Just Stuff

Most importantly, yesterday I did the stairs! And I took a long walk at lunch! Yay me!! Why, oh why, don't I keep up with this? I feel so much better when I do. I felt freakin' awesome after finishing the stairs yesterday. Note to self: exercise feels good. Even if you hate it. You should do it. C'mon, get back out there! I did 52 flights in 15 minutes, so it wasn't recordbreaking time. But it was still good, and hey, I did it, right?

Awesome weekend. Greg and I took a vacation day Friday and headed to the Oregon coast on Thursday after work. His 14yo daughter came along with us. We brought Greg's ATV, and met his sister down there, who brought along her two ATVs. I had never been quad riding! Mostly, I rode on the back of Greg's, as there were four of us and three quads. I also got to spend a fair amount of time riding by myself. Riding by yourself is more fun, but it was also very cool to ride with Greg, who took us up and down sand dunes that I wouldn't have ventured onto by myself. And it was a good opportunity to squeeze him tight: I am always looking for those! :) Plus, me riding alone was a bit more challenging for Greg, who had to dig me out of the sand two times. I buried it three times, haha, but the third time I was able to rescue myself before he realized I had gotten stuck.

Selfishly, vainly, I look at this picture and think, "I'm tiny!" 

We stayed inland at his mom's the first night down and the last night back, she lives on the I-5 corridor and it was a good place to be. Wow, I met his entire family this weekend! They are really nice and very welcoming. I'll admit I was nervous - it's been 20+ years since I met the boyfriend's family. Eek. But I had a great time, and it was an awesome weekend. His daughter is great, and his sister and I got to be buddies while Greg and his daughter were off riding. By the time they got back, when they pulled up to the trailer, it was like, "Oh! They're back - that's why we're sitting here talking!" The sister and I were just sitting in the sun chatting and having a great time. His mom is like that, too. Super nice and super easy to talk to. Wow, does she ever have a great place: it is literally 15' off the river's edge. So fun to sit on the deck in the sun and watch the river.

My weight is holding steady at 146. I have vowed to force it lower this month. :) My eating has become totally complacent. I'm eating bigger portions (waaah!!) and getting sloppy with what I eat, and how often. It's nice to know that I can fairly easily maintain my weight - seeings how I have been stuck here for ages and ages now! But I'm not done, and come hell or high water, I will get below 140 pounds. I did not come all this way only to not reach my goal. And I still think of that as my *first* goal!

On a relationship note, I am enjoying being with Greg so much. He's an awesome guy. My friend and I laugh, the best word to describe him is CAPABLE. That man can do anything. You have no idea how sexy that is to me. We had a bit more of the grounded in reality exposure this weekend, a couple difficult conversations and a couple acknowledgments that neither of us is perfect, nor do we come without some baggage.

For my part, I know Greg struggles a bit with my young kids. At sixteen and fourteen, he is further down the parenting path than I am. I freely acknowledge that it would have to be one helluva guy for me to consider starting over with children younger than my own. Just not something I'm interested in doing. But, I take a pragmatic approach: I am kid-free 50% of the time, and when they are with me, he does not have to be. My family is what it is: if he chooses not to be part of that, then he is obviously not the right guy. They aren't going anywhere. ;) We'll just let him work through that on his own, I certainly bear no hard feelings toward him about it as he faces the question realistically. I like, very much, that he is a long-term thinker and planner. So when he's thinking about my children, he's not thinking, "Can I date a woman with children?" He is thinking, "Can I be a long-term positive role model in these kids' lives?" He doesn't take "us" lightly, and while it sometimes feels too soon for me, it is nice to know, too, that he doesn't look at our relationship as "passing time until..."

On the plus side, my boys would eat him up with all his activities and interests. Really, Blake, my oldest, could *be* his son, haha. They have so much in common! Sports and the outdoors, cooking, working around the house and yard. Reid, oh, won't it be nice as Reid continues to grow older and settle down? Reid loves all these same things, too, he just comes with a certain exhaustion factor that can be difficult to swallow at time. ;)

After I just said my kids aren't going anywhere, I might as well mention that my youngest is actually going to go stay full-time with his dad starting next week. X and I talked about it last night. We are both concerned about his progress as his (second) kindergarten year winds down. He has actually made leaps and bounds of progress this year, but he still lags pretty far behind academically and socially. It always sounds funny to me to allude to "social" problems with him, because this is one very social kid! He's definitely an "everyone is an old friend" kind of guy, he always, always has been. He struggles more with transitions between activities, knowing when to settle down, etc. Play fighting and not reading people's cues when it's time to stop, that sort of thing. Definitely not in the social aspect: he's my only kid who has always said, "I'm going to go make friends with those kids," and within minutes, he is the center of the action! Love, love, love that boy, and he is going to be filthy stinking rich one day, running some company or being some sort of celebrity...as long as I can keep him out of prison. He'll take care of his mama, especially when I remind him of all the havoc he created as a child. ;)

Anyway, X is going to take him full-time for awhile, to give him some concentrated one-on-one time, some free time away from his siblings, and time to focus on his studies and such. We did this for a month or so last fall, and it worked pretty well. He is definitely daddy's boy. I have mixed feelings about it, of course, but we both agreed it went well last fall and may be the extra boost of attention he needs to finish out this school year in style. (I'm not saying he'll be there through the end of the school year, just that school is our main emphasis right now. We'll just play it by ear.)

Whew - did I ever throw a lot of my dirt at you, or what?? Told ya, the blog is pretty much my online diary, haha. Here's where I come to brain dump. You just get to watch the carnage. ;)