Dancing with Daffodils

I am all for moving forward, upward and onward in life.  I was thrilled to go to college, get married, become a mother, and while I dislike the process of moving, six of the eight times I’ve had to do it I’ve been excited for the new adventure that awaited me. What gets me is the lateral changes; the times when things are just different than they used to be but aren’t necessarily any better or worse.  Those changes take time for me wrap my mind around and figure out if I like or not.  Right now we’re in the situation of having three children and two rooms and trying to figure out who shares.  Our first try was putting the baby with the 4-year-old who is a super sleeper.  Turns out that baby wakes up too early when she sees her big brother in the room and starts yelling to get him up to play with her and even he couldn’t sleep through that display of noisy affection. Try number two is going to happen this weekend where we’ll put the older two together an...

Four years ago today the Vancouver Winter Olympics were going on and I took my 18-month-old daughter to the doctor for her check up.  I was also supposed to be having a baby boy.  After three years of fertility treatments, I was finally able to get pregnant with my daughter.  I adored her and she was the perfect little baby.  When she was about 10 months old, I realized that I was unusually tired, a tired that persisted no matter how much I slept.  I had an extra pregnancy test laying around so I thought I’d take it just to rule it out but you cannot imagine my shock when it came back positive.  I had never seen a positive result before and I’d taken close to 50.  It was so exciting and overwhelming and seriously surprising.  We had recently moved here and I started calling around to OBGYNs trying to get an appointment for confirmation with my hands shaking as I dialed. My husband was out of town and when he returned home a few days late...

Valentine’s Day is one of my very favorite holidays. I’ve loved it since I was a child and my parents would give me a valentine and we’d have chocolate and a special dinner.  I enjoy sharing love with my family and friends, plus I love covering my house in pink and red hearts.  There is so much positivity about the holiday and I believe love is worth celebrating.  I know some people are bitter because they don’t have a significant other to share the holiday with but I think Valentine’s Day is an opportunity to celebrate all love, including siblings, friends, cousins, parents, and children.  Even likable co-workers deserve a chocolate heart or two.   One of my favorite Valentine’s Day memories is from the year after we got married.  Josh was a full-time student and I was a temporarily unemployed graduate.  We had decided even while dating not to exchange gifts but to do something fun together as a way to celebrate the holiday. Unfortunately that ...