B-Day

Don't worry, you didn't forget my birthday. There is a new meaning for the popular abbreviation "B-day" and it's an exciting descriptor for my day yesterday which I have dubbed Breast Biopsy Day. Yay.

Not so much.

All in all, the biopsy wasn't fun but it wasn't as terrible as I had mentally prepared myself for. I did almost faint at the end which prompted the nurses to cover me in cold rags and force apple juice into my mouth, and that was just plain embarrasing. But I never react well to numbing agents, in fact I have a very low tolerance to any medicine, so this wasn't a huge surprise.

I'll spare you the gory details and leave you with some "highlights":

1- I get to work in bed with an ice pack tucked into my bra.
2- I forgot how yummy apple juice is. Yummm.
3- I had a really fast-talking doctor from Africa who was very sweet to me even with my negative attitude and the fact that I told her 9 times "I don't want to see anything and please don't tell me step-by-step what you're doing!" I really just wanted to slip into my yoga breathing and picture myself and Ryan Reynolds on an island somewhere.
4- They put a chip into the tumor so that when I get older it will show up on mammograms and they'll know they already looked at it. Matt is convinced the government is now tracking my every move. I'm pretty sure once they see how few exciting things I do they'll become disinterested and move on.
5- I can't lift Madelyn for 5 days but we're heading to Orlando tonight for THANKSGIVING (!) so my mom can help with the monkey.
6- It's done. The best highlight of all.

Hope you all have a safe and wonderful holiday!

It's ON!

Our house that is...its officially on the market!! We're just slightly excited.

Here are a few pictures. You never know who out there may know someone who wants to move to the beautiful suburb of Fayetteville.


The house is precious. We've truly put our heart and soul into it and will miss it dearly, but it's time for us to move on. And "on" for us means moving closer to work and family.

We've had many late-night get togethers on the back deck, celebrated bringing our baby girl home, even had our first kiss on the couch in the living room back when Matt's parents still owned the house. It's dripping with memories, and we will no doubt be dripping with tears upon leaving it.

I only hope her next owners love her as much as we have:)

Poor me

Poor me.

Tonight I leave for a 3 day business trip in Paris. I get to stay in the most beautiful hotel in the city, right next to the Opera House and a sweet little street vendor that sells the best scarves. I get to eat nutella and banana crepes for breakfast and indulge in French coffee and chocolate which in my opinion are the absolute best.

(from a website called We Heart It but I don't have time to find the link)

I'll fly first class, drinking wine and watching movies of my choice before reclining in my seat and sleeping the rest of the flight away.

Poor, poor me.

I'll also be flying for a total of 19 hours, working 12-14 hour days, surviving on coffee because I tend to experience extreme levels of jet lag when I travel overseas, and spending three precious days away from my honey and my Madelyn who literally evolves in front of my eyes every single day. I figure by the time I get back she'll be going to ballet class and practicing long division. Scary.

Bonjour for now, blog friends!

Craving boring

I'm fighting an unusual craving and it appears I'm going to lose. It's not the usual battle I wage between myself and the M&Ms in the work kitchen, or the draw to the couch when I really need to work out, it's a craving for one full week of normal, boring life.

It feels like since the spring it has been one thing after the other. Car repairs, house repairs, Matt traveling, myself traveling, illnesses, birthday parties, you name it, we've done it.

Sadly the next 6 weeks don't look much better.

This week had a lot of potential to be the week I needed. No major plans in sight (until Thanksgiving of course), my dad flying in on Friday which I was so looking forward to, and I appeared to be off the hook for an upcoming meeting in Paris which I didn't want to work (more on that later). Then yesterday I took Madelyn up to the pediatric pulmonologist to find out she has asthma. Coming from an asthmatic, this is like a parental nightmare because it's a condition that's generally difficult to anticipate and even more difficult to control. And as we all know, I like control.

After returning home I noticed the smell of gas around our water heater, and after a hour of "do I call the emergency service line? Do I not call? Am I crazy?" I called. Good thing, because we had a small gas leak. "Of course we do" I thought to myself.

Today we're meeting with the listing agent to get our house on the market. Next Tuesday I have my biopsy to confirm "the lump" is nothing (can you tell I'm confident?), Wednesday we head down to Florida for 5 days, and Tuesday I leave for Paris. Turns out I do have to go. Of course I do.

I know one day when it's just Matt and I sitting around, old and retired, I'll think about the days when we ran around like crazies and wished for a sometimes quieter life, and I'll feel blessed we had so many fun things to do and so many wonderful people to do them with.

But for now, all this mama wants is a plain, old, boring week.

How I spent my weekend

This is me in the middle of my two dear friends, Dai and Kristin. We're riding a motorized cooler through the streets of Gainesville, Florida in the midst of gameday mayhem. Just a normal Saturday.

Note: next time you ride a cooler, don't wear a dress.

And to the officer who insisted we immediately park our "vehicle" because we were endangering pedestrians, it IS street legal.

If you wanted to bust us for something you should have checked the inside of the cooler for open containers.

Just sayin'.

My best gift ever

Every year I have the hardest time trying to figure out what to give my dad for Christmas. You'd think, given that he's one of my favorite people and I know him so well, that this would be a slam dunk. Oh, if it were only that easy.

Let's not even mention that when you have an 8 month old baby at home, the last thing you want to do is spend your weekends trudging through the mall racking your brain for creative ideas all the while risking an inevitable infant meltdown every minute you forge on.

After years of DVDs and picture frames I cracked the code, thanks to Shutterfly. I made my Dad a hard cover photo book chronicling those first 8 months of Madelyn's life. And he said it was hands-down his favorite gift he'd ever been given (minus myself and my sister, duh). He was in awe of how professional and polished the book was. More importantly, he loved every little piece of evidence that he had been there for Madelyn's most important moments. He still talks about "the book" to this day, which says a lot given that the guy pretty much has everything he wants.

This year when I asked him what was on his list for Santa he simply replied "another one of those flutterfly books of my sweet little granddaughter" (he can never remember the word Shutterfly which I find very endearing for such a successful, professional guy).

I've been a long time user of Shutterfly and these books are really just the icing on the cake. They have a huge expanded selection of holiday cards and tons of beautiful, creative gift ideas that your friends and family will treasure. Here are a few of my favorites. As you can probably tell, I'm a "less is more" kind of girl :) Oh, and I love Christmas cards that mention peace and joy which many of their's do.

So simple yet so sweet! I just die over that picture.

Starlight Flurries

Again, simple and pretty

Full of Love

I love this brown as a Christmas color (yes, I'm the girl who's entire house is tan, don't judge me)

Peace and Joy

these luggage tags would make an adorable gift for newlyweds

these notebooks would make a great gift for someone who compulsively makes to do lists. ahem.

Everything I've ever ordered from Shutterfly has been great quality and has shipped quickly, which is great for an admittedly impatient person like myself.

And, since not everyone is as boring as me, here are a few really fun cards:

Glow and Behold

Initially chic (I don't know about you, but this girl LOVES a monogram)

Retro Chic

Happy holiday gift ordering, everyone!

Bloggers- get 50 free holiday cards from Shutterfly! Sign up here.

My new digs

I'd like to thank the fabulous Penny Lane Designs for my gorgeous site makeover!

I saw this template on her site and just fell in love.

Everyone needs a little makeover every now and then. Since I've already done my house and my closet, the blog was just bound to be next. And when I say I made-over my house and closet, you should know the great majority of the items that made those acts possible came from Target.
And took years to complete.

A day for me

Today was my day. The entire day. Matt was taking Madelyn to his parents house and going to a football game, and I have been alone, on my own, since 7 a.m. this morning.

ALL I have asked for all summer and fall is one day to myself, to do whatever I want, and not have to take care of anything but myself.

Well I got my day. And I had absolutely no idea what to do with myself. Seriously. How ridiculous is that?

I had plans in the morning to get together with some girlfriends and ooh and aah over a new baby in the group. It was just as fun as I expected. I absolutely cherish my girl time. I guess I'm a bit of a girl's girl, which is probably good given that I'm raising one. We had lovely conversations about nap times, entertaining children when it's cold out, how wine and coffee are so essential to motherhood, and how our husbands parent our children completely different than we do, simply because they're men.

Turns out once you have kids you just can't help but talk about them, even in the rare moments you get some time away. Go figure.

After my time with the ladies I went to the mall, but the whole time I felt rushed. I think that's just my default setting these days. Rush home from work. Rush to get ready. Rush rush rush.

I mean, I'm a fast walker anyways but you would have thought I was one of those speed-walking women pumping my arms and sporting a fanny pack. You know the type.

Anyways, I finally calmed myself down. I tried on some dresses for a few events we have coming up but didn't buy a single thing except for an eggnog latte from Starbucks.

Now I'm home missing my honey and my monkey. I missed them all day. I baked a double batch of these muffins, a batch of this Uh-mazing rice pudding, and now I'm sipping a glass of red and halfway watching football.

Turns out a day to myself was nice, but not all it was cracked up to be. I think a few hours would have been sufficient.

So much of who I am now is Madelyn's mommy that when I spend an entire day away from her it truly feels like a little piece of my heart is missing. It's quiet, and my idle hands aren't

quite sure what to do with "free time." Imagine that.

Matt and this little face will be home in a few hours and I plan to spend all day tomorrow loving on them and being grateful they make my heart feel so full. And next time I'll be careful what I wish for :)

Momnesia

Momnesia (n.): the inability to remember anything not written down or on your blackberry task list. Often occurs after childbirth. Worsens with age.

I once read that the aluminum in coke cans has been linked to early Alzheimer's, but I wonder if anyone has documented the effects on your brain that come from raising children.

Exhibit A. In the past 3 months I've left work twice oblivious to the fact that I was missing important items. Once, my laptop bag WITH my laptop. Another time, my purse. Not just my lip gloss, sunglasses, or snack for the ride home. The whole thing. Yesterday I pulled into the garage and reached down to turn the car off.

Turns out it helps to put the car in park before turning off the ignition.

Thank God for technological safety advances.

If you've seen Something to Talk About with Julia Roberts and Dennis Quaid you remember Julia's character constantly leaving to go somewhere and accidentally leaving her daughter behind.

I sincerely hope this is not what's next.

What causes this complete memory lapse? It's true that motherhood is busy. Very, very, busy. Maybe we all just have too much to do? Maybe it's learning to do all of those things on less sleep than we're accustomed to? Maybe the part of your brain that used to serve as your common-sense memory organ now swirls with Baby Einstein songs and verses from Goodnight Moon?

I tend to think it's because you get so used to focusing on one thing that you tend to let the rest fall by the wayside. Has Madelyn been fed? Yes. Is she clothed? Yes. Am I clothed? Yes.

Except for the time the mailman came to the door and I answered in my nursing bra. But that's another story for another day.

As I told my mom last week, I often feel like I'm a doctor in the triage unit of my life. Tend to those things in the most critical condition, the others can wait. Stop the bleeding (crying), bandage the wound (provide sippy and baby doll), move on to the next crisis.

Lord help me when we have more children.

And please say a prayer for our mailman, bless his heart. I fear he may be scarred for life.