My heart is a bit heavy today. I went to the shed at the old house to find something and saw this:

Matthew’s stroller.

I spent hours picking it out and worrying over which model to get. I remember him sleeping in it when I went to a family BBQ at the park. I didn’t know what had happened to it. I wondered over the years but nobody seemed to know, either. When we were de-junking for the move, I guess someone found it in the back of the shed and moved it into sight.

I sat down on my steps and put my head in my hands and just tried to think through the moment and the craziness that has been my life the last month and a half.

I’ve been ripping out lots of things lately.

Ripping out kitchen cabinets.

Ripping out a 100-year-old chimney.


Ripping out weeds and overgrowth from neglected flower beds.

There’s been more than just ripping things apart, though.

Like choosing paint colors.

Trying not to freak out that I am painting my kitchen RED. And also trying to be brave enough to paint my living room battleship gray. (I plan on playing “In the Navy” by The Village People while I paint. It seems fitting.)

We have had TONS of help from my inlaws. (It’s seriously groovy to have a master electrician as your father-in-law when projects like, oh, RIPPING! YOUR!! WHOLE!!! HOUSE!!!! APART!!!! happens.)

Jonathan is amazingly handy as well. There is nothing he can’t seem to fix or figure out. Though, one day I WILL get a photo of him that he approves of being on the internet. Until then, this will have to do.

My family has helped a lot and my parents have been GEMS. They come over every single morning to hang out with the little butterbean for a couple of hours so I can get a few hours of sleep a day and watch him during our house projects or pitch in and help out, too.

There have been wonderful things about this remodel that are going to make it a much better house to occupy, but it has been CRAZY and horrible in many ways. Even though I know we’re doing the right things, some of the disadvantages like having NO AIR CONDITIONING rears its head and makes me downhearted about it all. I’m worn out, discouraged, physically in large amounts of pain, emotionally all over the place and trying to balance a new baby and my kids out on summer break.

I have loved my new little baby more than I can say. He brings me such joy. Having a wee one around has healed a lot of me I thought was beyond saving. But having him around has also ripped open so many wounds and memories that I thought were deeply buried and that I was protected from.

I realize that I’m not nearly as well protected as I thought.

Seeing bug’s stroller like that-all dusty and dirty and so forgotten and neglected made one more thing get ripped out…my heart.

It also made me firmly believe that sometimes?

Ignorance IS bliss.

Heather, Danielle and Susan are hosting a fabulous hair makeover giveaway by Sparrow Salon for four lucky winners during BlogHer.

I want it so much I’m almost rabid and drooling.

Here is the thing. I’ve become “That” mom. The one that lets herself go. The one that is wearing the same hair she’s had for years and years.

The one that I swore I would never be.

I am excited to go to BlogHer but I am also dreading it.

DREADING IT.

I do not feel so great about myself right now. I’m 20lbs overweight, I have no clothes that fit me, I’m usually covered in and reek of baby vomit, and I walk around looking pretty hideous most of the time.

Want proof??

Here you go:

Lovely, no?

I think that the close up is even better. I love how my eyes are even going in different directions. (I am totally awesome.)

I’m poor as hell right now. Between not having the pregnancy and delivery of our sweet little butterbean covered by insurance and moving and getting the house we’re moving back into liveable, I don’t have two nickles to rub together. For the last year it’s been Sauve hair products, I have gone to Great Clips to get a trim and the few times I’ve colored my hair, it’s been out of a box from WalMart.

It looks like crap.

Even on days when it gets “styled” it is so boring. Straight, long’ish’ layers, faded color. BORING BORING BORING. Inventive style, a great cut and good color takes money and time…things I have been woefully short on as of late.

I know I could look worse. I am grateful that I got one of the volunteer slots to pay for my conference so that I can go to BlogHer at all. I could be fatter, uglier, poorer and blah, blah, blah. I know all of that.

I just feel so unsure of myself lately. It’s a grody feeling. It would be nice to have ONE thing about my physical appearance that makes me feel pretty. Confident. Like I can walk into a room of people without someone thinking “DEAR GOD WHAT IS THAT THING?!?!!!”

Since I’m mic wrangling during sessions I will be visible to an awful lot of people and I wish I felt better about myself when so many eyes will be looking at me. I can live with having a post-baby muffin top and I’m not terribly concerned about clothes. Which is good because there is not much I can do between now and then about my weight and I doubt that there will miraculously be funds for me to get new clothes. Having non-fugly hair, though? Well, it would go a LONG way in helping me feel more at ease.

So, Heather, Danielle and Susan?

I humbly ask you to consider me for your hair makeover. I’ll still love you either way, but man…I could use some serious, serious de-skeezing in the hair department.

There’s not much I can do about the whole “Smelling like baby vomit” thing, so my apologies in advace to everyone gathering in Chicago.