Kai is now 8 years old (8.5 she reminds me) and I hate that as she gets older there are times when I cannot relate to her at all.
And for the most part I'm happy about it!

I grew up in a dysfunctional family that I often likened to Roseann growing up only more dysfunctional.
I was (still am) an only child that was raised out in the sticks by my undiagnosed (at the time) PTSD, manic depressive Mother and my dad who was just trying to cope with it all which turned into raging alcoholism. 

Bonus both of my parents are ex-military!
So I was raised where I was either alone most of the time or in the company of adults because back then it was cool to take your kid to the bar with you.
So I spent my developing years either around adults that were drinking heavily, or with my Mom who I never knew what the mood was that day, or I was alone with my cat.
Some days were great with my mom, where we would bake cakes, work in the garden if it was summer time, snuggle and watch movies together if it was cold or raining and then there were the days where I got my ass beat for looking at her funny or saying something with the wrong tone, or if there was a speck of dust somewhere that I was suppose to clean up or if I made too much noise I would get kicked out of the house with my cat to go do whatever. I would be booted outside, only allowed to come in to use the restroom or eat lunch otherwise I was outside until my dad came home from work in the evening.
If I stepped outside the line even a little she would whoop me either with her hand, a shoe or most common a switch.

When I was about 7 I went through a phase of only sleeping under my bed and I spent all my time under out dining room table with a stack of books and my stuffed animals.
I felt safe under there and I think my parents occasionally forgot I was under there.

As I got older my dad's drinking got worse and my chore list got longer as I took on the little things he was supposed to do so that my mom wouldn't come home from waitressing and lose her shit.
They fought constantly so if there was anything I could do to stop it I tried.
So by the age of 9 I was doing dishes, vacuum, dusting, taking out the garbage, doing the laundry, feeding the animals, whatever I could think of.
Which some people think is the normal amount of chores but I respectfully disagree.

I grew up in a hurry. Between being pulled into the fights and going to school, and trying to keep the peace chore wise I lost my ability to be a kid. I became a miniature adult basically.

I swore if I ever had kids I would never be anything like my parents and I'm pleased to say that I'm not like them at all.

Now that I have kids I struggle to relate to Kai since at her age I was doing so much and then she won't even put away her laundry I lose my temper and yell "I was doing 10x's that when I was your age!"
My heart stopped when she responded that she would be more like me and I immediately sat her down to tell her I didn't want that at all. I would just appreciate her doing the chores I ask of her and to play with her little sister.

I'm trying so hard for Kai to enjoy being a kid but it's so freaking hard when I'm not even sure what a normal 8 year old does.
So I'm doing the best that I can and letting her set the pace with her interests with some exceptions such as no makeup, no daisy duke shorts, no bikinis, no mini skirts.

I'd like to think that I'm not fucking up but only time will tell.
My Dad is sober going on 9 years and my Mom is finally getting the help she needs so they are involved in my daughters lives and it's nice. 

She told you what?

I know the art of the conversation and just communication in general is dying out.
I'm guilty of it as much as anyone else.
I would prefer to communicate pretty much any way other than face to face or over the phone. Over the phone is the worst for me for some reason, I would rather send out freaking carrier pigeons than talk to anyone on the phone save my mother and some days I don't want to talk to her either 😁
If I can talk to you without actually talking to you that would be fantastic, email, text, IM, Snap Chat, smoke signals I'm down.

Kai had a parent/ teacher conference the other day and she has been slacking off on turning in her homework.
Her teacher was surprised to learn that Kai had willingly told me about it even though it wasn't good news and had the potential to get her grounded.
I didn't realize kids started keeping secrets in 3rd grade O.o

We keep things very open in our house, our main rules are
1. Be Respectful to everyone and to our home. (which translates into don't be an asshole and pick up after yourself. Lola the 2 year old is still learning this but Kai gets it even though she doesn't like it some days.)

2. No Secrets ( now keeping a gift a secret is one thing but we completely open about everything else to a point. Obviously we are not going to be 100% candid with our 8 and 2 year old about our sex and sneaking quickies while they play in the other room nor are we going to divulge all the details of when we go out and have a few drinks. You have to keep things age appropriate.)

3. No Lies. (We do not tell lies. Honesty is the best policy in our house and we back it completely.)

How hard is it to talk to your kids?
Answer: Not very fucking hard. All it takes is 15 minutes of your time tops. Turn off your phone or at least put it on vibrate in your pocket, shut your laptop, let the PC go to sleep for a minute, turn off the TV and ask them How their day went. If that gets you no where try asking if anything interesting happened during their day or what they learned.

I do this with Kai almost every damn day when I pick her up from school and on the 3 block walk home I ask her these questions.
Now granted I get the run down on a ton of shit I could care less about like whether Mason wore his blue shoes or not or what color the bow in her friend Mary's hair was but I also find out about how they are learning about forced perspectives in Art and how she is learning that she likes writing songs in Music class which has prompted us to look into getting her guitar lessons. I also find out when she's being bullied by little girls that are acting way older than they should be and how I find out that her teacher is working on teaching them to be responsible and take responsibility for their actions.
She tried to blame me for her not turning her work in and her teacher would hear none of that.
She informed Kai that it was KAI'S responsibility to turn in her work not mine especially when I have Lola to chase and HB works 3rd shift.
I could not have hoped for a better teacher for Kai this year.

Putting what on your baby's butt?

Lola has been successfully cloth diapered for over 2 years now. Which is impressive since everyone thought we'd make it like 2 weeks tops.
She's in mostly pocked diapers now with the occasional disposable at night or for long car trips.
However when she was 6 months and under I used covers and flour sack towels almost exclusively. Now the flour sack towels go in her Kawaii diapers wrapped around a hemp insert.
Its the one thing I rarely hear about people using on their cloth babies even though its literally one of the cheapest options for when they are not so wiggly. I've read about people using them past 6 months and adding a insert to the fold for more absorption but I never did that.
The Flour sack towels were easy to wash, dried quickly even on the clothes line and they are HELLA CHEAP! You can get a 5 pack of them for just a couple dollars.
There a ton of folds that you can do with them and I fastened mine with a Snappi since trying to use diaper pins makes me a nervous wreck.
You can find a TON of tutorials on Pinterest (my guilty pleasure) that are so easy and then you just put a cloth diaper cover over it. And covers are a lot cheaper than even a pocket diaper.
They are so trim and cute it amazes me that more parent's don't cloth diaper. 

Just trying to raise good people.

All we've ever been concerned with is raising the girls to be good people.
Raise them to not be assholes, to help others without being asked, to stand up for those who cannot stand up for themselves.
Religion has never been a way of keeping people from being assholes.
I would know! I was raised in the Lutheran church and there were just as many assholes there as anywhere else only they seemed to think that because they went to church every Sunday their being an asshole was excused. That they could treat others badly, be nasty to them, say humiliating things to others and it was ok as long as they went and prayed to the big JC come Sunday.
So called good Christians that couldn't be bothered to help their fellow man unless there was something in it for them.

So we have been raising the girls without religion. We want them to be genuinely good people not people that are only decent because they are scared of going to Hell.

It hadn't been an issue how we were raising them until recently when one of Kai's friend's started preaching to her on the play ground about how Jesus grants wishes and since we don't go to church we're all going to Hell.
Fun kid right there.
He's on to a head start in fear mongering.
Thankfully HB was raised in the church as well but he actually was confirmed where as I wanted no part of any of that and refused to go to church unless my grandma forced me to attend with her.
So he has been able to answer all the questions but she's been so confused as to why God has any right to judge us to begin with.
But it made us think about everything.
I am pagan.
He is agnostic at best.
And Kai is asking questions about Christianity.

Do I start teaching her about being Pagan and celebrate the Solstice that is come up along with Yule or do I drag her to church so she can see what it's all about in its boring glory.

We've decided to do both. I'm going to set up my altar and get her some books. And we'll be making a trip at least to the Unitarian Universalist church in our city.
Perhaps we'll go to church with my in-laws as well. I might need to be drunk for that trip lol 

Guess who's baaack... +1!

I am finally back to my poor neglected blog after a loooong ass hiatus.
Our life has been crazy hectic! 
Its been a busy 2 years!
We've added to our clan Kai's little sister Lola-bug, we moved, HB and I both got new jobs and now I'm working on starting my own business!
We finally found all the bits and pieces to our PC since writing a blog from my Kindle was a freaking pain in the ass.
I'm so excited to get this thing rolling again and share the antics of my crazy family!

A New Chapter: Getting Our Rainbow. (exciting news!)

It took us longer then we had expected to the nerve to try again for a sibling for Kai. We focused all our energies on her, school and getting married last year. Once the wedding was over and she was settled into a routine at school we finally had time to think.
We were unsure what to do for quite a while until we had an "accident" and then started counting down to my period.
We both very surprised when I cried and he was bummed when my period showed her icky, messy head.
We sat down and had a long talk about if we were ready and weighed all the pro and cons.
We decided that we were ready to give it another shot (pun intended)
I already tracked my cycle since I can't take hormonal BC and IUD's scare the hell out of me.
Turns out we got it right one our first try!
I then proceeded to turn into a nervous, neurotic mess panicking at every twinge, rushing to the bathroom every time I feel "wet".
I think I spent more time in the bathroom in the beginning of this pregnancy then I did at the end of my pregnancy with Kai.
I chose to continue to see a midwife collective that works out of a local clinic. They don't see patients until around 10 weeks so I had a long wait to drive HB nuts.
The midwives were very understanding and did awesome putting our minds at ease.
They couldn't find the heartbeat with the dopplar at our first app so we got a surprise ultrasound and there it was! Little bean was bouncing around like crazy to where she couldn't even zero in on the heart beat that way.

Kai is so excited and keeps telling me its a sister. She won't even consider it being a boy lol
We go in April to find out the gender and get the anatomy scan done. We can't wait!
We're pretty sure its another girl but I don't care as long as its healthy :) 

We tied the Knot! (finally)

HB and I finally got married in October after being together for 6.5 years and being engaged for 2 years.
We had to postpone the wedding twice because of very sad circumstances.
First time my closest cousin passed away after a battle with cancer that spread to her kidneys. There was no way I could get married on the same day as her funeral and I wanted to be there for my aunt. Everything else could wait.
HB understood completely and we put things off till the next summer.

Summer came and as they say "When it rains, it pours" 
First HB's grandma was diagnosed with Lymphoma, then my Grandpa was diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor, then I got pregnant and had a miscarriage at 10 weeks, AND then my Grandpa passed away that September.
I was completely crushed and pretty much lost the will to do anything besides function on a very basic level to care for Kai.
So we decided once again to put the wedding off till the next year when hopefully things were better.
I don't know about anyone else but 2013 freaking sucked donkey balls.

2014 has been a much better year if a little stressful.
I was bound and determined to be a calm, zen bride and not a Bride-zilla.
I let the bridesmaids pick their dresses. Just told them what color to go with and let them go. Same with shoes and hair. I didn't want to do something that they couldn't afford or saddle them with a dress they hated.
We did get tuxes for the groomsmen because none of them seemed to own dress clothes so I made it easy on them lol

We DIY-ed everything. Except the cake and photos.
We did our own music with a program called Wedding DJ on HB's Ipad and used my stereo for the sound system. One of HB's awesome nephews manned that for us during the ceremony and then just hit shuffle for the reception.
I'll do a better review of that later on.

For decorations I carved about 12 pumpkins and had two bridesmaids paint another like 10 pumpkins.
I got 30 pumpkins in trade for a loaf of Apple Bread... Best trade EVAR.
They were placed on the tables along with some autumn leaf garland. Very minimalist but turned out gorgeous with the rustic setting.

We had a friend that was ordained online perform the ceremony for us since neither of us is religious in the slightest.
She did an amazing job using pieces from Hedwig and the Angry Inch, Rufus Wainwright, and Bill n Ted's Excellent Adventure.

My Mom and Aunt made the food for the reception.
We had spaghetti with garlic bread and Filipino spring noodles with Lumpia. Strange combination of food but everyone loved it! People are still talking to me about the food and its been a month!

We kept it lo-key and everyone had a great time.
Things we didn't do...
1. Dance. None of us are into that
2. Traditional first Dance, Parents dance, etc.
3. Garter toss. Too cold for that
4. Bouquet toss. Everyone was married or recently dumped. Didn't want to rub salt in that wound.
5. No booze. Best man surprised HB with a beer but that was it. We don't drink so why pay for everyone else to get smashed?

Somethings happened that should have made me freak out but I was able to realize those things didn't really matter in the end.
What mattered was that we got married in front of the people we loved and cared about, and the ones we really wanted there were there to celebrate with us.