2013

I'd like to make a promise and say I'll write more before the year is out, but knowing myself, I'm just not going to do that.  It won't happen.

To tell you the truth, I'm writing a novel in my head every night before I go to sleep.  I was never a big fiction writer until after college... interesting how that happened.  I miss writing.  I need to sit down and do it more, but I have so much else going on that I feel I can't justify the time, which is sort of silly to me.

Anyway, December is good here because it's not as cold as Utah, but we've still had some snow.  Enough that my generally seasonally-confused self can finally recognize that it's Christmas time and soon it will be January.

Most days, I spend my time with my girls and making various things while they play together and need me occasionally.  I rearrange things, I talk to my dogs, I talk to my girls, I look out the window, I get the mail.  Most days, I don't go anywhere because we're sharing my car right now.  I'm ok with that--my days are pretty simple, and if I said I hope for more, I'd be lying. 

This is the season of my life.  I have such an urge to create, make, do, be more, be better, come up with new things, and sometimes, it hurts.  Most times, it's the norm.  I don't mind because if it means I get to spend time with my sweet and helpful little Ruby and fire-y yet calm little Emmy, I will certainly take it.  They are just my world spinning.

Ruby is killing me with sweetness lately.  She's so helpful at picking up her toys, and every morning, we watch Sesame Street.  She understands that Emmy HAS to sit on my lap because Emmy is a mama's girl more deeply in the mornings, but to compensate, she'll lean her head against my arm.  She's beginning to repeat words I say, like AMEN! or "Emma" for Emmy--she doesn't ever end things in "y. "Puppy" is "puppa" and "daddy" is "dada," etc.  She loves to give kisses and loves to kiss her snuggie (blanket).  She blows kisses and waves to everyone and is VERY social.  Loves her dada and her puppies.

Emmy, on the other hand, is a tough cookie.  She climbs on top of our table on the regular and generally gets into trouble climbing things, trying to climb things, getting into things.  She has this squeak-laugh that just about does me in; it's funny, though, because you can try so hard to get her to laugh and you'll get NOTHING.  You have to earn it with Emerson.  But when she loves you, she LOVES you. She loves talking to plants on our walks and talking to me in jumbled talk, which both she and Ruby do.  I really think they have their own twin language, because it's all nonsense to anyone else who hears it.  Yet, there's a lot of head-nodding that goes on between the two of them when it happens.  Anyway, Emmy is a tender little girl.  She puckers her lips all the time for kisses and says "hiya" regularly, which I LOVE.  She spots and talks about puppies everywhere we go, and she'll say "a puppy?" Over and over again, even when I haven't seen one anywhere.  I'll look and finally spot the dog (a ways away) she's talking about--she's hilarious.

Ruby above, Emmy below.

This year has been the best of the best and the worst of the worst, all rolled into one.  Confusing, hard, soul-searching and heartbreaking... it's been one of those years that's just been everything.  I'm glad to say I lived it. 

On living

So, we found a place to live.  All along in our search, I kept thinking back to what my friend Liz said on a previous post, that maybe we just hadn't found "our" place.  I really think that's it--because though we haven't seen this one in person, it seems like it'll be perfect for us.  I'm so excited. 

And, it's in Provo.  I'm a little nervous, mostly because I don't really love BYU (sorry.) and fanatic BYU fans (sorry.).  But I know good people are everywhere, I know there's a lot of fun things in and around Provo, and my sister lives 15-20 minutes one way and my brother about 25-30 minutes the other. 

We're excited.

I'm excited to get all my stuff out, sort through it, and live more simply.  Also?  I'm excited to sort out my mental space.  I feel like I've had this inner turmoil for a while, and part of it I know for sure is because I have anxiety.  Though most of the time I'm just fine, for the last little while I've begun to realize that I wasn't really fine.  Thankfully, I'm coming out of a difficult period and I feel as though things are beginning to look up; sometimes I hesitate writing about real and difficult things because it doesn't often seem like there's room for it in the world of perfect, happy, golden blogging, but that's real life and I think there's value and meaning in remembering even difficult times.  Regardless, I'm doing a lot better than I was, and I'm grateful for it.

I think part of it, too, is that I'm still trying to figure out my identity as a stay-at-home mom, and a mom in general.  I see certain ways I do things and want to change them.  But the thing I've recently realized in the last year is this:  if I don't like something, change it! 

For example, I used to never pick up my dogs' poop.  Yep.  Never.  Just didn't worry about it on walks.  And now I have no idea why because the idea horrifies me, and I'm pretty sure if I were a homeowner without a dog (or even with a dog), I'd probably be preeeeettttttty put out that a dog pooped on my lawn.  So one day, I got depressed about it.  I thought, oh man, I'm a terrible person who doesn't pick up their dogs' poop and I don't smile and say good morning to people on my jogs and I don't do this etc. etc. etc.  BUT THEN.  Then, one day, I thought, why not?  Why can't I do those things? 

So, every jog, I started bringing bags to pick up my dog's poop.  And I passed some people on the sidewalk, and though it's kind of outside my comfort zone, I smiled and said good morning.  And!  It felt awkward--not picking up the poop... Ok, ok, that's awkward, but it's a must-do thing--but smiling and saying hello felt really super good.

I guess what I'm trying to say is this:

Hi.  I'm Ashley, almost 27 years old, and I'm still working on becoming better, doing better, and figuring myself out.  Also, I'm moving really soon and I'd like to make some friends.  So if you know anyone who would be a good friend, I'm accepting applications as of now. (Ha!)

Lastly, my girls turned one on Saturday, and maybe sometime I'll write about that a bit more.  It's bittersweet because I can't believe they're not tiny newborns anymore, but they're just so fun, sweet and tender little girls.  I love them so, so much.  They look just like their daddy... so I guess it's a good thing I love him, too. 

It's a good life.

Things I think

I think, sometimes, I'm a little shy about writing here anymore. Which is so weird, because it's my blog?

But I've been "shrinking" myself a lot lately, and I've realized: wow, I'm a huge pushover. I definitely let other people's voices and opinions and ideas bowl mine over and I tend to just go with it.

Well... I'm trying not to do that so much anymore. Mostly because while I'm a pretty laid-back person, I've begun to realize it's also okay to have opinions or feel angry about things or strongly about things.

I'm still working on embracing that, however.

Anyway, life is pretty good. I have day-to-day things which bother me, but doesn't everyone? My babies are hilarious and cute and are these little people who just terrify me because I had no idea they would be such fantastic human beings. And how in the world am I supposed to raise them to be good when they're just these astonishingly innocent, beautiful girls and I'm so flawed? I often think about things I'll tell them when they're older, things I wish someone might have told me when I was growing up, like you don't need to feel bad about this, or guilty about this, and this is important... that's vague, I know. My mother did a really good job raising me, I feel. I often just need more reassurance about things than you might think is reasonable.

Sometimes I forget my babies are still babies because I interact with them so much and they respond to me now (as opposed to the days when, you know, they just used to lie there and look at me, though those times were wonderful, too). They've never really been big binky babies, but Ruby has lately been taking hers a little again and I have this moment regularly where I think, oh yeah, she is still a baby!  I miss having snuggly newborns, but I do not miss the lack of sleep and feeling like I had to stare at them every second just in case.

Although I still struggle with the whole mom-guilt thing, to be honest. But as a person, I generally feel guilty about things whether they're truly my fault or not. So clearly that's going to carry over into mothering as well.

Lately, I've taken up jogging. Or, realistically, walk/jogging. I go with Bagheera in the mornings a few times a week, and sometimes I drag Bert along. Today, I had to pick Bert up and carry him for like 20 feet because he wouldn't even go at all. At one point, he stopped dead in the middle of a crosswalk and wouldn't go, but we worked that out because I'm much bigger than him, holy cow.

ANYway, my point is that I've kind of begun to look forward to these jogs. As a mother and person who lives with her in-laws, I don't get out much. Several reasons why: my twins are a little too little to go play at activity places, I like them to nap at home, I'm a homebody, where we live doesn't have THAT many places to walk around and window shop (I covered all that in probably less than a couple weeks), and window shopping all the time without money is not all that fun after a while. So. We stay home. And I jog. And I get fired up about stuff and I get closure about things and I think of new ideas. It's refreshing. Plus, I'm trying to get healthier because I've heard that's good for you.

Sometimes when people ask me how old my girls are, I hear myself tell them and then think it's someone else because there's just no way they're almost 8 months old.  HOW did that happen?

Also, my housband will be done with school in the spring.  And then we'll be who knows where.  The not-knowing drives me crazy, but I'm also really excited. 

I sometimes read my old posts on this blog, like from when I first began writing here, and I think... oh geez.  But then the other day, I read a blog I used to write when I was senior in high school and I thought OH GEEZ.  I am such a weirdo.  An age-appropriate weirdo, but a weirdo, nonetheless. (Meaning the things I wrote probably fit with other people that age, but now I don't write like that anymore, thankgoodness.)  It made me miss the times when I was in college and the times when I was in high school and just beginning to wonder what I'd do with my life.  And then I remember that motherhood isn't the end-all, be-all of things, that there's so much more to me than just being a mother... though motherhood is one of my favorite things so far in life.

I miss decorating and organizing and cleaning my own place.  I'm excited to get that back and then I'm going to go nuts.   And probably get rid of a ton of my old stuff that's been sitting there doing nothing.  Ha....

My girls are already fighting over toys.  And pulling hair.  In Emmy's defense, though, Ruby's hair is really long and probably fun to pull.  I wouldn't know; I haven't pulled it. 

Maybe eventually I will write more cohesive and less random posts. TA-DA!

My babies are sleeping but I'm not sleeping.

YOU GUYS.  The girls have begun to sleep from 8ish to 4ish or even 5ish sometimes. 

But lately, I can't fall asleep.  And then, I sleep horribly.  Every sound I hear, I wonder, are they awake?  Are they waking up?  Are they choking?  And then I can't fall asleep until I hear whoever's wiggling settle down, take another breath, etc. 

They haven't choked yet.

I'm thinking they're going to be ok.

Maybe it's for the best that we'll be in separate rooms soon (with a monitor). 

I'm still pretty tired, even though they sleep well nowadays.

38 weeks............ Just kidding.

I almost had you, didn't I?  Well, you'd be wrong if you thought I still had two little people gestating in there.  I'd include a photo of  me today, but it's not as fun anymore, plus I haven't showered yet today.  So.

Our girls arrived on Friday the 13th, which turned out to be lucky.  Baby A, whose name is Ruby, weighed 5 lbs 7 oz; Baby B, now known as Emerson, weighed 5 lbs 2 oz.  Both were delivered happy and healthy, and they spent no time in the NICU (which I was worried about, but it never happened!).  We are feeling very blessed right now.  I'll have to write more about their arrival a little later, but it was a pretty neat experience.  I can't believe they're here or how much I love them!  I also can't believe that I had all that baby in me just 5 days ago. 

Here we all are after delivery--me and my two hooligans.

I want to post more photos, but I don't have my camera cord with me.  Soon! 

We're all doing well.  Emerson (Emmy) looks just like her daddy.  Ruby, I think, more like me.  Both have a good amount of hair, and we still don't know if they're identical or fraternal because they have the same blood type.  Maybe we'll have to find out some other way.

Oh, I just love them.