September 10th

Hank

In early November, Husband and I moved into our new house.

It has been busy, busy, busy since then. We have fixed a gas pipe and regular water pipes, cleaned hinges and found cabinets not being held up by hinges at all. We have primed and painted the pantry, the kitchen cabinets, the hallway, bathroom cabinets, and our massive hall cabinets and drawers. We have applied contact paper and fixed toilets and kitchen faucets. Husband and his friend used a metal lath to make a male-male faucet screw so that we could use the faucet neck that I picked out without realizing that there was a difference in how they were made. We have mowed the lawn, whacked the weeds, laid the insulation (okay, Husband did most of that). We have created a cleaning cabinet, created a dryer vent, replaced the shower heads and unplugged about six million drains.

It has been alot of work. And then we had cats. Cats who needed shots, who needed to be fixed, who needed some dental care and regular baths. Cats who shed their fur in clumps all over the house, all over the couch, all over the kitchen, all over my bed. Cats who jumped at the first light in the window in the morning and landed on my head. Cats who turned over for a belly rub as soon as I woke up and then scratched at my heel if I passed them by. Cats who laid in my laundry basket and my clean laundry, in my drawers and in my closet.

It was an incredible amount of work. And then, last week, we added a puppy.

Stress Stress Stress

This whole home-buying thing is very nerve-wracking. Everything feels within grasp...and then, it does not. I am looking forward to it all being settled and over. Hopefully, that includes us being moved in.

Totally Fucking Awesome

Please cross your fingers that at the end of 45 days, we will be broke as jugs. ACK!

First Comes Love

Then comes marriage.

Then comes trooping down to the real estate agent's office
To make an offer on a home. Not a house. A home.

Luckily They Held Their Peace

So the Resemblance Isn't a Fluke After All

On Friday night, Fiance came home from work with that look of a self-proclaimed genius. The talk that followed began well enough ("Sweetie, I was talking to Coworker and...") and went downhill from there. Apparently, when Coworker got married in December he only paid a fraction of the typical cost for invitations. Fiance was sold before their conversation was finished. Running the idea by me was really just a courtesy; we both knew I had no say in the matter.

Then he dropped the big "BUT" into our discussion. You know the one I'm talking about. I would love to go out to dinner with you tonight BUT I promised my goldfish a backrub. You look good BUT you've also got a booger hanging from your nose. Yes, that is the "BUT" I mean. In this case it went something like: "This guy makes amazing invitations BUT his English isn't that spectacular. He speaks Vietnamese." I'll admit that I wasn't stoked about ordering my wedding invitations from someone whose command of the English language wasn't commendable. So Fiance volunteered Coworker, who is Vietnamese, to translate should we need any help whatsoever.

Saturday morning, we visited the reception site with my parents and had breakfast together. Of course I had to tell them the story of how Fiance had dropped the InvitationManDoesn'tSpeakAFreakingWordOfEnglishDamnit bomb. My mother looked across the table and shook her head at Fiance. "You went about that whole thing wrong," she started out. "What you should have done is told her you'd heard about someone who sold reputable good-quality invitations for a reasonable price and potentially spoke French. She would have gone for that." And of course, Fiance and I both knew from that very moment that there was no denying she had given birth to me.

On the TREK to Marital Bliss

It didn't take Fiance and I long to decide we wanted a short engagement. What we did want was a date that worked best not only for us but for the rest of our world. We picked the last Saturday in July, a date that came before my sister's international departure and after the month my grandmother requested I never wed (apparently June in southern California is not a godsend). It honestly seemed like the perfect date. And then this classy conversation happened...

- We haven't set anything in stone yet, but we're considering July 28th.
- Wow, that's really soon! Are you pregnant?
- No! We just didn't want a long engagement. That's all.
- Oh come on, you may as well tell me if it's a shotgun wedding.
- It isn't. And what's that supposed to mean?
- Well, you'll be showing by the time you say your vows so don't you think it'll be obvious then?
- Seriously, I. Am. NOT. Pregnant.
- Really?
- Yes.
- Then why are you getting married so soon?

I can see right now that with family like this: 1) I don't need enemies, and 2) the next four months are going to be the longest of my life. I would have shared the other conversational jewel that was passed our way upon revealing the wedding date, but I feel it may offend the people who said it if I ever posted their qualms online and belittled them. But I will give you what my father said when he heard what they wanted me to schedule a wedding around: "Oh, and I'll be washing the dogs on the second weekend in July so if you could do me a favor and make sure not to have a wedding then."

Yes, as Linda so wisely put it, the adventure has begun!

Four Little Words and One Big Answer

In a very small corner of the world on Friday night, one man proposed to one woman.

And she said yes!

The Fiftieth Day of the Year

Several months ago, Boyfriend and I visited his Sister. The conversation somehow drifted into my love of literature and the next thing I knew, the evening was over and I was borrowing a "very quick read." Thirty pages into it, I decided that it wasn't a particularly quick read after all. Despite the enthusiasm for the tale that Boyfriend's Sister and her husband had shown, I just couldn't stomach Sleeping Beauty being presented in an erotic light. His sister, Boyfriend and I decided, loves her some smut. And that's what we call it now: The Smut, with capital letters.

Then, sometime during the first week of February, an invitation arrived for me in the mail. It was yellow and green and announced a baby shower the night of February 10th in honor of Boyfriend's Sister and her pending bundle of joy. And let me tell you right here and right now that Boyfriend and I absolutely racked our brains trying to decide on a gift. Boyfriend's Sister already has a daughter - a beautiful little 34 monther with a head full of curls - so it seemed to us that she and her husband had everything they could possibly need.

Exciting as we are, and in light of having seen their daughter's closet stuffed to the gills with unworn outfits, Boyfriend and I settled on buying Diaper Genie bags and some Playtex bottle liners for the shower.

Despite our triumph finding the right sizes for both bags and liners, however, purchasing a bunch of boring consumables just didn't seem right for a baby shower. So the next day, I stopped by a local bookstore on the way to work and bought the next two books in the erotic Sleeping Beauty trilogy. And ever since the baby shower, Boyfriend and I have casually wondered whether or not his sister is spending her maternity leave entrenched in erotic literature.

Sunday night, Boyfriend and I had dinner at his sister's place. We arrived just shy of 6pm and asked her how she was doing. At 38-39 weeks preggers, she was tired and uncomfortable and her back hurt and she had a sweet tooth. After dinner, we left and arrived home just shy of midnight. An hour and a half later, Boyfriend's sister was en route to the hospital. Then, at 4:26am on Monday morning at 7 pounds and .07 ounces, her little miracle was born.

I guess that answers our question; we think Boyfriend's Sister may be a little too busy now to read any of The Smut she loves =)

Keepin' That Cat in the Bag

Within the past six months, Boyfriend and I have spent a considerable amount of time discussing our future. In fact, these conversations are what spurred the very creation of this blog. One day, we realized that we would want to preserve aspects of our pre-married life together for our progeny to view down the road. A friend of mine once told me that one of the most enlightening experiences in her life was when she had the opportunity to read the love letters that each of her grandparents had saved in a chest at the end of their bed. Not only had she been given a glimpse into their adult lives, but she had seen some of their childhood and some of their pre-family memories and some of what had made them the grandparents she had known and loved. Boyfriend and I want to be able to give that gift to our children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren one day. We want to show them that we were lovers as well as friends, children as well as (someday) parents, individuals as well as a couple.

Clearly, the development of this blog as a fulfillment of its original intention leaves something to be desired. It's, er, a work in progress.

What Boyfriend and I didn't count on when this blog was started was the sheer amount of Nothing that was going on in our lives. Lately, however, that seems to be changing. Sadly, I have been sworn to secrecy about this fact for the next four to six weeks. So expect some big news around then =) In the meantime, I'm sorry if my blogging continues to be very sparse. It's just that so much of our current lives revolve around this secret that it's difficult to mention any part of our lives without including this new dynamic.