Miscellany Flix
2010 Mish Mash
Posted on February 16, 2013
I know I’ve been absent for quite some time, but with the little boy on the way (less than two months now!!), two little girls to love on and a pretty bad POTS flare up I’ve been dealing with, I haven’t had much energy left over to blog as well. 
I’ll come back soon and share my little maternity shoot I did a couple weeks ago … with the tripod and self-timer and a little help from my husband, Scott!
And, I’ve been in full on nesting mode the past couple weeks! As I set up and organized some of the little things for baby boy I snapped a few shots. Notice I’m starting him off with little hints at photography-love all around him (he’ll be sleeping with us, so this is technically just a place for his clothes for now, LOL). Edited with Paint the Moon Luminosity Photoshop actions.
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Posted on October 22, 2011
You may have noticed something from most of my posts this past year (or you may not have even known about it to begin with). My posts have been pretty void of any talk of POTS kicking my butt this past year. I’m pretty superstitious in only this one area of my life, and that is I never talk about it when I start feeling better. I have the awful experience of what seems to be jinxing it the minute I tell someone I’ve been feeling well. And so while I’ve been soaking up the unreal amount of “good days” I’ve experienced this past year or more … living every single minute to it’s fullest while snuggling baby Eliza and watching her and Adeline grow oh too quickly, I kept quiet about how overjoyed I was to be living so many days symptom free. I had a few short periods of flare ups, but nothing that didn’t pass quickly and nothing that totally wiped me out. And when I say wiped out, I mean can *not* function to save my life … can’t think, can’t breath, can barely stand up, and definitely can’t be a good mommy or wife.
So, if you know me at all you know I don’t like to talk about it much if I’m having a flare up and struggling … unless it’s a really bad one. And then I just get so scared and sad about the possibility of getting *really* sick again that I can’t help but say something. And then after I speak up and stop hiding just how difficult everything has become for me once again I end up regretting speaking up. I am rather talented at pretending and I do my very best to not let on how much I’m struggling because I’ve found it makes people uncomfortable to hear about illnesses and/or I just hate feeling like I’m complaining. Because despite this broken body I feel very blessed with my little family to love me and fill my days and nights with laughter, as well as a business I adore working with people I love. I’ve also heard my share of the “You Don’t Look Sick” comments … which is especially frustrating because as I just explained I fight to keep it together and appear to be feeling “normal” and then just crash (sometimes quite literally when my heart just can’t take it any longer) and also because I would give up the “looking healthy” thing for feeling normal in a second. I just try and focus on the fact that so far with this illness there have always been ups and downs over the years. And I focus on the idea that I’ll hopefully be on my way to another “up” soon.
The most difficult part of it is feeling cheated of being the kind of mommy I want to always be to these girls. I absolutely cannot stand it when Addie is begging to go out and play chase, ride bikes, jump on the bed (a favorite ritual in our house that we do together as often as we are able) … and I have to tell her mommy’s body won’t let me right now. And I admit that sometimes it’s hard being selfless and telling her to go on with daddy and have fun at the park while I sit inside wishing I were running after her myself. At least these days I have Miss Junebug to keep me company, but then there’s the guilt that she’s getting to be old enough that she should be out there running around too. So, all that said, I’m now completely wiped out and just don’t have the energy to wrap this rant up in an eloquent manner – my apologies!!
Leaving you with a couple photos of my little {BIG} blessings (yes, those are totally *real* smiles and I cant say enough how lucky I am to share in those giggles and happiness every day) …
And another of my two babies together …
If you enjoy my little, rambling blog, and have a second (literally), I would so appreciate it if you could pretty please click the banner below to vote for me (and thank you so much if you do!) … each click you make is your vote – heck, you can even vote every day, LOL!
Posted on October 8, 2011
This is going to be a short one … I’m exhausted to the core. Balancing everything so that I do most of my work at night while the girls sleep has become quite the struggle lately. The past few weeks I took on a huge project for work which involved doing A LOT of work in order to give customers an amazing product for free. Yes, free. I love my customers and this idea that came to me a couple months ago sounded like a wonderful idea at the time. The reality of it was that I’ve been working my tail off for weeks, getting an average of two hours (yes, TWO) of sleep each night so I could get this finished and all out to everyone.
I tend to just take on too much all the time. If I had as much time as I have ideas for, well, everything (homeschooling projects for the girls, organizing and decorating the house, getting back into shape, and all the *many* ideas I have for my business), I would be so productive! But my reality is that I don’t even have time to shower on many (most??) days, I usually get to sleep at 4am in the morning and then spend the next three hours waking up every 30 minutes to nurse Miss Eliza, and I am having a major POTS flare up from lack of sleep and too much stress. I am so far away from “having it all together” that I can’t help but laugh (and it’s kind of an unattractive little snort if I’m honest) when I read the kind comments from other mommies who tell me how “perfect” my life looks or how how amazing it is how I keep everything “together” with everything I do. I am so far from perfect or even sane at this point … but I am blessed, I have a beautiful family who accept me in all my craziness, and we have an insane amount of love and fun that we share together every day … but “together” is definitely not a word I’d use in describing my life.
If you enjoy my little, rambling blog, and have a second (literally), I would so appreciate it if you could pretty please click the banner below to vote for me (and thank you so much if you do!) … each click you make is your vote – heck, you can even vote every day, LOL!
Here is a little iPhone shot Scott took of me the other day. I had 45 minutes of sleep before having to get up and go record some videos for work … Miss Eliza is sleeping and nursing in my lap while I record some new tutorials. See her little fist in my hair? She has to always have my hair in her hands while she nurses and falls asleep. Love that.
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Posted on May 11, 2011
On Saturday Adeline ran in her second Awesome 3000 race. Last year we all ran together as well … me being very pregnant. Did I mention I, being the ever graceful gal that I’ve been all my life, ran smack into a pole and knocked it over with my very pregnant belly? I’m happy to report there were no crashes this year, and so glad of that fact since Eliza would have felt it much more this time around while riding in the Mai Tei. Let me tell you, running a race, no matter how dang short, with POTS and a baby strapped to you is no small feat (here little head was securely pinned to my chest with my hand, so there was no bobbling around during our tiny jog). After the race I told Addie just how proud I was of her and she simply smiled and said, “I’m proud of you too, mommy.” Melts my heart.
Forgive the snapshots … I’m usually much too busy enjoying the moment at things like this to worry about taking perfect photos …
Afterward we were lucky enough to spend the afternoon with some of our favorite people on a little hike down by the river. Nothing in the world like childhood friends, is there? And we’re just lucky enough that we adore Addie’s sweet friends’ parents just as much as she loves those boys.
Posted on February 25, 2011
No, not you … these emotions. Can’t breathe through the worry and {looming} depression … need to do something creative soon to lift the fog. Hints of dark feelings from years past are creeping in. How can that be with these two beautiful girls, a wonderful husband and a successful business that I love? It seems deep inside there is a dark part of my heart that will never be completely free of the sad, the insecure, the scared … even though most of my being is filled with all things light, joyful and happy. That broken part of me that was built during a tumultuous childhood and strengthened through tragedies and heartbreak, it refuses to completely leave the building. But now when it starts to rear it’s ugly head, on top of those dark feelings, I feel guilt for it’s very presence … because I adore my little angels and the happiness they bring us, because my husband is endlessly supportive, because I am blessed with a community of friends whom I adore and am lucky enough to have work that allows me to create and still be with my babies. So, how is it that with all those blessings, depression still sits in the corner of my mind sometimes threatening to engulf me again?
There is still the feeling of not being “enough” … not as a mommy, a wife, and now as a daughter once again. My daddy … my strong, stubborn and endlessly kind and generous father, is suffering from Advanced Parkinson’s. We’ve known for many years that something was wrong, but to know my dad is to know he doesn’t like to “burden” those he loves with his own problems and he doesn’t want us to worry. For years I’ve been noticing the symptoms, and his answers were vague and dismissive … “My doctor says it’s nothing, nothing to worry about.” Researching things on my own I knew in my heart ten years ago – yes, TEN years – that he likely had Parkinson’s. A couple years ago I ended up finally just confronting him about it and telling him I knew. He admitted it and then admitted the big shocker, he was diagnosed back in 1992! He had been hiding it and suffering silently since I graduated from high school!! And now, the heartache of watching my dad suffer so much, his dignity being taken away (I can’t stress enough how private and strong he is … and feel almost a bit of betrayal at even posting this much). Parkinson’s is a horrible progressive, degenerative disease that is stealing my dad from me … and even still he is the same man who scoffed at our plans to get him an easier chair to get in and out of because, in his words, “I am going to recover.” And all of this makes me miss my little brother all the more, if he were still alive at least we would have each other to lean on. Oh, my heart aches for him, for my dad, for all of us
Trying to find a balance between letting Adeline see that mommy is hurting and scared, and yet not overwhelming her and making her feel unsafe or feel a need to comfort me is difficult. I never want her to feel like she needs to worry about my feelings and make things better … I want her to feel empathy and compassion, but still be secure in her little child’s world where she is the one who is taken care of and comforted. I never want her to feel like the adults in her life are out of control because that steals away a little one’s childhood faster than anything. She already has so much fear in her little heart over my battle with POTS and knows mommy’s heart doesn’t work right sometimes. I do believe she is learning compassion and empathy on a grand scale for such a little person. Seeing her papa so sick now is yet another challenge she is having to work through, and I just hope I am doing right by her.
Me and my daddy when I was tiny.
How can you not smile with this joy in your life …
And those squishy cheeks and kissable little lips …
And my little giggly Junebug …
