Our New Old Home

The lockbox is coming off the door, the inspection sheet is no longer on display. Crews of people are  not showing up to at random times of day, needing access to our house.

Old Kitchen

New Kitchen

 Our remodel is done and we are thrilled.

It's not just that we have a mudroom or a new kitchen, it's what that change in space has meant to our family.

New main floor powder room.

Previously, with four of us sharing a bathroom, we've gotten into a habit of wandering while preparing for bed. For example, one person uses the sink to wet a toothbrush, then walks around the upstairs to brush teeth because the next person is using the sink to wash her face. By the time the tooth brushing is done the face washing is done, but then I'm leaning over the side, getting just a bit of mirror space so I can take out contacts as the face-washer wets a toothbrush.

Now when I want to get ready for bed, I go into my bedroom, shut the door and use my own bathroom. No one else needs to use the sink. No one else needs to use my mirror. It takes me half the time because I'm not waiting for someone else to be done. Ironically, though, we are all accustomed to walking around while brushing teeth, so now we have to train the girls to not wander into our bedroom while readying for bed.

New master bath.

The new kitchen has changed our family dynamic.

I used to enjoy cooking, but for me part of the enjoyment is being able to visit with other people while I'm working. This hasn't been possible for years, as there wasn't a suitable place in the kitchen for others to be. Many times Wayne or Kristi would stand in the kitchen to chat, but would have to move while I opened a drawer or needed in a cupboard. Trying to share in preparing a meal was practically impossible. I often felt cut off from the rest of the family, alone in the kitchen while everyone else gathered in the living room or on the patio.

Now, more than one person can be in the kitchen at the same time. The girls sit at the island and do homework while I cook; I don't have to keep stopping and walking into the dining room to look at a problem or hear a question. Homework feels less of an interruption and annoyance and more a part of the evening's activities.

I enjoy cooking again for the first time in years. And I can't wait to be able to finally get some of the kitchen gadgets that I haven't been able purchase before because there was no place to store them.

The new space has also allowed Wayne and I to have much-needed couple time.  We can sit down and share a glass of wine in the kitchen while the girls are in the living room, meaning that our conversation is a not open for commentary.

Our original bathroom, refreshed for the girls' use.

Our bedroom feels like a retreat. Even though it is right next to Marissa's bedroom, it feels a bit more secluded and private. We have a chair in our bedroom -- a chair! I have sat there in the early morning with a cup of a coffee and a computer, writing. What a joy.

My new coffee and writing corner.

I am so grateful that we were able to make the location we love into the home we love. 

Arkansa Edition

Terry and Dad together; a good evening on the patio.

My dad has not been in the best of health for some time. He is living with stage IV colon cancer,  with all the trials and tribulations that come along with that condition. He has been on a chemotherapy regimen for about a year, which doctors tell him should keep the tumors from growing and spreading, if he can withstand the side effects. As soon as the chemo stops working or his quality of life is such that he decides not to continue treatment, the cancer will probably continue to spread and grow.

This is a tough diagnosis to take. Quality of life has been less than ideal, not just for Dad but for my stepmom, who has been thrust into the role of primary caretaker.

I have not been to Arkansas to see Dad for some time, not to say that I haven't seen him or don't talk with him, but he came to Minnesota twice last year. He understands that my life is busy and it's hard to get away.

But at some point "busy" becomes "bullshit," and the people who are really important in your life must come to the surface. On some level I've been holding off on visiting, waiting for him to have the energy to have company. I finally came to the realization that I need to make the trip.

Kristi and I planned a trip over Labor Day weekend, flying from Minneapolis to St. Louis, then taking a 10-seater directly to Jonesboro, Arkansas.

We ain't in Minnesota anymore. A drive-through liquor store. They'll hand you a cup with ice with your vodka. No lie.

We had ourselves a time. There was plenty of "gabooning," as my grandfather Vern used to say (his term for visiting). The weather was divine, with plenty of opportunity to sit on the porch in a nice breeze, taking in the peace and quiet while three white dogs played the part of immovable porch rugs. Hummingbirds flitted from the feeder to trees; crickets and other insects provided the background music to their wings.

The largest and most immovable of all the white dogs, Jack.

Can you find all three?

We ate some good southern fare, and I made authentic Minnesota Wild Rice Soup, with wild rice smuggled from Minnesota. (Apparently bags of wild rice look like weed when viewed through a security x-ray machine, and warrant extra screening.) My nephew Sam decided it looked like bird suet, and leftover soup the rest of the weekend was donned "liquid suet."

I spent time with family members that Kristi has gotten to know so well through her many visits. We had a feast of pulled pork, barbecued ribs and smoked chicken.

Kristi and I helped with chores that escape doing in the midst of caring for someone else. We made trips to the store for victuals and supplies, vacuumed, helped organize the week's pills, cooked, and cleaned dishes, usually accompanied by laughter and banter.

Terry gives me a tour of the yard, including a fig tree.

By the end of three days Kristi and I were ready to get back to the land of North, and I think Dad and Terry were ready for us to leave. They themselves had to travel to Nashville the next day. What is it they say about fish and company?

Memories were made, and that's all that matters.

A Series of Unfortunate Events

Don't get me wrong. 90 percent of our remodel project has gone fantastically. And the majority of the big work, the stuff that really matters like laying a foundation, framing, electrical work, etc., has been done flawlessly and on time.

But in all projects some rain must fall, and the last three weeks it's been pouring. And unfortunately these final "touches" have everything to do with the creature comforts of why we took on a remodel in the first place, so they are hard to ignore.

It started with our kitchen backsplash tile, which I saw installed for the first time as the tiler was putting the final piece into place. I walked in and stared in utter astonishment -- were my eyes deceiving me?

"How do you like your tile?" he said, expecting a positive response.

"It's beautiful!" I replied. "But...it's not the color I picked out."

"Oh, ha ha, people say that to us all the time."

"No really, I wish I were kidding. It is not the tile we picked out."

Within 30 minutes the two people who had spent an entire day tiling our entire kitchen began the work of ripping it all out before it set and took the drywall with it. I felt badly for this small business owner to literally un-do an entire day's work, not knowing if he would get paid for it or not. It hurt all of our hearts to see that gorgeous tile in a trash can, all that beautiful greenish-gray tile, when we had selected white.

Turns out that the store we had purchased the tile from mislabeled the sample. Our designer ordered the right color, assuming that "Whisk Me Away" meant white since that's what the label said on the sample. I had set the white tile out the night before, but, in a fit of neatness, Wayne had put it away, so they didn't have a piece for comparison.

That same day our electrician informed me that the lights we had selected to hang vertically alongside our mirrors in our master bathroom were only meant to be hung horizontally. Plus...they were as bright as a fucking lighthouse lamp. He hung one up just to show me -- I can't imagine how someone could see past the brightness of that light to see their reflection in a mirror.

Back those lights went and a re-order for more appropriate light fixtures was on task.

The tiler got to work tiling our bathroom while waiting for the re-order of the correct white kitchen tile. Then the plumber came to put in our faucets -- finally, we would have a working master bath!

But alas, the faucets were set too low, the nozzles hung into the sinks themselves and the turn knob could not be turned before hitting the countertop. The beautiful tile work around the faucets was ripped out, the dry wall taken out, and the plumber raised the plumbing up and all was re-done again. Only this time the tile is not QUITE as perfect as the same time it was laid, and we can kind of see where the tile had to be taken down for this fix.

Throwing away more beautiful tile.

At least the SHOWER is ready to use! Except...the glass shower door hasn't arrived yet. And we still don't have mirrors. So we can use the toilet in our master bath, but then we have to walk to the original bathroom to wash our hands and brush our teeth, and the four of us are in a familiar bathroom battle.

Finally, the shower door arrived along with the mirrors, and the faucets were re-installed in the new, proper location. A working bathroom! I couldn't wait to take a shower in our OWN bathroom! Except...why doesn't the water drain? Not a single drop of water made it down the drain -- I had to stop my shower early or risk an overflow onto our bathroom floor.

A shower full of water.

Did you know that plumbers do an air test any time they install new plumbing? That makes sure that there are no leaks in all of the pipes that are laid. When they're done with the air test, they're supposed to take out the plastic stopper that keeps the air from escaping the plumbing during the test. And when they don't, well, then you don't exactly have a working shower.

Then this past week we were startled to get a text from our girls informing us that water was pouring into our kitchen through a recessed light. The water was from Marissa's bath in our original bathroom, NOT the new bathroom. What?!

Turns out that the construction work against the back of the original wall had displaced tiles in our original bathroom, so there was nothing keeping the water from running through the floor and out our new kitchen ceiling.

The radiator was drained, moved away from the wall and the tiler was called back again so he could fix the files underneath said radiator that had broken during the construction project.

Broken tiles (plus nasty dirt) in our existing bath due to construction on the wall behind it.

Our circuit breaker that controls our oven and frig goes off at random times, apparently due to an electric current fluctuation in the frig model itself. Fix is in order.

Our newly corrected bathroom faucets apparently STILL don't meet code. Being worked on.

Our hood vent for our oven was delivered with two massive scratches down the middle of it. The hood vent sat in our basement unopened for 2 months before they went to install it and found the scratch. We are waiting for a replacement. Seriously, people.

By this time our project manager was pretty pissed with the number of things that weren't going right at the end of this project. And for as nice and understanding as Wayne and I can be, we were rather pissed, too.

We appreciate the work all the crews have done in our house, but we just want them to leave and not come back.

Once it's all working, that is.

Surprise!

Our family has had to get used to constant change since this spring. For the most part I think we've adjusted well - the girls shared a bedroom beautifully for nearly three months. We learned to live without running water or a sink. We adjusted to eating in a variety of places: the Desk Kitchen, the patio table, now standing around an island because we have no chairs.

What better way to embrace chaos than to plan a surprise birthday party for Marissa...at our still-being-remodeled house?

The party was entirely planned by her big sister Lindsey. After sharing a room with her for three months she knew her well and planned a spa party put on with her friends. There were four stations: pedicures, manicures, facials and make up stations. Lindsey told Marissa that she was hosting a spa party for her own friends, so it didn't seem unusual for Lindsey to be planning and scheming.

Wayne took Marissa out for lunch as a special daddy-daughter treat, since he had been traveling over her actual birthday a few days earlier. While she was gone Lindsey and I frantically prepared -- I got groceries, Lindsey set up the spa stations and drinks in the kitchen.

When Marissa got home Lindsey led her into the kitchen to show her the spa set up. All of Marissa's friends had arrived by then and hid behind the island, then jumped up and yelled "SURPRISE!" And she was!

Marissa had a fantastic time getting her nails done, a facial, pedicure, all of it. We learned that some of her friends aren't quite as "girly" as Marissa is and didn't take advantage of the spa stations, but they seemed to have a good time anyway. We had gluten-free chocolate mousse cake which was divine!

Cake cutting.

It was supposed to rain that afternoon which was concerning,  since all the activities had to happen outside. At the time our living room floor was covered in paper, our dining room filled with furniture and our basement was our storage area where everything else is stored! Thankfully it turned into a beautiful afternoon and everyone could enjoy the great outdoors.

Marissa was very surprised and grateful for her party.

Eleven

Self portrait. 

When we had concrete poured for our new patio, she wondered how the ants and worms felt when they tried to reach the surface only to find concrete in their way. The thought worried her.

She has instant love for every dog she sees being walked on the street. She would probably feel that way about cats too, but most people don't walk their cats.

We once saw a homeless man in frigid weather holding out a sign asking for help. She asked what it meant to be a veteran (because that's what his sign said) and why we hadn't stopped to help him. How do you explain to your children the social injustice of poverty and safety nets that aren't wide enough to catch everyone? I did my best, and there was silence in the back seat. I turned to look and she was crying, tears silently rolling down her cheeks.

You've never met an 11-year-old with a bigger heart.

She is happiest and most herself with her music, making videos, singing and dancing. If you can sneak a peek without her knowing you're there, you will witness pure joy.

She is chronically messy, yet meticulously organized. She brushes her hair religiously every day but has to be reminded to wash it.

Take a moment to look her in the eyes while she's talking and you'll be distracted by their depth. Are they grey? Green? Brownish blue?

She is our Marissa, and she is eleven.

The Machine Shed

If you stop and listen, really listen, you can hear the life that once was there.

A tractor starting up, its long, slow crank to life. The clanking of tools. A command yelled over the sound of work. Perhaps a word of frustration. 

At the end of the day, the doors would pull shut and relative silence would fall over the machinery, interrupted only by the small scuffles of cats chasing mice, or birds in the rafters.

The machine shed is mostly empty now, or at least more empty than it's been in a long time. Favorite tractors have been hauled away, to be cherished or used by other family members. Cars that were in good working order are living their second or third life with someone else. 

Two cats remain to keep the mice population down. They are friendly and still call this shed home. Perhaps they will stay when the new owners come, and continue their useful lives for a new family.

Soon the final pieces will be hauled away, and the shed will be quiet and empty.

Sunrise

I walked to the lake and to the fishing dock to see the sunrise.

By the time I arrived the sun was up but clouds were obscuring it. I decided to wait to see if it would eventually break through the clouds.

My watch said the time was 5:56 a.m. I decided to absorb the morning until 6:00, then would walk home.

I watched the sun in an epic battle with the clouds. It looked brighter, then darker. Rays of sunlight escaped and colored the entire sky, then were obscured again.

Puffy clouds floated close to me, occasionally lit from beneath by the rising pink light, other times dark with the remains of night.

Fish jumped. Seagulls dove. Ducks fluffed their feathers, and geese chased each other across the lake.

It was beautiful, peaceful and quiet. I filled my lungs with air and my heart with gratitude, then looked at my watch to see if it was yet 6:00.

It had just turned to 5:57.

I was in awe at all I had seen in one small, little minute.

How much more slowly life would go by if we only took the time to enjoy it.

Learning Not to Judge Others

Photo credit SpiritualCleansing.org

While we are sprucing up much of the house, other parts of it that will remain untouched need a little work as well. The doorknob on our bathroom gets more and more jiggly as time goes on. I fear that one day it will come off in my hand and I'll be stuck in the bathroom. Wayne's tried to tighten the existing one, but it is old and tired and the screws won't hold any longer.

Wayne bought a glass doorknob that looks like others in our home, and started working on replacing the doorknob. He easily got the old one off, but the new hardware didn't fit with the original hardware in the door.

The girls and I were preparing to go shopping just a few blocks from our house. Wayne decided he had to buy a new cylinder that would fit the door, but before leaving for the hardware store, he jumped in the shower and shut the door.

The door with no doorknob.

We were about to leave the house when Marissa noticed that there was no doorknob on the door and that it was tightly shut. "How's Dad going to get out?" she asked.

Um, yeah, he isn't.

I inserted the cylinder and used the doorknob from the outside to open the door.

That would have been awkward -- we would have gone shopping and he would be locked in the bathroom -- naked -- with no way out and no phone to call anybody. I wonder how long he would have lasted before he would have bust through the plywood separating the bathroom from the addition, out of sheer frustration.

An hour or so later, we are in the dressing room at Athleta and Lindsey is trying on some items.

My phone buzzes and I read a text from Wayne:

Where are you guys? I'm locked in the bathroom.

I respond that we're close by and we'll leave shortly to let him out. I then go to the dressing room door and say, "Lindsey, we have to go, Dad's locked in the bathroom."

"Again?!" she replies rather loudly.

I bet all the people in the dressing room that day thought I married a super smart guy. I have to give him credit for bringing his phone into the bathroom before he started working on the door.

The girls left the store immediately to head home while I bought the items they had chosen, then walked home alone. As I get closer to our house I spy Marissa on the sidewalk walking toward me. I yell, "Did you guys get Dad out of the bathroom?"

"Yep," she says, "He's out. At least this time he wasn't naked."

And this is why you should never judge people based what you overhear them say.

The accursed doorknob.

Learning and Living Through Remodeling

Our remodel project sped along for a month with very little impact to our family. Sure, we couldn't use the backyard, or enter the house through the side door, but for the most part we lived in the home as we always have.

This changed when our kitchen was demolished about a month ago.

The shell of our old kitchen.

Our new "kitchen," aka desk.

Not only do we not have use of a water source on the first floor, but our house is cut in two by way of tarps over the kitchen doors. For the first week, in order to do laundry in the basement we had to go out the front door, back in the house through the side door and down the stairs to the laundry room. Talk about airing your dirty laundry.

The path to our laundry room from the side door of the house.

The first week we had take-out nearly every night. That got tiring. And expensive.

I spent a weekend morning at my sister's house preparing slow cooker recipes that could go from freezer to slow cooker, and prepping spaghetti sauce that could be frozen and used in small batches. Winner!

We accepted an invitation to dinner at my sister's house, and had a divine and relaxing evening, visiting and eating food she had prepared. Such a treat!

The girls had to move into a bedroom together while Marissa's old bedroom is converted into our new master suite.

 So what have we learned?

1. Gratitude. I am grateful that we have the resources to take on this remodel, to make this home our dream home. Nearly every evening I come home from work to a pleasant surprise. Oh look, they took out the kitchen cabinets! They put the arch up in the new entryway!

2. Appreciation. The crews working on our home have a very high work ethic. The framing crew in particular was incredible to watch. The speed and skill at which they could frame a window was amazing. I remember struggling for hours to put together a dumb shelf in shop class -- they framed a window and a wall in 30 minutes. All of the experts who come through our house do their work with efficiency and skill, and I am humbled by their talents.

3. Neatness. It only takes two items out of place in our "kitchen" to make the whole space unusable. Sure, the girls' shoes are left all over the floor because there's no room in the closet they are sharing, but for the most part everyone understands that they need to pick up after themselves so we can all live in the space.

4. Creativity. I learned how to cook pasta in a microwave, we've improvised a pantry out of a dresser, and discovered all the kitchen essentials aren't really essential when you don't have a kitchen.

5. Tolerance. The girls are getting along in their shared room better than I had expected. I hear them chatting together at night, and they negotiate the use of a favorite lotion or book. While I know Marissa will be excited to move into her new room, I suspect that both of them will be a little sad and miss the camaraderie of sharing a room.

(Passive) Aggressive Pitbull Behavior

You'd never know it from this photo, but this is one passive-aggressive dog.

Beauty woke Wayne and I up at 4:25 this morning to go out.

She snuck into our room from the girls' at about 2 a.m. -- I heard her because I was awake (Not shocking). She jumped up, nudged her way under the covers, curled up in a ball and didn't move for hours. She was warm and comforting to snuggle with while I lay there suffering from insomnia.

At 4:25 she got up, stretched, yawned, and sat next to my head and looked at me. I, of course, was awake.

I did not move. I did not want to give away the fact that I was awake.

She did her "ear flap" thing -- she shakes her head really fast so that her ears make a loud flapping sound against her head. It's insanely loud and will wake the dead. It's her way of informing others that she's ready to make a location change; she does it whenever she moves from one room to another. She yawned, stretched again, and made her way to Wayne's side and stared at him.

He did not move either, because he actually WAS asleep.

She did this a few more times, each time getting more disruptive in her moves. Instead of stretching between our bodies, she would stretch OVER our bodies, so that you could not ignore that there was a 40-pound dog leaning on you. Finally, I was awake enough to do something about this.

At 4:30 I let her out to piddle. She did.

We went back in. I went back to bed.

She went back to staring at us, yawning and ear-flapping. We put her outside of the room and shut our door tightly. We heard her pacing the hall and coming back to our room, nudging our door with her nose to see if it would open. It wouldn't. But it was annoying to hear.

Finally Wayne got up and took her for a walk about 5 a.m. He got back at 5:30, now awake for the day.

Beauty came back to our bed and slept with me until 7 a.m. while Wayne made coffee, read the paper, and then swept and mopped the entire downstairs. He was grumpy and annoyed the rest of the day.

Beauty doesn't know that it's Memorial Day and that even though she NORMALLY goes out at 4:30 a.m. and goes for a walk or run, it's a holiday and we get to NOT get up at some insane hour.

Our next dog trick?

Teach her to tell time. And read a calendar.

Is it 7 a.m. yet?!

Miniature Woman

Lindsey at her murder-mystery themed birthday party.

Lindsey just turned 13. This is an amazing time of her life, and it is incredible to watch.

Her wit was brought to light when my family played cards when my mom and stepdad visited. She was funny. Witty. Intelligent. And won every game.

She is kind to her friends. She gives advice when it is asked, none when it is not, and a joke when the tension is high.

She speaks to adults with confidence and politeness, and has appropriate conversations and not awkward silence.

It is hard to believe that this independent, confident girl is my child, and not someone else's. Wasn't it just yesterday she was a little tiny baby, brought home from the hospital, with a mother who wondered how the nurses could entrust such a little life into her care?

Yet here she is, despite my foibles, a young lady growing, becoming her own.

I am so amazed and grateful.

Lindsey was "The Goose" in the middle school play. "Squacks" were never so funny!

Why We're Remodeling

It's time.

We've been living in our house for nearly 14 years. It's time that it finally fit our family's needs.

The location is amazing, the neighborhood unbeatable. And we love the charm of our older home.

What we don't love is that there is no bathroom on our first floor. There's only one actual bathroom in the whole house. (There is a toilet and sink in our laundry room downstairs, but they don't count as a bathroom, according to the appraiser.)

Did I mention that in less than a month our first-born will be a teenager? She is already up to 45-minute shower/private time in the bathroom, God help us if she begins wearing make up.

We don't love the cramped kitchen, where the main traffic pattern through the house goes straight past the stove.

Oh, the stove. Did I mention that there is no countertop space next to it? If I need to take a lid off a pot to stir some spaghetti sauce I take the chance of whacking a family member in the face with it as I search for a flat surface to place it. You can often hear "hot pan coming through!" during dinner prep. And I can't open the oven door if someone has the fridge door open -- they collide.

It's time.

For years Wayne and I have sat on our patio in the summer, looking at the back of the house and dreaming. What if we expanded the kitchen? What if we expanded the bathroom upstairs? What if...what if?

And now, we find those "what ifs" becoming reality. We are in disbelief that we are actually doing this, even as I look out at a new crawl space and framing wood stacked neatly in our backyard, about to become our addition.

"Where am I supposed to poop?" thinks Beauty.

Best of all, we are incorporating parts of our history into our home. One wall of our kitchen will be adorned with wood from Wayne's grandfather's barn, the original homestead of the Horsman family. We hope to fill the walls in the dining room with photos of the Upper Peninsula, where I spent many a summer as a child.

We cannot wait until it's all complete. But, we get to live through the middle part. Marissa will have to bunk with Lindsey for about two months. We will be without a kitchen for about that amount of time. Hopefully it'll be grilling weather most of that time.

Somehow I think we'll survive as a family; we've got our eye on the prize.

Not the Real Mexico

The view from our balcony.

When our family took our trip to Mexico, we all were more than a bit nervous about traveling to another country. It's been years since Wayne and I had been to Mexico, and we all wondered about the language barrier.

As I expected, everyone working in the resort spoke English. We got to practice saying "gracias" and "por favor" a lot, but otherwise all transactions occurred in English. We didn't even have to change our money, we paid for any cash transactions with US dollars and tipped in dollars.  Can you imagine someone from Mexico coming to our country and trying to use pesos?

Early on in our stay Lindsey asked if Mexicans who vacation in the US can stay in places that only speak Spanish. I said, "If they vacation in an area that has a lot of Spanish-speaking people possibly, but for the most part they need to know English."

"But that's not fair!" she said., You are correct, it is not.

One day when went shopping in Playa del Carmen and had a taxi take us to "5th Avenue" (which is actually on 5th Ave), with blocks and blocks of vendors with tables out, stores and restaurants. The drive to leave our resort was a boulevard lined with lights, sculptures and palm trees. The driver then took a left and we were on a city street lined with half-tumbled down buildings and ramshackle lean-tos. A clothesline hung under a bridge held tiny t-shirts for boys and dresses for little girls. The heat was oppressive and there was no escaping it -- no pool to dip your toes into, no one to offer you a cool drink.

I felt like we had been living in Capitol City in the Hunger Games while District 13 was right outside our door.

Our luxurious bathroom.

Our family talked about it for some time after our shopping excursion. I would like to think that our visiting the country, going to a resort that employs local people and tipping generously throughout our trip helps. Yet the poverty we saw in a few blocks was no different from the poverty I saw in Honduras 15 years ago. Of the thousands of dollars we spent on our vacation -- airfare, the resort, food and shopping -- the majority of that money went to Melia, the company that owns the Paradisus line of resorts, and the airline. How much of that trickled down to the employees themselves? I can't imagine very much.

Our girls got a glimpse of how extravagantly Americans live compared to people in other countries. We talked a bit about the girl our family sponsors in the Philippines and how we can't help everyone living in poverty, but we can help one girl. And that has to count for something.

Mexico

The view when you enter the resort lobby of Paradisus La Esmeralda.

I never in my wildest dreams imagined we could ever do a family vacation to Mexico. We never took exotic vacations like that when I was a kid, and when Wayne was a kid -- well, they didn't take vacations.

The four of us had an absolutely fantastic time. The weather was balmy and sunny every day. The resort was absolutely incredible -- top-notch service everywhere we went, amazing restaurants, and delicious food. Our room was breath-taking and perfect for our family, with a swim-out into the pool right from our deck, perfect for our little fishy Marissa who always wanted to go to the pool. She could swim straight from our room while we sat on the deck, reading a book and having a cold one.

Marissa on the steps of our swim-out balcony. 

 But the best part of the vacation wasn't where we were (though that certainly helped), it was who we were with and what we did.

On one of our first nights there Marissa tried to cut a steak and managed to keep one little piece and lose the entire rest of the steak under the table. Lindsey laughed so hard that the rest of us were in giggles the rest of the night.

One morning Lindsey sneezed and the cough drop that used to be in her mouth skittered across the marble floor in the lobby of our hotel, to be heard stopping against a potted plant. Again, I don't know why all these things were so funny to us, but they were.

We all tried snorkeling for the first time. Lindsey and Wayne went parasailing. We lounged around the beach, the room, the pool, the lobby. We read, journaled, listened to music, giggled at Spongebob Squarepants in Spanish, and napped most every afternoon.

Reading.

Writing a letter to Grandma Horsman.

We are already planning next year's vacation. The Paradisus was an incredible resort and we would go there again, but we're thinking about visiting the one in Costa Rica. Or Belize. After all, we've only got 5 more years until the oldest one graduates high school.

Gulp.

Enjoying one last view of the mangroves before heading home.

Who Do You Trust?

I've been carefully watching the case between the U.S. government and Apple and the San Bernadino iPhone.

In case you haven't kept up: The FBI has asked Apple to create a software "back door" into the iPhone used by one of the bombers involved in the San Bernadino terrorist attack. The FBI states that there is no other way to unlock the data within that phone besides having Apple compromise the security of every iPhone that's been produced.

Don't believe me? That's what it comes down to. Create a master key and it unlocks every door. Even though the FBI assures Apple (and thus assures us) that this master key will only be used to unlock this one phone, it all comes down to this:

Who do you, a member of the public, trust more, the U.S. government, or Apple?

The answer to that question is obvious to me: I trust Apple. They have a vested interest in the security of all the phones they've produced, phones that millions of us rely on for our only phone line, our email access, our connection to the world.

I've polled a few people with that very question; which do you trust more? The answer in every case has been Apple.

What a sad statement on the state of our governing body that we would trust a for-profit corporation before we trust our own government. Between the economic downturn, the big bank bailout, the current election shenanigans and the ever growing gap between the have's and the have not's, it's no wonder we'd trust Apple over our government.

Yet another sign that government by the people, for the people, is not working.

Popular

The other day Lindsey was telling me about the "popular" kids at school. Lindsey and her friends don't describe themselves as popular, and she clearly has that "I wish I were them" and "I hate them" kind of thinking that kids this age have about the in-crowd.

It seems that everyone grew up in a school where there was a "popular" group; doesn't matter your generation, class size, big town (or small) or what state you grew up in.  I just don't get it.  I decided to ask her some questions to see what's changed over the years, and perhaps impart some wisdom.

Q: So what does it take to be popular?

A: To be popular you have to be nice, wear really, really nice clothes, have neat handwriting, and have a smartphone.

Q: How do you know who the popular kids are?

A: You can just tell. They dress really nice and care about how they look. Boys too. And they're nice one-on-one, but if you come up to them as a group they're really mean.

Q: Really? Have you seem them do that?

A: Well one time my friend came up to a popular girl and asked her a question and she just turned away from her and wouldn't talk to her, even though they hang out together because they live on the same block.

Q: Maybe she didn't hear your friend.

A: I doubt that.

Q: Do the popular kids hang out with unpopular kids at school?

A: No. They all sit at the same lunch table and joke and laugh with each other.

Q: So what would happen if you came up to them, sat down at the table and joined in?

A: Are you kidding, Mom? They would look at you like "What are you doing here?" and would probably be quiet until you went away.

Q: What do you and your friends do at lunch?

A: We have a blast. We have such an awesome table, we spend the entire time trying to make each other crack up. We have so much fun.

Q: Wow, that sounds like something other kids would want to be a part of. What would happen if someone you didn't know sat down at your table and asked to join in?

A: We'd probably look at them like "What are you doing here?" and....oooohhhh!

We talked for a bit longer and then I gave her the same message I've been giving my kids for years: Be Yourself! Be your own authentic self and you will attract the kind of people you want to have in your life. It won't matter if you're popular or geeky or musical or anything else, because you'll be happy.

And then I told her not to smoke or do drugs ever or have sex before 18. I got the eyeroll AND the big sigh.

Bonus parenting points.

Sleepless No More

I am sitting in a darkened house with a cup of coffee, looking out at a winter wonderland, piano music softly playing from our living room speaker. I am finally doing one of my favorite activities that has been absent for too long: writing.

These quiet moments are rare.  For years I have suffered from insomnia, which means that on weekends I "sleep in" until 8 or 9 sometimes, catching up on the sleep I missed earlier in the week.  Weekends I finally get a full 8 hours of sleep, even though it takes me 12 hours to do so. Usually by the time I'm up the girls are up and the day's activities have begun.

Today, they are still in bed and it is quiet. I began writing at 6:30 a.m.

I had been in a slump this summer and part of this fall, though others couldn't tell. My Fitbit that I got for my birthday in the spring informed me of how very little sleep I was getting, yet at the same time how much. I would awake in the morning thinking I'd barely slept 3 hours, only to find that I had slept more than that but hadn't thought so.

But really, what's the point of knowing you got seven hours of sleep when you feel like you got three? Knowing that I'd gotten more sleep than I thought would energize me for a time, until physical fatigue set in. I'd convince myself that I really should be able to function; after all, I got seven whole hours of sleep! But I still felt exhausted because the sleep was so disjointed. I would wake up around 2:00 most every night. Some times I fell right back asleep, but most nights I would lie awake until at least 4:00 if not 5:00. Occasionally I was up for the day.

Morning meetings are a bitch when you've already been up for 8 hours by the time they occur, much less afternoon meetings. People at work thought I was a morning person, but that was only because morning was actually my afternoon considering the time I got up for the day.

My wise husband, who has talked to me over the years about my sleeplessness, finally convinced me to do something different about it than what I'd been doing before, which was, really, nothing. I had read every resource about getting good sleep, followed every recommendation. I went to bed at about the same time, have a bedtime routine, used lavender,  tried melatonin, insert well-intentioned person's advice here. I had tried over-the-counter sleeping pills but they made me groggy upon waking. Despite all attempts, like clockwork my eyes would pop open at 2 a.m.

My doctor informed me that if I hadn't been waking up in the middle of the night previously that I would start to do so, as women in "my stage of life" often have hormones fluctuate mid-sleep cycle and for some it causes insomnia.

What kind of walking zombie was I going to become?

I finally tried something I had never done before, something that was always a last ditch effort for me: a prescription sleeping pill.

What a novel concept, right?

Sleep aids are one of the most commonly prescribed medications, and I only finally decided to consider them.

My mother has always been hesitant to take prescription medications. Her life's experience led her to have no trust in pharmaceutical companies, and her skepticism is not unfounded. Just like any parent/child relationship, her values have rubbed off on me.

My mother expressed concern that sleep aids cause long-term memory loss and confusion. But guess what else does: lack of sleep. And here I was, wasting hours of my life attempting to sleep while not having the energy to get my exercise in, being cranky with my family, masking my fatigue at work, and never trying a sleeping pill.

After discussing options with my doctor and expressing my hesitation at taking Ambien, which was his recommendation, he finally convinced me to try it with one caution: Never, EVER take it if I've had any alcohol at all. Yes, sir. (And then he and I compared our favorite wines.)

The first night I took one I let my husband know to be on the look out for any weird behavior, and that if the kids needed something in the middle of the night he was on-call. I dutifully took a sleeping pill and went to sleep.

I woke up with my alarm at 6:30.  I was refreshed, not groggy. I cannot describe to you the feeling of having a full night's sleep for the first time in what felt like eons. All day I walked around with a giddy smile on my face. I couldn't believe how good I felt!

It's been a few months now since that first experience, and I am a changed woman. I sleep through the night. If I awake in the middle of the night I fall back asleep usually within 30 minutes.

I started doing my fitness routine again, first just on weekends (when I used to get my catch-up sleep), and then rising earlier during the week as well. I'm back up to exercising three times a week, and I feel AMAZING. Exercise gives me strength and energy, and I'm thrilled to be getting the rest needed to be back at it.

I feel like my life is back on track. It's incredible what sleep can do for a body.