Spring Break '08

Boy oh boy am I exhausted!!! Last week was our "Spring Break." Um, the break part kind of flies out the window when you are still working 40 hours. Luckily the weekend was so fun it more than made up for it! I have some pretty amazing friends... not to brag or anything...

I left our house at 6AM on Friday to head to San Fransisco to be with my best fried Tina who had a surgery the day before. I was really excited to go visit her but at the same time kind of freaking out because while I was gone we had house guests arriving who were staying the weekend. Jerad was amazing and cleaned the house and entertained everyone while I was gone.

San Fransisco was beautiful and it was so great getting to spend time with Tina and her finance Tom and talk about their upcoming wedding. He is more excited about the planning than any guy I have ever met before which was adorable. As much as I adore living in a small town, the city definitely has its perks. Such as you can order food online, pay for it, and it shows up at your house... any time of the day. I'm not talking pizza or Chinese, I mean good food. Weird.

I thought that Tina would mostly be recovering and sleeping but she stayed up the whole time and we watched wedding and baby shows and Martha Stewart and planned her engagement party and looked at all things wedding. It was a girly ol' time. I am going to miss her so much when she moves to New York this summer. ahhh! We have been best friends since 3rd grade and never lived more than a few hours apart... and now she will be all the way on the other side of the US. Her finance is a great guy and his family sounds so nice so I know she will be happy... its just sooo far!

Saturday afternoon I headed back home. There were a few accidents which made the traffic horrible. I stopped at Ikea to ease the pain and bought a few things for the baby shower I am throwing for Jerad's sister and the Engagement party for Tina. Man I love that place. you know any store that has its own parking structure and restaurant is going to be good. Its lucky I only had my car or I think I would have come home with new patio furniture and a bunch of artwork I fell in love with.

It turns out that the two house guests I thought we were having was actually 5; my friend Erik, his wonderful wife Sara, and their friends Beth, Jen, and Sam. Saturday night we played some games, drank wine, and talked. The next morning Erik Jerad and I made breakfast and after that I took the girls and Sam wine tasting. It was so much fun. We went to all my favorite wineries and had some great wine and great conversations. After wine tasting we headed back to my house and while some people napped a few walked downtown and I visited with Erik. Man I miss that guy.

We talked about Religion, and Churches, and all these issues and doubts I have been having. It was so refreshing. I love that I can always tell him anything and instead of judging me, we can have a rational, productive conversation about it. He is the friend that most understands my family situation and the way I have grown up and how that effects the way I make decisions now. Whenever I have talked to him about something hard I am going through instead of giving me the superficial "it'll work out" "hang in there" "these things happen for a reason" "keep your chin up" CRAP that people tell you when they don't want to actually deal with you, he has been the one who will talk to me at 1 am and find out what I am really feeling and help me realize what about the whole situation I am REALLY upset about and why I am.

Even though we live states apart and don't see each other very often I know without a doubt that (besides Tina) Erik is my only friend who 100% understands me and I could tell anything to without being judged. That is why it mean so much to me that he told me over and over what a wonderful guy Jerad was and how happy we were together. They had met a few times but had never really talked before or hung out alone. Erik has literally met every guy I have ever dated and accurately predicted that the relationships wouldn't work out and why.... so its great that he thinks Jerad is the bee's knees.

My first serious boyfriend was named Ron. We dated like 3 months I think, which is a long time when you are 13. Erik hated him and always told me he was a terrible match for me and was controlling and I would resent it. Well, he was definitely right and by the time I realized it I had already made a lot of choices that I wouldn't have if I had listened in the first place and wound up compromising who the real "me" was. After that I had a few short "highschool" relationships that were just for fun. My next long term boyfriend was Eric who Erik (confusing they have the same name...) was never sold on. Every time they got together Erik would ask me if I was really happy with the relationship. He didn't think Eric was challenging enough for me and that I was just settling. He thought Eric was a nice guy, but could never figure out why we were dating. Whenever I would tell him about a fight we had had he would ask me why I was always the one who was making the effort to fix things and make him happy. Or he would point out that again I was changing who I was to try to be what he wanted.

I was just head-over-heals in that way high school girls get so I would promptly ignore any "advise" and just tell my self that Erik didn't really know him so he shouldn't be judging. He finally stopped trying to talk sense into me and time went on. Well, after 7 and a half years and a divorce later and all the things Erik had warned me about had come true. Surprise surprise. When I called Erik to tell him what happened, he didn't even seem surprised, the first thing he asked me was if my family was emotionally supporting me at all... which was so ironic because that was honestly the hardest part of the whole process was my family blaming me for everything when it really didn't have anything to do with me at all.

With Jerad I feel like I am finally "me" again and don't have to compromise that to be happy anymore. I'm not saying our relationship is always easy, but when it is work, we BOTH work together to fix things and I don't have this deep hopeless feeling anymore. And he is so good at calming me down and reassuring me when I start to freak about the little things and pointing me back towards what is really important. Well, I have gotten waaaay off topic for this post but what I am trying to say is that Erik telling me that he thinks Jerad a genuinely great guy and is happy for us means more to me than if anyone else had told me the same thing.

After everyone went home we went and picked up a sewing machine that my uncle gave me. So, in the last month we went from not sewing and having no sewing machines to being a 2 person sweat shop. Ha! I have been having a ton of fun though and have made some really cute things. Hopefully someday soon I'll actually have time to make a quilt. yeah right.

I'll try to remember to post weekend pics tonight!