This One's For You, Dear Cousin

Well, it's official, I have a ball and glittering chain.  No longer can I claim single parenting, I'm going to be a wife.

He asked Wednesday night.

This has prompted a wide range of emotions from Lou who can't decide just exactly how excited or how upset she should be.  Amid the frenzied excitement surrounding an upcoming wedding, Lou's found many things to worry about:

1.  After I get married I won't be her mother anymore.

2.  Other Half and I will go live together- without her.

3.  She DOES NOT want to change her name.

This recent development in events isn't entirely unexpected and we've been talking about it with Lou for a while now.  We've made it clear to her that being married won't change a thing about our family.  All it does is tell the world that we are, and always will be, a family.

We have daily talks about family, usually ours, but her concept of family is still new and developing, and up until just over a year ago, our family was me and her.  She accepted my Other Half right away, just as he accepted her, but the newness wore off after a while and she wasn't too sure she wanted to share me.  She and I have talked about how, by loving Dad, I don't love her any less.  Instead of splitting my love I got more.  And then, I got even more because I love our family too.  So I have love for her, love for Dad, love for our family, and then some extra love for the Collection.

Lou had a momentary meltdown when she was seized by the idea that Dad and I were going to get married and then go live together, without her, maybe in the woods or something.  And since I can't tell her how completely absurd the idea of me living in the woods really is, we calmly reiterated the family concept and stressed that marriage changes nothing about our family. 

But maybe we've been stressing this love for everyone always and forever a bit too much.  Stability is key, and I want her to know that I'll always love her, but love doesn't mean I can take care of it all.

We have a rule that if you don't attempt to eat your dinner at dinnertime then it becomes your snack before bed.  No ice cream, no animal crackers, none of the good stuff unless you eat dinner.  And, standard for a Saturday, Lou didn't even touch her plate at dinner.  So, naturally, it was brought back at story time which prompted the following: 

Lou: Mom, I love you.

Me: I love you too.

Lou: We'll ALWAYS live together, right? And we'll ALWAYS be family?  And we'll ALWAYS love each other?

Me:  ABSOLUTELY!  You are, and always will be, my baby girl and I will love you forever!

Lou: Good.
Then can you eat some of these leftovers for me?  Cuz that's what family does, they share leftovers.

Nice try. 

But, like I said, family's a new and developing concept and why not see what you can get away with.

I Think I Got a Riley

I grew up with two dogs, Tara and Riley. 

When I was three, in the first in a series of seemingly unplanned events I would grow to anticipate, I picked out Tara from the humane society.  We thought Tara was around a year old, odds are she was closer to three or four.  A German Shepherd, Corgi mix, Tara was unique, to say the least.  She was my dog, my forever companion, my confidante, my protector, and my best friend with four legs.

Tara knew my soul.   

Riley was the puppy my mom brought home, after being urged not to, and though I loved Riley, he was the dog I never wanted.

Riley's proud heritage began with a Border Collie mother who's favorite lookout was from the branches of a large tree in her front yard.  We have no idea who his dad was.  A Shepherd maybe?  Where Tara followed me everywhere, Riley couldn't care less where I was or what I wanted him to do.  What?  Did you just call me?  Um, actually I couldn't hear you...

Tara's dedication knew no bounds.  If, at the playground, I climbed up the nearly vertical stairs to the slide, Tara was right there behind me.  Something I'm told is all but impossible to teach dogs, much less ones with miniature legs.  She dutifully guarded the front door of the neighbors house when I babysat.  Walking home with me and Doc, guarding us from the silent night on our quiet street.  She never spent the night in one place, preferring instead to take short naps in a rotation of locations: start in the upstairs hallway, as close to center as she could get from the three bedrooms.  From there she moved to the landing on the stairs, my room, my brother's room, my parents' room, before returning to the hall to start the rotation again.

Riley slept wherever he happened to find himself tired and wasn't too bothered if someone came to the door.  No amount of coaxing or treats could convince Riley to ride with us in the canoe.  Tara got in because we were, Riley wanted his feet on stable ground.  We called him Guy Smiley because his hound face made him look like as if he were perpetually smiling, making him always look so pleasant, even when he was blatantly defying you.

We never needed a fence with Tara.  She knew where our yard began and ended and she never wanted to stray too far lest she miss an opportunity to protect the house or one of its occupants.

Riley was a wandering man.  Even away in college I got calls from housewives who'd had my dog with them all day, He's been great, we baked cookies!  Sure I got the occasional angry call to come pick up my dog, he's been wandering the neighborhood; but more often than not I would get a call from a woman who claimed that Riley had come to her door during a rain, or heat, or whatever adverse weather he'd invented, and begged to be let in.  Once in, Riley would happily accept any treats and a nice spot to nap.  When he was ready to be off again he would simply wait by the door.  And if, after a few hours and a failed phone call to convince her husband they should keep this dog, he was still there, I would get a call asking where she could drop him off.

Riley was Sibling's dog.  Two free spirits who had found one another.

So when I found myself dogless more than a year ago, the choice was simple: a short-legged rescue dog who was between the ages of one and three.  I wanted my Tara back.

Unfortunately, I'm afraid I've accidentally acquired a Riley.

Her name is  Gidget.

A Corgi, Australian Shepherd mix, she makes Tara look normal.  She is, at first glance, a slight reincarnation of Tara.  And yet she is also a healthy mix of Riley.

Gidge has Tara's body shape but less fur and different colors, well, that's if you don't count her massively large head. 

Gidge is Lou's best friend.  Always ready with a kiss and a smile, she's the dog that Lou can lean on, literally and figuratively.  She is more than patient with children, specifically the ones pulling her ears and tail.  She's down for a good old fashioned race, but she knows who brought her home and she doesn't want to stay away too long.  She patrols the house and yard, the lethal combination of herding dog heritage makes it impossible for her to ignore any issue, even an imaginary one.

And in so many ways she is my Tara.  She is my four legged nanny and the dog I want to snuggle when I'm happy, sad, confused, or otherwise overcome with emotion.  She loves her mother and she wants nothing more than to see me smile.  She guards my Collection because she knows that it is important to me, therefore it's important to her.

But she is also my Riley.  My goofy dog I will never understand with her own idea of what needs to be done when.

Maybe Gidge is here to teach me a lesson about loving dogs for who they are.  For loving the wanderer in them, their free spirit and departure from the term "mans best friend".  For appreciating that the darling puppy they most surely were only loosely resembles the dog they have become.  Gidge shows me how much I can love a dog that doesn't fit into my idea of what a dog should be.

In the way that Tara imparted her wisdom, Gidge has shared some of hers with me.  I do have my Tara back.

She's just also a Riley.

It's Party Time?

Today at the zoo I saw a mom wearing a shirt that said "Party Today, Confess Tomorrow."

Seriously? 

What kind of a mother wears a shirt that says this?  Is she trying to avoid play dates?  She had two kids, when does she find the time to party?  To whom is she confessing?  Does she tell the whole truth or is this day-after confession just as shady as her previous night's activities?  And how, exactly, does she define "party"?

The P word (don't want to say it too loud just in case Lou is in earshot, which she ALWAYS is, possibly even while she sleeps, it's a crazy osmosis-like process) took on a whole new meaning once Lou was in the picture. 

Party suddenly meant an alcohol free gathering, between the hours of one and four pm, made up of women who wanted nothing more than to share their wealth of maternal wisdom and give me all the things I "absolutely can't live without during baby's first year!" or things that were just "SO CUTE!" they couldn't resist buying.  The spiked punch was replaced with a concoction of fresh squeezed lemonade dotted with drowning fruit.  Finger sandwiches and salads lined the walls and there wasn't an ashtray in sight.  No more drunken darts.  Instead we cut string in an attempt to guess the girth of my ever expanding middle and sampled baby food, guessing what former food had been mashed to create it.     

Party slowly evolved to include birthday parties.  Not the last minute, uncoordinated get-togethers I had been attending not so long ago, but full fledged kids' parties complete with inflatable jumpy and face paints.  They start at ten in the morning and we need two days to get back to normal.  Not because of anything we put in our bodies, but because of the energy exerted by them. 

Maybe I need to get out more often, but it seems that the parties I remember from my past are fewer and farther between.  Now when I hear the word Party my first thought is something along the lines of, "what the hell do you buy a three year old boy?" or "how much do you think they spent on THIS setup?" instead of, "what should I wear?"

We've got a party tomorrow.  And yes, it will be one hell of a shindig, there's going to be fire trucks and cake. 

But really, when your world revolves around someone who's forearm is about the size of your hand what more do you want?

Of course I still want to party like an adult.  And, I'll admit it, I sometimes do.  But I don't advertise it and I have no desire to.  There comes a time- in theory it happens before you have that second kid- where you realize you have to grow up.  Party doesn't revolve around you, it's not for or about you.  And that's not just ok, that's how it should be.

You're a mother now, so save the T-shirts printed with sayings for the childless set.  They have less to lose if anyone finds out about the previous night.

As for me, I'm keeping my "adult parties", and confessions, to myself.

If You Give a Girl a Turkey

If you give a girl a Turkey she has to make sure that he's cozy.

So she makes a little bed and gives him lots of light.

Then she has to feed the Turkey.

So she goes to the feed store to get some Turkey Food.
When she gets there she discovers that the feed store has
     some baby Chicks.
Well she's sure the Turkey wants some friends.
So she gets a couple of Chicks to live with the Turkey.

If she has Chicks they need a bigger house.

So she builds a coop for her Chickens and Turkey.

Once she's built the coop she realizes that it looks really plain.
So she builds some flower boxes to adorn the coop.

Once she's built the flower boxes she realizes that she should
     probably grow more than just flowers.
These birds like corn so she may as well grow some of that too.
When she gives the birds the corn they say they also want some
     grains.

So she goes out into the field and plants some of that too.

The grains grow really fast and soon she has more than she
     knows what to do with.
So because she has extra grain she gets some Goats to keep it
     down.
The Goats get lonely at night and ask for a friend to watch over
     them.

She asks the Dog to sleep outside to watch over the flock.
Of course the Dog wants to sleep inside with her.

So because the Goats are lonely she gets a Llama to keep them
     company.
And that's when she realizes that she needs a bigger barn.

So she builds a nice big barn to keep everyone cozy and out of the
     cold.

Well the chickens have babies and the goats have babies and soon
     she needs more room.
So she buys a bigger farm to make everyone happy.
Her garden grows because if she's growing corn she may as well
     plant everything she likes to eat.

And someday she'll wake up in a large farm surrounded by animals
     and covered in crops.

So if you give a girl a Turkey you should probably just buy her a farm.

And make sure you've got lots of extra cash.