unemployed

For the first time in 14 years I am unemployed, and it feels FAN........TASTIC!

I plan on enjoying a fun-filled and relaxing 2 weeks before Chapter 2 of Karen's Career begins. Now, what to do with 14 days off.... I CAN NOT wait to hang out with CJ and the kids for two weeks. I am going to love every second of it!

......... starting........... NOW! :)

it hit

over the last few weeks I've been wondering if I am emotionally dead... or at least a "cold fish". I just couldn't feel "sad" about leaving. I wasn't happy about leaving... I just felt nothing.

Well this morning it hit and it wasn't pleasant. I woke up late and had been having some sort of a bad dream. I can't remember the dream but I woke up feeling very sad and anxious. On my way to work, as I was crossing the bridge, I looked around and was overcome by a tremendous feeling of sadness.

I realized that this was one of the last times I would see the beautiful mountains all around, the last time I would drive over Lake Washington, with the blue water sparkling and the UW rowers rowing alongside the bridge. Then my thoughts moved on to my girlfriends. It was like someone had punched me in the stomach. Life is going to be so empty without them. I know we will stay in touch. But email and phone calls are one thing... sitting down over a glass of wine and having a good heart-to-heart chat is another. The thought that I will no longer be able to put my arms around a friend and give her a good "i love you" hug, makes my heart ache. One of the things I love most about friendship is being able to share the little daily "nothings". The "I feel fat today", or "I love your new earrings", or "Hey, do you want to hit the sale at Old Navy with me on saturday". I will miss getting together and seeing our children play together. I will no longer be able to watch them and think about how they will grow up together and go to school together. How maybe one day our kids would fall in love and marry and that maybe we would be able to share grandchildren (I know.... probably very unlikely, but I still loved being able to dream). I will miss impromptu get togethers where we can just laugh together. When we can give each other a look and know exactly what the other one is thinking. I will miss being able to call you and say "I need to talk to you, it's important, can you come over now". I will miss being able to cry on your shoulder and then laugh through my tears at something you said to cheer me up. I will miss being in the same space as you. I will miss us being part of each others day-to-day lives.

I am so so so sad. My heart is aching.

Karen, Dawn, Hadley, Nabila, Sam, Rachel, Deb, Christy, Kelly, Sarah, Kristin, JL, Leigh, Ellen, I love you all so much. Thank you for being my friends. I will miss you so much. I love you :(

I miss the kids

I miss them so much. I talked to Kenzie on the phone yesterday. She told me that "Glenda has two fish". Glenda is my mum's neighbour. Mum and the kids went to visit Glenda and her husband Tony yesterday. Tony apparently entertained the kids for an hour and let my mum and Glenda have a chat. Mum told me that Seb was very enamored with Tony and followed him around everywhere. Kenzie was obviously very impressed by the fish - "there was an orange one and a little baby one".


I am counting down teh days till I see them. 4 days from now - exactly, I will be landing in Toronto. YAY!

Let the adventure begin.

Now if we could get our house sold.

Things I had forgotten about Canada

1. Hickory sticks, chocolate, smarties!
2. French, french everywhere
3. Most Canadians are very patriotic and also very proud of their (European, or other) heritage - I was amazed at how many different flags I saw on people's cars (for the world cup)
4. No Fred Meyer - you have to drive to 4 different stores to get your shopping done. (no beer or wine in grocery stores - grrrr)
5. The heat! It felt tropical.
6. The town where I grew up is really beautiful. I was a very lucky kid.
7. The selection of cookies in the grocery store is incredible.
8. My mom has a TON of friends! (that makes me happy)
9. The traffic
10. It still feeels like home.

My birthday

So it's my 36th birthday today. I feel a bit under the weather... okay, more than a bit. I feel horrible. I can hardly talk. My flight yesterday was less than perfect. There were terrible thunderstorms in Denver so our descent was super turbulent. Now that I have children, my life seems a lot more valuable and as a result I am much more scared of flying. I had to practice deep breathing excercises the whole way down. I think my flight was the last to land before they started diverting planes away from the airport. The plane coming in from seattle (which was also the plane that was to take me TO Seattle) was diverted to Colorado Springs. As a result my flight was delayed about 3 hours. I finally got home at about 1:00 am Seattle time (4:00 am Toronto time). It was fabulous to see CJ again though. I missed him very much!

I have to admit that I am quite glad we don't have the kids today. It's nice to relax this morning, sit on the couch, watch some football and drink coffee. That's a pretty spectacular birthday present. I wish I was feeling better though. If I could I'd spend teh day in bed today. BUT, we have another Open House today. So soon we will get moving, take showers, and tidy up the house a bit. Then we are going out for lunch. Since we have to kill a few hours I think I will get my toes done and then after that perhaps do some shopping. I need a whole new "conservative" work wardrobe.

Tonight, CJ and I are going out for a birthday dinner with Leigh, David, Karen, Eric and JL. I am very much looking forward to it.

Since i miss the kiddos terribly, I will leave you with a few pictures I took yesterday. Mum had a little brunch yesterday and Andrea, Chris, Issac and Chris's parents came. It was so cool. It made me so excited to be together with extended family... I loved watching the kids play with their cousin Isaac, and to see Chris's parents playing with Isaac and Kenzie. It just warmed my heart. The thought that this will soon be a regular part of day-to-day life made me feel good about all the turmoil we have been through over the last few months.



I love mum's backyard.


the family


this reminds me of my childhood

it's been a while

Well let's see. A few things have happened since I last blogged.

First, and most importantly, Sam and Charles got married. Unfortunately I didn't go (it was just too much traveling in a short period of time). Congrats yous guys! Love you!!!

We went to the Wheeler's house on Saturday to watch some football. A good time was had by all. Here are a couple pics.

CJ doing the happy dance when the US scored.


Kenzie playing soccer with Tim.


On Sunday we relaxed and had the wheeler's over for a barbeque. It was very sad when they left to go home since it was the last time they'll see the kids for a few months. :( It was hard.

On Monday morning CJ left for his annual boys fishing trip and the kids and I headed to the airport to come to Toronto. The trip was pure hell. The first flight was delayed 45 minutes. Then Sebby screamed for 3 hours straight. I kid you not. He was way overtired but wouldn't sleep. The other passengers were giving me looks.

We landed and got off the plane at Terminal F at 5:35. Our next flight was leaving Terminal D at 5:50. As we walked off the plane I heard an announcement for last call for my flight. Seb was in the stroller and Kenzie and I started running. It was a long way between terminals and I asked 3 of those little passenger cars to take me but they each refused because they have a set route and they couldn't turn around yet. Halfway there Kenzie was too tired to run so I picked her up and ran carrying her and pushing the stroller to the gate.

We arrived as they were shutting the door. When I saw that I burst into tears. That of course made Kenzie upset. Ugh. The flight attendant took pity on us and let us on the plane. So we walked on the plane with me a sobbing teary mess with all the passengers seated, belted and looking at us. very embarrassing.

Anyhow. So we made it to Toronto but Sebby has the flu now and I have this crappy cold flu. Oh well, it can only get better On the plus side, the kids are getting totally spoiled by my mum and all her friends. And they are having fun playing in mum's backyard with teh sprinkler and little pool.

I took these pics when Kenzie was sleeping. I'll post some of her soon.

ha ha ha

Turns out I have 3 weeks of vacation left over from last year!!!

Fantastic Day!

CJ stepped on a nail last week and got a tetanus shot on Saturday. His body isn't reacting very well to the shot and he's been feeling pretty crappy (to say the least) the last few days. He even went in to the ER last night and ended up having a spinal to see if he had meningitis. Thankfully the test came back negative. BUT, I decided to stay home today because I felt so bad for him.

Turned out to be a great day for all of us. CJ had a bit of downtime and the kids and I got to do some fun stuff.

This morning we went to the Children's museum with Karen and her brood. It was a blast. Sebby is a friggin maniac though and ran everywhere... I was exhausted by the time we left. An extra bonus was that we bumped into Leigh there too. We got to hang out and chat. After the museum we headed over to Red Robin for some lunch and it was reasonably uneventful which is a bonus when you go out to eat with 4 kids under the age of 4.

Terrible picture of me, but everyone else looks great.


After lunch we came home and napped for a couple hours before the whole family headed out to watch Austin's baseball game. His team was in the finals. The Lacey's met us at the park and much fun was had by all. We left after the 5th inning but it looked like the Athletics were on their way to a victory! WOOT.

Sebby enjoying his corn dog. It was dropped on the ground no fewer than 20 times..... a little dirt never hurt anyone.


My future daughter-in-law. I love her.


Nabila, I love your Dad!


This may just be the end of this pair of glasses.


Dawn and I had plans to go out for a drink tonight. I don't know whether she'll still be up for it, but if so I'm sure that'll be a wonderful ending to the day.

short timers

I've got a bad case of it. It is REALLY hard for me to get motivated to get any work done. Especially since I got a slap in the face yesterday - I am over in vacation hours this year by about 8 hours. I found out yesterday that my last paycheck will be adjusted accordingly. I am stunned. I can't even guess at how many hours of overtime I have worked in my THIRTEEN YEARS with this company! I'm completely insulted. I know I'm not supposed to blog about work stuff - you all know what happened to dooce?! Wait, she is rich and famous now and travels the world. I could be the next dooce! Except I would have to be funnier. I'll have to work on that.

In any case, I'm not feeling too loyal or dedicated anymore.

overheard this weekend

"The Wiggles was a much better show."

- Darwin Wheeler, commenting on the Dora the Explorer - Dora's Pirate Adventure Show

the zoo

CJ and I are both up right now... unable to sleep at 2:20 am. There is something wrong with this picture.

Anyhow... we had a fun day yesterday. Took Dad (Opa) and the kids to the zoo. In the evening we went to the Lacey's for a barbeque. It was really fun.

We had an Open House yesterday and will be having one today too. I hope this is the last time strangers will be walking through our house. Oh yeah, and I'm annoyed with our realtor. I think he is computer illiterate. He hasn't retaken the photos, so I took some yesterday. They were nice. Bright and crisp. I even resized them for him and CJ loaded them onto a CD for him. I just checked and they still aren't up with the listing. I'm annoyed.

Here are pics from yesterday.

the band

there is a lot of history behind the band. First there was the Trash Monquies. This was before my time, but I was able to enjoy the music from the CD. Then there was Clayton Park. Then, after the fun "band renaming gig" CP became Cousin Phil. I have so many amazing memories of Cousin Phil.... some of which invlove dancing like a crazy person with all my friends to the song with no words! or crying to "what's going on" after 9-11. I also have fond memories of the afternoon party at the Farmhouse. And I will never forget the gig at Jo's on April 21st, 2001 :D

Then there was Spank. Steve, Tom, Ebo and CJ made some pretty awesome funky and fun music. Tonight was Spank's last gig. It was incredible. Everyone came out. People I haven't seen since the Smokey Joe's days were there... even Jo was there! :) The band sounded awesome. Guys, you sounded fantastic tonight!

These are my friends. I love you all SO MUCH! Thank for for being my friends.

The girls


Brent and Abbey


The band


My sexy husband


The bald guys (Nick and CJ)


The Barker-Kenyon's


awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww


me and Karen


I love you!

Andy, this one's for you!

leaving

So, just now I had a thought. I thougt about when I leave the house with the kids on June 19th to head to Toronto. We will stay there at my mum's house for a week and then I will return to Seattle for my last week of work - leaving the kids at my mum's. It just hit me that when we walk out the door the morning of June 19th, that will be the last time the kids will live in our house. This is the only house they have ever lived in. I have a sinking, nervous, scared feeling in my stomach. I can't even go, in my mind, to the last day when CJ and I walk out the door.

so the house is on the market

It's on the market. I hope it sells quickly because it's really hard having it "for sale". First of all it's hard (especially for CJ) to keep it spotless, with the toys put away, waste bins empty and dishes put away every time we leave the house. Then, it's hard knowing that strangers are walking through your house and "evaluating it". I also am having a hard time hearing negative feedback from our realtor - things like "they thought the kitchen was too small", or "they didn't like the street noise". I feel personally insulted and hurt whenever I hear something like that. Also, I am really dissappointed in the pictures that the realtor took and uploaded. They don't do our house justice, and I KNOW that pictures are one of the most important things when a buyer is looking on-line.

I am really in a bad place emotionally right now. I feel drained from everything:- job hunting, accepting a job, quitting mine, telling our friends we are moving, getting our house ready to go on the market (all the disruption, noise, construction), getting ready to go to Toronto in a couple weeks with the intention of buying a new house. I am already feeling sad about being away from CJ for a week, and then being away from the kids for a week. I don't know how I am going to feel when we are in Toronto and I realize that we are away from our friends.

Tomorrow night CJ's band is having their last gig. It is going to be very hard for CJ and for all of us watching (being with friends and watching CJ play in the band are some of the best memories I have - ever!). I hope that the night doesn't turn into a sad event.

cat attrition

Omi left this morning and took the cats with her.

We were joking last night about how we wouldn't be all that upset if, well you know... they are old and the flight may be stressful and they may just kick the bucket on the plane.

Now that they are on the plane I keep thinking "what if they die? Then I'll feel really bad I said those things."