Surprise me.

Phase of life

Back in November I made a visit to my alma mater. I was in Wichita picking up a bridesmaid dress, and my old stopping grounds are within driving distance.

My former boss said something that day that stuck with me. I’m paraphrasing here, but it was something along the lines of: “Each phase of your life is better than the last.”

I have to agree with that.

After high school, I knew I’d go to college. After college, I knew I’d get a job. After I got that job, I knew I wanted another job. After that job, well, you get the point.

I never realized that all of the dots eventually connect and lead to something bigger and better down the road.

No one told me what that road would be like 10 years ago. No one told me what it feels like to hold your nieces. On a related note, no one told me that when you burp them, you better turn their head away from your face.

Take my advice on that one.

Also, no one told me what it would feel like to see one of your childhood friends – your best childhood friend of more than 20 years – in a wedding dress.

Yes, I should have expected all of those things to happen. People grow up and move on to bigger and better things all the time. These are the little things that I wanted to be a part of when I moved back to my hometown.

I’m happy that I get to be a part of these people’s lives.

It’s true. Each phase of your life is better than the last one.

I can do this.

On Sunday afternoon I successfully watched two baby humans without supervision for about an hour.

After that hour, my dad arrived to help me, but fell asleep with one of the babies.

Both babies lived. We had a diaper and outfit change that was nearly disastrous, but we got through it. Plus, the other baby and my dad slept through that incident, so I don't think it was very bad at all. The crying stopped after I wrapped her up like a baby burrito, laid her on my shoulder and rocked her back to sleep.

When mommy and daddy got home, I was watching television and both babies were sleeping peacefully.

World, I can do this baby thing. Not only can I do it, I kind of like it.

Aunt Monica has a nice ring to it.

Overheard

Things I've said today:

"Hurry up and burp. Your sister has to eat."

"Carly, do you really have to lick your butt on the couch?"

:)

Let there be light

Life's all about finding unique solutions to problems.

Take this morning, for instance, around 6:45ish a.m. The electricity went off at my house.

This caused several problems:

1. My hair was soaking wet.

2. My breakfast requires a microwave.

3. Putting on make-up in a dark bathroom? Please.

My dog came to tell me about the lack of electricity a few minutes later. I asked her what I should do about my hair. She snorted and walked away.

Sometimes I wish I could do that in life.

Anyway, instead of worrying I was going to be late and look like a slob today, I decided to embrace the challenge of getting ready for work with no lights. Penny wandered off somewhere and probably went back to sleep. Pugs.

Anyway, my solutions to the problems above included:

1. Towel drying my hair as much as possible, then doing the whole 'just put goop in it and hope for the wet/curly look.' It doesn't look half bad, actually. Goop works. The other option was wet hair in a ponytail. Um, I don't think so.

2. I ate breakfast at work this morning as soon as the electricity came back on. I was crabby and hungry, but survived the late breakfast time. First world problem.

3. I didn't bother putting make-up on at my house and just took it to work. The cool thing is it was dark there, too, so no one really cared.

All in all, I would say I won this problem.

Side note: I found a quote that I love earlier this week. I never thought about it until now, but it's true.

“Bad things don’t happen to writers; it’s all material.”
– Garrison Keillor

Not graceful.

A television station posted a story on Facebook yesterday about a child who got his head stuck in an escalator at a mall in Wichita.

People's comments on Facebook weren't very nice. Where was the mother? Didn't she know better? Why was the child around the escalator alone? That mom is a terrible person! Fire her! She doesn't deserve children!

My confession: Um, that almost happened to me last weekend. 

Let me explain. I'm a lot of things in life - creative, a good driver, a good speller, punctual - but I am not graceful. It doesn't take much for me to trip and fall over things, or over nothing at all.

For some reason, I thought I could walk down a moving surface gracefully. Ha, ha.

It could have been a disaster. I caught my balance after a couple of seconds, but there was a brief moment when I wasn't entirely sure how it was going to end. Luckily, my ego was the only thing hurt.

If a late 20-something-year-old can almost injure herself on an escalator, then yes, I can see how a 4-year-old can get hurt (the boy is fine, by the way). If I would have been a newspaper story I hate to think of what the comments would have been like.

Jesus, people. Stop being so judgmental.

Girl

I can't stop listening to Carrie Underwood's song, "All American Girl."

I'm a big fan of hanging out with two little girls. When I look at them I think of the lyrics: "sweet, little, beautiful, wonderful, perfect All-American girl."

All American Girl

Since the day they got married
He'd been praying for a little baby boy
Someone he could take fishing
Throw the football, be his pride and joy
He could already see him holding that trophy
Taking his team to state
But when the nurse came in with a little pink blanket
All those big dreams changed

And now, he's wrapped around her finger
She's the center of his whole world
And his heart belongs to that sweet, little, beautiful, wonderful, perfect
All-American girl

Sixteen short years later
She was falling for the senior football star
Before you knew it he was dropping passes
Skipping practice just to spend more time with her

The coach said, "Hey, son, what's your problem
Tell me have you lost your mind?
Daddy said you'll lose your free ride to college.
Boy, you better tell her goodbye."

But now, he's wrapped around her finger
She's the center of his whole world
And his heart belongs to that sweet, little, beautiful, wonderful, perfect
All-American

And when they got married and decided to have one of their own
She said, "Be honest, tell me what you want?"
And he said, "Honey, you ought to know...

A sweet, little, beautiful one just-a like you.
I want a beautiful, wonderful, perfect all-American..."

Now he's wrapped around her finger
She's the center of his whole world
And his heart belongs to that sweet, little, beautiful, wonderful, perfect
All-American girl

All-American girl

Valentine's Day

I'm sad to report I don't have a photo of this, and I probably won't take one.

In my hometown's daily newspaper there's a Valentine's Day ad next to a divorce ad. Honey, I love you! Divorce - only $350!

I got a kick out of it.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Inappropriate and appropriate at the same time

I have nothing to add to this except I saved this image as, "lolololol."

Boring

Being an adult is lame and boring sometimes.

The past couple of hours has involved me gathering information for taxes, dealing with some health insurance stuff, and the annual requesting of and viewing of my credit report.

Yawn on all three accounts.

The most exciting thing that's happened to me tonight is listening to my dog snore and giggling at her like there's no tomorrow. Pugs...

Me: Penny, want to wake up? Penny: Bite me, human.

The best pins ever

I used to use Pinterest for semi-serious things, like recipes and what I want my future house to look like.

Nowadays, I just find really funny and inappropriate things and send them to my bff.

Good times are had by all.

And for the record, I did work out today. So take that, pins about not working out!

On snow and dog sitting

I'm not really sure how many inches of snow we got, but the number doesn't really matter.

My Pug knows there's white stuff out there, and she wants no part of it.

This is how my weekend went:

"Penny, want to go outside?"

"...Penny? Where are you?"

"Penny!"

Once the word 'outside' is mentioned, she puts her tail between her legs and runs away from me. She'll lay on a dog bed in the front room facing the wall, pretending to be invisible. She won't go outside by herself, so I have to pick her up, open the door, then toss her outside. She also starts shivering violently as soon as the word 'outside' is mentioned.

And that's how I spent my weekend.

Pugs.

I also spent the weekend watching multiple houses and multiple sets of dogs. This leaves me spread a little thin, and I don't have a whole lot of patience for dogs who act like idiots (I say that with all the love in my heart).

Idiot No. 1:

Jasper is a blue merle Collie. He's five years old (I think) and he's a beautiful, playful dog.

He also hates it when I watch him.

I've lived in my hometown for 2.5 years now. I see this dog almost every day. He's always happy to see me and he doesn't mind coming to me and asking for chicken chewies.

But Jasper doesn't like it when I'm in charge. He'll stare at me, like he is in this picture, with a disapproving look on his face.

I mean, I know how to take care of dogs. I spent five years in college. I think I can handle this. Food, water, medicine, go outside, belly rub, toys...it's not that difficult.

But Jasper is unconvinced about me being qualified to take care of him. He whines and cries in the middle of the night, spends his days pacing around the house, and he stares at the door that leads into the garage, as if my parents are right behind it.

I don't know what to tell him.

Does anyone have a pair of big boy pants he can borrow when his owners are out of town?

Quotable

No one should be surprised at this, but I have some news. I lost that piece of paper that had the page numbers that marked my favorite quotes from the book 'The first phone call from heaven.'

In the past month I've also lost my car keys numerous times and my purse. Oh well.

I looked through the book multiple times trying to find one quote. I never found it again, but when I read it for the first time I couldn't turn the page. I kept going back to that one quote.

It was something to the effect of this: "What in life can love not fix?"

I'm going to keep searching for that stupid piece of paper over the weekend. Until then...

Life tip

I learned an important lesson this morning.

In order to start your car on a cold winter morning, you need your car keys. If your keys are in another person's car across town, that's not going to be of much help.

Oops.

This is a promising start to the day.

On organization

In the past four weeks I've gone out of town five times.

I haven't had much time to think or breathe, let alone organize my things and my life. I'm waiting for life to slow down a bit and not be so hectic.

In the meantime, my purse has been driving me crazy. I can't find anything in it, and when I do find something and pull it out, 15 other things fall out. Tonight I dumped my purse out and kept a tally of all the things I found (please note that my purse isn't even that big).

After I emptied the contents out, here's what I found:

- Seven pens.

- Three highlighters.

- Five tubes of lip gloss.

- One jump drive.

- One toothbrush.

- One bottle of contact solution.

- One $1 bill (I have cash? Sweet!)

- A bill.

- Two hospital ID bracelets from two pretty cute little girls I know.

- A stack of my business cards I didn't know I had.

- A stack of other people's business cards I didn't know I had.

- A phone charger, which I thought I lost.

- A pair of gloves I looked all over for this morning and couldn't find anywhere. That's right, I walked around in the snow today without gloves on while they were in my purse the whole time. Sigh.

Living life always on the go is tough. My purse is now neatly organized. Life, on the other hand, is not organized at all. Another sigh.

Humbly take your place

I can't stop listening to John McCutcheon's 2007 album "This Fire." I've heard one of the songs before, and I've played it a few times this morning.

Forgiving isn't an easy thing for me to do. I can't even say I'm working on it, because I'm not. This song, however, gives some helpful advice: There's nothing you can really do / There's nothing you can say / Except to humbly take your place / And in every trial that we face / May we somehow find the grace / To live the words we pray.

Fine, John McCutcheon. I'll work on that whole forgiving thing.

Forgive us

In the little town that I was born in
Early every Sunday morning
We'd drive past those fields of corn
That led us to Saint James
Planted in those hard oak pews
Your neighbors sitting next to you
Said the words each of us knew
As well as our own names
"Our Father,
Who art in Heaven,
Holy is your name.
Thy kingdom come,
Thy will be done.
Give us this day our bread."
Then came the hardest part
The one that troubled every heart
Those haunting words of mystery
That long have followed after me

Forgive us, as we forgive
Forgive us, as we forgive
Forgive us, as we forgive each other

In the long years since those days
My soul and heart have often strayed
But still I bow my life to pray
Those sweet, familiar words
But, oh, the meanings shift and dart
Whenever I come to that part
It stirs my soul, it stills my heart
Like nothing I have heard

Forgive us, as we forgive
Forgive us, as we forgive
Forgive us, as we forgive each other
Forgive us, as we forgive
Forgive us, as we forgive
Forgive us

In that Pennsylvania town
That awful day, that awful sound
When madness struck the young girls down
A tale too often heard
These strangers from another time
They knew the grief, they knew the crime
But somehow, somewhere they could find
The strength to say these words:

Forgive us, as we forgive
Forgive us, as we forgive
Forgive us, as we forgive each other

Sometimes what's holy is so true
It's standing right in front of you
Nothing you can really do,
There's nothing you can say
Except to humbly take your place
And in every trial that we face
May we somehow find the grace
To live the words we pray

Forgive us, as we forgive
Forgive us, as we forgive
Forgive us, as we forgive each other
Forgive us, as we forgive
Forgive us, as we forgive
Forgive us, forgive.

The awesome.

I've been struggling to stay awake since 7 p.m. tonight.

I missed the Puppy Bowl, put off paying bills, quit watching the Super Bowl after halftime, played too much Candy Crush and managed to get some laundry done.

At 10 p.m., I picked up my unfinished book and started to read. I finished it in 30 minutes.

Oh. My. God. The awesome!

I have a white sheet of paper with random numbers written on it. That means I'll do another quotes list post in the near future.

In the meantime, I found a perfect quote: "...heaven is always and forever around us, and no soul remembered is ever really gone."

Mitch Albom, you are amazing.

That's a nice toe you have there.

I'm too tired to write tonight. Instead, I'm just going to send the Broncos good vibes and give you a bunch of pins from Pinterest instead.