Tuesday, January 31, 2023

weekends

 


Sometimes weekend plans work and sometimes they don't.

2 weekends ago we went on a special trip to south Florida. It had been one of the Christmas presents from me to Chris, to travel to the South Florida Fair to see Brandon Davis in concert.

Brandon is an upcoming country singer that Chris discovered a couple of years ago and absolutely loves and we've already been to 2 of his concerts. In December, when I discovered that he was playing a headliner concert at the fair in January, I bought tickets for the 4 of us (it was a kid weekend) and got an inexpensive motel room near the fairgrounds for the night and surprised Chris with the news on Christmas day. He got tears in his eyes when I told him because following this guy's career means a lot to him.



We headed out straight after basketball because it was a 3 hour drive down to West Palm Beach. The drive was a breeze, check-in at our motel went smoothly and soon we were enjoying the sights and sounds of the fair.





The kids and I had a great time playing with Sally while waiting for the concert to start. It was their first concert experience and they loved it. Because we'd been to some of his other concerts he remembered us and talked to the kids, posed for pictures (which I can't seem to find on my phone) and played really great music for a couple of hours. We had used one of his songs "Step By Step" at our wedding because it's about becoming a family so hearing it live in the concert was amazing.

The whole weekend was so much fun and reminded me how much I love traveling and making new memories. Everything was perfectly planned because I'm awesome like that; I just love planning trips.

And then there's this past weekend - epic fail.

I had planned on us attending an outdoor flea market that a new shop in town was holding but Chris forgot (probably never listened in the first place) and planned some work things after basketball without my knowledge that he needed my help with. I watched the time go by and finally said I was going to the flea market by myself but by the time I made it there they had already closed and I was left feeling, once again, like my wishes are the lowest priority and that's not a pleasant feeling. Then, because of circumstances out of his control, Chris had to spend all of Sunday hanging around the house waiting for a repair person so we couldn't even do anything together that day either. And I know it sounds like I'm whining but I'm just so tired of coming in last when it comes to the things I want to do. It was that way all during the Christmas season - I had several events I wanted us to attend and we went to none of them because it just wasn't important enough to anybody but me.

I don't really know what to do except just start expecting to do things on my own. I've already put down a few things in my own personal calendar for the next few months and I'm going to make myself a priority even if nobody else does. Life is too short to waste time waiting for somebody else to put you first. Time to take care of me.

Tuesday, January 10, 2023

Christmas and New Year's Eve

 


Happy New Year!

I have some pictures from Christmas and New Years Eve that I'd like to share. We had a lovely Christmas day with the kids, they enjoyed their presents, we ate ham (which I really don't like) plus Chris insisted on making green bean casserole and yams (which the kids and I don't like) but Chris enjoyed it all. Later I made biscuits and the kids and I spread them with Nutella which we all enjoyed so at least we didn't go hungry. 

The kids went back to their mother's house that evening and were there until they went back to school after the new year so I finally got a chance to work from home without interruptions which was very much appreciated.


One amazing thing that we did on Christmas morning was to visit each of the 3 ladies that Chris transports at 5am 3 days a week to wish them Merry Christmas and give them a little present. It was a complete surprise to each of them and they were so touched that their transport driver and his family remembered them on that day. These are the same 3 ladies that attended our wedding and each of them calls Chris their "husband" because they swear he married each of us that day. I couldn't ask for 3 sweeter "sister wives" so I'm ok with that. Truly, going to see them was the best part of Christmas day for all of us.










We had a quiet New Years Eve. Chris canceled his plans to do work with his business partner to get the office/shed ready and was willing to go with me to a favorite little town but it started raining as we started out and walking around that town in the rain would be no fun so we decided to go out to eat for lunch and then back home to enjoy snacks and movies for the rest of the night.


Neither of us made it until midnight, we took a "nap" at 9pm. Chris set an alarm for 11:30pm but that didn't wake him up so I turned it off. I was still awake at midnight and he magically woke up at that minute, kissed me and then was back asleep right away, which was actually pretty funny. I didn't mind that we didn't have any party plans, I enjoyed a quiet start to 2023 - the year I reclaim myself.