Across the Pond

This April Simon and I joined his mom and step-dad on a little trip across the pond. Simon's step-dad was born and raised in Bolton, England and moved to the US for a job in his 30's.

As you can tell I did not bring a hairdryer and it took me several days to find the one in the hotel room! Our first day we took the train to Bolton to visit Harry's Mum and Dad,
Monday we explored Manchester which we absolutely loved. It is a very big city but it is very easy to get from place to place and they even have a free bus system!

On Tuesday we jumped on another train with Harry and Jane Ann and headed for my homeland of Wales. We took a tour of Conwy Castle, it was really neat, unlike the castles of London there has been minimal alteration of the castles so they really are original which is so neat!

 

 

Simon and I took a 3 day excursion to London while Jane Ann and Harry went South to visit Harry's daughter and granddaughter. London is oober pricey so we opted to stay in a hostel...EW. It was very clean and we got our own room but it just weirded me out! Some people are a little too free in the shared bathrooms to say the least! Also it is really hard to sleep alone, and a twin bed when you are so used to sleeping with your spouse in a queen bed!

 

 

Our first day in London was spent mostly on a bus tour, it was supposed to me 3 hours long but due to the horrendous traffic in London it was over 4. I am glad we went though it was really nice to get to see everything in such a short period of time, that helped us decide what we really wanted to take the time to see the following day.

 

The next day we hit up the Tower of London, which is a castle so I have no idea why it's called "tower." The castle is very well kept and has many simulated scenes with old furniture and other displays. We also hit up the infamous Harrod's Department store and bought chocholates and tea for some of our family members.

 

 

Our last day we just did some speed tourism of Westminster Abbey and Big Ben/Parliament. The Abbey didn't open for tours until 10 am, and Big Ben is only open to the public on certain days and so on and really the outside is so neat I was good with that! We learned to walk very fast in London, now when we take walks Simon will always say "Come on let's walk London speed!" I always opt for "Manchester Speed" instead!

 

 

 

All in all our trip was fricken amazing, though I was glad to get back to America were public bathrooms are free and I don't need signs to tell me which way to look before I cross the street!

 

 

 

It's all relative

Recently a friend introduced me to the website stfuparentsblog.com, which is hilarious by the way. It is almost all facebook posts of parents embarrassing themselves. One post was a status that read "people without kids shouldn't complain to people who have kids" it really bothered me and really got me thinking.
First I thought, you chose to have kids, and why did you have kids if you knew it would make tyour life so miserable?
Secondly everyone's life is different and just because we have different challenges doesn't mean anyone's are harder than anyone elses. Right now I have foot and mouth disease that I developed from my loving nephew... is that as challenging as cancer... of course not but I have never had cancer to compare it to. I also can't imagine what life would be like if all I thought about was how much worse something could be! Should I just lie in bed thinking of how awful cancer is rather than watch Grey's Anatomy and try to forget the pain? Although I do believe in being positive it hurts to walk and grasp things so if I want to be in pain and verbalize it...I shall!
Very rarely do unfiltered people comment on my facebook, but I have seen a lot on the stfu blog and on other people's pages. It happened to me once when I was venting my moving frustration but I don't think the person meant anything by it so I let it go.
However rather than competing over who's life is harder let's just sympathize with everyone and their unique situation. To the stranger who said "people without kids shouldn't complain to people who have kids" I would want to say "people with 2 kids shouldn't complain to people with 3 kids!" and people with 3 can't complain to people with 4 kids and so on. My life is regularly challenging for me because it is all I know, and it is only going to get more challenging before it gets easier.
Even if we see something that makes us go "are you really complaining about that?" we all need to loosen up a bit and be friends to those who we claim are our friends! So anyway that is my share for the day... I hope to be back shortly to write posts about my UK trip and my upcoming move to Kansas City.

John 13:34 "A new command I give you: Love one Another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another." NIV

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Overdue-Puppy Update

In December we got Hank! We decided to go with a hunting dog to ensure good lines, there are so many other breeds we were interested in but so many of them are from Puppy Mills and it seemed impossible to find a reputable non-scammy breeder. So we found a good ole' breeder from Ava Missouri that we found through the NRA Website. Brittanys are the "all around" dog, wonderful hunting dogs and just as wonderful house dogs. He weighed a wee 6 pounds when we got him and Zoe was NOT impressed! He is now 6 months old, in general he is a sweet boy, he likes to steal things such as my underwear, remotes, hairbrushes, etc. and drag them out into the yard through the dog door for the neighbors to see. He is high energy and does get a little rowdy if he hasn't had much play time or a walk so we are making an effort to walk him or play fetch in the yard everyday. He and Zoe are doing so much better together, unfortunately we have to re-crate train him as he for some reason MUST pee in our room at night.

Puppy

At this point in our lives the topic of children comes up well... everyday!
However we are currently thinking about starting off smaller... say a puppy? We have been talking off and on about getting a dog or puppy because Zoe is so social. Recently she seems to be getting into more and more things when we aren't home, which I know is because she is bored!
We know we would keep a puppy alive but puppies are similiar to babies in they way that they pee all the time and wake you up in the middle of the night! Having a puppy is very fun but it can also be very stressfull and would serve as a great test.
We got Zoe as a 4 year old dog who was for the most part already trained, we haven't watched her grow or taught her anything new, maybe a few basic tricks such as "down" and "off" but nothing extraordinary.
So anyways wish this puppy luck as he/she is going to be the most spoiled "lab rat" in the state of Missouri!

Stay at Home Moms

Obviously I am not very good at blogging, it has been exactly 3 months since my first post...oops!

Anyway, my sister is an excellent blogger, and a stay at home mom. She recently blogged about how little support there is for stay at home moms, at first I thought this was ridiculous but it is so true. There is an overload of support for moms who work from home,  support for stay at home moms with part time jobs or who run small businesses such as avon, there is also support for moms who are going back to school. However there is little to no support for those mom's who are just moms, and even that sounds bad, "oh I'm just a mom" just a mom? Is that not only one of the most important jobs on the planet? Just watch the news, we would have so few stories if more women were just moms and invested themselves in their families and raised healthy well adjusted individuals became productive valued members of society rather than deviants and perverts.

Why is it wrong to want to care for your home, your husband and your children? Why am I even blogging about this you ask, I don't have kids. Obviously it is because I want to have children and my husband and I like the idea of me staying at home. Unlike a lot of working mothers I know, we don't have a grandparent who would be available to provide child care, and my sister is a stay at home mom so she can raise HER children, not mine. Child care from nannies or daycares not only makes me very nervous but it is very expensive and I really don't make enough money to counter balance that expense nor do I want someone else molding my child into the person they will become.

I am not against working from home and I have looked into it but nothing has caught my interest, I am an oil painter and am currently making pillows for my husbands cousins as gifts but even if those did become things I sold, I will never be rich off of hand made goods that take such a long time to produce. I am also not against working a few nights a week at a coffee shop or restaurant but I don't want to go into motherhood knowing that I HAVE to do that. Can't I just be my anal retentive self and create a million cleaning lists and go to the grocery store and have dinner ready every night? People will stop comparing themselves to Mrs. Cleaver and start coparing themselves to Mrs. Goodwin!

Anywho obviously you know what has been on my mind the last few months since I have nothing else to bring up :-) I hope I don't forget about my blog again and be back much sooner!

First Blog

A lot of my friends have blogs and I really enjoy hearing about their kids and families, but what I haven't really found are any blogs written by people like me. Working wives witth no children. I enjoy cooking and crafting like the rest of them, but instead of a career as a mom I have a career in a restaurant. If I could make a career painting and sewing and crafting I would quit today. My husband and I have a 4 year old one-eyed beagle Zoe, that I rescued in August 2010 and she is a huge part of our lives.