It’s my blogiversary! One year ago today, I made my first blog post on this website. Woohoo!
In an odd twist, I think this also marks the longest stretch of time between posts. Sure, life has been busy, there is never enough time in the day, yadda yadda yadda, but if I’m being honest, the silence is largely because I haven’t felt like I’ve had anything inspired enough, interesting enough, or valuable enough to share. There is so much happening in the news worth commenting on, but I generally feel I am too unqualified or uninformed to speak, or that I have nothing to add that hasn’t already been said, and said better than I can.
At the same time, I looked around and saw coworkers, family, and friends doing things. Amazing things. Volunteering, fundraising, participating, travelling, graduating, and more. So many are having adventures worth documenting. It made me feel like my little family diary was superficial and silly. How many pictures from the zoo can I share? How many new words can Thea say before it stops being fun to read about to anyone beyond her parents and grandparents?
Then, tonight I reread that first blog post from one year ago, and I smiled. And I remembered that was the original intent of this blog – To document the things in our life that could make others smile, and give us something to look back on later when the memories had started to fade. Not everything has to be big or important. Some things are small, but they make us smile and are worth remembering all the same.
So I’m putting aside my worries about not being enough, and am going to share some recent little things that made me smile.
One Saturday we went to Costco, and Thea spotted a teddy bear mascot who was walking around representing the Alberta Children’s Hospital. She stopped cold in awe. I encouraged her to walk up to him, but she was too shy to give him a hug or even a high five (she’s usually willing to high-five anyone). So the bear waved and moved on. Thea then proceeded to stalk him. By that I mean she followed him allllllll they way around the perimeter of Costco, staying about 10 yards behind, pointing and yelling, “BEAR!” Anytime he stopped and looked at her, she froze. Once he turned back again, she resumed her hunt. This carried on for about 20 minutes until I finally scooped her up for this picture so that we could go meet Daddy at checkout:
On the topic of bears, Thea has developed a very special bond with her own teddy bear. We didn’t plan for her to have a security blanket, but it’s so dang sweet how she cuddles her bear at night and wants him to sit next to her at the dinner table.
Thea learned to say, “Thank you,” so we tried to teach her, “You’re welcome.” It backfired a bit – Now, if she is handed something, she says, “Thank you welcome.”
My incredibly intelligent and hardworking sister-in-law was accepted into TWO Veterinary schools this month! The even better news is that she has chosen to attend U of C which means she isn’t moving away – Yay!
At Daycare, Thea knows the names of all her classmates, and they all swarm her for hugs every morning when I drop her off.
When Thea gives hugs, she doesn’t use her arms. She just leans her head against the hug-ee and announces her intent by saying, “Huuuuuuug!”
Luke and I have a niece or nephew on the way! Few things bring me as much joy as seeing Thea with her cousins, and I couldn’t be more excited for her to meet her first younger cousin in the Fall.
These memes:
When Gemini jumps up on the counter, Thea runs over saying, “No Kitty! Down Kitty!” Gemini obliges the order and Thea rewards her with “Good Kitty” and “Huuuuuug!”
My talented husband with a photography hobby takes pictures like these:
I can’t help but laugh anytime I see little fingers reaching under the bathroom door:
We have no plans this weekend! With how busy things can seem, an unstructured weekend is often something to smile about.
To summarize all of the above – Life is just pretty damn good right now. I hope something in this post made you smile too. And I hope you don’t hesitate the next time you have a little happy thing to share. There can never be too many little happy things.
On a final note: Happy Father’s Day to all you dads out there!
