Happy Birthday to Steve!::February 12

Today is my Sweetheart's Birthday! This is the 18th of his birthdays that I've celebrated with him. He's had 42 celebrations so far, and one actual birth day, so I haven't even been around for half of them yet. I'll stick around and remedy that though.


I am very thankful for him. He is very much my best friend. He has been by my side through the good, the bad, and the ugly for all of these many years. He and I have a very unique relationship. We are both very comfortable with our individual thoughts, and very often we like to be alone with those thoughts. But we can be together, doing, our own thing, being very alone, and very together, at the very same time.


We also enjoy spending time together just hanging out and being friends. We enjoy many of the same things and love each other enough to enjoy what the other loves but that we simply tolerate for a while. There aren't many of those though.

When I was first together with him, I realized what an amazing concoction he is! He likes action/adventure shoot'em up movies, westerns, comedies, dramas, sci-fi/fantasy, romances, and musicals. And his music is also just as varied. The kids thought he was awesome because they were never able to introduce them to their music w/o him already having listened to it. And I have always loved being able to go to a wide variety of movies with him and being able to enjoy myself knowing that he was enjoying himself too.

He likes spicy food. And curry. He doesn't like sweets much. He is the only man I've ever known to utter this sentence, "We have eaten meat with every meal for a week. When can we just have vegetables?" That was said after we were first married and I was shocked! Now, he has to cook his own meat because we eat vegetables a lot.


When we were first married he commented that he would love it if I would bake some bread. I told him to never count on me making bread. He also said that he might like to move by his family in TN. I told him I would never move out of Utah. Less than 2 years went by, finding me in our kitchen in TN baking bread. He probably has some kind of mind control or something.....

We have had 4 children together, we've raised 3 already with 3 more to go. We have suffered through and comforted each other through the death of our way-too-premature baby Ammon's death. The math doesn't add up unless you realize that at 24 years old he took on not only a new bride, but also her 3 children. He has been a dad to all of our kids, and has earned the respect of all of them too.


And now we're working on grandkids. Aiden loves his Pops.


He was raised as the oldest of 6. Then after he enlisted in the marines at 18, his mom remarried and he accumulated 4 more siblings. Then, a few years later, two more came into the picture. So after all is said and done, he is the oldest of 12.

He was a marine back in the days of the Cold War. Fortunately, he never had to go to combat, something he regretted back then, but is thankful for now.

I married him way back when because I could see myself grow old with him. It was the first time I'd ever been able to picture growing old with someone, even though I was married before. I still look forward to every new year with him.

He is quiet sometimes. He is loud others. He is soft-spoken and long suffering... until he's not. Then he can raise the roof with one breath and send the kids doing exactly what they should have been the entire time.


He is eclectic. He is original. He is personable. He is shy sometimes and outgoing others.

I really like him. I like what he has become and I like where he's headed.

I'm glad that he likes me, and wants me to be where he goes.


Happy Birthday Steve! I hope that I can celebrate many, many more of your birthdays with you and that you have many, many happy years ahead! I love you with all of my heart!

5/52::February 8

Michael and I have spent a lot of time resting on the couch or in our beds this week. I'm hoping next week will find him more chipper than this week has.

A Drive with Aiden::February 6

Josh has had Aiden since Monday, and since Josh is living with us, I have been with Aiden since Monday too :) minus the time that he hangs out with friends...

But I haven't had him all to myself.

Since Josh's time is limited with him, I try not to infringe. But when he mentioned that he needed to get a haircut and get his oil changed, I snatched up the chance to spend a little one on one time with him, so he went with me to take Jared to the dentist.

After dropping Jared off, Aiden and I went and drove around the pond.

We saw some workers in boats, hooking up and moving the floating lights that had lit up the pond since before Christmas.

Then guys in bucket trucks took the light off the floating frame,

leaving the skeleton of the frame to be moved by a dump truck pushing them all to the side of the road.

I think that I was more impressed with the process than Aiden was, but I think he liked seeing the big trucks and the boat, anyway.

Then we drove around a saw some ducks on the water,


and a cat sitting on a garbage can. I told Aiden that if I was a cat, I'd sit on a garbage can too because it is probably a lot warmer than anywhere else he could sit. And because he is 3, and because he understand things, I think he thought he'd like to sit on the garbage can if he was a cat too.

(I love the peep hole that some kids must have made when they built a fort in the snow. :)

At the other end of the pond, we saw a guy getting ready to go fishing. Most of the ducks on the pond saw too and are hopeful for a handout.

Then we drove the back-country roads on our way to get some lunch. This barn with a tractor, the thawed-out brook, and the blanket of snow with the brown weeds pushing through caught my eye. Life is so beautiful!

And for some reason it was at this point in our trip that I was so filled with love for Aiden, for the land, and for life, that my mind started singing the song, "I Love" by Tom T Hall. And my mind drifted to my dad, whom I also love.

This song has always reminded me of him ever since I was a little girl. I don't know why... I don't know if I was with him when I heard it one time, or if he has ever told me whether or not he likes it, but the simple, sweet song about things that warm the heart has always stuck with me as a song that reminds me of my dad.




And then, because I was completely at peace, I noticed another sign of harmony in the world:


Ebony and Ivory and Coke and Pepsi - we can all live together peacefully in the world.

There were other things in the day that weren't so peaceful and didn't leave me with love and harmony in my soul, but it is so nice when for an hour or two life can be just this good.