by Sarah | Mar 3, 2016 | All About Denver, All About Family, All About Me, Disney, Make-A-Wish, Redefining Perfect
There was one little detail Denver didn’t bother to tell us.
Of course, this was during the time he didn’t speak to us much at all, so that shouldn’t be surprising.
But, still, he didn’t mention that he didn’t choose Disney as his initial wish for one reason, and one reason alone.
He was certain he would hate it.
It would be stupid.
He was sixteen, what did he care about a land that all began with a mouse?
And then…
And then he went. He remained stoic through a good portion of it, but yet there were smiles.
Here and there.
Somewhere in that time, in that brief week of time – it happened.
He fell in love.
With the land that started with a mouse.
With the land he now calls home.
With the dream.
And I say we are a Disney loving family, but he is the king of it all.
Disney has transformed him in ways I had only hoped would happen.
He is focused, and driven (though not on school – that’s another story). He is ready to move on and out, and head back home.
And if I could, I would be right there with him.
It’s funny how Disney works that way. How it takes a teenager who’s too big for his britches, and too cool for such things…and makes him a believer.
Disney was special to me before – now it’s even more so because it brought my kid back to me.
by Sarah | Mar 1, 2016 | All About Me, All of Us, Crap, Random, Redefining Perfect, WTF?
I work in a bank. I have for years, off and on.
My first teller job was in 1999 in Virginia. Back when banks had actual banker hours, and checks were still a thing.
Now it’s over 15 years later and the world of banking, like everything else, is so different.
I’ve seen what a plastic culture we’ve become.
Every day I see people that don’t have a register to keep track of their spending.
Don’t even know how to balance a checkbook.
Then wonder why they are in the hole, how could a charge have hit?
There have been so many times I’ve asked, “Do you keep a register?” only to get the identical response every time, “No…but I know what is in my account. I check it online every day.”
I’ve had teenager upon teenager, and quite a few adults come up to my window in a panic because they forgot their card, and “How on earth can I get money out?”
I am stunned on a regular basis on the ineptitude of people and how to handle their checking account. (and for the record, it is checking account…one of my biggest pet peeves is calling it checkingS. ~shudder~)
How did we come to this?
Plastic. It’s made everything so easy. I’m guilty of it myself.
So I implore every single one of you.
If you don’t know how to handle a checkbook, LEARN. Do NOT count on what you see on your online banking every day. Pending charges can drop off only to return. Some online payments don’t show up right away. And god forbid you actually write a check…you are bound to forget about it.
If your kids are coming of age to get their own accounts, teach them how to balance a checkbook. Teach them what a withdrawal is, and how it can be done without an ATM.
Remember that just because the card works doesn’t mean the money is there. It’s very possible your bank allows a certain amount of overdraft.
Also, remember you are dealing with real money, even if it doesn’t cross your fingertips. Plastic doesn’t make it fakes, just easy to abuse.
Oh, and please don’t blame the tellers for fees or errors. While we do make mistakes, often your issue is not our mistake. I promise, we really are there to help.
And lastly, teach them, and yourself, some basic bank protocol. I have some examples, but this’ll turn into a lecture. Let’s just say, use common sense and be kind to your tellers.
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One final note: Try going plastic-free for one month. Use checks and cash. It’ll change the way you view money inw ays you never imagined.
by Sarah | Feb 22, 2016 | All About Denver, All About Family, All About Me, Redefining Perfect, The Teenager
More often than not anymore, our conversations turn toward what’s coming.
Toward his inevitable departure.
How he will move.
What he will do when he is gone.
How we will handle the adult things.
Like a car.
A job.
Where he’ll live.
What he’ll leave with.
And come back for.
There is no talk of college anymore, and I’m okay with that.
Because he has plans and dreams.
A lifetime career in the land of the mouse.
He is taking a leap.
A leap I never dared to take.
To chase a dream.
And we are ready to rally behind him, and encourage such reckless dream chasing.
Or not so reckless – after all he’s a planner, a saver, a stingy penny-pincher, willing to go the distance to achieve his end-game.
And yet…
He is leaving.
If all goes well, in seven or eight months we will get in a car and I will take him south, get him settled, and leave him to his future hundreds of miles away.
The first to leave the nest.
To strike out on his own and take chances, make friends, create a life.
And I can only hope that we have given him the tools he needs to succeed. To live a life to its fullest. To care for his CF. To care for himself. To create a home.
And while I have my worries, as all mothers do.
I am proud that he is taking a risk to chase a dream.
I have a strong feeling he’ll succeed.
by Sarah | Feb 18, 2016 | All About Denver, All About Erik, All About Family, All About Kennedy, All About Me, All About Molly, All of Us, Disney, Make-A-Wish, Redefining Perfect
We once again had the mixed blessing of a Make-A-Wish trip to Disney and Universal. How it came about wasn’t intentional, in fact the wish was originally something much different.
When we had our first meeting with Make-A-Wish Denver thought he’d hate Disney, that Kennedy’s wish would be awful, and he’d be so bored. His wish was to meet Sir Patrick Stewart. We were warned that celebrity wishes were difficult and took a long time to fulfill. So we waited.
I planned Kennedy’s trip in the few months we had, and we ended up going in pretty blind.
We had an amazing trip, as I’ve documented here (and will continue to do so), and all too soon we returned home. Although Denver returned home a changed teen, we thought that was it.
A few months later I got the fateful email – Denver’s original wish to meet Sir Patrick Stewart would not be able to come to fruition. He was working 27 hour days on the set of his new show and they couldn’t make it happen. Did Denver want to change his second wish?
Boy, did he ever. He wasn’t sure Make-A-Wish could make it happen because we’d just been, but if we could, could we return to Disney?
Turns out, they could, and so we were going to return to Disney!
Denver wasn’t done there, though.
To top of the already magical wish of a Disney vacation – he wanted to invite his grandparents (only my mother went).
And then he wanted to take it a step further.
He wanted to completely surprise his sisters.
So for seven months we kept the secret, barely at times.
The story of the reveal is one for another day, but suffice it to say, it went over very well and we made the amazing return to Disney.
We did more, saw more. Had better times, and some not-so-great times. We went on every coaster, sometimes twice. We took chances, we met princesses and dined with them.
We met villains and Eeyore and Mad Hatters.
The return was a breathtaking celebration, the fate of our family as a Disney family sealed. The future goals of our son irrevocably changed.
Once again their is so much to tell. So much that will come out over the course of the next few months. I’ll continue our stories from the first year and add in those from the second.
Needless to say. If we weren’t before – we are a Disney family now.
by Sarah | Feb 16, 2016 | All About Me, All of Us, Blogging Life, Redefining Perfect
Last year I decided to commit myself to do some things, 30 days at a time. I have a long list of things to try, but I thought I’d do them one at time at first so I wouldn’t overwhelm myself. In October I thought I’d take on the challenge of doing my makeup for 30 days. Whether I worked or not, I would put on makeup every day.
There was a big problem with this.
I have never in my life been successful at makeup.
You’d think having grown up as a dancer and then in theater that I’d have some clue, but honestly I didn’t. I rarely wore it because any time I tried I looked like I had full-on cake. It wasn’t nice, or pretty or, well…it was a mess.
So I did what any first world girl would do.
I took to YouTube.
I looked up tutorials, suggested makeups, everything I could get my hands on.
I studied, I took a deep breath, picked up a handful of supplies, and dove in.
For 30 days straight, through work, home days, lazy days, and a trip to Disney I put on makeup.
Some days it was little more than concealer and mascara.
In the insanely hot days in Florida it was a light base, and some eye makeup. Simple, but enough to add a little oomph.
And what happened?
I loved it.
I actually took more selfies.
I was more confident.
I felt pretty.
I found that even a little effort in the morning helped boost my esteem and my mood.
Due to excuses I shouldn’t be making, I’ve fallen back out of the habit, but hope to get back into it.
I’ve been on the anti-makeup bandwagon for a long time…but I can’t say it was for any noble reason – because it was real laziness.
For me the makeup became about more than my 30 day project, and it was more about changing my appearance (I’ve seen those insanely drastic change videos and it’s insane, I couldn’t handle that). It was about covering up a few flaws (like genetically awful dark circles), and enhancing the good things. Adding a little life to my features, and taking care of my skin in between the applications.
I felt like a better version of myself.
And isn’t that what it’s all about?
by Sarah | Feb 10, 2016 | All About Me, All of Us, I'm A Reader, Redefining Perfect
January is the time for resolutions and goals and all that sort of thing. I’m not a big resolution girl, but every year in January I set goals on Goodreads. Once again, I went for 50 books this year, and I’ve already got a start on it. So, I’m a little late this month (thanks sickness), but here’s what I read in January (into the first of February), and what I’m currently reading, or plan on reading. (Yes, I read a lot of books at the same time. shush)
What I’ve Read
Harry Potter and The Socerer’s Stone – What? Again? Yup. I’m still in the middle of reading the entire series aloud w/ my baby girl…but I wanted to sit down and just read them through fast, rather than a chapter a night. She’s decided to do the same too. We’ve also been watching them (again)…we might have a problem. Then again, if a Harry Potter obsession is wrong, I do not want to be right. As always, I enjoyed the first book, even on my fourth read-through. It’s a bit juvenile (I always found the first 2 that way), but it’s clearly geared toward that age and not an adult…but I still love it. I like to get lost in the magical world all over again. It just makes me happy 🙂
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You’re Never Weird on the Internet (Almost) – OMG, I want Felicia Day to be my best friend. We could just sit around and be weird together all day long. If you’ve been around these parts for any length of time, you know that I don’t do NF books…like ever. If I do, I almost always hate them. Not this one, not by a long shot. I have never been a “Gamer Girl”, but I have been a nerd, a geek, and insanely awkward and lacking in social skills. Everything about this book was relatable, and funny. A NF book I was so happy I took a chance on. I’d always enjoyed The Guild, and thought she was fun and quirky on facebook, so I took a gamble to borrow this from the library. Very happy Felicia didn’t disappoint. So lovely. 🙂
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Flunked – Well, it was a fractured fairy tale of sorts…a bit of a new world of classic Fairy Tales. It was fun, a quick read. Did it rock my world? Eh. Would I read book 2? Sure! Will I clear my TBR pile to do it? Probably not.
Illuminae – I have a bad habit of reading books that people I know RAVE about and not loving them. That was the case with this. It wasn’t horrible, I actually sort of enjoyed the storyline. I think a lot of my disappointment had to do with the format I read it in. Just about everyone says the hard cover is GORGEOUS and that’s what makes this book so astoundingly wonderful. I read it on Kindle (library borrow. I swore to stop spending so much on books this year). Apparently in Kindle it loses way too much. Beyond that, the format threw me off. It was all chat transcripts and military files, etc. I suppose in the “beautiful” layout of the hard cover print book it makes more sense. I might borrow it that way once I can just to see what all the fuss is about.
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What I’m Reading
Harry Potter & the Chamber of Secrets – In my fourth solo read of this one. Actually, almost done really, probably in the next day or two I’ll finish it up. I like this one, but it’s not my favorite. I like the next as the themes start to get a little darker and more intense. Still, it’s Harry Potter and I always enjoy the ride.
Harry Potter & the Order of the Phoenix – In my out loud reading with the little, we are at about 1/4 of the way through. Unfortunately, though we’d been off to a great start, things stalled with my laryngitis. Hopefully once I get my voice back we’ll get rolling again. This one is a LONG one, and I’ve always found it the most depressing (so. much. angst.) But, we’re working on it and we’ll get through. 🙂
Marked – I got this ages and ages ago on netgalley and never read it. Now that I’ve taken a peak inside I have to wonder what’s taken me so long. The world building is stunning, and I’m looking forward to seeing how it progresses.
Anna Dressed in Blood – A recommendation from my fabulous editor (who I always listen to). It’s been on my TBR for a while, but when I saw her review I snatched it up. Really enjoying it, but am afraid to read it at night so it’s going slooow. lol. I need to hurry up, though b/c it’s a library borrow and I need to return it!
The Last Place on Earth – This was a Goodreads First Reads win…and it’s actually an ARC, so I’m super excited to read it and hope I manage before the book releases at the end of the month. I’ve just started it and so far it’s okay…but I’m only 15 pages in so I don’t have so much in opinions yet. 🙂
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What I’m Reading Next
Red Rising – Another Goodreads First Reads win…I’ve been wanting to read it forever, though. I hope it doesn’t go the way of the other hugely popular books that I end up feeling ambivalent about. I’m really excited for it. I actually won this before The Last Place on Earth, but as the other is an ARC, I’m wanting to get it done. Fingers crossed it’s as good as everyone says it is!!
Let’s Pretend This Never Happened – Another NF. I have it on hold at the library. I’ve been a fan/FB-friend of Jenny for ever and a day, but never read this. Even though I don’t normally like NF books (see above), I’ve always enjoyed Jenny’s posts. There is a huge line for this one, so I’m waiting patiently.
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And that’s where I’m at for now. More books coming in the near-future I’m sure. Here’s hoping I get through them all quick. 😀
There was one little detail Denver didn’t bother to tell us.
And then he went. He remained stoic through a good portion of it, but yet there were smiles.
