A Good Excuse

Just in case you wanted something to make you happy, you should know that a week from today I will be packing. Charlotte and I will be taking a week long vacation to San Diego!!!! We leave a week from tomorrow to go to Yuma Great Grandma Jane's house to see Great Grandpa Mel for a night and then we'll drive on into San Diego. How exciting! We can't wait!

Then when we get back Daddy gets a week long Spring Break! YEAH! A whole week with nothing to do but have fun! Since Daniel hasn't seen much of St. Louis due to the fact that he's studying all the time, we'll be having our own St. Louis vacation.



(I realize now that this might not make you happy, but it sure does make me happy! YEAH!)

Relief

The past couple of days Daniel has come home quiet-very quiet. I know this means one of two things: 1) he's tired or 2) somethings stressing him out. He never tells me if something is stressing him out until after the fact so I asked if he was tired. He said no. So I waited for option 2 to present itself. This waiting game can last anything from hours to weeks. I was hoping it would pass soon. Today I picked him up from school (the bike is still broken) and he was positively chatty! I found out that since he has an test tomorrow (in ethics) he was feeling that he didn't have enough time to get all his studying in. Then today there was only 1.5 hours of lecture and tomorrow he wont have any lecture before the afternoon test. So I guess he figured he will have plenty of time to study. Glad that one is over.

Close Call

This morning my daughter started to cry to get up for the day at 6:50 AM. This is 25 minutes before her usual 7:15 AM get up for the day time. That was the first thing off that I noticed. The second was that my bedroom door was shut. Daniel always kisses me goodbye in the morning before he leaves. I'm mostly asleep when he does it, but I like that he does it anyway. It's important and he does it EVERY day. With the door shut it means Daniel never kissed me goodbye this morning. That's so weird. Then I noticed that he had left the kitchen light on. At that point I was a little annoyed thinking that the kitchen light is what woke Charlotte up early. Then I went and got her up.

Then I noticed that the lights were still on upstairs. Dan would never leave for the day with all the lights on. Something was wrong. So I looked around. His backpack was still next to the sofa. So I called his name.

No reply.

Little bells of worry started to go off in my mind. Where was Dan? Why had he left the lights on and his stuff at home? I went to the back door to the stairs to the basement. Dan had left it unlocked! He never does that! He wants to make sure that nobody could get into the house with his sleeping wife and daughter after he left. Something was seriously wrong. Where is my husband? Is he OK? What if something happened to my Sweetie?

I went down the stairs with near panic in my heart. I got to the bottom of the stairs just far enough to see that the board to our basement door was still in place. So where is my husband?! Then I heard a noise in the basement. I scurried upstairs because what if the killer was still in the basement? I couldn't have him getting to my baby. I thought I'd call Daniel's cell phone to locate him so that he could calm my fears and let me know he wasn't killed. I dialed and then his phone rang,

in our bedroom.

It wasn't on him! What should I do? Should I wake up our neighbors to help me look in the basement? No, I couldn't do that. With all this worry I decided that I would do what any responsible adult would do....

I called my mom.

She told me to go down and look in the basement and she'd stay on the line. So I went downstairs and called his name. I jumped and screamed just a little bit when he appeared from behind the sheet where our belongings are stored. He was simply trying to fix his bike before going to school. He wasn't dead. Oh good, another disaster averted.

When I'm Rich

I've been pricing out photography studios to get Charlotte's one year old photos. (Because a year can't pass without taking professional photos right?) I stumbled across this photographer's site. I LOVE IT. If I were rich I would totally use her! I love the photos. There really is a difference. Alas, I have enough money for JCPenney portraits or Olan Mills. She'll be cute either way.

The End of an Era

I'm pretty sure Charlotte has decided to go down to one nap a day (or is it no naps?). For the past two days she has REFUSED to sleep during her first nap and subsequently gone kicking and screaming down for the second, so riled up that she wont sleep. Then for the rest of the day I have to deal with a sad and tired no-nap little baby. So the game plan for today is not to try to put her down until noon. But as she's crying a lot right now I'm thinking that maybe two days isn't long enough to establish a new trend. Good grief!

The Big and The Little

It has occurd to me that I haven't mentioned very much about the whole medical school experience in a while. This is mostly because medical school is just so big and I don't really know what to say. Most days I think that it's no big deal. Most days it seems like any other job any other husband would have. Leaves in the morning, gets back in the evening. Mostly all I know about the whole experience is that he's either at home or he's not. I know you're all really surprised that my husband isn't much of a talker about this!

Sometimes though it's hard, very hard. My experience with medical school has been a lot like my experience in marriage. (I've only had two and a half years under my belt on the marriage thing and 7 months of med school so I'm no expert on either. That doesn't stop me from having opinions though.) When I first got married and people told me that marriage was work and that you had to work at your marriage to make it successful I always said ok, but I don't think I really understood. Being married to my husband has been one of the most wonderful blessings of my life, but it hasn't been the easiest thing I've ever done. I didn't understand the ways in which marriage could be hard until I encountered them. I never knew the minutae of life with this wonderful man and then our beautiful daughter that could stretch me to what I thought was my capacity and sometimes beyond. I know now better than I did before the hard work that is quietly done by each member of the union that make for successful and happy marriages. And just like with anything else you haven't mastered it until it seems effortless. I also know that future stretching will take place and that it wont be easy. It will be worth it if we are a success at it though.

Medical school is the same. When I told people I was marrying a man that wanted to be a doctor I always heard the sentiment that it was hard for people that had done it before. I agreed, it would be hard. I didn't understand the challenges that would face us. Some of them are not unique to medical school. Some of them all couples face. And some of them are unique to medical school. They're never huge obstacles that I feel I need to hurdle. Mostly it is the minutae and logistics of our life now that stretch me a little bit more each time I encounter them.

What I also didn't understand about either experience going into it was the wonderful blessings that have come out of both. When I have been stretched beyond what I thought was my capacity I discovered new facets to my spirit I never knew existed. I also discovered new things about my partner in this journey. The trick is to make sure that we're going forward together. That is my ultimate goal.

They call it Puppy Love

Charlotte's Grandma and Grandpa Whiting gave her a stuffed puppy for Christmas. For a few weeks now that has been her favorite. She has a teddy bear that is roughly the same fur texture and shape that she loves too, but it doesn't have the floppy ears. Yesterday she decided to carry the teddy bear around the house, but she didn't want to let go of the puppy. The answer: carry the puppy by the ear with her mouth. I should have taken a photo, but I couldn't find the camera.

In other big news, two more of Charlotte's teeth broke through her gums on Sunday! They aren't the middle two on the top. They're the two just outside the middle two on the top. It sort of feels like the middle two are trying to come in right now too so maybe we'll have more to share later.

One I actually Like!

Since getting married the vast majority of the photos of myself have been taken by my sweet husband. He thinks I look beautiful without my make-up. He likes it when I do very little, if anything, to my hair. He thinks I look great getting out of bed in the morning. In short, the photos he takes of my look awful. Here's a sample of his type of photography.

Why didn't he look at this one in the digital camera and say, "Tip your head down a little so we don't see directly into your nostrils"?

That is why I was pleasently surprised to see the photo in the camera the other day. I don't even remember taking it. Years from now my daughter will be able to look back at these photos and say, "You didn't always look like a slob when I was little did you?"

Getting ready for church. That head band in Charlotte's hair lasted approximately 10 minutes and then was ripped off.

Chicken

My daughter used to be so scared of the vacuum I had to hold her the entire time I vacuumed. Then we got our new red one for Christmas. I loved it so much I didn't put it away for a couple of days. She played with it, took off the attachments, knocked it over and enjoyed it throughly. Now when I vacuum she's still wary of the thing, but she doesn't insist on having me hold her. Now she plays chicken with it. She will try to get close enough to the vacuum to touch it and then "run" away. She's still slow at walking and turning so it's a slow tango we dance while cleaning the house. This very calculated game of chicken entertains her the entire time I vacuum the house. She knows that if she stops I will go around her and now there are four or five Charlotte sized spots in our house that aren't vacuumed because I got tired of waiting for her and moved away. It is so funny to play with her while vacuuming!

Creative Corner

My newest project is a dress for myself. I love this pattern. I typically like vintage dresses and I've fallen in love with this one. Now I'm just trying to find a good fabric. There are so many good choices out there. Do I want it to be a solid like this yellow or turquois? Do I want a pattern like this tan embriodered one or this red lotus print? But I'm still not convinced that I have the right fabric. Any ideas? Suggestions? Places to look that I haven't thought of? Other considerations?

Mental Health

I'm being so indulged lately! I feel like I just made it out of the dark hole that was my sickness, then my daughter's sickness. Sadly, now Daniel has the sickness that makes you want to die. I know because he's burning up and also because it took him until 9 AM to go study this morning! Also he took four Motrin with him incase he needs them during the day. I've never seen him actually sick before and it kinda freaked me out! He is the hardest working sick person I've ever seen. I hope he takes it easy tomorrow and focuses on getting better because he has a test next Saturday and he needs to be 100% for it!

Because of the recent illness our house has been going through I haven't cooked a dinner for everyone since last Monday! I know, you're wondering how we ate. Leftovers one night. Gift card dinner another, no dinner another, then eating at a friends house another. Now I'm sort of getting ready for cooking again.

The party was great! About 12 women came over and we sat around, talked, and ate. Unfortunately everyone brought a dish and I made dishes to eat so there was so much food that we got stuck with a ton of leftovers. Leftover meals are great. Leftover desserts and snacks can make a person start to feel a little sickly.

Yesterday, instead of cleaning after the party, Charlotte and I went to the zoo. It was so much fun, even though it was cold. We jumped from indoor exhibit to indoor exhibit and saw all the primates. It was great to get out of the house and see the sun! Today we did the same thing and went to the Botanical Gardens (free if you live in the city). I didn't realize how much I missed going outside during the cold winter days! It is such a blessing to have sunny weather days in the middle of winter. It's supposed to get cold again, but I don't care as much now that I've had a little time outside. Do you find that your mental health improves with outdoor time? Mine does.

Sick Day

I was sick the end of the week last week and then all weekend. Yesterday my baby had a temperature all day and through the night. I'm so tired! My house is a mess, my checks haven't been deposited, and my grocery shopping needs to be done, but I can't because she wont let me put her down.