on crows feet and gestational acne

I haven't been smiling much lately.



I haven't been sitting up straight either.

Both of which might be attributed to the part where being pregnant is none fun and rather hard on my particular body.

Not to mention my prego-mama acne.  I've got at least one funny story from each pregnancy, and so far this time Sir O has offered to get me a bandaid for the owies on my face....

It's cool.  I love having mottled scar tissue all over my visage, it adds character.  Or something.

Now that my test is behind me, it is not much fun to be the "not busy" person surrounded by "busy people" who have "important", or at least demanding things to do.  Aside from giving me an inferiority complex,  it pretty much blows all chances of an afternoon nap, or even of putting one's feet up for 10 minutes.  Which sounds luxurious really, but I think for me it might actually be a necessity.  A necessity that I have to find a way to live without, because my need for a nap (when all I've done is shuffled around behind my kids all day) can hardly compete with deadlines and jobs and classes and rehearsals.  Around these parts people stay on their toes, and if you're not "busy" somebody will ask you to do something pretty quickly.  It's a big house, there's always lots that needs to be done.Too big actually, and the list of things to do overwhelms me (and my paltry energy) pretty quickly.  

I remind myself a dozen times a day that I'm gestating, and that gestating is important.  Dang it.

I have caught Mr Renn's cough, which I can dub the most annoying cough in all the world.  And it's currently being aggravated by the neighbor's cottonwood trees.  I love trees; I miss my PA trees something fierce, but for these trees I have nothing but the fiery hatred of intense eternal loathing.

Mr Renn is much too productive at home when he's not actively employed (only 4 more days).  This sounds like a blessing, but when he expects me (pregnant me) to be just as productive as he is, it is not a blessing.  I cannot do it, and we have a rift.  Rifts are not blessings.

So this is me, sitting in a nest of pregnancy woes and hormones, while the rest of my current world whizzes around at a dizzying pace.  It's not a very conducive environment for finding one's bearings.  Thus I have not got mine, and I can barely keep a day ahead of myself, resulting in some embarrassing pleas for babysitters.  And some considerable listlessness.

One of these pregnancies I'm going to actually be able to do something about that nesting instinct when it kicks in.  But not this pregnancy.  I actually think that being able to nest is a huge part of a mother's ability to define her environment, and her role, and feel confident about her impact on her family, and subsequently the world at large.  Thus, living in borrowed space, and under conditions where I cannot do one dollop of nesting (outside of cleaning... and scrubbing toilets isn't particularly fulfilling for me) is making me a little insecure.

Negative, negative, negative post?  Why yes, yes it is.  Mostly because I just needed to decompress a bit.  And also because I desperately miss my PA institute class and the boost it gave me every week.  I find myself rather easily deflated without it, and there is no comparable experience currently available to me.  If I can get my act together I may be able to initiate something entirely of my own gumption and volition, but you may have noticed the lack of gumption and volition in this post, and be able to anticipate the problem there.  I was really enjoying having heaps of spiritual insight, inspiration, and motivation land in my lap in return for the simple act of showing up (usually without having done my assigned reading).  That went WAY BEYOND being a tender mercy.

But now that all of that is outside of me and buzzing in the whiny quadrant of the blogosphere, I fully intend to pull myself up by the prego bootstraps, and count my blessings and unapologetically tackle my necessary list.
That will fix everything, and don't I know it!  If only knowing and doing were the same thing.  In the meantime, if you see me and I look a bit droopy, just assume I haven't figured out the doing part just yet.

Round trips

Is it worth almost 7 hours -round trip- of driving to get a 4 generation photo?

Depends on who you ask.

I'd say yes.  Just don't ask me when we've been in the car for 2.5 hours and my maternity jeans that have decided to be too small are making my hips and thighs riot with discomfort.  At that moment I may not be thinking clearly enough to say yes.

Besides, where else but Flaming Gorge can you order a hamburger that's bigger than a pizza?  (and forget to take a before photo?)



Or traipse out to Vernal to take a 1/2 mile hike to see a dinosaur fossil?  (Okay, so that may not have been our brightest, shiniest idea ever)



Or watch your husband single-handedly move a large tree into the back of a truck? (Felling trees is kind of exciting..... Mr Renn's grandparents use a lot of firewood every winter)



Or watch your boys play in the same cars their daddy used to play in and love every moment of it?  (Possibly my favorite part)

Still, it's nice to be back with our stuff, and to not be worried that Sir O is going to pee through his very last pair of pants at any moment.  We have just a few moments to catch our breath, and Mr Renn has his ACLS test and starts work!

I could apologize profusely

for falling behind, but what good would that do?

This entire month has been crazy for me.  Almost entirely good crazy, but still full of more flexibility and adjustments then I can properly wrap my brain around.  We've gone from living as a family of 4 in a tiny apartment in PA to living as a family of (8, then) 7 in an oversized house with 5 animals. I've gone from having Mr Renn gone all the time to home all the time, and soon back to gone all the time again.  (He's terribly productive when he's home, but ironically I'm not terribly productive when he's home...hence the blog lag). I've gone from looking mildly pregnant to having people think I'm due any day (that's a treat).  I've flown across the country 3 times, I've spent almost 5 entire days with out my kids,  I've taken my floral design exam and passed (!!),  we've moved all kinds of furniture and "stuff" around to get settled, and I've never once gotten enough sleep.

Between packing, ultrasound, moving, unpacking, seeing my brother off on his mission, flying back for my test, and facing my 10 year high school reunion I've had a steady stream of stresses, large and small (luckily none huge.)  And now that I'm at the end of the list, and the steady stream has run dry, I'm slightly at a loss.  No more living off of endorphins.  I can, perhaps, begin to mold a new routine.  I can, perhaps, allow myself to start enjoying the perks of living here.  (Even if I comment about how I miss the trees of PA a dozen times a day).  Perks like Sir O discovering the joy of cousins, and the Captain discovering the joy of belly buttons.





And my reunion was a surprisingly good experience.  Enough people showed up that there were plenty to see and catch up with, but not so many that it was overwhelming.  Mr Renn talked me through my few awkward moments (he's golden that way) and only one person commented about how my current life path seems inconsistent with my "most likely to succeed" image in high school..... and even that was expressed admirably. We were overdressed, and I was okay with that.  It's the one way in which I depart from Audrey Hepburn's mantra.  I'd rather be over than under-dressed.  (Probably because I don't look as good underdressed as she would).  The evening wrapped up in much less time than I thought it would and we were able to get home and  relieve our babysitters before 10.



It's about what you could hope for from an experience with the phrase "high school" in it.  I was kind of surprised to feel happy about how old the whole thing made me feel.  I kind of like getting old.  I like moving on.  I like the phase of life that I'm in, and I'm rather looking forward to the phases coming in my immediate future.  I'm not the least bit stuck in high school ( I don't think I am anyway), and I'm pretty much capable of looking on it as a time in my past when I learned and grew and struggled and was awkward (not that dissimilar to now), without being bitter about the painful awkwardness of then or of now...


I've given up on thinking the awkwardness isn't supposed to be there.  Embracing imperfection, without ceasing to strive for improvement,  is the best part of growing up.

In my inbox today:

   CONGRATULATIONS!!! 

 

YOU ARE NOW A GRADUATE OF THE LONGWOOD GARDENS FLORAL DESIGN CERTIFICATE EXAM. 

 

YOU GOT AN A. 

 

I AM SO  PROUD OF YOU. 

 

Nancy 

And just like that, I find myself in need of a new pursuit.  Except not today; today I need a nap.  I have yet to catch up entirely on sleep from waking up at 2am mountain time the day of my flight home.  I really do need a new goal though, this has been such a big and exciting endeavor for me for so long that I'm feeling a frightening let-down at the thought of it being over.

Ciao Uncle "Ize skit"

My littlest brother was safely placed in the hands of the MTC today.  I trust they will keep him very busy and teach him how to wake up early in the morning.

In the meanwhile, everybody is plenty emotional around these parts.  Right after this video ended Sir O started to cry.... " I want him to come back and say goodbye again!"

surfacing

Um, surfacing for air.... but only just.
I don't know how anybody manages to blog while moving cross-country, I sure can't seem to manage it.

We are just beginning to think unpacked thoughts and I head back to PA for my floral design test this week.  I am still only feeling mildly prepared.... so there will be more frantic studying rather than posting until that is over.

But, lest I forget:

• My kids managed to get fevers right after we got here.  Knowing about HSF's ongoing drama, taking them to a doctor wasn't a option yet.  Luckily it passed quickly, to be followed by the Captain getting a riotous cold, causing his entire face too ooze with exudate. (That one's still on the table). Party, I tell you.
• My boys love the dogs at this house.  It's kind of a terrified love at times, but they cannot get enough of them.
• I have gotten sunburned 4 times since I got here.  Apparently my learning curve is steep.
• I watched The Young Victoria and loved it, followed by Victoria and Albert, which I did not love.  Fascinating to see how the telling of such a well-documented portion of history could be told in such vastly different ways.  Makes me worry about the academic teaching of history as though it was objective.  There is no objective take on history.  not possible.
• I'm almost done reading Charlotte's Web to Sir O.  I'm not sure how much he's actually paying attention, but he likes to be read to at night.  I'm tempted to try Treasure Island next.  It may be way over his head, but it's bound to increase one of our vocabularies.  
• It was marvelous to spend Memorial Day with extended family.  We haven't been able to do that in ages.

• We Are making lots of lists of what need to happen before Mr Renn's residency starts in July.  June is proving to be a full month.  My parent's household is a busy one, with them both working full time and with my little sister in the full swing of extracurricular teenager-ness.  Everyone should live in a house with both teenagers and toddlers at least once.  It's a whole new level of insanity.
• My kids are cute, if prone to testing limits.  Sometimes my only short-term compensation is their cuteness.  Oddly, it seems to be enough.

• Sir O has taken to peeing his pants 3-5 times a day.  I'm hoping it's just a symptom of all the stress of change he's dealing with, but I'm terribly terribly glad I'm not laundromatting just now.
• There are boxes everywhere, and despite all my organizational efforts, we still don't know (exactly) where lots of things are that we'd like to get our hands on.  It's an uncomfortable level of chaos, and we don't seem to be  able to tackle it at a satisfactory rate.  Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow....
• Tomorrow I must choose between getting the bathroom functional and studying for my test.  Either choice requires someone else to watch my kids.  I require large chunks of completely uninterrupted time to study with any effectiveness, so can you see why progress on all fronts is slow?  

A week from now my test will be over, I'll be in the midst of the longest break I'll have ever had from my kids (and miss them like crazy I'll bet) and my littlest brother will be in the MTC.  I'd say it's going to be a big week.

And when I get back (on the 15th) then I'll officially consider myself landed in Utah.  I may even venture out to the DMV to prove it.