silver lining

so long, 2012.

i fear i won't miss you much. this year has been, well, a lot. sometimes too much. sometimes not enough. i suppose that's true for every year but especially this one. this year has been heavy. heavy in the grown up way that i suppose i should have expected when i was so excited to turn thirty. give me thirty, i said. and thirty i got.

we left our church and found a new one, a move i was so hesitant to make but so glad we did. cam left his job and started a new one, a move he was not at all hesitant to make and he's so glad he did. he argued in front of the seventh circuit court of appeals and had a two-day bench trial in federal court. i started teaching at my local quilt shop. i started quilting, really, and quilted a lot. 

we said good bye to mabel this year.

we lost two pregnancies this year.

and then our washer broke.

so long, 2012.

dear 2013, please be light.

being merry.

thankful.

life has been overwhelming in many ways this year, in ways that i couldn't have known it ever could be, in ways that have made me smile bigger and cry harder than i thought possible. the silver lining in all of it, though, is that i have learned to be thankful for what i have (and even for what i don't have). 

happy thanksgiving. 

on the eve of 30.

i looked at my thirty before thirty list that i wrote some two years ago this morning, the eve of my thirtieth birthday. there are a good number of checkmarks but not thirty, no, not thirty. tomorrow it will become the thirty while thirty, i suppose. this last year has been so good but i'm anxious to say good-bye to my twenties. i feel like i've spent the majority of this past decade on my way. shifting and juggling identity changes (student, adult, wife, momma) and not knowing what it is i'm supposed to be doing. finding my way has long been important to me and this past year, this past year has shown me that i'm there - i finally made it. 

and tomorrow i'll turn thirty.

tonight, i'll go to dinner with friends i made this past year. and after dinner, we'll go to our favorite place and sew for a few hours. i'll come home and tuck in my little night owl who will surely wait up for me and then i'll wait for that clock to strike midnight.

and i'll be thirty.

thirty.

this day.

today, we woke up late and made crepes and planted new plants and put down new mulch and mowed the yard and swept the sidewalk. and annie, she slept the entire afternoon. when she woke up, we had dinner on the front porch. and after dinner, we rode our bikes downtown for ice cream. annie and i shared. and then we took the trail to our favorite park. swings and slides and a little girl who didn't want to leave. but the sun was leaving for the day and we rode home. we ate some popcorn before bath time and then annie and cam went upstairs. i listened from downstairs, like i do every night, and thought about how much different it sounded tonight from just a couple of months ago. annie chose her books (old bunny AND new bunny, please). and she requested cam's guitar. i listened to cam abide her requests (the avett brothers and itsy bitsy spider and apples and bananas). 

as i went upstairs to interrupt the bath that had lasted nearly an hour, i thought i want to remember this day forever.

and then she was two.

she turned two a month and twelve days ago and i still haven't fully come to grips with that and all of the very two year old things she's doing like stringing words together and talking non stop and being funny on purpose and saying, on repeat, 'whoah mommy. whoah daddy. whoah ME!' and just the way she LOOKS two and so much more like a kid and not a baby and it's all very good and everything but part of my heart is just aching. it's going so fast and she's getting so big and so grown up and it really does feel like it was just yesterday that we brought her sleepy self home from the hospital. my heart, it feels too big for my chest like maybe it used to fit but it just doesn't anymore. she's made it too big.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

about that weather.

i actually dislike very much that it's january and we didn't wear coats to the park yesterday. it was snowing on monday. and here's proof.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

it's january and  it's indiana and i'd really love it if it snowed more than silly flurries. 

wordless wednesday : a carousel ride (in two parts).

before:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

and after:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

a big wish.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

as we were blowing out two candles last night, i made a wish. a wish that millions of mothers before me have made: i wished that she might stay this way forever. that she might always be strong and independent and always with a plan. that she might always slow down, the way she does, to take everything in. that she might always love being outside and getting dirty and picking herself right back up after skinned knees.

and, mostly, that she might always believe in herself the way only two year olds do.

i love you, anderson elizabeth. happy two!

new year's eve.

i've never really understood going out for new year's eve. i much prefer staying in and ordering indian take-out and, this year, playing a game (or ten) of don't spill the beans (or spill the beans which is what annie prefers). happy 2012. (and happy birthday, annie. in forty minutes, you will be two. TWO!)