If You’re Going To Do It….Don’t Do This

So it was BU’s post mentioning spiteful masturbation that first caused lots of rolling on the floor, but then made me realize ‘hey I should masturbate more’. I mean, let’s be honest, dudes do it all the time. If you’re husband says he doesn’t, he is lying….maybe lying is too strong of a word. He is probably trying not to hurt your feelings. I know when I first learned of Andy’s frequency I was met with feelings of inadequacy. But after just shy of 9 years of marriage I am like ‘eh whatever, get down with your bad self’.

All I know is Andy makes time for it at least once a day, some days more. Maybe that is excessive? I am not sure. I guess maybe it is easier for dudes. I mean they “handle” their junk every time they go to the bathroom. Our is much more incognito. I barely remember I have a vagina until AF comes to town….which as we all know doesn’t happen often.

Andy has started working nights again. That adjustment has been a mixed bag. On the one hand it is hard to notice a real difference. He leaves for work about an hour before I go to sleep and he get’s home as I am about to leave for work. I would actually argue the plus side is that we actually have a conversation in the morning before I leave because previously he would still be asleep as I snuck out of the bedroom.

Someone actually asked me ‘so when does he get to see Jack?’. I was sort of offended by that statement. Because honestly, if you realize his hours, he’s just switching when he used to sleep with work and squeezing in some sleep when he would have previously been on campus all day.

He isn’t done with school, but he is on summer, thus only taking one class two days a week. So he still spends the mornings with Jack and the evenings before we put him to bed. It is about the same. Only big difference is sleeping by myself. And I have found we’ve needed to change our sex time from evening to mornings.

Now before I begin this ridiculous story, you must know we have a unique bed. Basically picture a king sized hospital bed. The head and feet raise for comfort levels. There is a “zero gravity” mode which is awesome….oh and it vibrates…which doesn’t do much for either of us, but makes Jack laugh. So our bed has a remote. Obviously it is an awesome bed for reading because you don’t have to stack pillows behind you and what not.

Anyhoodles. On Friday night it escaped me that I would still be in bed when Andy got home from work. I am so used to being ready to leave for work when he gets home, it didn’t occur to me that I wouldn’t be getting up at 5:30 on Saturday morning. So while I was getting ready for bed on Friday I decided to put on the pair of pjs that Kelly bought me. They are super comfy and consist of a light green t-shirt and brown pants with butterflies on them. When I first brought them home, he was like ‘what are those?’. He’s not a bit fan of the pjs I tend to buy. Thus why I usually just sleep in a tank with built-in-bra and what not. But thinking he wouldn’t see my wearing of the comfy pjs I decided to put them on.

In addition I decided it was a good night to have a little vagina party or whatever it might be called. I get out my party accessory and turn off the lights ready for some romantical time. Next thing I remember is waking up to Andy walking in the bedroom door. Now it is hard to say if I just passed out as soon as the lights were off or if I did in fact accomplish a vajayjay party for one….if I could venture a guess I would say nothing happened. But my hand was still on my “accessory”. I was in such a groggy state though that I thought I was holding on to the bed remote, so I pulled it out from under the covers meaning to set the bed remote on the side table.

Imagine Andy’s surprise when I produce a vibrator in front of his eyes. I remember him saying ‘oh really?’ and me turning quite red. As I sat up to stash my party toy in the drawer he caught a glimpse of my pjs and added ‘in your sexy pjs no less’.

So yeah…..basically if you are going to have sexy time with yourself, don’t get caught. And if you are going to get caught, be wearing something sexy. Because I am pretty sure when dudes picture us taking care of ourselves they are thinking sexy lingerie maybe, I am not sure. Let’s just say they are not picturing butterfly pjs. Le sigh.

Classy and Fabulous!

I can’t believe this day is FINALLY HERE!!!! The day we get to celebrate the most deserving and beautiful woman finally becoming the newest mommy on the block. A mommy at last! We’ve all waited for this for so long….there just aren’t enough words to describe how absolutely elated I am that my girl E brought her little girl home. CONGRATS!!!!! Miss Am.e.lia Gr.ay or Aggie, as I have decided to call you in this post, you are so loved! All your cyber aunties waited with baited breath for a very very VERY long time. We are so glad you finally arrived home with your mom and dad and filled their waiting hearts and arms. You have overwhelmed them. I am certain they were never sure if that hole would ever be filled and now they probably are thinking ‘what hole?’.

E I am not really sure I can fully describe how much I love you…and well shit, I am already crying. Cry-typing is never attractive. You are one of the most beautiful women I have ever known. If I could spend every waking minute with you, I am certain I would never tire and we’d constantly come up with ridiculous things to say to one another. You have endlessly been here to lift each and every one of us up when we are down and encourage us when we struggle. All the while you’ve had to sit in this perpetual limbo of interviews, being placed, game changes, and now finally FINALLY, it is your turn.

You’re a mom! You have a daughter! You have a teeny tiny human that will love you and cherish you exactly the way you’ve always been meant to be loved and cherished. A little girl! Just exactly what you needed. Someone to go shopping with and bake cookies, and play house, and have tea, and garden. Someday you will get to plan her wedding!….wait I bet you’ve already started that haven’t you?

Now that I said all that, she may infact be a lesbian rugby player, but you know what? She’ll still do all those things. I don’t know one lesbian who doesn’t like cake, am I right? I can already see you on the sidelines of that rugby game yelling obscenities in your adorable blazer and sensible, yet stylish, flats. You will be the best mother for Aggie. You will be exactly what she needs.

Little Aggie! Auntie Natalie just can’t wait to hold you…I am not gonna lie, I have already started looking at plane tickets. I can’t help it if you are only a few hours away from my in-laws lake house. I did promise them I would come out this summer. What’s a girl to do if I get “lost” on my way there and end up at your door? Obviously I will need to say hello and kiss your sweet little cheeks.

Obviously you deserved the most fabulous shower. Being your momma’s girl, you were in some serious need of accessories. Can’t be outdone by mom! Am I right? So this is your “Classy and Fabulous” Shower. Because in the words of Coco Chanel -

A girl should be two things: classy and fabulous

This is already so true of you. I mean look at that face? So camera-ready! You’re mom is a bit of a fan of Etsy. Who isn’t really? After a few hours of shopping around and mentally spending thousands of dollars on you, I decided I must make you something special instead. You are one of my favorite nieces after all. Plus I got your memo from the other day “Aunt Natalie, I need a basic white onesie with a ruffle-butt, preferably in Tiffany blue”. I completely agree. All Classy and Fabulous ladies need something in the Tiffany blue hue. I might have gotten a little excited about the ruffles. Hopefully they aren’t too big, but then again you are latina, so flaunt it girl! After I finished it I decided it looks a little like a sassy flaminco dress, which is also suiting for you. I was going to try to get Jack to model it for me, but he is a little too big and also I am pretty sure Andy would kill me. But here you go a little gift from your Auntie Natalie (I may have more creations headed your way too, what’s a girl to do when she has too much fun fabric?).

To check out the other blogs throwing E a “shower” see the links below. I must apologize if I left you out. I found as many e-mails for people that I could, but a few could not be found. If you want to join in, please do so!

Emily @ a blanket 2 keep

Bridget @ The Lost Stork

Shannon @ Solo Pronto

Steph @ Blawnde’s Blog

Josey @ My Cheap Version of Therapy

Kelly @ Little Looman Log

Oak @ The Acorn Chronicles

BU @ Relaxing Doesn’t Get Your Pregnant

Amanda @ Our Fertility Journey

Heather @ A Little Hope in My Pocket

Mrs. H. @ Life As Mrs. H

Missy @ Scarlet Baby

Seriously?!

Jen @ ….Within Reach

Sarah @ Baby Talk

Jess @ Life in the White House

I will update the list as posts go up. You can leave a comment if I missed you and I’ll get ya up here!

This is How We Do It

Does anyone else have Montell Jordan playing in their head now? Sorry about that, but it is playing over and over in my head and literally the only words I can think of are “oooooohhhh oooohhhh This is how we do it!”.

So dudes it was time for a new tactic. The previous one was working okay….scratch that, let’s not lie, the previous approach was crap. Watching job boards and applying for new postings was not resulting in locating my dream job. I mentioned last week that I had a response to a cold-call….well a cold-email.

I wasn’t entirely sure if it was an interview or just the guy agreeing to sit down with me as I had suggested in my email. Well turns out it was an interview. And it went amazing!

This is seriously the way to get a job yo. Forget the sending your resume and being 1 of 140 applicants (no shit, one of my interviews the woman said that was how many they received) just hoping your cover letter will catch their eye. I know I am part of the minority who has the luxury to sit and wait for a dream job. I am not trying to negate the fact that I am lucky to be employed at all in this economy.

But if you are ever in my situation where you can continue working while seeking something new, this is the best method. Look for what you really want to do, not necessarily what is available.

I think when I resolved that I didn’t need to get out of my job asap and should just relax my shit and really focus on what I want to do with my life, things started settling down in my brain. I am not in a hurry. I am excited to take my time.

Interview 1 went great. I am slated to go back next week to meet with their historic preservation expert, to show them my work and what not. Hopefully me and this lady just click. Hopefully she will be like ‘we need this girl!’.

Maybe it will be several more months until we can work out an offer or something, who knows? I am not sure what to expect. I feel like it is the 18th Century and I am a suitor setting out to court a young lady to get her to marry me…..yeah I read way too many classic books.

But I like this process WAYYYYY better. Way Wayy waaaayyyy better. It feels less like a rollercoaster and more like a leasurely jaunt down the lazy river.

How Bizarre

I can’t even tell you how weird this feels.

I had to have FF e-mail me my password it has been so long since I was on there. I logged in to find that I was at CD756 before I entered the first data for Tuesday morning…….this is really truly strange folks.

As is customary for me, I am a mixed bag of thoughts and emotions. I am excited to get this business started again. I am nervous and scared and questioning whether this is the ”right time” for this. I believe “What are you thinking?!?!” is being screamed by one side of my brain and the other is like ”This better happen fast this time, I can’t deal with the disappointment again!”.

I am not really sure what I am hoping for. Part of me hopes four weeks from now I am looking at another box of tampons thinking ‘yes! we’re regular’. The other part is hoping that this will be my only trip down Tampon Lane because I’ll be reporting a BFP again….does anyone even remember what all these acronyms mean? Fuck me, I need a crash course reminder.

I am not sure if I should classify myself as TTC…..TTC….it feels like such a distant memory full of heartache and worry and stress and….and I just almost hate that acronym more than anything. I don’t want to be trying. Because to me with trying there is a sense that it could turning into failing to conceive. I don’t want to fail. Failing is almost scary enough at this point that I don’t even want to try.

Along with all those stupid thoughts I can’t get rid of, we have the other side of the coin. The return of that part of me that probably talked itself into not having kids at all 8 years ago. The girl who thought ‘if I have kids I can’t have adventures and travel at the drop of a hat and move around as much as I want, you just can’t do that with kids!’.

Obviously I now know what an idiot that girl was. Stupid stupid girl. But part of her is still there. Thinking ‘with one kid you can still do all those things!’. With one kid you can scoop him up, jump on a plane and go!. You can maneuver around an airport with only slight coordination with one kid.

It isn’t that this part of me is thinking no more kids! completely. But she is sort of convincing me that a couple more years of just one kid might be absolutely fabulous….but then….what if? what if this is my window? what if I wait too long? what if? what if? what if?……..ahhh fuck.

What am I gonna do folks? I have no freakin’ idea! There is a HUGE part of me that is ready. That is like ‘yes! let’s do this! please let this happen’. And there is this other part that is kind of okay if it doesn’t happen right away again. I know that is the dumbest and probably the most hurtful thing some of you could probably read. I am sorry. I know I am a selfish good-fer-nothing bitch for thinking that. I just speak my brains thoughts on here, so I hope you’ll forgive me if that at all hurt those of you who are still so desperate to meet your first little ones.

I know I will still make things happen for myself and my family if numero dos comes right now. I will figure out how to take two babies on a plane by myself or I will stop traveling so much. I just realized that tomorrow Jack and I will be boarding a plane for his 15th flight. He is just a couple of weeks shy of 15 months and he is going on his 8th trip. I want to be able to do that for both of my kids. I want them both to have the same adventures and experiences……but I am not dumb. I know I won’t be able to do that.

But the truth is, come next March, we probably wouldn’t be doing as much traveling anyway. Jack will be turning two. That whole ‘hold yer kid in lap’ sitch will end. So that means two tickets…..and he will be two….I have no idea what to expect with that.

He is so sweet and awesome that I can’t possibly imagine him going through this thing that people call the “terrible twos”. Certainly that won’t happen to my sweet little man…..but again, I am not dumb….I know it probably will. A classification like ‘the terrible twos” doesn’t come about by only 2 or 3 parents having kids that go through it.

Le sigh….are you all confused by my brain yet? Basically I think I have worked it out. Thanks for reading as I mentally dump all my thoughts and feelings and work through them. The truth is, this is almost over. March of 2013 my streak of jaunting about the country at will is probably over. So why not go for it and see if the end of that part of my life can’t mean the beginning of another…..a second baby!……soooooo I guess we are trying to conceive again. Heeelllppp I am so effing scared dudes!

Alright eff this

I can’t not talk about it. Obviously because when I try to not talk about something I start writing in-depth posts about grass root structures and what not. My brain is trying to calmly deal with all the change that is potentially happening and I am really good at a lot of things, but keeping shit under wraps is not one of them.

Shiz has been crazy up in here. You know how I am all ‘attack from all angles!’ when it comes to this career thing…..yeah well the downside of that is that you might find yourself with like 3 things going on at once and unable to focus on what is happening.

Here’s how things got wild: about two months ago I applied for a position with the gov’t. For anyone who has gone down this road, it is a LONG process…..like LOOONGGG. About a month later I got a first interview, then three weeks after that I had a second interview. Then I had a week of waiting to hear back. The job itself? I was kind of unsure of. The positive side was that they had a building stock of about 300 old buildings. So there was potential for me to do something maybe eventually with preservation. The negative side was that I would be spending a good year or more stuck in front of a computer producing bid documents for pre-manufactured metal maintenance buildings. I was looking at it mostly as a possible stepping stone to get where I eventually want to go….or at least where I thought I wanted to go at the time. Needless to say I did not get offered the job, which is probably for the best.

Meanwhile the whole China opportunity came up again. This time I was like ‘you best be sending me!’. Picture sassy finger movements with that sentence. They want to send two more people for a 3 month stint. My resume went to the firm in China to be reviewed. There are three people willing to go and two spots, so technically my odds are good. The bad news is it is completely up to the other firm. My boss is all on board. But it isn’t up to him. And they don’t have laws in China about discrimination or equal opportunity and what not. So the fact that all dudes went last time and two of the three peeps this time are dudes…..I am not counting on it, but there is still a chance.

I was told two weeks ago that I would be hearing about China on Monday or Tuesday last week. The exact same time I should be hearing back about the gov’t job. Meanwhile I got a response to another job I had applied for. I was like ‘shit! I need to know whether this is a possibility ASAP’. The guy was willing to meet with me right away, like as in 24 hours later. Which rocked.

My meeting with him was SUBLIME! He was awesome, his vision was amazing and I could just see myself working with him. The interview went fantastic and at the end of it I found myself with a tentative job offer and him saying ‘think about it and get back to me’. I came home ready to toss all thoughts of my 401K and dental benefits and thinking ‘fuck yes! THIS is why I became an architect’.

Andy and I had a real conversation though. Obviously family comes first. Obviously we needed to make sure this wasn’t going to mean I was going to be on unemployment in two months. Fortunately Andy recently went back to work for a big company. So although I still winneth the majority of the bread, we had a new venue for getting our benefits. A more stable venue. I decided I had to take the risk. Big risks could mean big rewards. I mean this could be a firm I could someday run.

I e-mailed him that afternoon saying ‘okay I am interested, what comes next?’. He replied that he would get me an official offer letter by Monday morning. SHIIIITTT!!!! Here I was worrying how I would decide between China and this gov’t job and I just got scooped up completely by something else. And you know what? I didn’t even mind.

You are probably like ‘Hello, Natalie CHINA!?!?!?!’, but I was totally willing to give that up for this firm. I spent 24 hours thinking ‘OMG I am going to quit my job next week’. It was the most exciting and nervous I have been in a long time. Then….something weird happened. The guy e-mailed me on Sunday and said things were moving too fast. He wanted to take a step back. Check my references. Meet again, etc.

I was a little stunned and like ‘wait…what?’. I mean I wasn’t the one moving too fast, he offered me a job. So then I panicked. Um is this guy mentally stable? Did I just almost make the hugest mistake ever? I sent him my references on Monday morning, but all of a sudden I was gun shy. I was once again ready to consider all my options and approach this latest one with a mountain of salt. I would for sure not be throwing caution to the wind and taking a great blind leap anymore.

So Monday and Tuesday rolled on by….nothing. Wednesday, Thursday…..????? Thursday night I sent an e-mail to the office manager with the gov’t position asking about the decision. On Friday afternoon I got a voicemail saying I wasn’t selected. Someone with quite a bit more experience than me was. Good for them. If someone who has more than 8 years of experience wanted a job drafting pre-manufactured metal maintainance buildings that tells me one thing. They were out of work. So I am glad they got it. And honestly I wasn’t 100% sure I would take that position anyway. So it is better that this person got it.

I also got a “checking in” e-mail from the spastic guy. He was waiting to get a few contracts signed before moving forward, but he was still very interested. This tells me this guy doesn’t have the work log to keep me employed long-term. He may have it in the future, but it definitely makes me nervous that he doesn’t have it now. I told Oak and E that I sort of want to say ‘let’s talk again in a year and see where you are at’. I mean let’s face it. I am not 19. I don’t live in a studio apartment or in my parent’s basement.

I own a house, I have a family, I can’t just take a job and be like ‘well if it doesn’t work out, oh well’. As confident that I am that this economy will only get better from here. There are no guarantees. So caution is the name of the game.

As for China….you guessed it, no information yet. I am looking at my calendar and seeing that they wanted the new group to start in two and a half weeks. When the topic originally came back up I had six weeks. Plenty of time to expedite a passport and apply for a visa for Jack and Andy….now….time has eliminated this opportunity as well.

I am not sure what the deal is. I can certainly tell you I had no idea last week when I was overwhelmed by the idea of having 3 possible opportunities hit me at once, that I would be sitting here this week with nothing. You would think I would have at least a chance of one of those things working themselves out.

But you know what? It isn’t over until the fat lady sings. And this fat lady is just warming up. Not to be deterred by disappointment, I decided it was time to do some cold calls. I started looking at where I would want to work rather than who was hiring.

So yesterday I sent an e-mail to a firm I would LOVE to work for. It was more of an “I know you’re not hiring, but I’d love to sit down with you and learn more about you” e-mail. Well this morning I received an e-mail from the office manager that they would like me to come in for an interview. Now it could just be a meeting like I asked for, but it could maybe turn into something more! Which is exciting. Still moving forward. I refuse to sit still.

Wait, Do I Know You?

I woke up to Aunt Flo. It has been over two years since the last time this lady came for a visit. Pretty crazy right? I had almost forgotten I had a vajayjay until this morning….alright well I remembered I had a vajayjay, but forgot that she did tricks….gross tricks, but still.

I finally broke open one of the two jumbo boxes of tampons that silly me bought a couple of months after Jack was born thinking I might need them….tampons don’t expire right? Let’s hope not. I opened the box to find a bonus little pink and yellow tampon carrying case. SCORE for me!

Sure I probably didn’t need to shove 20 in there, but it was sort of like when I first started my period…you know….5 years ago when I was a teen…I have forgotten how this shit goes. Do I need 14 a day? I can’t remember…..I started wondering how I was going to smuggle them past my 4 male co-workers to get to the bathroom. Or should I celebrate it? ‘Nothing to see here! Just having my PERIOD!!!! No big deal, happens all the time’. Well except that obviously it doesn’t.

Which kind of makes this a celebration right? Like a “YAY Natalie seems to maybe work” celebration. The downside being obviously no one will really understand the idea of celebrating this. grrr. Why can’t you dudes all live next door (yep, in one house, that would be super convenient for me) then we could have like a big red tent party (if you haven’t read “The Red Tent”, do it!). Only our’s would be way cooler because we’d be sipping on margaritas and eating lots of delicious foods that we’re not supposed to have. Also fuck the tent, we’d be at a spa in the A/C getting a mani and pedi. Ahhh sounds delightful.

Obviously I am sure you are on the edges of your seats, but I will definitely be letting you know whether AF will be a regular visitor or return to her sporadic and absentee ways. Let’s hope for the former. Wow….it is weird….I feel like a functional woman.

 

 

Yoga is for Older Chicks

I tried yoga for the first time when I was about 16-17. I was mature in a lot of ways, but definitely not when it came to yoga. I approached it as a physical task. Bend over and hold, stand on one leg and hold. The talk of ‘quieting your mind’ and those silly breaths they do at the end where you basically pant like a dog. Well it didn’t work for me.

I went to Bikram for the first time in College and loved it. In general the instructor toned down the poses since the heat added a lot more intensity on its own. I am not a stretchy person. You know when you’re seated and you put your feet together and try to get your knees to touch the ground?…yeah I can’t do that. So the fact that I wasn’t super good at it and I wasn’t into the “om-ing” and panting led to me leaving yoga in the past.

It didn’t even cross my mind again until I was at my midwife and she asked if I did yoga. I came home and found a prenatal yoga video on demand and gave it another go. Prenatal yoga is the shit. It is definitely the best yoga out there. It is super super laid back. You spend a lot of time laying on your side and breathing. So obviously I excelled at that.

Recently my SIL mentioned that she wanted to try yoga. So when a groupon showed up for a month of unlimited hot yoga (Bikram) we both bought it.

After that first class I knew yoga was something different to me now. Don’t get me wrong, the majority of the time I am just trying to get through each pose without dying. But the mental aspect has changed. When they say ‘stay present’ and ‘quiet your mind’, I actually know what that means now. And it doesn’t make me giggle….okay well the dog panting breath thing still makes me want to giggle.

The instructor’s at this particular studio try to push you, but also encourage you to listen to your body and give in to the need to rest….I am not gonna lie, I did a 90 minute hot hot session on Monday and spent the last 15 minutes just laying on my back I was so afraid I was going to puke….um don’t eat a sandwich 30 minutes before a hot hot class. Poor choices.

I guess I decided that it is okay to suck. I don’t need to look awesome when I do yoga. What I need is that mind body connection. Think about what you are doing, talk to yourself, praise it for what it is capable of and own up to your limitations. Breathe in to lengthen, breathe out to stretch

Basically yoga is just different for me now. So if you were like me and tried yoga at one time or another and thought it was hokey, maybe you should give it another go. Maybe you will find that yoga is exactly what you need too. Namaste.