I really have had a great day! I picked my mom up from the airport last night and she's been spoiling me all day. Well, okay, actually I dragged her around on a million errands and in the middle of it we went to Kohl's, her requested destination of choice, where she bought me twice as many articles of clothing as she bought herself. (A little early birthday.) And yeah. New clothes pretty much shoot the moon for me.
I just finished immersing myself in the blogs of my very best friends. Do you know how amazing it is that my very best friends all are bloggers too!?
Sarah got me started blogging.
Then I got Melissa hooked.
Next Charmian joined in.
And now they all follow each other!
It's a beautiful thing.
Ladies, can I just tell you that reading all your bloggy thoughts is almost as good as sitting in your living rooms with a cup of hot cocoa? I said almost.
Anywhooooo... Alejandro is still in California. If things keep up, he's going to be there for a while longer forever. The man is just good and every time he turns around he has someone asking for an estimate. He's working on three tonight. I really couldn't possibly be prouder or I think I'd burst.
But yes, being apart is no fun... Please pray for us as we look toward the future. We're starting to realize we may be headed toward a new reality (at least for a time) of working in different parts of the country and traveling regularly. I don't know that, so please don't quote me. Things are still WAY up in the air. But as a sort of survival mode, I'm trying to figure out how to make this work long term while still having a family together since at this point we have surpassed twice the amount of time we expected him to be gone. The wonderful thing is that I do have a lot of flexibility and I can work anywhere in the country too. It's just a matter of figuring out how to do that and where to draw the line and how not to fall over from exhaustion.
I hear a lot that, "this must be so hard." What's NOT hard is doing every diaper, never ever sleeping in, never ever having a night off, finding a sitter any time I want to work when Danny's not sleeping, cooking every meal or washing every dish. It just doesn't phase me anymore. What IS hard is not snuggling at night, not kissing him good morning, trying to remember all of the new things Danny does and recounting them so Alejandro can be a part of his growth, not holding hands and not having him by my side through all the things of life, mundane and exciting.
But I'll tell you what: I'm thankful. I know better than to think I have any room to complain. There are plenty of women out there (and reading this blog) who deal with the alone-ness but who deal with loneliness too, because their husbands have removed their love. I praise the Lord that mine has never done that. I will never begrudge my husband for gathering all the courage he has to step out and do something he'd never done before because we had to eat and the heat had to stay on. I know that this is a huge sacrifice for him too.
I'll end by just sharing two things we started this week that have worked for us and I'd encourage any couple who experiences distance for any amount of time to put these two things into place. Also I want to share because there may come a time when we realize we got out of these two habits and they have made the last four days SO MUCH better, despite being apart, and I don't want to forget them.
First, we pray together each morning. It took compromise and flexibility and a little brain-work to accomodate the time difference, but we figured out a way to connect by phone every single morning to pray over each other. It's like a warm wake-up hug. Wow, do I love it!
Second, we have phone-dates. Yep. Phone dates. There's a date and a time and when that rolls around we each curl up with the phone (or the computer and Skype), put everything else away and just hang out together. We talk about all things not too important (business stuff is off-limits during this hang-out time) and just enjoy the sound of each other's voice. The rule is, the phone date can't end until we've set a date for the next one. It just fills my love-bucket.
Alright, that's enough rambling tonight. I hope that you are all content, cozy and full of warm-fuzzies tonight.
With much love,
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