Erica's Blog

Well, I went to the SAND group last night for the first time in about a month.  We’ve both been wanting to go, but we didn’t have a sitter for the Things and the dog, so only one of us could go.  Hubby thought I should be the one to go, even though I was going to be out for a while tonight and tomorrow night.  He thought that, with Mother’s Day coming, it would be good for me.

Knowing that he’s usually right about these kinds of things about me, I went.  As it turned out, I was the only parent who showed up.  Even one of the facilitators didn’t make it, so it was essentially a private appointment with the social worker.  It was good to talk.

One of the things we talked about was that I’d like to do some kind of small something on either Paul’s birthday or the anniversary of his death.  She gave me the words to a couple of songs that rang SO true for me: 

The first is called “Visitor From Heaven” by Twila Paris.  You can read the words and hear the song here.  I don’t especially care for the melody — it sounds pretty sappy to me — but the words so much express how it was to let Paul go. 

The second is an Irving Berlin song called “How Deep Is The Ocean”.  It sounds like a typical love song, but apparently he lost a child at one point, so the song could have been written for his child.  You can read the lyrics here.

A BIG step for me was that a couple of weekends ago, Hubby and I went to go sit with my brother-in-law and sis-in-law while Baby Michael had surgery.  If he had been in the ICN or had been at UCSF, Hubby wouldn’t have let me go, but it was OK.  We were there for about seven hours.  We would have stayed all night if they had let us — we would have appreciated the support if we’d been in their shoes — but they kicked us out.  I only had a moment of flashback to the days in the ICN, but it passed quickly.  It was all so different than with Paul.  Michael was so much bigger and so much healthier (even with needing surgery).  Last weekend, we saw both babies at our nephew Jesse’s birthday party, and it was OK.  I’m still not ready to hold a baby, but I was OK seeing them.

Yes, I’ve been knitting.  I just finished a big project.  Unfortunately, I can’t tell you about it yet.  Sigh.  One of the hazards of having the recipient reading this.  ;->

About half-way through another project, this time with Lion Brand Chenille Thick & Quick.  Again, can’t give details or pictures yet.

STILL waiting to get a picture of my friend in the poncho I made her.  Ahem!  If you’re out there, MEY, I’m waaaiiiittttiiinnnngggg!

Hubby let me do some major stashing today.  www.joann.com had Fun Fur and some other yarns marked down significantly.  I get free shipping from them, and they also had a “free priority shipping” special going on, so he said it was OK for me to stock up and get “as much as you want”.  WOW!  Them’s dangerous words!  Here’s what I ended up getting:

• Fun Fur Yarn Self Striping! – Night Sky (HMMMM…Black, grey & white stripes?  What COULD that make me think of?)
• Lion Brand Fun Fur Yarn – Hawaii
• Lion Brand Fun Fur Yarn – Fuji
• Fun Fur Yarn – Black (Got lots of this to have on hand for various different projects.)
• Fun Fur Yarn – Tropical
• Fun Fur Yarn – White
• Fun Fur Yarn – Soft Pink
• Fun Fur Yarn – Raspberry
• Fun Fur Yarn – Red
• Fun Fur Yarn – Mango
• Fun Fur Yarn Self Striping! – Mexicana  (LOVE those bright colors!)
• Divine Yarn-Halo Blue (Will look good with the Denim Storm Divine I still have left.)
• Homespun Yarn-Coral Gables
• Homespun Yarn-Florida Keys Green
• Homespun Yarn-Mexicana (Yes, a different type of yarn but the same colors.)
• Homespun Yarn-Delft
• Lion Brand Homespun Yarn – Harvest  (I’m just drooling over the idea of making prayer shawls from www.shawlministry.com out of the Homespun!)
• Lion Brand Homespun Yarn – Olive
• Lion Brand Homespun Yarn – Cobalt
• Lion Brand Homespun Yarn- Plantation
• Divine Yarn-Richest Rose
• Divine Yarn-Floral Fantasy (Love these pink colors!)
• Wool-Ease Yarn -Gold
• Wool-Ease Yarn -Fuchsia

NO, I won’t tell you what all the Fun Fur is for.  Let’s just say that some of them are for specific projects I have in mind, and some are just “for instance”.  Drool, drool, drool….

Oh, and YES, I saved about $100 dollars.  Gotta love that!  This is also why my pantry is so full — buy a bunch when it IS on sale, even if you don’t need it just now so that when you DO need it, you have it already and don’t have to pay premium prices.

Yes, Jenna came for a one-night sleepover on April 1st and hasn’t left.  I don’t know why we haven’t done the paperwork yet to make it official — at this point, if she left it would break all our hearts, including hers.  We even got her a tag on Tuesday with her name and our address and phone number.  Heck, I’ve even added stuff for her to the Amazon wish list! 

It’s really cool to see her different relationship with each one of us.  Thing One reads Bible stories to her every morning before school, plays with her after school, and brushes her.  Thing Two tries to see how close she can get her nose to Jenna’s before Jenna starts licking her all over her face (euw!).  Hubby takes her out for a walk most evenings, tucks her in at night, and Jenna goes nuts when he comes home from work.  They all play “bone” with her, also known as tug-o-war with her red rubber Kong bone.  Funny how since I stopped playing “bone” with her, my back hasn’t been hurting as much….Me, I’m the food source, the one who takes her out to potty, sometimes walks her, plays ball, and pets her a lot. 

Now, if we could just find a new collar for her that we can all agree on.

Oh, and I’ll be glad when she’s done with her warm weather shedding.  Blech! 

FYI, you can see pictures of Jenna’s first bath here on Hubby’s blog.

So, yesterday was the 12th.  Paul would have been nine months old.  It’s really weird to think of.  I can’t really imagine him that big.  The other day, I was looking at some videos hubby is in the process of moving onto DVD, and there was one where Thing Two was nine months old.  I just couldn’t picture Paul being that old or big, doing all those things. 

I was OK yesterday, but the pain hit me today.  I think it was partly b/c I told the story twice today — first to a mom at school who didn’t know about him, second to a former mom from school whom I hadn’t seen since June.  Of course, she asked, “How’s the baby?”, and I had to explain.  At least she didn’t ask “Where’s your baby?”  I keep thinking that if someone asks me that, I might just blurt out, “St. Joseph’s Cemetery in the East Bay”.  Probably not a good idea.  That would probably freak people out.  Oh, and one of the ladies who works at my Curves was asking me about him b/c of the flyer on the wall, asking people to sponsor me in the March of Dimes walk.

Hubby stayed home with me tonight instead of going to church.  By the time I got home from Curves, I was starting to spiral down pretty quickly.  I was torn — I wanted him to be able to go to church, but I was also afraid that it might not be a good idea for me to be here w/o him.  I’ve been doing OK, but who knows how it would have been if he’d left, and I’d kept spiraling down.

Seeing pictures of our new nephews the twins was *REALLY* hard last week.  It’s beyond cool to see my bro-in-law getting into being a dad, but it was SO hard to look at those two sweet little boys with their dark hair and want so badly to hold Paul again, knowing I never will.  It’s hard to be torn between such conflicting emotions — being SO excited for them, having “auntie syndrome”, wanting to spend lots of money buying them all kinds of cute personalized twin-related stuff, yet also feeling so much of my own pain over it.  I feel bad that we haven’t gone to see the babies yet, but I know my sis-in-law understands.  Someday, we’ll be ready to see them.  We won’t be able to stall the girls much longer.  They really want to meet their new cousins after having prayed for so long for their auntie to get pregnant, then for the babies to “grow and be strong and stay inside until it’s time to come out.”

Knitting?  Yes, I’m still knitting.  I’m up to about sixty of the hats for UCSF.  As soon as I finish my giant Pound of Love ball of pink yarn, I’ll deliver them.

I attempted to make myself a poncho out of the Divine (hey, I had *ten* balls of the stuff), but it came out too small.  I forget — “one size fits most” rarely does, and certainly doesn’t usually fit a Rubenesque size 16.  So, I gave it to my little ex-roommate for her b-day.  She needed something cool and non-matronly after just having a baby.  I’m sure it looks cute on her.  She promised to have her hubby email me a picture of her in it for the blog.

I’m working on some other stuff, but one disadvantage of having told people I actually *know* about this blog is that now I can’t write about gifts I’m making or put up pictures of them until after I’ve given them.  Oh, well.

All I’ll say is that the current ones involve the Paton’s Fresco and some Lion Brand Chenille Thick & Quick.  Oh, and as soon as Julie finds out whether she’s having a boy or a girl, I’ll have to get started on planning what I’ll make for her.  I’m hoping she’s having a girl.

Plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose [sorry, I don't know how to get the French accents, etc.]  Translation:  The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Was farting around Google the other day and ran across a guy I dated in high school and college.  I’m sure he’s still brilliant and a very interesting guy, but if I’d ever had any doubts about the choices I’ve made, I don’t have any now.  The guy’s 40 years old, still way into comic books, and is a drummer in a punk band. 

YEEAAAHHH, I’m definitely glad I made the life choices I did.  I am most DEFINITELY married to the right guy.  Let me repeat:  I MARRIED THE RIGHT MAN. 

Sorry no posts in so long.  Been living life instead of posting, which is probably a good thing. 

Sporty came for an overnight on Friday the 1st and is still here!  Fifteen minutes after she arrived, her name was Jenna.  Apparently, all it takes to change even a nearly-three-year-old dog’s name is a few people standing in a circle with some kibble in their hands to call the dog by the new name.  She’s very food-oriented, a dog after my own heart!

So, we’re still in the “foster” stage of the foster adoption of Miss Jenna.  She is the greatest dog ever!  The only way she could be better would be if she didn’t shed and didn’t poop, but I’m not holding my breath on either of those to happen in this lifetime.  Going to the dog trainer has helped a lot, too.  Mostly, it’s helped *us* to know the right things to do with her to get her to do what we want.  She performs perfectly for the trainer.  After even just one session, taking her for a walk was SO much easier!  In 45 minutes, I think I only had to say “heel” three times. 

The girls love having Jenna around.  Thing One plays with her after school every day before having snack and doing homework.  Thing Two likes to get her face really close to Jenna’s and let Jenna lick her.  She also likes to flop on her, hanging on her while she walks.  I swear if she were smaller or Jenna bigger, she’d try to ride her!

Hubby and I are both pleasantly surprised at how much we enjoy having a dog.  Usually, I walk her while Thing Two is in her afternoon preschool class, and he walks her in the evenings after the Things go to bed.  She is *SO* devoted to him.  She really loves that nightly walk/run.  Hubby even plans to get running shoes so he can run for real with her.  I can’t imagine I’ll ever run with her, but even on days when we can’t take our walk b/c I’m stuck at home w/a sick kid, I take her in the back yard for several spurts of catch or “gimme that bone/stick”.

The only reason we haven’t signed the papers yet to complete the adoption is allergies.  I just want to make sure none of us (especially Thing Two or I) is reacting to her allergy-wise.  It’s tough b/c this is a bad allergy time anyway, even if we didn’t have a dog, so it’s hard to tell whether we’re reacting to her or not.  Meanwhile, we vaccuum up the hair frequently and wash her blankets every other day.  I tell ya, we’d better not have to give her back b/c we’ve all fallen in love with this dog.  Check out pictures of her here.