Archive for the 'Bloggy Stuff' Category

Changing Things Up A Bit

by athena714 Tuesday, 18 March, 2008

Bear with me while I screw around with my blog layout. I’m thinking that I’m mainly going to turn this space into a photo blog, so I want to have the best layout for picture viewing.

I will, of course, still write about my life, but I’m finding that I’m not needing to as much. My blog was extremely important for me as an outlet in order to be able to process my feelings surrounding my first miscarriage. Lately I’m able to sort things out in my head more easily without having to write them down. Plus, I’m just happier in general these days and don’t have as much that I need to vent about.

My second miscarriage is still very fresh, but this one was…I hesitate to say “easier”, but that’s really what I mean. To be honest, right now both Hawk and I are not ready to be parents. When we found out I was pregnant this last time, there was a part of me - a small part, mind you, but still a part - that was a little disappointed. We’ve really been enjoying each other lately, enjoying our freedom, enjoying sleeping in, enjoying going out to dinner whenever we want and drinking wine with friends. Right now I find I’m just not ready to give that up. It just wasn’t the right time for us to have a baby. When it is the right time, we will know, and we will devote ourselves to the journey completely. But right now is not that time.

Last year was grief, almost from beginning to end. I was such an emotional wreck that I almost consider it a wasted year, because I was so enveloped by anxiety and sadness that I couldn’t enjoy my life at all. Now that I am feeling so much better, I need some time to just be. Just feel good for a while before we start trying to have a baby again. Because when we start trying, it’s going to work, and then I’ll have other (wonderful) things to concentrate on than myself!

There are a lot of other things going on right now. I was telling Hawk after we got back from our trip, that I was feeling totally rejuvenated and “like we’re on the cusp of something really big”. I’m taking the last two classes I need to finish my Diploma in Aromatherapy, I’m really wanting to concentrate more on my photography. Hawk is concentrating on building his computer consulting business and I am helping him with that. There are great things afoot, here, I think.

in Bloggy Stuff, Deep Thoughts and Pregnancy Quest. 3 Comments

Hawk Told Me To Blog About This

by athena714 Tuesday, 19 February, 2008

Someone found my blog by googling “my husband is a stud”. Love it.

in Bloggy Stuff and My Love. 5 Comments

New Year

by athena714 Monday, 31 December, 2007

I’ve been feeling detached from my blog and writing lately, not really having anything to say, and if I do, not wanting to put forth the effort to put it into words that mean anything.

So when, in my daily blog meanderings, I ran across this post from Bella, I knew that in my present state of writer’s block I couldn’t say anything about the coming New Year better than she had. Thank you, Bella, for sharing your beautiful thoughts and words with us again.

January is named after the Roman god Janus. He was the god of gates, of doorways and entrances, beginnings and endings tied together. In most depictions of him, he is double faced, looking both backwards and forwards, as if to remember and reach out simultaneously. He reminds me of the goddess Hecate, she who stands at the crossroads. He brings the clarity of vision, the loss of leaving something behind which has already passed us by and the hope of what is yet to come.

I breathe out, only to once again breath in. I feel a pause, that moment in-between, as the foot leaves the ground, right before it steps down once again. Then I enter. I step inside. I cross through. It has been a hard year. It has been the best year ever. And now, here we go.

in Bloggy Stuff. 4 Comments

The End

by athena714 Friday, 30 November, 2007

Here we are on the last day of NaBloPoMo. What did I learn? I learned that making myself post for thirty days straight makes me really really boring. I have to say I got less and less interesting as the month progressed. So from now on I think I will only post when I’ve got something I really want to share, a thought I really need to process, a picture I just really want you to see. There were some people who did this beautifully all month long, and to them I take off my hat, as well as thank them from the bottom of my heart for sharing themselves with all of us.

I am so glad I participated this year, because I found some new daily reads that I really enjoy, and made a new internet friend or two, which is awesome.

Congrats to all of you who made it through the whole month and also to those of you who may not have posted everyday but gave it your best. Thank you for opening your world to me for thirty days, sharing your laughter, tears and words of support.

Let’s do it again next year!

in Bloggy Stuff. 5 Comments

7 Random Things

by athena714 Thursday, 29 November, 2007

I got tagged for a meme by secretleaves that requires me to post seven random things about myself, so heregoes.

1. I have six tattoos.

2. I hate bananas, but like banana flavored things.

3. Owls are my favorite bird.

4. When I was a little girl, all my dolls were named Judy.

5. When I was in high school, I spend an inordinate amount of time with my friends in the creek behind the school catching frogs. We would catch them at lunchtime, then put them in plastic water bottles for the rest of the school day and take them home. My favorite frog was named Pudge. He was named Pudge because he was fat. I kept him for a few weeks and then I took him back to the creek and let him go.

6. I still have my baby blanket. Every so often I’ll take it out of my hope chest and nuzzle my favorite part of it.

7. My favorite song to sing for karaoke is “I Love Rock N’ Roll” by Joan Jett.

(Since I am the last person on earth (it seems) to do this meme, I’m not going to tag anybody else.)

in Bloggy Stuff. 2 Comments

Pay It Forward

by athena714 Tuesday, 27 November, 2007

For her birthday, the lovely Darlene (all the way up there in the Great White North) decided that she would like to “pay it forward” and give the first three commenters on her site a little gift. Luckily, I was one of them, so I have a surprise zipping its way to me right now. Fun!

The one “condition” of this is that I also have to “pay it forward”, so I am doing the same. The first three commenters on this post who agree to play along on their own blogs will get a gift of their very own from me.

Ready, set. go!

in Bloggy Stuff. 2 Comments

Happy Thanksgiving!

by athena714 Thursday, 22 November, 2007

I am grateful for so many things this year. This year was particularly difficult for so many reasons, but I have an amazing (not to mention handsome, sexy, brilliant…I could keep going) husband who stood by my side through all of it. I also have wonderfully supportive parents and friends, so above all else I am thankful for having that love in my life.

But here are a few other things I am thankful for that aren’t so - for lack of a better word - obvious:

I am thankful for the gift that was Maggie. I am thankful that I got to spend almost five years with her as part of our family. I learned so much from her, her love of life, the joyfulness with which she approached everything. Her loyalty and unconditional love and affection, her tenacity.

I am thankful for the gift that is my job, or more specifically, the gift that is the amazing women I work with. I’ve worked there during the most difficult time of my life thus far, and they have taught me how to be strong and compassionate through adversity. I would not be the woman I am today without the four of them in my life.

Finally, I am thankful for the gift that is my blog, because it has given me an outlet for my feelings surrounding everything that has happened this year that I would not have had otherwise, given me a space to process my thoughts, and it has led some amazing people my way who have renewed my faith in humanity with their willingness to reach out to a perfect stranger. I am thankful for all of you who are my “internet friends”, who I have never met but who share a little bit of yourselves on your own blogs, that make me feel not quite so alone in this big, scary, messy, wonderful world of ours.

Happy Thanksgiving, all of you. I hope today finds you warm, safe, and loved.

in Bloggy Stuff, Critters, Deep Thoughts, Family and Friends. 4 Comments

NaBloPoMo is HARD, Y’All

by athena714 Thursday, 15 November, 2007

I have nothing to say, I really don’t. You can probably tell from my last couple posts. I’m like, uhhh, I got nothing, so…Here! Look at this instead!

Lessee…hmm. Going for sushi tonight with some friends. Yummy.

I’m going to see Neko Case at the Walt Disney Concert Hall tomorrow night. Super stoked about that.

The dogs had their first successful stay alone in the backyard today while I went to the gym. No carnage, no atrocities - yay. Daisy has one of those cone collars on right now because she has an owie on her foot that she keeps licking. She is not a happy camper. Jenny continues to be cute and loveable and a total spaz. I’ve taken to calling her “Knucklehead McSpazzatron” (which I got from the Spongebob Squarepants movie), and I think she likes the new nickname, because she smiles and me and licks me whenever I say it. But then again, all she ever does is smile and lick me, so I could be wrong.

in Bloggy Stuff. 5 Comments

New Must-Reads

by athena714 Tuesday, 13 November, 2007

The main reason I love NaBloPoMo is the chance it gives me to check out a whole bunch of new blogs and have new people discover mine. Since I’m running around doing errands today and don’t have much time to post, I thought I would share a few of my new favorite fellow bloggers. Enjoy!

Sassy - Sassy lives in France (lucky) and writes very honestly about her fertility challenges.
Bella - A courageous, beautiful, inspirational woman if ever there was one. And quite the writer.
Saucygrrl - Fellow animal lover, and a great read.
Live at the KitKat Lounge - Fellow Valley Dweller and a great photographer to boot. Also has a purse fetish. My kind of woman.

in Bloggy Stuff. 3 Comments

Nick of Time

by athena714 Monday, 12 November, 2007

Woo! Got in today’s post four minutes before midnight. Haven’t missed a day yet!

We went to see Feist play at the Universal Amphitheater. She was a.ma.zing. Awesome show.

Although, going to Universal means having to walk through the Universal City Walk, and I feel like a bad person for just being there. It’s so…neon. And full of chain restaurants and crap souvenir stores. Ick.

in Bloggy Stuff and Music. 2 Comments