Irony...

So...really...I usually have good stuff in my grocery bag...and usually I just use my cloth bags or they give me plastic.

But this morning...a morning that all I needed was supplies for a birthday cake and a personal hygiene item...THIS is the bag I got...



FAIL!

made me laugh...

See ya around...

HAIR - Vindication.

What may not be well known to those of you who know me only electronically...or have only known me as an adult...is that I'm REALLY not that into hair.



I know. I'm a girl. Hair and shoes are supposed to matter. Bubba has more shoes that he ACTIVELY wears on a day to day basis than I do...probably 3 times as many pairs. And, until the last 2 years, HE has always used more hair product (except conditioner) on a day to day basis than I.

Here's the deal...I was BORN with Barbie-Quick-Grow hair...case in point...


Yep...there I am, somewhere under 6 months old with more hair than most 2 year olds possess. (We won't speak of the hive on my mother's head.)

Because of this hair-o-mine...I've always known that ANY haircut...any style that I could dream will be short-lived...even if I liked it...but especially if I hated it.

A few more examples for your viewing pleasure...

My senior picture...


Some weeks, maybe months, later for my senior group shot...I'd gone even blonder...I'm the girl with the sunglasses center frame...


Round about this very bleached time, I put blue gel in my hair for a spirit day at school, not realizing that my very dark hair, when bleached very blond, would become a straw and suck up all that blue...and it would keep blue-ish green streaks until my mother took pity on me and got my hair reverse-weaved. I have no pictures of that traumatic event...Although the memory of the BLEACHING gives my brother joy to this moment.

I've had LOOOOOOOOONG hair and short hair...actually, I had shorter hair than Bubba when we met...


I'd had straight (that's how it grows out of my head) and curly...


So when I had three daughters, I realized that it was possible that at least ONE of them would have some wild hair...and I should probably figure out how I feel about it...so here are my rules about hair for my kids.

1.) If I have to DO your hair...it has to be long enough for a piggy tale...and what's more, I'd prefer you keep your hair outta your face so I have scissors and I will cut bangs before you are big enough to tell me not tah.

2.) Once you are big enough to do your OWN hair...you should do it how you like it. If you decide to cut it...I don't want to hear a single word. NOT one. You chose it. If you don't like it...it'll grow. If you would like a very expensive style...save up...hair styles cost money.

3.) I will continue to do your hair for you upon request for special occasions, but should never EVER be expected to have to support your style with egg products (for instance a particularly large mohawk).

4.) You may color your hair any old color that you choose, so long as you pay for it yourself...I only provide temporary spray for whimsy and special occasions. If you do not LIKE your hair color. NOT one word. See number 2

5.) If I HAVE something to say about a particular style...you really REALLY should consider my experience before you disdain my advice...

Because WHEN you and I discuss how incredibly uncomfortable the Justin-Bieber-long-bangs-that-push-to-the-side-style would be...and I say something WISE like, "That's gonna bug you...and get greasy from you pushing them out of your face...and feel like there are bugs crawling on you."...and you disregard me...When, later, you say, "Mom, my bangs are really bugging me, could you trim them?"...I will mock you.

See ya around...

Greetings from the Frigid...errrr...South.

I know I know...typical Stack...don't post for MONTHS and then post too much.

No excuses...I must bow to my nature...some call it a muse...I'm just inspired in spurts and there is nothing for it but to write when I WANNA and NOT when I don't. Movin right along.

So, I don't know if anyone else noticed but this has been a CRAZY week, climate-wise. Seriously on Saturday and Sunday, we girls were out hooping in the very warm weather...short sleeves...Monkey-Face even had to change into shorts and sandals...she, apparently, has hot feet.

Monday we went to a friend's house and it was your standard February jacket/jeans weather...but we played outside...with bunnies...and horses (more on that in the next post)...

Now we KNEW it was going to get cold and we were going to have some "Wintry Mix" precipitation...which, at least since I've lived in Texas means some mixture of water and ICE...it's always got ice in it...sometimes big ole hail...sometimes little crystally stuff...but ICE is involved. But I was not prepared for what we got.

It SOUNDED like being in a Sonic ice machine...(to those of you outside of an area that Sonic has stores...I'm sorry...and they have the best ice ever...it's teeny tiny little barrels of ice that are fabulous for chewing). When the storm rolled in it actually rattled and sounded like the house was being pummled with those itty bitty chunks...and then we could hear it sliiiiiide off the roof. Very interesting. And LOUD. I was up, pretty much the whole storm.

So I got up KNOWING that we were going to have piles of ice and frozen stuff all over...I mean, this is not my first rodeo, y'know?

Yeah.

I was wrong. What we actually had was an ice rink...a HUGE, impenetrable, thick, slippery ice rink.

AND it was CaCaCaCold...it sat at about 18 degrees most of the day and dipped to 12 degrees by my bedtime. (To those of you who live in Colorado, or Canada, or Wisconsin who are thinking, "18 Degrees is nuthin, ya big baby...it was -23 with a wind chill that made it feel like -207"...I have this to say...if you CHOSE to live in Colorado or Canada or WISCONSIN...you bought your ticket, baby! I live in the SOUTH and the south has done me wrong this week. There.)

So what did that mean? Well, Bubba stayed home...he has a laptop...easy enough.

And the girls played...



Check out the frozen rings left by the hoops...very cool...


I think the most fascinating thing was that WE made no impact on that ice...no footprints...no noticeable trace of where we went or fell (ehem)...

So that was Tuesday, right? Well Wednesday stayed REALLY cold...Bubba started getting a little stir crazy...SO...using salt and a pitch fork, he hacked his way to the concrete on his side of the driveway (tossing the extra chunks onto my side of the driveway...who says chivalry is dead?) and managed to get OUT and buy us Chinese food for lunch, for which I was thankful. And Thursday, he actually went to work.

But wait, there's more.

This morning, we woke up to this...


Yeah...easily 6 inches of snow by 8 am and prolly closer to 8 to 10 now, at 4 ish...on TOP of 2 inches of ice. Um...Bubba was grounded again.

But the girls played...


And I STEPPED in it...just for you, dear reader...I'm a giver...


But I can't say that I've had the best attitude about it. For some reason, just KNOWING that I can't go anywhere makes me REALLY want to. It's possible I need to work on contentment. I do find myself saying, "Ah...that's pretty"...but I have ZERO desire to play in it...brrrrr.

And the other irritating part...it BROKE my little green house...that I put out not expecting REALLY freezing temperatures to last for days and days...


And I can't tell through the iced over plastic if anything survived cuz I'm afraid that unzipping it will REALLY break it...and release whatever magic heat might be in there so I'm forced to take pictures through the frost...


It LOOKS kinda green in there...of course so did my aloe plant that I accidentally left outside during a frost a couple years ago...it looked really green...until it melted...and then it sorta looked like an olive colored octopus...it did not survive.

At this moment, it's warmer than it has been all week...a WHOPPING 26 degrees...I might even consider taking off my second pair of socks...it's THAT warm. And there is stuff dripping off of the roof that I can only assume is water...but I'm not really getting my hopes up.

See ya around...

February 3, 2011...One Year Without My Dad.

Huh. This one is long.

I've been thinking about this particular blog post for awhile. What do I say? My sentimental nature doesn't let me let it pass by without comment...but what.should.I.say?

This has been an incredible year. Really. In all my years so far...it has been the hardest I've passed.

This is the year I lost my dad...and late in this year I realized that I'd actually lost 7 friends/family in 18 months.

This is the year I grieved with my mom.

This is the year that I've had the most health struggles, whooping cough, broken rib, unexplained fatigue, heart freak-outs, girlie stuff and that doesn't include health issues with my kids.

This is the year that Bubba and I have struggled the most to find each other and actually considered what might happen if we couldn't.

This is the year we experienced the heartbreak of leaving a church that we loved.

But you know what...as hard as this year has been...I think I've witnessed more miracles and joys specifically from the Lord than I ever have before.

When Dad died, I got to be part of an incredible community of friends and family the week of the memorial. We had somewhere in the neighborhood of 30 family members join us in Arizona from all over the United States and an entire town full of people who had loved my Dad surrounding us and praying with us and loving us. I made friends that week that I will never ever lose...friends that love me and my family and pray for me and my family that I only met because of that terrible moment that I had to lose my dad.

Because of the loss of so many of my loved ones, I've had to face God and decide whether I would follow Him even through this. There were times even I wasn't sure which way I would go. God has truly been my support in so many ways while these tragedies changed me irrevocably. Even so my faith feels more solid than it has been in my entire life.

This year of grieving has been so precious. I've gotten to know my mom so much more deeply through all of this. I've been blessed to be the strong one sometimes and the weak one at others. I've been allowed to wrap my arms around my mommy and just cry. And I've been blessed to laugh with her until my sides hurt. This has made us better friends and sisters in Christ than we ever have been. And I am blessed each day by the bond.

This year of health problems has been interesting. I'm learning to live inside my limitations. I learning not to plan for tomorrow, but to do exactly what I can today. I'm learning to let the mess roll off my back. I'm learning to pull my kids close and just hold them even if I can't do anything else.

I've worried for years about not doing everything that people think that I should...I'm learning to just get over it. And I'm learning to say, "No, I don't think so" and "I can help you so long as you realize that sometimes I won't be able to help you and can live with that." and the hardest, "I know that you think I'm good at that...but I don't think it's a good idea right now".

I don't know, anymore, that I'll ever be up to snuff again. I pray that I will, but for the first time ever, I'm done FIGHTING and have started accepting. That's not to say that I'm ready to roll over and die...but the stress when I can't FIX it is leaving me finally. And honestly, I think it's good for me.

During this tough stuff, Bubba and I struggled. A LOT. But the Lord provided us a marriage conference that has opened up topics that BOTH of us have been stuffing for years. It has allowed a level of openness and honesty that we haven't had in a long time. And even more than that, God has given us both understanding and opened our hearts to grace and mercy for one another. We aren't out of the woods yet...but for the first time, in a long time, we are both trudging in the same direction.

Leaving our long time church back in March was one of the most difficult steps of this year...But God had an amazing plan for us. He had been preparing a different church for us. He had brought them to the area...He had established several of our long term friends IN the church...and He found them a BUILDING in February...just in time for our arrival. ;)

Within two weeks of being at the new church, we knew we were home. There was no uneasy search. The kids were comfortable immediately which was unlike our last church hunt. I think the most amazing part of it all for me was how much I hadn't realized what I'd needed, until God pulled us through those doors.

Through this new church, we have a community, unlike any we've ever experienced before. We have a small group of people who we meet with weekly who have made us one of the family in a way that has been missing in all of our church experiences. Missing church is the biggest disappointment of our week, and I have to say that has never been the case before. Through this group, we are making friends as a family and it is very sweet.

We also have a counselor that has been really helpful to Bubba and I. We didn't know, when we left our old church, that we would need a counselor...but God did.

As I look back on this year that I was forced to live without my Daddy...I realize that I am blessed. I would not have chosen this path...not for a million bucks!! And I wouldn't have WISHED this path on my worst enemy. But this path was chosen for me...and I followed it ONLY because the Lord held my hand the entire way...

For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope. Jeremiah 29:11


I always THOUGHT I believed that before...now I KNOW that I do.

See ya around...