One Sweet Day

Not that we're keeping score, but today is the 10th anniversary of my first Valentine's Day with Lovey Loverpants in which he was confused by my verbiage and thought that when I said, "We are going out to dinner," I meant with him and not my roommates. This misunderstanding meant he drove 7 hours to my apartment in DC and was dressed in a BOWTIE awaiting my arrival so that we could go out to dinner.  Only, shoooooot!  I had just eaten!  With my roommates.  Don't you remember? So I ordered him a pizza and together we enjoyed it, he eating it, and me enjoying him in a bowtie.

To let the circle go unbroken, we celebrated tonight with a similar circular-shaped pie, only with Baby Girl (and, by extension, Wee En Utero Baby).  We all ate together this year, though, and that was sweet indeed.

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Prior to that, though, there were CHOCOLATE BUFFETS to orchestrate, and this was perhaps one of my proudest feats in the kitchen to date.  I hosted a little Mary Kay showing of our new products (and still have a few gift bags and one of these gift boxes left if you are in the market, I'll send it your way with free shipping). To sweeten the deal, I offered my guests a self-guided tour of chocolate.  Somehow we all managed to find our way....

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Chocolate Pretzel Tart

Homemade strawberry marshmallows

Made with help from Baby Girl

The world's largest shmallow

A glimpse of the buffet:

A few valentines made by Baby Girl and a gluestick:

A few of my sweethearts

Homesteading

Thanks to each and everyone of you who pinged me with your thoughts on geographic relocation. I appreciate your thoughtful comments and e-mails so much. Many of you mentioned that the goods of being close to your parents outweighed the bads, and that encourages me. I also appreciated the wisdom that relationships are ever-evolving... The part of this decision that is weighing heavily on me is something that many people would probably say we should have seen coming. I married outside of both my race and the religion in which I was raised. I married into a culture that is different from mine in nearly every noticeable way. I left the church that my entire family is a part of to take on a new denomination and with it a whole set of lifestyle changes. This decision or set of decisions affects every holiday, every family visit, and myriad conversations Loverpants and I have with our family. I oftentimes find myself envying friends who don't seem to have all these wrinkles to iron out with their parents, who don't need to translate or try to find the equivalent of an aphorism in English with a comparable one in Korean.

But we've all got our bag of nails, don't we? We've all got so much in our family dynamics that require nailing down and which still becomes rusty or unhinged.

One more thought before I close this chapter on the Hypothetical Move -- I don't want to start over. I don't want to have to find out when and where the story hours are and which parents are the ones that freak when you try to share your non-organic bunny cookies with their kid. I don't want to move from my neighborhood where my kid hears 3 different languages spoken on a 10 minute walk to the train. I don't want to be suburban bound. I don't want to be offered a salary below $25K and accept that that is the going rate in other parts of the country for a full-time candidate with a master's. I don't want to move. I want to stay here!

But that's just Kendra thinking about what Kendra wants. What does Baby Girl want? And Loverpants? I'll have to let them weigh in here sometime...

*** A few snaps from our trip to Frankenmuth, MI (sniff sniff! family time!):

I can honestly say that I am now as big as a house. A gingerbread house.

And look at these cuties all dolled up for the Christmassy sabbath!

Visiting our friends Aimee and Aileen in Detroit...

And notice how Curious George still makes it into every family photo?

Overdone

Jingle Bells!Something smells! Toddler barfing all the way!

Hey! And happy holidays, loveys. Were yours as festive and positively overblown as were ours? We drove through the night from Beantown to Motown, awe yeah, all fourteen hours to Detroit about 10 days ago. Saw Lovey's family. Then headed to Cleveland to see my homeslices. Then we continued the marathon theme of pushing all reasonable limits on carb-loading and shopping and napping and playing the "Little People's" Christmas album until we made ourselves sick with it all. And then we drove back last night. Baby Girl basically marked the passing of every state line with a memorial vomit. Poor kid was upchucking her way back home, and while you are busy composing your comment on this blog about What Kind of Parent persists in driving home while her kid is ralphing all over the back seat -- let it be known. We would have stopped at a hotel room and made her do a kegstand of Pedialyte, but then none of us would have slept and we would be none the closer to home. Whereas by 6 a.m. we were snug in our barf-laden pajamas all nestled in our beds, visions of sugarplums dancing in our heads. HURRAH!

It's clear, though, that Baby Girl's projectile pukes were a sign that we had all royally overdone it this year. The visits, the cookies, the presents, the planning of my 15 year grade school reunion? Yeah, it's totally what the midwife ordered for a 5 month preggo mcbeggo with a toddler. Highly advisable.

So the only resolution Lovey Loverpants and I can devise is one of the following: 1.) Relocate to Somewhere Closer to Family 2.) Relocate Our Family Closer to Us 3.) Forget Our Family; they are a costly, geographically undesirable lot. Stay tuned for more in 2010 as to which course of action the Loverpants decides...

And in the meantime, enjoy the sights and sounds of Holidaze 2009!

Baby Girl having an awesome time with her granny at Java Jungle

About to clear the little ginger kid who was smart enough to stand at the end of the turbo-slide:

The gift box that smacks of clothing within: To open or not to open.... My auntie MJ and I admire the festive banquet table set by my gifted stepmum Grade School Reunion. Yes, my nametag does say: "Hello, my name is: Most Likely to Become a Supermodel"