Mommy Dearest...

Confession: Being a step mom is tricky.

Did I mention I have been married for 5 years and have yet to meet my step daughter? Again Cray cray! Much of that is due to the fact that she lives out of state with her mother and well, we live here. And while Alfie goes out to visit her usually every year around her birthday, it is that difficult road to travel  between desire to really want to meet her, and the worry that me (new wife) being around ex wife, would in some way make his time with his daughter harder, trickier, more torturous. For what? All so I can have an opportunity? I never thought it was fair, and I never wanted to ruin that small window of time, just for my wants. He deserves to have that time be as perfect as possible, even if it means I go another year without meeting her, or if it means I have to cringe and deal with the expenses that come with the territory. That’s what we do, right?

There are many things I wish more people talked about, and being a step parent is one of them. Especially one with a straining relationship between the hubby’s ex and himself. And then here I am, the “new wife” tossed in the mix. Unsure of whether to be fully involved, to mind my own business, to be half involved and half not involved, I don’t know what the right answer is. I don’t often, okay rarely ever, have a sounding board of friends or aquaintences with whom I can bounce questions off of or ask for advice from the perspective of having an additional child fit into the mix. And for these past 5 years, it really hasn’t been an issue. Much of our situation was almost “out of sight, out of mind” due to the fact that Alfie’s daughter didn’t live here, had yet to visit, and had a parent who was unwilling to allow certain things. Until now. Circumstances have changed and we are working through new parental responsibilities and roles, definite changes to current visitation privileges, and possible custody changes. All during which we are taking care of a 2 year old, working and oh yeah, expecting a baby. And much of it feels like sailing through uncharted waters at the mercy of out of state lawyers and with involvement of ex-inlaws. And while this is a HUGE answer to many, many, many (like 10 years worth of) prayers, it is still really stressful and often makes me wonder, “Okay, God, whatcha doing here”? Not in doubting his plan, but in the “why now?”, “What are you planning here, Lord?” It’s that exciting anticipation of what He is going to do, along with that fearful anxiousness of having absolutely no idea how things are going to play out, how long it is going to take, or what that means for our small family. However, there have been definite moments of “God things” that remind me that He is sooo allllll over this entire situation. One of the “God things” that im like, “yep, that was totally You!” is our home. We bought our house in Webster 2 years ago, and never really thought about the number of bedrooms we would need. Most houses in our price range had 3 rooms, almost none had 4 and even fewer had 4 with more than 1 bathroom (more than 1 bathroom was a MUST for me). And then we found our current house. 4 bedrooms, and more than 1 full bathroom! Little did we know, that we would need the 4^th room as more that a craft room or guest room. Little did we know that it would be important and an ease to the mind to not have to figure out how we would make a special space for an 11 year old, while also having to plan for a nursery! Little did we know it would be important in our home study to have a specific bedroom arrangement for her. I know I would for sure be freaking out more so than I am now… (I’m a worrier, what can I say…). And the crazy part is that this has all primarily happened since Christmas! There has been lots of paperwork filled out, a few court “phone appearances”, many sleepless nights and much excitement of what could be coming. We are currently prepping for a home inspection, in which we didn’t get much advanced notice (for a planner like myself, that is very very nerve wracking) and which would determine how long of visits Alfie’s daughter would be able to have. I have no doubt we will pass with flying colors, but the whole unknown factor to it and the desire to put ours and our homes best foot forward, does put me on edge. So here’s hoping everything tomorrow goes well! And well, I guess, more to come in the next 2 months! Oye!

True Story: The Boob Pillow...

**Based on ACTUAL events. Names have been changed to keep people anonymous**

So a few years ago a group of my friends go together for a Christmas gathering. We had previously decided to exchanged White Elephant gifts. Awesome. Everyone did a great job bringing silly items. But the most hilarious gift was an anatomically correct bright pink pillow in the shape of Tata's. Yeah that's right! I think we guessed them to be a D or a DD. The best part was they were originally opened by Bark and Mecky who sooo DID NOT want them but got stuck with them in the end via the luck of the White Elephant process! lol And thus began the game of dropping them off at each other's home. Bark and Mecky stealthily kept the pillow hidden until they could sneak it into someone else's home and leave it to be discovered at another date by another couple. Such as a Murder Mystery party at Meve and Stegan's (they sound Swedish, ya!). Well Meve and Stegan found the Billow (haha boob pillow, that was Alfie's phrase, not mine) that had been hidden in their bedroom and then proceeded to share the billow wealth and dropped it off at Rosh and Jobin's (haha Jewish??orrr Jamaican, mon' ??) and Rosh and Jobin made sure to bring it to our house, where it sat on the floor in our room waiting to be taken to Cave and Dassie's (haha Southern friends ??? lol). And this is where it gets interesting....

Alfie and I lived next door to his sister and brother in law for a few years at 290. It was great getting to see our niece and nephews, especially in the summer when they would be out playing when we would get home from work. On this particular day Cristen and the kids stopped over (i think i was home due to morning *all the time* sickness).

Side note: Alfie and I leave stuff around. no surprise here. Especially in our room. Neither of us are masters at picking up. But we also don't have anything dir-tay that NEEDS to be tucked away, however we are good about keeping things that should be private, private. Moving on...

So of course we didn't care that the kids would go into any room as they would search for our cat Nelly. We were used to this, and often Nelly would hide under our bed. No biggie. It was not shocking that as Cristen and i stood chatting in the family room, the kids had made their way into our bedroom. Although this time they came out with THE PILLOW. OH.DEAR.LORD. I.HAVE.CORRUPTED.THE.KIDS!! THEY HAVE THE PILLOW! (which had been on the floor by the dresser waiting to be taken to Cave and Dassie's).

"What is this?" was pretty much the first thing out of their mouth. I could not believe this was happening...NO NO NO! Luckily Cristen jumped in with a "Hmm what do you think it is?" (brilliant! test out what they know and see how much damage control we need to run...perfect!! What a mom!!). Micah jumps in with a "I think they look like eyes" and proceeded to hold them up like eyes. (Okay, i can see that... one down, one to go before we are in the clear). And then Jonah pipes in with "I think they look like these" and to my horror held them to where the large D-Cup mamba jambas would naturally be. DANG IT! Right on the money! Smart lil guy! Luckily their wise mama jumped in with a "Maybe Aunt Kimi uses them to practice for the baby?".....so clever, so clever. She then proceed to usher the boys out of the house and encourage them to play outside. THANK YOU JESUS! BUTTTT not before snapping a picture and sending it to Alfie with the caption "Uncle Alfie, what are these??" haha At which point he called saying "uhhh are you at home?!?!?" haha fearful that the kids had been at our house without me. You can bet that I made sure Cristen knew the back story of how we got the pillow as a white elephant gift and that it was not some freaky sex toy her children were holding. There really would have been no coming back from something like that I'm sure.

Ohhh the Good times at 290!!

Merry Newlywed Christmas!

Confession: We survived our first Christmas! Phew! Those who have been married are totally nodding along with me right now thinking "yeah thats totally a biotch trying to coordinate schedules!" Well after making it semi-painlessly through thanksgiving I was not looking forward to trying to figure out where we were going and when. I was however, SUPER DUPER thankful that both our families were in rochester thus cutting down on any extensive traveling. So we decided Christmas eve this year would be spent with Alfies family and we would exchange gifts then after all attending the Christmas Eve service together. Ok no problem. Then christmas morning would be with just alfie and I and eventually wander over to my parents house (prob around noon) to exchange gifts with them. It actually turned out good. So we spent christmas day with my family doing the "white" thing of laying around enjoying our gifts.Even lauren popped over to hang out with her favorite white family and good ol eddie let her pretend she owned his new beemer! Then that following morning we trekked over to the LoMag household for breakfast (as only LoMags do)we had omlettes (Al totally spoils me and puts mushrooms in them! i love it) and breakfast sandwiches and toast and coffee and more! Its yum. We hung out there with the Briscos and then opened a few more gifts that didnt get exchanged christmas eve. Then Saturday we were back at the White house to spend time with my Aunt Dyann and Uncle Charlie who were in from Colorado and Titi Juni who came in from Binghamton. That night was sooooo much fun! We all had dinner and then laughed and dad and my aunts shared stories of the things they did growing up and the whippings that followed! It was quite obvious that "lil eddie" DEFINITELY could do no wrong!Their stories were great and we had a very fun time! That week flew by too quickly, probably because i was thinking about the schedule and when we had to be where instead of just going with it and doing my thing reguardless of where I was. Its ok, ill eventually get the hang of this multiple family christmas! I am just very blessed to marry into a family that enjoys being together as much as my family does and that they all love me (not that they wouldn't because duhh im awesome.) :) Thankfully the holiday went by wonderfully although FARRRR too quickly. It was a nice start to many more married holidays!!

Fyi - one month til the second most important day of the year...my birthday! WOOP WOOP! Let the countdown begin!

Its begining to look a lot like Christmasssss....

Can you believe its November already??? WOW talk about the months flying by! But its finally almost "tis the season" time. Confession: Im actually feeling the spirit of christmas this year!! yeah i know you are probably like "WHAT?? who are you? the grinch?" Noo its not that I don't like christmas but some of the hoopla does get on my nerves... like the excessive christmas music. Do we HAVE to play the same 10 songs over and over from Thanksgiving til new years? or how about the Crazy decor of tinsle, ribbon, ornaments, reindeer and the like. Don't get me wrong I generally enjoy all that for a few days but come on they ALREADY decorated the mall! Let us enjoy the beautiful harvest time before all the christmas decorations. I haven't even gotten a chance to hate pumpkins and leaves yet!! But this year is different! I am looking forward to christmas (minus the snow). Maybe its cause I get to decorate the house MY way and shop for lil "tis the season" knick-knacks. And get to have christmas music playing and my very own little christmas tree! I am VERY much into christmas this year. Alfie ofcourse is VERY much into christmas every year. AND for the very first time since dating Alfie, I will FINALLY accompany him to the christmas eve service! Every year he has asked me to go and every year I have been guilted by mother into going to the family christmas get-to-gether. But this year I have already said I would go and am hoping to offer my assistance to the Christmas play (HAHA don't worry folk, I won't be singing nor acting. my talents must be used elsewhere). I am looking forward to having the house all Christmassed out! I even contimplated how fun it would be to have a Christmas party! But I think we are going to do a dressy New years Extravaganza instead. I haven't decided if we want to do a small formal dinner or a Large bring a "fancy" dish to pass and get all dressed up party. We will see. Probably the more the merrier! But ONLY if people dress up! No jeans, no sweats.... cocktail attire. Sport coats and khakis or dress pants and dresses or skirts or pantsuits for the ladies. I think it will be fun, a nice reason to dress up!