Another cake!

I made this one for my niece yesterday. She wanted a "hello kitty" cake and I think it turned out rather good. Especially since I just threw it together (because it was mothers day and I didn't have a lot of time). It was fun making another cake, it was a funfetti one with pink cream cheese filling. I think my niece liked it.

My baby is growing up!

My youngest had her second birthday! One of her first words was "shortcake" in reference to the character strawberry shortcake. So I finally decided to make her that kind of cake. The cake was strawberry flavored and the icing was strawberry/banana. My family came over and gave her presents and we played upset the animal kingdom (a game we used to play when we were kids). It was a lovely evening!

Finding the positive

I have lately realized a few very important things:

One- sometimes your physical needs can be taken care of and you can still feel like you are desperately in need of air

Two- sometimes you have to talk to someone about the negative things in your life pressing the air out of your chest, and it's not complaining it's just breathing

Three- there is such a thing as overwhelming somebody with the problems in your life and that is why you need more than one friend so you can parcel out little bits of your problems to different people who will understand them individually

Four- the time comes to stop thinking about yourself and start thinking about others. Finding somebody in need and thinking about what you can do for them always helps. Even if it is just praying for others who are having problems as well.

Five- count your blessings and even if only the physical needs in your life are taken care of, think of how amazingly lucky you are!

Life is a series of ups and downs, that's the way it works and the way it's supposed to work. Contrasting the bad times with the good times makes the good times sweeter. I need to find reasons to enjoy the bad times in life. Even when up feels like down and it seems like I don't have the brains, experience or self confidence to navigate life with any grace.

Never good enough!

Does anyone else every find that no matter how hard they try it's never enough. You work all day to clean the house and it's still dirty at the end of the day. You cook an amazing meal and your husband either shows up after it's cold cause he neglected to tell you he was busy that evening, or he eats it and says "It's nice" when you ask him "how is it?" You read to your kids, play with them and just because you have to discipline them they yell "You're not the best mommy in the world!". I try so hard to be nice to everyone I meet and people seem to find me overbearing or a person who just tries too hard (quoting my sister in law).

I love my family but I shared with them why I don't want to have a dozen kids and instead of saying ok I understand you have a hard time they say, you shouldn't be around your kids if you have negative feelings towards them.

I called one of my best friends today by a different name. She took it fine, but I felt like a heel. My daughter refused to put on the expensive hat I bought for her and so I couldn't play with her at the park instead I went running while she pouted in the stroller.

I'm having a very hard time lately and I can't seem to get out of this funk I'm in. I just want to be happy. I have a wonderful husband who supports us financially and doesn't yell at me for anything. I've got two healthy children. I have a house in a nice neighborhood and I have a religion that fills my heart with sunshine and which I truly believe in.

Why can't I shake this bad mood. I just want to be happy, but sometimes it just feels like I care way too much about things other people just don't find worthy enough to think about. I wish I could be like the cool kids, you know the people who don't care what other people think and to heck with anybody who disagrees with them, cause they don't need them anyway.

I'm not that way and maybe that's why over the years several people have found it uncomfortable to be around me because my personality just has too much to it. My mom says my dad is the same, you either love or hate him. The thing is Dad doesn't mind if people don't like him or his personality. He's secure enough with himself that he ignores the fact that people may not like him and treats everyone like they are his best friend anyway.

I guess what I am saying is that I want to be a better person. I think those who close themselves off to caring about what others think stunt their growth, because to a certain degree it means they believe they are above reproach and have nothing to improve. But I think focusing too much on what you do wrong is stunting as well. It just all boils down to the fact that it is never really enough, not for myself or others which means that I need to be more thick skinned and keep plugging along trying to personally improve.

The good book dilemma

Has anyone ever read a book that was enlightening, well written, paced evenly and a good read in general but not like it? I read a book recently it was called "Olive Kitterage". Dan got it for me on his last trip while shopping for presents for us in a airport. I would not recommend this book to my religious friends as you might be offended by the language. I'm kind of immune to horrid language in books since I was an English major in college, but I think I may have learned a new swear word while reading this which is really quite a feat. I have to admit I am more offended by sexual content in books than bad language. Perhaps it's because I've heard fairly dirty language since I was in Kindergarten (some of the kids were a little rough).

The problem I had was not with the language of the book, I think she was trying to illustrate real people and even though in general I am bothered every time I come across a word that I would never say I get to a point where I gloss over the words and don't read them in my head. I think what actually bothers me about this book is the thing that make most books really good. It was a real book. It reflected the world in a very real way. I recognized things about myself in this book. The reason this wasn't a good thing is that the majority of truth that was shared was darkness. I think it wasn't just the darkness, it was the ratio of darkness to light. I am aware that in this world many people are unhappy, and that many if not most marriages are unhappy a large portion of the time. I don't object to being given a closer look at the way many people suffer, the objection I have is when there isn't enough light to give hope.

The absence of hope in any literature is a dark hole that can pull you in very quickly regardless of the amount you have in your life. Moody poetic literature is not bad in my opinion but I think too much of it can be counterproductive. I wish that more people wrote about happy marriages. I'm not naive enough to believe that all marriages don't have some form of unhappiness, but I also think it is naive to believe that there aren't blissfully happy marriages out there. Perhaps truly happy marriages aren't compelling enough to serve as interesting subjects for dissection.

I think that as I have gotten older reading about darkness isn't as abstract as it once felt when I was a young college student. I've seen the darkness and in some cases been overwhelmed by the effect it's had on those I love. The darkness of life is real to me... and I'm not sure at this time in my life that I can bear to invite that into my mind with fiction as well.

The fact that I truly am blissfully happy is it's own balm and does make it easier, or I should say bearable. But even as a child my mother says that I used to cry when I saw my siblings get a shot at the doctors. Even if I am not personally involved in the hurt caused by disturbed individuals or unhappy marriages, I cannot help but stay awake at night hurting for those who live with the pain.

I used to make fun of those women who read fluff, or in other words books that couldn't be considered literature. You know the books I'm talking about, the ones that are fake because they ignore reality too much. I don't mean science fiction. I mean literature that doesn't try and understand the human condition; it tries to cover it up with what I refer to as fluff (people writing about how they wish things were). For years I thought people who read fluff didn't understand what good writing was. Now as I've had more life experience I've found that people who enjoy fluff are really quite smart.

Whether they realize it or not by reading things that have contrived happy endings they are fostering that part of them that esteems happiness. Men are that they might have joy and whether or not everyone is really happy, we should strive for it. Valuing joy, hope and happiness does not make someone an idiot. Those who look for unhappiness are the idiots.

Now I am not saying that I am going to start reading substandard writing all the time. I just think throwing in a little fluff every now and then is actually something worth trying.