Honest Scrap Award

I was about to post this right before we got the news that Jet died. I just couldn't imagine how it was appropriate to post silly things about myself and try to be funny when we were all in such shock. It's hard to believe that Mirne and Craig's third baby dying, would seem to take so much out of me. I can not imagine what they were/are/will be feeling.
Did anyone else sense the hush that has fallen over babyloss blogland?

So here's the finished draft that was started during happier times.


Caitsmom at A Fifth Season, Mirne at Frejya Ione and Kees Henry and Lea at Nicholas' Touch have nominated this blog for The Honest Scrap award.




I have yet to learn how to publish links. I get the little prompt window like everyone else and then I have no idea what to do. I've tried trial and error and it's always an error. It's not that I can't follow directions, I just don't know how...


There are some simple rules to accept this award. Firstly, pass the award on to 7 other bloggers and, secondly, list 10 honest and hopefully interesting things about yourself.


Therefore, I pass on the Honest Scrap award to the following bloggers and hopefully they will forgive my lack of computer skills. I'm sorry if you've already been nominated:

Jennifer @ He Will Carry Me
Angie @ Still Life With Circles
M @ The Unlucky Lottery
Larns @ Magic Rain
Birne @ All the Little Ponies
Monique @ Samuel Marc
Tina @ Living Without Sophia and Ellie

Now, ten honest and hopefully interesting things about yours truly:

1) I have a strange love/hate relationship to paper. I love it, in that it's versatile, convenient, and I can fill it with some paint and my imagination. I hate that it's so dry. I can not read a paper-backed book without lotion on my hands. I can't stand the roughness of it. It gives me the prickly sensation of nails on a chalkboard. One of the mental considerations I make before deciding on a restaurant has to do with the texture of their napkins. If it's been a bad day or I've been sweating (it's very humid where I live) cloth napkins please!


2)I am a shy adult. I was not a shy child, or a shy teen. I used to love to meet new people, and I would talk to anyone. I still like to meet new people, but I'm not near the extrovert that I was. I am shy. I get awkward and self conscious. It's strange to think that I'm like that now, but it's undeniable. I am painfully shy around doctors, L.O's teachers, K's parents, even members of my own family.


3) When I was 15, I was sent to an overzealous religious girls home for nearly a year. We worked long hours outside in the burning heat, doing 'God's work', kept busy as 'idle hands, were in fact, the devil's workshop', or so they liked to say. We had our food rationed and had limited contact with our family and none with our friends. I was denied medical care on many occasions (I had untreated gastrointeritis for over two months) while they sent reports home and spoke on the phone to my family that I was doing just peachy and growing in the Lord. We watched animals get slaughtered and had to castrate baby piglets. (I became a vegetarian for a time after) We went to churches and sang for money/donations. We went to a one room school and earned credits that were worthless in the real world. It was there that I learned about survival. It was there that I learned about sabotage and manipulation. I dreamt of that place for almost exactly seven years afterward and still have a dream now and then. It took me a long time to trust people again and an even longer time to trust Him.


4) I have at least one aquarium everywhere I have lived since I was 9. I started out with a Betta that my grandmother had given me when she used to own a pet store. I had fish from the lake, fish from the pet store and fish that my dad would bring home from his adventures looking for Indian artifacts or hunting. I've had two octopus' (octopi?) and a cayman crocodile, to name a few of the stranger animals I've had around.


5)I collect Chinese and Japanese tea sets. I adore white oolong and jasmine green tea. If I was smart, I would drink these in lieu of coffee. K likes a cup of hot tea after a long hard day at work.


6) I hide things from myself. For example, I'll walk around with something in my hand, looking for the perfect place to put it, and when I leave it there, that something is now lost. I will never be able to remember where I put it. K will remember that I had lost it, and spot it, or I find it when I clean or rearrange furniture. LO does it too and it drives K nuts.


7) I love the show 'Wife Swap'. It is ridiculous and funny. They mix families that are completely opposite and the results crack me up. My favorite part is the resistance from the family when it's the new mom's turn to do things her way. I also like 'The Nanny'. It makes me feel a bit better about my situation. Is that wrong?
Other than that (add in 'House', of course), I don't watch much television.


8)K's real name is Kenneth, but we call him Kenny. We grew up in the same neighborhood. I actually got sent to stay with my aunt in Washington state, for getting caught at his house when I was 16 and freshly out of that nutty place in entry 3. We didn't see each other again until he saw me buying M&M's at a store by my house after Zoe had died. I found out that he lived around the corner from me and had for the last few years. We started seeing each other and have been together since.


9) My favorite foods are fruits, cheeses and sweets. Cream pies, layer cakes, cookie cakes you name it. I love to bake and it's rare that you won't find a roll of cookie dough in the fridge or a few muffin mixes laying around. I do bake from scratch, but the kitchen must be spotless and I have to really be in the mood. I made a two-layer cake for Zoe's first birthday, and I plan to do it this year as well. It helps me feel as if I'm doing something normal for her, even if we eat it after we go visit her grave.


10) I am a little bit of a germ-a-phobe. I have lived in this house a little over two years and have changed the floors twice. I got Lucy (my border collie for those that don't know) after Zoe died, so lets just say that grief and potty training a dog don't mix well. Now days my dogs are fairly well trained, but nonetheless I was not satisfied with the carpet. It was a deep chocolate and smelled like poo. I had been fretting and loathing the carpet. I mentioned it to Kenny and he went and bought oak flooring and installed it in the living room this weekend. It will be put in the kitchen before long, but until then, I am just thrilled with the living room. I LOVE it. I also love my baby for dealing with my quirks and going along with it because he loves me.


I'll end this post with a picture or two of my baby's handiwork. ;)






Do you see LO's new border collie baby? So cute...