To My Bug On Your 4th Birthday

I have written one of these posts to you my Bug every year around your birthday. I wrote this one for your First Birthday, this one for your Second Birthday, and this one for your Third Birthday. Now it is your 4th birthday I am torn between a need to see you return to my little baby, and rejoicing in your newest milestones. You recently started school and I am so so proud of you. You at no point were scared or reluctant, you faced school head on and are excelling already. I have never seen you hesitate with anything in your 4 years of life. I have seen you take on the world like a whirlwind. You are smart, sometimes scary smart. You are courageous and independent. You are beautiful inside and out. I am so proud to be your mother. Four years ago you were born. I remember they had doctor after doctor introducing themselves and reminding me this could result in my death. I just kept thinking... I don't care just save him. They were so unsure of his actual size or what they would find. Turned out all the worry was for nothing.... just like I knew it would be. You were born at 9 lbs 7 ounces, well below the almost 12 or so lbs they had estimated you to be. You were perfect. Daddy and I held hands through the whole thing and sobbed when we heard you cry for the first time. They say when you fall in love the other person completes you, but I can honestly say Daddy and I love each other more than life itself but that day, in that moment we were both complete. The missing piece of our family puzzle was in our arms. Bug, you complete us. Watching you grow, change...become the little man you are today... has been the single greatest joy of my life. I love you.

First Days of School

Well it is official, we are now a family with a school age child. He began his first year of school this last week. It was a very big deal for us. As first days go it was kind of a wild one. He had gone to visitor day the week before and all had gone quite well. We waited with him for the bus, he was picked up just when we thought he would be, and we snapped some adorable pics of his standing waiting for the bus and running for it. However when it came to the real first day of Pre Kindergarten we had a rough start. We began the day with a good breakfast, and cute clothes picked out the night before, but I just couldn't shake the feeling that something was going to go wrong with his bus schedule. So I called the school to double check his schedule. I expected the secretary to rattle off his exact schedule and chide me for being silly but instead the schedule she read off to me would have resulted in my son being dropped off across town in front of a perfect stranger's house. I was floored. I trusted these people with my child. I had written down his schedule for them no less then 3 times. So I told her that it was not right and that I would like her to take down what was the right one. I was told "that is not how we do things, you need to write it in a note and give it to his teacher and then she will give it to me and I will tell the bus garage". I think I nailed on the head why they make giant mistakes that could lose children! What a round robin of insane bureaucratic nonsense! So then I said "alright well thank you" hung up and wrote the note.
I had just finished and put it in Bug's backpack when I looked at the clock. It was 7:15 and Bug was due at school at 8:30, so I knew we had about 45 mins before the earliest the bus would arrive. No sooner had I thought that, then I saw the bus slow to a stop in front of our house. I ran out freaking out. Bug was no where near ready and there could not be anyway that this bus was here for him... he must be here for the highschoolers that are due at school at 7:30. I asked him "You are not here for (my son's full name) are you?" "Yes" "But there is over and hour until he will be at school and that is so long.. too long for a little guy to be on a bus, we were not expecting you until 8 at the earliest." "I can't wait, is he ready?" "No he isn't because there is over an hour until he is due at school". At this point the bus driver basically slammed the door in my face. I was so angry.
So I had to go back inside and comfort my now crying child who was distraught at having missed his bus on the first day of school. So undeterred I let him finish getting ready, at his own pace and we loaded up everything in the bike, and I biked him the 2 blocks to school. I decided that until they change his schedule I would just bike him every morning. Why not, better for him, me and the environment. So instead of the traditional waiting for the bus pics I got a few really cute ones while we were waiting at the school. When all was said and done it was a wonderful first day. I got to actually walk him to his room, kiss him goodbye. It was great. I guess things happen the way they are meant to happen.
I think that all in all we had a wonderful first day of school.

September 1st Came In a Whisper

Well here we are. September 1st. Asya Rose's due date. A day that held so much promise 9 months ago when we first learned of our happy little addition to our family. My husband and I are trying, but not trying. We are trying in the sense that when it happens it will happen and we are not preventing, but we have given up the ovulation predictors, the testing, the charting... and most of all hope. Now I don't say that to say I am sad. Far from it. It is just that we have chosen to be realistic. We have had two beautiful children, one who is with us everyday and one who in up in heaven. We also have had two other losses too early to really count as our children. So for us this October marks 5 years since we began our journey of TTC which resulted in 4 pregnancies, and only 1 child. For us if and when it happens it will be a blessing but we are not waiting around for it to happen.
For me September 1st holds more meaning in the fact that in a few days Bug will be in Pre K everyday, riding a bus to and from school everyday. He will be turning 4 years old in 21 days and I will be celebrating my 30th birthday in 17 days.
Here he is running for the bus on Visiting Day.













We have so much produce coming out of the garden everyday. I have been canning every weekend as much as I can. Banana peppers, green peppers, tomatoes, dilly beans, dill pickles, sweet pickled beets.
Yesterday I even made squash chips for snacking. Just salt and pepper in the dehydrator and they came out fabulous.




We have been making our own ice cream from frozen bananas, almond milk and fresh local blueberries too, and just the other day we made pasta from nothing but veggies out of our garden (and pasta of course).




Our Pumpkins are turning orange and everyday it is fun to see them turning a little more orange. Our watermelon are getting bigger and more ripe, almost ready to be picked.


Most of all we have been spending most Saturday mornings enjoying the local Farmer's Market. The friends, sun, good local food, and even sometimes outdoor music to add to the overall fun of the day. I can not think of a better place to go on a Saturday in August or September.

So I suppose I can say that September 1st has come and gone, just as my little girl came into our lives and was so quickly gone. Though it was a day filled with promise, it now holds for me a new sort of promise, one of warm days, chilled nights, leaves changing, pumpkins turning orange and all the fresh tomatoes we can eat. It holds the promise of new changes, laughs and challenges and twists and turns on this road we call life. This has been a truly challenging year but as it begins to draw to a close I see new hopes in the next one. Happy September Everyone!