I'm not going to wave enthusiastically, that will show them

I go for a walk every day, sometimes two or three. Usually I just walk around the neighborhood. I'm a friendly person and I like to wave at people and smile while I walk. It's a nice way to know the neighbors. Sometimes people drive by while I'm walking and I wave at them too. But depending on their speed and my interpretation of their regard for my life and the lives of my two small children that I often bring with me, my wave will be different.  If you're driving slow and move out of the way, you get an enthusiastic wave. If you are driving a little faster than I'd like, you get a wave but only a half smile. If you are going objectively and definitely too fast, I do a sort of arm lift wave with no smile. If you zoom down the street like it's a freeway, I'm not even going to wave and I will do my best to look you in the eye so you know how I feel about your speeding through a family friendly neighborhood. I expect that you know and understand these levels and will be moved to do better in the future.

 

Encanto 2: We're gonna talk about Bruno

I have a five year old, which means that one time I listened to the Encanto soundtrack for six hours straight and most days we make it through the line up at least once. We took a few weeks hiatus to listen to the Hamilton soundtrack again because apparently we only get obsessed with things Lin Manuel Miranda makes. The day we made it to six hours straight of We Don't Talk About Bruno and The Family Madrigal and the 100th time of Aaron yelling, "Alexa! Play the Encanto soundtrack!" I yelled back, "ALEXA! NO! STOP!" and then told Aaron he needed to read books silently while I shook a little. 

Anyway, I've thought about Encanto a bunch. 

If I had to pick my top five songs, they would be (in this order):

1. Surface Pressure
2. All of You (especially the part when the whole town shows up to help them)
3. Dos Oruguitas 
4. The Family Madrigal
5. We Don't Talk About Bruno

There's a lot of things we could talk about like:

1. Why Surface Pressure makes me cry every time
2. Some really good song lines
   
3. How many sermons I could come up with because of Encanto 
4. What gifts would be cool to have
5. What characters we relate to best
6. Family systems 
7. Generational trauma

I am guessing there will be a sequel, and if it's not about talking about Bruno, that seems like a real missed opportunity. They really wrapped up that storyline pretty quick at the end and I bet there's more to say about Bruno than a third of a song. 

What Encanto thoughts do you have?

Vomit

I got busy and sick and now I'm traveling and forgot to do my blog for a couple of weeks. That's okay. Let's talk about vomit now.

It's my number one fear. I'm afraid of it happening to me, I'm afraid of being around anyone who is throwing up or might throw up (including my children who I love so very much), I'm afraid of having to look at it, etc. 

The worst thing you can say to me is: I/my kid just threw up yesterday.

It's the miserable anticipation. Is it going to happen? Is it going to happen again? How many hours has it been since I was in contact with that person who I learned just threw up? And then waiting 18 hours, 24, then 36. I usually take a sigh of relief at 36 and a bigger one at 48 if it hasn't happened.

I've been afraid since I was little. In first grade, this kid, Eduardo threw up by my shoe when we were lining up to go in the class. He went to the office, and then I went a few minutes later because I was sure I was also sick. I missed the next day at school because I was so nervous. I wasn't sick.

This summer we went to the farmers market with our friends. We got some pizza from a food truck, because our farmers market is kind of cool and has food trucks. I was wrangling Clara and trying to eat dinner and talk to our friends, and wasn't suuuper paying attention to Aaron who had drank a juice box and eaten all of an adult personal pizza and was running laps with his bestie and chugging water. 3 minutes later he said, "mommy, my tummy hurts" and proceeded to vomit everywhere. My maternal instinct was to run away. I literally jumped away from him clutching Clara while he threw up all over the pavement. So now we know, I will run.

Although this fall Aaron wasn't feeling well and I was sitting on the couch with him early one morning while breastfeeding Clara. I held the bowl for him in one hand and his sister still attached to me in the other hand. I believe that I unlocked a new parent award that day. If Jesse had been in the room, I probably would have ran, but alas, he was still asleep, so I parented instead.

Here's the thing about my vomit fear actually: it's horribly vulnerable and I cannot control anything about it. Also, it's gross and it feels bad. 

Last weekend, I faced my biggest fear. I got the stomach bug at my sister's bachelorette party and got to spend the party alone in the basement bedroom throwing up in a bowl. Not only did I have to be real sick, I did it in an airbnb with people I don't know super duper well yet. That's vulnerable on top of vulnerable. And guess what? I even survived. Maybe this sickness will be part of my healing. Deep right?    

Gifts I Always Want

 Here are some gifts I always want, even if I have a zil of them:

• mugs (like fun ones or friendshippy ones, not ones that would come in a pack of 4 and match the dinner plates)
• a journal
• a candle, because they make me happy and I can't get myself to buy any more expensive than the glade ones
• gel pens
• a Target card (because basically this whole list can be found in a single section at Target) and also one hour alone to go there. 

 

Wordle is the new Farmville

I've never played Wordle. I bet it's fun. I kinda want to just because other people I know are playing it and I like to be in on things. I see at least like 15 of you every day posting your wordles on Facebook. Is that how you say it? Since I'm too tired and busy and not going to add another hobby, I want you to know that I've decided from afar that it's the new Farmville. Sorry and I love you.    

Left

This title sounds moody, like a poem I'd write in high school. It's actually just about the word "left."

Left can simultaneously mean like two opposite things. He left. He's left. (And a bonus: he's left HANDED). It's weird that one word can mean to go and stay at the same time and also that way <---

Look, you can do one sentence with a bunch of lefts in it with mostly different meanings:

I left for school and my sister was left at home; she ate my leftovers from the left side of the fridge (and now I'm left pretty mad at her).  

You know what they say...3 lefts make a right. That sentence had like 5 though. 

Snowshoeing in CA

I love snowshoeing. It's really fun. It's basically hiking but you can do it after it snows a bunch and you get to waddle in a socially acceptable way.

The first time I went snowshoeing was in California. I was in college and a few friends from places where it actually snows said, "wouldn't it be so fun if we went snowshoeing?" I said yes, obviously, without actually knowing what it was.

In Southern California you GO TO the snow. And sometimes it's not even there. I have a memory of when I was like 4 or 5 and driving up to the mountains to play in the snow and when we got there we saw it! We got out of the car and there were these tiny chunks of snow surrounded by dirt. We squealed with joy and tried to make a snowman out of them. 

This time we went up to Frazier Park and there was snow. Kind of. It was the kind of snow that has been there for a while and the paths are mostly ice. I didn't know. It looked lovely. I was ready to snowshoe on it. We went in the little visitor center where you could rent them. There were 5 of us and they had 4 pairs of actual snowshoes. BUT they had one pair of giant plastic ones as a decoration on the wall and they told me, "we'll just have you use these." I don't know if it was a mean joke or not, but if it were me, I'd only rent someone plastic shoes to walk on ice if I was kind of mean. It worked about as well as you'd expect. I trailed 10 feet behind everyone and fell every second. I finally took them off and just hiked. 

Also, it was still fun. And here are some pics (thanks FB!): 

The "I have two kids now (and one of them is a baby), also a full time job, and also it's year 47 of a pandemic" version.

I almost wasn't going to do this blog again, but then me and my sisters brainstormed a bunch of topics and now I am. Probably a little less than other years. See: the title. The question I ask myself each year when I try to decide if I'm going to do this blog again is: can you think of a bunch of things to talk about? I've yet to not have things to talk about. You already knew that.

I really like doing this blog. Here are some reasons:

• It's only 6 weeks of writing things.
• Who else has a Lenten blog, honestly?
• It's a good creative outlet and practice in vulnerability.
• I can use my preferred writing styles: fragment sentences and bullet point lists.
• It's better than scrolling the internet.
• I feel like I can bring a little randomness and (something similar to) humor to sprinkle in with constant barrage of bad news and bad news and bad news. 
• It makes me happy that my grandma reads it just about everyday. Hi grandma!! 

Here are some topics we came up with:

• foods I can't eat anymore
• fantasy coffee
• business idea that I want someone to steal
• gifts I always want
• You can't always get what you want (*see what my brain did there?)
• boundaries
• meal planning
• snow shoeing in CA
• Instagram Kelli
• I'm not going to wave enthusiastically, that will show them.
• You need an exclamation or two: a lesson in positive texting
• creativity in covidland
• It's not dead
• What if it all works out?
• ARE there any other Lent blogs? If so, a ranked order of all the Lent blogs
• Eggstravaganza
• Dinosaur names I can't pronounce 
• Encanto 2: We're gonna talk about Bruno
• I can't wait until...
• Hometown Buffet and Sizzler: Fancy dining in 1995
• TGIF + Taco Bell Picnic Parties
• Things I would have done differently in the last 2 years.
• "You just walk through a long tunnel, sit down, watch 2 movies, and then you're in California"/ Aaron explaining how to do things.
• Why finish a book when you can stop part way in a fury of excitement and tell everyone else to read it and then lose interest and never finish it yourself?
• Perfect working environment
• bad guys
• how you know you picked the right spouse.