Wedding photos!

Just wanted to drop in real quick to give y'all a link to the wedding photos. I keep getting more in, so there may be more added to the Flickr set , but I wanted to get something up fast for those who couldn't make it to the party.

Also, you might want to watch our first dance. :)

Enjoy!

Bearing fruit

You may recall, a few years ago I spent a full autumn day planting over 250 spring bulbs, in the hopes that I'd wind up with a garden full of my favorite flowers to cheer me up during the high hay fever season. Unfortunately, I didn't realize at the time that gophers LOVE tulip bulbs, and not only that, but they can easily get into my planter boxes. I ended up with a few hyacinths and daffodils, but only ONE lone tulip escaped the gopher feast.

This past fall, Mr Wonderful cleared out my designated "cutting garden" planter box (we have several huge boxes), laid down plastic netting, and filled it back in with fresh, happy dirt that was left over from our new lawn project. Then I spent a day planting spring bulbs again, hoping that this year, they'd escape devastation.

Obviously, from the picture on the right, you can see that they did, and our labors are bearing fruit at last...dozens and dozens of tulips and daffodils, and scores of grape hyacinths (the little purple flowers in the mid-ground here, also known as muscari) and crocuses. This is the garden I hoped for.

Click the photo to go to my flickr feed, where I have another shot of the planter box, showing off pretty much the entire thing, and a picture of our beautiful lilac bush as well.

Wedding & job update

Oooh boy, things are in full swing now!

Still no job, but I've been doing some contract work for individual clients and for my old supervisor, who quit working for The Boss and is now opening up her own consulting business. So there's some money coming in. In fact I'm hopeful that I'll be able to just do consulting, as that would solve my issues with telecommuting quite nicely.

The wedding is set for May 2, at a large regional park. We've reserved a lovely picnic spot with a bunch of picnic tables, BBQs, a small deck for dancing, and a beautiful flagstone patio area that will serve quite well for the ceremony. I built a wedsite & found a free web host, and then sent out email invitations. We're doing a potluck BBQ reception, telling guests not to bring presents, but to bring food instead. I'm actually really excited; this is just the kind of wedding I would have wanted originally - something fun and laid back that we could invite all of our friends & family to. We're getting a great response - most of people we've invited are coming, I think.

My dress is in, and it's gorgeous and needs almost no alterations - just a bustle and maybe to tack down the sleeves to the elastic underneath. I made a beautiful silk flower hair clip for about $10. Mr Wonderful is renting a jacket for his tux, and we're getting some of the more esoteric accessories (sporran, hose, etc) at the Scottish Games in Woodland on the weekend before the wedding. And the kids? Well, Kohl's had an enormous sale and we ended up getting Tomboy a dress and Rugrat a pinstriped suit for less than $100. Awesome.

We got our rings too. Mine is a just simple white gold band, so it doesn't compete with my engagement ring. I already had a tungsten ring purchased for Mr Wonderful, but then he lost about 20 pounds and it ended up being too big. Unfortunately you cannot resize tungsten, so we bought another tungsten ring for him (one full size smaller!) on Overstock.com, for about $50. So now if he gains weight, he can wear the bigger one, but if he stays all skinny like he is now, he can wear the new smaller one. They're very similar; just the celtic knot pattern in the center is different.

There's not much left to do -- find a solution for music (speakers or boombox, battery-operated, that will accommodate an ipod), get a bouquet (Grandma has graciously offered to pay for my flowers!), decide on shoes (whether to buy some new ones, if I can find something good and cheap), find someone to do my hair, and figure out the cupcake situation. My wedding shawl is well on its way, and if I continue knitting a full repeat each day, I'll have it done in plenty of time. I'm working my butt off at the gym, so I should be in better shape than I have been in years when I walk down that aisle. Oh, and we have to get our marriage license.

Things are falling into place, and I am so excited! I'm not nervous at all about marrying Mr Wonderful - there hasn't been any doubt in my mind about him. I just can't wait to make things official, and to celebrate with all of our friends and family. :)

Free

Nothing better than free stuff, right? Well, today, I got a FREE tooth whitening kit from my dentist. Not just any crap-ass whitening kit either; he made custom molds of my teeth and gave me the good stuff. This is like a $300 tooth whitening kit that he just gave me.

I totally love my dentist. And that is saying a LOT...my dentist phobia is near-legendary. In fact, I won't go to the dentist - even for a routine cleaning! - without sedation anymore. I have had countless dentists dismiss my fears for years, and guess what? I would go once, and then never again. It would be literally years before I would get up the guts to visit a new dentist. Once I had a dentist who gave me nitrous for a cleaning and that didn't help at all. But this dentist prescribes me valium before each visit, no questions & no hassles, and I happily lay there in a fog with my ipod blaring while he scrapes & polishes my teeth.

I know, it seems extreme. But this is what makes it possible for me to lay down in that chair once every six months, so that's what I do. I'm just glad I found a dentist who's willing to do what it takes to make sure I get regular checkups. So if anyone in far east CoCo County needs a new dentist, hit me up in the comments. I'd be happy to refer you to the best dentist in the world.

KILT!!!!

Mr Wonderful's kilt is here! It just came in the mail today, and I cannot wait to see it. (He said I can't see it before him, so I have to wait until he comes home for "lunch" before we open the package.) This is no cheap mass-produced kilt, either. It's a custom kilt, with his clan tartan, all the way from Scotland!

In other squee-worthy news, we've decided on our rental cabin for our Vermont honeymoon. We'll be staying in Bristol, right on the river, very near Lake Champlain and surrounded by trees. I cannot wait! Also, Mr Wonderful talked to our preferred officiant this morning, and he is available for our wedding date & said he'd be honored to perform the marriage ceremony for us. :)

Everything is coming together and I am so happy. Now, if I can just find a wedding band to go with my lovely engagement ring...

Yes, we did

Will post my disappointment about Prop 8 later, but for now...thank you, America. Thank you for voting for hope, instead of fear. Thank you for proving that we can move past our old sins and work for a brighter tomorrow. Thank you for coming out in droves, to put the most principled, intelligent man I've ever seen in the White House.

The people have spoken, and after eight long years, I feel like they're finally speaking my language again.

Best birthday present ever!

Last Wednesday, on my 35th birthday, Mr Wonderful proposed!

I had a feeling it was going to happen on my birthday, to be totally honest. I was about 90% sure that he had the ring already. The kids were making oblique references to my birthday, when normally they wouldn't even notice it was coming up (although to give them props, they really didn't breathe a WORD about the proposal). And Mr Wonderful had hinted that he wanted me all to himself on my birthday - he even took the day off of work! - so I switched nights with Babydaddy. It's not like this proposal was coming as a complete surprise anyway; we decided before he moved in last October that we were planning on getting married, and we wanted to get engaged this year.

So on my birthday, I woke up thinking: "This is the day!" Mr. Wonderful took Rugrat to school for me, which meant I could sleep in a bit. All morning I was trying to work and not be too distracted. I had lunch planned with my coworkers in WC, which meant I'd be gone for about 3 hours or so.

When I got home, Mr. Wonderful was relaxing on the couch, watching TV. There was a lovely white bouquet on the table that wasn't there when I left for lunch, so I said, "What's this?" and pulled out the envelope that was stuck in the bouquet. He said, "Oh, are we doing this now?" I kind of smiled and said, "Should we wait?" He replied, 'No, now's fine..." and he paused the TV and came over by me and put his hand in his pocket. I thought, "Oh my God, this is it!" So I opened the envelope, and inside was a little note. I sort of blanked for a second. It was just two words: "Double woobie." Now, Mr. Wonderful and I each have a down pillow that we sleep with, all curled up around it as if it was a stuffed animal. We call these our "woobies" because they're not used as pillows really - they're more like security blankets. Anyway...it was a clue! So I went upstairs to the bedroom, with Mr. Wonderful trailing me the whole way.

In the bedroom was a clue that led me to the fireplace...then another clue that led to the clothes dryer, then finally a clue that led to the oven.

Inside the oven was a letter rolled up and tied like a scroll, and big wrapped present behind it. He grabbed the scroll and said, "Open the present first, then you can read this." So I pulled out the box and thought, "Damn, that's WAY too heavy to be a ring!" Turns out it was an All Clad saucepan that I'd been drooling over for a while! I was both thrilled and disappointed - thrilled at the saucepan, because I really, really wanted it, and disappointed that he wasn't going to propose. But then he told me to read the letter, which was folded up at the very bottom, so you could read most of it but there was some that was hidden. And when I started reading, I knew that the proposal WAS going to happen, RIGHT THEN!

And so, of course, the phone rang.

First my cell phone, and then the house phone. Mr. Wonderful said, "Don't..." but I'd already decided to ignore the phone; this was way more important at the moment! Turns out it was my boss, who was in a meeting with a client and had come across an error on the website we're developing for them. *sigh*

Anyway, so I stood there, kind of shaking a little and trying to read the scroll , which was a beautiful letter about how as we grow older, our birthdays become more mundane, and the presents more practical, and we lose that sense of magical anticipation. But, it said, he wanted to start a new tradition, so every year on my birthday, he would ask me one question:

(and then I unfolded the bottom of the letter, which showed what was hidden...)

"Will you marry me?"

And I started crying a little bit, and then HE started getting all misty-eyed, and I said, "Yes! Yes!" and he asked me if I wanted to see the ring, so I said, "YEAH I want to see it!" and started laughing a little. And then he said the words I'd been waiting to hear: "Will you marry me?" and of course I said "Yes" again.

And the ring? The ring is beautiful and perfect and I couldn't be happier with it. It's a radiant-cut (rectangular but sparkly, not like an emerald-cut) diamond in a very delicate beautiful white-gold setting, with a filigree underneath the semi-cathedral setting and milgrain detail on the band. And of course pictures do not ever do it justice, but if you click on this one, you'll see the other two photos I've taken of it. :)

Is it kind of redundant to say that I'm blissfully happy and thrilled to be marrying this wonderful, amazing man? I cannot believe how lucky I am, to have found him again after so long, and to find out that this incredible man, who's been in my life since high school, has turned out to be the love of my life.

Best news ever!

I know I owe y'all a recap of the camping trip and I am slacking on it. In the meantime, you can enjoy the photos on Flickr.

But! Mr Wonderful and I got the Best! News! Ever! yesterday. He was offered a position at the local hospital and accepted it, and will be transferring out here next month. While a job offer may not sound like the best news in the whole wide world, in this case it is. It means 3+ hours per day not spent commuting anymore. It means about $400 in gas not being purchased. It means Mr Wonderful won't be so freakin' exhausted all the time anymore. It's a swing shift position (afternoon to late night) so we'll miss our evenings together, but it also means that he can start taking classes at the local community college in the mornings to fulfill the prerequisites he needs in order to take the Kaiser course to become an ultrasound tech.

And he'll be working only five minutes away!!!

Wait, let me say that again: Five. Minute. Commute.

Best news ever, folks!

Growing up

Rugrat's last day of school is today. The end of third grade!

He's been really impressing me lately. First of all, he hasn't lost his housekey yet. He's been working hard on his goals - remembering to bring all his stuff home from school, taking care of his responsibilities at home (homework, cleaning his lizard's cage at Babydaddy's house, etc). He's walked to school several times by himself (Babydaddy followed him the first couple of times just to be sure). And....he finally learned how to ride his bike.

I've tried a few times to teach him to ride his bike, but he was very resistant to even trying. However, I made this a prerequisite to him being able to be a latchkey kid next school year; I'd rather have him be able to ride his bike to/from school than just walk. So a few weeks ago, Mr Wonderful took him out in our court and taught him how to ride. It took him less than 20 minutes before Rugrat was riding his bike completely solo (including starting off and stopping without falling over). I was absolutely flabbergasted. It helps that Mr Wonderful is a lot stronger than I am, and that learning to ride the bike felt more secure and less wobbly while he was holding the back of the seat. But I think Rugrat was finally just ready to learn. Now, of course, he LOVES riding his bike. He couldn't see what the big deal was before, but once he learned how to do it, he couldn't believe how fun it was. And I had nearly given up on him ever learning to ride a bike, so when I saw him take off for the first time, completely on his own, I almost started crying. My little munchkin is growing up!

This is such a golden age of childhood, and it makes me especially excited about our upcoming camping trip. I've taken Rugrat camping before, but only once, for a single night, and it was a few years ago. I think this is going to be one of those vacations that he remembers for the rest of his life. We'll have three adjoining campsites: my sister & her family, my cousin & her son, and Mr Wonderful, Rugrat and I (unfortunately, Tomboy is not able to join us this time). It'll be five days of getting dirty, hiking, swimming in a river, fishing, and playing with his two cousins that are just about the same age as him. I've gotten a separate tent just for the boys to sleep in, and I really think they're going to have a blast. S'mores around the campfire at night, hot cocoa with marshmallows in the mornings, and long summer days playing in the woods and the river with his favorite cousins. What could be better for a nine-year-old boy?

Light at the end of the tunnel

Mr Wonderful has been commuting to work 120 miles roundtrip (that's FOUR HOURS of driving during gridlock hours) ever since he moved in last fall. And now, finally, we are seeing some light at the end of the tunnel: it looks like he may be transferring to the local hospital here in about six weeks.

The local hospital is so close that he'll be able to bike to work and still get there within fifteen minutes. No more getting up at 4 AM for a 6 AM shift. Never again will he be stuck in traffic for two hours on the way home. And our gasoline bill will be cut in half.

Beautiful

Last night I watched, with tears in my eyes, as Barack Obama made his victory speech in St. Louis. I am so damn proud of my country right now. Finally, nearly 50 years after the civil rights movement, we have an African-American running for president with the backing of one of our two major political parties. It was a beautiful moment, and I am so happy to have witnessed it.

(I could easily rant here about Sen. Clinton's petulant little foot-stomping speech, but I will refrain. Because I'm just too darned happy to care what that delusional bitch thinks right now.)

I can't wait to see him kick McCain's ass in the general election.

Muuuuch better

I'm feeling much better these days. In fact, it only took a day or two for me to get out of my funk last week. About half of the scab fell off my nose, and I started seeing scar tissue, which was a big improvement. The rest of the scab just fell off today (I know, ewww!) and I'm finally starting to see what it will look like eventually. There's some lumpy spots still, around the edges (where the stitches were) but for the most part it's nice & smooth, and when the pink & lavender color fades, it will look very normal again, I think.

Memorial Day weekend was pretty mellow around here. Like most folks, we had a "staycation" instead of a "vacation." Gas is too darned expensive to go anywhere (over $60 to fill my tank this morning! OMG!). Plus, Mr Wonderful had to work -- hospitals don't close for holidays. So I filled my weekend with other fun things: watching the Indiana Jones movie, getting a pedicure, lunching with friends, and painting the last wall in Tomboy's room. Did I mention that she has three walls in her room painted ACID GREEN? Yeah, ugh. But that's what she chose - and it matches her bed linens perfectly. I painted the fourth wall chocolate brown yesterday, and I think it looks fantastic. It does a lot to offset the crazy green color. Now we just need to get some curtains, a rug, and some decorative stuff for the walls.

Oh yeah, and I bought a Playstation 3 yesterday. I know, I know. But it's got a blu-ray disc player built in, and I was planning on buying one of those anyway, so why not spend the extra $100 and get an upgraded video game player at the same time? It really is awesome; the graphics are incredible (especially hooked up to my HDTV with the HDMI cable!), and the new Guitar Hero III (which I also bought) is loads of fun for Mr Wonderful and the kids. We watched the pilot episode of LOST on the PS3 last night, just to see what it was like with a regular DVD, and the upgrade was amazing. You could see the forest reflected in Jack's eye in the opening shot.

Babydaddy and I are discussing the possibility of letting Rugrat be a "latchkey kid" next school year. It would be really nice to not have the daycare expense, but fourth grade still seems pretty young to me. In the meantime, he'll be out of daycare this summer, spending most of the time here with me, but I'm lining up some activities for him to do for a few of those weeks. He'll have sleep-away summer camp for a week in late July, and we've got our family camping trip in late June, but I'm also going to put him in some summer programs through the city. There will still be a lot of unscheduled time though, and one of the ways that he needs to show us that he's ready to be a latchkey kid is by entertaining himself for long periods of time without bugging me (since I'll be working). I'm not saying I need to have perfect silence and never hear from him, but I can't have him telling me he's bored every five minutes either. So this is one of our "tests."

Another thing we're working on is responsibility: he has a tendency to forget things at school sometimes (although he's been MUCH better this year than in previous years), so he needs to remember all of his stuff (backpack, lunchbox, homework, sweatshirt) every day through the end of the schoolyear. And even more importantly, I gave him a copy of the house key. He has to know where the key is at all times. I told him I will randomly check to see if he knows where the key is, and he has to always know, because if he loses his house key, he'd be locked out for hours.

And finally, there's the cell phone dilemma. Babydaddy doesn't have a landline, just a cell phone. And I would feel a lot better about Rugrat walking or riding his bike home alone if he had a cell phone with him, in case of emergencies. A landline would be fine once he's in the house, but if he got locked out (like if he lost his key) a cell phone would be preferable. And it wouldn't cost much to add him to my plan; I've got a family plan already. But nine and a half years old? That's awfully darn young to have a cell phone. And it's another huge responsibility. He might be ready for it, but I don't want to overload him with too many big responsibilities at once.

What do you think? Is fourth grade too young to spend a few hours home alone each day? It wouldn't be more than two or three hours a day, and he's a pretty level-headed kid. He seems to have outgrown a lot of his rambunctious impulsiveness in the past year or so. He's also very anxious to prove that he's ready and responsible enough to do this; it's something he really wants to do, not something we're pushing him into. How young were your kids when you first started leaving them home alone after school? And what about the cell phone issue? At what age and under what circumstances would you give your child a cell phone?

OMFG! iPhone!!!

I have the greatest job ever. Today we had an in-house staff meeting (which means I had to go in to the office, horror of horrors) and then a belated birthday lunch for the boss. After lunch, as I was packing up to go, the boss called me in. He asked me a quick question about a client and then said, "I got you something. I don't want you to make a big deal about it, but..." And DUDE!! It was a 16GB iPhone!

Yes, I "need" it for work because I sometimes need to check mobile websites to make sure they're displaying properly and my phone doesn't work for that, for some reason. But seriously??? A freakin' iPhone, y'all! FOR FREE.

I love my job.

Finito!

The two-tone ribbed shrug for Tomboy is finished! I can't believe how fast that knitted up -- I had it done in less than two weeks! I love the colors, and the cotton is gorgeous - soft and warm, with the yarn held double.

One year

I am very proud to announce that it has been a full year since my last cigarette.

YAY, ME!

Sweater is DONE!

Finally. Finally, finally, finally, the damn sweater is off my needles.

Saturday I frantically knitted up the ribbing on the neckline, after completely screwing it up Friday night (beer + knitting apparently equals forgetting how to do knit-one-purl-one ribbing. *sigh*). We took the kids to a free church-sponsored Easter event in the next town over, and I have to say, that was the most AMAZING thing I'd ever seen. There were more than 20 bounce houses (I think they must have rented every single one in the area), a laser tag game, a rock climbing wall, easter egg hunt, hotdogs and drinks and people driving around in golf carts throwing out candy...and the whole thing was free. Every single bit of it. They must have spent thousands and thousands of dollars on this shindig. Anyway, while Rugrat was waiting in line for the laser tag, I knitted the neckline. Afterwards, we went to Tomboy's piano recital, where I finished the sweater by weaving in all the ends. And Saturday night I washed and blocked the sweater. Sunday morning it was dry and ready to go, and I achieved my goal (well, my latest goal) of finishing the sweater in time for Easter.

As you can see, the sweater is a *bit* big. The neckline in particular is huge, but the sleeves are also a little too long and the shoulders are definitely too wide. That's OK. Turns out I'm fine with that, because now he'll be able to wear it for a couple of years, probably. And he is incredibly proud and excited - he kept telling everybody we saw that his mom made the sweater just for him, and he's the only person in the world who has a sweater like that. He wore it all day on Easter and put it on over a t-shirt to wear to school today, as well. And you know what? That's just fine with me. :)