Sarcasm in a Skirt » Family

Chase – Month 3

jenbshaw — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 02:23:48 +0000

Chase,

I have struggled for a week to figure out what to say to you after this month. Someone very wise said I should write “Dear Chase, This month you were an asshole. Love Mom”. Unfortunately this isn’t far from the truth. You seem to be at your first of many “difficult ages”. You have figured out how to scream and you certainly aren’t afraid to tell me when something is not to your liking. You and I spent most of this month by ourselves as Daddy was working out of town. We had some pretty serious battles of will this month and honestly I’m not sure who came out ahead. I do know that plenty of tears were shed, mostly mine.

You finally started reaching for things and holding them. I think sometimes you know exactly what skill I’m waiting for you to develop and you taunt me by refusing. You wait until I have let the voices in my head convince me there is something wrong and then when I’m at my wits end you smile and perform like a little circus monkey. What frightens me is that this is only the beginning of your mind games with me.

It hasn’t been a constant battle however. I’m still blown away everyday at how much I love you. You are so happy in the mornings, as soon as you see my face you smile and gasp. You’re closer and closer everyday to an actual laugh.

I can’t imagine how much you will change in the next month after watching so much change this month. Soon you’ll be rolling over and laughing and sitting up on your own. I can’t wait to watch you reach each of these milestones and at the same time I’m not quite ready for you to be so grown up.

No matter how big you get promise me that you will always need me as much as you do now (even if I complain about)

Love Mama

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Family Photos – Finally

jenbshaw — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 10:23:15 +0000

Twitter can be a powerful thing…that is obvious and yet I’m still surprised at the ways it affects me. A couple of months ago I put a picture of my newborn up as my avatar. While I got lots of compliments on it people wanted to see me too. I complained that I had no recent pictures of myself and didn’t want to use an old one. Out of the blue Heather emailed me and mentioned that she was going to be in my area and would love to shoot my family. I cannot even begin to describe how happy I am with how the pictures turned out. Getting a decent shot of my hubby and I can be hair-raising, add a baby in the mix and I have no idea how she managed to capture us. Here are a few of my favorites. Check out the rest of Heather’s work on her Flickr stream or her photography website. If you ever manage to get in her area I highly suggest wrangling her for pictures.

Thank you a thousand times and then some Heather!

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Ughhh…why with the drama

jenbshaw — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 07:51:00 +0000

**warning** this post may contain language and subjects that could be construed as HIGHLY offensive, for that I apologize. If cursing in particular is not your thing I will not be offended if you just click away from here without reading.

Dear Former Family – You f@cking suck, really and truly I’m as close to absolute hate as I think I have ever been. Please follow the lemmings off a cliff soon….

I would love nothing more that to tell this whole story and lay out all the facts but honestly I don’t know that I could do that, mostly because I don’t always get the “full” story. The long and short of it is my Dad is a partner in a family farm, has been for the past 40 years, his brother, brother-in-law and him. A year and a half ago my grandfather, his father, passed away, it was shortly after that when things went to hell in a hand-basket. The brother, we’ll call him C, decided that he no longer wanted anything to do with the family and he wanted out of the corporation. What took place after that was a lot of snap/emotional decisions, faulty advice from a bad lawyer, and oral as opposed to written agreements. Needless to say things got messy in a hurry.

Over a year later we are still “negotiating” to get C out of the corporation. At this point it is almost certain to go to court because we are unwilling to meet his demands. Mind you his demands are those of a fucking lunatic. Case in point after he decided he wanted out he went and took out huge operating loans so he could “farm on his own”, all the while farming ground that wasn’t even legally his yet. He went so far as to put up grain bins on ground that was possibly going to go to him after a settlement was reached. Well now one of his demands is that we pay him $24,000 – to pay the damn interest on his operating loans. Is it just me or is that completely asinine?

I could go on for days about all the ridiculous demands but that really isn’t the point and honestly would just upset me more to rehash it all. What bothers me the most is the levels of hate this whole situation has made me feel. I hate that he is constantly attacking my dad’s mental capacity to anyone and everyone around town. I hate that he and his children verbally threaten to “come fucking after” my aunt and her family. I hate that “being the bigger person” has led to him and his family basically getting away with all of it. I hate that today I actually said the words “I wouldn’t feel bad if he died” outloud and meant them. Somewhere deep in my head or maybe my heart there is a voice saying that I don’t really mean it and that its just the hurt talking but I can’t honestly say that I believe that.

After negotiations fell through today and another threatening call and another visit from the cops it is more than likely that this will be decided in court. I want to have faith that going to court is the chance for us to get a fair settlement but I just don’t know if I have that kind of faith in the system. What if they decide that the only thing to do is sell the whole thing and split the proceeds three ways. Even if selling out made my parents enough money to retire (which it won’t) I think it would literally kill my dad to lose the farm.

I’m scared for what the future holds and there is really nothing I can do but wait and see what happens.

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Why the Heck Not I Say…

jenbshaw — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 21:23:00 +0000

I found this meme on Liz’s site, it looked easy (mostly because our answers are so similar – Gawd I’m lazy today).

• How long have you been together? Together almost six years married two and a half years

• How long did you know each other before you started dating? A week or so, and by “dating” you mean pretty much living together right?

• Who asked who out? There really wasn’t any “asking out” we met in college, we traveled in packs. I just made sure we would be going to the same bar on the same night.

• How old are each of you? 27

• Whose siblings do/ did you see the most? Well considering I’m an only lonely that would be his sister

• Do you have any children together? Can I count the little ~~parasite~~ darling currently residing in my tummy

• What about pets? We have a cat named Kitty and we should have a lab puppy this summer sometime.

• Which situation is the hardest on you as a couple? dealing with families, we both have awesome families but they function in very different ways and it has been hard for us to adjust to each others idiosyncrasies – very hard.

• Did you go to the same school? To the same college yes

• Are you from the same home town? Nope, he doesn’t really have a “hometown” he moved around a lot as a child

• Who is the smartest? well I’m a complete nerd but he is really smart too, luckily we are smart in different areas

• Who is the most sensitive? sensitive towards others neither, in respect to ourselves I think it would be me, I get my feelings hurt easier

• Where do you eat out most as a couple? Longhorn Steakhouse, it drives him nuts that I order the same thing every time. I have a favorite dish/meal every where we go and I RARELY veer off course

• Where is the furthest you two have traveled together as a couple? Imperial Beach, CA

• Who has the craziest exes? definitely him

• Who has the worst temper? that would be me, I am a true red head

• Who does the cooking? He does basically all the cooking (and the dishes) I am completely inept in the kitchen

• Who is more social? Him for sure

• Who is the neat-freak? Neither of us is super clean

• Who is the more stubborn? I’m pretty sure that’s a draw

• Who hogs the bed? He does. No matter what size bed we sleep in, he always ends up right in the middle of it. (wow I didn’t even have to touch this answer from Liz)

• Who wakes up earlier? I do, he can still sleep until noon, I’m up by 7:00 at least no matter what

• Where was your first date? Like I said before we traveled in a pack in college, although if I had to pick I would say it took place in my living room, I invited him over to watch a Nascar Race at my apartment.

• Who has the bigger family? Me – drives him nuts

• Do you get flowers often? Only on Valentine’s Day but I’m not super into flowers, I only enjoy them on Valentine’s Day because I don’t want to be left out.

• How do you spend the holidays? Thanksgiving belongs to my family (to avoid the crazies in his), We have Easter with both our parents (I know it’s weird that they get along – right) and Christmas we go all over hell’s half acre and back to see everyone.

• Who is more jealous? This is too broad to really know, we both have our moments.

• How long did it take to get serious? Not very damn long, I would say withing 3 weeks of “meeting” him we were pretty much living together.

• Who eats more? Me, I graze all day long

• Who does/ did the laundry? Since he handles the kitchen I try to do most all the other chores

• Who’s better with the computer? He can barely get online without my help.

• Who drives when you are together? Usually him unless I’m being DD

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