It is what it is

I'm rarely primped and coiffed by kindergarten drop off time. On a normal day I am woken by Jemma before the sun comes up. I moan. Nic goes and gets her and potato sacks her to me. I nurse her and try to sleep. Afton then wakes up at an unholy hour and comes and stares at me. I can hear her breathing through her nose. I can feel her breath on my face. I pretend to sleep. I'm getting pretty good at the subtle fake snore and at not squinting my eyes. Once Jemma starts whispering "ta- ta" and "dee- dee", I know my gig is up. Soon will come the face patting, nose pinching and head butting. Rise and shine.

My mom always tells me that there are keys to successful mommyhood. A couple of these keys include doing at least one load of laundry a day and getting up way before your kids do. I know it's possible because I see the other moms at school show up with a fresh blow-out or damp pony tails. They manage somehow.

I pour cereal and gather backpacks in my p.j.'s. I dress and comb and herd children from room to room. "Did you go pee pee?" "Did you eat all your food?" "Uh-oh, we only have ten more minutes" "You can't wear your snow-suit". "No, you don't need your snow boots." "Yes, I promise you Friday is and has always been a school day".

Two minutes before departure, I take the stairs two at a time and find my clothes that are rumpled accordian style on the floor next to my bed. Exactly where I left them the night before. I always have a fleeting thought of, will the moms notice this is what I wore yesterday? As an afterthought I pull Nic's hoodie we bought on our honeymoon off of a hanger and throw it over yesterday's shirt. Perfect disguise! I look in the mirror and use my knuckles to scrape yesterday's mascara crumbs out from under my eyes. I tell myself, "I gotta get up earlier!"

Drop off, kisses, waves, "See you in a couple hours!" "Run! Don't look back!"

When I got home this morning, Jemma was ready for her nap. I took her upstairs and rocked her. I know when she is asleep because she breaks into a sweat just like her dad. This morning's sleep sweat warmed up her face, turned her cheeks pink and made her smell of the maple syrup I hadn't cleaned off of her face yet. I layed her in her bed. One of her legs had escaped her jammies and was hanging bare outside of the yellow flowered terry cloth. That image was a metaphor for my mom-ness...Everything is fine, people are happy, but nothing will ever be put together perfectly! Amen.

Cat Fight

I was in a sterile-like room with a shower cap and rubber gloves on. I was standing across from my sister. She's five years older than me and she looked ridiculous in her get- up too. We'd driven 45 minutes across town in the rain with a Stake Relief society president in the back seat to go can our beans, dry milk, rice...and anything else we would live on if "the big one" ever hits. I looked around the room. The other women were slightly pot-bellied like me from having babies. There were crows feet, eyes with day old mascara, outdated wedding rings, successful and not so successful attempts at being fashionable. Just a hodge-podge of Mormon women at the cannery.

I thought back to my days as a teenager. I thought I was so, so (did I mention so) so cool. I could barely breathe because of how awesome I thought I was. I laugh so hard now at what I thought made me like that. Clothes? Music? Boyfriends? Good report card? Lame. I was harmless, but so vain. LOL! I'd die if you could see in my head and understand how important I thought I was.

So standing there in the cannery with my sweats and plastic apron, I just started to giggle. Then that turned into laughing. Which turned into uncontrollable laughing which fetched me some wayward glances from the potato pearl posse. My sister said, "What's so funny?"

I laughed more and pointed to her shower cap and then at mine and back at hers. Then I skipped across the packing room and sang, "Wee! Let's go to the cannery!" My sister understood. We talked about being such fierce big haired teenagers with a world of hearts to break and now we are among the leagues of the unglamorous. I saw myself in the reflection of the squeaky clean windows. I was a pretty frumpy lookin' mamasita. Oh...a full circle moment.

Don't get me wrong. I love my life. I love my babies. I love my house that is sometimes clean and I love my bills getting paid on time. I love folding my laundry GAP style and vacuuming my car mats. I love God and singing and praying my guts out to be better. I love my life. It's just not a glamorous life. And the vain me sometimes misses the cocaine-like draw of pointless and meaningless attention. I know...it's a fault. But this is my blog and I can talk about it if I want.

So, this morning while my husband was swishing with Scope, we had a conversation. In that conversation, I told him that all I require is his awe-like reverence for my womanliness. He choked on his mouthwash, getting some on his tie and told me the house wasn't big enough for my ego. For the most part though, he does give me the paparazzi attention I need. (I still want him to gush about how amazing I look when I'm pregnant...and how could I possibly give birth in such a fertility warrior way...and darn if I don't look downright RADIANT!) It's a work in progress.

I guess it is balancing the housewife with the diva in me that sometimes gets in a cat fight. So, I'll wear lipstick when I pick up my kindergartner, and I'll put perfumed lotion on before bed. I'll still use my thumbnails to scrape cereal off of two day old dirty bowls, and I'll doctor diaper rash with stinky creams. I'll sock away food storage because I love the prophet and will do what he says. I'll pray and sing and watch over the blessed rug rats at church in my new calling. I'll write because it's the only thing that is truly my own anymore. Somewhere in there, I hope I find homeostasis.

Ladies, we rock.

Garth (not Brooks)

Garth Abbott loved my husband even when he dyed his hair blue and came to church with it like that. Garth Abbott cares for his 90 year old mother and family member with down syndrome. Garth Abbot has a wife, children, and grand children. He has the biggest meaty hands I've ever shook and an even bigger heart. He was my bishop when I was in college and he gave me acceptance, love and a better view of how much God loves me, loves us all. He knew my name in a sea of faces. He has aggressive cancer. He can't pay for the treatment. You can do a good thing by donating an item, service to an online auction for him or just donate money. Email his daughter-in-law at helpgarth@yahoo.com to see what you can do. I didn't think I had any talent or item to share, but I can make a killer Valentine's Day gift basket! What can you do? Check out the details at thedailyabbott.blogspot.com

Special Agent

The C.I.A. should be recruiting me any day now. My interrogation skills are supreme. Not bragging here...it's just a fact.

I walked into the kitchen this morning to find Evan in a puddle of spilled cereal. His pajamas looked like Swiss Cheese because of the holes freshly cut in them.

Me: Evan? What happened to your pajamas? Why are there holes in them?

Evan: There's no holes. ( With a tone that implied "you silly, silly woman)

Me: Evan, I see the holes and I see the scissors on the floor. Don't lie to Mom.

Evan: There's no holes.

Oh to be young again and not even flinch at a bald face lie.

Me: What color were the scissors you used to cut your pajamas?

Evan: (starting to squirm now) Um.....um....the sharp ones.

Me: That's what I thought.

Tajma Super Fance

I'm in a good mood this morning. I'm purely tickled with my lot. The kids have bed heads and milk moustaches and are chasing each other around with uncooked spaghetti noodle swords. Jemma is warm and floppy fresh out of her crib. Her cheeks are pink and I love the sound of her nursing to beat the band first thing in the morning. When I nurse this baby I feel like I could take down 50 rabid tigers in a field of broken glass with bare feet...the mothering urge is so strong. Is that weird? I want to absorb her!

I went in my room to answer the phone. That's not interesting, but this is: Earlier this week I was bummed that I had no paint or furniture to decorate this big room with. I saw it as an empty place. Today though, I walked in and the covers were pulled back and a sun beam had landed on my blue snowman flannel sheets. The pillows were askew, the room was every bit as empty as before with nothing more than outdated night stands and a lamp with no shade. But something about the sun warming that little spot on my bed... and the tiny particles of dust even glowed with contentment...that room looked like the presidential Taj MaSuper Fancy suite of the universe. I was grateful for it and didn't want anything else.

I was feeding Jemma in her highchair and a feather from an upstairs comforter somehow floated down stairs, around the corner, into the kitchen and right above Jemma's sticky face. She reached for it and bounced in her chair. It was like a scene out of Forrest Gump.

The vacuum-like draw of my bed beckoned us back and the kids and I lounged around like lazy island natives with not a care. Afton stroked the bit of my calf that peeked out of my terry cloth p.j. bottoms. How perfectly satisfied I was. Then Afton said, "You need to shave your whiskers mom. You must have like 2000 whiskers." I wonder if there really are 2000? I'm too stupidly happy to care.

TWERDS UNITE! (again)

Click on the invitation to see full size...
Okay ladies! We've waited, we've obsessed, we've combed the internet for pictures and news, we've sniffed our jar of La Push beach sand before bed each night (wait, maybe that's just me), and now the time is actually here! New Moon will be in theaters November 19th! Come celebrate at a dinner party at my new house! I hope to see all of my old cronies and my new ones too! Email me for directions @ cecchiniang@yahoo.com or just call.

I loved seeing you all last year at the Twilight party and hope to see even more of you this time! Come Come Come!!
Love, Ang.

Take Me Home

I went home for the first time in a long while. I didn't realize how much I missed it. One of my favorite parts of going home is when we finally pass the city limits of Las Vegas and the houses, signs and city smells go away. It feels like unbuttoning your pants after a big meal.

On my way home my mom and I pulled into the town I was born. I passed the hospital, small enough that I could walk around the entire thing by the time you are done tying your shoes. I wondered which window was the room entered the world in.

Main street was so quaint. I recalled the old post office with its dozen steps, the towering stone and wrought iron on the top window. I remember the smell of paper and floor wax. My grandma used to take me there. Go in, to the left, half way down her box was hollow and tinny sounding.

The bank had painted the front display window with the hometown mascot - The Mucker. He was moustached and poised for battle with his boots and pick axe. And since when did banks stop having a display window?

Shop after shop of odds and ends. Books, crafts, hardware. How do they stay in business? A salon in an old house on stilts with a view of main street traffic and a viney plant in the window.

We continued on to my old home. When we hit the dirt the vibration of the washboard road was familiar. I've done it a thousand times, but pulling into the drive, stopping the car and getting out surprises me every time. The silence! The impenetrable darkness! The smell of clean and hay and wet earth. The stars innumerable, white, pressing down so close I forget there even existed so many with Vegas's scant handful that burn through the glow of the city sky. The same thought comes to me every time. "Why don't I live here?"

I pull sleeping kids from sweaty car seats and cover them with blankets before their damp temples and backs get a chill. The smell of my parent's house is delicious and for a sec I feel seventeen and carefree. I put the babies in my old bed and go in my old bathroom for a long awaited pit stop. I flip on the light and the bathroom looks too clean! Where is the tangle of curling iron cords and the sticky hair-sprayed counter tops? Where is the litter of make up and globs of toothpaste in the sink? The knee pads and tennis shoes on the floor? And who the heck is that 31 year old girl in the mirror? I was surprised to see her in deed!

I tip toe into my old room, open the shades like I used to so I could see the mountain while I lay in bed. The waterbed is gone. The walls are now pink. Tasteful pictures are on the wall and a rocking chair for my babies is in the corner. Time warp. Strange and sweet.

The next morning I couldn't resist stopping and smelling the stacked wood, warm and piney in the sun.

We had a beautiful time wiling away the hours on the western porch. Swinging, talking, looking through grandma's cook book from 1943 and watching the mountains.

Jemma chewing (Cruella De'Ville style) on a good clean stick. To my mom's horror of course.

We are gathered near the orchard for a good ol' fashioned apple pickin'.

Kids so excited on the walk to the orchard.

Afton in heaven with her first apple.

Dad testing the spoils. Juicy, crunchy, tart, delicious.

Crew can't decide. He ate one bite of lots.

As the sun went down, I had a silly quiet moment looking up at the canyon. There used to be a tire swing by the corral that I would come to when I had a broken heart or was just plain bored. I've looked at these rocks and shared my soul's complaint with God many a time!

Tina was feeling ambitious and picked the orchard clean with only falling out of a tree once. I hope I get a jar of apple butter or a pie out of the deal. It was a great weekend except for Nic was in Vegas and I missed him. Oh it's good to go home!