The Truth About Mommy

I know I told you I'd post today about the other award I have received and while it's still technically Tuesday (with 17 minutes to spare) I feel bad for my tardiness. I wish I had a good excuse, but really it was just Hubby's night off. I forgot about it (since he just switched job positions and he used to get Friday Saturday off, but now has rotating nights off), but once he reminded me we snuggled up and watched movies all night. We watched 17 Again (I have to give that little Efron kid some credit-I thought the movie was adorable!) and Sunshine Cleaning (a really good dark comedy) and it was so much fun!

Still, I'm sorry I was late. Now, onto the award.........

Recently I have received the Honest Scrap award from Jenny at Our Nifty Notebook and The Crazy Baby Mama. I've received this award before, but I am honored and happy to get it again. It's always nice to know that someone is thinking of me-I always have a little Sally Fields moment when that happens. Also, I'd really like another shot at this award. Last time I had a lot of fun telling you quirky facts about myself (like the fact that I am afraid of birds and like cleaning doorknobs) but after I posted I felt like maybe I should have taken a more serious note with it. There is a lot about me that I haven't talked about, and maybe some of you are curious. Or maybe none of you are curious, but if it's going to be something that the kids read when they're older (and I hope it is) then I'll want them to know some serious things about me in addition to enjoying stories of their own hyjinx. So thanks Jenny and Mama for giving me a second chance!

The rules of the Honest Scrap Award go like this: List at least 10 honest things about yourself. Then, choose a minimum of 7 blogs that you find brilliant in content or design and link to them, leaving a comment to inform them they have been awarded. Here we go.........

1. I've lived on my own since I was 16 years old. I didn't do anything wrong, and my parents didn't do anything wrong-it was just a parting of ways between three people who never could fully understand each other. It was very hard at first, but in retrospect I think it was one of the greatest turning points for the better in my entire life. I certainly wouldn't be the woman I am today if I had not worked as hard as I did, and lived through as much as I did. As an adult I get along great with my parents, and though we still don't really "get" each other on a philosophical level we talk all the time and enjoy monthly family barbecues together at their house.

2. I was born with a SVT (superventricular tachycardia). Basically it means that my heart has extra electrical impulses and beats really really fast sometimes (my resting pulse is about 110bpm but has been monitored as high as 160bpm while sleeping and has gotten as high as 210bpm during an attack). It's not deadly or anything, but it does have the unfortunate side affect of giving me panic attacks (among other things). I can't really treat the panic attacks because I'd have to treat the heart thing first, which I can't take the meds for because of the side effects....and I'm not about to get possibly deadly heart surgery for a non-lethal heart problem....so yeah, truth number 2-I have panic attacks. Luckily these days I'm only having 3 or 4 tachy episodes a year.

3. I have wanted to be a mom all my life but as a kid I felt obligated to pick some kind of dream career. I was in all the honors classes, I was in the "talented and gifted" program, and people were always telling me I was going to be something great someday. I felt like people were telling me that I was too smart to be "just" a mom. That people would think I was lazy or unmotivated, or that I would somehow be setting all of woman-kind back if I didn't become a doctor or a lawyer or an engineer. Now days I don't care-even if all of that were true (which I don't think is the case) it wouldn't matter to me a bit. I love being home with my husband and my children and I know in my heart that I am doing the greatest thing I could ever wish to do.

4. I often wonder if I'm a good mother. I can't ever quite convince myself that I'm not overlooking some way that I could be a better mom-but I do my best every day to be everything the kidlets could ever want or need in a Mommy....I might not exactly know what I'm doing, but I know I love the dickens out of those babies.

5. Being at home with the kidlets is my calling. Cleaning the house is not. I am a terrible, terrible housekeeper. I don't like cleaning, and I really don't see the point in keeping a museum like house when I could be playing with the kids instead. So what if there are books and toys everywhere and hand prints on everything? So what if my house is dusty or the kids colored on the couch? Kids live here. They are happy here-and I'm happy here too. If it were not for my undying love for my neat freak Hubby I might never wash another window or vacuum under the furniture again.

6. I love cooking and baking because it reminds me of my Nana. When I was small, my Nana was the Mommy my biological mother never was. She sang songs and played games and read stories and let my sister and I do her hair and make up. She drove backwards through the Tasty Freeze drive through so my sister and I could order at the window. Most of all, she cooked and baked. She made the heartiest most delicious southern meals that any person ever made. The smell would fill up the house and hug you before you even took a bite. Nana used to let us cook with her-we'd stand on chairs and stir things and pour measuring cups, but our most important job was tasting. Well, that and licking the bowl after desserts. I love those memories, and every time I'm in the kitchen I think of her. I still miss her to this day, and I think I always will-but when I see my own little ones helping in the kitchen (including Baby Bug, who has my Nana's name) I know that I am passing all I have of her on to her great grandbabies and it is just the greatest feeling.

7. Despite being admittedly anti-social, I do have one close friend that is not a family member. I met her in high school, and she is way cooler than I am. I have so much fun hanging out with her that I think it temporarily qualifies me as a social butterfly, even though what we really have is a close friendship...because no matter how social I act, deep down, I have an issue with having 'casual' relationships. They don't feel sincere to me. The problem of course is that you can have a thousand casual relationships, but being a truly dedicated friend takes a lot of time and energy-well spent, of course. So I guess my social problem is endless dedication and loyalty to a small group of people while being hesitant to form casual friendly bonds-forget butterflies, I'm the golden retriever of socialization.

8. Okay, this is not deep or meaningful but I just said socialization, which reminds me of sociopath, which reminds me that I cannot stand Elijah Wood. That's the truth. He gives me the creeps and always has. It's something about his eyes that makes me think that he is just one hair this side of homicidal maniac...and this has been true forever. We're talking since the Radio Flyer/Searching for Bobby Fisher days, I've never been able to see him as friendly and adorable....just creepy and a kind of terrifying. I guess the meaningful thing you can take out of that is that I often make weird word associations in my brain that make me switch topics and thought processes quickly. Moving on.....

9. Doing something creative is essential to my mental and emotional well being. It doesn't matter what it is, or if I'm good at it, I just need to do something that is just creation for creation's sake. I knit and crochet and quilt and bake and paint and sketch and sing and play pretend with the kids-anything that gets my brain going in a more creative way. If I don't, I start to feel sluggish and, I don't know, gross. I think that's a lot of the reason why I blog.

10. I believe with all my heart that my husband is a direct answer to prayer. From the time I began to pray with my own words, I prayed every night with my whole being that I would meet him. My best friend, the person who would love me for who I was for the rest of my life. I prayed hard that I would meet him as soon as I could (I was a very lonely child) and I prayed and prayed and prayed that I would know him as soon as I saw him. I didn't want to be alone, but I didn't want to be with the wrong person either. Every night I prayed, and I waited every day to meet him. Then one day, in the last place I would have ever expected, I saw Hubby...and my prayers were answered exactly as I had asked them to be. I was only 16, so though it felt like an eternity I really hadn't had to wait long, and I knew the instant I saw him before we ever spoke a single word that he was The One. I felt loved and safe and right from that moment on, and we only get stronger every day. Funny thing, about two years into our relationship I told Hubby about my prayers and he just sat there and looked at me for a long time. Then he finally told me-he had prayed, all his life, for me.

There you have it-some serious Truth about me, the good the bad and the, well, you know....

Since I've already given this award away before, and it is now 2am, I'm going to give it to four people instead of 7-those people are:

Susie of Up The Hill Backwards
Kathi of My Story. My Family. My Life.
Jen of The Spoiled Housewife
Jesse of Muthering Heights