Nursery Paintings

Rainy Days

We are in the midst of a serious drought here in Central Texas. 18 months with very little rain, I've read that it's the dryest 18 month period in recorded weather history. In fact, we'd been so long without rain that when it finally started raining two nights ago, both me and my hubby were tossing and turning all night because of the strange noise outside. This is especially funny for me - I grew up in Tennessee where it rained frequently and I like to think that rain lulls me to sleep. Apparently not anymore. But I'll get my groove back.
I love the rain. When I was a little girl, my dad and I would stand on the back porch and hold hands, watching the rain and the lightening together. I always felt like rainy days were our special place. When I was a teenager, sometimes I would crawl through my bedroom window and sit on the roof of the porch to watch the storms. Other times I'd stay hand-in-hand with my Dad on the porch downstairs.
My Dad died one month after my nineteenth birthday. I know that all people lose their parents at some point in their life, but losing my dad has been the most tragic part of my 30 years of life. I should be grateful for that, I guess. I never had grandparents though (my longest living grandparent, Grandma Dove, died when I was barely 3), and my Dad was especially important to me. He was much older, 47 when I was born, and was much like a grandparent most of my life (except for spankings with the belt!) He was retired for most of my life, retired from multiple jobs and working odd jobs to make a few more dollars on the side. He was my basketball coach, he attended every one of my softball games, he took me and all my friends to all of our volleyball games. I "home-schooled" my 8th grade year. I put that in quotes because actually, I spent the year with my Dad, doing whatever we did. Gardening, travelling, having fun. We were very close. We hiked the woods, told jokes, played cards and generally just enjoyed each others' company. It didn't effect my grades any, I came to high school as a freshman in all advanced classes and I graduated with distinguished honors.
The day we buried my dad, the wind blew strong and knocked over all the flowers at his graveside. Clouds rolled in and darkened during the graveside service, and gentle rain fell from above. My mom told me it upset her, to get rain at Daddy's funeral. I told her it was perfect, it was my Dad saying hello, wrapping us in a hug, letting us know we'd be OK and he wasn't gone.
The same thing happened the day I married my husband. We got married on the banks of the Guadalupe River, and as we turned around, together, to walk back down the aisle, I noticed huge dark rainclouds over the top of us. We'd had some decent rain earlier in the day, and we only got a few drops after the ceremony, thankfully, but I felt like it was my Dad telling me he was there and walking me down the aisle to my husband. There was a huge rainbow in the sky that evening.
We're expecting our first child in early August. I keep telling Dale that I expect there to be the most amazing thunderstorm when we deliver. He wouldn't miss it for the world.

Losing myself

Yesterday evening I walked into my temporarily empty former guest room. I took the new paint and poured it into the tray. I took my paint roller and sopped it up good and full of paint. I began to roll the new calm, sage green color onto the walls. A nice neutral color that I'm sure guests (in the next few months before the baby is born) will appreciate. A very good color for a guest room or a nursery. A color that matches the rest of our house and I'm sure will be easier to pawn off on buyers at resell time. A color that I love and that I surely could have picked for this room in the first place. This room that had been a guest room only out of need. The room that was my creative center for quilting projects and inspiration. The room that I had painted an in-your-face bright ass green because it made me feel alive and awake whenever I walked in. A color that made guests give me strange looks like maybe I was a little crazy and hadn't realized my walls could easily be featured in Crayola. A color that struck me as standing proud even when people wondered why it was wearing that shirt, or dancing that dance or singing that song. A color that respected others but knew it was the best it could possibly be. A color that had worked hard for her achievements and had been successful. A color that knew it was well loved by some and that was more important than being liked by all. A color that was me. A color that was the me that not everyone sees.

I'm so in love with the thought of this amazing little child of mine, growing in my belly to be this unknown amazing person. But painting those walls was the first time I realized that parts of me will be lost in this little one. I'm happy to bring this life into the world, but I am sad to be losing a part of me - me that I have worked so hard to become.

So I covered up my bright-ass in-your-face green walls. I smothered them in mother, in love, in nature.

Burglars

I used to work for a bank, back when I lived in Tennessee and before I became a wildlife whore. I worked in the Teller Pool, which is like substitute tellers who go around to all the different banks when the regular tellers are on vacation, or the bank is short on people, or whatever. So I got to work at all of the 5/3's banks in Knoxville (the name of the bank was fifth thirds, not that I'm retarded and trying to say I worked at five thirds of the banks in Knoxville, I don't even know what that would mean).
There was a particular bank location that was known for two things: being incredibly busy and being robbed on multiple occasions. Needless to say, I was a bit tepid about working at this particular locale. I ended up being at this bank for a couple of months, because they were short on tellers. There would be lines snaking through the lobby and out the door into the parking lot on most afternoons, and we'd get so busy that I would have hundreds of thousands of dollars in my drawer, which is against policy, but was unavoidable. (I can't remember what the limit was on a drawer of a regular teller, I want to say like $10,000 or something, and I remember one day I had $360,000 and the head teller told me to just keep going, there was no time to sell cash to the vault). Turns out the head teller was a bit shady, but that's a story for another time.
One day I'm working my ass off and look around the lobby to notice 3 strange-looking (foreign? like Russian maybe)men huddled together over the table where deposit slips and pens and such things are located. I saw them take a deposit slip, turn it over (our slips were blank on the back side) and begin writing on it, still talking in hushed whispers. I watched them out of the corner of my eye with one finger on the alarm button, praying to myself that they wouldn't end up at my slot. All three men wore jackets and were, aside from the slightly foreign side, normal looking dudes.
They finish writing, the guy with the paper comes forward and the other two stay back, at the table, casually looking around the bank, eyes resting on tellers and our officer a bit long for my taste. Of course, the man with the paper comes to me. By now, he has folded and refolded the paper many times, and it is, as he pushes it towards me, about a 2 inch by 2 inch square. I look into his eyes and notice how nervous he is, sweat beading on his brow, eyes barely making contact with mine before changing focus to his shoes, his hands, the floor.
I unfold the paper, heart thudding in my chest, wondering how I will make it through this experience. On the paper is written
"I do not speak good English, I need $100 from account XXXXXX"

Don't watch while Preggo!

Today I decided it would be a fun idea to watch "Premonition" (with Sandra Bullock). Not only are the pregnancy hormones in full swing, but this morning I woke up grumpy and in a fit, for no good reason. Well, maybe because I had to pee 3 times last night when I'd rather be sleeping soundly, and then my dogs want to get up promptly at 7 to go poddy themselves, and when I'd like for them to come back into the house, they ignore me, so I go back to bed only to be kept awake by them scratching at the back door, then let them in, get snuggled in bed and am kept awake by Sierra licking her vadge...
So I decide to watch "Premonition" thinking it is probably a cheesy movie since I haven't really heard of it before and it's got Sandra Bullock in it, which since Miss Congeniality, usually means cheese.
I haven't been bery weepy in the last few days, so I was confident in my abilities to watch this movie without sobbing.
Turns out, if you are a pregnant woman who loves her husband, you should NOT watch this movie. The entire movie was making me leak tears, and by the end, spoiler alert, I was WAILING. Not just crying, or sobbing, or leaking a few insignificant tears, I was a howling, bawling, snotty nose, tears in my ears, Mess.

Fortune Cookies Really Work!

When I was visiting my mother over Thanksgiving, we went to eat at a Chinese restaurant. This was Sunday night (I was expecting Aunt Flo on Tuesday).

I actually got a double fortune, which is extra fortunate - but reading them together is what really kind of creeps me out!

Apparently we're scumbags

Night before last, Dale and I headed over to the storage unit to get a few things I needed for work. (The unit is for my work and I keep files and stuff in there, as well as my 4-wheeler). This is what I found:

The silver circular lock is mine. The black lock is... management's. I have never in my life felt more like a scumbag! Apparently the main office never got the storage place's bill, so it never got paid. The funny thing is, I got this storage place in JUNE. I have been able to get into my storage unit for 7 months with no problems without paying, and I was none the wiser. What really pisses me off is that these people never thought to give me a phone call and say "Hey, do you know you've never paid your bill, in ... uh... 7 months?" Instead, they wait until the day before New Year's Eve and throw a damn lock on it! I'm betting these people aren't very business savvy!