Freedom comes from Confinement

Oh how I have some great posts just waiting to be written, I just don't make the time to actually sit at the computer to write them and it's so hard to type a post on my phone, but they are coming I promise! Oh such good ones! There is vacation, a tid bit I've been chewing on and processing since vacation, the kitchen remodel, mind blowing television with strong subtexts, oh so many. Maybe with a teaser I'll make a little time to get them out of my head. Soon, until then, I must sleep, although I've slept most of the last three days away, but that's besides the point. Until then loves. wow, since when am I british?

Seriously, how cute am I? That's me with my lawn mower, no I didn't sleep with it, it stayed outside, it was a lawn mower after all. I loved to pretend to mow the yard, I loved our yard. There was always so much to do. That patch of concrete was so random, there was the concrete path I am on that lead from the patio out to a square of concrete that you can see at the end of the path. We always assumed that the previous owners had a table or something out there, it was the middle of the yard and just never really made sense. Behind me there was a pipe in the ground where dad said there used to be a grill. It was so weird, but it fed into our imagination so much. We used it as home base in games, we used it as a garage for our bikes, a meeting place, and so many other things that I'm forgetting now as an adult. It was there for years and years until we finally removed it when we put the family room onto the back of the house and had to take it out. The side you can s...

Look at that child and tell me I was not the most adorable thing on the planet. Seriously, try it. I mean check out how awkward I was, the priceless expression on my face, my pot belly. How awkwardly wonderful. This was my wheel barrel. I'm not sure why I loved it so much, but I really loved that wheel barrel. My grandparents on my dad side got it for me one year for Easter. My grandma loved to get us gifts for any holiday. Sometimes they were bigger gifts, and other times just random small things that always brought joy to me because they were from the heart. I never wanted anything material from my grandparents, I never expected anything from them, but gifts small and large were what my grandmother loved to do. She did not shower us with stuff all the time, but she certainly enjoyed giving. So anyway, I got this thing and apparently my whole day, week, month was spent with this wheel barrel, my family thought it was the cutest thing ever. Don't believe me how ...

This is me and Julio in Greenfield Village when I was two. I do not remember much about this trip except one thing, getting lost. My mom says that I managed to wander away in a crowd and away from the family in a split second like kids often do. It wasn't as big of a deal back then because that was before predators and pedophiles. lol. But like I said, I remember being lost. I still remember that terrifying feeling of being alone, terrified as the crowd cleared and my family was no where to be found. I remember being at the end of a building, similar to this one and being completely alone and I was terrified. I'm sure my screaming and crying is how my mother found me, I could scream and cry with the best of them. I remember feeling the relief of seeing my family again, the warm hug after being found. That feeling is still inside of me. Now it's not always when there isn't anyone around, it sometimes happens in groups as well. Not as often as it used to, bu...

Not every family is lucky enough to have an Aunt Julie, I was pretty lucky. She was young enough to have the time to give us, she was energetic enough to put the effort in, and she was genuine enough to give us something to believe in. That's me she's holding obviously, I guess it was one of the nights she was watching me and my parents came home to find us sleeping. I was not an easy baby, I was constantly sick, constant ear infections, and very, very clingy. It took some energy to watch me, ask anyone that did it. lol. It wasn't until I was school age that things got even slightly easier for my parents. My mother said that as a child I used to sneak down stairs to their room at night after they moved me to my own room and would either crawl into bed with them or they would wake up and find me sleeping on the floor in the corner of their room. For awhile they gave up fighting it and put a fold away bed in the corner of their room for me. I told you I was a cli...

So early in our family we were linked with another cousin. My family seemed to multiply in pairs and sometimes threes. Each of us on my mom's side has a cousin that is within a year or so in age. It's freaky and makes me think things I don't want to think about when it comes to family. lol. So here is two examples. Julio is the blonde kid on the left and Gretchen is the girl on the right. They are a little over a year apart. Then there is me next to Julio and my cousin Jason to the right of me. We were born about a week apart, one in New Jersey and me in Ohio. Growing up our cousins were our friends, it's not to say we didn't all have friends outside of the family but our family used to get together a lot so it was always nice to be able to have your cousin by your side to play with. Jason and I were as close as we could be with so many miles between us, what helped in my case is that my cousin Andy who I've spoken about on here before was born less...

This is proof that my obsession with kitchen items goes all the way back! Granted I don't still chew on them.....for the most part. I could always be found as a child in that drawer constantly pulling out kitchen stuff, then after my sister was born and she started to get kitchen stuff I was all over that stuff like white on rice. Somewhere there is a picture of me a little older than this somewhere messing with my sister's toy kitchen. She could never even cook plastic food right, I always had to correct her. What's funny is for years I never had any interest in cooking. I loved food obviously, but was never into cooking for myself. I tried a few dishes when I was growing up with my mom's help, but never really got into it until I moved out on my own the second time. The first time I was just too poor and busy to worry about cooking anything, but I'll cover that when the pictures from that time frame comes up. I love to create and I guess that feeling ...