Departures

Our lil BHB is almost 2. I can't believe it. If you have a new-ish baby and you're reading this, let me be the 412th person to tell you this 'It goes so fast!'.

Are you annoyed? I sure was.

But, holy crap, it goes so fast! Hold on, wait, that's not true. The first 6 months took about 6 years. 

But since then, it's been blazing by in a blur of sweet and firsts and 'oh I should write that down' or oh I should blog about that'. But there are no lack of pictures my friends, the boy is documented at the very least in photographic evidence. Here are a few recent goodies:

Kale smoothie

ASL - the letter V. Or peace.

In other news...

I don't know about you, but my heart and brain are just breaking apart the last few days with the news of the Earthquake and Tsunami in Japan. That event is the true meaning of devastation, and I never know what to do with the overwhelming feelings that crowd my synapses at times like this. It's such a mix of unreasonable sadness and helplessness and the weird relief that distance provides. Although living in LA which by all accounts is 'next' when it comes to anyone's guess for earth shaking disaster zones isn't exactly providing much in the way of 'thank god that's not us'. Cause it so totally-ottally could be and likely in our lifetime will be.

So there's that. 

In recent months I went into a power scramble to get our 'kit' together and did a pretty good job of making it happen thanks to this place and this site and of course the cute hubs who just totally obliged my freaked out state of mind. And that feels somewhat better. But. When I watch the footage of that horrifying blob of water creeping across the land makes me wonder what the heck our collection of  bottled water and snacks and bandaids will do in a moment like that?  I shudder when I say, 'Oh, not much'.

Being a parent just really puts a giant amplifier on these types of moments, doesn't it? The fears and sadness the 'whelming empathy I feel for those families come from a place that's so different now. Being the one who that tiny laughing boy with the big eyes counts on just makes me feel so responsible and useless at the same time.

Like tonight I want to sleep under his crib so that if the earth moves even the tiniest bit I can grab his little sleeping body and somehow be good enough to save him from whatever the hell is going to happen. Guess what? I can't do that now, nor will I be able to do that when he walks to school alone and has to cross the street where there are big trucks that are driven by dudes with big egos and big addictions or when he wants to skate around town with his ipod and knit hat pulled down over his eyes, or when he becomes a pilot or when he...ok, you get the idea.

So I guess the best I can do is enjoy his little snore and be grateful for the running water (hot even!) and for the safety of my loved ones and the bed that beckons and even the loss of an hour due to random time scrambling.

I just want to say that my deepest sympathies are with you Japan and your beautiful people, I am so very sorry for your losses and continued troubles. I cannot begin to know.

Yours,

PS - If you need some cheering up with some deeeelicious foodstuffs, be sure to drop by this blog. My friend and a supporter of our movie cooks and writes these amazing recipes up, I'm so going to cook the current recipe for our own warmth and cheer and try to figure out how to ship it across the sea.

Christmas Vacation

We didn't go anywhere, we stayed put with the mysteriously warm days mixed in with crazy ass rain.

We didn't make plans, we sorta faked it. There were no demands, we weren't willing to have them.

And it was good. Spontaneous delight appeared.

We opened a few gifts, well...whatever other people bought us. BHB's gifts were then wrapped with that same wrapping paper. The dog did the unwrapping anyway. (video evidence below).

Boy that kinda makes us sound a little. Um. Cheap? Sure. How about 'on a budget?'. Which is true, too. Cute hubs and I don't buy gifts for each other anymore. Sometimes that makes me a little sad. Mostly it's a relief.

Let's just wander through the days of our vaca, shall we?

Are you kidding me with this?

Mom, Boy and God?

Christmas Morning with Kissy Whale and Daddy

Yes we call this sleeping buddy the Kissy Whale instead of the Killer Whale that it is. I know. Damn left-coasters.

New Years Eve we took the BHB to his first Sushi. He beat me to this 'first' one by 21 years.

BFF's

BHB has a dear friend who he knows from hiking. She's appeared up here before, as you can see. This day he rolled his hand around in her hand for a really long time giggling. She was both enchanted and confused by it. They often fight over each other's cheerios as we make our way up the hill. And they talk about birds.

BHB has a great habit of repeating the word, Yea. Yea! Yea. Yeaaaaa. Yea. 

He awakes with this idea in his mind sometimes, we hear him yelling it from his crib. We call it his morning affirmations. I bring this up because his blonde girlfriend will often talk about him when they are apart by saying 'He says Yea! Yea. Yep. Yea'. 

I hope he always feels this way about life. 

I have to include the following video. Our brown dog developed a new talent this Christmas, is David Letterman still doing stupid pet tricks? "Cause comon', this qualifies.

With the warmest wishes for a Happy New Year!

PS - Shout out going out to Corrie Davidson who is one of our backers for our short film. She is a film producer, social media goddess type and a mascot. How genius is that? You can find her here or here. 

Time Bandits

It's pouring here. Buckets and train cars full of water slosh from the sky. I am lucky that unlike other Los Angelens, I do not live near the edge of a cliff or under the shadow of a mountain so it is without reservation that I celebrate the influx of wet. Huzzah! Bring it! (with a little shout to any Angelens who  are in either of this situations, eep. sorry).

It has been raining, storming even, for like six days. It's easy to love it because I know it ends. Also, I don't commute anywhere. Plus I figure we were overdue, so let's gather as much of it in the ground or reservoirs as possible. Of course most if it runs off, creates havoc and is useless but I like my pollyanna vision of little ponds with frogs and ducks getting filled with clean, fresh water.

Here are a few pics from a recent rain hike where we got whipped by rain and wind but the BHB was a total champ under his plastic tarp.

Rain makes me have deep thoughts...

Overdue is a quick apt description to my reality at the moment. I've got a library book so overdue I even got the wtf robot dialed phonecall on my cell phone. But getting to that library one mile away sounds hard. I'm a disappointment as a citizen and a human being, I realize that. But it's raining! I need a boat to get there.

And I'm overdue with my updates here. Overdue on several emails. Overdue to spend QT with friends, I wonder if they remember me?Overdue to get the kid out on playdates. I've got that big stamp over me at the moment, but I'm strangely peaceful about it.

I recently transitioned from SAHM who REALLY needs to be working to WAHM with waaay too much work. I felt like that desperate, dehydrated desert traveler who stumbles onto water and gorges on it until he is sick. Ah! Did you see 127 hours? Like that. That was me. Still is.

And honestly? It's been fantastic. I've had two jobs of late, one is editing behind-the-scenes videos for various artists. Here is one of my favorites so far:



So while I cut away in my office, the BHB has several girlfriends who come over in the afternoons who party with him at the park, entertain him here at home, or do laps n' snacks in the red stroller that he could sit in for hours. It's pretty darn sweet, he love these girls and I'm right here if I'm needed. When the day ends, he and I do the dinner dance, bath, book, bed and I go right back to work...usually til the wee hours of the night. Or get up at 4 or 5 to work again til late morning when cute hubs needs help again.

Which finally brings me to the title of this post. While it's been a super sweet time, it feels like there have been bandits who have taken late summer and fall away. I feel DAMN lucky to be able to work at home so I can have meals with the dude and see him off to bed. Sure sleep is back off the list of things in abundance, but it's a fair trade for the laughing contests I get to be a part of....

Oh, and is there something happening this week? Something to do with Jesus or the Mall? Remind me ok. I'm kinda out of it.

Soaked in goodness,



PS. Sending out some love for our friends in the real estate business. Holiday is the perfect time of year to buy a house, prices are lower and sellers are eager and you've got time to cruise around in the rain with our buddy Brad. Go grab a house before interest rates go up!

Year One

Approximately one year ago (give or take 3 weeks) I began this blog. I didn't know what the hell I was doing, I just knew that my friend Stefanie Wilder-Taylor said I should. We had just met, I thought 'she's funny as hell and seems to have it together as a mom, I'll do whatever she says'. I know, that's ridiculous. In my defense I was sleep deprived, and she's pretty.

You: Dude, you are such a name dropper.
Me: I know. Sorry.

But I'm glad I did. And so I've been up here more or less consistently typing into the void of the interweb sharing my panic about this parenting thing, and my love of the tiny boy with the big head, the endless nights of sleepwalking, our shortfilm fundraising efforts which succeeded (woot!), a possible huge move out of the state (which isn't happening by the way), and the continual unfolding of realization that this choice we made to be parents just changes the whole playing field in ways I still don't fully understand.

The shockwaves run the gamut: finances, career, friendships, marriage, personal identity. For me it's been a bit extreme in such groundshaking, earthquaking ways that it looks like a crack the size of South Dakota and feels like the crushing loneliness I felt driving through that state when I was 20. I feel a little ridiculous by how thrown I am by this new life, and while it's definitely getting easier, glimmers of the existential angst remains.

But I'm here, and you know what?  It's getting better and better. It's actually turning out to be an incredibly sweet life, and the likelihood is that the darkness I've seen this year is what brought me into this light. Sure the PPD fairy left her mark, but her fairydust doesn't choke me anymore, thankfully that little beyatch is flitting about more on the periphery.

So now that I've linked my way through some highlights of the year, I'll also share some faves that are unrelated. If you've got a minute or 14, wade on through...

* Cute hubs on our anniversary
*A big creepy fight outside our house
* A lovely moment of happiness during the holidays
* Sad (long) story of my brother's journey with schizophrenia
* During the movie review phase - Away We Go
* The birth story that I wrote in SWT's class. This was Take 2.

I'll leave you with this. One of the only ways cute hubs and I made it through the year is through knowing Larry and Linda - The Untroubled Couple. They are amazing and have a beautiful way navigating the stormy waters of love. Please watch the trailer for their webseries and become a follower. You won't regret it.




Untroubled and pretty happy about it,


PS - Link count: -  14 of my past posts and 2 other sites. That's a lotta linky!

PPS - Can't leave you without one pic of the BHB. This is his sign for Light.

Snow White

I type and I watch. I'm catching out of the corner of my eye these mad dudes with their flying, flashing ski's willingly flip, well - fling themselves miles into the air and flip flop fall and float (but mostly flip) into the relative safety of the snow that sometimes catches and sometimes kick back with a splash of white and whatev's. All I can say is WHOA dude. These guys are awesome.

What inspired that? Were they like six years old and racing a car around the Berber carpet in 1994 and  looked up at the flickering coverage of the Olympics coming to them from Norway and saw these nutty dudes flipping through the air and then turn to their mom's with big round eyes and matchbox car mid-track and point their little stubby fingers at the screen and say - "Yes, I will do that. It will be rad and I will wear shiny colorful spandex and I will win."

photo credit: Mike Groll AP/File

Don't you wonder? As I watched the other jumping event tonight - the ski jump - with the dudes that fly for like 30 gorgeous heartdropping seconds I got totally annoyed with my 10 month old son as I projected into the relative near future when lil BHB and I will likely have this conversation....

INT: OUR HOUSE - NIGHT

An adorable 4 year old BOY pushes a monster truck around the hardwood floors as his MOM and DAD watch slack-jawed as the Olympic aerialists flip fourteen times before landing on the fake snow.                        

His Mom is extremely hot and looks amazing in casual sweats. She is a very thin and young-looking 43 year old...(oh rats, sorry - went off into fantasy there) Ahem. The sweet boy looks up at the giant plasma TV that is uber fancy and wafer thin...

BHB 

Look Mom! I can do that!

ME

Nope. No way. Forget it.

BHB

But Mooommmmmm.

ME

Sorry.

BHB

(looking offscreen with intense resolve) 

I will wear flashy spandex, and I will win.

ME

Noo! I love your big head!

 I don't want you to break it on that mean snow.  

Curse you inspiring dudes who flip through the 

air with the greatest of ease!

Sigh. I guess we're not going to be watching the next Winter Olympics.

With love from the future,




PS - Ok, I realize that reading the above is like watching reality tv when a really great drama is on the other channel. It's on the silly, fluffy and pointless side but thanks for coming by...

Now if you want to read something really heartfelt and poetic and filled with awesomeness, you should go here. The writer is a dear friend, filmmaker, writer, and mom of an amaaaazing kid. I met her in line at Sundance a bunch of years ago. She's just fantastic! But I digress. But yes, you should definitely check this post out (whut up double link!) And be sure to play the music, it's a wonderful good time.