Warm Weather and Sunshine!

Finally, warm weather is here!  And it is beautiful!  Mid-February when it was -40 degrees I vowed that I would punch the first person who complained about warm weather.  Yesterday, while coaching Aida's 8u softball team, a very pretty, petite, and honest 7-year old girl proclaimed that it was hot, she was going to melt and we couldn't possibly expect her to play in 75-degree weather. Don't worry, I did not punch her.

We had such a beautiful weekend: sunshine, friends, cousins, and baseball!

 Aida and Ivie were troopers today!  Seven hours at the baseball field.

 

Aida before her recital last week.

Jackson W

Most twenty-three year olds these days have a college degree. I once had a friend shriek at me, “Twenty-three no degree!” He was funny and my best friend so I let him get away with it, but secretly in my heart I was disappointed with myself. I had a very non-traditional college experience; I bounced around between universities before finally deciding, very irrationally, to move half way across the country to Missouri. I took semesters off; I flunked classes; I dropped classes and I worked…a lot. I made good money and had a great group of dysfunctional friends. To add to my non-traditional ways in college, I picked up one summer and followed a man to South Carolina for an internship. I don’t think I ever really asked this man if he wanted me to visit, but honestly, I don’t think I really cared; I needed to escape Columbia.
I had the best summer of my life. Every young person should experience the same carefree, limitless, irresponsible summer that we had. Our weeks consisted of working a little, drinking a lot, lying by the ocean or pool and laughing and exploring the South Carolina coast. I didn’t know if I loved him, but I knew I loved the happiness I was experiencing.

When the summer and my internship ended, I had to reluctantly go back to Missouri to complete my senior year of college. My non-traditional flare and my impromptu thinking was finally trumped by good sound logic, and despite my deep yearning to blow off school and continue my fairy tale in South Carolina, this man and I put the top and doors back on my 1995 Jeep Wrangler and drove across the country back to Missouri.

Leaving this man was hard. I cried. I’m pretty sure he cried too except that his dad was staring at his son with bewilderment and masculinity wondering, why the hell was his good-looking son upset about a young girl?

I climbed back in my Wrangler after we had battled a dangerous storm to meet his parents in St. Louis, who were driving him back to South Carolina. I started my journey back to Columbia; I remember the storm was behind me and ahead of me was a break in the clouds and the sun. I screamed. I was so terribly heart-broken. My soul hurt, my stomach ached, and my mind couldn’t fathom the thought of not seeing him every day.

Once I pulled myself back together, I called my mother. I don’t remember much about our conversation except for her one very important question: What do you think is going to happen with you two? To this question, I answered: “I don’t think anything - I really don’t think I’ll ever see him again.” As I drove back to Columbia to meet up with my friends, the ones I had abandoned for South Carolina for three months, through my soul-aching pain, I somehow thought I understood young, uninhibited love: We had a great time together for the summer, but I had a degree to get and a career to begin. I just didn’t think our lives belonged together past this wonderful summer.

Nine years ago today, on May 5, 2005, the most beautiful human being entered my life. Through the fog of the general anesthesia and the ripping pain in my belly, I remembered I had had a baby. I didn’t even know if it was a boy or girl. Before falling back to sleep, I mustered up enough strength to ask the nurse to see my baby. That’s when Jackson Howard Rock was placed in my arms: The love; the awe; the curiosity. I was a mother! He was beautiful and perfect and the previous nine months of a lonely and sad pregnancy disappeared. This most perfect little human being was going to be with me now and forever.

Jackson Howard Rock Weidner, as he is now known, started my beautiful family. He may never know the depth and significance of his role in our lives, but this precious little boy is the foundation of the love that established our family and two other perfect little human beings – his sisters. Jackson is the best little boy ever. I know this because I have the pleasure of being his mom. I cannot believe that it has been nine years since I woke up out of that anesthetic haze as a mother. I can’t believe that despite saying I would never see Scott again, we now have spent thirteen years of our lives together, nine as parents, and seven married. Jackson is so special in so many ways.

Jackson and I have grown up together. I wasn’t ready to be a mother. After spending my magical summer with Scott, I was ready to go back to Missouri to party my senior year away; God and Jackson had a different plan. Instead, I lived in my aunt’s basement and waddled around the beautiful Mizzou campus. I watched my friends do shots and drink beer while I rubbed my belly. I saw other students stare at me probably wondering how I could have made such a horrible mistake. I was embarrassed. I was scared. I was lonely, especially without Scott, but the little baby who I had no idea would change my life the way he did, stayed close to my heart.

I didn’t know how to be a parent and Jackson sensed that. He cried – a lot. I cried along with him. When he was a toddler, I was impatient. As a mother of a grade-schooler, I’m still impatient, but he is patient with me. Jackson’s desire for independence is not stronger than his love for me. He randomly hugs me and gives me the biggest smiles ever. That boy is my heart. He is my soul; Jackson is my everything; and thank goodness I was wrong that day in August 2004, when I was convinced I would never see Scott again. I was twenty-three “with no degree”, but I was a mother and didn’t know it. When that stormed passed and the clouds parted and the sun emerged, it was then that God was telling me something big was going to happen.

Just Another Saturday Night in the W Household

Seriously...there is never a dull moment in the W household!  And yet, when I ask and inquire and try to fit the pieces of an ill-fitting story together, I receive ridicule:

Scene:

Scott and I sitting in the bedroom watching a movie.
All three kids upstairs playing fairly quiet.

Jackson: Ivie has to go poop.
Me: Ivie has pooped three times today. I'm not interested.
Jackson: Side eye look
Scott: Clearly not his concern

Enter stage left Ivie.

Jackson: Ivie has poop hanging out of her butt.

Scott jumps up and gets her to the pot.
Me: What the hell is going on?

Jackson and Aida muddling through a story, talking over each other: "We were playing in the tent..." "I smelled something" "Ivie said she farted" "But it smelled BAD" "Yeah, BAD" "Then Ivie had poop hanging out of her butt."

Ivie exits from the bathroom no pants and a very concerned experession on her face.

Me: WHAT!?!?! Is there poop upstairs?
J and A: No
Me: What do you mean no? You said she had poop hangning out of her butt.
J and A: Right
Me: So... is there poop on her pants?
J and A: No.
Me: Is there poop on the steps, walls, tent?
J and A: No, no, no.
Scott chuckles. I glare.

Me: I don't understand. You said she had poop hanging out of her butt upstairs, now she's downstairs.
Scott: Well, clearly she had a very uncomfortable walk downstairs...
Me: Glare
Scott to kids talking as though I'm not standing right there: See Mama is trying to make sense of out this story.

Um...yeah...I mean, REALLY? Is this normal? In everyday life do other people just talk about a 4 year old walking down the steps with poop hanging out of their butt? Does ANYONE have this conversation?

As usual, I'm odd man out because I am tyrin to make sense of parenthood.  Scott is SO much better because he just goes with it. Me, I try to connect the dots, analyze, prescribe, diagnosis and fix.  I guess with kids sometimes you just have to say "ok" and move on.

So, no there was no sign of poop anywhere. I still don't get it.

Polar Vortex

It's cold here in Ohio. That's really all people talk about.  "Hey, how are you today". "Oh, fine...it sure is cold out there." Every conversation.  The Polar Vortex and all of the Weather Channel-suspensefully-named winter storms of 2014 are about the only thing going on in Northeast Ohio.  In true Ohio fashion...seriously, the weather has sucked.  I can't remember when I've experienced a winter like this one. It's horrible. Why do I live here?

The kids are doing well.  We had a rough first week of February as Aida battled a serious eye infection in the hospital for three days.  As a parent, the resilience of your children and the ability of you to cope is amazing. I didn't realize the seriousness of the infection until she was out of the hospital. God works in great ways. It was a good thing. It kept me sane during the three-day hospital stay. I was a zombie but it saved me and I was able to care for Aida. Thank God.

JHRW is doing well. Baseball these days is serious biz. I mean seriously, he's 8. He practices indoors once a week. When I was eight we practiced when and if the weather was nice in April.

Ivie is Ivie. She is an enormous ball of energy and laughter in our house. Her and Scott are best friends and she has started calling him her "friendy friend". She addresses him as friend, not daddy.

This winter has been hard; not just weather wise but emotionally. I'm looking forward to spring and the blossoming of new opportunities, fresh air and sunshine.

Happy 2014!

We've had a fun few months: Parties, birthdays, anniversaries, traveling, and holidays.  The kids are finally back home after ten days in St. Louis and I'm back to work tomorrow.

We had a fantastic holiday.  The kids had an even better one. Yes, we sent our kids to STL to spend Christmas with their grandparents, yes I missed them and yes, we will do this again next year (if Mimi and Grandpa offer :-).

We ended our string of partying and the holidays with one last night of debauchery with Scott's good friends from high school and college in Peoria, IL.  Some of the best people I know, all in our 30s and 40s partying and having a grand ole time.  We had a blast!

I'm hoping, praying and working for good things in 2014. I working on putting myself in a position to have two successful business, three happy kids, one loving marriage, and one rewarding/successful professional career as a Sustainability/CSR leader.

May 2014 be blessed, crazy, chaotic, loving, happy, rewarding, safe and healthy!

The kids rang in the New Year at 9:20 with Papa Phil and Grandma Phil!

 Best buddies for about 25 years!!!

Some really, REALLY great ladies!

Holiday in Ohio

So we've been without kids for eight days.  Eight days.  We didn't work six of those eight days.  We've had a lot of fun. We've argued. We've slept in, stayed up late, and drank way too much. We've spent time with friends and family and most importantly each other.  It's been a great few days. 

I miss my kids.

The house is quiet. It's clean. I haven't heard "mama" in excess of fifty times a day.  Little people have such a big presence.  It's really quite amazing. 

In two weeks when we're back to kids, jobs, businesses, sports, dance, and preschool, I will repeat...I missed my kids.

Mural my neighbor's 18-year old daughter painted! My girls don't know about it yet!

 The cousins.

A few things

A few things about me: I love my family, my kids, and my husband! I value education and hard work. I like working and making a positive impact on my company and my community.  I like to volunteer. I'm a tree-hugging, avocado-to-the-hair hippie, a naturalist and an environmentalist.  A new thing to my list: I'm an entrepreneur.  My two new businesses allow to me combine the things I love.

After following this blog for the last couple of years, I invite you to check out business number 2: Arbonne!

It. Is. Amazing!!!! Arbonne is a fantastic line of all-natural, vegan-certified, botanically-based, and paraben-free hair care, skincare, cosmetics and nutrition products. It's where the professional me meets the hippie me.  Because I love this product so much, I decided to start selling Arbonne.  I think you will too. Check out my site:  www.weidnerarbonne.myarbonne.com.  Email me with any questions! I have some amazing deals too!

Now back to college football.  I also love college football.  MIZZOU! BUCKEYES!