Happy, Happy

Here are a few of the things that made me happy this week.

I love laughing until I cry, so Sunday was an especially good day.

On Monday Nicholas made me a very fancy necklace.

I received a Facebook notice on Tuesday. Something about being tagged in a picture. Oh goody, my favorite. I clicked over and found a picture of Mikey and his baseball team, with Mikey looking positively miserable. Full on pouty face with arms crossed! Fabulous. I showed it to him later and asked him what was going on when the coach took the picture. Mikey took one look and winced, then claimed he didn’t know how to smile. I told him I wasn’t buying it. Try again, and this time tell me the truth. Truth? He was trying to look like “a tough guy” in the picture. Looking like a guy with a murder of zombie crows at his disposal his new thing, in case you didn’t notice. So, Mikey was trying to look hard and he ended up looking like someone took his lunch money. Not so happy, happy for him, but the end result is that his toothy grins are back.

:: The price of gas is killing us, but at least on Wednesday I remembered to go to Sam’s Club. They were 20¢ cheaper than the gas station near our house.

:: Thursday was a relaxing day. I spent an hour in the afternoon reading in the family room while Nicholas napped next to me. Then Mikey came home from baseball practice and I marveled at how handsome both my boys look in sky blue.

:: There is a Mother’s Tea at school on Friday, so I’ll be putting on makeup and taking down my ponytail. Maybe I should wear sky blue, too.

:: Saturday is more baseball, and is Sunday Mother’s Day? Oof. That was fast.

Happy, Happy

We received the pricing for the trip to Rome shortly after Easter. It was eye opening, but I was confident that with hard work and prayer we could make it happen. I took on writing jobs, whittled down the balance on our only credit card, and accepted another sponsored post opportunity shortly after the one that almost killed me. Our Roman holiday seemed like a real possibility, and I was getting excited. I talked about it to anyone who would listen, and even those who wouldn’t. All I needed was the final price to reflect child discounts before turning in our deposits.

The discounts came in, but they weren’t enough. I went over the numbers with a fine-toothed comb and realized that, lifetime opportunity or not, we couldn’t afford the trip. In order to go we would need to pay off our credit card and then charge it back up again to staggering heights. That’s not something we are willing to do.

We tried our best but it didn’t work out. That’s how life goes sometimes. I won’t feel sad about it because our time will come. I’m disappointed, but realistic. It’s a luxury trip, not a personal rejection or a layoff. Perspective, you know? Speaking of which, the fact we even believed this trip possible shows how far we have come from the disaster of the Mister’s layoff in 2009.  How far we have come since just last year! We can finally see a light at the end of the tunnel, and if that isn’t something to be happy, happy about, I don’t know what is.

 

Happy, Happy

I started the week determined to make it great. I’m ending it committed to making the next one even better. These are some of the things that made me happy.

:: On Saturday we watched both boys play baseball, and for once it was a beautiful day. Hot, even.

:: Sunday brought us more baseball and more heat. Everyone was complaining, but I soaked it up like a lizard. Vitamin D, that’s what I was thinking.

:: Monday brought very good news, indeed. Good enough to take the sting out of yet another baseball game. Also, I was honored at Mikey’s school assembly for the volunteering I’ve done at the school.

:: We didn’t even touch a baseball on Tuesday.

:: Buster snuck out of the house on Wednesday while I was talking to the Mister, who just got home. It wasn’t a big deal because Buster is far too lazy to go more than a few yards without Buddy leading the way. I ended up walking alongside him for all twelve feet of his journey and took some pictures of him playing in the neighbor’s garden.

:: I drove Buddy to a fancy canine ophthalmologist in Upland on Thursday. His left eye is clouded and irritated, and has been since December unless we give him special drops. I had to take him in to rule out a “more aggressive disease state,” which is code for cancer. (If I never hear that word again…) Turns out he is fine, though he will be on drops for the rest of his life. He has, essentially, Old Man Eye. He has Old Man Lung, too, but that’s a different set of medication. My poor Buddy. Twelve is hitting him hard.

:: Today is Friday, a day Nico has been looking forward to all week. A school friend is having a birthday party! I will not know a soul there. I can’t hardly wait.

Saturday and Sunday? More baseball? Get outta here. I’m shocked.

Dancing

I’m back, and with good news. The procedure I had on Thursday was a surgery and biopsy, the culmination of almost four months of testing, failed medications, and waiting. I received my preliminary reports on Monday, and everything that is but shouldn’t be is benign. I trust those results won’t change in the final report. Whew and hurray!

It’s been a long four months. I’ve been tired, moody, and preoccupied. I haven’t been focused, especially the last couple of weeks, and this whole mess is the real reason behind my Happy, Happy posts. There was a Thursday a while back where everything seemed bleak, so I went through the week day-by-day and looked for good news. I found it, as it often goes when you make the effort to find what you have lost.

Last night I caught Nico dancing while I made dinner. The video was spontaneous and unplanned, so the quality is poor at best. What is excellent is his spirit and personality, the same one teachers call “a ray of sunshine on a dark day.” Nicholas is just a happy kid, despite his introspective parents and older brother, and that makes me happy, happy.

Also excellent:

1. His dance moves, including the finger pointing.
2. The finger pointing!! At the minute mark!!! GAH!!!!
3. If he can’t raise a glass, he’ll raise a stool.
4. The grand finale.

Until Tuesday

I was going to try to fake it through tomorrow, but it doesn’t look like that will happen. I’m having a small procedure Thursday and while it is not serious (or cosmetic, sadly), I have a few things to prepare around the house before then. The William Morris Project will have to wait, which is a shame because I like what I did this week, even though it is minor and along the lines of my kitchen odds and ends post. I’ll be back on Tuesday, ready to go! No worries. Piece of cake.

This picture doesn’t have anything to do with surgeries, kitchens or organizing. I just like mountainscapes. Actually, I like exactly what I have in real life: mountain ranges that dot large expanses of land. I’ve never been much of a coastal gal. I took this in Bishop off the 395 this past July and decided to put it up today so that when I return on Tuesday, I will have something pretty to greet me.