Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Those three magic words...

Tonight I heard those three wonderful words...no, it wasn't "I love you," or "Pretty please Mom," or even "Uh-oh Mommy, Yucky!" No, today my husband said the three words that when he says them, they still take my breath away...Here's the story.

I had to go to work today extra early. For me, that meant starting my day around 4:00am. I worked my regular job with extra tasks today only to head off to my second job as soon as the first finished. Needless to say, by the time my work day was ending, I was reasonably exhausted. As I was driving to pick-up the kids I was dreading the evening of cooking and dishes. Also, being Wednesday, I was hitting my mid-week lonely cycle. Most of you know that Kelly and I work opposite schedules so other than a kiss hello while I'm asleep in the evening and a kiss goodbye while he's asleep in the morning, we don't see each other all week. We communicate mostly by phone calls though we are starting to join the texting generation. Anyway, I picked up the phone to call Kelly (don't tell Bailey I was talking on my phone while driving or she'll yell at me!). I called his office line...no Kelly. So, then I called his cell phone and though the connection was bad and there was a lot of commotion, I finally got him on the line. Knowing how busy he was just from the fact that I had to track him down, I tentatively asked "Is today a bad day for us to come have dinner with you?" Kelly hmm'd and haa'd, explaining that he was really busy, and I realized I was forcing him to feel guilty and I didn't want that so I told him that it was okay, I understood, we'd do it another day.

Then he said it. Oh, it makes my heart flutter just to think about it. Girls it's the sexiest line, I'm telling you. Are you ready for this...my wonderful husband said "No, it's okay, I'll make time. Come and we'll have dinner." He'll make time for me. He will take time out of his busy day, pay the consequences of being pulled away from his tasks, and make time for me. Could there be any better way to say that he loves me? Diamonds, BAH! Give me your time and my heart will forever be yours. Truly, I think there is no better feeling than your husband specifically making the choice to give you his time even when it is not convenient or even downright difficult to do so. Someone can tell you over and over that they love you but when they sacrifice to be with you then they are showing you that they love you.
So we had a nice dinner. We talked about our day. We laughed at the kids. We dealt with a Vaughn toddler tantrum as a team. Now, I am getting ready to go to bed alone but it's okay because my heart is full because he made time for me. I think sometimes we take those simple things like a dinner together as a family for granted but for Kelly and I, a midweek family moment is truly a gift.
Thank you Kelly for making my day, my week...my lifetime. Thank you for doing something so simple yet so important as making time for me. I love you!

Tuesday, March 10, 2009

A Bad Day...

***Update at Bottom***

It's good that if we're gonna have a bad day that we get it all out at once...so, with that, today was one of those bad days where we got out all that bad luck.

Bad day event number 1...

Yesterday I got a call from a buyer for our house making an offer. The offer was what we considered fair and so we verbally accepted the offer and began to put it in writing. My broker stayed up late last night getting the contracts all written and after talking to the buyer, emailed them out to her. Then, for reasons I'm still unclear about, the buyer decided they no longer wanted the house. They really gave very little explanation, they just pulled out. To say we were disapointed is an understatement. To be honest, even though the smart part of me reminded that so many things could go wrong so I shouldn't get my hopes up, my heart had already packed the boxes and had ironed out the plan for the major change in our lives. When I got the call canceling the offer, all those moving boxes in my head had no where to go and I spent a great deal of time this afternoon feeling especially sorry for myself.

Bad day event number 2...

We were invited to my parents house for a lovely dinner. After dinner, Vaughn was putting on a real show for us in the living room. He had one of those books that you push different buttons to play music and so he would push a button and dance around the living room in all kinds of silly ways. After about 20 minutes of watching him dance while my mom and I giggled at his antics, Vaughn got a little too silly and made himself dizzy and when he did, he fell face first into their stone fireplace hearth. I got to him as quickly as I could and flipped him around to see the blood dripping from his face. I pulled his lip up and his mouth was a mess. Perhaps I was a bit over-protective but I headed for the ER to see if he needed stitches as there were several flaps of skin pulled away from his gums and a large area of just raw open wound with bleeding. So, I met Kelly at the ER and we had Vaughn seen.

The wait wasn't too long so I was impressed with that. The doctor examined Vaughn and said that it was probably the worst mouth injury she had seen in that type of wound for a toddler and that he had ripped off the top layer of skin across his gum line on his upper lip. Vaughn was a real trooper and let the examine him and didn't even cry. Anyway, an exam and a $125 co-pay later, the doctor said that there was little they could do and that it just needs to heal on its own even though it looked horrible. She said it may bleed for days and that he will be uncomfortable for awhile but that he should be okay. They said his nose got bruised too but on the positive side, his teeth were okay and looks like he managed to miss them completely. On the downside, he now looks like The Joker is his father but we're hoping that will be gone quickly.

Here is a picture of Vaughn with his fat lip. It's not the best picture but the boy was wiped out so I did the best I could. Keep in mind that the damage is on the inside so the outside really doesn't look as bad as it could.



All in all, the experience with Vaughn certainly put the house thing in perspective. I realized that until I sat down to type up this entry, I hadn't even thought about the house as Vaughn was the only thought on my mind. I wish I wouldn't have had Vaughn put on the chopping block to teach me a necessary life lesson but anyone that knows me knows that the quickest way to get me to take notice is to go through my kids. Perhaps if I wasn't so stubborn and worried about material things, I wouldn't have needed that lesson and next time I hope I can avoid it but at least for this time, I'm willing to sit back and be thankful that my children are healthy and safe and that we have a nice home for them to find comfort in and that's truly all we really need.

***Update***
So Vaughn woke up this morning looking as if he'd done 6 rounds with Mike Tyson. Poor little guy. He's smiling here so he's not feeling too bad (I hope!)