the month of giving thanks

I know it's A Thing for bloggers and people on Facebook to post what they're grateful for every day of the month of November, which is a nice exercise and all, but I'm not going to do that because I would not remember to do it every day and then feel stressed about starting something I didn't finish. But I do want to give a shout-out to the fact that this is the month of gratitude.

I was explaining to a friend today about how I don't feel any desire to go back to school and that I definitely don't want to get a PhD. This friend is in a PhD program right now, and I didn't want to make her think I judged her decision at all, so I was trying to explain how my experience with my master's program has just turned me off from wanting to sign up for more school ever again (or at least that's how it feels right now). How it was a great program but that I just felt like my life was so pointless, that I was studying and writing about things that were useless and would never be helpful to anyone, that I hated, hated, hated every stupid paper I had to write and every stupid class I had to sit through. How I cried nearly every Sunday night because I had to go back to school the next day, and just how unhappy I was with my life. And I remembered how unhappy I really was! How every day I felt like I was just dragging myself through everything, step by step, just dying to get to the weekend when Tommy and I could relax and not think about school any more.

I had really, truly, forgotten how sad and tired and depressed I had been, having to drag myself through the rest of that program. (Not that my life was really that bad, folks. I just hated this one aspect of it.) And I realized WHY I had forgotten it--because I am so much happier with life now.

It's not that I just love Dane so much and it makes this new phase of my life where I'm a stay-at-home mom all magical and wonderful. It's not the cute moments that Dane and I have hundreds of times a day that make me happy with my life (although those are great). It's not that there aren't lots of bad days and hundreds of frustrating, terrible moments where I have to learn to control my temper (because there are many of those). It's not that I think being a stay-at-home mom is the be-all and end-all of motherhood for everyone (because I really think that every woman and mom should be able to choose what she wants to do).

I don't really know what it is, but I just know that I am so much happier now than I was in school.

And I am so, so grateful that I feel that way and that I am able to have this life that makes me happy.

happy halloween!

I'll post more of a story about our Halloween festivities later, but just here are a few pictures of Dane in his costumeS for my mom and sister who have been asking for them. Note that they are TERRIBLE pictures and that it is impossible to get one with Dane actually looking at the camera, let alone smiling. He is naughty. But he is also a super cute pumpkin/cowboy.

10/12/13

Everyone knows that 10/12 is a BIG day around these parts. We look forward to it all year (especially by seeing it on the clock twice a day). I turned 25 this year, which seems like a nice round number that should be celebrated in an extra-special way. Since we are super classy people with expensive tastes, we did some really fancy things to celebrate.

First, I went to teach at Durham Tech at eight in the morning, so I had to get up at six to prepare. But I made sure to eat my birthday cereal and open the birthday cards I got from parents and grandparents before I went.

After class, Tommy picked me up and told me we were going to a little farm/pumpkin patch place, which sounded awesome because Dane would love it and we are just obsessed with doing whatever Dane wants to do. Turns out good thing I wasn't set on going because it was a LIE--we were actually going to a surprise party my friends threw for me at their house! And the even more awesome part of it was that it was a HARRY POTTER surprise party, which really just took the cake. (I had been thinking about having a birthday party, but I never got around to planning one [TOO MUCH WORK!] and these awesome friends had known I was wanting to do it and just did it for me. It was so fun and wonderful of them.) And I didn't even get a picture with them at the party--but thanks so much to Sarah, Stephanie, and Libby for all of the fantastic planning and excitement.

There were all sorts of Harry Potter-themed foods, like Cauldron Cupcakes and Corned Beef Sandwiches and all other delicious and fun sorts of foods that were named Harry Potter names.

Oh yeah, Tommy brought our Harry Potter costumes that we made a few years ago and tried to get me to wear it for the party. I put on the cape, which was actually just a $3 vampire cape we got a the dollar store. So if I don't actually look like Hermione Granger in these pictures, that's why.

And we played some awesome Harry Potter trivia games, which I totally failed at and which made me really think hard about re-reading the books. It's been almost a year and a half since I last read them--I think it's time Harry and I reunite. Joanna and Sarah killed the rest of us with their HP trivia--hats off to the Ehrisman sisters!

After the fabulous party, Tommy and I went home and we got Dane down for his nap and continued celebrating by taking a nap too. We had a babysitter all lined up for the evening, but no real plans, so we decided spur-of-the-moment to buy tickets to see Beauty and the Beast at the DPAC that night. It was super last-minute but such a fun splurge to do something exciting. And the play was awesome! We really loved it and had a great time seeing the show.

It was a really great birthday! The big 2-5, my friends. I still feel like I'm always the youngest person I know (at church, with friends, anywhere) so I'm still glad to hit another year to reach an age where people will take me seriously and not just think I'm just a baby. It's weird to think that when we moved here to Durham I was only 21 and Tommy was 25 himself. That really makes it seem like we've been here for a while. But this last year really has been the best--and FASTEST--yet (thanks to our little friend). I can't wait to see what my twenty-sixth year will be like.

Dane, utensil hoarder

His rice spoon--his BEST friend.

TWO spoons. Life is good.

Dane is for some reason obsessed with spoons. He ALWAYS wants to be holding one, whether he's eating, napping, bathing, playing, walking around. We have friends who ask where Dane's spoon is whenever they see him without one. He's not particular about whatever type of spoon it is; he loves the regular eating spoons, wooden spoons, plastic spoons--he'll even take a fork in desperate circumstances. He's been lusting after our giant soup ladle recently, which is far too big and heavy for him to actually grab onto. But his absolute favorite is the rice scooper that came with our rice cooker--he holds it all day long and whenever we make rice we can't actually use the spoon with it because if he sees it he screams for it. We aren't sure where this obsession came from, but it is hilarious.

Every night after Dane goes to bed, Tommy and I have a conversation like this:

Me: Oh my gosh, he is just so cute.
Tommy: Oh man. Remember when he was walking around laughing at himself? And he was holding his wooden spoon and banging the balloon with it?
Me: He's so funny. Today when I was reading him books he pointed out the balloons in the book and then pointed at the real balloon here. It was so amazing. How did he figure that out?
Tommy: And he points at it and says "Wow wow." He is so cute.
Me: Seriously, he is the best. He was obsessed with his grapes today.
Tommy: Haha really? He wouldn't touch them this morning!
Me: He freaked out when I stopped giving him any more. And he started calling the milk "k" and asking for it.
Tommy: Are you serious? That's amazing! He is so smart!
Me: I know! Where does he come up with this stuff?
Tommy: He is so cute. I just love it when he lays his head on my shoulder and snuggles with me.
Me: I know. I want him to do that all day long. I just love him.
Tommy: We are so lucky.
Me: We are so ridiculous. And so obsessed.

Pretty sure we use the word "cute" in every other sentence when we're talking about Dane. And we could talk about him and his cuteness all night long. We are OBSESSED. And INSANE.

And it is THE BEST.

NC State Fair!

The State Fair here in North Carolina is a BIG DEAL. It's only a week and a half long and it seems like everyone goes to it! It's just enormous--each year we've gone we've found more and more things that we hadn't seen before. And of course, the amount of deep-fried food there is just AMAZING--we feel totally justified going crazy at the state fair since we don't have anything deep-fried most of the time. This year, we were excited because Dane is at the age where he's getting really excited about seeing animals and we knew he would love seeing all the farm animals and all of the excitement that you see at the fair. And he DID--it was so fun to see how serious he was about watching all of the animals we could find.

We went with the Busbys again this year. It was funny to reminisce about how we went with them three years ago, right after we moved here, when they just had Kylie and we could all drive together in the same car. Now there are eight people between us and we'd have to get a much bigger car! We had a lot of fun with them since they have their priorities straight. It's all about eating whatever food you want, and then doing whatever else you have time for.

While we were waiting for the Busbys to get there, Dane was having fun pretending he was in jail. He does this all day long with the gate at the top of our stairs so he was well-versed in what he was supposed to do.

And here are a bunch of pictures of Dane looking at the animals. These are such dumb pictures if you aren't Dane's parents or grandparents, so you can just skip over them if you're not. But we were getting such a kick out of how he just STARED at the animals and studied them so seriously. He could not take his eyes off of them the whole time.

Dane LOVED this pen with all of these little chicks. He started crying every time Tommy tried to walk away. 

Dane and Preston--two manly men hanging out in their stroller together.

Our first deep-fried treat of the day: deep-fried Girl Scout cookies.

Happy guy at the fair!

Fair foods numbers 2 and 3: the Krispy Kreme burger and a red velvet funnel cake! (You would doubt the Krispy Kreme burger, but it's unfortunately actually pretty good, which makes me feel trashy just thinking it. The red velvet funnel cake was AMAZING.)

Dane might be a cowboy for Halloween, so we scored a cowboy hat for him at the fair!

All of us together! Too bad the person taking the picture didn't get the ferris wheel in the background like we were thinking.

It was a perfectly fun day! We love having the Busbys so close and being able to do things with them all the time. And we LOVE the state fair!

he can't stop won't stop!

For the last few weeks, Dane has been OBSESSED with practicing his walking by clinging to our fingers and walking around. Tommy is basically his slave in this exercise, because Tommy is too nice to ever say no to him. (I, on the other hand, only agree to do it for limited amounts of time.) So Dane and Tommy will just walk around our apartment for half-hour intervals, Dane with his arms up high and Tommy bending over to reach his little arms. When he wants to walk, he will crawl over to you, pull your arm towards him, snatch your finger with his vice-like grip, and just start walking. He doesn't bother to see if you're coming--he'll just keep pulling on you until you get up and start following him around.

matchy matchy boys!

Dane is always VERY focused on the hard work he's doing. Walking takes a lot of concentration.

Although he's LOVED walking with our help, he hasn't really taken more than one step on his own--at least, until today! Becca was watching him during the day while I worked, and when she dropped him off at the end of the day today, she mentioned, "He was taking a bunch of steps today!" So I set him down standing up and he just got this big grin on his face and walked right over to me, pretty unsteady but all on his own. He went over to their house this morning not walking and came back taking up to 12 steps at a time! He is SO thrilled about it--every time he walked by himself this evening he'd start grinning and cackling and clapping for himself, looking at us expectantly waiting for us to start clapping and cheering too. And of course we're just as excited as he is. We'll get some pictures of him walking eventually.

Also, when Tommy got home, I brought Dane outside to meet him and had Dane walk over to him to surprise him. We had been just meandering, walking slowly along the sidewalk with Dane looking at the worms and wood chips and other fascinating elements of nature, but when I pointed Tommy out to Dane and he saw him, Dane started marching, walking as fast and as determinedly as he could over to Tommy, saying "Ooooh! Ooohh! Oooooh!" He knows what he wants, and what he wants is his daddy.

And to end, a few adorable pictures of Dane giggling while Tommy takes off his shoes and socks (for some reason the funniest thing to him all the time):