Wedding dress

A couple of weeks ago, I went wedding dress shopping with my sister, who is getting married in a month. It will be exactly 6 years ago from their wedding day that they started dating; therefore the wedding theme is "about time." In accordance with this theme, my parents are getting my sister and her fiance matching watches as gifts. Their wedding will be held at a Las Vegas chapel. The chapel really ought to do a better job of advertisement because if I had known about it, I would've done my wedding there. It's a one stop place for the ceremony, pictures, flowers, limo service, all for just a few hundred bucks. My sister is always complaining about being the third-born, ie. me and my other sister sucked all the good health out of my mom which is why she's got a zillion health problems, at least in her mind. She's lucky in this case, though, because my parents would have had a cow if I as the first-born had done it in a Vegas chapel. We (me and my other sister) have mellowed them out so much that they don't care if there are no centerpieces or party favors or bridesmaids or cake or guests besides ourselves.

Anyway, while we were waiting for my sister to try on her dresses, we looked around at the other brides-to-be. Actually I walked around mentally cringing at certain dresses and staring at other dresses. One of the brides-to-be that I walked by 3 times in an effort to not stare at had her mom and grandmother there. It hit me that one day, that will be me as the mom sitting there watching one daughter, then another try on wedding dresses. That thought made me inexplicably sad. In fact, weddings in general make me sad now because I always think, one day it will be my little girl or boy up there. And my oldest just turned 7 so it won't be that long.

When that time comes, I am not going to make them wear my wedding dress. Every bride-to-be deserves to try on a bunch of beautiful dresses until she finds The One and not to wear an old one that looked better on her mother or grandmother. I will jot down some reminders for that time, as I suspect this will be my last wedding dress shopping foray until then.

(1) Bring a book to read
(2) Bring a decent camera, not just the cellphone camera
(3) Stand up to take the pictures
(4) Sneak in food and drinks
(5) Bring tissues to wipe tears

Hard times

The recession has officially hit us. Awhile back, the husband, who manages our finances, gave me a directive to "be careful" with our spending. Upon questioning, he suggested that we hold off on the girls' dance class. This meant things were bad, very bad. Cutting back on the kids' expenditures is always our last resort. Although I tried hard not to worry (after all, we are more precious to Him than the lilies of the field or the birds of the air), I have to admit I did in the beginning. Now that we've settled into our new lifestyle, I am glad for this season. It has taught me some enormously valuable lessons: (1) to trust Him, really really trust Him from the depths of my gut, (2) to weed out unnecessary garbage and prioritize better, (3) to be thankful because even during these times we have way more than we need, (4) to resist temptation, particularly during shopping trips.

As a result of our budget cutbacks, my hubby is enjoying my longest hair ever look (each trip to the salon is about $30!), the kids are enjoying helping out with cooking & baking, and I am finally selling all the old stuff that I've been meaning to but never got around to. Here in the OC, there is a strong, strong pressure to conform, to wear and own what everyone else has. I'm glad that temptation has been taken away for us. Meanwhile, does anyone want to buy a portable air conditioner?

Hello howdy hi hey yo

I'm thinking of which topic to tackle for my first post. Granted, I'm joining the game late because everyone and their mother is blogging these days, even my husband, whose emails read something like this:

John,
Yes, it's been awhile. I have four kids now.
Kevin

This man's got THREE running blogs now. In my defense, though, even before all the blogging, internet, and email, I was one of those people who would send out handwritten letters in actual envelopes with real stamps. But I was only 6 years old at the time, so you know, I'm really not that old.

Once I decided to blog, I stumbled onto a major obstacle, which was what to name the blog. I tried a few names; guess what - they were taken. I tried more names - they were also taken. I tried pretty much all combinations with "mom" but no go. Finally I typed in "kill me now." Yup, it was taken too (I am not kidding). As I was sitting there, it occurred to me that all the titles which would describe me now were all gone and that maybe I should pick a title I could aspire to be. Sort of like "The Secret," where you just think and believe it, and voila, you're there. There, I just saved you $20 and umpteen hours from having to buy the book and read it. This blog is nothing if not helpful.

So here I am, previously chickenmom but now and forevermore FEARLESSMOM (it deserves caps, no?). I personally think it's a sign that such a cool name like FEARLESSMOM was up for grabs right when I was looking. Perhaps someone higher up wanted me to blog? Why not - He cares enough and is powerful enough to make the small things work out too.

My time to blog is up, as signaled by my baby boy who is simultaneously trying to crawl in my lap and push the keyboard away. Be thankful for him; otherwise who knows how long I would blather on. So here's to me! May I have a fun and rewarding time jotting down all my thoughts before my brain cells are completely depleted!

Simple pleasures

My favorite simple pleasures:

1. slowly eating a big bowl of ice cream while reading a novel
2. watching Kevin read to kids
3. sinking into bed after a long day
4. getting a phone call from a friend
5. nabbing the closest parking spot
6. singing a favorite song in church
7. watching my kids sleep
8. a clean kitchen sink
9. a cool breeze when I’m sweaty
10. the feel of my kids' chubby hands when we walk together.

A Chapter a Day

Kevin and our oldest have this cute little tradition going that I just have to share about. He reads a book to her slowly, a chapter every day, with no pictures, while she listens intently until they're done. It takes them two or three weeks. Their first book was The Lion, Witch, and Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis, and they just finished Charlie and the Chocolate Factory last week. After each one, they celebrated by watching the dvd. We loved the movie version of The Lion, Witch, and Wardrobe, but the Willy Wonka movie with Johnny Depp was just strange. Guess I'm not a big fan of Tim Burton, and the movie had his stamp all over it. This next book they're going through doesn't have a movie, but it's a goodie anyway. It's a Ramona book by Beverly Cleary. After that, maybe Charlotte's Web. It has become a daily ritual: "Daddy, can you read me another chapter?" Kevin can never resist, and I love the sound and sight of them snuggled together reading. I'm hoping that the other kids will enjoy this too when they get older, even if it means Kevin reading the same books at least four times out loud.

It's times like these that I know I really lucked out in getting a great father for my kids. Not that I was thinking of that 13 years ago when we started dating. When you're that young, you're not thinking about parenthood. Thankfully, God knew what He was doing. He saw what I couldn't see 13 years and more into the future: that my kids would be getting the best possible dad in the world.

Marital spat

Today was a bad day because Kevin and I had a major argument. I know I'm not supposed to talk about these things. But tonight, it's bugging me that nobody talks about these things. When I was younger, like in high school and college, my girlfriends shared all kinds of stuff with me, like what kissing was like, and why they fought with their boyfriends. And then, once they got married, that was it, no more intimate discussions. All of a sudden, it was about protecting the husband, making him look good, which certainly meant no more talking about marital squabbles and sex. Wouldn't want to present him as a jerk in any way, I guess.

I got over this hangup awhile ago, while we were living with my parents. It was hard hiding Kevin's flaws while we all lived together. Besides, it totally gave him the upper hand, because all he had to do was act up a tiny bit in front of others, and I would give in. Eventually, I got sick of this and realized so what if people knew Kevin had jerkish tendencies. He was my husband, we were going to stick together, and tough luck if they didn't approve. After that, whenever he tried to get to me by acting up in front of others, I would just yell at him, "You want to do this right now?! Good, let's do it!" So that's no longer a problem.

I'm embarrrassed to go into the details of why we squabbled today because I don't want to look bad, but of course it started small and then got blown way out of proportion. I just can't believe one person has so much influence and power over me, that one person can determine whether I laugh or cry, whether I'm happy or depressed, that I can feel utterly worthless just from one thing he says. It sounds dysfunctional, but I think it must be normal, because we're pretty normal in general. Everybody's always waxing on about the wonders of love and marriage. Nobody ever tells you how sometimes it totally stinks to depend so much on one person and be so helpless.

We've made up. And we don't have major blow-outs like this very often. It seems to be somewhat cyclical. Sometimes, after a calm period, Kevin will say that it's time for another major spat. So after today, I guess we're good for another few months.

Random catch-up

Yikes it has been a long time. I was actually thinking about shutting this thing down. Is anyone still out there? Wouldn't blame you if you left.

I'm still waiting for Kevin to download or upload or whatever the pictures. We have even more pictures on the camera now because we went to Legoland this past weekend. It's a pretty good place for little kids, except the lines are the slowest I've waited in, and it's way overpriced. But the kids had fun, and that's what counts. When we came home, they were all really tired and cranky from skipping their nap. Made me think how crazy in love with our kids (or just plain crazy) we must be for dragging ourselves around all day in the horrible heat, only to put up with tantrum after tantrum when we got home. Still, it was all worth it at the end of the day, when they were lying in bed together and talking about all the things they had seen at Legoland: "Hey, did you see the giwaffe at Wegowand?"

Last weekend was also my first days back at teaching. I think some of them were surprised that such a humongously pregnant woman would be their teacher. But I reassured them, telling them that it was my 4th one, that there was nothing to worry about, no complications most likely. I also told them not to expect any extra absences because I would pop the baby out and then come right back.

Speaking of baby, I'm in my third semester now, 7 months along. I feel really big and cumbersome. Baby is very active, doing waves across my abdomen. I can't believe it's almost time. We still haven't thought of a name yet. We've been thinking about it but boy names are really hard. Last week, a student asked me if I assign extra credit work, and I thought about giving students extra credit for coming up with decent names. Would that be wrong?