Date With My Dad: The Seattle Great Wheel, Dahlia Lounge, and…A Mishap

April 29, 2013May 3, 2013Leave a comment

My dad and I have a tradition of going out for a “Daddy-Daughter Date” for my birthday. We’ve done this every year since I was a little girl, and it’s something I always look forward to. My birthday is not until June but, with our big move looming on the horizon, we decided to do our date a bit early this year before things get too crazy.

I wanted to do something Seattle-y, so we went downtown for a little adventure. We started at the Seattle Great Wheel, a giant new ferris wheel on the Seattle waterfront.

My dad had called ahead and scheduled us for the VIP treatment at the wheel. We got to go to the very front of the line where they had some nice cushy chairs–thrones, if you will– waiting for us so we didn’t have to stand while we were waiting to board. Then we got to ride in a deluxe “pod”–instead of the usual benches we got nice leather chairs with seat warmers, we had a port where we could plug in our phones for music, and we had a glass bottom on our pod so we could see below us as we lifted into the air and over the water.

We even got T-shirts and a champagne toast! The views weren’t too shabby either.

It really was a fun experience and I would definitely go back there with my tourist-friends (hint, hint–anyone want to come up for a visit?!).

After the Wheel we hailed a cab (my first time actually waving one down–can’t believe I’d never done that before!) and headed back downtown for dinner. We dined at Tom Douglas’s Dahlia Lounge and it was incredible. We had fresh baked bread from the Dahlia Bakery, Tuscan Bread Salad (probably the best salad I’ve ever eaten), and spice-rubbed pork. Delicious. Everything was just amazing. We finished off the meal with the most decadent Coconut Creme Pie, also from the Dahlia Bakery. Everything was perfect.

Until…

After dinner my dad walked me across the street to the parking garage where I’d parked my car (such a gentleman!). When we got there, however, there was something a bit strange–all of the garage doors were shut. Hmmm….

We took the elevator down to the level where my car was parked and saw that the parking attendant was still in his kiosk. Alright, I thought, they must just close the garage doors when it’s getting late so nobody else will come in to park. Well, that’s partly true. But they also close the garage doors when it’s getting late so nobody will go out.

Turns out my garage closed at 8:00 (who closes anything at 8:00???) and we were there at 8:03. And that parking attendant? He was just locking up the kiosk and in the 1 minute (literally one minute, I was parked as close to the exit as you could be parked) that it took me to get there, he was gone. Vanished. Never to be seen again.

All of the phone numbers in the parking garage took me to centralized answering stations somewhere NOT in Seattle and all they could say was, “Well, someone will be back tomorrow.” Tomorrow. Uggh.

So, long story short (OK, long story long) my helpful dad drove me all the way back home (in the opposite direction of his home, by the way). Then, at 5 AM this morning (WOOHOO!) my ever-endearing husband drove me and two sleepy children back down to Seattle to retrieve my poor, caged-up car before Dear Husband had to get to work. Lesson learned: always know when things close if you need them to be open.

It was a birthday date we will always remember–for better and worse!

How To Prepare Yourself For Parenthood In 138 Easy Steps

April 26, 2013Leave a comment

I have about a dozen friends who are currently pregnant with their first babies. That’s a lot of new babies, and a lot of people who are about to enter the hallowed role of “Parent”. There are many things that run through your mind when you’re about to become a mom or a dad: What are babies like? How do I know what the baby wants? What do I do with a baby?

Well I’m glad you were wondering, soon-to-be-parents, because I have all the answers (get used to that one, because soon enough you’ll realize that everyone else seems to think they have all the answers for how to raise your child). So, in no particular order, here are a few things you can do ahead of time to prepare yourself for parenthood.

Preparation For Labor And Delivery:

Run a marathon. Backwards. Or on your hands, for all I care. Do this while getting jabbed in the gut by a UFC cage fighter every 2-5 minutes. Repeat for 12-48 hours.
Don’t let your husband sleep for 2 or 3 days. Then, at the peak of rush hour, insist that he drive you across town in 1/4 the time that it usually takes during no-traffic. Turn up the heat in the car to 90 degrees. Yell at him the whole time he’s driving, and continuously insist that he drive faster.
Forget holding an ice cube in your hand–go to Alaska and jump into the frozen ocean. Stay in the water until you don’t think you’re going to die, and then stay in the water because you know that it’s what is best for your unborn child.
Have a sumo wrestler sit on your stomach while someone reminds you to breathe calmly.
Take off your clothes–all of them–and invite your closest family and friends over to witness you walk naked through the house while shouting obscenities.
Pee or throw-up on the floor and expect your husband to clean it up with a smile on his face while he says, “You’re doing GREAT, Honey! Keep it up!”.
Pull down your pants and sit in a pile of poison ivy or stinging nettles. Have fun trying to pee for the next couple of weeks.
Roll around on shards of broken glass while practicing your hypno-birthing mantras.

Preparation For A Newborn:

9. Set your alarm clock to go off every 2 hours around the clock. Every time the alarm goes off, get out of bed and repeatedly pinch the most tender part of your body for 30 minutes.
10. Put a cat in a paper bag. Blindfold yourself. Gently and swiftly wrap the “happy” cat in a tight swaddle.
11. Find some moldy food in the back of your fridge and smear it on your shirt. Don’t change, because you know that a clean shirt will just get dirty again.
12. Turn on your kitchen faucet to a low stream. Wrap the faucet in a towel. When that towel gets soaked in a few minutes, take it off and wrap on a new towel. Continue doing this, night and day, until you run out of towels. Then wash the towels and keep doing it.
13. Hold a 10 pound sack of flour while you do everything: get dressed, go to the bathroom, cook dinner, eat.
14. Squirt mustard on all of your favorite clothes, your carpet, and your furniture. Have fun trying to get the stains out.
15. Search iTunes for an annoying sound: nails on a chalkboard, screeching animals, or grinding metal would all work. Have your husband play the sounds any time you start to doze off to sleep.
16. Read “Goodnight Moon”. 5,468 times.
17. Forget to eat breakfast, be too busy to eat lunch, and be too tired to eat dinner.
18. Take all of your showers at 5 AM or midnight because they’re the only times that you’re free.
19. Buy an entire wardrobe of adorable clothes that are 3 sizes too small. Get frustrated that you can’t wear any of them.

Preparation For A Toddler:

20. Take all of your favorite possessions and either lock them away or break them.
21. Take a pick-up truck to Goodwill and buy out their toy section. Back the truck up to your front door and dump the toys into your living room. Don’t ever pick them up.
22. Make a big batch of spaghetti. Throw all of it onto your walls, ceiling, floors, and furniture.
23. Gather all of the items you think you would need if the world was ending and you needed to get out of town. It will be a lot of stuff. Load those items into your car every time you leave the house, and unload them every time you get back home.
24. Cover every outlet in your house with duct tape. Get annoyed every time you try to plug something in.
25. Make an important phone call with a boombox playing heavy metal music at max volume in the background.
26. Do a load of laundry. Take your clean laundry directly outside and dump it into a mud puddle. Wash it all again. Repeat 7 days a week.
27. Go to the grocery store with a pair of fighting dogs. Tie them up inside your shopping cart and calmly complete your shopping trip while ignoring the evil stares of the other shoppers.
28. Go to Costco and buy a box of Goldfish crackers, a box of Cheerios, and a bag of raisins. Dump them all out in your car, smash them into the seats, and stomp them into the carpet.
29. Wake up at 6 AM every. Single. Day.
30. Spend time away from your home exactly 1 evening per month. Return home by 9 PM because you know that you’ll have to wake up at 6 AM tomorrow.
31. Put honey on your hands and smear them over all of your windows.
32. Withdraw $400 from your bank account each month. Burn it.
33. Start drinking massive quantities of coffee each day to kick-start your caffeine-dependency.
34. Repeat the following words to yourself until they don’t phase you anymore: poop, pee, booger, snot, puke. Take it one step further by posting about these topics on Facebook.

OK, so it’s not exactly 138 steps–but it sure feels like it. Hey, nobody ever said that parenting was easy!

Haircuts: A Retrospective

April 24, 2013Leave a comment

I have a tendency to let some things go until they are absolutely driving me nuts. ‘Tis the case with David’s hair. It’s been a few months since his last trim and David’s head was starting to look like an overgrown jungle. So, it was decided: today would be haircut day.

David must have known it was haircut day because he decided to pull all of our photo albums off the shelf while I was putting Jacob down for his morning snooze. As we were looking at some of the old photos I came across these gems from David’s very first haircut, a year ago almost to the day.

Here he is before his first cut:

And after:

I couldn’t help but notice how little he looks in these photos! Which is funny, because when it was actually happening I thought he was so big. Here he was–my BABY–getting his very first big boy haircut. I remember thinking how old and grown up he looked after the haircut…and I remember being a little bit sad that he was already growing up (OK, I’m still a little bit sad that he’s growing up).

And then there was today. We usually do David’s haircuts at home now, but we decided to splurge and take him back to the same place where he got his first haircut. But things were a little different this time. He sat still (quite the improvement!), he held a conversation with his stylist, and he came out looking even bigger than after that first fateful cut.

I know that some day in the not-too-distant future I will look back at these photos and think about how little he looked. But, at least for today, he seems so big to me.

To my handsome boy David: I hope you continue to change and to grow and to become your own person. As long as a little part of you still wants to be my baby.

Lessons From A Garbage Can

April 22, 2013Leave a comment

This is a garbage can.

It looks like an ordinary, run-of-the-mill garbage can, and it is…and it isn’t. You see, this garbage can has become a bit of an extension of our family. We spend time with it, we care for it and it has taught us many things. This all sounds a bit strange, so let me explain.

Several months ago at church we heard a sermon that challenged us to fix the problems that we found. The message was basically that if you see a problem and it is bothering you, then maybe you should be the one to help find a solution. After all, if it’s bothering you that much then it’s probably something that’s already near and dear to your heart.

The first problem that came to mind when I was listening to the sermon was our park. We have a wonderful neighborhood park across the street from our house that is well-loved and much-used by kids from the surrounding area. There is a playground and a basketball court in the park, so we spend many, many hours there–rain or shine. I know all of the kids who play there and they all know us. I spend so much time there that I feel like it’s “my” park.

You can imagine my annoyance, then, when I would get to the park each morning to find piles of trash lining the basketball court and littering the fields. How dare these kids come to my park and leave such a mess? Who was going to clean this up? And that’s when it hit me: I was annoyed by this problem because I needed to be the one to fix it.

We had an extra-large garbage can from when we were doing some home improvement projects and I got permission from our homeowner’s association to chain it to one of the hoops in the park. Then we went to work.

I started by gathering together all of the kids who frequent the park and showing them the garbage can and how to use it (I didn’t want to leave it up to chance that they’d actually know how to put their trash in the can). Then I had them all help me tidy up the park. I told them we were going to have a race to see who could get the most pieces of trash in the garbage can in 5 minutes–they all won! (wink, wink).

It’s been about 6 months now since we first put the garbage can in our park. David and I still go to the park almost every day, but now the first thing we do when we get there is collect litter to put in the garbage can. David has taken ownership of the park that he uses so frequently and he enjoys lending a helping hand.

I explain to David that when we pick up litter we are helping the environment and helping to keep our park safe and clean for everyone. More importantly, though, David is learning that he can solve problems. He can do his own little part to be Jesus’ hands and feet in a world that is full of problems. And, some day, he will find his own problems–and instead of running away from them he will fix them.

Reasons My Kid Is Crying

April 19, 2013April 19, 20134 Comments

Last week my sister-in-law sent us a link to this blog called “Reasons My Son Is Crying”. It’s pretty stinking hilarious. Basically, the boys’ parents just post photos of the ridiculous things that their toddler is crying over. It’s really funny but, the reality is, any parent of a 2- or 3-year old knows that life with a toddler is just a series of tantrums, almost-tantrums, and just-got-over-tantrums.

Since David throws a fit about once an hour, I thought it would be pretty easy for me to do my own post on the ridiculous reasons my kid is crying. Turns out, I was able to snap all of these photos in just a few days–piece of cake. And, since it’s a lot more fun to laugh at a crying kid than to join him, here are are the reasons why my kid was crying this week:

He wants the net on his basketball hoop to be “tangled”.

He wants the string off his balloon.

He doesn’t want me to sing Jesus Loves Me.

He wants me to put the basketball hoop in the other room.

He doesn’t want his basketball hoop in the other room.

He wants to throw his brother’s toys outside to the dog.

He wants to sit on his bed (note that he is sitting on his bed).

His basketball hoop doesn’t fit inside a box.

Daddy tried to say “Hi” to him.

And, last but not least…

The dog won’t sit for him.

It’s tough being a toddler, but somebody’s got to do it. Thanks for humoring us, David!

Modeling At Zulily

April 16, 2013April 19, 20135 Comments

Yesterday we went down to the Zulily headquarters in Seattle for a fun little photo shoot. Zulily is an online daily deal site that sells items for moms, kids and home. I love the website and shop there frequently, so I was excited to learn that they are actually based right here in the Emerald City. I have several friends whose kids have modeled on the site so I decided to look into it. Turns out, all you have to do is sign up on their website and if they need models in your kids’ size they’ll contact you to come in for a photo shoot. The models get “paid” in juice boxes, toys, copies of their professional photos, and gift certificates to the Zulily website.

This is the second time we’ve gone down to Zulily for photos. David actually had a lot of fun last time and has been talking about it ever since we went a couple of months ago. So, when they asked us to come back again this week, we were happy to return.

We brought along my friend Diana for moral support and extra hands. Since Zulily is literally across the street from Starbucks headquarters we thought it would be fitting to pick up some coffee and cocoa before our photo shoot.

When we got to Zulily we had a few minutes before our stylist (yes, even my baby was assigned his own stylist) was ready to bring us on set. They have a pretty sweet playroom for the model-kids to hang out in while they’re waiting:

Then it was time for “lights, camera, SMILE!”. They ended up doing separate photo shoots for David and Jacob this time. I had to stay with Jacob, so Diana went along with David to help him.

Jacob got to baby-model a baby sling. Here he is posing oh-so-sweetly with his model-mama and his patient photographer:

I didn’t get to see any of David’s shoot because I was in a separate studio with Jacob this time. Since I don’t have any photos of David from this week, here’s a little peek back to his shoot from the last time we went to Zulily:

So dapper! If you want to see the boys’ photos “live” on the Zulily website, head on over there today (Tuesday) to see David (he’s modeling “Candyland” kids apparel) and Wednesday to see Jacob (he’ll be modeling for “Slinglings” baby carriers). I have to say, I think they’re the cutest little models I ever have seen!

Ridiculous Reasons My Kid Is Crying

April 15, 2013April 24, 20132 Comments

Thai Lettuce Wrap Recipe and This Week’s Menu

April 15, 20133 Comments

Now that we are officially in “imminent-moving mode” I have to start eating all of the food I have stock-piled in my pantry and freezer. I am, admittedly, a bit of a food hoarder. I love having well-stocked shelves and ready-to-heat meals in my freezer to make weeknight cooking easier. The only problem with this, however, is that if you have to, say, do something like move half-way around the world, there is a lot of eating that has to be done. And that’s exactly what we’ll be doing. For the next month or two until we leave I am going to be planning most of our meals around food that is in our pantry and/or freezer. Here’s what I’ve come up with for this week:

Thai Lettuce Wraps (recipe below) with Spring Rolls
Ricotta and Basil Stuffed Pasta Shells With Marinara
Sloppy Joe’s
Panang Curry with Potstickers
Grilled Salmon
Tamales with Black Beans and Rice

Below is my recipe for Thai Lettuce Wraps. I’ll be using ground turkey from my freezer and a few sauces from my fridge (we have a LOT of condiments to get through!). I like serving this family-style at the table so everyone can make as many Lettuce Wraps as they like.

Thai Lettuce Wraps:
1 pound ground turkey
1 Tablespoon oil
2 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
2 teaspoons fresh ginger, peeled and minced
1-2 Tablespoons Teriyaki Sauce
1 Tablespoon Soy Sauce
1 teaspoon Siracha hot sauce (leave this out if you want it mild, add more if you like it spicy)
1 Tablespoon fresh, chopped cilantro
1 carrot, peeled and julienned or shredded
1 head butter lettuce (use Romaine if you can’t find butter lettuce), leaves separated

Separate lettuce leaves, rise and dry. Set lettuce leaves aside. Saute the garlic, ginger and oil over medium heat for about 2 minutes (don’t let the garlic turn brown). Add the ground turkey and brown the meat. Drain the juices from the browned ground turkey. Add the teriyaki sauce, soy sauce and Siracha to the ground turkey and heat over low heat–taste for seasoning and add more sauce if necessary. Remove meat from heat. Top a lettuce leaf with a spoonful of the meat mixture, cilantro and carrots (think of this as a lettuce taco). Eat and enjoy!

My California Adventure

April 12, 2013April 24, 20132 Comments

Last week I had an incredible adventure: my first solo-trip with both boys. We flew down to California for a week to visit family and some dear friends. It was both challenging (Just try spending a week sharing a tiny bedroom with a teething 8-month old and a rambunctious 2 year old. I dare you.) and incredibly touching. I got to see two friends with whom I’ve shared some of the biggest milestones in my life (even though we now live in 3 separate states), and I got to spend a whole week with my lovely sister and her family. In the middle of our trip we got word that we will officially be moving half-way around the world to Ireland in the next month or two. It was a beautiful, crazy week. Here are some of the highlights:

We got to fly on an airplane. Both boys have been on planes before, but this was their first time flying together (and my first time flying alone with both of them). God must have heard my prayers because I was able to get a whole row to myself on both of our flights–even though the plane was supposed to be completely full. It was great to have an extra seat for Jacob so I could bring on his carseat and allow him to snooze a bit. David had fun eating sugary snacks that he doesn’t usually get to have (including a giant ring pop that took him almost an hour to consume), watching videos on my iPhone, throwing stickers at other passengers, and smiling at the cute flight attendant who brought him apple juice. Overall, the flights went really well and I think I could totally do it again.

We went directly from the airport in Burbank to Ventura so we could meet up with my friends, Tammy and Krista, and their families. We all met a few years ago at our church and coincidentally all had our first sons within a few weeks of each other. Then, two years later, we all had our second sons within a couple of months of each other. Tammy now lives in Fargo, Krista now lives in Central California, and I live in Seattle. This was the first time that we all got to see each other with our youngest babies–it really was a dream come true for me!

We spent the afternoon in Ventura picnicking, playing on the beach, and catching up.

Even the babies had fun playing in the sun!

After our beach time in Ventrua we headed back to my sister Erin’s house to unpack and get settled. That night we got a really special treat: my nephew Noah was having an art show at his preschool and we were invited! Here’s Noah showing us snail art in his classroom–the teacher put drops of food coloring on paper, then put snails on top of the paper. As they slid around the paper, they dragged the food coloring around to make a beautiful picture. I can see practical applications for this technique in Washington using slugs from my garden.

The next day we met up with Tammy and Krista again, this time in Santa Barbara. We went to the Santa Barbara Mission and spent the morning exploring their beautiful gardens.

David learned not to hug a cactus.

He also learned that good friends can help you feel better.

After we exhausted the boys’ patience looking at beautiful gardens and fascinating old relics at the mission, we went into town for some lunch and exploring. We ate lunch at Taqueria Super Rica (be sure to check it out if you’re ever in Santa Barbara) and walked around State Street looking at the shops. We also visited the courthouse (the rooftop has a wonderful observation deck) and found a fun park for the kids to burn off some energy in.

Jacob and Calvin got to play in the swings. They both loved it! David spent about an hour (really) putting wood chips into a life-size plastic shark’s mouth. Then we snapped one last photo of us with our “6-pack” of boys:

It was a magical two days with dear friends, a time I will treasure forever!

The rest of our week was spent with my sister, Erin, her husband, Toph (OK, his name is really Christopher, but we all call him Toph because my other sister–Erin’s twin–married another Christopher and it just all gets too confusing), and her 3 1/2 year old son Noah.

David and Noah are buddies, and they got along great all week (despite a few spats over balls that David was, unexpectedly, quite possessive over). Here they are walking to “Bucky Park”, a neighborhood park down the street from Noah’s house.

On Saturday we went to Leo Carillo Beach. It’s a quiet little beach near Malibu with private coves that you can set up your “camp” in, tide pools for exploring, and gentle surf for playing. It’s the same beach where Erin and Toph got married 4 years ago, so it was fun for me to go back there and re-live that beautiful day.

Jacob had fun playing in the sand and watching the “big boys” run around like wild banshees.

David and Noah (with a little help from Uncle Toph) built a “big hole”. This hole kept David occupied for two hours. He jumped in the hole, sat in the hole, put balls in the hole, buried his feet in the hole–he really would have stayed there for the rest of his life if I would have let him.

Unfortunately, Erin had to work on Saturday so she didn’t get to come to the beach with us. But that afternoon she got some snuggle time with her youngest nephew, and I think that helped make up for it a bit.

On Sunday we went to Griffith Park in Los Angeles. I’d never been there before but, man, that place is HUGE! We started the morning at the Griffith Park Observatory. If you look very closely at the hill behind me you can see the white “Hollywood” sign in the distance.

We thought it would be fun to take the boys to the planetarium show at the observatory.

Don’t let this photo fool you. The planetarium show was NOT fun. The show was great. I would have loved it. But the experience was….well, just look at who we brought with us. Not the crowd who enjoys sitting through long scientific talks in the dark. It was stressful, aggravating and, at times, physically painful. We’ll just leave it at that. Lesson learned: don’t bring 3 kids under the age of 4 to a planetarium show.

After the planetarium experience we decided we needed to go somewhere a bit more low key. We ate a picnic lunch then drove around to the other side of Griffith Park to a place called Transportation Town. It’s set up like a big train yard, complete with train tracks and lots of old trains for the kids to climb around in.

David and Noah got to “drive” a train (although, David’s favorite part was throwing pebbles into the coal chute: “Goal!”).

And I just love this picture because it looks like our children are about to get run over by trains. (Don’t worry, Grandma Doreen, none of the trains can actually move).

The next day, Monday, was Erin’s day off work. We decided to take the boys to one of my favorite places, the Santa Barbara Zoo. This zoo is great for young kids: it’s easily walk-able, you get really close to the animals, and they have a great play area for the little ones. Plus, the giraffes have a view of the Pacific Ocean. I would love to be a giraffe at the Santa Barbara Zoo.

Here we are by the elephants (you can barely see one to the left of David).

And here are David and Noah “sledding” down an astro-turf hill on sheets of cardboard. It’s actually a LOT of fun!

We saw some interesting creatures at the zoo, including this tiny hatchling.

On Tuesday we went to one of my other favorite California attractions, Noah’s farm (really, it’s called Underwood Farms and it’s just about the most amazing place ever. I would perhaps move to California just so I could live next to this farm).

We got to feed the animals. These are chickens and ROOSTERS!!! (David’s favorite), but they also had pigs, goats, Emu, cows, and horses that you could feed.

We took a wagon ride out to the fields where we had…

SNACK TIME! We helped ourselves to the farm’s bounty (I mean, we were U-picking produce to purchase when we exited the farm). There were so many wonderful fruits and veggies ready for the picking: strawberries, oranges, sugar snap peas, carrots, heads of lettuce bigger than David. After we all had our fill, we headed back to the animals for a little while.

David and Noah got to ride ponies. You may be able to tell by his expression: David was in heaven.

After a busy day at the farm we drove into town for some nourishment. And, when you’re in California, that means In-N-Out. When we lived in Palo Alto I used to go to In-N-Out about once a week (terrible, I know, but if you’ve ever had it then you know why). David actually ate a whole cheeseburger–I think all that rooster-feeding and pony-riding worked up quite the appetite.

And, just like that, our trip was over. We had an uneventful flight back home and then we all crashed for a 4-hour nap as soon as we got back to our house. Thank you to Erin and Toph for putting up with my crazy lot for a whole week, and thank you, California, for never disappointing.

Guest Post: Making It Through Cancer and New Motherhood

April 12, 2013April 12, 2013Leave a comment

Today I am excited to welcome my first guest writer to my blog! Heather has an incredible story of strength, survival, and the power of a mother’s love. When her daughter, Lily, was only 3 1/2 months old Heather was diagnosed with a type of cancer called Mesothelioma. This type of cancer is deadly–it has only a 5% survival rate–but, sadly, it is 100% preventable. Now, 7 years later, Heather has beaten the asbestos disease and is a poster child for hope after Mesothelioma. If you would like to learn more about Heather, you can read her blog here. And, with no further ado, here is Heather’s story:

Not too many adults can believe it when my daughter proudly exclaims that she saved me from cancer over seven years ago. She says it in such a matter-of-fact way that you can’t help but to question how that’s possible. However, it’s the truth. I was diagnosed with malignant pleural mesothelioma. Some people don’t understand what kind of effect a child can truly have on someone going through cancer, but for me, Lily was my saving grace.

My husband Cameron and I waited about seven years before deciding that we ready for kids. It was the first time that we really gave it a lot of thought. I knew that it was the right moment to start. Once we made the decision, I was pregnant and in the midst of craving heaven. There were a lot of emotions that ran through me as a newly pregnant mother, but what I really wondered was what kind of mother I was going to be. I didn’t know how I was going to treat all kinds of situations that may come up during my kid’s life, but I just knew that as long as I was a good mom, then I could handle whatever came our way. I had so many dreams as all moms do about their kids and what kinds of things that life would bring. I never expected it to go the way that it did after Lily was born.

My pregnancy was smooth besides the delivery. On that day, the doctor told me that I had a breech baby and needed an emergency C-section. That moment was terrifying, but soon after, Lily was in my arms, just as beautiful as ever. I knew that I would do anything to protect this wonderful bundle of joy. It was the happiest moment of my life, and that must be why the news hit so hard a few months later when I realized that my body was not as healthy as I thought.

After my pregnancy, things started to get really strange for my body. I was tired all the time. I was losing a lot of weight every week. I went in for testing to figure out what was wrong. Three days before Thanksgiving, I went to the doctor’s office with Cameron. He has such an amazing heart and strength. This was a moment that really tested me as a human being and wife. The doctor told me that I had mesothelioma, and that I only had 15 months to live without treatment. I sat there in total shock, going over everything in my mind as he continued to talk about treatment. Cameron looked to me for help but I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know what treatment to pick. Cameron knew that there was only one option to save my life. We had to see a mesothelioma specialist in Boston who had a high success rate.

I knew that the road was going to be long and hard to recovery. In those first few months, I spent doting on Lily as much as I could, preparing for major surgery and what would come after: chemotherapy and radiation. During those months, I wasn’t going to be able to see Lily at all. I went in for major surgery to remove my lung and parts of my chest, diaphragm and heart. I was in the hospital for 18 days. It was such a difficult time in my life. The dreams that I had of being this healthy mom running and playing with my daughter looked so far off and away that it was hard to think of what was coming. However, I kept my strength and I held hope that the clouds were going to break.

Two months after being out of the hospital, I started chemotherapy and radiation. It was a rigorous and terrible process. I knew that it was trying to save my life, but I couldn’t help but feel that I was dying anyway. It was a very dark time. The only thing that kept me alive I truly feel was the thought of Lily. I wasn’t done yet. I had so many things to do in her life, and if I could just hold on, I knew that I could beat mesothelioma and the treatment that came with it.

Well, I did. I beat a cancer that takes 95 percent of the people that it infects. I’m here seven years later because of Lily. We did pick an amazing time to have a baby, just in time, in fact. Without Lily, I don’t know what the treatment process would have been like. Of course, my husband and family were there for me, but it was those feelings of being a mother and holding Lily in my arms that I knew I was going to make it.

We Love, Teach, Grow

My journey through motherhood

Month: April 2013