It's been a rough couple of months in our house. I try not to linger on this stuff but I feel like I need to get some of it "out there" in order to get it off my chest.
In order:
-A horrible sinus infection / ear infection
-An awful reaction to my antibiotic
-A trip to the ER
-3 trips to the doctor over a 2-week time span
-A week without J & Mary (they went on vacation)
-A car wreck -- not my fault, but it's no consolation because it's turning into a bigger headache than the one I had for the 4 days after the accident.
So instead of lingering too long on the negative, I'm going to try to accentuate the positive:
-A two-year anniversary, that allowed me to give J the "big secret" surprise I'd been waiting to give him for MONTHS...officially the first surprise I've ever pulled off with him. Painting with Cita the elephant at the zoo. I think this picture will always make me smile. Mostly because you can see that he's grinning like a 6-year-old. (It's worth mentioning that Cita is a movie star. She was in PeeWee's Big Adventure and The Color Purple. That's a pretty diverse resume.)
-I missed out on most of beach week this year because I was so sick. But J was a trooper and took both dogs the night the fam just hung around on the sand to relax and watch fireworks. He brought me back this picture, which makes me smile equally as hard. Pictured in the green (guess J and his pops both enjoy green tees?) is my future father in law and his future granddog in law watching fireworks on the beach together. Love it.
-As mentioned earlier, our household was split in two for a week, as J and Mary headed back to Tennessee for a week of outdoorsiness. Because I changed jobs in August, I couldn't take that much time off to go (which turned out to be ironic because I was home sick that whole week???). He came back with a beard, a smile, and one stinky dog. But no ticks, oh, and this picture. I call it "Mary of the Valley" and this is where her heart lives.
-And my prides and joys. My ready-made collection of antique Mason jars. I have had them for a few months now, but here's a picture before I washed them. You can kind of see it on one of them, but a few of them have remnants of old jam labels on them. From the kitchen of Ruth. Blackberry jam. Boysenberry jam. My favorite says "Grape jelly -- ???" That's the kind of mystery I think would've been worth solving. These will be front and center (literally) at the wedding...centerpieces. Some holding zinnias. Some holding mums. But all of them holding a little piece of the past. I love that.
