2 Years

And just like that, we have a two year old.

The time has flown and the time has crawled. I can believe it; I can’t believe it.

Yet here we are.

I worried before getting pregnant that I wouldn’t actually enjoy having a kid. I worried while pregnant that I wasn’t the kid type. I worried two months post partum if I’d made a serious mistake because newborns were so, so hard.

And then things started getting easier. Sleep came and stayed. Giggles became full-bellied laughter. Crawling became toddling became chasing around the house.

I love being a mother. I love it so so much. It has been so far beyond any and all of my expectations it’s difficult to even put into words.

But I still try.

Today we’re going to a pumpkin patch and then later it’ll be time for cupcakes. Her birthday was actually earlier in the week, but with two working moms, well.

Happy birthday, Lady Jr.

General Updates

It’s June. How did that happen.

Life has been running at full speed yet standing still. Now that the sun stays up well past our bedtime (tsk tsk), we’ve been able to enjoy having a yard and all that entails. And unlike almost everywhere else I’ve lived, it cools down in the evenings, so it’s actually pleasant to be outside.

I have a hundred million updates and Lady Jr is already starting to wiggle so let’s do this bullet style:

– Depression stole most of May from me, but forcing myself to do unpleasant things like a) go outside and b) eat more than just tortillas [and bonus c) remember to take vit D] has helped me reclaim June. I still lost a lot in terms of productivity and, well, life, but I’m trying to accept that and move on.

– Lady Jr is a small child. She understands way more than we know and this comes out in surprising ways. Like how excited she gets when I mention folding laundry. And the devilish look she gets when she’s about to do something she knows she shouldn’t. I guess she knows it’s hard for us to be upset with her when we’re laughing.

– Words are still not really a thing. I mean, she definitely knows words. But she’s still not using them. She just moved into the bigger kid room at daycare, though, so hopefully we’ll see some progress in the coming month.

– Summer with a toddler is the best. Full stop.

– Our legalversery was this week. Yay for legals!

– Speaking of which, I never updated on Lady Jr’s adoption. We got the official certificate in the mail a few weeks back so Dr Lady can breathe more easily now.

– Oh yeah, work. So our company is closing at the end of this year because our biggest client had a budget cut they decided to shove off on us. It’s a complicated mess of emotions and poor management, but we all knew this would happen eventually, just hoped it wouldn’t be now. So I’ll be looking for gainful employment soon and ugggh, because I had such a nice thing going. I don’t know if I’ll be able to find anything so flexible and so well-suited to my picky yet creative skillset. I’m trying not to think about it too much right now because we still have six months, but. If you know anyone in dire need of online training development. *coughs*

– But the work thing has come at a very inconvenient time because we’d just been starting to plan for #2 and. Well. Money was already going to be an issue. We can’t do it unless I have a decent job.

– And my book?? Is a thing??? ARCs arrived just a week or so ago and I still can’t get over it. People have been reading it and saying nice things and I don’t know how to deal. Well. I mean. I do know how to deal. And that’s by focusing on finishing the third book. I’ve been keeping talk about it all separate from here, over at my author blog. But it’s like. Available for pre-order. If you’re interested. *coughs*

– We’re going to see HAMILTON next weekend and AAAH I’ve been waiting for this for YEARS it’s gonna be AWESOME.

– Okay yeah the baby toddler is definitely awake time to make breakfast.

And a warm hello to whoever just read my entire blog!

Summer, finally

I’m pretty sure we skipped straight from winter to summer. Not two weeks ago we were in the midst of an ice storm and now it’s hitting 80 and everything is life-ing as hard as it can.

And I love it.

As soon as Lady Jr was walking confidently, I was ready to start taking her outside. Unfortunately, that’s when the weather dropped and the snow came back with a vengeance. I tried going outside with her anyway, but she was having none of it. After a while, I gave up trying to go out myself.

But now we’re out every day. Lady Jr will grab our shoes and bring them to us in an attempt to get us to go outside. She bangs on the back door and if we let her out, she navigates the stairs on her own – usually by scooting – and then runs across the yard to the garage to get the stroller. Literally overnight, she went from hating the stroller to begging for walks.

Growing up in Florida, where summer was an endless slog of humidity, heat, and bugs, I never learned to appreciate summer. Then of course, there was our stint in Arizona, where summer meant bubbling asphalt and third degree burns.

I still can’t shake my lingering animosity toward summer, but man – what a difference it makes to be able to just go outside. Whenever.

We were able to start a garden this year because Lady Jr will mostly amuse herself outside now – by digging in dirt, but well.

We’ve already been to the nearby play area a few times, and Lady Jr has learned how to climb the stairs to get to the slide. She still won’t go down the slide, but, well.

She’s also enamored by birds. Every time one flies by, she points and makes this happy little noise. It’s so friggin cute.

Basically, I am so glad it’s summer and so looking forward to all the things we’ll be able to do and show Lady Jr. I want to hit up all the parks and go for all the walks and teach her how to garden and work on “gentle pets” with the plants, and go berry picking and take her to the farmer’s market and eat watermelon on the grass and watch the lightning bugs come out and

Am I missing anything??

Google Understands

Okay, so maybe the feeling isn’t quite the same. Not even by a long shot. But there are certainly a lot of conflicting emotions, expectations, and surrealness surrounding both.

It makes sense afterward. There’s so much heaped on that moment – by us, by our community, by society. And above all, we are supposed to feel nothing but pure joy. There is no room for any other emotion, certainly no conflict, certainly no confusion. Be happy. Just be happy. Why aren’t you happy??

Funny how so few things in life are truly that cut and dry. Processing takes time, especially for any major event in your life. And in our era of instant connection, it’s so easy to get instant feedback, to give instant feedback, instead of just taking a day – or a week – and cocooning yourself and letting all the emotions wash over you, accepting them, letting them go, and sifting through them until you get to the ones that feel right.

All that’s to say – I remember being handed a purpleish, bloody, tiny creature with a scrunched up face and thinking what the heck is this? Then falling in love over the subsequent days and weeks.

The same is apparently truer of covers than I’d expected. Except, well, it wasn’t bloody. I mean. A little bloody. And I’ve run through the whole rollercoaster of emotions this past week, all the way from what have I done to holy shit this is my life now. So perhaps Google knows.

I tend to resist the common narrative that babies and books can be compared, because when it comes down to it, I will burn the world for Lady Jr, while I might get into a Twitter spat for my book. But at least when it comes to conflicting and surprising emotions, well.

Not wrong, Google. Not wrong.

2011 in Books

At the beginning of 2011, I set a goal (through Goodreads) to read at least 40 books this year. In 2010, I’d barely managed 25. This year, I hit 42.

I think a lot about reading. It’s one of my longtime favorite activities and as a writer, it is absolutely essential. It’s good in so many, many ways but, just like a lot of things which are good for us, sometimes we simply don’t take the time to prioritize and fit them into our lives. I had a lot of time through my job last year and through riding the bus every day. But now, sans job and therefore also bus, I’m going to have to be a little more conscious about making sure I do read.

And being a little more conscious about what I’m reading and what I’ve read so that in a year or two or ten, I haven’t completely forgotten everything. Goodreads has helped with that, but I’m still not very good at writing down my thoughts. So I collected together all forty of the books I read last year and wrote a little bit about each – a short blurb on what it’s about, then what I thought. I’ll share with you just the last fifteen or so, but in the coming year I’m going to have a monthly weigh-in post on what I’ve read and my thoughts. Because I freaking love books and a lot of what I’ve read recently has come from fellow bloggers’ recommendations and I’d like to pass that along.

Read on for a 2011 review – in books:

An Introduction

I’m a twenty-something secretary who wields her Classics major like it actually means something. You got some Jordanes? I can translate that for you.

I’m also a writer and a photographer and a sing-while-baking-er and a hiker and a biker and a crossfiter and a DIY-er wannabe. I like to make things, be it cupcakes, picnic baskets, novels or photos. You’ll find all those things and more here.

I also really, really love books, so much so that I started National Novel Reading Month last year. I’m a fantasy reader (give me some Rothfuss and Priest any day), but I dabble in other genres. You’ll find reviews and musings here, too, because if there’s anything I love more than books, it’s talking about them.

But really, this blog is about my N Steps Towards Self-Embetterment and (Eventual) World Domination – including all of my missteps, failings, and doubts. I don’t presume that what I say is important to you, but I can hope it’s relevant.