Hello and Welcome

I want to take a moment to say hi to all of the fine people that are clicking over from Story of My Life this morning. My name is Amy, the writer and creator of this little blog, and I'm so happy to have you.

Alright, here's the basics. I'm married to that big piece of man cake down there on the right. His name is Geoff, and if he knew that I'd just called him a piece of man cake, he'd probably leave me. You won't tell him will you? Oh good. (See? We're getting along already.) So, my man cake and I happen to have two sweet little kids. I like to write about our lives and take a picture our two so I can remember all of the adventures we've had together in my old age.

A few things about me...

If you've ever seen me stub my toe, you'll know that I have the mouth of a sailor and the temper of a Viking. I've swam with sharks (and not even on purpose) and peered over the edge of the Grand Canyon. I have a deep and long standing hatred for snakes and clowns. One of the most embarrassing things I've ever done is ask a lady that was not pregnant when her baby was due. (But in my defense she was wearing maternity pants!)

So basically, I'm just your average American sweetheart. I'm sure you love me already.  

Onto the good stuff, the kids. Sometimes they're a little goofy. 

A Good Day

Birthday Trip

For Neya's third birthday we're taking a trip to Cape Cod. I hope our weekend away is everything a girl who is in love with pink and the beach could hope for. Even though I will probably forget something important the day we leave, like diapers or our cell phone chargers, I think we've planned a great trip.

The important things-- cake, presents, decorations, and accommodations-- are already taken care of. Over the weekend, I found the perfect birthday present, a kid's digital camera. It takes videos and she can turn her pictures into "art", which I know will be a big hit. And of course, it's pink.

My husband is taking off Thursday, Friday, and the Monday following the weekend. It's the longest break we've all had together since Christmas, and it's long over due.

I can't wait.

What It Means To Be Me

This is the view from my kitchen window. I have my first cup of coffee here. It’s where you can find me when I’m answering emails, responding to comments, writing posts. Sometimes Peyton sits across from me and we play a game, or Neya scoots her chair up close and we spend the afternoon coloring. Basically, it’s where I work and spend a good amount of time during the day. I like it here.


My husband brought me home a bouquet of flowers this week and said, “This is for your blog. I’m so proud of what you’ve done.”

Swoon.

I put the flowers right in my favorite spot, right up by the window. I looked at them while I worked that afternoon. I couldn’t stop smiling at the sweet gesture.

Since I've become a mom, I’ve had two parts of my life that are always at odds with each other: my family and my career. I’ve never been very good at balancing the two. When my kids were little, I put all of my focus and attention on them, to the determinate of my marriage and my sanity. Then when Peyton and Neya got a little older, I unintentionally put my career above them. I learned the hard way that they were what was most important to me all along.

I’m learning to balance the two parts now, but the truth that I am more than just a mom and a wife won’t ever go away. So patiently and kindly, my little family allows me alone time to work. And in return, I continually remind myself that they need my time, too. They are my most important job.

Take a Hike

One of our favorite things to do together as a family is hike. Yesterday we hiked to this tower after Geoff got off of work. It was my favorite time of day, when the sun is just starting to think about setting. The temperature was perfect; not too hot, cool in the shade. Since we lived in Seattle for so long, I've gotten use to hiking in the rain. Sunny weather is a nice change. 

Before we left, my son begged me to let him take along his pirate hook. So of course, along the pirate hook came. He held onto it for the entire hike, and let me tell you, it was incredibly helpful. 

"Daddy, good thing I have my pirate hook so I can climb this mountain better!" 

"Daddy, Daddy, look at me! I'm Captain Hook and I'm the leader!" 

"Mommy, I'm a pirate and I'll get us to the top safe!" I'm not sure what the two things had to do with each other, but I went along with it. 

There was at least one person in every group of people that we met that noticed the hook and said something along the lines of, "Arrgh, matey!" 

Peyton completely ignored them. 

On the way down, I had this strange moment where I thought, "It's been a really long time since I've seen a snake while we were hiking." 

Bam! Snake slithers across the trail. 

Peyton screams, "Mama, Mama! Snake! Look, it's a snake, Mama!" 

It was the size of my husband, at least, with the head of a lion and teeth. The fracking thing head teeth, you guys. 

I took five steps back, realized my daughter was still in very immediate danger, and ran like hell to grab her. 

My idiot husband actually started to chase it through the bushes. My son followed. Dios mio. 

The rest of the hike went by very fast. Neya and I were the firsts ones to the car. 

Pink Balloons and Crepe Paper

Ever year when my kids blow out their candles on their birthday, I cry. I can't help it. At each party I promise myself that I'll hold it together, then I open my mouth and sing "Happy Birthday to yo-", and that's when I loose it.

In just two weeks Neya is turning three. I know that I need to face the fact that she's getting older, but a part of me clings tight (like, death grip tight) to the image of her after she was first born. I can still see her, just like she was. She was so beautiful.

In some ways, that baby is still with me. I can hear her when she laughs. When she cries, sometimes it’s still my baby that’s there when I scoop her up and kiss the tip of her nose. I tell myself that she’ll always be little and my baby.

But then I look at her, and I see her as she is, this strong, independent little girl. She's changed in front of my eyes, and I didn't even realize. 

She asked me today, “Mama? Will you play with me?”

And it just got me. She's growing up. Way. Too. Fast.

My Style Evolution

Confession: there was a time during Elementary School when I would only wear cowboy boots and Wrangler jeans. In my defense, I grew up in Montana, and I did ride horses on the weekends. Still, it didn't stop a boy in my class from asking me every day at our lockers if the rodeo was in town. I also had this bizarre and inexplicable love of big, padded fabric headbands, which I would wear with my bangs all tucked up in a big poof above my forehead. (Good lord, why am I telling you this?) A few years later I couldn't decide if I wanted to be a goth or a gangster, so I just sort of combined the two. The result, probably the most pathetic twelve year old with bleach blonde hair and baggy pants you've ever seen. I'll just gloss over my time in high school by telling you that I wore a lot of jeans and sweaters and my hair mostly stayed up in a ponytail. Oh, and flip flops. I loved me some flip-flops.

These days, I love it when I wake up in the morning and my hair is just messy enough that if I curl a few pieces and straighten out my bangs, I can throw it up into a messy top knot and be done with it. Although I like the polished look of an up do or a full head of curls, I lean towards a more hipster, Bohemian look when my hair is down. If I want to dress up my look to go from day to night, I might let my hair down and add a few more curls or a braid.

In the summer months, my closet is full of dresses, leggings, jeans, cardigans, light jackets, scarves, and with my shirts, I lean towards a good hourglass shape with a pattern. I love belts, especially when paired with a flowery shirt or a dress. In the winter I wear a lot of sweaters with leggings and boots. If I'm feeling really adventurous, I may add a necklace or a few rings.

There you have it folks, my style through the years. Deep stuff, I know. 

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I Hope I Remember This

I didn’t have a perfect Mother’s Day. My daughter woke me up by accidentally punching me in the eye. (Go ahead and laugh, my husband did.) But then we had pancakes and eggs and coffee (my favorite part) and the kids gave me the cards that they had picked out special for me (actually, that was my favorite part). My daughter sat in my lap with her head on my shoulder as I read her card, and it was just her. It was sweet and it said all of the things that she couldn’t put into words, because she’s only two (though I have a hard time remembering that sometimes), and at the end she showed me the flower she’d drawn special for me and I squeezed her very tightly because I love her so damn much.

My son kept saying, “It’s Mother’s Day!” like it was the biggest deal in the world and even though my husband and I had a long talk in the middle of the day that was sort of heavy and tough to get through, it was as close to perfect as a day can get.

About Parenthood

One day when my son and daughter are all grown up, I hope I'll be able to fill a book with all of the things I've learned from being their mama. It's amazing to me that they're still so young, and I already feel like I've learned a lifetime of wisdom. I can't imagine how much I will have learned in another ten years. God, help me.

Things I Learned From Being a Mama:

Never plan to drive for more than 6 hours a day on a road trip.

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When it's raining, put a towel by the door. That one works for dogs, too.

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And Then I Got Distracted

I've been spiffing things up around Picture It lately, getting ready for a sponsorship spot on this lovely blog that starts at the end of May. The potential of having so many new people clicking over to my humble little site is nerve wracking. It has me a little on edge.

I love this blog, truly. It has come far from it's lowly beginnings in January as a mostly disorganized mess of pictures and my random thoughts on life. I've tried out dozens (if not more) of layouts, fonts, headings, sidebars, and I feel closer than ever to achieving a look that feels like "me". I'm starting to take this blogging thing seriously, and it feels good. 

But sometimes I forget about what's important. I'm a mama and wife and that's my first job, always. Blogging can be a distraction from that. But it takes a lot of time to get a blog up and running, not to mention writing posts on a regular basis. When I don't put time into my blog, I feel guilty because I'm not working. When I do, I feel bad because my kids and husband need me, too. (Vicious circle.) So to get some clarity, I wrote down the reasons that I started this blog:

1. Share my pictures with the world.

2. Work on my writing.

3. Write down everything I want to remember about my kids and the memories my husband and I are making with them.

4. Talk about the things that I love.

I also, unintentionally realized that I wanted to:

5. Remember my past, my childhood, and talk about things that really matter to me. 

When I start something new, I want to make sure that I have good motives and reasons for going forward with it. I think that I started this blog with the best of intentions. 

And then I got distracted.

With pretty fonts and amazing designs, cool blogs, and even cooler people; with ad space and sponsored posts and Twitter and Bloglovin'. There is a whole wide blogging and social media world out there and it's intimidating as hell. Eesh. I get stressed just thinking about it.  

This weekend, instead of obsessing over design and posts and layout and everything blog related, I decided to take a little break. We went to the beach. 

My Week and Stuff

This week I started two new projects, 365 Days of Grateful and a Photo a Day May challenge via Instagram. Here's a look back at my week in pictures!

It was rainy almost all week, so we were stuck in doors watching our favorite cartoons, drinking warm things and playing games. All in all, it wasn't a bad way to spend our time.

Reading blogs and drinking coffee during nap time. My very first #365Grateful!

Trick My Ride

My kids are the proud new owners of a pair of bicycles.

Neya's bicycle has a carrier on the back for her dollies and a little bag on the front to hold whatever a girl could need. The last bike ride we went on she needed sidewalk chalk, matchbox cars, jewelry, and a bottle of water. Very sensible choices, I thought.

365 Days of Grateful

The beginning of a good story should always start with "I started seeing a nun who did life coaching..." In the case of Hailey, a photographer and mom, this is actually how her story to find one thing she was grateful for every day began. 

That Time My Mom Scared a Little Old Man

When I turned sixteen, my mom and step dad took me to Seattle for my birthday.

After we checked into our hotel, my sister, step dad and I were looking at the pool when we realized that my mom had disappeared. A moment later, we heard screaming. We followed the sound around the corner to find my mom and a little old man staring at each other.

Alabama Shakes - Boys and Girls

If I could go back in time and pick another song for my first dance with my husband on our wedding day, this is the song I would pick.

"Last June or July, one of their videos gets picked up by the music blog Aquarium Drunkard. It gets the attention of one of the blog's readers, Pat Hood of Drive-By Truckers, who tracks down lead singer/guitarist Brittany Howard (who is working for the post office in Athens, Alabama at the time). He invites the band to open a few shows for DBT. By October, they're headlining a CMJ showcase show. By December, they've all quit their day jobs, have professional representation, and are shopping their demo to labels. By April, they've played sold-out shows in the UK and US, their album hits #5 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #3 on the UK charts."

Quote via Dooce.com

Oh the Places You'll Go

I'm not ashamed to admit that the first time I read Oh the Places You'll Go by Dr. Seuss to my kids I wept openly onto my husbands shoulder teared up. It wasn't just that the writing was good, though it is, it was that somehow Dr. Seuss conveyed in this one little book what LIFE is like, with all of its ups and downs and twists and turns and things that go bump in the night. Somehow, he tells all of the lessons that I want to pass on to my son and daughter, but beautifully, lyrically. How is that even possible, to so capture the wisdom a parent wants to share with their child? I don't know. I assume it has something to do with being a genius with a great big heart. 

The Pursuit of Happiness

“I actually attack the concept of happiness. I don’t mind people being happy - but the idea that everything we do is part of the pursuit of happiness seems to me a really dangerous idea and has led to a contemporary disease in Western society, which is fear of sadness. It’s a really odd thing that we’re now seeing people saying 'write down 3 things that made you happy today before you go to sleep', and 'cheer up' and 'happiness is our birthright' and so on. We’re kind of teaching our kids that happiness is the default position - it’s rubbish. Wholeness is what we ought to be striving for and part of that is sadness, disappointment, frustration, failure; all of those things which make us who we are. Happiness and victory and fulfillment are nice little things that also happen to us, but they don’t teach us much. Everyone says we grow through pain and then as soon as they experience pain they say 'Quick! Move on! Cheer up!' I’d like just for a year to have a moratorium on the word 'happiness' and to replace it with the word 'wholeness'. Ask yourself 'is this contributing to my wholeness?' and if you’re having a bad day, it is.”

Hugh Mackay, psychologist and social researcher

I may be taking a big leap here, but this quote reminded me of the movie, The Pursuit of Happyness with Will Smith and his son, Jaden. Because despite the title, the movie is actually about Chris's search for a future for his family and at the end of the movie, I don't think that Chris necessarily found 'happiness' but 'wholeness'. As Dr. Mackay said,

Why Orange Juice Makes Me Cry

I spent a lot of time at my grandparent's house while I was growing up. My memories are a mix of Saturday morning pancakes with orange juice and summers spent hanging out with the other kids in the neighborhood. A lot of those memories happen to be funny, like the time I was with a friend down by the 'lake' (really an over sized pond, but we called it a lake because it seemed huge to us) when we spotted a few bees. I watched them warily from a distance while my friend, who it turns out was very afraid of bees indeed, freaked the f out. She got stung. She took off towards her house, screaming and flailing her arms. I think at some point a neighbor came out to see who was on fire. In the end it turned out that she wasn't allergic, not even little.

Scarlett Johansson

Scarlett Johansson first caught my eye when she starred as Griet in Girl With a Pearl Earring back in 2003. I read the book before the movie came out and I can honestly say that the movie met my expectations, which doesn't usually happen with a book to film translation. Scarlett  made Griet's character come to life for me. I've been a fan of her's ever since.

Woody Allen, who first met Scarlett on the set of the film Match Point, said she has “the acting ability to be not just a passing pinup girl but a genuinely meaningful actress.”

Agreed.

Cookie Failure

This is what happens when I make cookies. 

<Here’s where I'm suppose to show you a picture of my failed cookie attempt, but I'm not going to do that. Instead, I want you to imagine a big lump of brown gooey oatmeal dotted with raisins and some sort of oozing nastiness. Got it? Okay, take that image, duplicate it twenty four times, super glue that image to two big cookie sheets, and voila! my failure.>

What can I say? I have a special talent for screwing things up. It’s sort of epic, like a super power of sucky-ness. A sucker power, you might say.