happy <3 day!

a few more things on our plate…

Well, a few weeks ago Will was officially informed that he was selected for the position in Denver.

Yep. We’re moving to Denver.

 

As if we didn’t have enough to worry about, right?

Of course, Will had been telling them that we’d like to go in February so that was what they were expecting to hear after giving him the selection notice.

Weeelllll…. See…We’d been holding back the information that we wouldn’t be able to leave the DC area until after the baby is born (the doctors want me to deliver a little early so our window of time got narrowed as much as I would have liked to be out there settling in without a newborn) because we were afraid that it would delay the decision even more than it already had been. So now we’re looking at a start date for Will of mid-July.

We’re excited – I mean, it is almost exactly what we were hoping for.

But, holy crap, we have so many more things to worry about now!

I made a list last week – it’s 4 pages long. It was nice to get all the questions and thoughts that were buzzing around my head, out of my head. I finally felt like I could breathe again. But I’ll spare everyone, except Will of course, my list. Suffice to say there are a lot of details to be worked out in life right now.

I keep laying out tentative plans on the calendar so that we can make mental deadlines and prioritize the topics that need to be addressed.

But then I think of that Woody Allen quote –

If you want to make God laugh, tell him about your plans.

Or another favorite of mine –

The best laid plans of mice and men…

I can’t help but wonder what is going to happen that is going to throw a wrench in even the barest of plans that we have made. 

Yes, I’m bordering on fatalistic on the topic of whether this will all go smoothly and according to any sort of plan.  It’s how I roll.

Photo credits from around the web.  Thanks to Google image search.  They are linked to their original websites.

first 24 hours

(I wrote this in the first 24 hours after finding out that I was pregnant but waited to post for obvious reasons)

At approximately 6:30pm on August 18^th, I gave in to my growing anxiety and took a home pregnancy test.

I wasn’t truly “late” and I should have waited until morning but, with the exception of only 2 months of my adult life, I’ve always been extremely “regular” so a day overdue had me on high order. That combined with 8 months of hope and waiting and a week of bizarre hot flashes, I just couldn’t take it anymore.

I had to know.

I didn’t tell Will what I was up to. I didn’t want to get his hopes up.

I just did it.

The results were clear before I was even finished in the bathroom.

Holy crap.

Then I laughed and nearly cried.

Wow. Holy cow.

Will, in the other room, was by now convinced that I was crying or otherwise upset.

By the time I was finished, he was standing outside the door waiting for me to explain what in the world was going on.

So I handed him the test through the crack in the door.

Really?

Really.

Holy crap. We’re having a baby.

*hugs*

Oh my God.

*more hugs*

Wow. We finally did it.

I nearly cried again.

Then we resumed “regularly scheduled programming” i.e. watching “Melissa & Joey,” playing on the internet, watching Shopgirl, etc. All of this was interspersed with:

Wow.

Holy cow.

You’re not telling anyone, are you? (This was directed at me because I can have trouble keeping secrets sometimes and I was chatting on FB with a friend at the time.  That was you, Ravi, if you’re reading this)

Oh. My.

When can we tell people? November? No, October. Mid-October.

Wow.

When we switched back to regular TV, Will started reading the pertinent (now that we have a positive test) chapters in his Dad Labs book and randomly reading me pages.

I was reviewing the list of “forbidden” foods posted to the website of the OB practice that I’m planning to use. (I can’t wait to understand why deli meats are on that list while trying to figure out what to eat for lunch.) I got out my book too but found that I couldn’t really focus on it – still being in a state of shock and awe.

We determined the approximate due date – likely 28 April 2011 (no Coachella for us in ’11. We are a tiny bit sad.)

Finally, we went to bed.

But sleep wasn’t in the cards. Maybe that’s another reason to take the test in the morning so that you have all day to adjust to the news before you try to sleep.

We talked.

I finally gave into the tears.

Because, well, I’m scared.

There are a bazillion things that can happen and go wrong. We feel like we know so many people who don’t have happy healthy baby stories.

I’m going to be someone’s mother.

We have to figure out all the other parts of our life.

How do I apply for jobs in Denver if I’m pregnant?

How can we spend 2 weeks in Ireland with my parents without telling them or having them figure it out?

There’s no turning back now. Wow.

I got hot again. (Man, I hope that doesn’t last and is not a preview of my future with menopause.)

I had to pee again.

Somehow we eventually fell asleep.

And then woke up to the same thoughts. It’s kind of like a CD skipping.

Will’s already thinking of what music he wants to play to the baby in utero so that he/she will be smart. And looking forward to rubbing my burgeoning belly. And following me around.

Wait until he finds out that I’m going to run 3+ miles this evening.

19 August 2010

so few words…

It’s amazing how a few simple words can change the entire course of your life.

You’ve been accepted.

Whether it’s a private grade school, a private or magnet high school, a college or university, a special summer program, or any number of other possibilities; acceptance is a great thing that shapes the future, sets you on one of several paths. Its opposite: “You have not been accepted” has similar effects.

Yes.

Yes, I will accept the job.

Yes, I’ll take the apartment.

Yes, I’ll go on a date with you.

And the ultimate “yes”: Yes, I will marry you.

I do.

The ultimate promise joining forever your future with that of another and giving freely of one’s self to that person.

Pregnant.

A solitary word on a digital home pregnancy test and life as you know it is changed forever.

Such power in such small simple words.

Written 19 August 2010.

SSG Edwardo Loredo laid to rest

Not sure what exactly to say about the funeral so I think I’ll let the pictures (and ABC 13 in Houston) speak for themselves.

 

All pictures either AP or Getty pulled from various internet sources.

SSG Edwardo Loredo – May he rest in peace

Today, we have the honor of attending a rather somber event.

But it’s also a celebration of a brave American soldier – Staff Sergeant Edwardo Loredo, brother-in-law of very good friends of ours, Tara and Bob.

SSG Edwardo Loredo, Eddie to his family and friends, joined the Army after graduating Sam Houston High School in Houston, TX (it was a surprise to me to find out that he grew up in my home town).  He became a paratrooper and was most recently assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 508th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 4th Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division, Fort Bragg, NC. He met his wife, Jennifer, our good friend’s sister, while in the service.  After a tour in Iraq, he decided to re-enlist because the Army was his family and his life.  He was deployed to Afghanistan last December and Jennifer followed (though she was in the North and he was in the South) in May.

On June 24th, one day shy of his 35th birthday, Eddie fell victim to an IED while deployed in Afghanistan.  His wife, Jennifer, was unable to be with her husband.  She did accompany him back to the States where he was honored at Dover AFB upon his arrival.  He leaves behind a daughter, son and a step-daughter in addition to his wife and all the family and friends who loved him.

On July 13th, Congressman Ted Poe from Texas gave the following eulogy on the House floor.

But truthfully, I wish I could print the text of the beautiful eulogy that Bob gave for his brother-in-law at the service Monday night.  There was such love, respect, and sadness for dashed plans for the future in his words.  There was hardly a dry eye in the room.

Eddie is being honored with burial at Arlington Cemetery as this is published.

Please keep the Urbans and Loredos in your prayers.

Here is a link to an article published in the Houston Chronicle: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/military/7083608.html

kate’s graduation present

I got crafty with my present for Kate’s graduation – ok, I’m still not sure if graduation is the proper term.  She’s still finished with her residency anyway.  It involved my new love Etsy as well.

In looking for something that was interesting and different for my very deserving sister-in-law, I considered a lot of different things.  There weren’t many things that I wanted to straight up buy so I decided to buy supplies (Etsy sells both handmade products and supplies for any number of different projects) and make something for her.

Basically – get crafty.

I found this lot of 40 x-ray clippings from old medical texts:
 

My original idea was to select a few and frame them.  Well, when they arrived, they were all much smaller than I’d expected.  So I had to rethink my project.

What I decided to do was to use a piece of mat board that I had leftover (from when I bought a whole sheet, had it cut into 4 16” x 20” pieces but only used 3 of them for the pictures over our bed) and make something of a collage.

Here’s my “cast of characters” if you will:

One 16” x 20” black frame, the 16” x 20” white mat board, Tombow removable adhesive, 3M spray adhesive, my Creative Memories picture cutter, and the x-rays, of course.  I should have included a pencil and a ruler – preferably a yard stick.

My first step, sadly, was to trim each clipping so that they had straight edges – the woman I bought them from had done just slightly better than a random hack job with a pair of scissors.

Next I moved on to layout.  First I had to decide how much white space I wanted to leave.

I decided on 3.5” all around with a 1/4” bottom weight (wherein you have 1/4 – 1/2” more border on the bottom edge of mat for a picture) and drew guidelines on the back of my piece of mat board so that I could begin to determine how I was going to lay out the clippings.

Clearly then, the next step was to figure out how to lay things out – a completely trial and error process.

Once I had the layout mostly fixed:

I used the removable adhesive to hold them in place while I determined which ones needed trimming.
 
Having the pictures more or less stuck in place as I worked made it easier to be more precise with layout and trimming.

After I was completely satisfied, it was time to turn the mat board over to begin for real.

I lightly drew a box as guidelines and got to work spraying each clipping thoroughly with the adhesive putting them into place permanently.
  

Almost finished…

The final steps: erase the bits of pencil that show between the pictures, prepare frame, and then put the whole thing together.

Final product:

It seemed to be a hit.  Kate plans to hang it over her desk in her new digs.

I also found this:

on Etsy and thought it would be funny for her to hang on the fridge.

i ♥ etsy

I’d heard of Etsy.com (can someone please tell me how you’re supposed to say that?) but had never really taken the opportunity to search around until I was looking for something very specific back in May.  I started out looking for clear rhinestoned statement necklace to wear with this dress:

for Kate’s graduation dinner (something I’ll likely blog about soon though I’ll probably make sure she doesn’t mind first).  I didn’t quite find what I was looking for on Etsy so I ended up buying this:

from David’s Bridal (FYI – bad idea to go to David’s on a Saturday in June – holy cow it was busy).  But then I needed earrings.  The “problem” was that the necklace, while perfect for my outfit, was clear rhinestones set in oxidized silver.  I love silver and have a ton of it but nothing oxidized and I didn’t feel that typical shiny silver was going to go with the necklace.  After perusing the mall only to find more shiny silver, I was off to Etsy again.

One of my favorite shops that I’ve found is Red Chair.  She had these:

and another similar pair that were oxidized with 3 equally spaced dangly balls for sale (the picture is now gone from her store) but what I really wanted was the perfect combination of the two.  Oxidized silver but only one dangly ball (I felt that the 3 would be too much with the necklace). 

Well, one of the beauties of Etsy is that you can have conversations with shop owners if you perhaps like something that they’ve produced but it’s not quite what you’re looking for.  So that’s what I did.  I sent the woman behind Red Chair a message and asked what she could do for me.  In the matter of 24 hours she had agreed to make the earrings – one ball and oxidized – for only $18!

(I seriously need/want a macro lens – that would make this picture so much better)

As a bonus, she’s only in Takoma Park, MD so I received them super quickly.  And they were perfection. 

Here’s the whole look (though you can’t really see the earrings) with the whole fam:

(no, we didn’t coordinate outfits.)

While I was trolling Etsy for handmade jewelry, I was also trying to find ideas for a more personal “yay! you’re done with residency!” gift than what we’d already purchased (a map of the DC area, Not for Tourists – Washington DC, and the City Walks for DC card deck).  In the end, I had a new project on my hands which I’ll describe tomorrow (Sorry, I had to explain my love for Etsy first.)

reagan’s 1st birthday

I didn’t even remember I had these pictures on my camera until I finally cleaned off the card in the Canon.  They’re too cute not to share.

Susan, Tim and Reagan had been out of the country until Memorial Day weekend and decided to have a small first birthday party for Reagan on Memorial Day a few days after they returned.  It turned out that Evite was too smart for its own good and since Susan set up the invitation in Switzerland, it adjusted for the timezones and the party ended up being at lunch instead of dinner – oops!

Given the hour, the guest of honor slept until it was time for cake.  The rest of us had a great time awaiting her arrival but then it was time for cake.

  
Better keep an eye on the knife, Will!

 
Um, Mom, what do I do with this?

 
With a little help from her friends…

 
Ah, happy girl enjoying her cake.

And we don’t know how to follow directions so we brought her a present.

I think she enjoyed it.

Hey Mr. Will, you want some balloons?

 
I know what Will wants….

crafty crafty

So I randomly will decide to get crafty at times.  Ok, I know that cross stitching can be considered crafty but there’s not too much personal creativity in it for me (because there’s a pattern to follow) – but that’s part of the joy of it for me.  I think it’s a math-brained thing really.

But I do like to get creative sometimes.  I really loved coming up with the various paper design elements for our wedding – the programs, the place cards and the table numbers.  I think that part of it was that I spent easily 3 hours or more searching the internet for a free source to provide me with the exact same font on our wedding invitations (I found it a whole bunch of places for sale for about $50).

Of course, what you can’t see (and there aren’t pictures) is that inside each place card there’s a “fun fact” about us (thanks to Ruben and Sarah for that idea) and on the back of each “table number” is a story about our time spent in each state.

I’d also designed the invitations for my matron of honor’s bridal shower and bachelorette party.  If I wasn’t in NC, I might make the effort to dig them out and take pictures.

Sometimes I wonder about trying to make an actual paying side project out of it like Michelle has but then I just don’t think I’m creative enough in a graphic design sense and I stick to just doing what I like for people I like – and myself, of course.  Besides, I don’t need to encourage my Paper Source habit in the slightest.

Oh – and I’m lazy.

Oh – and I really am going somewhere with this. 

I swear. 

It’s just that sometimes I feel the need for intros when I launch into something new and then the posts get really long if I continue on to my point and I don’t like that.