to admit, however, that I'm not feeling incredibly grateful. I'm swerving over to the bitter and nasty end of the scale.
Cross your fingers, pray, etc. whatever will help me to get over this huge, nasty hump. That and a whole tub of ice cream. Good thing I've found a gym here with a trial membership for the week. I've been spending some good hours there working out some of my frustrations.

Fati-gwayed

2008-08-15T00:08:00.002-05:00

In a shoutout to my friend Wonder, may I just say I was quite fah-tee-gwayed yesterday. We are now in Visalia. Our vehicles arrived the day after we did, and it was very satisfying to see our cars arrive here to join us. The rest of the stuff arrived the next day. That was very satisfying to see, too, but then it meant a HUGE amount of work in a short time. Marce and I, our sister-in-law (you GO, girl!), two missionaries, and four others (including an 11-year-old boy) participated in unloading the whole almost-28-feet of tractor trailer stuffed full of our material possessions. In 6 hours. Marce and I were pretty steady going that whole time, with the others kind of coming and going. It was unreal, looking at that huge truck full of things, packed to the gills, and knowing that we had to get it all transferred into a storage shed. Very soon after starting, I realized the one storage shed we had reserved (10x20) was NOT going to do it. So I got another one across the little driveway, and we had two places to put our stuff.
The sun beat down on us, and we went through a bunch of bottles of water and a couple of jugs of Gatorade. I didn't eat lunch for fear I'd just want to throw up. Towards the end of the afternoon, though, we both wanted to throw up from the work and heat. But we didn't. We held out. We managed to get it all unloaded, so the trucking company could pick up the truck today and get it out of the way of other people's storage sheds.
So we were majorly fatigued. And dirty and dusty. Showers have never felt better. And we celebrated with a fantastic Mexican dinner at a restaurant I found in downtown Visalia. Picked it out of the phone book. New fave Mexican place. It was wonderful. There were a number of Mexican places back in Anniston, but I never found anything I really liked. This was perfect. Hit the spot! We'll be going back soon.
So I fell into bed shortly after 9 p.m. and slept until 6:30. Then I went back to sleep after a bit until almost 8. Then I slept for almost 3 hours midday. I'm feeling a bit more like myself now. And no more moving for about another month, when we'll get to put all that stuff from the sheds onto moving trucks and take it across town and put them -- at last -- into our new home. o
We found a really cool house here. It's almost 3000 square feet, not counting the basement, and it's got a way cool front door. Medieval. It's got a little door set in the old wood, and metal bars across that. There's a second set of stairs in the back of the house going from the kitchen up to a small bedroom that I'm claiming as my office. Tons of storage space, lots of room to put all that junk we just carted cross-country and hefted in and out of that huge tractor-trailer. I don't want to have to move EVER AGAIN. I said that 2 years ago when we moved into our bigger house in Anniston, and I am saying it now with even greater fervor. We will only move again if we get incredibly rich and a moving company can do it entirely for us. It cost a small fortune to get here as it was, and that was supplemented with the blood, sweat and tears of us and a whole lot of incredibly dedicated friends who are now probably quite glad we're not around to be moved anymore!
So now we wait. We put in an offer on this house today and hope it will yield a contract within just a few days (at least this one's not on short sale -- it's already been foreclosed on) so we can have proof of some kind of residence so the girls can start school. School started today but we're just having to let them be truant for a few days. But then they can start in their permanent schools and not have to switch. The house is just a few blocks from the elementary, middle and high schools, and two blocks away from the church. That is very handy indeed. The girls can walk and won't even have to school-bus it. And with the high price of gas, I certainly won't be driving them!
And we wait for Marce's license to be approved/renewed here in California. He first received his license here 11 years ago. Since we've been in Alabama the past 10 years, he's had a license active there. Now getting it back here is taking some time. Please just pray for us that he'll get it renewed soon so he can start working next week! A paycheck would come in pretty handy, let me tell ya.
And we wait for our house to sell in Alabama. The money from that will also come in VERY handy.
So we wait. And I sleep, apparently. I am so eager to be in our own house again. But in the meantime, we are very much enjoying being with Marce's brother's family. Watching all the girls be with their cousins has been wonderful. It is really making it worth all this hassle. So neat.
And I sign off now to get some more sleep! I think it'll be awhile till I'm really "caught up."

Tragicomedy of errors

2008-08-09T23:58:00.003-05:00

So I took an honors Shakespeare course my first semester at BYU. I had to write essays on what comedy and tragedy meant in Shakespearean terms. So I could technically say that our move has been a comedy. It will turn out to have a good ending as Shakespeare would write it. In the middle, however, it's just been a little shaky.
We are now in California, so at least we've made it this far. Our stuff is all on a 28-foot tractor-trailer (hopefully) bound for California. We should be getting it around Wednesday or Thursday in Visalia.
Here's the rundown on move week:
Last Saturday and Sunday I was dead sick. Coughing, wheezing in my upper respiratory area, dead tired, exhausted, etc. I stayed in bed all weekend. No packing.
On Monday of this week, the car shipper picked up both of our vehicles. I managed to raise myself from my sickbed enough to do some packing and organizing, with little breaks. The vehicles then were gone and we were without cars.
Late Monday night, Cami woke up feeling icky and then proceeded to throw up. She continued this throughout late evening Tuesday. I lost another whole day of packing. But I did go into work to do my last book page editing. I caved and rented a car so I'd be able to get there.
Wednesday was really crunch time. The trailer was delivered that afternoon. I tried to do more packing. I also did my last batches of laundry. Wednesday night I started to get panicky.
Thursday was it. Friends came in that morning to help me pack up everything I hadn't gotten to, which was a whole heckuva lot. Sicknesses didn't help, of course. I still was hacking and wheezing, but I had enough energy to drag myself around to pack and give directions.
Marce had his last day of work. He came home around 11 a.m. I sent him to go get the little rental Budget truck we needed solely for its ramp, which turned out not to be a huge help. But the tractor-trailer didn't have a ramp, and it was 4 feet off the ground. Just picture it: huge refrigerator (I love it so I wouldn't possibly leave it behind), washer, dryer. Heavy sleeper sofa.
Shortly after I sent Marce to get the truck, an Alagasco pickup parked on the street in front of my house. It was towing a strange driller truck. I felt a bit panicky. I asked, "So, gas people, whatsa happenin?" Gas leak. Gotta fix it. Yeah, um, not really the ideal time for you to be doing heavy work like this out front of my house. Oh well. Most likely won't be in the way. We'll cross our fingers.
An hour later, it started dumping rain. Stopped in half an hour. I am still inside, wheezing away.
We're packing, men are loading the truck. Are we making progress? Doesn't look like it.
A couple hours later, I am trying to make arrangements for Mac, our cat, to be shipped via Delta's air cargo. I'm on the phone 45 minutes before I get a workable plan figured out.
Two hours later, Mac has escaped the hubbub of the house. He hides under the house in the crawl space.
Two hours after that, Marce tries to get Mac out from under the house. He goes in the crawl space and instructs a horde of about 8 kids to position themselves out in the back yard, ready to grab Mac. Marce gets Mac out in the yard; none of the 8 kids catch him. Mac runs into other people's back yards. Marce, steam pretty much visibly coming out his ears, steps into the house, covered in mud. His old clothes go in the trash bag, and we wonder if we'll have to write off Mac. At 10 p.m. Mac shows back up at the back door, meowing. I quietly try to get him inside. He runs away, never to be seen again before we leave town. Today, I canceled his reservation to be shipped. We're sad, Mac is free, and we save about $350 in shipping and associated costs.
Around 7 p.m. Marce surveys the house. I've been surveying it myself. It doesn't look very empty. We've been working our friends like dogs, and there seems to be no end in sight. Marce starts to panic. I feel for him on the one hand but on the other say, "So now you get why I've been so stressed for a month?" I try to stay strong in his panicky moment. How are we gonna do this? We just HAVE TO, that's how.
We're still in the house just past 10 p.m. We have a bunch of odds and ends still scattered, but the big stuff is all on the tractor-trailer. I've reserved 19 feet of the 28-foot trailer, and it's looking like we might use the whole darn thing. $163 extra per linear foot. Yikes!
We go to our hotel nearby and enjoy amazing showers. We could theoretically get 7 or 8 hours of sleep, but Marce and I probably get about 4 hours all told. Too much still weighs on our minds. We chow down on breakfast and get back to work.
We deliver our old entertainment center (yeah, we're not even taking that or the TV or a sofa) to a friend's house. We return the truck, which was $50 but almost useless. We race back to the house. We are helped tremendously by several loyal friends who see the look of despair and madness on our faces. We box up all the rest of the junk in the house and then leave behind a whole lot of stuff in the barn and a few odds and ends in the house for our friends to pick through and claim as their own.
We race to the hotel. First, I run to the school to get some forms for Marissa for her new school in California. We shower again. I rearrange the suitcases a bit. I try to make sure the huge suitcase is almost entirely clothes so it doesn't go over the 50 pound weight limit. We run by Marce's work for a check. We run in the bank to do three transactions. We hustle to the car rental place to return the car. We scoot out of town and cross our fingers, since it's 12:15 p.m. and our flight leaves at 2:10 p.m. and it's a one-hour drive to the airport. Our good comrade from the ward and neighbor down the street drives us all and our luggage and carry-ons. We make it to the airport at 1:20. We check in (the big bag weighs 59 pounds. Arrgh. $25 extra charge. And no, I don't think I can rearrange it to get 9 pounds out. I'll be happy to fork over 25 bucks.) We go through security. I pay $23 for three sandwiches and a banana to hold us over until we reach Chicago. We have a good flight. In Chicago, we have less than an hour before our next flight leaves, and we all swallow McDonald's burgers and fries in record time. We board our plane and sigh a huge sigh of relief that we are actually about done with this segment of our move.
And here we are at Marce's dad's house. It's Saturday, and we sleep some long naps indeed. I wash the sweat out of our clothes. I shower and even put on makeup and we all enjoy a nice dinner out with Marce's dad's family. Things are looking OK. But now comes the big second part of the move. Stay tuned for Act II. Let's cross our fingers on this one.

Moving

2008-07-20T10:58:00.002-05:00

So it's official: we are truly out of limbo and really moving. The date is less than three weeks away. I've been packing like crazy, sorting, organizing, throwing, recycling, giving away, selling, and making phone calls. I've been choreographing car shipping, truck rental, plane tickets, home selling, home buying, Marce's job details and professional licensure, and all the other moves associated with moving. I'm starting to feel a bit like the girl with the red shoes (I think that's it), in which the poor girl of the fairy tale puts on shoes that dance with her in them and never stop. She gets danced to death because she can't take them off. I'm pretty sure I'll be able to take these "shoes" off in about 6 weeks, but I'm not sure I'll not be danced to death by then. Cross your fingers for me.
Sleep has become a commodity much sought-after but continually elusive. I'm like those commercials for sleep aids, before some butterfly flitters by a peacefully slumbering actor. I've been thinking the silver lining of this cloud is that at least I'll already be acclimated to the Pacific time zone, two hours earlier. Midnight here is a respectable 10 p.m. there. Voila! Of course, the other side is that I've been waking up at 5 or 6, so will I be waking at 3 or 4 there? I hope that I'll at least just be waking with the early light.
In the meantime, I'm still doing laundry, cooking (well, a little less), cleaning, doing dishes, prying fighting children apart, etc.
Either way, Visalia, here we come! We will definitely be in town by Aug. 11, the day before school registration. It would be nice to be in our own home, but we may very well be staying with family still. Should be quite a fun crowd!

Reunited and it feels so ... odd

2008-07-20T10:47:00.003-05:00

So last month was my high school 20-year reunion. Yikes! I can't believe it was 20 years ago I finished high school and was finally able to go West to college, what I'd dreamed about for years.
I didn't get to go to the 10th reunion because I was about to give birth to Marissa. Traveling in a car for about 6 hours didn't seem like a good idea at the time. I figured this time I was bound to go. Since we have been planning on moving, it was also a good time to attend, since I wouldn't be back for a while.
So I went. I wasn't happy about my larger figure (thanks, stress!) but I got gussied up in a pretty pink dress and put on makeup and actually spent 20 minutes with my hair. Rare I get to do THAT, I'll tell ya.
Aside from the weight, I was apprehensive. I wasn't particularly close to a lot of people in my high school, mainly because I was only there for 2 years. But I thought I would be happy to see several, so I went. It wasn't too bad. I was shocked at how OLD so many people looked! Some looked just the same, and several told me I looked exactly the same (I guess they were overlooking the weight gain). So it was all a fairly good boost for me as I realized that not everyone has stayed the same as 20 years ago, so I'm entitled to a little change. (That has kind of faded with the passage of a few weeks and the visuals I've gotten of myself in photos there. Aack! The mirror is much kinder.)
I stayed a few hours, showed off my "arm candy" (my handsome husband), and exchanged hugs and conversations. It was interesting how some of the less mature students I knew then have grown up and become pretty responsible, likable people! Very reassuring. Of course, there were a couple who were obnoxious then who have become ten times more obnoxious. Goes both ways, I guess.
All in all, I came out of it fairly unscathed. I just hope that if I go to the 50th, I'll have lost these 35 extra pounds...

Crazed

2008-06-24T13:42:00.002-05:00

I think that with the very good possibility of a pending move and all the usual things going on, plus its being summertime, my brain just might explode. Even Marce is having a bit harder of a time getting to sleep at night, what with new interesting things popping up here and there. The night before last, I had a different real-estate search engine open and had made it a certain way through, and he kept on looking past where I had. So he comes to me at 10:45 at night (I was actually in bed, for once not staying up late reading -- the only quiet time I had alone) and says, "You've got to see this house." And he was right. We both LOVE it. It's "affordable" and is full of styles that we love. It reminds me a bit of the house we rented for a year in California before we moved here. So of course, we stayed up looking at all the pictures (of which there were 21, which was very nice) and me running numbers and hopping up and down a bit (literally) for him to allow me to take the keyboard and look up info on the agent so I could email her. Then we tossed around in bed for a while before we finally fell off to sleep.
So today, I decided it was really best for my health and sanity to take some time, first thing after I dropped off Charlotte at her "day care/camp/preschool" (whatever you'd like to call it), to take a nap. I dropped into bed around 10:15 and got up around 1 p.m. I am feeling a little more normal right now after having had some sleep. I still have lots of things to do (like pack, throw things away, give things away, ad nauseam) but I must have some energy to do them with.
The next thing coming up is my 20th high school reunion. That's this weekend. We're going to see Mom and I'll be trying to look my nicest for people I mostly haven't seen in 20 years. I'm kind of not looking forward to it. I know that there are people I'll be interested to visit with again, but I'm just kind of dreading it mostly because I'm kind of on the heavy side right now (thanks, stress...) and it's that typical "I hate people to see me like this" thing. It sounds terrible, but it's true. Just five years ago (or even three) I was looking trim and normal. Now... Arrrgh.
So I'm hoping that the weekend is fun, and from there, it will be a whirlwind of activity through the end of August. I almost wouldn't be surprised if I don't have another post on here until September. At least I'm somewhat up to date on here; my journal is another story (it was up to date... in March).

Leaving Limbo, We Hope

2008-06-18T07:36:00.003-05:00

Marce now has an interview scheduled in California in two weeks. Things are moving along. It's exciting and a little scary. 'Cause that means we really are going to have to pack up and move, all the way across the country. It's 2,192 miles or so, according to Mapquest. Yikes! I just get butterflies (or some kind of bugs...) flittering around in my stomach when I think of all the possessions we have to move. I'm trying to shed them like our cats are shedding fur. But there
is always more stuff left, just as the cats seem to have endless amounts of fur to get rid of. I'm making a list now of all the big things to leave behind: the old, beat-up couch; the piano given to us free when we moved into our first place here; the car. The van we keep. It's crazy time. That's why I asked my doctor for some Valium or something similar the other day at a checkup! ;) Could be very useful, considering that swirling brain I've had lately on some evenings.
But seriously, life has been busy, but now I know it will swing into ultra-busy mode. It's a little nervous-making. But the move will be such a good thing for the girls, in particular, and nice for Marce. He'll be able to work in a rehab facility, with more neuro patients, 11 years after getting special training to do just that. Yay for Marce. Me, I'll just really, really miss my book page job here. I still have my website, though, so pass the word along about Rated Reads. I just love books!

One Small Step for Charlotte-kind

2008-06-18T07:33:00.002-05:00

She walked! She took four steps last night! Yay for Charlotte! What was really fun is that all of our family were gathered in the living room (Marce was watching the very disappointing final NBA game) and that I was on the phone with my mom. So all of us were able to see her take her first steps, and my mom got to hear us all cheering for her. Thrilling stuff. I have to admit, even on our fourth child, it's just as exciting as it was with our first. Could be even more so, since there are more of us to be excited! It's amazing how wondrous it is to watch a baby grow up and learn new things. It's always fresh and thrilling.

De-camped and de-flea'd

2008-06-12T22:15:00.002-05:00

So it's been an interesting week. I sent my oldest daughter off to our church's annual "girls camp." It's for young women ages 12 to 18. I went three years in a row when I was that age. I remember it was hot and muggy and miserable, since I was in Mississippi and Alabama at that time. I was SO grateful when it rained two of those years! I was singing hallelujahs.
Needless to say, I had the obvious feelings of "gee, I can't believe my baby is this old..." yada, yada. I took her and a few other girls up to the camp on Tuesday and watched them get settled in and start getting to know each other. I could tell that she didn't need a big kiss and hug from the ol' mom once she was dressed in her cute new camp T-shirt and sitting at a a table eating lunch with all the other girls. So I just let Cami kiss her and I stood at a very short distance waving. But I'd already given her the hug and kiss when it was just the two of us, no other girls around. So yes, she IS that old, and yes, she is old enough to want a little distance from me among a bunch of other teens. Whoa.
Before I went through all those hackneyed feelings, I was laughing a bit inwardly at the picture of her being at camp. I myself was never much of a camper. I was glad when it rained and we didn't have to go outside a pavilion and do stuff. We could just sing silly songs. I hate the hot weather and all the grunginess. And I am quite sure Brianna's not much of the camper either. She hated the YMCA kids day camp a few years ago that she tried a couple of times because it was hot and there were "lots of ants." Not the outdoorsgirl. So I'm smirking a bit picturing her there. Well, I WAS. Now I just picture her having fun and enjoying herself and then coming home to tell me all about it. That'll be tomorrow.
So on to the second topic. Brianna has been gone for two and a half days, and I haven't had her help with the younger girls. I've kind of missed that. Marce has had other things going on, including going up to the camp this evening in his church duties to participate as a leader. So I've handled things all on my own without any backup/support from older people like my husband or my competent 12-year-old. But during one evening we had "open" without anything going on, duties, etc., Marce and I chose to use our glorious time bathing the cats.
Yeah. I thought it would only take 15 minutes or so. No biggie. They've both been flea-infested so it was time for a good soaking and scrubbing with flea shampoo. Mac, the strong manly-man who's only 2, put up a big fight and left Marce looking like a druggie who shoots up both arms. We scrubbed him, pulled off a few fleas, and let him go. We grabbed Cocoa Puff, my sweet little stray I had to rescue a few months ago (she was obviously a good house cat before because she's spayed and de-clawed in the front and was obviously spoiled on soft food, which she ain't gettin' here on a regular basis, I can tell ya that) and put her in the clawfoot. (Hmm. Appropriate we're bathing the cats in the CLAW-foot tub....) She is much smaller and a whole lot furrier, and as I mentioned, claw-less in the front. We discovered that was REALLY nice. She made a few attempts to bite a few times, but she didn't put up a big fight. Which was a good thing. Because once we got that long fur all wet, and we could actually see under to her skin, we found a whole circus of fleas. We spent a solid half-hour or more crouched over the bathtub, picking at least a hundred fleas off her. We'd find them clustered three and four at a time in different spots and then grab them and try to pull them out. It was hard work, I tell ya. And we'd rinse, keep searching, and find three or four more. And on and on it went. She let out a few plaintive "me-rows" and sat there putting up a fruitless struggle on occasion. I felt so bad for her. I mean, I have no idea how many fleas we got off of her.
So there my dear husband and I were: huddled over a tub, holding down a scrawny-looking cat with fur plastered to her skin, meowing on occasion, picking off a ridiculous infestation. We're sopping wet from splashing and from sweat. I looked at him and had to laugh on numerous occasions: nice way to spend an evening with my beloved.
Life sure is good.

Cool '70s vibe

2008-06-09T11:39:00.002-05:00

OK, this is on a totally different note. But I got to go see a fun, fun performance of ABBA music on Saturday night. Here in Anniston we have a former fort that has been closed and turned into civilian use called McClellan. During the summer, they have been having a short series of orchestra performances out in a park there. On Saturday, this included the Alabama Symphony Orchestra performing with a group called Waterloo, a tribute band that does a really great imitation of ABBA. (If you want to see more about them, check out this link: http://www.abba-the-show.com/index.html)
They sounded fantastic. Really very close in sound, and their costumes and vibe were spot-on. The group is even Swedish, so they have that neat accent with all those soft, sibiliant "s's." The orchestra backing it up did a great job, and it had a really, deep, rich sound. On certain songs, the orchestra's presence was really spectacular. Most of the time, you wouldn't notice them obviously, but their backup gave real depth. My dad and I took Brianna to the performance, and we all just had a fun evening. I sang along with everything. Dad had gotten into ABBA back when I was about Brianna's age, and he started gathering up records, then CDs. So I grew up listening to them. Now their CDs are kind of my "traveling music." If I'm going on a trip, I throw those CDs in the car for sure.
I'd say, take a chance on the group if you ever have the opportunity!

Self-Flagellation

2008-06-09T11:19:00.002-05:00

I'm starting to wonder (well, frankly, it's not the first time I've wondered this, but...) if I'm a masochist. I must enjoy rejection. That's why I became a writer.
Well, more specifically, I'm a writer who wants to be published. If I were just a writer doing it for my own pleasure, then I'd be fine. But, sadly, I'm one of those sorts who wants to publish and get my work out there for lots of other people to see. (Perhaps that's why I blog... Yikes. Well, no, really, I write this blog as a lazy way of keeping my friends up to date. Really. )
So I wrote a book about my experience as a mother and spent a good five years of my life writing, editing, and trying to get it published. I collected a lot of books about how to get published, as well as a file folder stuffed full of rejection letters from agents and publishers alike. I learned that it's nigh-near impossible to get a nonfiction book published unless you're some sort of expert, or have a really pitiful life story to share in the form of memoir. (Yeah, neither of my parents is an alcoholic, and I didn't grow up poor.) It sounds crass, but it's largely the truth in the publishing world. So I realized, hey, I'm going to have to self-publish. So I did. And I learned a lot more about publishing, as a result, and it was valuable information. I hope I've been able to put it to good use as I've tried to help some friends find publishers/agents. I can say I have helped a friend find an agent, which is more than I've been able to do for myself, so I suppose so far it's a success. Now we're waiting for his book to find a publisher. So, as I said, I at least can say my experience has been valuable in some way.
Now through the things I've learned, I thought that my best bet would be to work on children's books. I had an idea both for a picture book and for a middle-readers book. So I wrote one chapter on the latter about a year ago and have simply chewed over it in my mind ever since. I also sat down about a month and a half ago, I guess, and just wrote down the children's picture-book story. It took me three tries to get it right, to get into the right style and tone, but I did it to my great satisfaction. Then I edited it a bit more and felt very pleased with the result. I think it's a delightful, fun, silly little tale. So here comes the self-flagellation part: I decided to SEND OUT QUERY LETTERS to agents. I've sent out maybe 15 letters and emails, and I've gotten maybe 6 or 7 rejections so far. I started a new file folder. It's filling up with my little rejection letters. As much as it's to be expected that I won't get a positive response right away, it still kills me a little inside each and every time I open up an envelope with a standard rejection form in it. As if I don't have enough stuff to bother me as it is. Like possibly moving. Or all the other usual stuff. But I'm piling it on.
Even so, I feel inside that I'm on the right track. I am quite sure that writing books for young readers is where I'm supposed to go. So exactly how long will it take until I really get a "bite?" If I count my previous attempts at publication, I've been doing this for about 10 years, without any real encouragement. If I count this new situation, I suppose I'm at the very beginning of perhaps another 10-year run. I truly hope that this run will be more positive than the last. I mean, yeah, it's nice to learn things, and find valuable experience, etc etc. and to be able to help other people. But I'd REALLY like to find some success of my own. I always hope that I'm not one of those completely untalented types who is convinced they're talented. I'd hate to be one of the kinds of people who auditions for American Idol or some such thing, sure they're the next big star, but they can't even hit a note on-key. That's what bugs me the most, I think. Am I completely fooling myself? How many people ask themselves that question on a regular basis? Am I normal that way? Or am I abnormal in that I continue to cling doggedly to a goal that's truly pie in the sky?
I am a good editor and a passable writer when it comes to writing for the newspaper or magazines. I mean, on my first try, I got a story accepted for publication for The Friend, the Church magazine for kids. I saw that as a really good sign that I am meant to write for kids. But I would just love to have another little sign that at least I'm on the right track. Somebody throw me a bone!
Well, I'm just whining now. I should turn my pain into some good writing, rather than a blog rant. So, here I am, pulling out another rope to beat myself up with.

Summer Cleaning, aka Battling Entropy

2008-06-06T17:21:00.003-05:00

All you women who have ever been pregnant will probably know what I'm referring to when I say the phrase "nesting." It's that energy to clean up and organize that you get when it's almost time to have the baby. Gotta "feather the nest" for the new little chick.
Well, I can probably say I've been un-nesting. I've already got four little chicks, and they've done a whole hecka lotta feathering themselves over the years. And we've lived in the same town for exactly 10 years now. Although we moved houses two years ago, it was only a distance of 1 mile away. And it was a mess because all we did was throw junk in the car over and over again and move junk to a different location. I did not clear out as much junk as I would had I truly been "moving."
Well, I'm trying to un-feather our big nest just in case we actually DO move. And this time it won't be a mile away -- it'll be 3000 miles or so. And you just don't move junk that kind of distance. At least, I don't care to.
(For those who read "In Limbo," I mentioned we're waiting to move. We're still waiting, but at least we have found out that someone has given notice, so there will be an opening at the hospital Marce wants to work at. It's just now more waiting to see what the official position will be and when he'll get out for an interview.)
I thought of myself as a bit of a packrat when I was young. But since I've been an adult, I have thought of myself as a "thrower." I have packed up enough boxes over the years that I can't bear to have to pack any more than is absolutely necessary. And I am a bit of a neat freak and probably a touch OCD in the sense that clutter around me just heightens the clutter that is often my mind. It makes me a little "itchy" psychologically.
So this past week, I've used the time Charlotte has been at her "preschool" for a few hours at a time to clean out stuff while she's not underfoot. I told the girls I was going to clean out their room and they would help me decide what to give away. Even though on Tuesday, I filled a huge bag full of paper products for recycling, and a small bag for trash, pulled everything off shelves and from under beds, organized, and vacuumed up a few litters' worth of dust bunnies, Marce couldn't tell a difference when he walked in Cami and Marissa's room. So on Thursday, I went in there and worked some more to find dolls and stuffed animals to give away. We ended up with two paper bags full of them, which we took across the street to a place that helps children who have been abused. I am quite sure Marce still couldn't see a difference in their room, because the stuff primarily came from boxes under their bunk bed. I also organized their book shelf. Of course, I didn't give away a single book.
Even though my dear husband didn't see a difference in the girls' room, he did see a major difference in the kitchen. I spent a couple more hours on Tuesday in there. I threw away junk and cleaned and organized. A couple of trash bags went out to the garbage bin. And we could see our countertops! I went to the store and brought home a big watermelon and two cantaloupes and laid them on the counter, with plenty of room to spare.
I cleaned out the bathrooms a bit. While I've done this in the fairly recent past, this time was primarily for the purpose of getting all the blankets and towels off the large wire shelf so we could put tile on the floor. The bulk of our bathroom redo was done before Charlotte arrived last year, but we have been walking on a yucky, un-matching floor all this time. We picked out backerboard and ceramic tile a few months ago. Now that it's 90 degrees outside, it's the perfect time to finally hunker down and put down the tile, especially since there is no AC in the upstairs bathroom (there was no central air upstairs in the house when we bought it, so we bought very nice individual "Mr. Slim" units for each bedroom. They have great energy efficiency and are very comfortable, and they were almost entirely non-invasive on our old house. But they were quite pricey for each unit, and it wasn' t worth putting just in the bathroom. So we have no air in there but a fan.)
So here we are trying to get the floor somehow level (Marce is working on that right as I write), and put the backerboard down. And then we can figure out the ideal time to lay the tile. That will mean a day to dry, a day to put in grout, etc., making the tub inaccessible for a few days, and the toilet as well (since we are going to put a new one in finally). Not sure how we'll swing that. We do have a full bathroom downstairs, but the clawfoot is just a tub and not a shower. And as it is, Marissa hates having to go downstairs to use the toilet when the upstairs one is ocupado. She'll stand there and fuss for a few minutes when she could have just gone down the stairs in that time.
So we're not luxuriating in summer relaxation. I'm playing host to a house full of children freshly out of school, and cleaning like CRAZY and all the usual stuff. But the house is looking pretty good. It's not nearly as cluttered, although I think it will still have to be photographed very strategically in each room to make it look really stylish for any real-estate listings.
I'm just pleased that at least I've hauled out a lot more lately than I've hauled in. It's a start in fighting the uphill battle that is the encroachment of entropy.

In Limbo

2008-05-20T12:40:00.002-05:00

Well, we've been hoping to move to California. That's it in a nutshell. I got the idea back in January, while visiting SF, that it would be really great for the girls especially if we could move to Visalia, where Marce's brother and his wife and their six kids live. The girls could grow up now near their cousins, the schools would invariably be better than what we have here, and the church would be a little bigger. Right now, the Primary is pretty small, and there aren't a lot of kids at church for our girls to hang out with. I'd really love it if they had a few more options.
So, the hospital out there would love for Marce to come work for them. But we've been waiting for a position to open up. Isn't anyone there quitting??
Truth be told, I haven't been wanting anyone to quit too soon, anyway. We have a lot to do around here to prepare to move, and school has still been in, etc. So we feel pretty determined to move, but all we have right now are plans. And plans are SO subject to change. In the meantime, we're quite busy living life (as noted in my other posts) and going about our business. But we've got in the back of our heads (and often in the FRONTS) that we're going to be moving. We're trying to fix up what needs to be fixed up in the house; I'm trying to box up junk we don't use often or throw it away or give it away. Trying to get an idea of what finances will be like. All that kind of fun stuff.
Of course, if we stay, we still have to deal with the big issue of the schools. The public school system here in the city of Anniston is the pits. It may be slowly back on the rise, but it will be a very long, slow process. In the meantime, it's become untenable for us and for our girls. Brianna has been in a private Catholic school this past year, and it has been great for her. We thought the elementary school closest to us would be fine for Cami and Marissa, which it has been mostly, and mainly academically, but it has just not been good in terms of the other students. Everyone who could has left the system, either moving away to other areas or paying for private school. So everyone who's left has no money or doesn't care. (I'm talking families, now, of course.) So what we feel remains is a lot of kids from families who largely don't seem to care about the kids and their lives and their discipline. It makes for a pretty crazy environment for our girls. The principal over at the school spends quite a bit of her time paddling kids who are acting up. I could go on and on. But as much as I've wanted to help the school and the whole system, and to keep my kids in it to try to help, I'm way beyond my depth at this point. It's sad and frustrating. I want to be part of the solution, but at the same time, I simply can't sacrifice my children on that altar. They seem to have been acting up more and I just feel it has a lot to do with the kids who surround them every day.
SO. Either we move, to California, or to outlying areas of town, or we send them all to the private school. If we don't move this year, that's what I will do. But even that isn't a permanent solution. The private school won't have the resources or the mandate to provide Marissa with the extra help she needs. That's the big issue.
In the meantime, we stay busy, we clean, we throw away, we fix up, we live our lives. And we have faith that it will work out the way it should. And it will. Just not exactly sure what to prepare for. And that's kind of the hardest part of being in Limbo.

Birthdays galore

2008-05-20T12:21:00.002-05:00

May is a very busy month at our house. It contains a plethora of birthdays: mine on the 14th, Brianna's on the 16th, and Cami's on the 31st. It also contains Mother's Day, which is very close to my birthday, if not actually the same day some years. Charlotte was due to be born on May 12th but graciously arrived on April 30, so she's not actually a May birthday as well. So while she gets to say she was born in April and have a diamond birthstone (I would prefer that neutral "color" to the green of the emerald that is MY birthstone, but hey, what can I do about that? I was due to be born in April and I chose to stay inside my cocoon for way longer), she still kind of piggybacks on the May train. She is now the start of birthday season for the Lims.
So Charlotte turned 1. Brianna has turned 12. Cami's about to turn 6. I'm astonished at how big they are. Charlotte is a solid 24 pounds, and getting heavy for any of us to carry around. Brianna, to contrast, was just over 15 pounds at a year old. She walked right at a year. Charlotte still hasn't gotten that far. I'm thinking she has a lot more to lug around. But she does crawl with amazing speed and agility. I put her down on the floor of Circuit City the other day so I could pick something else up, and she was GONE in a split second. I had to run around a couple of different aisles till I found her! It's like she just teleported. (Note to self: will find a cart there next time, no matter what.)
Brianna is 12 now, and officially a young woman. She really is, at least in our church lingo. Kids from age 18 months to 3 get to go to Nursery at church on Sundays; kids from 3 to 11 go to Primary for their lessons and singing time, etc.; and the girls go to Young Women at age 12, until they hit 18. This means she gets to go to classes now with teen girls instead of little kids. It means she gets to go to the yearly Girls' Camp, which here is being held in just a couple of weeks. And it means that she gets to go to do some work at the temple, which is really neat. I can't believe that she's 12 now. Brianna is still a very gracious, sensitive and kind, and delightful girl. She rarely makes me frustrated with her and she is very helpful around the house. She has a fun sense of humor and is just sweet and enjoyable to be around. I am so proud of her, if you hadn't guessed it yet!
Cami lost her first tooth, finally, just a couple of weeks ago, and was able to get a visit from the tooth fairy. The other tooth was fully grown in, and luckily it moved right into place pretty quickly. Now her other tooth next to it is doing the same thing: growing in, tooth in front barely loose. That means Marce will harp on her every day to WIGGLE IT, ALREADY! Or I'LL YANK IT OUT MYSELF! A fun bit of entertainment.
For Charlotte's birthday, we had a little party and invited a few people (would have loved to invite more, but I was trying to keep it under some control) to witness the cake-eating, etc. Charlotte turned out to LOVE the cake. She hesitantly took a bite, reaching out with her hand to pluck off a bit of frosting from the top, and then looked very pleased at the result. She took a few more little nibbles, and then her hands started moving much faster. Grab cake, stuff in mouth, other hand follow. It was a great show. I believe it was the most entertaining of any of the girls' cake-eating experiences to date. Pictures are on my Smugmug site.
Brianna will have her party on Friday night. Details to follow if I survive.
My birthday, you ask? I took a day off. I drove to Atlanta and spent the night the night before my big day and then spent Wednesday shopping for clothes. I hung out with a friend and talked like crazy late into the night and watched a movie on her big-screen TV. It was a very nice day for me. I got to eat a nice, healthy lunch at a very pleasant restaurant, and that night I came home to have a TCBY ice cream pie. And then ... I went to a meeting at church. But hey, all in all it was very nice. It was most enjoyable after the previous week of hospital "fun."

An onslaught of posts

2008-05-20T12:01:00.002-05:00

OK, here's what I'm gonna do. I planned to write numerous posts this month on numerous useful and pertinent, even poignant, topics. Now here it is May 20, and I've had friends/family wondering where the posts are. So rather than write one HUGE post, I'm going to introduce the topics by first explaining why in the world I didn't write earlier. I really, really did want to post earlier. But I got sidetracked.
One main sidetracking: Charlotte. She got some kind of infection and was hospitalized. Yeah, in the hospital. With four children and their illnesses and accidents under our belts, so to say, we have not yet had a child admitted to the hospital. Sure, we've visited the ER a few times (mainly for Marissa and whatever little hijinks she managed to pull, like chewing a whole bottle of Cami's Singulair medication or getting her thumb squished in a door by a very active little boy), but haven't had to STAY in the hospital for more than a few hours. Charlotte's a first in many ways now (possibly see another related entry). She spiked a fever, not a really high one, but a fever. Then she had a dr checkup, and he was afraid that her eye looked like it had cellulitis. He had blood work done. Came back, and her white blood cell count was 28,000. A tad high. So he tossed it around. He sent me to another pediatrician who works with Stringfellow (Marce's hospital... our pediatrician doesn't sent kids there but to the other local hospital) so we could get the visit covered without paying an exorbitant sum out of pocket. That dr decided to admit her. That was Monday the 5th. I spent 5 hours in the doctors' offices that day before we even went to the hospital.
SO, I let Marce take Charlotte into the hospital to get her admitted at 6 p.m., and I ran home to pack up our stuff. I was hoping that he would be present for the insertion of the IV. I had already witnessed her stuck about four times that day, and it was not a pretty sight. She started to scream just when a medical person approached her. So I got to come home, field phone calls, do stuff, feed the children, etc., before I ran back to the hospital for what would surely be a "way fun" time. Needless to say, I was a bit perturbed when I arrived two hours later and found Marce lounging on the hospital bed with Charlotte cuddled next to him, watching ESPN. No IV, nothing. In two hours, NOTHING HAD HAPPENED.
I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised. Medical stuff does not happen quickly unless gallons of blood are spurting out of a detached limb. But I did allow my hopes to rise only to be dashed. It wasn't the first time hopes would be dashed in the following days.
The nurses finally got the IV in Charlotte around 10 p.m., after four tries in different spots. Then we were able to settle in and sleep. She was exhausted from the whole ordeal and I was ready to get some sleep myself. And it was a decent night.
Tuesday was fine; Charlotte was a bit tired and listless but was managing. The listlessness part worked for me. I could rest a bit, read, etc. I got a couple of hours away when Marce relieved me for a bit later in the day. I spent another night there. It wasn't as fun. The IV pump beeped off and on for half the night and I didn't sleep so soundly.
On Wednesday morning I was really thinking we'd get to go. But the dr came by and said that while he was happy that the IV antibiotics had already helped her blood cell count to go down to 13,000 the day before, he was wanting to make sure her fever had been gone for a while before he sent us home. (Pop! Sounds of bursting bubbles.)
So I had to endure another day. Friends came by and helped out a bit, relieved me for a little while, talked, brought chocolate milkshakes... After my near-breakdown of not being able to handle the strain of the experience (by this point, Charlotte was feeling pretty good and was wanting to be mobile but couldn't be because of the IV in her foot. Not fun.) anymore, Marce volunteered to stay the night that night. So I got to sleep at home in my comfy bed. Thursday, I resumed my post in the hospital, expecting the dr to let us go anytime. I was not at all pleased when by 7 p.m. he still hadn't shown up. The nurse made phone calls to his beeper, cell phone, etc. which he didn't answer. Then the other pediatrician on call graciously let us go, before I caused any damage....
I got home and changed into workout clothes and enjoyed a 90-minute workout, during which I did my usual elliptical workout and then ran on the treadmill, increasing the speed up to 7.5 mph before I started feeling a real burn that could allow me to release all my pent-up frustrations. It felt great.
Charlotte is doing just fine. Still has a bit of a cold and some ear infection, but the big infection part is gone. She is her usual funny, get-into-stuff girl.
And I hope that we don't have to enter a hospital again for a very, very long time.

Pearly whites and the 3 dwarfs

2008-04-06T21:27:00.002-05:00

Note: Just in case you were wondering, my April 1 post yielded no success. Life went on as usual. Surprise. But it is healthy to cultivate and keep a good imagination.
My children have kept the dentist and the tooth fairy busy lately. I'm not the only one they keep on her toes, at least. Marissa had to have two teeth pulled a few weeks ago -- again -- because not a single one of her teeth has gotten loose or come out on its own. SO glad to keep our peds dentist fed and clothed. Brianna even had to have one tooth pulled because teeth were growing in behind two other teeth. One was pulled because it wasn't loose at all, and the second tooth was loose, so it was spared the humiliation of being unceremoniously yanked. It fell out this week while she was eating. That meant that she was instantly finished with dinner because it became uncomfortable to eat.
Cami, not to be outdone, is growing in a new tooth, its baby counterpart at least a little loose. It didn't start off very loose, but after the other girls' dentist visits (can you say $80 per tooth?), we insisted on getting some movement going on our own. We did a little not-so-gentle wiggling and then reminded her to put hand to mouth to nudge it herself. It's still in there, but it should come out eventually. This will be her first lost tooth, which will earn her her first tooth fairy visit. Brianna, at almost 12, isn't majorly eager to have the fairy drop by of an evening. She's rather attached to her teeth, so for the past few that have come out, she has chosen to keep them as souvenirs rather than lose her mementos to the tooth fairy in exchange for the pittance of 50 cents or something (she's got a nice savings account going and four bits wouldn't make a big change in the ledger). I don't know where she's keeping them. She was going to give up this week's tooth just because it still had some food embedded in its ridges, but she ended up keeping it, apparently. I saw her in the bathroom sticking it with a toothpick to clean it out.
Charlotte hasn't been left out in the cold. She has also sprouted a new tooth, the same tooth that Cami is just now trying to get rid of. So no visits from the tooth fairy for her yet; simply lengthy stays by the drool and booger witches.
Meanwhile, I'm staying busy playing Cinderella. I've been cooking, cleaning and doing dishes like crazy, and keeping the dirty laundry at bay. I've felt like I've been living in the kitchen. But my family has eaten well lately. Today was just a day for leftovers. That's it.
I've also been living with the incarnation of three dwarfs: Sneezy, Sleepy and Grumpy. This three-headed creature (a truncated Hydra, perhaps?) is otherwise known as Marce, my husband. It's April and springtime, at last, here in the South. Spring is by far my favorite season. You can picture me in a pretty little floral dress, tiptoeing through the tulips, frolicking in slow motion in a breezy wonderland of flowers and trees. I'm happy and light-hearted, singing and tra-la-la-ing. The coating of yellow dust that settles onto everything around me doesn't bother me at all. I merrily skip as I sing and breathe in the heady scents of flowers and grass that is being mown in neighbors' yards. Oh, it is almost heaven!
Cut to Marce. He is beset by his yearly nemesis, ALLERGY season. He would otherwise enjoy spring, sure. But thanks to his body's reaction to the allergens in the air, he is miserable. His eyes are itchy and watery and red; they are puffy around the upper and lower lids. He is sniffling and sneezing and generally looking like death warmed over. He is truly misery incarnate for a solid month. Grumpy is not my favorite hubby. I notice Marce morphing into Grumpy at the start of allergy season and start asking him, "What's got you in such a bad mood?" I ask this every year several times (you'd think I'd learn after 15 years!) until it hits me that I'm dealing with Allergy-ridden Evil Twin Marce. I am trying to be patient and kind with him, knowing how bad it is to be miserable, but I am probably not doing so well. I also am thinking, you know, I should be sympathetic -- it's only fair since I am PMS Evil Twin Cathy once a month for maybe a week. His 1/12-th of a year is actually less than my 1/4-th of a month. But I suppose I'm less charitable than he. So while he is Grumpy right now, I do have to remind myself that he is much more often Long-Suffering Man, the kind, forgiving guy who I am always thanking heaven that I have in my life.
Now if we could just get Doc to move in for a while to take care of the dental and ENT issues, I think I'd be free to go outside as Happy and do some slo-mo frolicking.

Fools' Day

2008-04-01T12:40:00.002-05:00

I've never been much of a practical joker. I hate being on the receiving end, so I'd never dream of being on the giving end of a nasty joke. I have a hard time even with really minor pranks. No imagination for them, apparently. So I have nothing to share today that would be at all jokey.
I can, however, dream. ...
My day is perfect. My children are all absolutely, completely obedient and helpful. They play happily together, providing background noise of gentle, cute giggles. My baby isn't clingy -- instead, she watches her older sisters play and participates in what she can without making them say, "Mah-uhm! Charlotte's messing up our stuff!!"
I go to the gym for my daily workout and find that, unwittingly, I've lost 10 pounds overnight. I can fit into some nice pants that have previously been too tight. I look in the mirror and find my skin is absolutely clear and beautiful, no zits in sight.
I sit down at the computer and find that the text for my next great American novel is springing to mind completely formed, and lining itself up on my monitor with almost no effort from my fingers. Writer's block is gone, ideas are ingenious, poignant, at times gently humorous.
I don't have to worry about what to cook because a top chef is coming today to make a scrumptious meal everyone will love that is healthy and low in calories.
After dinner, my husband and I are able to jet out of town for a few days to Europe, for a quick, romantic getaway. The Concorde is still flying, so we can arrive in just a couple of hours without any jetlag. Our energy is high, and fireworks light up the night sky just for us.

... apparently I still have a little imagination left. Here's to life, love, and foolish dreams!

Itty-bitty traveling space

2008-02-23T12:04:00.002-06:00

Our family has never shied away from long road trips. So this month, we packed the van practically as full of people as it is capable of holding and traipsed on down to Texas. Marce, the girls, my dad and I all drove 11 hours or so from here to Houston. That's not including stops, mind you. I don't mind the usual 6-hour jaunts, but 11 hours is kind of rough. I try to avoid those types of long hauls on a regular basis, but sometimes they're important.
Such as this time around, when my niece got married. We couldn't miss this important event, especially since it was -- technically -- within driving distance. The girls have had several opportunities to meet Kim and play with her (she has a huge box of crayons and coloring books, to boot), so I knew they would appreciate seeing her in her beautiful wedding dress.
It was actually not so bad a trip, considering everything. Including the fact that Marissa got sick the day or two before we left, and I feared all of us catching it and being a car full of sick folks. Luckily, she wasn't vomiting sick, except for one occasion before the trip, and none of the rest of us got that way. I caught it, which seemed to have been a fairly minor version of the flu. So Marissa was somewhat short of her usual energy level, and I was far below mine. Lethargic certainly described us well. Luckily, Marce could drive and Dad could drive. I was almost useless. But the girls all did fairly well. Charlotte got to being not too happy to be put back in her car seat, but she survived.
The wedding was beautiful, and it was such a pleasure to be with family for such a happy occasion. It was also a wonderful opportunity to reinforce the value of the temple for our daughters, who a mere 3 weeks before were able to be in the Birmingham temple with us as Charlotte was sealed to our family for eternity. This time, they got to stand outside the Houston temple of our church to witness the bride and groom emerging from the ceremony we were able to witness inside. It was beautiful.
Since then, I've been busy uploading photos and posting them on the SmugMug site and getting prints made of a variety of pictures from the past 6 months so I can update Charlotte's baby book. Nice to be getting a handle on that again. She's changed so much. I can't believe she was so tiny 9 months ago, and here she is in the 75th percentile for height and weight and crawling all over, pulling books off the bottom shelves, yanking CDs out of their little tower. I walk around and find all kinds of detritus strewn about the floor. Ah. Fun having a crawler around. She also has discovered saying "uh-oh." It's absolutely ADORABLE.
I've been so busy with all the odds and ends around the house as well as starting and updating my books website, Rated Reads. If you haven't seen it, check it out and pass along the word to friends. I think it is a great resource and I plan on it just getting better and better and having more tools for discussion and so on. I'm really pleased with it.
So far, the year is going very well. So many neat things to enjoy.

Swimming right along

2008-01-25T12:41:00.000-06:00

Here it is the end of January, almost, and I've got lots to report.
First, since Charlotte is now legally ours, as of Dec. 20, we were able to bless her in church and have her "sealed" to us in our church's temple in Birmingham. For those of you reading who might not be familiar with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we believe that families can be together forever, not "til death do you part." So we go to our temples to have marriages "sealed," as well as children "sealed" to us. Since we adopted Charlotte, we took her to the temple for this ordinance. It was a very special day for us, and it was beautiful for all our girls to be inside the temple with us to share in it too. Now we're all in it together -- permanently! We are very happy about that. I put pictures of it on www.limfamily.smugmug.com.
I also started up a new website, www.ratedreads.com. I have been planning it for some months now and finally got the time (well, basically) to do it. The basic idea is this: since I'm a) an avid reader, and b) a newspaper book page editor, lots of people ask me what books I can recommend. Many want books that don't have objectionable content. So I'm writing reviews on RatedReads about books that aren't objectionable. I'm completely avoiding books that have lots of language or sex. I am including a three-level ratings system for the books that I feel I can recommend based on content. So if you need some good new books to read, you can check out the site. It's just beginning, so it's not heavy on content yet but it should pick up weight as time progresses. You can email and give suggestions too. I hope you find it useful.
Charlotte has been doing great lately but today seems to have a gunky nose and is not too happy. So, that's the end of my brief post!

Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and acknowledging 2008

2008-01-05T16:23:00.000-06:00

I had no time to blog during the "holiday season." I've concluded that it's really not a time of leisure and enjoyment for any women. My husband has always just LOVED Christmas -- the whole Christmas season. But I, on the other hand, do NOT. And I DO know the reason. It's just that I have far too much to do and not enough time to do it in. Same old song there. When it comes to just regular Christmas shopping for gifts, that's almost a piece of cake. But then, speaking of goodies, it ends up being treats for those I visit teach, Marce home teaches, the teachers -- and bus drivers and aides and all the other associated staff -- at school, people at work, and so on. I have to make sure goodies are baked (that's the fun part, though!) and then boxed up in cute little packages, with notes on them all. Then there's the Christmas photo card and the (gulp) newsletter. I have a reputation to keep up, and it gets a little sweaty around here come time to write that thing. This year we finally got to it right around the time our adoption was finally finalized. That turned out to be a boon because, hey, we could just say we waited until then deliberately so we could include it in the newsletter. Biggest news of the year. Happiest. I can say goodbye, mostly, to the whole adoption mess. I have my baby now for good, and the messy part is mostly over. Debts from the exorbitant costs of the whole thing remain, and extra poundage -- a whole lot -- is sitting around my midsection and the rest of my body, clinging tightly despite my daily trips to the gym. SIGH. The only cool thing is it's forced me to buy lots of new clothes. That was fun, but not fun because I was having to spend more money for those, and then I've had to see myself in the mirror a lot more than I'd like, with all that extra flesh. SIGH again.
Quite honestly, now that it's January and it's really time for a new start, I'm grieving for all the huge, gigantuan stresses of the last year and all they did to me physically and emotionally. That's the short story. I hope to grieve and move on, and hopefully moving on will include leaving behind some of the poundage, somehow.
So I'm going to start on some projects I've been wanting to do for a while. First is my "clean books" website. It's called RatedReads.com and it's in progress, at last. I'm very pleased. I think it will be a great resource for lots of people. I hope we can get the word out. Then after I get that settled, I can start writing (crossing fingers...) my new YA novel. I've been mulling it for over a year. High time to write it.
My book page job is still wonderful. Love those books!! Charlotte is now going to go to a "mom's day out" program one day a week so I can actually get my work done now. That will be very helpful now that she's 8 months old and mobile and very talkative. I WAS carting her to work with me and it was great for a while when she slept or sat quietly. Now that's going to change.
She's growing very fast. She's huge. Really. Over 20 pounds. But adorable, still sweet.
Hope you all have a wonderful 2008. That's MY plan.

OOh, and updates

2007-11-28T13:09:00.000-06:00

About my book blog, I do hope to get that started soon. I still plan on having a "clean books" site. I think the idea now is that I will kind of loosely "rate" books according to content. How acceptable is the level of violence, sex, language, etc. I'm working on that and will let you all know when it's going, and I'll probably solicit some more opinions before I pin it down.
I also have new photos on my SmugMug website. Check them out! limfamily.smugmug.com.

Catching up

2007-11-28T12:51:00.001-06:00

Well, here I am and it's the end of November. I am always catching up from something. I went to Utah for a wonderful long weekend 2 1/2 weeks ago and then had to catch up from that. But it was SO worth it. Had a great time being with friends and roaming my alma mater. Bought great stuff at the bookstore, got a milkshake from the creamery, went to see the Minerva Teichert exhibit at the art museum. LOVELY. Awe-inspiring.
Ate well, introduced my friend there to good media: took her to see "Stardust," the movie that is my favorite of the whole year, probably since last year's "Pride and Prejudice." (Or was it 2 years ago? Time slips away.) I've now seen it four times in the theater, which is unprecedented for me. Now it comes out on video soon. CAN'T WAIT!! It's funny, romantic as all get-out, swashbuckling, clever, just fun entertainment. Need more movies like that. Also introduced Sarah to "Pushing Daisies." I can't say enough either about this TV show. It's funny, romantic, clever, quirky, unbelievably original, and great entertainment. Unlike anything else on and SO worth watching. LOVE IT.
Ah, the joys of really good media and good food. ...
Books. Still a highlight of my life. I've read quite a bit lately. Enjoyed the gothic style of the new book "The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox," was completely drawn in to Orson Scott Card's genetic thriller "Invasive Procedures," did rather enjoy "The Last Summer of You and Me." Those were all new books I reviewed for my book page. Hm, what else? Can't think right now.
Family is good. The girls are growing and busy. Charlotte has teeth now and is eating solid food, which she is still not crazy about but is managing to get down. She is a roly-poly little bundle compared to my older girls. It's fun having a baby with rolls of fat! She is such a doll! Just dripping wet from all the drool thanks to teething.
Brianna is enjoying her private school and Cami and Marissa are doing just fine at the public elementary school. I'm still involved with the school and the system at large in trying to make things better. This year has seen a lot of good things happen, in some tiny parts thanks to my input. So I feel positive about the progress that's being made with our somewhat struggling city system. It has a bad rap, for some real reasons and for some just perceived things. But I'm trying to do my part to change that. I hate to see the inequity that it's created. The school system right now is largely composed of children from poor backgrounds who are black. So it's not diverse at all. That's not good for anybody. I love to see good diversity and equality and fairness and equal opportunity for anyone, regardless of background. The schools are really the start of that. Well, it's a complicated long story but one that I'm passionate about. I hope to be able to do some small things to be part of a larger effort for positive change.
Church is busy. Good. The usual, really. I stay busy as the 1st counselor in RS, over education now. That is a change from being over HFPE for four years, so it's fun.
Marce is thrilled that it's finally Christmas time. He is decorating the outside of the house. He's been so busy getting the painting done outside and getting storm windows taken care of and trim painted and so on, that now that he's mostly done with that, he can have fun with lights and reindeer and such. He loves Christmas and would be happy if it were all year round, I think. Me, I just kind of groan because I know what kind of work it all entails. Bah humbug me, I know.
My best Christmas present will be if our court date for finalizing the adoption actually holds for Dec. 20, and we will actually be done with it all. Then we can bless Charlotte and have her sealed to us in Birmingham. That will be wonderful after all we've been through legally and emotionally this year. It's been terribly draining, emotionally and financially. But an end is in sight.
That's the short of it. I still love my book page job. SO fun. I'm in the middle of two children's book pages; last Sunday was picture books, and this coming Sunday is chapter books. I'm really proud of my work, and I've had good involvement from local young readers this time, which is great. I love getting free books, reading them, writing about them, and just having them around. Talking about them, etc. ... I am happy to be surrounded by full bookshelves.
I think I must conclude. There is so much to say but not as much time as I would like to say it in. Here's hoping I can enjoy the holiday season and not be too much of a humbug.

Home again, jiggity-jig

2007-10-16T10:18:00.000-05:00

I am home, unpacked, mostly cleaned up, catching up, and getting in touch with all now about our trip to California this past week. The schools here have fall break so we had a week to go do some visiting. We haven't taken the girls to see Marce's family in four years, and we've had our new addition since the last visit, of course, so it was high time to take everyone to northern California.
One of my sisters-in-law works for US Airways so we were able to get very cheap standby tickets at the beginning of the year. It wasn't the ideal way to fly, but it went pretty smoothly, all things considered. We flew out on a light travel day, last Tuesday, and planned to come home Sunday. The flight out was incredibly smooth and easy, except that we had to leave home before 4 a.m. to get to the airport. But Sunday wasn't as simple. Flights got full and we couldn't get on the first one we had planned, so we waited six hours to get on the next one that had space. Then we couldn't get on the last flight from Charlotte, NC (the hub), to home, so we ended up getting a hotel in Charlotte and hanging out until almost noon, when the next open flight left. We finally made it home mid-afternoon on Monday. The girls were wonderful travelers and the crew and staffers with US Airways were terrific and most helpful. We were very pleased. Now, we probably won't be doing a big trip like that again any too soon, and not on standby, but perhaps Marce and I or just me could do a standby thing again sometime in the future. But it was MOST welcome for our limited budget this year.
So that was the flight situation. In terms of the actual trip, it went well except for us all getting colds right before we left home or right after we arrived in Cali. So we were popping Zicams and hoping for the best. It was surprisingly cold last week, apparently both here and in California, so we ended up buying the girls little jackets and some long pants. Charlotte also got a tooth while we were out there! Her first one. At only 5 1/2 months old. She did pretty well. We didn't really realize she was teething; the traveling and different sleeping arrangements had us all a bit unrested anyway, so we had no idea she was at all uncomfortable thanks to teeth. But she has been chewing and chomping on our fingers or anything else she can get her gums on!
We went into San Francisco, of course, and drove the girls all around. It was a GORGEOUS day for it. We went to Macy's at Union Square and let Brianna see some REAL shopping. The 8 floors impressed and delighted her. We all made some very nice purchases and got some good deals, as it turned out.
We also went to Ghirardelli Square, so we could eat at the soda fountain. We got the "Earthquake," the 8-scoop, 8-topping sundae that we love and had four years ago. We polished it off in about 5 minutes. Not a drop left. When the server brought it out, all the tourists and fellow eaters around us turned and stared, smiled, laughed, eyes popping wide open, amazed. We had a number of people stand and take pictures of our ice cream! It was great. Also purchased a few bits of chocolate to take home, natch.
Marce and I went to the Oakland Temple while we were there, where we were married. It was a nice visit and so great to be back somewhere familiar and very special/sentimental to us. We were exhausted and barely able to stay awake because of sleep deprivation, time zone difference, colds, etc., but it was nice.
Marce's brother and family came up to see us from Visalia, where they now live. We were SO glad they were able to do that. We enjoyed visiting with them and all the girls (and boy). The kids all had a great time together, playing like crazy all day Saturday in Marce's dad's backyard. Marce's sister came to hang out with us all too, and some friends, and it was just wonderful to all be together.
We ate the foods we enjoy out there -- big, cheap, yummy burritos; Fresh Choice and Black Angus. Had a fair amount of Chinese food... :)
Marce and I were able to go to the opera on Saturday night right before we flew out (we only got three hours sleep once we got back from it and before we headed to the airport). We saw the opening night of "The Magic Flute" by Mozart put on by the San Francisco Opera at the grand War Memorial Opera House. WOW! It was stunning. The house is beautiful, stately, ornate, amazing. The opera was really fun and the performances stellar. It was really an amazing experience. Marce was just sad he wasn't all there for it -- he was still exhausted, though I had managed to adjust and feel awake to enjoy it. It was really a great experience. We had gotten to see the SF Opera before, right before we moved to Anniston 9 1/2 years ago, but the opera house was being renovated at the time so we only saw the opera in a temporary location. Madama Butterfly was still amazing and absolutely heartbreakingly beautiful, and I loved it, but being at the opera house was an experience I didn't want to miss. Wow! again.
Let's see... that pretty much wraps things up. We're all home safe and sound again and I'm just getting caught up. Enjoy the photos of the trip on my SmugMug site.

Ohhhh, it's been an embarrassingly long time ...

2007-10-06T06:55:00.000-05:00

Well, life has been busy. That's my answer for everything lately. But how to make it less so? That is the question for the ages. My ages, at least.
Brianna, Marissa, and Cami started school at the beginning of August. Brianna is attending a private Catholic school in the area because the city's middle school is absolutely out of the question for her to attend. It would take far too long for me to write about the whole schooling situation in this city, so suffice it to say it's a huge issue here in this area, and as much as I want to support the public schools (which I do), I simply cannot subject Brianna to the city system's middle school. Thus, the private school. In brief, though, she loves it. She feels absolutely comfortable there and is having a great time. She's just been trying to adjust to the changes that sixth grade has brought. She has a locker, switches classes, etc.
Marissa and Cami are going to the elementary school that's closest to us. It's not as nice as the school that M and B were going to the past few years but we were forced to put them over at the other school because of zoning and Cami just getting into the system. Long story, trust me. Looooonnnnggg. It gave me fits for some weeks. At any rate, they are loved by the staff and they are enjoying school, whatever the situation. But in the long run, they will end up either in the private school (ouch! $) or we will move. And Marissa's needing extra services complicates that. So it's an interesting dynamic. I have been involved in the system pretty heavily this year trying to see what I can do from the top down to make things better. One hurrah is that the school board finally fired the superintendent I was not at all pleased with and put in an interim who has been excellent. So that's a step in the right direction. And we wonder why I'm busy... I'm crusading mommy. I can't stand by and watch something happen if I can do something to help change it.
SOOOO, I had hoped things would calm down when it was just Charlotte and me at home. They did not. It's taken two months for it to slow down a bit for me to "catch up." I'm getting there.
The other big thing has been the adoption situation with Charlotte. All along, I have been dogged by huge frustrations with the system and our lawyer here, in particular. I will not recommend her to anyone else. However, she's really the only lawyer here in town who handles adoptions. I'm thinking out of town.... She has given me fits too. But just when we thought we could just sit back and wait for our court date, which had been set for Sept. 4, our 14th anniversary, the rug got pulled out. Just a few days beforehand, the lawyer emailed me and told me the judge had decided since the birth father had sent back a denial of paternity, that we should publish. Now that the birth father was legally "unknown," she wanted to publish a legal notice in the paper notifying any possible fathers about the adoption. What that means is the notice has to run for four weeks and then there must be 30 days before the adoption hearing so any father can respond. What's hilarious is since we live here in Alabama, we publish here. Charlotte's birth father is undoubtedly in North Carolina. The law. What can I say? So our hearing is now set for December 9.
That affected our trip to California. We wanted to have Charlotte sealed to us in the Oakland temple, where we were married. But we had planned our trip for this coming week, during the girls' fall break. So as it happens now, we'll just go to California, visit, introduce her to Marce's family and friends there, and have her sealed to us in Birmingham. It was disappointing, but at that point, whatever fight is in me can do nothing about it. But at the same time, a whole lot of friends from here can be with us in the temple. So that will be delightful.
Those have been the big issues in my life. At the same time, we've actually had a baby and three older daughters to raise, do our callings in church, live, breathe, eat, shop for food and clothing, pay bills, etc. No wonder I've got a few extra pounds on me. Arrrgggggh.
But good things are happening too. We do get to go to California on Tuesday, and we plan to do some fun things. Going to take the girls to Marine World, eat great food, see old friends, enjoy San Francisco, and go to the OPERA! Marce and I are going to see Mozart's The Magic Flute on opening night at the SF opera house. Can't wait! It should be an amazing experience.
I've also helped a friend edit and submit a terrific novel for publication; he just secured an agent this week who loves the book and thinks it has bestselling potential, which I've thought all along. I'm just thrilled to have been a part of this. It's very exciting. Now we'll see what kind of publishing offers he might get.
With that, I hope to start writing on my own again. I'm still busy with home life and my part-time work at the newspaper, which is terrific. I love my job! Fun at the paper and lots of great free books. Best job ever! But I do long to do some writing. I've got a number of books in me that could have potential.
That's the long and the short of it. I'm trying to keep our SmugMug photo site updated with pictures of Charlotte, who is now 5 months old and still an absolute doll and wonderful baby. She really is a delight and I love her to pieces. We all do. She's so happy and fun and easygoing. Anyway, I've got pictures of her on the site and try to put new ones on every week or every other week. The link is
http://limfamily.smugmug.com/
So, I do hope to update more often now. (sure, I SAY that now....) I've also got to get caught up in journaling. Ha! Have a wonderful week and hope to see or talk to you all or email, etc.

Trips and such

2007-08-01T08:47:00.000-05:00

Just returned from a 1600-plus-mile trip to see family and friends. I must be a glutton for punishment. All those miles in a van with 4 kids for 8 days. The last day was brutal -- 11 hours of driving. But it was nice to see everyone, and I survived. That's kind of the basic word here. Summer equals survival for me. I've survived with most of my sanity intact, so I'm a winner! The girls start school in 8 days. I haven't been counting down until now, whereas Brianna has been so eager to get back to school (a new one) that she's been counting down for at least 37 days (that's the first I was aware of the countdown she has posted on her chalkboard). She's going to a private school this year so I got to pay tuition and fees and buy uniforms. Eeek. With that and the new baby and adoption costs and then just buying the house exactly a year ago today and spending all kinds of money on it to fix it up in the past 12 months, it has been the most expensive year of my life, by far. I'm hoping for a nice, quiet, cheap year to come, perhaps? Shop Salvation Army, live off food storage? Ha. Well, it's worth a think at least.
In all seriousness, we are doing very well. Charlotte just turned 3 months on Monday and has been absolutely a delight. I had to get up with her every night while we were traveling in less-than-ideal circumstances, since the trip was made without Marce (who did a lot of work on the house while we were gone), but she is still just such a wonderful baby that it's not too bad. She is so happy and cheerful and great to have around. In one month, she will be officially, completely, legally ours, and then she will be blessed in church and sealed to us in the temple, in California. We are so looking forward to that.
The summer has been fairly good, despite the stresses, and we've all survived it. We've been so blessed to have this new baby and to have things eventually work out well. There have definitely been some giant hiccups, but it has worked out in the near-end here. I am incredibly grateful for that.
I don't have a lot more words in me right now but will try to write sooner rather than later again.

Book blog -- need help with a title!

2007-07-06T15:58:00.000-05:00

OK, I'm sharing this with you all in hopes you can help me. I'm going to put together a book blog to review and recommend new books that are good reading and -- even better -- fairly clean. No vulgarity, not much bad language, etc. There are lots of websites with info about good books that are clean, but not ones that have just been published. So since I'm in a position to know about these things, I figure I'll put a website together to fill this niche. My only problem is trying to come up with a name. I'm only going to focus on fairly newly-published books, and I'm not going to review Christian/faith books. Other people are doing that. And I don't want to focus exclusively on an LDS or even a larger Christian/faith community, though they will obviously be among those who would want to read my site. I could use a title like "clean books review," but I'd really rather not use "clean" in the title. Subtitle, probably, but I don't want it to sound all "squeaky-clean." I'm just aiming to write about books that are for a fairly general audience -- kind of like "PG-rated" books. Since there's no rating system for books, I'll kind of focus on books I consider to fit that kind of a "rating." Make sense? But I can't use PG because it's copyrighted.
Here are some of my ideas:

Tasteful tomes: Recent books that check out clean
open book
page preview: reviews and ratings
Above reproach reading
Higher standard books
Checked out
of good report books
nontoxic tomes
safe for your shelf
reliable reads
respectable reads
tasteful tomes

Most of them I don't really like. And I've found that tomes isn't a word a lot of people know or use. So that's kind of out. I could just call it "Lit lady" or "Lim Lit" or "Cathy's book something-or-other." I usually am pretty good about coming up with names but this is really eluding me. I've been brooding over it for almost two weeks.
So, if you have bright ideas, let me know. I'd SOOO appreciate it. Then I'll have the page up and running, and you can all see what I've got for recommendations. Then you can pass along the link to interested parties and so on. I think it could be a lot of fun.
Thanks!!

Summer's half over

2007-07-06T15:52:00.000-05:00

For those of you who live where school ends in June and starts in September, you'll be surprised to hear me say that summer is "half over." But it's true. The girls start back to school in a little over a month. They've been out of school for a month and a couple of weeks. So I'm pretty much on the home stretch! I have to admit that it's not been too bad and I've kind of enjoyed the summer in some ways, but I'm still not the one who's all eager to get out and do all kinds of fun things with the kids. It's probably their ages and the fact that I have a baby around who is making me tired, thus sapping me of much energy or enthusiasm that would be required for those fun outings. The girls have been good in many ways but they have still definitely had their share of fighting and fussing and screaming and squealing. I am looking forward to some regular peace and quiet once school is in and it's just Charlotte and I during the day. REALLY. I'd sometimes just like to throw them all in a room and lock the door from the outside and go downstairs and put in earplugs.
But I have to say that I really, really appreciate Brianna's age and size. She has been extremely helpful with Charlotte. It's made having a baby around much easier. Still tired, but I can sometimes get naps more readily with Brianna's help. So here's a shout-out to my eldest, who 11 years ago made me wonder how I would ever make it through her infancy. She is now a great boon.

The girls of summer

2007-06-19T13:17:00.000-05:00

It's now a few weeks into summer break, and we're into a routine of sorts. Marissa gets to go to camp or school of some type for most of the summer. The very last couple of weeks she doesn't, and we'll all go on a road trip. (And you KNOW that will be plenty of fodder for my blog.) Cami has preschool "camp" on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and on Thursdays they have water day. Brianna has nothing going on this summer. She's old enough to help out with the baby and to talk on the phone with friends and email and listen to her MP3 player. And occasionally say that she's bored. I think she's smart enough not to say that very much. She'd like to take pottery lessons, which they do at a ceramics store here, but a) that costs money, a pretty good little chunk per lesson, and b) I haven't gotten around to even thinking about really doing it, money notwithstanding. She's mainly eager for school to start. She gets to go to a Catholic private school this year and is very excited. She's already compiled the supply list and has gathered up what she has already and talked to me several times about what she yet needs. And it's only mid-June. Needless to say, I have told her that as much as I appreciate her eagerness, it doesn't rank quite as high on my list of priorities as it does hers. Which means we'll worry about supplies in about 6 weeks. In the meantime, I've got smaller fishies to fry all over the place. Fishies that cry and whine and want stuff all the time.
I have gotten into somewhat of a routine for going to the YMCA and doing my cardio and yoga and getting my book page done at the newspaper once a week, but yesterday I threw a wrench into that by jamming my big toe quite hard. It zings with pain if I brush it against anything, even the sheet on the bed. Even if it's broken, there's nothing to do but wait. And "rest." Ha ha ha ha ha. I can feel the fat creeping onto my hips as I sit, when I DO sit, and I am hoping it heals speedy-quick, as Junie B. would say. (If you haven't read Junie B., you really must. It's hilarious.)
I am hoping/waiting for something profound or profoundly witty to spring forth from my inner muses, but nothing so far. So enjoy the post and know that Charlotte is 7 weeks old now (as of yesterday) and who knows how heavy. She was 9 pounds 10 ounces 2 weeks ago. Her brand-new, tiny infancy is becoming only a memory that makes me nostalgic even now.

Relative merits

2007-06-06T22:24:00.000-05:00

I've found myself fascinated by how easy it seems now to take care of a newborn. I can say this even in spite of the occasional desperation I feel at midnight when every ounce of me (not counting how many) is crying out for sleep and the baby is not. I remember the feeling of desperation from each previous baby, especially the first. But even noting this, I am astonished at how much easier it is now.
I haven't read my book lately. Perhaps right now is a good time to get it out. (Let me also note that I -- like many authors, I have found out -- hate to read my own stuff. It becomes disgusting to me after writing it and editing it so many times. I hate it, think it's dreck, etc. I have heard this even from J.K. Rowling and many others, so at least I'm not alone. However, I feel I am absolutely correct in thinking it's dreck, and what was I thinking putting it in print for THE WHOLE WORLD TO READ AND KNOW THAT I AM A TERRIBLE WRITER!!?)
Anyway. Revulsion aside at my writing, it might be instructive, useful, humorous. Or embarrassing. That's what I'm thinking. I remember experiencing it and I remember writing about it. And I'm a bit embarrassed on one hand to think that I had such a rough time adjusting to tiny little person put into my care. It's not so bad now. But it sure as heck was then. I was such an amateur! But the nice thing is I have grown. Look at me! no hands! I'm a decent mother now. Who woulda thunk?
It's easier for several very good reasons. I'm sure there are others, but here are ones that spring immediately to mind: 1) I've done this three times before. I recognize what cries mean or I can guess pretty easily what baby needs. The choices are pretty limited. It's simple elimination. 2) I am not breast-feeding. This is a biggie, I think. I can hand baby over to someone else (see reason 3) and take off and live a fairly normal life without being tethered so completely. 3) I have four helpers. Two very useful ones. The other two not so incredibly useful but at least they're something. Marce is completely useful. Brianna is pretty much so. She can do things on her own but still is a bit baffled by how to calm fussy baby, which I seem to have down pat. (see number 1.)
I am really thinking in light of number 3 that I should have had this many useful helpers around when I had baby number 1. This is great stuff. But then reasons 1 and 2 play a significant role as well, so 3 isn't a stand-alone.
In the same vein, I also have been thinking about the relative merits of having one, two, three and four children. One is very hard because it's the first and you're completely without experience. But there's only one. But ... without the experience, it might as well be five. Having two is pretty hard because usually the first is only a couple of years old and is still pretty demanding and you have two little ones demanding all that one would demand. Twice as hard. Three isn't too bad. The first two keep each other busy, both are usually at least old enough to kind of take care of themselves, or the first can help out the second. You can go back to focusing on the one while the other two are somewhat under control (this is relative, mind you). Four is pretty nice because it's not much different than three; the same arguments apply, and by this time, time-wise, the oldest may actually be of some real value to you as "mommy's little helper," rather than the jokey way older ladies ask you when you have your second child, "Is (number one offspring) being Mommy's Little Helper?" (ha! Are you kidding? See argument for having two children ...) And of course, enough time has passed that they're all older and autonomous. 11-year-old, in my case, is helpful. 8-year-old takes care of herself just fine. 5-year-old is old enough to listen and understand and sometimes obey when told to leave Mommy alone because she desperately needs to nap because while everyone else was asleep last night, she was awake with baby Charlotte. So 5-year-old is old enough to understand and sometimes leave Mommy alone. In the case of today, she understands but doesn't obey. Arrgh. But try getting a 2-year-old to do that. That's definitely not possible. At least it is in the realm of possibility of a 5-year-old. If you see what I'm saying.
Lastly, I'm mostly astonished at how quickly time goes now. With Brianna, my first, who is now a beautiful and mostly helpful young lady, I thought time had slowed down to a crawl. I thought she would never get big or old enough to stop crying all the time and stop wanting me to hold her all the time, never give me time to myself, never ... all kinds of things. Now I'm absolutely amazed that she ever was that small. I can barely remember that. She's so grown up. Where did the time go? And watching Charlotte grow so quickly (she's up to 9 pounds 10 ounces as of yesterday), I am already, at 5 weeks, wishing she would slow down. I didn't get to appreciate her enough when she was only a few days old. Or a week old. Or two weeks. She's filled out so much. She's no longer that tiny, scrawny newborn that's all cheeks. Where did the time go? It's all going too fast. Sure, I'll be happy when she sleeps through the night, but at this stage of life, I'm not in any rush to make that time come too soon. Because that will mean I will be pining for her to be this size again, when she was only a month old and just beginning to smile fully and coo and talk to us. I am wise enough and experienced enough -- after all, those two qualities go hand in hand -- to know that time is going way too fast as it is. I don't want to speed it up anymore. I want it to slow down long enough for me to savor it, to get a good stop-motion picture that I can treasure forever.
And now I head off to bed, where I will hopefully rest peacefully while Marce takes care of our little sweetheart during the night.

More new photos!

2007-05-31T10:37:00.001-05:00

Check the photosite again. I uploaded a few really cute ones. Well, I think they're very cute. Not biased or anything.

Tired AGAIN!

2007-05-31T10:27:00.000-05:00

OK, so the little stinker kept me up again until 1:45 a.m. She slept a good portion of the day and would not stay awake for long periods of time in the evening. So I was up with her for a good long while in the quiet, wee hours. For a while, I read some emails and so on, and then I did some research online about my attorney here who's NOT RETURNING MY CALLS. Arrgh. I wrote an email with a link to the Alabama Bar Association's ethics page that talks about communication with clients. Not sure if she'll even read it. That was around 11:45 p.m. Then she had a pacifier and fell asleep. Put her down, lay down myself, then heard stirring. I lay there quietly, hoping for blessed sleep. But no, then it was crying. Got up, checked diaper. Tried pacifier again. Kept in bed. Walked around. Fed another bottle. Checked diaper. Tried pacifier. Went into bathroom to just hang out with her. At 1:30 a.m. we were talking. She was talking up a storm to me, alert as ever. I spoke back to her. Then at 1:45 tried the pacifier again and -- voila! -- success! I got to sleep until 7:30 a.m. with a couple of times waking up with stirring but no feeding or changing.
Today is Cami's 5th birthday. I am making her a cake in the shape of a castle -- she loves anything princess-y so this really made her happy. So I hope it turns out pretty. Marce's 40th birthday cake was ugly, ugly, ugly. But tasty!
We're having a baby shower over at church this evening. Should be fun -- we girls are going to have a good ol' time. And now... it's off to bed for a little spot of a nap.

Photos, get your photos here!

2007-05-29T16:43:00.000-05:00

If you'd like to see a whole bunch of pictures, just go on over to Photosite. That way I won't put them all in two places. The link is http://CLim101.photosite.com.

Weary, Weary, Eyes So Bleary

2007-05-29T16:14:00.000-05:00

Everyone has been asking for the past few weeks, "How is Charlotte doing?" "How is she sleeping?" Natural questions, I suppose, but a bit hard to answer completely honestly. I generally respond, "Well, for a newborn." She wakes up at night to eat (her pediatrician observed that she probably "never refuses a meal") once or twice, depending on when you start the time period of "night." She doesn't often stay awake long after eating, allowing us to get to sleep again soon. That's typically how it goes. I've stayed up a couple of times for an hour or more with her but it's not been bad. Marce was up with her a few nights ago and then couldn't get back to sleep for three hours, while Charlotte slept just fine. She's pretty easygoing if she has a bottle and someone to hold her!
With my mom here this week, it has been somewhat useful having another set of arms and a couple of extra ideas. Mom thought a pacifier might be helpful because Charlotte just seemed to want to suck. My other girls nursed, and they all found a finger or thumb. Well, Marissa didn't stick with it as surely as Brianna or Cami. But they never took pacifiers. So I hadn't seriously considered one for Charlotte -- or at least, not seriously enough to put it on my shopping list. Last night, it went on the list, and I was tempted to just run out and get it at 9 p.m. Mom said, "Oh, no, it's not THAT urgent." Why did I listen to her? Why why why? I should have run out.
Today I went to the store and bought two pacifiers. That was after a long night of a little restless baby keeping me up until 1 a.m. She just would not stay asleep. This afternoon, after lunch and a little diaper change and some hanging out, she was ready for the test. Hey, she likes it! She likes it! Nap achieved, Mommy relieved.
I haven't had a night like that yet, so I suppose it's only fair it happen once, at least. Marce and I trade off nights, since neither of us is breast feeding! I like that part of it. I'm not always on call for milk. But there's a certain desperation that sets in in the dark of the night when the house is all quiet and asleep and a little, tiny, restless being that can't even talk is keeping you from the sleep that your body feels it has never had. I was up and down, trying different options to see if she'd go to sleep. And finally, it happened. At that point, I lay down and was restless myself for half an hour before I finally succumbed to a light night (during which I was awakened for feeding again at 4 a.m.) of dreaming about being up late. Horrible irony.
*On another note altogether, I do realize that many of you are wondering how in the world you didn't know about this new baby any earlier. I can only say, it surprises me a bit myself. It's not in character. The only explanation I can offer is that I have been (and still am) living in a bit of fear that it would all collapse. The birth mom signed off and that's all OK. But the birth father has been another issue. As far as I can tell (not being able to talk to my attorney for the past two weeks), it sounds like it's going to be OK, but one can never be sure. Nothing in life is sure, of course, and I know that perfectly well, but when something is so important, it is that much more scary. I was nervous for the month and a half before she was born about saying anything, really, lest I should jinx it somehow, and be emotionally a mess and financially a ruin. I then worried about being able to leave NC, then about the birth mom's time being up to change her mind (long past now). Now it's just the birth father. Not a completely done deal yet. I know about odds, and about how things "usually" go. That said, when I was pregnant with Marissa, and the AFP blood test indicated she had a 1 in 80 chance of having Down syndrome, I was assured by many people and clinicians that it was really just a small chance. I knew better, however. When the ultrasound and amniocentesis confirmed that she was the 1 in 80, I knew the odds were nothing. This may sound like pessimism, but it was simply that I KNEW. I then came to terms with it, and now it's all fine and dandy. And she is just a great gift to have in our family. No big deal, really. But then the "odds" made me kind of laugh. Anyway, you (most of you) know I'm generally optimistic and cheery and mostly faithful and hopeful. But my cautious and worried side came out in full force with this baby, and combined with it being a COMPLETELY different and new experience in our world of adding children to our family, I didn't say much. But don't expect me to stay mute for long. That's just not my style, natch! So please don't be offended that I didn't tell you. I didn't tell anyone. I hardly told myself! :) But now you will hear lots. And if something, by some wild, long shot, should go wrong at this point (very unlikely), I guess I'll have lots of support, won't I?

Inspired

2007-05-28T22:51:00.000-05:00

I am inspired today to write in a blog that is user-friendly and on which my friends can comment. I have a website with a bit of a "blog," but which isn't postable (well, it could be, I suppose, but I haven't had time to figure THAT out, and this is easier), and I haven't done a good job keeping up with. But it's got my basic information on it. Well, now, almost.
The biggest news is we've just adopted. I'm going to publish a bunch of photos on a PhotoSite soon, but this is my first venture into blog territory for the word-y angle. I just feel like sharing tonight. Charlotte Regina Lim is the newest member of our family. She was born April 30 in Raleigh, North Carolina, to a wonderful birth mom whom I have come to respect and admire greatly. I had to stay in NC for two weeks until the two states cleared us to come home to Alabama. It was stressful not being with my family and having to constantly be in touch with lawyers about what piece of information was needed that day or hour, but it was rather relaxing to be there alone for a while. I was holed up in a hotel room and had no responsibilities other than taking care of Charlotte (and keeping in touch with lawyers...). My children were taken care of by friends and family and then by Marce (he was with me for 5 days and then came home). They missed me terribly, as I did them, but they survived just fine. I didn't have to cook or clean or do anything in particular. I slept when Charlotte slept and ate good meals and watched a few movies and meandered slowly around nice malls in Charlotte, NC. It was freeing not to have all the other responsibilities at the same time. Just me and my new baby.
Now she's not completely legally ours yet. We have to still go through the court and get the adoption finalized. But that will come. We love her and are enjoying her tremendously. The three older sisters are fabulous with her, and Brianna, who just turned 11, is a great help. She is very useful to her old mom, who's not getting any younger, by the way. I celebrated my 37th birthday in the midst of all this and it wasn't fun. Too much stress. But I don't at all mind being 37. I feel in the prime of my life, except that I'm not sleeping through the night all the time! But hey, I have plenty else to enjoy and appreciate. Sleep will come later, right?
You might be interested to hear that Charlotte is black/African-American, whichever you prefer to call her. So we are building a bit of a little U.N. I'm white, Marce is Filipino, our three older girls are mixed, and the new baby is black. I figure we need a Hispanic baby... or not. I think I've got my hands full right now. So we will probably have some interesting conversations over the years with Charlotte, and we have already had interesting conversations with perfect strangers (well, primarily me, as I wandered around in public with the baby). They have all been very supportive and positive. We are aware that there will be a few issues to address, but mostly, I don't think much about how she looks, except that she's cute as a button! She's just a doll.
She's my baby, however she came into our family, and I love her. She is such a blessing. I always said that when I had a new baby, I was meeting a perfect little stranger each time. This was the same -- I was handed a new little stranger to get to know. Just came a different way. But I didn't feel any different as I have gotten to know her. It's been really a neat experience.
OK, so that's the end of my inaugural post. There will be more to come, more often than not, I hope.