bed memories

i had just woken up. it was too early in the morning. the sun was just beginning to seep through the blinds. chris was sleeping next to me. i reached my hand across to his side and he couldn't be touched until i inched closer and closer, finally connecting hand to body.
i thought to myself how awesome it is that i can sleep in my bed with another person even, and not have to touch that person, or have that person touch me, on purpose! i said to myself; "i love my king size bed," then smiled.

i began thinking about the beds chris and i have had in the past 16 years. 3 to be exact. our very first bed was purchased a bit before we were to be married. we were college students. we had little money. chris found a bed for sale in the want ads.
one saturday found us driving through a trailor park, finding the address, and knocking on the door of the home of a single older lady. she was selling her queen size mattress she no longer needed.
no longer needed because her husband and recently died.
died as he slept in his bed.
she assured us it wasn't soiled at all.
sold: $100.00
side note: I AM THE BEST WIFE EVER!

that bed took us through a few years. we moved it with us across the states from utah to virginia. ceily was born. she became a permanet resident in our bed. always. every night. all night. i was grateful it was large enough for a smaller person to join us. to be kept warm and safe. she was a bad, bad baby and wouldn't nurse well. she would latch on and then immediately fall to sleep. to keep her awake, i would take her naked toes and place them against the wall that the head of our bed touched. it was an external wall and very cold. it worked.

that bed moved with us to our first house. eddie's arrival was shortly due. needed a bigger bed so one more tiny body could be added. we acquired our very first king size bed. chris' parents had gotten a brand new bed, and offered us their old one. (thank you very much.) that first night was the best night ever!! "chris. where are you? i can't see you," i remember saying as we lay together, not having to touch. even when ceily was between us. (like always.) ceily was also a bad, bad toddler. being very pregnant and very tired, i needed my almost two year old to take naps. she didn't want to. so i would have to snuggle her on our bed. snuggling consisted of me holding her in a vise-like grip around her entire body until she was motionless and sleeping. we loved napping and sleeping on our huge bed.
but it was very hard and i like very soft.



after 8 years we finally had become grown ups and could afford a brand new, king size bed. a bed of our choosing. we even went shopping at a mattress store. i wanted the tempurpedic. it was like a soft, billowy, cloud of dreams.
when it was delivered, factory instructions told us to air out our brand new king size mattress. our family room became the bed room. the children jumped on it. we watched tv together comfortably on the floor, atop our new bed. our friends even watched tv with us, together, because it was a king size bed, and that was big. big enough for two families practically.

after it finally didn't smell like a chemical factory, we took our bed to it's room. i slept like a princess. no hardness. no worries of dead bodies before. although those first few weeks, our bodies had to adjust to the new sleeping material. it was hard to turn because you felt like you had been suctioned down into a soft, billowy cloud of dreams. and it did seem to retain heat from our bodies.

our bed has had us all together at once, sleeping. not too comfy and a little smooshy to say the least, but i love that we can all "fit" together if we want to.
last night even, ceily fell asleep next to me, in the middle, as chris watched monday night football downstairs. this king size dream of a bed, hid her body enough that chris didn't even notice she was in bed until he tried to climb inside. he slept in ceily's one person bed last night.
second side note: YOU'RE THE BEST CHRIS!!

i still love my bed. it's perfect. has always been perfect. i love that it's big enough for me and lana and her bestie maren, when we, i mean lana, has sleep overs and chris is out of town and i'm a scaredy cat, and i make them sleep with me. (they LOVE to sleep with me because they are also scaredy cats, but wont admit it.)

the best part? not one person has died on our bed.
i love that too.

school

i haven't asked if he is the little blue fish or the larger red and orange monster.
yesterday he came home, hot and sweaty from the bus, sat down on the couch, started to take his shoes and socks off. while doing so, he said-
"worst day ever! we had soooo much work to do!!

i'm thinking the transition from kindergarten to first grade isn't too fun right now.

ceily jayne

One of Ceily's teachers requested a homework assignment to be completed by her parents. In 1 million words or less, tell about your child. Ceily reminded me I needed to complete this assignment so she can get her first A+. This is a good thing because she just stormed up the stairs saying she was too tired to finish her homework and was going to sleep and she'll finish it in the morning... An A+ will serve her well.

Ceily Jayne was born on November 21st, in 1996.

She was perfect in every way.

You never can expect what it's like to love another human being as much as you love a child, until you hold them in your arms and look at their face, and search their eyes and marvel at the miracle that is yours. She was wet, and sticky, and crying, but she was the most beautiful creature I had ever seen. And her head was perfectly round, not a cone. I liked that.

There wasn't anything better than holding Ceily and feeding her and cuddling her and cleaning her. I would sit and hold her in the nook of my arm, and trace her eyelids, and eyebrows with my fingertip. I would touch her rosebud mouth. I loved the velvety feel of her hair. It never grew old. My love for her increased daily. Sometimes hourly.

Ceily was an early walker. She was a fast runner. She was busy. Always studying things. She was quiet but very adventuresome. She made her father proud as her little 2 year old body scaled the playground jungle gym, horrifying the other park parents below. She was the first to jump in the lake. First girl in line to touch the toad.

Since those first days, I have sat and watched Ceily, wondering, musing, as a mother does, what will this baby, child, young women become? Will she realize her Kindergarten dream of being a Sonic carhop because they can wear roller skates? Or will she form that rock band and travel the world, performing concerts in front of thousands? Will her bright mind take her to an Ivy League college, to study law (her newest goal?) Will she create pieces of art with her hands; works that become masterpieces? Will those chapters she has stored in her head, work their way onto paper, becoming volumes? Will her gentle heart, take care of those in need? Will her courage take her places I can't even dream of?

She is an avid reader. Books being her first love. Her second love; Edward Cullen. Although, that phase in life has passed. "Edward is so yesterday." Her third love is music. Fourth: Texting. lol.

Ceily has an individuality that can't be hidden. She likes to wear bright purple knee socks with her gym clothes. One day she will wear turquoise jeans, ugly black shoes, with Hello Kitty on her chest. The next day, her cowboy boots with a cute short dress and jean jacket and pearls. Some days her naturally curly hair will be mechanically altered straight. Most days she begs for a new color to streak her hair. All days she never cleans her room.

Don't get me wrong. Sometimes I would like to kick her to the moon. Teenagers and parents don't mix at times. But most times, I see the real Ceily; beautiful, gentle, kind, smart, good, funny, full of potential that could propel her to the moon and back... if she wanted.

new year at school

this last week was filled with antsy children and tired parents. chris did his spreadsheet with bedtimes and how many hours of sleep each child should get each night. (after doing online research of course.)

the back-to-school shopping done. all supplies bought and ready. meet the teachers met. last nights of sleep-overs and all nighters. cramming 3 months of lost math and reading skills into two weeks. it worked on most days. one last have-the-stuckie's-over-for-movie-night. (the sound of music. the first hour all 12 of us together. the last hour four adults remained.)


then came that early, early morning. without any bumps. (although eddie and ceily lost cell phone privileges by 7:30...)

chris and i believe middle school may have been the elixir that cured this sister/brother relationship. they haven't stopped talking since yesterday. love, love, love it.

i walked into ceily's room around 6am and she was sitting on her bed, clad in first day clothes, texting. she had been awake since 4:30. her hair straightened flat. looking beautiful and cute and darling, with a flair of individuality. like always."why didn't you come into my room?", eddie exclaimed from across the hall. "i couldn't sleep either."

eddie quickly dressed. "are you done cleaning your room?, asked the mom. "i'm done," replied the snotty child. "you'll be done for life if you don't get back upstairs now." the mom said. (boy's phone taken for displaying great disrespect towards the mom.) he looked handsome, hair gelled up into faux-hawk. he was excited, if a bit nervous, about going to middle school.

noah dressed as well, but had been mentioning throughout the week that he was not going to be attending the first day of school. he would go to the second day, but not the first.

i said that was fine, because he may remember, he had promised me he would never grow up and go to school. (last year he lied and went to kindergarten.)

lana dressed, did her hair, laced her shoes, ate her breakfast, took pictures. "mom, remember last year when i didn't want to go into the classroom and i stood outside the door?" i think she was thinking that might be a good idea this year as well.

then they came home. eddie and ceily first. lana and noah second. i had been waiting all day.

as we sat at the dinner table, ceily asked how long she had napped...2+ hours. her favorite was meeting her new bff, matt.

eddie's worst was not being able to open his locker and being late for some classes. his favorite was the sundae from sonic, celebrating the first day of school.

lana's worst was having to go to school. she was happy we had sundaes.

after noah fell apart maybe 20 million times, lamenting his life, and his mean mom, sitting in time out, crying, deciding he was going to bed for the rest of the night!, hating salad for dinner!!!, he finally wiped his tears and sat at the table with the rest of the family. his worst was no one talked to him and he hates school.

i had spent hours in the hot, hot car cleaning gross, disgusting trash and other stuff, deciding many times over that my children were no longer allowed to ride in my car. realizing that maybe that was a bit dramatic but then deciding again, that no, they don't deserve the luxury because apparently they don't care about respecting other's property...blah, blah, blah.
my worst was when i scratched the car as i was leaving the car wash. "good thing we aren't planning on selling it," commented the husband.

chris' worst was discovering that the upstairs air conditioning isn't working. (that is a very good worst. i would have chosen that to, but scratching the car was worse-er.)

BUT

my best by far was seeing everyone after missing them all day long and jumping into the very clean car, and racing to sonic for jr. sundaes to celebrate the first day of school. i was nice mom again and had decided i love them more than not and want them in my car, next to me, with me, enjoying them, listening to them sing and talk. (except ceily. she was alseep. was greatly surprised and shocked upon hearing we had eaten ice cream without her.)

aren't they cute?