nerd weekend

Sunday night.  All my nerds sitting at their various stations, doing nerd things.  Annika spent the day discovering the Starcraft Brood war while Brandon and I dropped $20.00 on the Starcraft 2 Major League Gaming tournament online.  We plugged a laptop into our office/family room TV and parked on the couch for the last two days.  We set up camp so that we could parent and veg out simultaneously.  The mornings were reserved for heavy toddler activity, lots of coloring, Spanish & French flash cards, super hero play with all Liam's "guys".  Around lunchtime, we would load up Liam's favorite orange plate with all his favorites, green beans, cheese, french bread and a fruit cup.  When you are trying to balance good parenting with super nerd, you stick with the favorites so as not to disrupt the perfect harmony.  


During some tournament downtime, Autumn made a red velvet cake.  


During nap times we started playing the game Brandon bought me for Valentines Day, Final Fantasy XIV.  


I'm fully aware 90% of you will have no idea what I'm talking about, but in my world, this is one of about 3 versions of a perfect weekend.  This is the "nerds only" version, where everyone gets to be a kid for 48 hours.  Meals aren't really planned, we actually stop to get enough soda for a weekend (normally not found in our house in any great quantity) and no makeup, pigtails and comfy sweats rule.  


There are no schedules, no bedtimes, no wake up calls, no projects.


As a rule, both Brandon and I prefer to stay home.  We love to do this nerd thing, but also to paint or sew or garden or read or order in all weekend with a great bottle of wine while we avoid outside commitments.  It's tough to get us out of the house.  


But sometimes we do get out and...oh I don't know...do something like...go to Vegas. 


::


Vegas.  I have been there many times.  First as a fairly young child of about 5 I guess.  Since then, I honestly can't tell you how many times I've been there, simply because many were when I was so young, the trips are kind of crammed together in my head.  It's a mashup up of Circus Circus, red carpets and lots of mirrors.  Sparkly gold gilded smoke filled rooms and shows.


One spring break in college stands out.  I went with my best friend.  One of the best trips of my life, so much laughing.  It was on that trip that my mom and I transitioned from mother/daughter to our brand of mother/daughter/friendship.  I think we all have a period of time or moment when we look at our parents and see real adult human beings, rather than our perfect or imperfect mom and dad.  We start to cut them some slack and understand that they are just regular schmoes like us.  It was on this trip that I looked up and saw my in my mom a person, a woman independent of the nurturer who raised me.  It was a good trip and a different Vegas experience.


A couple of trips up when I lived in Phoenix, but was too poor to do anything but people watch, which is really the best use of one's time in Vegas.  


And now again on a business trip, which meant yet another version of Vegas.  Early morning seminars and speakers.  Suits + heels = blisters from running from one venue to the next.  Business cards, names to remember, happy hours to have just enough to be charming, not enough to be loud.  Oh the balancing act, it was exhausting.


I brought my baby girls to see the bright lights, glitz and glamor.  The spectacle of entire regions of the world confined to several city blocks.  To see shows on such grand scales it boggles the mind and some on such a small cheesy scale you can only say "that's Vegas baby". 


We stayed at Caesars Palace, the same place the guys from The Hangover stayed.  This was huge for the girls.  Autumn got to stand in front of the Bellagio at midnight and watch the same water show they watched after the big heist in Ocean's 11.   I don't remember if I had a Vegas movie memory the first time I went, but it absolutely came up again and again with my kids, a product of our nerd movie weekends I'm sure. 


Every morning Autumn and I would wake up around 4 am and fight to get back to sleep.  After it was clear we were not transitioning to the new timezone, we'd watch the sunrise.  Every single morning I sat on the floor with my oldest baby girl, coffee in hand, in front of the giant window facing the strip...watching the sun come up over a city that ignores the night.  


And every morning Autumn would say "hey Mom.  We're in Vegas."




















What will stick with me about this trip, is seeing my girls actually have some fun together.  We are smack in the middle of teenage/tween/puberty/bratty little sister/mean big sister years.  They almost never laugh together and cannot be in the same space together without bickering about absolutely everything.  They appear to be used to it, or feel like this is all normal.  But I hate it, I hate them being unkind to each other and refuse to give up the fight for civility in my home.

This didn't stop on this trip, but be still my heart...they actually had some fun together.

I learned that most places in Vegas do not want you snapping photos inside. And I barely had time to do any touristy photography anyway. But when I look at all the pictures of the trip I'm so thankful I got these.









Apparently 65 degrees is too cold for swimming in Nevada. Wimps.

But pools make fantastic natural light photos studios:)



























As always, you can see more shots of daily life at my other little blog project Wings for Maria  .

6 days in Vegas is a long time.  On the second day my mom got deathly ill, on the fourth my dad.  I desparately missed my boys.  It was difficult to balance being where I should have been for work and networking and being where I wanted to be...  taking care of my mom, spending warm, sunny afternoons with my girls or even feeling like I should never have gone at all, leaving Brandon home with the baby for so long.

It wasn't like running around Circus Circus with a bag of quarters.

It sure wasn't like spring break in college.

Even with the hiccups, it was better.  I was there as a professional in a role I can be proud of.  I was there as a daughter in awe of what her parents have accomplished.  I was there as a mother wanting to show her growing daughters yet another glorious take on how to live your one wild and precious life.

It was a good 6 days in Vegas and this was a good nerd weekend at home.

XOXOXOXOXOXO

follow me follow me!

I love me some Friday night tired.  It's the content warm tingling of an exhausted body, having completed a full week of work, child rearing, good wifing and healthy "ish" living.  As with all good Friday nights, I'm still stuck in my work clothes because I've spent the night not worrying about schedules and routines, instead indulging each family member with time.  Time to recap the week, catch up on the drama, plan the weekend.  I don't cook on Friday's, we grab and sit in shifts, so that each person gets their own time with each parent.  Some of us eat, while the other's play cards.  Some play cards while one of us gives Liam a bath.  Fridays are a free for all love fest with no rules about what you eat, when you eat it or where.

On a weeknight, I enforce a fairly rigid schedule of chores, homework, dinner time and bedtime.  There is always a smattering of dance parties and orange soda happy hours because all work and no play makes momma freak out a little. But every night at the exact same time the kids heads hit the pillow...I turn into a pumpkin.

A couch pumpkin.

But on Fridays, I'm in it until the end baby.  Did you know that "the end" of a Friday night is 11pm?  True story.  For me it is anyway and if I make it that long, I fee kind of like a rock star.  Sometimes I worry I'm making my kids super lame.  My 15 year old daughter just woke up from a half hour nap on the floor to tell me she is going to bed.  15 and turning in at 10pm on a Friday night.  Does that mean I'm doing a good job?  Or a terrible job?

2.6.12

I cannot prove this, but I know Liam lays in his toddler bed, waiting to hear the sound of my ass hitting the pleather of my office chair.  Waiting for the sound of fingers being gingerly placed on the keyboard and for the deep cleansing breathe his momma takes at the end of the day, when she thinks she has some time to her self to write, or edit photos, or blog stalk.  Or maybe have a good laugh at Damn You Auto Correct.  Or a good cry in front her her computer so that she can blame it on something there, but really just cuz she needs a good cry.

He waits and when he hears any combination of these things, he gets sick.  BAM.  And stays sick for days, irritable & adorably pathetic, needy and cuddly, demanding and helpless against his booger nose.  And this guarantees my undivided attention day and night, I'm locked in.

This phenomenon is the reason I cannot piece together a blog more than once a week if that.  I have dozens of one paragraph blogs, all begun in a sincere moment of inspiration to write, to share something, interrupted by the crocodile tears of a my little prince.

His little voice breaks me down to the very core.  When he looks at me and uses his new big boy words he gazes into my eyes.  He is like his dad that way, always flirting, always looking into you, never just at you.

"Momma sleepa Liam?"
"Come on momma...follow me follow me!"
"One more book?"

And when I give in and climb into his narrow twin bed with him, suffering the panda pillow pet as my only option, he touches my face and confirms "Momma sleepa Liam?"

"Yes baby, momma will sleep with Liam."

He touches my face, tracing my eyes and nose, whispering what he knows "eyes...nose...cheeks...boca".  Almost without exception, he puts me to sleep with his face tickles.

And this is why my blogs are so few and far between these days.  I thought you should know.

::

I have never felt like I had to go out looking for inspiration for my writing or photography.  I don't do either as a source of income, just for creative therapy which allows me a lot of room to move in.  I'm accountable to no one and if suddenly no one read this blog, I'd still write it.

With that big a playground to play in, virtually no rules about how and why I do this, it's easy to do.  Inspiration is automatic, just write what I want.

But you should never ignore inspiration when it kisses you right on the mouth.  That would be rude.

I was gifted inspiration once before and it about sent me into orbit.  I've been gifted inspiration again.

I love this book, this journal.  I want to carry it around with me at all times and live the life that I imagine as I fill in the blanks.  So I have been.

I'm going to tackle each unfinished answer here as well.  One by one, on no particular timeline with no particular agenda.

I'm feeling like stretching myself, exploring and learning something new about myself.  I'm feeling like growing and moving towards something.

::

I made the cake.  I'm making a lot of cakes lately because of a cake plate we found at a thrift store.  It's perfect and begs for a cake.  See...inspiration.

I did not make the lovely pot holder, but I want it.

I did drink the wine and the beer.

There is that Superman t-shirt again.  Heaven help us when he outgrows it.

We got snow!  It was short lived, but it allowed Liam the chance to wear his new snow pants and boots.  Wouldn't you know it, the first year I've EVER had my poop in a group enough to have everyone geared up for winter before it starts, and it doesn't start.  Unbelievable.

But for one day, I had some snow babies.

I needed there to be some kind of cold snap, some kind of warm cozy snowed in day.  I was pouty about the non winter winter.  I guess this will have to do.  At least I got pictures.  And now spring can come.

::

We've given the girls a choice:

Quinceanera

Sweet 16

Autumn chose Quinceanera - (lit. meaning One (f.) who is fifteen), sometimes called "Fiesta de quince años", "Fiesta de Quinceañera", "Quince años" or simply "quince", is the celebration of a girl's fifteenth birthday in parts of Latin America and elsewhere in communities of people from Latin America. This birthday is celebrated differently from any other birthday, as it marks the transition from childhoodto young womanhood.^[1] The celebration, however, varies significantly across countries, with celebrations in some countries taking on, for example, more religious overtones than in others.

Good thing they can vary because her's is a Japanese flavored quinceanera lacking entirely in religious overtones.

I am so very excited for this party.  It's all her, I'm just here to make sure it all comes together for her.  It's Japanese food and language,  anime and cosplay and of course...the Anime Detour. It's a weekend party in Minneapolis, it could be no other place with no other people.

The invitations are done, complete with origami crane gift from the birthday girl herself.

I am so very excited for this party.

Back to the book...or rather the journal.  Feel free to play along, it's simple. Just finish the unfinished.

Chapter 1 - A Handmade Life (identity)

My body is holding onto...

baby fat

mystery pain

youth

the dance

the urge to go...somewhere

it's early morning internal alarm

the force

power

junk food

the rhythm

fatigue

 a more comfortable version of itself

Ahhhh a completed post.  Feels good:)  XOXOXOXOXOXO

ode to the joy of a couch

Note:  For the 33 of you that have already read the sleepy, first edition of  "Ode to the couch" blog, stick around for the photos.  For the rest of you...this is all new information.  Kisses.


::


I'm coming to you live, from my new couch.  The one that feels like a velvet covered cloud and is the soothing color of a perfectly sweet creamed coffee.  We've had the couch for a week and 2 days and I haven't done one single bit of evening physical activity since this beautiful creature came in to our lives.  I cannot resist the chase lounge, the over stuffed pillows.  We've even spent the night on it.  Both of us. And we slept better than we do in our bed.  This could be very very bad.


I've caught up on about 5 tv shows that I never even heard of before.  Which is easy because I don't really watch tv.  I have accidentally found some tv I enjoy via the netflix, but hulu is a different game entirely.  Hulu and this couch have given me blogger's block.  Every time I belly up to my desk to write, I get tense and figity, distracted by the siren song of the couch and the hulu.


It took me a week and 2 days to give up the fight and cave completely, bringing the laptop to the couch.  My giant comfy blanket and my holiday jammie pants are made of the same material. I'm encased in velvety goodness, velcroed to this spot, peering over the top of my laptop fearful that the witch hunters will burn to to get rid of her dark magic.  Name the terrible CW show.


But the writer's block is gone:)  When you can't move your ass from the couch to the desk, bring the desk to the couch I guess.  And then write about said couch.  


This is no way to get ready for the Warrior Dash or a Tough Mudder or even the Pumpkin Festival 5k.  I feel an intervention coming.


Or, it could be that my body needs this little piece of heaven just now.  I have been crazy content, it's been building day by day since December.  I'm taking deeper breathes, reading books, cooking new meals from new cookbooks.  I'm journaling meals, complete with pictures, giddy with the idea that someday the girls will pick up this "cookbook" to find not only delish recipes, but their momma's sense of humor, and memories of how we always partied in the kitchen.  


I'm not crashing on the couch every night.  I'm sitting here reading.  Real books, from start to finish.  I've been reading the same 3 books for about 3 years.  This couch comes along and BAM!  New book done in less than a week.  This couch is making me smarter.  Fatter...but smarter.


When I'm not pining over furniture, some good work is getting done around here.  A massive purge of excess toys brought more organization to several rooms in our new house.  Finally, I feel like these rooms have their own purpose, a specific function rather than just places we dumped our stuff 6 months ago.  We've lived in a lot of houses over the last 10 years and each time, there is a moment when I realize the house has become our home.  When our people arrived last weekend for Autumn's 15 birthday, and everyone was settling into their rooms and tossing suitcases around like they would stay for ever...I felt that moment.  


I love walking by a room and seeing suitcases open, things tossed about.  It means someone is visiting:)


Fast forward 24 hours.  After a peaceful snowed in Sunday at home, I just jumped on here to enjoy some of my frick'n amazing chili and finish this blog.  Add some photos and call it good.  But what I saw was 33 page views.  For a blog post I did not send out into the universe. Except... I did.  In my couch drunk stupor, I must have "posted" the blog instead of "saved" it.

I am too cool.

::


My girl turned 15 on January 17th. 15.  Fifteen.  Quince.  It blows my mind.  Of my three children, the story of how Autumn came to us is my favorite .  She was the unplanned game changer of my life.  In 3 minutes my life went from one of total self absorption to one of possibility.  The possibility of knowing love so intense and overwhelming, you lose yourself in it.  You would throw yourself in front of a freight train for it.  That 15 seconds of peeing on a stick, followed by 165 seconds of watching a second blue line appear, forged a bond between myself and that cluster of cells that would forever change the course of my life. In 3 minutes, I become a mother, without hesitation, reservation or regret.


By the time I got pregnant with Annika I knew I was capable of sharing this love with however many children the universe blessed me with.  


I knew I loved being pregnant and could rock it.


I had breastfeeding down.  I could feed nations.


I could work off the baby fat in 12 months with out sacrificing Mexican food. 


And when we decided to see if God and my old eggs could rally one last time, I was content with what I had, so Liam was the cherry on top.  He is ALL dessert baby.


And as much as I believe each of my children is nothing short of a miracle, the truth is that neither Annika or Liam would have ever even had a chance...without Autumn.


My girl.

Well hello baby girl. 

Look at my girl now.  Totally confident in her style...eat'n an apple.  I think she is the coolest.

My favorite part of birthday weekends?  The long, lazy mornings.

with superman...

and Grandmas...

Grandmas who wear Ed Hardy glasses rule.

Grandma's who wear Superman t-shirts rule.

and favorite cousins...

I'm not a big shopper.  As a matter of fact, you could know me for a very long time and never hear me utter the words "Let's go shopping!!"  No, it's typically more like "Ugh, I have to go shopping, will you go for me?"

But for some reason, my 3 Aries loves can sweet talk me into just about anything, even a Saturday of shopping.  How do they do it?

From left to right: Libra, Aries, Aries, Scorpio (me), Capricorn and... Aries.

The Aries.  They are lovely, complicated creatures.  I seem to be wildly attracted to them as well, even though as a Scorpio their over the top enthusiasm for life and right on the surface emotions require a lot of focus.

I have 4 Aries in my "inner circle" already, and I recently befriended another one without even realizing it. There is something going on here.  I'll get back to you when I complete my research:)

I love it when family hangs out in my kitchen.

And it always happens.  I've lived in houses where the kitchen is the smallest room in a tiny house and without fail, we end up piled high, sitting on counter tops and floors with wine in hand chatting away.  Standing room only, the rest of the house available, but no...the kitchen is the heart of the home in my family. 

My family + my husband's family + our family + eating a giant breakfast in my house = over the moon, swooning, gushing, cheesy joy! 

Yup.  We are home.

Speaking of my home.  I need your help.  

I have A LOT of windows that need A LOT of help in the window treatment department.  At the moment there are blinds on them.  I hate blinds. I'm grateful the former owners left them on, because this would be a giant fishbowl peep show if not for the terrible beige blinds.  But we aren't really "beige" blinds kind of people.

Having said that, I am struggling to find a beautiful, creative and affordable way to cover all these fracking windows.  I would like to spend less than 300.00, but so far that seems unlikely. 

The big issue is that anytime you are going to toss up this much fabric, it needs to not overwhelm the room.  I want to make them myself, but what fabric?!?!? 

There are more, I just can't get them all in the photo.

Please, please help a sister out.  

Happy Chinese New Year!  And don't forget to give my other little project some love when you can! XOXOXOXOXO

Going Black

This is what the web could look like under the Stop Online Piracy Act.

Keep the web open. Contact your representatives or find out more

the mother of all holiday posts

My husband begged me not to name this blog "the mother of all holiday blog posts"...the expectations will be sky high.  I laughed at the idea that anyone has "expectations"of the nerd herd blog.  He's cute.


So I'm moving along through December, making cookies, shopping online, snapping photos and enjoying my Christmas jams when I realize that I hadn't had a "short" moment in almost 20 days.  I was totally and completely present.  I didn't review photos or write a single word beyond the occasional status update.  It felt good to neglect everything but my family and Christmas tasks.  It has been quite some time since days have flowed together so effortlessly and I've felt tears of joy well up in my eyes.  The ride through each day took me to a place in my heart that desperately needed the visit.  


Sometimes my husband looks over to find happy tears coming.  It used to happen quite often.  A peaceful snowy Sunday snowed in with the kids, a good video game and chili on the stove could overwhelm my heart with gratitude.  For a husband who shares the exact same interests and for kids who love to spend time at home, with their family.  Daughter's who sew with me or beg to play hearts.  A little man who insists his dad keep his Superman jammie pants on for an entire Saturday.  Such good stuff.  


Over the last year, I was very careful to protect my heart from fully breaking.  I tread lightly in all emotions for fear sadness would take root permanently.  When you do that, it works but the price is that joy and gratitude get through in small doses as well.  And in recent years, those are the two emotions that have driven my creativity, my photography and writing, my mothering style and dictating what kind of wife, daughter and friend I strive to be.  Joy and gratitude for my unbelievable life. 


But December 2011 may go down as the month of tears of gratitude.  Something happened, my heart opened up and accepted whatever the universe offered.  Of course there was the deep punching pain of our first Christmas without Maria...as expected.  But I was shocked to find so much peace in just thinking about her, in recalling our last holiday with her.  


I allowed myself to feel it all, and was rewarded with peace.  


Here is something my husband hears a few Sundays a year..."I'm just going to stay up as late as I can with you and be wiped out at work tomorrow.  I just want to keep this going."  Sometimes, the fleeting 48 hours of a weekend are so painfully precious that I fight to stretch it out until only a death like sleep can take them away from me.


He heard that every weekend in December. I've spent a lot of tired days at work, but a girl has got to have priorities. 


My priorities:


Her first formal.

Homemade Christmas gifts.









Christmas cookie marathons









Skipping family photos so that Liam can explore the set instead.



When the dancing starts, cookies get pushed wayyyyyyyyyyyyy down the priority list.



Getting to Brandon's family was the highest priority this year. Between my need to be close to my family for support and healing, the packing and moving and building a new life in South Dakota, we have been far too absent. Upon reflection, we realized that it had been a year since we had all been together at their house. We took time off to ensure we could spend 2 full days. As we drove north my husband spoke excitedly about the upcoming weekend, how pleased he was with finding the perfect gifts and how he was going to insist that I relax. Really relax. And sleep in late (I did) and unplug (I did) and just be together.





As much as I love my husband's feet, this is about my awesome new Christmas jammies.



And this is about awesome new flash cards from Grandma.



New babies in the family.



Laughter, sweet, precious laughter.



My mother in law's home is always ...home. perfectly manicured for every season but not over done.






Liam is finally old enough to really get Kimass. It blew his mind that we were letting him...in deed encouraging him, to rip apart pretty paper and tear open boxes. And even crazier, that inside each of these were trucks & super hero "guys" & books & tools and...oh my.



It was perfect. From start to finish. 


Well, almost. Mother nature took the year off, she must still be recovering from the show she put on last winter.  I miss the snow.


But back to some faces I love in places I love:




And then we came home to do it all again in our home with my family.












So...that is the mother of all holiday posts. In re-reading it, I realize all that  really happened is that we did what most people do this time of year.  See a little more beauty, become a little more generous and kind, offer more smiles, laugh a little more and make "getting there" a priority. It was good.


I think we'll keep it going.


Happy New Year to you and yours. XOXOXOXOXO