a blended life

The produce guy at the store said to me "If we didn't have Mondays, Tuesday would be a horrible day." I guess we have to have one rough day a week, right? I'm a little blue today, so I thought I'd write about something that made me happy-our most recent trip to Logan to celebrate Sam's birthday. We left Saturday morning and our first stop was the Riley house. Trisha has been my friend since I first moved to Logan 8 years ago, when we were both childless and still newlyweds. She introduced me to Harry Potter (I don't think she knows that!) so I hold her in high esteem. Here's Dahlia, her one month old baby girl, sleeping on my lap. And then waking up... We headed to the Walker house to spend some time with Sam. He turned 9 yesterday! We ate a Golden Corral, so here's Sam lovin' it: Leah hiding under the table. She had to go #2 and is scared of public toilets (because they're loud). She said "Don't worry mom. I pushed it back in....

I've started so many new posts that I haven't put on this blog this past few weeks and I've finally realized why-I'm having a hard time balancing being very superficial about my life with "TMI, dude." In other words, I want to be open about what's going on and how we're really doing, but I know that can make people uncomfortable. It's also not in my nature to sugar coat reality or pussyfoot around issues (and I know some of you just LOVE that about me!). Here's the thing about being separated as opposed to divorced or married: no one knows what the rules are. When you are married, you spend the holidays together. When you are divorced, you don't. What do you do if you're separated, you have kids and your spouse doesn't have family in the area? And you are tyring to orchestrate a holiday without awkwardness? I finally came to the solution- lower your expectations. Not every Christmas can be The Best Ever, right? So the schedule looke...