it's only life

Diving wildly into the unknown

2013-07-26T23:10:00.002-06:00

In August 2007, I arrived in Greeley, Colorado with a car full of stuff and $100 in my pocket. Tomorrow morning, I'm leaving Greeley with a husband, a baby, a degree, lifelong friends, a lot of great memories, and a brand new perspective on life.

When I first came here, I had no idea what I was doing. I had only visited Greeley a handful of times with friends from high school who lived here, and it was really only to go to parties with them, so I didn't get a great idea of what the city was like. I moved into a house completely sight-unseen with a friend from high school and two other roommates who I had never met. I had no job, a brand new lease, a new car payment, and a college acceptance letter.

It was this crazy, risky situation where total failure was not only completely possible, but almost happened a few times. There were times when I had to borrow money from my parents or Bryan to pay bills, times when I thought I wouldn't have the money to continue to go to school, times when I wasn't sure where I'd live, times when I thought I had no friends. I survived a tornado, a recession while working in retail, a home burglary, a fire, and a failed home birth.

I moved to Greeley because despite the risk of total and complete failure, I was at a point in my life where I needed to do something. I had already experienced total and complete, expensive, humiliating, life-shaking failure after my first year of college out of state and had spent the next few months at home recovering. But staying in Colorado Springs wasn't much of an option for me either. Even though it was my hometown, I never felt like it was my home. So I moved to Greeley. It was something to do. I think the fact that I had already experienced failure, and survived it, made me less afraid of it happening again.

I spent a few hours today with one of my best friends and we talked about feeling stifled in Greeley. I'm at a point in my life where I'm stuck. It's a lot of things. Being a stay-at-home mom is not the life for me. Once I realized that my videographer job was not for me (and it was ending in two months, anyway) I was eager to start working in journalism again. It's being part of a small group where we aren't really doing anything together when I so desperately want to be part of an army and working aggressively on a mission.

I know that there are plenty of opportunities to pursue and needs to be met here in Greeley. There are homeless people in the park, meth addicts down the street, refugees from Africa, and lonely first-time moms. There are things to do here, and from a lot of conversations I've had with friends during the summer, it seems like there are at least a few people who want to do them. But there are a lot—A LOT—of people who are content with their lives of corporate jobs and kids t-ball games and deciding which color of bland to paint their kitchen.

Mediocrity is a worse kind of failure. Doing nothing at all is worse than trying something new and crazy and failing at it. Again, maybe it's because I've already experienced failure that I feel like it's not that bad. I moved to Greeley because my life was stagnant, and I had to do something. Now I'm leaving because my life here is stagnant, and it's time to do something.

I know that God could have planned for us to stay here, and he would have given us the grace to be content with it. We would have had a good life. I even applied for a job in Greeley that would not have changed much about our day-to-day lives. I've had adventures in Greeley I never thought I would in this podunk little cow town. And I know plenty of people who are doing big things in little Greeley. Packing up and moving a family across the country is definitely not for everyone.

I know there's this whole thing about being content with where you are, blooming where you are planted rather than always looking for fulfillment elsewhere. I know they say that if you're discontent in Greeley, you're going to be discontent in New Bern—that it's more of a character issue than a circumstantial one. I get that, and I was willing to invest in Greeley, and to find those opportunities and go after them, and to work with God on contentment.

But there's also value in exploring, and in taking huge risks and diving wildly into the unknown. We are leaving behind our family and our friends and our church and our entire history and support system with nothing but faith that this is what God wants for us and that he will be there with us.

This is a dream fulfilled—not only because I get to be a journalist, but because I get to travel somewhere new and completely different from anything I know. I get to live there and experience this entirely new culture. I get to go on a road trip and see the country. It's something I've always wanted. I've got too much wanderlust to settle down here. The world is too big and too interesting.

I had planned to write this nice, sentimental post about how I'll unexpectedly miss Greeley, but if I'm being really honest, I am not that sad to leave. There are a small number of very close friends who I will miss, and maybe once we're out there for a few weeks (and the bugs arrive OMG), it'll hit me, but for right now, I'm way too excited about leaving it behind and going somewhere new.

Big News

2013-07-25T15:22:00.001-06:00

A few weeks ago, I saw a tweet advertising a job at my local public radio station. Even though it was radio and not TV, I decided I wanted to apply. I rushed to get a bunch of stuff done—I wrote out my resume, put together my entire website, and even did some selfie headshots because I didn't have anything current or any time to hire a photographer. It was rushed, and not at all as perfect as I wanted it to be, but I was happy enough with the results to apply for the job.

I found out a week or so later that I didn't get the job, but I was so fueled by the excitement of possibly working again that I sort of impulsively decided to apply for a bunch of TV jobs. I applied for reporter and producer openings in North Carolina, Anchorage, Mississippi, Maine, and South Carolina.

About a week after I did that, I got an email from the Executive Producer at WCTI-TV in New Bern, NC. She said she wanted to talk to me about their open news producer position.

I called her later that day and had an interview with her. The next day, she sent me a writing test and asked for some references. A few days later, I interviewed over the phone with the assistant news director. A few days after that, I interviewed AGAIN with the news director. By this point, I was really hoping I'd get the job just because this interview process was exhausting.

Bryan and I spent the week researching New Bern and getting excited about the possibility of living on the east coast, right on the water. I didn't want to get my hopes up too high because even though I knew I was a strong candidate, I had no idea what the competition was like. Journalism is an industry full of well-qualified, extremely driven people.

The afternoon after the last interview, I was playing with Sebastian in the park when the news director called me to offer me the job. He said I “impressed the heck out of them.”

So. A dream A DECADE in the making has finally come true. I'm a professional journalist.

The whole process from the first interview to the job offer took less than a week. And this was all at the beginning of July. I start August 5th, and we leave Colorado on Saturday. It's been a rush of quitting our jobs, getting rid of most of our stuff (we thought we were minimalists until we looked at hauling everything we own across the country.), trying to find and rent a place to live completely sight-unseen, and saying goodbye to friends and family. But now we're pretty much ready to go, and I could not be more excited!

Our minimalism journey

2013-07-01T12:05:00.000-06:00

I've been wanting to write for a while about how and why we became minimalists. It's a movement that seems to be gaining popularity online, but it's something that still confuses (and angers, sometimes) our friends and family who are largely caught up in a consumer-driven culture.

It's not that we're somehow better than the rest America. We're still drawn to fun gadgets and first-world conveniences. Living a simpler life has been something that we've been pursuing intentionally for around two years now, and it still involves daily choices and struggles. We're not living in a studio apartment with only the bare necessities for survival (although I won't lie, that's kind of my dream). What we are doing is trying very hard to be intentional about everything. We live where we do, buy what we buy, and spend our time doing certain things because we've chosen to do these things, rather than having society choose it for us.

Bryan and I are non-conformists. We don't try to be different just for the sake of being different, but we want to do the things we want to do, not the things everyone else wants to do. Our wedding was probably the first big battle.

We went shopping for wedding rings, and salespeople in every jewelry store we went to were confused and annoyed that we didn't want diamond rings. For whatever reason, diamonds are the popular choice for weddings, but diamonds are mined by slaves, including children, with cartels inflating the prices because they know Americans will pay for it. The money then goes to fuel wars which have killed more than 4 million people. Only 11% of diamond-sellers in the US use "conflict-free" diamonds, and even then, they cannot be guaranteed because there are serious flaws in the process. Nice to think about how many children have been slaughtered so that you can have a sparkly little rock on finger, right? So Bryan ended up making my wedding ring himself, and it's way more special than any mass-manufactured ring he could've bought at a jewelry store.

But it didn't end there! Weddings are a huge hassle when you're a non-conformist. Everyone has their ideas about how things should be. If I had to do it all over again, I would have just eloped, and I am serious about that. People got mad about some of the decisions we made, like how I wore a gold dress instead of white (it was prettier and more interesting than boring white), or how we didn't have centerpieces (why put all the work into it? Who actually cares about centerpieces?) or how we didn't have flowers (they will just die a week after the wedding!). I have no idea why people get so angry about things that don't concern them at all, but they do.

Surprisingly, the biggest battle we had with our family was over our gift registry. At first, I actually wanted one. People buy you new things! Pretty things! You get to pick them out yourself! But then Bryan brought up the point that we already have way more things than we need. His parents said we should just use the opportunity to ask for fun things like camping and outdoors equipment, and that's when I realized just how selfish the whole thing was. We wanted our wedding to be a testimony, and selfishly demanding junk from our friends and family seemed like the wrong way to do that.

What we decided to do was pick out a few important charities, and send the list to people with our invitation. We asked them to donate to one of our favorite causes or one of their own in lieu of gifts. For the most part, the people we invited really loved the idea, but many of our family members were still angry about it. They said that people just wanted to do something nice for us and make sure we had everything we need, and I think it seemed ungrateful when we told them not to.

Our first year of marriage taught us a lot about what is important and what is not. In one year, our fridge died and we couldn't afford a new one, so we lived without one for about two months. Later, when our house was broken into, we realized that we didn't have any possessions we minded being stolen (we realized that again after the fire later that year).

After the gang shooting, we decided to sell our trailer. We had wanted to for a while because our roommate moved out and we had more space than we needed, and we were starting to hate being home-owners. We got stressed out whenever something broke and we needed to spend hundreds of dollars to fix it. We had a lot of fun home improvement projects in mind, but we realized those cost a lot of time and money and don't result in anything much more than a cute house, which isn't really good for anything but impressing people. We also wanted to be mobile, which was surprisingly difficult in a mobile home. We didn't want to be tied to Greeley forever, so we went back to renting (It's so great, you guys! The furnace breaks and you just call someone and they come fix it for you! For free!)

We went to look for apartments and we found this little 400-square-foot college apartment. It had one tiny bedroom, living room, a little bathroom with no bathtub (sad), and a tiny little kitchen with a miniature stove and only TWO square feet of counter space.

At first, I thought, there's no way we can live here. We can't fit all our stuff in here.

But Bryan said the apartment had everything we needed, and he loved it. And the more I looked around, I realized that he was right, and that I loved it too. It was cute and cozy and part of an interesting 100-year-old house. It was right across the street from campus and near all of our friends and the places we go.

So we rented the apartment, and spent the next month getting rid of everything we didn't need. We got rid of SO much stuff. Probably around 3/4 of our possessions (extra glad we didn't have a wedding registry). We gave kitchen stuff to our college friends who needed it and were grateful to have it. We gave things to our neighbors and our friends' kids, and to the thrift store. Furniture, dishes, a deep-freezer, a filing cabinet, a desk, craft supplies. We gave away duplicate things (no one needs seven spatulas or ten throw blankets or twenty towels). After we moved into the apartment, we found ourselves still giving tons of things away because we realized we didn't need them. Too many clothes. Too many books when you can get them for free at the library.

Since then, we've moved around a few times, getting rid of more things and buying a few new things. Moving is way easier with less stuff. We can unpack our whole house in an hour now. There have been maybe two or three times when we've regretted giving something away, which is minuscule compared to the thousands and thousands of things we haven't missed.

I'll probably do an entire separate blog post on the benefits of minimalism, but it has changed our lives. There was a time someone gave us a gift card to Target, and we went through the whole store and didn't see a single thing we needed or even wanted. We have no desire to have a bigger house or fancy cars or tons of clothes like so many people do. We can clean our entire house in half an hour.

I go to other peoples' houses now and there is such a huge difference. We have friends who have little families of three just like us who are living in these ridiculously PALATIAL 2,000-square-foot-plus McMansions that are filled to the brim with clutter. Their kids' toys are overflowing their toy boxes and their laundry is stacked to the ceiling. They have their own backyard pool or playground rather than going to the park and interacting with other people. They spend an entire weekend cleaning instead of doing something fun.

Like I said, we're not immune to consumerism. We live in an 800-square-foot house now, and I'm thankful for our counter space and bathtub and Sebastian's bedroom. We buy ridiculous, unnecessary things sometimes. But for the most part, we have been able to be very intentional about our time and money, and it's been a huge blessing. It's carried over to other parts of our lives, which I will write about another time.

Summer Bucket List 2013

2013-06-29T14:15:00.000-06:00

For me, summer started pretty much as soon as it stopped snowing (WHICH WASN'T UNTIL MID-APRIL OMG COLORADO), so we've already started on a lot of these activities. But officially, summer only started last week, and it will most likely be a bajillion degrees all the way until September or October (although you really never know around here. There could be a blizzard in July) so we still have a lot of time to do fun things. This is most likely going to be our last summer in Colorado, and while there are a lot of things we can't do with a baby, we still want to take advantage of living here while we do.

I also want to be intentional about the way I spend my time. In college ministry, we always used the summer to do a lot of things--intense Bible study, lots of fellowship, and service and mission trips. It's usually been a time when I've had a lot of spiritual growth. I'm actually really frustrated with the small group we are in now because all we're doing as a group is meeting at a park twice a month and chit-chatting about stupid things like garage sales and gallery walls. So since that's kind of pointless, I'm trying to spend the summer building my own personal relationship with God, as well as developing fellowship with people within and without of our small group, especially around our neighborhood.

Things we've already done:

Visit my mom on the western slope

Go to Moab

Ride a tandem bike

Run the Bolder Boulder

Tour the Celestial Seasonings factory

Go to Windsor Lake

Grow a garden

Still to do:

Bar outreach at Friday Fest

Throw an ice cream social for our neighborhood

Invite a family to dinner every week

Berry picking

Camping

Take Sebastian to the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo so he can feed the giraffes

Read a bunch of Christian books. On my list right now is The Art of Neighboring, Erasing Hell, Don't Waste Your Life, and Kisses from Katie, but I'd love suggestions if you have them.

Volunteer at the Global Refugee Center

Take Sebastian swimming

Dye my hair blonde

Cheyenne Frontier Days

Zip line

Visit the Wild Animal Sanctuary

Back to the news

2013-06-27T23:30:00.000-06:00

I never wanted to be a stay-at-home mom forever. I actually remember meeting a girl my freshman year of college whose only life ambition was to be a mom. I thought that was so weird, especially given that she was in school studying business, but I came to find out as college went on that there are a lot of women who had that dream. It's something that never crossed my mind, though. I've always wanted to be a mom, but I've always wanted to work, too. I've wanted to be a reporter since high school.

When Bryan and I were dating and planning out our future, we decided that I would be the breadwinner and he would be a stay-at-home dad. It was an easy decision at the time. I had big career ambitions, he didn't. He has a degree in English that he got only so he could have a degree in something. He has a lot of interests and hobbies that are always changing, and not usually anything that would become a career.

I did want to stay home for at least the first six months of my babies' lives. Breastfeeding was extremely important to me, and although it's totally possible to pump and work, I figured it was a good opportunity to spend at least some time at home building a solid relationship with the baby. Sebastian's birth seemed like the world's most perfect timing. He was born two days before I graduated college, so I could stay at home with him for six months and not have to worry about finding a job right away or taking any time off work.

It didn't take me long to realize that staying at home with a baby is hard, hard work. I didn't realize that when I was in school, I had been surrounded by people all day long. Even though I didn't know or talk to the majority of them, they were there. I was also used to having my days and tasks scheduled out for me. Go to this class at this time on these days. Do this project in this way by this day. I always had goals and deadlines set before me, and I usually had some sort of end product to show for my efforts.

And then suddenly, in the course of two days, all that was gone.

Bryan went back to work less than a week after Sebastian was born. He worked both at Target and building fences, so he was gone from 4 a.m. until 6 or 7 p.m. every day except Sunday. We had a few visitors for the first week or two, and that was it. We were on our own. Because I'd had a C-section, I couldn't even really do much other than lay around and recover for about a month. I couldn't drive, and even walking around the house was too painful. And newborns don't do much other than lay around and sleep and eat and poop 20 times a day. I pretty much just spent my time watching a lot of TV.

I woke up every morning for about the first three or four months of Sebastian's life wondering how in the world I will get through the day. What to fill the hours with. Did you know that sheer, overwhelming boredom can give you anxiety? I was literally afraid to start the days.

We moved into Jason's basement, so we were also cooped up underground all day. We tried to leave the house and go do things, but there just isn't much to do in Greeley. We took baby literacy classes at the library and tried to visit friends and did a lot of aimless driving or walking around. When I worked at Target, I'd often see moms of young kids come to the store on weekday mornings and just wander the aisles. I could tell it was just an excuse to get out of the damn house and feel like you're doing something, and I thought that was just so sad. That became my life, though.

When Sebastian was about four months old, there was a notice on the journalism school's listserv for a videographer position with the university. I sort of impulsively decided to apply, and I got the job. It seemed pretty perfect for my lifestyle--one or two events a week to get me out of the house and doing something, and I could usually take Sebastian with me, and they gave me editing software so I could do the bulk of my work from home.

I always thought it would be amazing and perfect as a parent to have a job where you could go out just enough to see other people, do interesting things, and be challenged, but work largely from home and be there for your family.

This is what I've realized, though.

Sebastian is at an age where it's hard sometimes (not always) to take him out to work with me, especially if I'm doing something very involved. He's not young enough anymore where he will just chill out in the Ergo while I work, but he's not old enough yet where I can just set him down with some toys and he's entertained. Actually, the same goes for working at home, too. He needs a lot of attention right now, and it's impossible to sit at a computer and edit a video while he's awake if no one else is home to hang out with him.

The other thing I've realized is that baby or not, working from home is just not really for me. By the end of the day when Sebastian's in bed, I want it to be the end of my day, too. I want to just relax and hang out with Bryan instead of start working. I want my work to be at work and my home to just be home. Now that I think about it, I had this trouble in school too. I had a really hard time doing homework at home. It's hard to be motivated when there are so many distractions around. I did much better work out at the library or a coffee shop.

What I've realized, in the end, is that my heart is still in journalism. I don't want to be a full-time stay-at-home mom. I don't want to be a freelancer. I don't want to work at home. I want to get up in the morning, put on a professional outfit and some makeup, and go report the news. It's what I've always wanted. It may not be what I want forever. I still have a lot of interests I'd like to pursue some day, and journalism is changing pretty rapidly, but it's what I want now.

This last year has been a huge blessing. It's been an amazing opportunity to explore other interests I had and see if they were something I truly wanted. A lot of people who are already entrenched in careers or parenthood probably don't have the chance to just try a bunch of things and see what they like. They have to just keep doing what they're doing because their livelihood depends on it. As hard as it's been to have him gone all day, I'm blessed that Bryan has been the breadwinner so I can explore other things.

Because of a really weird state regulation, my videographer job at UNC is most likely ending in the fall, right around the time that Bryan's work building fences will probably slow down. So I've decided to start looking for journalism jobs. I'm not sure where we'll end up, or when it will happen. We actually really love our lives here in Greeley, but I'm excited about the possibility of going somewhere new. I know there will be a lot of challenges in moving to a new place with a toddler and switching caretakers. It'll be difficult to leave behind our friends here, and our little house and our garden. I'm sure I will miss Sebastian and our long, lonely days, but I'm soooooo ready for a full-time job.

Why I ran 6.2 miles when I wasn't even being chased by zombies

2013-06-17T23:41:00.000-06:00

I... am not one of those people who looks cute while running. Sorry.

In 5th grade, my gym teacher threatened me with my first-ever C because I couldn't run a mile without stopping. I guess he thought that I wasn't trying hard enough, and maybe I wasn't, but back then I really thought I was giving it my all and that it was really mean and unfair of him to do that because I just couldn't run a mile without stopping. It was tooooooooooo hhhhhhhhhhaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrdddddddddddd.

Oddly enough, that same year I decided I would join the track team when middle school started. I had a lot of fun at Track-and-Field Day (best day of elementary school EVER). Somehow, I won the 100-meter dash and my relay team took second place in the 800-meter. I thought, I'm a good runner--just with short distances, not long ones. Then middle school came around and on the track team they made us run ALL THE TIME and I hated it. HATED it. I was super slow and came in last or close to last all the time. I got shin splints and halfway through the season I ended up just doing shotput all the time because I was kind of okay at that, instead of really terrible at it like running.

For some reason, though, I have never totally given up on running, even though I've never been particularly good at it or enjoyed it.

In college I started running again here and there, but I never dedicated myself completely to it. Three years ago, the summer I got married, I decided I wanted to run the Bolder Boulder. Our roommate ran it the year before, and he said it was a lot of fun--people in costumes, spectators spraying water at runners as they pass by, and lots of bands and entertainment along the course. It sounded like a blast. Plus, I was getting married soon and I wanted to be thin for my wedding, and running seemed like a good way to achieve that.

I learned several things during that first attempt at training for a 10K race. First, I CAN run a mile without stopping. The first time I went out on a training run, I decided to just run as long as I possibly could to gage where I was at. I ended up running 2.5 miles! I was blown away. I hadn't really been working out regularly, although I wasn't in terrible shape. But I had never run that far without stopping before.

The second thing I learned is that running in the heat suuuuuuuuuuucks. Once the temperature hit 80 degrees, I was done.

The last thing I learned is that training for a race takes a lot of dedication. You have to actually carve out time in your day several times a week, and then go out there and, you know, freaking run. And when you don't want to run when it's above 80 degrees, you need to get up early and run in the morning (HA!) or late at night.

In the end, I didn't run the race that year (I still fit into my wedding dress so I was okay with it). I picked up running again the next year after our house got broken into. I ran at night and it helped alleviate anxiety and help me sleep better, and it helped me feel less anxious about being out at night. I didn't run the race that year because I was crazy busy with my internship and didn't make the time for training, again.

Last year, I had just had major abdominal surgery and running (or hell, walking for more than 10 feet) was nnnnnnoooooooottttt going to happen.

This year, though, I was determined to make it happen. I'm not really sure why I was so determined. Maybe it had to do with this year being my year of recovery, and it seemed like a good way to recover my physical health, along with giving up sugar.

Maybe it was because as a stay-at-home-mom, it's hard to really feel accomplished these days. I've always been a pretty goal-oriented person, but without being in school or working, there aren't really any goals to reach or anyone making sure I do. I have to set my own goals now and I'm pretty much my only accountability--although I have two friends who I told I wanted to run this race, and they made sure to ask me how running was going and to make sure I kept at it, and that made a big difference.

Maybe it was because now that I have a baby, there is so much more demand on my presence that I need a time to be alone and do something for myself.

Whatever it was, something just clicked this year with running like it never has before in my life, despite all the times I've tried. It's the same with sugar. I've tried giving it up for years, but for whatever reason, this year it worked.

The race was a ton of fun, although it was HOT and there were a ton of hills and I had only had an hour of sleep the night before thanks to a gassy, cranky baby. I finished in 1:27 (slooooooow, but under my 1:30 goal). I got sprayed on and hit with marshmallows and serenaded by a band of 12-year-old girls singing One Direction. I saw about a thousand belly dancers and got a million high fives and a popsicle (which OMG SAVED ME after running 4 miles in 80-degree heat). I didn't dress up because I couldn't think of anything to wear that I could run in, but next year, I'm dressing as a zombie. Duh.

More than completing the race itself, though, I'm amazed at the fact that I actually went out and ran 2-3 times a week for 8 weeks. And ENJOYED it. The long runs on the weekends were particularly awesome. Each week, I was like, "OMG I have to run FOUR MILES. How am I going to do this?!" And then I did it, and I was like, "OMG I just ran FOUR MILES and I could have kept going!" It kind of made me want to go kick self-doubting 5th-grade Ashley in the butt and tell her to just run a damn mile.

The livin' is easy

2013-06-14T12:37:00.001-06:00

It's been about a zillion degrees lately and all of Colorado is on fire, so summer is officially heeeeeeeeeeeerrrrrrrrrrrrre!

Normally I get excited for summer for about a week. I love being outdoors and grilling food and going to the pool and not wearing pants. Then the temperature gets to about 90 degrees and I'm over it. This year, though, I'm still really enjoying it. I could be because we had SEVEN MONTHS of snow, or because our new house stays a lot cooler than we're used to, or the fact that we're growing a garden this year and it's super fun. Either way, this summer rocks already.

Bryan quit his job at Target to work for a local fencing company that our friend owns and one of the many perks to that is that we finally have weekends again! Just like normal people! Between going to races and visiting family, we have been traveling every weekend for like the last month. Normally, this would wear me out, but since I mostly just hang out at home during the week, it's nice to get out and do something. We're trying to take full advantage of living in Colorado, where, you know, people go for vacation. We've planned a lot of little weekend stay-cations around the state to do some of the things we've always wanted to do but never have.

One of the things I always wanted to do is run the Bolder Boulder 10K race on Memorial Day. As it turns out, training for a 6.2-mile race is haaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrddddddd, so I've always given up on it. This year, though, I was determined to do it. I spent 8 weeks training for it. My only goal was to finish and run the entire time, no matter how slowly I needed to go (and I am sloooooooooooow). It was hard and HOT, but I did it! And it was kind of fun!

We planned a stay-cation in Boulder for the weekend, but as it turned out, everyone else in the whole world had that same idea, and there was literally NOWHERE to stay, even a month in advance. I guess that happens when you have 50,000+ people (or, you know, an ENTIRE SMALL CITY) running one race. So we stayed at Bryan's parents' house in Evergreen and drove an hour to Boulder every day. It wasn't really the trip I wanted, but the benefit is that we got to leave Sebastian with them one afternoon and have a baby-free day! We went to the Celestial Seasonings tea factory, which is another thing we've always wanted to do, and as it turns out, kids under 5 can't go on the tour anyway.

This weekend, we're headed to Colorado Springs. Bryan is going to the Renaissance Festival in Larkspur, and since I think the Renaissance Festival is super boring, Sebastian and I are going to hang out with my family. My sister's birthday is today and Father's Day is on Sunday, so it'll be fun to get together and celebrate with everyone.

The Winter of Our Discontent

2013-04-09T22:54:00.000-06:00

We got our first snowstorm waaaaaaayyyyy back in October. Then it was pretty dry (but still COLD), and since January, it seems like we've had at least one snowstorm a month. Usually on Saturdays.

Here's the thing.

When you don't have a baby, snowstorm days are great. You wear your pajamas all day and watch movies and drink hot chocolate and bake things and eat soup and take baths and build snow forts and take extra naps. It's relaxing and wonderful.

When you have a baby, snowstorms are like prison.

You're trapped in the house because it's one thing to risk your own neck driving on slick roads with people who don't know how to drive in the snow, but you can't risk the life of your innocent baby. There's also the matter of bundling up the baby, which takes like an hour, and stuffing him into the car seat, which he hates. Also, it's no fun at all to have to carry a baby around outside in the cold, so snowball fights and forts are off.

Movies and baking and taking naps and baths are off except during his naptime because kiddo needs constant attention.

Mom gets bored.

Dad gets bored.

Baby gets antsy.

There is only so long that baby toys keep anyone interested.

Did I mention that it's APRIL now? We've been doing this for MORE THAN HALF THE YEAR.

The snow moves in and it feels like the cell door is sliding shut. I know there will be a time when snow days with him will be fun. Once he's bigger, we can go out and do all those fun things. But for now, I have no idea what to do all day. Our normal days usually include leaving the house at least once, so when we're trapped inside, it seems really brutal. I never used to like summer, but I am ITCHING for it now. I know, I know, we're in a drought right now and we need the moisture, but I miss the rest of the world.

Late Winter

2013-03-06T14:25:00.000-07:00

Seasons changing excites me. I love winter, but actually, I only love it until Christmas. I think Christmas needs to be pushed back to the end of January or something, because as soon as it's over, winter starts to seem really dreary and I'm ready for spring.

The three of us have been sick for about the last month, just infecting and re-infecting each other. Bryan actually went to a doctor, so you know it's bad. He was diagnosed with influenza B and told to get rest and fluids. You know what sucks worse than being sick? Being sick and having to take care of a sick baby. Who can't understand why he can't breathe but is pretty angry about it.

Now that it's finally warming up, I've been opening the windows and cleaning a lot and finally, we're all able to get through the day without blowing our nose, and I haven't been puked on in a few days. Turning corners.

This is the one week out of the year when I actually get excited about the summer. I don't actually like the summer very much, but before the temperature shoots up and the bugs hatch and the plants bloom, I get excited about things like camping and swimming and barbecues. Sebastian will be one in less than two months (what?!) and I think summer with a toddler should be more fun than summer with a newborn. I've got big plans for pool days and park days and the zoo and camping.

Our family is facing some big decisions, ranging from doing nothing and keeping life exactly the same to uprooting everything and changing, with all kinds of variants in between.

Bryan could quit Target and build fences full time, which would reduce the stress from working a crappy job but would mean no health insurance, a little less money, and potentially less work in the winter (although he built pretty steadily through this winter, but it was a warm winter).

I'm reaching the point where I want to start working full time, probably as a journalist but potentially as a videographer or something else entirely. I'm ready for it and Sebastian is mostly ready for it, if only he could learn to fall asleep without nursing. I could look for a job in Colorado or we could go somewhere new. Part of me is comfortable in Greeley, but part of me feels stifled. We have a good friends and good things happening here, but there is a great big world out there ready to be explored.

It's hard to know exactly what to do because every scenario has pros and cons. It's one of those situations where we need to just do SOMETHING and commit to it and see what happens. For the last almost year, we've just been living more or less day-to-day, adjusting to our new life as parents. We haven't made any steps towards big changes because hello! One big life change at a time, please. But things have settled down, and I think I might be ready for something new. I'm not sure if it's because we necessarily NEED something new, though, or if I just get bored easily and like shaking things up. I definitely never pictured myself settling down anywhere, much less Greeley, but there's no terribly compelling reason to leave just yet.

Two Months Without Sugar

2013-02-27T14:58:00.001-07:00

Click here for more about why I'm going without sugar this year.

In two months without sugar, I have lost fourteen pounds. This is completely ridiculous to me. Other than breastfeeding, which burns a ton of calories, I haven't really done much else to lose weight other than give up sugar. I eat fairly healthy but I don't really work out regularly. With basically no effort, I have been steadily losing about 3 pounds per week (other than a few weeks before my period returned after 18 months and I gained like 3 pounds in a week. FUN TIMES). It is crazy to me that I have just been carrying around at least 14 pounds of SUGAR WEIGHT all this time. But Alec Baldwin gave up sugar and lost 30 pounds in four months and this guy lost 25 pounds. The weight loss is a such a nice effect that I sometimes forget that even if I don't lose weight, there are tons of added health benefits to this.

In two months without sugar, I... have had some sugar. I've given in a few times when I've really wanted that brownie or a piece of candy or even an entire Coke one time. This is why I gave myself an entire year to get over sugar. I knew I couldn't do it in a month or two. Addiction is hard to kick. Even when I've had some, though, I'm consuming far, FAR less sugar than I used to, and even far less than most people do. And the thing is...

In two months without sugar, I have lost my taste for sweet. Every time I've had something sugary, all I can taste is sugar. It reminds me of just eating a spoonful of pure sugar. It's disgusting and unsatisfying (although knowing I've conquered sugar addiction is pretty satisfying). It's never been worth it to give in. I was afraid that I'd go a long time without sugar and finally have some and love it and be right back to the beginning, but I haven't loved it. I haven't even really liked it. The sugar rush from suddenly eating/drinking something sugary after not having much is INSANE, though. There was one night I had a Coke before work, and the whole night, I was bouncing in my seat and side-stepping back and forth behind my camera like a freaking lunatic. It is nuts. And I still get that gross, rung-out feeling after the sugar high crashes. Not really worth it.

In two months without sugar, my taste buds have changed. Not only have I lost my taste for sweet, but I can taste the depth of flavor in other things. For example, I LOVE unsweetened coffee now. I thought that giving up sugar would also decrease my coffee intake, because I always drank coffee with creamer or sugar. But one day, I decided to try it with just half-and-half and it was SO GOOD. It tastes so different from sugary coffee--just sort of dark and rich and creamy without sweetness getting in the way. It tastes way different. I actually may be more addicted to coffee now. I also had some 90% cacao dark chocolate with a tiny bit of sugar in it, and it was the same experience. Chocolate is so different without sugar! And GOOD. Totally doesn't need as much sugar as we normally use.

How to have a baby when you have no money--THE COSTS

2013-02-22T12:21:00.000-07:00

That hat was probably the best $6 I ever spent.

To get you started: How to Have a Baby When You Have No Money

When I wrote the last post, we had only spent around $200 on Sebastian. Since then, we've had a few random things come up that we've needed, and some things we've bought him that we haven't needed. I tried to think of everything we've bought. This is only what we ourselves have bought, and it doesn't include things others have bought for us. I linked to the exact product if I could, but some of them are just similar products. This was exhausting. You're welcome.

New Pack-n-Play mattress ($45 including shipping)
New sheet for Pack-n-Play ($10) (actually a crib sheet) because our old ones were too small
Breast pump ($100 after $50 of gift cards) (I'm starting to think this might have been a waste of money because he refuses to drink pumped milk)
Ergo baby carrier ($100) (We got this instead of a stroller for cheaper than a lot of strollers. It takes up a lot less space than a stroller, promotes bonding, and burns calories)
Large size SwaddleMe blanket ($10) (we got some small-sized ones at our baby shower, and they were the best ever for helping him sleep, so we bought a bigger one when he grew out of them)
Sleep sack for when he grew out of the swaddle ($10)
Booster seat when he started [pretending to] eat solids ($30 on sale)
Toy containment system ($35 on sale) (also can be found for cheaper--I just liked the organization, but obviously a big box is just fine, too)
Winter hat ($12) (I absolutely could have found a cheaper one at the thrift store, but I liked this one and I had a gift card)
Newsboy hat ($6)
Totally useless boots he never kept on his feet ($8)
Halloween costume ($15) (It would have been much cheaper if I had planned it better, but I ran out of feathers on Halloween night and had to pay more because the thrift store was out by then)
Fall/winter clothes ($20 at consignment and thrift stores for about 6 shirts and 4 pairs of pants. He grows out of clothes way too fast to spend more money on new ones)
Family portraits ($20) (Bryan met a girl who is trying to become a professional photographer, so she offered to do our pictures for free in order to get practice and build her portfolio. She did an awesome job and Bryan gave her $20 for her trouble)
Disposable diapers for overnight and traveling (around $50)
Jacket for next winter ($16 on clearance)
Medical bill for when he was sick ($142) (Super annoyed that our insurance only covered $20 of this. Sebastian's doctor goes to our church, and let's just say, I know why he has such a huge house. $142 for 10 minutes worth of work to look in Sebastian's ears and tell me they're infected. Dang.)
Prescription ($4)
Infant acetaminophen for when he was sick/teething ($6)

Total: $639

Obviously, some of these were necessities, and a lot of them were frivolous. With the $200 we spent before he was born, that's about $839. It's still a lot of money, but it's a far cry from the $10,000 in the first year average parents spend (THAT IS IN-FREAKING-SANE and totally unnecessary in most cases) (that article cites things like buying new cars and new houses which is so stupid).

I'll have another post in a few days about advice for raising a baby cheaply, but the best thing I can say is take things a little at a time and to do things your own way. Do what is right for you and your family, not just what someone tells you to do. Don't stress out about having all the things.

How to Have a Baby When You Have No Money--UPDATE

2013-02-19T23:58:00.002-07:00

I get a huge amount of hits to this blog from Google searches about having a baby and not having any money. It leads to this post, which is one of my most popular of all time. I hope it's been helpful to people who have found themselves pregnant (or wanting to get pregnant) without much money.

Sebastian is 9 1/2 months old now, so I thought I'd look back over his life so far and see how it's all worked out.

Living Simply

We're still doing this, although it looks a little different. We moved to a new house that's about twice the size of our apartment (it's still small--it's just that our apartment was really really small). Moving had everything to do with the crazy roommate situation and nothing to do with Sebastian. A lot of people said that we'd need a bigger place, especially when he becomes mobile, but I don't think that's true. Actually, a smaller place would be nice because it would be easier to keep an eye on him and less for him to get into.

He has his own room now, which is nice, but not totally necessary. He shared with us until he was 6 months old, and it was great, except for when he would wake up when we came to bed or when we woke up at night. Having his own room helps him sleep marginally better, but it hasn't made a huge difference.

He still sleeps in his Pack-n-Play and I LOVE it. Getting a Pack-n-Play instead of a crib was one of the best decisions we made. It's SO nice to have a small, portable bed instead of a huge, bulky crib. We did get a new mattress for it because the one that comes with it is AWFUL. It's thin and not water-proof (what were they thinking?) and the board under it warped from being wet. Still, the entire Pack-n-Play AND the new mattress together cost less than just a crib mattress, not to mention the crib itself.

When Sebastian gets too big for the Pack-n-Play, our plan is just to put the mattress on the floor rather than get a whole separate toddler bed, and once he's big enough, he'll just get a regular bed. An entire toddler bed seems like a ridiculous waste to me.

Generous Friends and Family

Still a big help, but mostly for toys and clothes at this point because there isn't much else we need. Bryan and I have bought Sebastian a total of one toy and a few clothes. All of the rest of his toys and clothes come from family members. My dad bought him a winter coat and some new prefold diapers, too, because he grew out of the ones he had.

Breastfeeding

Still going strong. In fact, even at 9 months, he isn't terribly interested in solid food. He mostly just plays with it and feeds it to the dog, and maybe eats one or two bites. He's still pretty huge, though, so I try not to worry. I can't imagine weaning any time soon because I don't know what else he would eat. When he does eat food, he just eats (plays with/feeds to the dog) what we eat. We haven't bought any formula or baby food aside from one or two of those squeezy fruit pouches.

Cloth Diapers

Again, one of the best decisions we made as parents so far. It's SO nice not to have to worry about diapers all the time. We even have a washer at our house now, so we don't need to go to the laundromat anymore, but I would still happily go to the laundromat instead of having to buy diapers all the time. We also got cloth wipes so we don't have to buy wipes anymore. My dad did have to buy us some more prefolds, though, like I said, but even the cost of those evens out after a few weeks of cloth diapering.

For the last two or three months, though, we've been using disposables at night. Sebastian wakes up to eat all night long, and he was peeing so much from it that the pocket diapers we were using were leaking. Disposables are more absorbent for that kind of thing. If anyone has an overnight cloth diaper solution for heavy wetters, though, I am all ears! We're only using one a day instead of using them all day long, so we're still saving a ton of money.

Stay-at-Home Parenting

Still a good decision, although it's a little harder these days, because technically I am also a working mom. My job is more about professional development and less about the money, though. I make enough to pay off medical bills and that's about it. The nice thing about my job is that it works around Bryan's schedule and I can usually bring Sebastian with me if I absolutely need to. I've only needed to get a babysitter twice.

Staying at home is just really nice because we don't have to worry about taking time off for things like illness or doctors visits. It leaves Bryan free to work a bajillion hours a week, which is frustrating for me, but it makes him happy and it makes it so that I can stay home. Being a stay-at-home mom has had a lot of emotional challenges for me, but financially, it was a good decision. We're starting to talk about switching soon and having me work and Bryan stay home. We're not entirely sure about when that will happen, but one of us will always stay home with Sebastian.

Medical Bills

Through a state-funded program called Colorado Indigent Care Program, we had our $7,000 hospital bill reduced to around $100. They eliminated Sebastian's bill entirely, and our anesthesia bill was reduced from $1,000 to $32. We had to go through a LONG, laborious interview at the hospital where they went over all of our financial documents and assigned us a level of poorness (we are right above "Homeless." Score?). Bryan was annoyed that they were "looking up our financial butts," but money is a lot more personal to him than it is to me. I don't care that people know we're poor (obviously, or I wouldn't be writing this post).

The only part of our medical bills that CICP didn't cover was the actual surgery, because the surgeon's office, the Center for Women's Health, refused to accept it. Our surgery bill was $1,200 after our insurance covered part of it, and we've slowly been chipping away at it. The really annoying thing about the Center for Women's Health is that not only did they refuse to accept CICP, but they wanted us to pay $100 a month on our bill! I don't know ANYONE, even upper-middle class families, who can suddenly just FIND $100 extra a month. It's like I PLANNED to have a C-section, but they've been treating me like I bought something frivolous and need to cough up some money. If I ever get pregnant again, there's no way I'm (voluntarily) going to them for any service.

I have another post later this week about every dollar we've had to spend on Sebastian for random, unexpected things, as well as more advice for having a baby with no money.

Our nursery theme is Sodom and Gomorrah

2013-02-11T09:29:00.001-07:00

Source

Every time I read the story of Noah's ark, I wonder why in the heck it is used as a kid's story.

When you do a Google image search for "Noah's ark," most of the results are cute, happy animals smiling away as they go on a nice little sailing expedition. Precious. Baby shower supplies, lunch boxes, kids' puzzles, toys, and nursery decorations of fluffy little animals, rainbows, and smiling suns.

It makes me wonder how many people actually read the story of Noah's ark, and how many actually took it seriously. Let's take a look:

It's the early days of humanity, and we're starting to spread out among the earth, causing all sorts of destruction and wickedness in our path, as sinful humans do. Our wickedness starts to trouble God as He watches us destroy his beautiful creation:

"The LORD saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time. The LORD regretted that he had made human beings on the earth, and his heart was deeply troubled. So the LORD said, 'I will wipe from the face of the earth the human race I have created—and with them the animals, the birds and the creatures that move along the ground—for I regret that I have made them.'" Genesis 6:5-7

But then there's Noah, the only good guy in the entire human race, who finds favor with God. God decides that there is hope for these fools after all, and he decides to spare Noah and give the animals a second chance, too. God tells Noah his plan to destroy the earth and wipe out most of humanity, and tells him how to build the ark to save himself and his family.

"Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight and was full of violence. God saw how corrupt the earth had become, for all the people on earth had corrupted their ways. So God said to Noah, 'I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth.'" Genesis 6:11-13

So Noah builds this crazy-huge ark, which was more like a giant floating warehouse than a boat, collects a few thousand species of animals, and God opens up the floodgates to drown the earth.

TO DROWN THE EARTH.

"Every living thing that moved on land perished—birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died. Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; people and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds were wiped from the earth. Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark. The waters flooded the earth for a hundred and fifty days." Genesis 7:21-24

Imagine it like this: you're sitting around, minding your own business, going about your day, when suddenly it begins to rain the most torrential of downpours. There is probably earth-shaking thunder and lightning, and the streets begin to flood. Houses crumble and get swept away within a matter of days or less. Everything and everyone you love is torn from you and washed away. Everything you put your security and comfort in--your job, your house, your money, your relationships, is all washed away in this non-stop flood. There's no chance of holding onto or trying to save anything.

Your feet are taken out from under you in a wave, and you fall, struggling to stay afloat, but all around you is chaos as waves crashed and sheets of rain batter the earth. You are tossed about in this sea of death and destruction, unable to cling to anything. You get swept under and can no longer see the surface as the water closes in around you. The world becomes silent as you thrash desperately about under the water, knowing you have only seconds. You quickly lose hope, knowing that the water is crushing you. Your lungs are burning and your head is pounding as your body becomes desperate for oxygen. In a second, you lose control, gasping your final breath as the water fills you up and you die.

Cute, right?

Now, the glimmer of hope in this situation is the ark, but let's remember that this isn't a Disney Cruise, despite what the Christian Family Store wants you to think (and BUY--let's be honest). There are thousands or more animals packed into about 100,000 square feet, not counting all the space that food and supplies takes up. So thousands of animals packed into a space the size of a small Wal-Mart for more than a year with only eight people to clean up after them. Don't forget that everything on earth has just DROWNED, so they're probably floating around in a sea of bloated, rotting human and animal corpses.

The corpses get left out of the nursery murals, though.

Yes, the story has a happy ending (for EIGHT PEOPLE out of the ENTIRE WORLD), and it's a wonderful story of redemption and love and God's promises. And these are good things to teach kids, of course.

What bothers me is how the gory details are watered down (PUN TOTALLY INTENDED). We de-emphasize the part about how wretched humanity is and how powerful God's wrath is. We hear the cute, happy version and grow up with that, and as adults, we have trouble taking the gory part seriously.

I know, I know. We don't like death and destruction. It makes us uncomfortable to think about how evil we are, and how God could just wipe us out if he wanted to. So we focus on cute, fluffy animals instead. We like our warm, fluffy, Santa-Claus version of God and not the powerful, thundering, just God we have. It certainly suits our lifestyle preference better to focus on fluff rather than reality.

Which makes me wonder: how much do we tell kids about sin and death and evil? Sebastian has a baby Bible which goes over some of these kinds of death and destruction stories, including the crucifixion, but it doesn't go into great detail (it also calls slaves "helpers," so it has some issues. OMG). How much do kids understand? Will it scare them? Do you do tell them anyway?

I'm not sure where the limits are, but I don't think the answer is ignoring it completely. It doesn't do kids or the kingdom of God any service to pretend the story of Noah's Ark is about animals going on a cruise.

To love another person is to see the face of God

2013-01-31T23:20:00.000-07:00

Credit

I'm reading Les Miserables right now. I FINALLY got to go see the movie last week, and I LOVED it. I have crazy amounts of new-found respect for Hugh Jackman. I mean, I knew he was good, but I could only ever picture him as Wolverine, you know? The only thing I didn't like was when all the characters were staring down the camera as they sang. That was weird. But maybe not something you notice if you aren't a videographer?

This book, though. This book is my Everest. It is loooooooooooong. The Kindle version is as long as my Kindle Bible, and my Kindle Bible is about 1/3 footnotes, so it's actually probably a lot longer THAN THE BIBLE. The musical is about 12 hours long already, and it barely scratches the surface, you guys. It is split into VOLUMES, and then books, and then chapters.

And books back in the 19th century were written differently than they were today. Victor Hugo seems to have little concept of the word pacing or things like holding the reader's attention. It's not written at all like books are today, where everything is fast-moving and exciting and marketable. Hugo is thorough. The characters are meticulously described. The first 12 or 13 chapters are just talking about the BISHOP, who is in the musical for approximately 4 minutes. You know the two women who live with the bishop, who, in the musical, don't say anything? There are whole chapters devoted to them. Jean Valjean isn't even mentioned until the second book (that would be like a Harry Potter book where Harry isn't mentioned until halfway through the first book, but with exhaustive chapters devoted to the life of Mrs. Figg). Occasionally, Hugo stops the narrative altogether to talk about French history or just generally muse about humanity.

I'm really, really enjoying it, though. It's fairly easy to read, despite the fact that I haven't read any classics since college and I've been reading mostly YA books, baby books, and the Little House series lately. One of the flaws of the musical is that you fall in love with the characters, but you're left wanting more. The book delivers. You learn why the Bishop was so generous and welcoming, how Valjean was raised and why he stole bread, and what prison was like (and that's as far as I've gotten). I love that it's slow and thorough. It's a book you can savor.

It's such an amazing story of grace and the law and redemption and love (and I wonder why Christian books and movies aren't this good! Don't get me started). It's obviously missing all of the fantastic music, but it uses the world "lugubrious" just about every other sentence, so that kind of makes up for it. I'm thinking I should finish it sometime in my mid-40s.

What do Johnny Depp, Barack Obama, Peyton Manning, and I have in common?

2013-01-16T22:08:00.001-07:00

Credit

I took a couple of communication classes in college where we took a lot of personality tests. They were for all sorts of things: Are you confrontational or avoidant? (I'm confrontational). Adventurous or traditional? (Adventurous). Are you rigidly scheduled or flexible? (Down the middle on that one, surprisingly). We compared our answers and it was to help us learn about why people have trouble understanding each other. Out of everything in college, it was one of the exercises that has stuck with me the most (and has even helped a ton in my marriage to my avoidant/traditional/rigidly scheduled husband).

When I was interviewing for my videographer job, my now-boss mentioned her Myers-Briggs personality type to explain how she manages work. She just casually rattled off the four letters as if I'm supposed to understand what they mean. I've seen this personality indicator all over the place in blog land--people actually have it in their About Me blurb. I don't really think that my entire personality can be explained by one test, and I'd never cling to it as my identity, but I thought it'd be fun to see what it says. I took this test.

My result: ENFJ (Extrovert/Intuitive/Feeling/Judging) "The Idealist"

Attributes: organized, honest, creative, sensitive

They believe in their dreams, and see themselves as helpers and enablers, which they usually are.
ENFJs are global learners. They see the big picture.
The ENFJ's focus is expansive. Some can juggle an amazing number of responsibilities or projects simultaneously.
Organized in the arena of interpersonal affairs. Their offices may or may not be cluttered, but their conclusions (reached through feelings) about people and motives are drawn quickly and are resilient.
ENFJs know and appreciate people. They are apt to neglect themselves and their own needs for the needs of others. ENFJs often take on more of the burdens of others than they can bear.
They have thinner psychological boundaries than most, and are at risk for being hurt or even abused by less sensitive people.
Face-to-face relationships are intense, personable and warm, though they may be so infrequently achieved that intimate friendships are rare.
The dynamic nature of their intuition moves ENFJs from one project to another with the assurance that the next one will be perfect, or much more nearly so than the last. ENFJs are continually looking for newer and better solutions to benefit their extensive family, staff, or organization. They can manage details, particularly those necessary to implement the prevailing vision.

Seems fairly spot-on to me. I've always had an eye for injustice. I'm easily hurt, even by situations where I'm not directly involved. I can easily see problems that exist and I love scheming solutions to make things better. I like to do lots of things all at once.

Careers suited to an ENFJ are:

Journalist (well, then)
Diplomat
Social worker

Famous ENFJs include:

David, king of Israel (who figured that one out? I'm picturing King David setting aside psalm-writing to fill in bubbles and be psycho-analyzed)
Abraham Lincoln
Barack Obama
Sean Connery
Johnny Depp
Oprah Winfrey
Peyton Manning

My literary ENFJ counterpart was Charles Darnay from A Tale of Two Cities, which I haven't read, but now I want to.

Take the personality test! Tell me your results!

No sugar for a year

2013-01-15T00:31:00.001-07:00

One of the biggest components to my year of recovery in 2013 is giving up refined sugar.

I tried in 2012 and it last like... half a day. But I've noticed more and more in the last couple of months how completely awful sugar makes me feel. When I eat sugar, I feel like a sponge being squeezed out. All of the energy just RUSHES out of me all at once, and I'm left feeling limp and used up. I feel like absolute crap--tired, crabby, unable to muster energy for anything.

When I started researching the effects of over-consumption of sugar and high fructose corn syrup, it became clear that they are bad news. I mean, BAD. Like, compared to heroin and cocaine bad. I was worried about diabetes, but sugar is also linked to heart disease, liver damage, and cancer. It ages skin prematurely and negatively affects sleep quality. It's even responsible for things like sinus infections. It's responsible for 35 millions deaths annually.

It was enough for me to give it a shot. I was done feeling like crap, I'm ready for the rest of this baby weight to go, and I was up for a big challenge, just to see if I could accomplish it.

Cane sugar (white or brown), corn syrup, artificial sweeteners with aspartame.

Honey, agave nectar, real maple syrup, blackstrap molasses, fruit, all other carbs.

I've heard the argument that most of these things are processed by your body in the same way as sugar, and therefore have the same negative effects as sugar. There's also a lot of sneaky added sugar in processed foods. We found it in our peanut butter and in spaghetti sauce. However, for me, most of my sugar consumption was coming blatant sugary sources--either from high fructose corn syrup from soda or candy, or sugar-laden desserts. I was consuming MASSIVE amounts of sugar from these two things. I feel like if I start with just giving up refined sugar, then I'll be cutting huge amounts of sugar from my diet. I'm not going to worry yet about being militant about having no sugar in anything ever.

I'm actually surprised at how amazingly easy this has been so far. It hasn't felt like much of a challenge at all yet. I think one of the things that helped was that I talked about it a LOT in the weeks leading up to 2013, so I knew that I had to stick with it because people would ask (and they have). I prepared a lot by researching and planning healthy recipes, and it made me really excited to eat healthy in all aspects, not just without sugar.

I had cravings for sugar for about a week--mostly in the middle of the afternoon or at night--but I was able to ward them off pretty easily with fruit or no-sugar-added fruit juice or smoothies. I was also getting SUPER hungry at the most random times during the first week. I think my body was confused about suddenly not getting as many calories as it was used to, so I snacked on healthy things.

To be fair, I have had some sugar. I bought a big bottle of delicious, sugary, chemical-laden coffee creamer right before Christmas, and I wanted to finish it, so I've had a little bit sugar in the mornings for the past two weeks. It's still a huge step down from what I was used to, though, and I think weaning myself off sugar slowly has really helped keep my body from freaking out about giving it up cold turkey. The creamer is totally gone, now, though, so I'm completely sugar-free.

I've lost four pounds in two weeks, and I feel really good. I have a lot of energy, although I'm still drinking coffee, so I can't really chalk that one up to no sugar (one vice at a time, people). I don't have that horrible, wrung-out feeling I was getting from sugar high crashes.

One of the unexpected and most amazingly wonderful surprises was that at the same time that I gave up sugar, Sebastian started suddenly sleeping better. Not quite sleeping through the night, but SO MUCH BETTER than what we were used to. I looked it up, though, and I haven't found any evidence that a mother's sugar consumption affects her baby's sleep. Still, I'll take it.

I'm surprised that I hardly miss sugar at all so far. It's only been two weeks, but I feel great about this decision. I'm loving eating healthy and exploring new options for sweets without sugar. I have a whole post planned about natural sugar desserts. There are so many, and they are awesome! Expect more food-related posts as this year goes on, because I am super excited about this.

Twenty Thirteen

2013-01-06T22:50:00.000-07:00

2012. What do I say about 2012?

I think it's safe to say that 2012 fairly kicked my ass. I mean, I had my guts hacked open and a screaming person ripped from my body. So. There's that. Which, in my book, is enough to propel 2012 straight to the medal platform for Olympic ass-kicking years. Add to it the fact that they put me in charge of taking care of said screaming person (who only learned to scream loud and higher) (and let's not forget about my nipples. Let's never forget about my nipples, shall we?), and then some home-wrecker came along and wrecked my home, and then we moved approximately a bajillion times, and then my husband left the continent, and then college made me stop coming because I've learned everything, and also I HAVEN'T HAD MORE THAN THREE CONSECUTIVE HOURS OF SLEEP IN A YEAR AND A HALF. A YEAR AND A FREAKING HALF. All capitals. Bold-face type. Yes, 2012 can leave this party. It has LONG overstayed its welcome.

The new cool thing in blogging, apparently, is to do a New Year Keyword instead of New Year's Resolutions. As much as I love jumping on bandwagons, I don't usually join in to that game. I love New Year's resolutions. I love to make lots and lots of them. Multiple-page bulleted lists of big, grandiose, unrealistic ways to improve my life and the world around me, of which I actually accomplish very few. It's never deterred me, though. New years are full of possibilities, and I like to jump right in a try lots of new things. Before now, I've never wanted to simplify it into one word.

This year, I'm going for a little of both. I'm setting goals, and lots of them. I love setting goals because it gives me and opportunity to try new things. It gives me pressure to actually accomplish them and if (when) I fail, I get to learn more about myself and what I'm capable (or not capable) of. However, after the insanity of the last two years, I also would really love the simplicity of one word. One focus for this year.

So, 2013 will be about recovery. I'm not going to plan for anything huge (it'll probably happen anyway because my life is ridiculous). I'm just working on loving what I already have and making it better. The resolutions I made follow that focus. I won't list every little resolution here, but they all generally focus on improving the things I have. They are things like improving my physical health, learning more about my job, spending more time with God, repairing my marriage, being a better mom, and little things like writing more, paying off debt, and getting my oil changed (it, um, didn't exactly get done in 2012).

I'm not sure what this year has for us. Maybe it will be crazier than the past two. Maybe it will be boring. Maybe it will be wonderful. Maybe I will be better at blogging it so we can see.

Update Schmupdate

2012-11-12T23:22:00.000-07:00

Sebastian and his first girlfriend, Ariel, enjoying a special moment.

I like doing these listy updates because it is so super easy. It keeps a record of life right now and keeps people informed. I know it's the lazy man's blog post--I mean, I didn't even try to come up with a real title--but it works for right now.
Bryan is back from Africa! And it's great! But also super difficult. To be honest, our marriage has been pretty rough ever since Sebastian was born, and Africa just kind of intensified the whole thing. It's one of those hard things in life that suck right now but in the end, we'll be glad we went through it... It's just that whole sucking right now part, you know? We were able to sit down with a couple from our church and just talk and yell and ugly cry and it was really, really... exhausting. But great. Every married couple needs another strong married couple they trust to be able to be an objective third party who listens to both sides and speaks truth. Without it, we'd just be butting heads and getting nowhere except more mad at each other. But we've been able to sort some things out that have been causing contention and develop some ways of dealing with them that don't involve endless arguments.
We're moving! After the craziness with Jason and Carol while Bryan was gone, Jason told me that he had decided to end things with Carol for good. I told him that if that was really the case (he's been saying the same thing every week for the last six months), we'd like to stay. Moving is a pain in the butt, especially when we just moved here six months ago. So, everything was good until Bryan came back and Jason told him that Carol was coming over for dinner. Bryan and I decided that we'd had enough of being lied to and that it was time to find a new place. There are a whole lot of other things I want to rant about misplaced anger and growing some damn testicles already, but THE INTERNET IS NOT THE PLACE FOR THAT. Anyway, we've looked at a few places, and we found one today that we love, so we're hoping we'll have the money for it by tomorrow so we can snatch it up.
I didn't really give up on NaBloPoMo, but I did take a break last week to try and sort out my crazy life (it's not much more sorted right now). Also, I got a little burnt out on blog posting. I think I need to try some new things like planning posts so that I'm not sitting there at the end of the day, tiredly cranking out a mediocre post and slapping some picture on it. Still, it's been good to write a lot again.
If someone could leave a comment telling me a crazy dramatic story about their life to make me feel better about mine being such a soap opera, that'd be so cool.

Because it matters

2012-11-06T22:45:00.000-07:00

Standing in line to vote

When I was in elementary school, I won an essay contest called "How My Vote Changes America" (or something to that effect).

Bill Clinton was running for re-election against Bob Dole. I was way too young to really understand any of it, but my school got really into it. We learned all about politics and civics and how democracy works. We even had a whole fake election day and got to fill out our fake ballots and everything.

They hosted this essay contest and I wrote all about how I vote for ways to make my world better. I wrote about what I want my ideal world to look like and what things needed to happen in order to make that world. And then, what it all comes down to is voting for those things. I mean, I totally had it figured out in elementary school.

I sort of understand why people don't vote. For one thing, the electoral college makes no sense whatsoever. I'd have a hard time being convinced to even get out and vote if I was a democrat who lived in Texas or Utah. And the two-party system is ridiculous in a country that touts the ideology that "anyone can be president." It's disheartening to have to choose "the lesser of two evils." Campaign ads are probably the most annoying thing ever invented, and campaign finance is more than a little corrupted. And then there are so many issues upon issues with so much complexity that it's overwhelming to try and sort it all out and pin the solution to one candidate.

It's not exactly the clear-cut version of democracy I learned about in elementary school.

But for all its messiness, democracy does shape my world. The way I live my life now and the way my life will continue is a result of the way people vote. Things like being able to work, being able to afford food, the opportunity to go to college, and even the people that I spend time with are all the result of voting. My life could easily be way different as a result of different voting. And to think of how different my life would be if I could not vote is sort of terrifying. I only have to look at the everyday lives of women in countries without women's suffrage to be thankful for it.

I stood in line to vote today with Sebastian strapped to my chest and realized that not long ago, I would not have been able to do that. I would have been expected to wait at home with Sebastian while my husband goes out and makes decisions. Women fought for me to be able to stand in that line--many of who never got to stand there themselves. People have fought and died in America and around the world (and they STILL ARE) for the right to have a say in the way they live their life. It's just one vote in one election, but collectively, it shapes the world.

Second star to the right

2012-11-05T22:05:00.000-07:00

This post was inspired by a similar post on The Desert Dandelion.

A few months ago, I was in the baby aisle of the grocery store looking for pacifiers when it dawned on me how weird my life has become. I'm this ADULT now. I'm someone's MOM. I'm in charge of this entire little life. They let me take him home from the hospital and just trusted that I would take care of him without anyone there to tell me what to do and make sure I did everything right. For instance, I didn't know that you're only supposed to sponge-bathe him until his umbilical cord stump falls off. We definitely gave him full-on real baths because no one was there to show us what to do and correct us as we go.

In a lot of ways, I still feel like a kid. I think it's because I've never really had much opportunity to be completely on my own. When I went to college, I lived with roommates. Even though I worked and paid for my own rent and food and everything, my dad still paid half my car payment. I went straight from that to getting married in the middle of college. I've never lived alone and I've usually had some sort of safety net when it comes to things like paying bills, either from my parents or my husband.

Things like going to the liquor store or buying pregnancy tests still feel a little scandalous, even though they're perfectly acceptable.

Even though I'm married and have a baby, I still have yet to feel like I've really arrived at adulthood. I still read YA novels and watch kids movies and eat pudding cups and gold fish. I cry when things don't go my way. I have no idea how my retirement savings works. I forget to do my laundry and drive around with my gas light on and overdraft my checking account buying coffee. But I'm expected to feed and bathe and teach an entire fragile little human?

I can do some adulty things. I ran a news show for two years. I can tell you all about politics. I love to menu plan and grocery shop.

I went to a friend's high school volleyball game last weekend and realized that I am pretty far removed from that life. I still feel like I just finished high school, when really, that was ages ago. I don't miss it, either, when I hear her stories. I think becoming an adult is a gradual process rather than a distinct moment. One day you look at where your life was and where it is and realize that it's different. I'm not an awkward, insecure 15-year-old anymore. I am an awkward, slightly-more-secure 20-something mom. I can do my makeup and I dress a little better now. I can walk around with my baby and get supportive smiles rather than judgmental stares. I can eat candy whenever I want without permission.

Sometimes I really miss being a kid. But I honestly really like being an adult, way more than I ever thought I would. I wasn't one of those kids who ever really looked forward to being an adult. I liked being a kid. But I like being an adult, too. I still feel a little ill-equipped for taking care of a family and paying bills and retiring, but I think adulthood is about more than that. It's about learning about who you are and what your place is in the world. It's realizing your potential and the effect you have. It's encountering problems and discovering your power and developing wisdom.

Decluttering Tips

2012-11-04T22:39:00.000-07:00

I'm staying with some friends this week, and they were talking about decluttering their kids' play room tonight. They have six kids, so it's easy for clutter to accumulate and for the mess to get out of hand. I'm actually a pretty awesome declutterer. I love to get rid of things. I'd rather get rid of unnecessary things than waste my time cleaning or organizing. It frees up time to actually spend using and enjoying my stuff, rather than just managing it.

There are a lot of cultural, emotional, and psychological reasons we over-consume and hoard material things, but that's a different blog post for a different time. But if you've reached the point where you know things need to go, it can be difficult to know where to begin. Huge piles of clutter can be daunting, and it's easier--in the short term--to just shove it all into a closet and don't think about it (this is Bryan's preferred method of cleaning). I love to declutter, though, so here are some tips to help get you started.

Set aside a few hours or a whole day or a weekend or whatever you need in order to finish the project you start, whether it's cleaning out just a closet or an entire room. If you start to pull stuff out and make piles, but then you never get around to going through everything and actually getting rid of it, you're just going to create more of a mess for yourself. Take it from me--I used to be the queen of half-finished piles of clutter until I forced myself to finish things.

It helps to start small sometimes. Instead of trying to declutter your whole bedroom, start with one closet, finish it, and move on to one dresser, etc. That will keep the project manageable and keep you from getting overwhelmed and giving up halfway.

If something is broken, either get rid of it, or fix it immediately. I've found that I'm not usually the kind of person who fixes things. I used to set aside a torn pair of jeans to sew them, and a year later, I hadn't done it yet. Be honest with yourself. If you know you'll never fix it, just get rid of it. If you do decide to fix things, do it immediately so that you don't build up a pile of broken, useless things you may never fix.

If clothes don't fit, get rid of them. Unless you are actively losing weight (not just hoping to) or you have special circumstances like pregnancy, it is silly to hold onto things hoping that one day you'll use them. I'd much rather have a closet full of clothes I actually wear and feel good in than have to open up my closet and see things I can't fit and then feel bad about myself.

If you have duplicates of something, or two different things that serve the same purpose, keep the one you like the best. We used to have an electric coffee maker, a French press, AND an espresso maker until I realized that owning three coffee makers when I'm the only one in our house who drinks coffee was ridiculous. We had like five juice pitchers when there was never, ever a time we had five kinds of juice at once. We had, seriously, like 20 towels for TWO PEOPLE. Now we have three nice towels that we like using and WAY less laundry.

This is my favorite minimalist concept because it's so easy. You decide on a spatial limit for your things, and then you are allowed to fill it to the brim but you can't go over. For example, we have one bookshelf only for contemporary books, one bookshelf for antique books, and one half-sized bookshelf for kids books. Each of these shelves can be packed with as many books as we can stuff into them, but if there is no more room, we can't get more books without getting rid of some to make room. This keeps our things from just spreading out indefinitely. If you have to buy more storage items--things to hold your things--you might have a problem.

We do this with books, magic stuff (one shelf), craft supplies (one drawer), clothes (a certain number of hangers), and once Sebastian has more toys, he'll have one set of bins and that's his limit.

With this option, you take EVERYTHING out of whatever you're trying to declutter. Don't leave anything behind; just clear a room/closet/whatever completely out. Then put back your favorite/most important items one at a time. This makes you be intentional about what you have by carefully evaluating each thing. You have to physically decide whether to keep something by holding it and putting it away. Then you get rid of everything you don't need or want.

This isn't always the best option if you have a big project, because it can make a huge mess as you're clearing everything out. I like to do this when we move, but it can be hard to do in a house you plan to stay in because you need to put all of the stuff somewhere, and it can just make a mess in another room. But it's the most thorough and the most intentional. You can't just gloss over things.

Once something goes into the discard pile, it can't be rescued. Put it in the pile and keep it there. It helps if it's a black garbage bag or a cardboard box or something else you can't see through. If you don't commit to just letting something go once and for all, you'll second-guess yourself and talk yourself into keeping more things than you get rid of. Out of all of the thousands of things I've gotten rid of in the past few years, I've regretted getting rid of maybe two or three. And each of them has been easily replaceable. It's much easier to replace two or three things than to hoard thousands of things.

If there are things that you truly can't decide whether to keep or toss, put them in a maybe pile. I like to give myself a time period--I need to use this thing in the next six months, or it goes. With clothes, I like to wear them around a few times and think about how I feel while I'm wearing it--is this comfortable; does it look good? The Maybe Pile gives you chance to use something and really assess the value that a thing adds to your life if you can't decide right on the spot on Decluttering Day.

Be careful about The Maybe Pile. It can easily turn into an excuse to hoard. If you don't find yourself using something after its time period is up, you need to reassess. Is it something you will eventually use, or did you forget you had it? Once again, be honest with yourself. Usually, I find that I can just get rid of something, but sometimes I do find unexpected value in something after waiting and evaluating it.

Decluttering can be exhausting in the short term, but dealing with clutter forever is exhausting in the long term. Remind yourself of how nice it will be to be able to find things, clean up more quickly, and just feel lighter and less encumbered by junk.

Use your decluttering to serve others. We gave Sebastian's outgrown clothes to some friends fostering a newborn baby. We gave our excess kitchen stuff to college friends. We had an extra dresser that we were able to give to a family who had been praying specifically for a dresser. I'm looking forward to teaching Sebastian to give his things to others who need them, rather than hoarding them for his own selfishness. We have definitely blessed by hand-me downs. Almost all of our furniture is hand-me-downs, and our friends gave us a ton of baby stuff. It's nice to be able to serve others by giving them something they'll use rather than keeping it for myself and not using it.

One of the nice things about decluttering is that it's addictive. Once you get a momentum built by getting rid of things, it gets easier and easier, and you start to see more and more things you have that you don't need. Parting with them gets easier and you can start to free yourself from the grasp of materialism.

Half-birthday

2012-11-03T23:35:00.002-06:00

My little man is six months old today!

All of the cliche emotions are true for me--the last six months have flown by, but I feel like I've known him forever. I can hardly remember what my life was like before him.

When we first brought Sebastian home from the hospital I was overwhelmed. I was so overwhelmed. I felt like we had made a horrible mistake that we couldn't fix. Not that I didn't love him or want him, because I was then and still am enthralled by him. But when we brought him home, I realized how I was not at all ready for the responsibility of being a mom. I was not prepared for the drastic overhaul of my entire life. I didn't realize how much I'd miss being able to sleep whenever I want, or shower whenever I want, or just sit around and do nothing.

I wasn't prepared for how terribly lonely it is to be a stay-at-home mom to one little baby. I had been used to college life, where I was surrounded by people all over the place--in classes, in the hallways, outside. There was always someone to talk to, even if it was just meaningless small talk. I thought I liked having alone time. What I realized is that I liked being around people most of the time, with a little bit of alone time to get a break from it. But as a mom, there was no one except me and Sebastian all day long.

I was used to being able to take breaks when I needed them. If I was getting overwhelmed by work or school or social life, I could just call in sick or skip class or stay home from an event and relax. But there are no breaks with a newborn. Even when you're just laying around recovering from a C-section, there is very little relaxation. There are still no real breaks now, when he's old enough to leave him with someone else and go out for a little while. I spend the whole time away from him thinking about him and wondering how he's doing and worrying if he's okay.

Before I had a baby, I needed a whole day of relaxation to recharge. Now, I can do that with a 20-minute nap or a quick shower or running a quick errand by myself. Back then, only getting six hours of sleep was a bad night. Now, I would literally kill a unicorn for six whole hours of deep, uninterrupted sleep. Back then, I'd be tired by the end of the day and didn't go out with friends very often. Now, I accept almost every social invitation that comes my way.

Things are not as hard now as they were right at the beginning. It's still unbelievably challenging--each day is full of challenges and just thinking about how much the future holds is so daunting I can hardly stand to think about it sometimes. But I feel better prepared for it now. I've been stretched further than I ever thought I could go and discovered potential I never knew I had. I don't feel like I'll ever have it all together again.

Man, is he sweet, though. He smiles with his entire face. His laugh will warm your heart. He is curious and determined and expressive and full of personality. He can do new things every day, and it's amazing to watch him develop. He stares at me like I'm the greatest person in the world. The last six months have blown my mind. This is the craziest adventure I've ever gone on. It's been more challenging and more rewarding than I ever thought possible.

Things Everyone Else Loves That I Just Don't Get

2012-11-02T23:48:00.000-06:00

Don't try to explain it to me. People have tried, and I still don't get the obsession. I've been to the website, and I agree that there's a lot of interesting stuff. But all of those things already exist on the internet! I can find any of them by Googling them! It's the "pinning" and the "boards" that I don't understand. You people realize that bookmarking web pages has been around since like the beginning of the internet, right? Admittedly, I can see it being semi-useful for something you'd do with another person like planning a party or photo shoot or something. It's the boards full of "dream homes" you'll never actually own, or weddings planned by people who aren't even in a relationship, or all of the millions of recipes for putting things in crescent rolls that really boggles my mind.

This is one that I just realized: I don't actually like having my nails painted. It's always a mess, and then it chips in a day or two and looks awful until I give up and take it off. It feels weird and even if it's cute for like a day, it's never worth it in the end. Nail polish is stupidly expensive and full of formaldehyde and other toxic chemicals, and nail polish remover is pretty toxic, too. I finally realized that the whole thing was stupid and threw out all of my nail polish a few weeks ago. It seems silly to paint finger nails, anyway, when they're just strands of dead proteins, but I love to dye my hair so I can't really criticize that one.

Don't get me wrong. I LOVE ridiculous fashion. I love wearing adult clothes that we inspired by kids clothes. I have TWO sets of adult onesie pajamas. For some reason, though, the romper thing is just weird to me. They don't look good on anyone over the age of three. And they seem like kind of a pain to wear (although maybe they're easier because they're a whole outfit in one? That's how I feel about Sebastian's rompers, anyway).

I get the whole "it's so bad, it's good" thing, and I get the fact that it's funny to watch crazy, deluded people being ridiculous. Everything I've heard about this show, though, makes me feel like it would just be too much, you know? It would just be TOO annoying.

I want to like wine. And beer. I really do. It sounds like so much fun--to try different kinds of wine or beer from all over the world. To unwind with a glass at the end of the day, or pretentiously sip it at a party. I just can't take the taste. It's too strong and concentrated for me. I like to cook with it a lot, but wine by itself is too much. It's sort of like vinegar or salad dressing or something. It's good with something else, but you wouldn't want it alone.

This is another one I just realized. They aren't comfortable and they don't go with my style, so they don't look good with anything I own. The convenience is nice, but I can get that from slip-on shoes and like it much better.

What do you hate that everyone else loves? Don't worry, I'm not just a huge jerk. There are PLENTY of things I love that everyone else does, and plenty of things I love that no one else does.

All Saints Day

2012-11-01T23:35:00.000-06:00

One of the good things about trials is how people rally together. You find out who your friends are, as that one country singer says.

In the last few days, it's been so heartening to have so many of my friends and family help out Sebastian and me. We've had offers of dinner, places to stay, babysitting, help moving, and hanging out. We got to stay with my dad last week and hang out with him and my siblings, and this week, we're staying with a family from my church who I just love. I've gotten so many sweet text messages and comments from people telling me they're praying for us, and it's done so much good.

When Bryan left, I felt really abandoned. I felt like he chose a vacation to Africa on his own over staying in Greeley and taking care of his family. I still don't entirely believe that's not true, but my friends and family have helped so much.

What I didn't really anticipate before I had Sebastian is how very lonely it is to be a stay-at-home mom, especially to only one baby. He is so sweet and fun to be with, but he doesn't really talk or do a whole lot. There have been a lot of days when I've LONGED for Bryan to come home at the end of the day. So the thought of him NOT coming home for TWO WEEKS was just beyond daunting. I don't do very well with being alone anyway, but to be alone with a baby and no help is really hard.

There have been a few times when I've been lonely during the last week and a half, but sweet friends have really helped alleviate that. I've had a ton of help with Sebastian, too. And as a bonus, I've been able to get to know some of my friends and their families better.

My punkin in a pumpkin.

One dude who really deserves some props during this whole situation is Sebastian. He had been having a hard time in the last few weeks before Bryan left. He wasn't sleeping well and he learned how to scream and he LOVED to try it out, and then he got super sick with an ear infection in both ears and a nose infection. But he's been doing really great, especially since I took him to the doctor and now he's on antibiotics. He's been sleeping really well, and doing great for being dragged around all over the state with me. I don't know if he's old enough to miss Bryan, which is sort of a sad thought on Bryan's part, but probably a blessing to me.

Life is still pretty hard these days. Our marriage needs a lot of work, and it's getting to be increasingly uncomfortable to be at my house. But I can't imagine how hard it would be to go through all of this alone. Thank you to all of you who have prayed for us, encouraged us, fed us, housed us, and entertained us. It really means so much to me.

Meanwhile, back in Crazy Town

2012-10-30T23:13:00.002-06:00

One more week until Bryan comes home. We've made it to the halfway point. In some ways, it has gone by more quickly than I would have expected. But in other, very real ways, it has been pure torture.

I keep feeling like I CAN NOT do this any more. I've reached the limit to what I can handle, and I'm just going to shut down or something. More and more horrible things keep getting piled onto my shoulders and I just have to take it all. Alone.

About a week after Sebastian was born, Bryan went to a party with some friends of his, and his friend Jason's wife, Carol, got drunk and kissed him. He told me about it right away and assured me that it was all her--that he had done nothing wrong, and I believed him.

Some other, crazier events from that night led to Jason and Carol's divorce. But then Jason needed someone to rent out his basement or he would have needed to sell the house and move. Our lease was up and we've always wanted to live with another family anyway, so we decided to move in. It seemed like they could use some help during this hard time, and we could try to be a positive influence. It really seemed like God wanted us here and had a very specific purpose for us.

I guess I naively thought that because they were getting a divorce, they wouldn't see each other any more. Jason always talks about how much he hates her and how crazy she is. But I forget how complex relationships are, and how there are still feelings there. Carol still comes around all the time. She hangs out and brings her kids and eats dinner and has even spent the night several times.

If this was anyone else, I wouldn't care. But every time I see her, I remember that she kissed my husband. MY HUSBAND, who has never kissed or been kissed by anyone since we started dating almost 5 years ago. She pretended to be my friend for MONTHS. She came over to my house and hung out. She came to my baby shower and brought gifts for my son and decorated a onesie for him. She gave me advice. She went out with us. Bryan went out with them on his own, and I never questioned it. But then she waited until I was home with my newborn baby recovering from major surgery to swoop in.

If I never saw her again, I probably would get over it and move on. But now I live in her old house, with her old family, and she's here all the time, and every time I see her I have to be reminded of what she did and how much I hate her. She hasn't apologized or tried to reconcile in any way. She just smiles smugly at me.

This whole thing has caused so much contention in our marriage, which has already been battered pretty heavily by becoming parents. After a lot A LOT of fighting, and some advice from Bryan's boss, who is a leader in our church, we decided that we can only continue to live here if she was not here. We talked about it with Jason a week or so ago, and he agreed that she would not come in the house or we would move out.

I'm all for reconciling a broken marriage, if that's what Jason and Carol want to do. I'm all for friendship, if they want to just be friends. But I can't handle being around her, so if she's going to be here for any reason, Bryan and Sebastian and I need to not be here.

I'm sure you can imagine where this story is going. Today, while I was home, Jason came home followed by Carol. I asked him if he remembered what we had agreed upon, and he pretended not to. When I reminded him, he said that if that was the case, "I guess you're moving out." He came down later and said that he had remembered our agreement, but that Carol was going to be here anyway.

So I guess we're moving out now. I have no idea where we're going to go or what we're going to do. And of course, Bryan's not here to help me with any of this. I'm back to being angry and bitter with him for going on a vacation and leaving me to deal with our life alone. I don't know what to do or where to turn and I just feel so hopeless.