A very warm hello to you all! I had thought at the beginning of the year that I would cut back to one update for every couple of months. But when I sit down and try to think back to early February and March I can hardly remember what happened! It all seems so long ago. I'm trying to clear the cobwebs as best I can, but I've decided not to strain my brain and just go back to writing one every month. Consider yourself forewarned!

Ethan and I took a trip to visit Karen and Jackson Stump in February. It was part missing Karen and part yearning for some warmer weather so I just called her up and invited myself down. We both mentioned it - that we weren't really close friends before. But we're bonded now! It was such a good time and nice to have another mom around to talk about baby stuff. The best moments, the horrible moments. You know, the stuff you just can't share in the same way with someone who hasn't been through it. We went to the beach, the kid's museum, the park to feed the geese, and watched every Disney Pixar movie Karen owned when it decided to monsoon on Saturday. Oh, and Karen made me promise that I'd tell you I LOST our NO SARCASM contest by multiple points; The day we went to the beach I suggested that we give up sarcasm for a whole day and I lost miserably. I guess she just brings it out in me! Florida wrap-up: so besides the fact that Ethan made it his mission to see how many heart attacks he could give me (including taking a HUGE bite out of a bar of soap, a face plant on the floor that made his tooth bleed, etc...) and the fact that Jackson was SOOOO ready for us to go home by the last day and an attack by killer seagulls at the beach, it was a totally positive experience. So much so that I've decided to make it an annual event! P.S. You can see all the pictures at Florida scrapbook

In other quickie news, I turned 33 on March 6th. I ate a LOT of really good seafood and was well celebrated. I started woodshop class and am building a chess board and all its pieces. Hopefully I'll have it done by the time Ethan's ready to learn to play. I attended a Habitat for Humanity orientation and am standing by the phone, hammer in hand. They will hopefully have something for us to build by May. I've been board gaming like a wild woman!! It's such a good outlet for me and I am getting a lot of practice at being a good loser. I also have the Parents Without Partners orientation on my calendar for April. I'm really looking forward to seeing what the organization has to offer and will scoop you on all the details next month.

Ethan continues to amaze me and I'm delighted by the stuff he's into. I almost feel like I've been let into the secret world of a mad scientist! He does all kinds of experiments. He's currently fascinated with having me drop scraps of different kinds of paper of different sizes from the ceiling. He watches very closely every time, claps and requests more. He also does experiments with substances acting on objects. His current favorite is spit on body parts. I can only imagine what his experimentation log would look like:

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4/8/2003 Substance: Spit
This viscous substance continues to amaze me. I seem to be able to produce it at will! If applied to my belly, it slowly makes its way downward. The velocity is somewhat increased if a fresh layer of lotion has just been applied. Others don't seem to appreciate the wonder of spit on their body parts with the exception of the belly. However, it must be applied with buzzing lips. Laughing always follows. Strange how delivery seems to make the difference. Is it not the same substance, regardless of the means of distribution? I must continue with my observations. Tomorrow I'm planning the belly experiment with the cat. I'll let you know how it turns out.
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Ethan still has four teeth with another slowly, painfully on the way. Still, it's amazing what kind of damage he can do at the dinner table with just biting teeth! I give him just about everything we eat with the exception of things like raw carrots. He likes just about everything and even more so if it's "with cheese". He's sleeping through the night almost all the time and still takes two deliciously long naps during the day. Could it be that all that perpetual motion wears him out? Nah!! Ethan continues to develop his language skills. He is able to communicate roughly 35 things from body parts to people to animals. I'm trying to teach him how to let me know when he needs something, like a new diaper or something to eat but he just isn't interested. He'd much rather learn to talk about the "good" stuff like bananas and cats. One interesting twist is that the word Mama has been transformed in Ethan's vocabulary. Roughly translated, I believe it means "adult that I like". He calls me Mama, both his grandmas Mama and his play class teacher, Jeff! It's a riot seeing him run after Jeff saying "Mama"! Although it's an odd development, I'm happy to share my title with such distinguished company. :)

I've been putting off writing this month's update. I find it very easy to write when things are going great and I have lots of good news and enthusiasm to share. However, it's much harder to be honest when I'm struggling as I am now. As some of you know, my divorce was fast. Really fast. Like over in three weeks fast. Right after that I moved home to live with my parents and spent the next 7 months on the rollercoaster they call pregnancy. I gave birth and spent last year learning how to be a mom. At long last, life has just started to approximate normal again. Whew! Now that I finally have a little left over energy, all the emotions that I just didn't have the time to deal with before have started making their way to the surface. And man, are they kickin' my butt. I've made a decision to go get help and, not surprisingly, that has made it all worse. It's almost like taking action in that direction has given the emotional floodgates permission to open wide.

However, I've learned two very important lessons in the last couple of years. The most important is that I can't do it alone. So I am requesting your thoughts, prayers and words of encouragement. There is nothing that means more to me than the support of family and friends and I could really use some. The other thing I have learned is that I'm a very strong woman and will see the other side of this. I mean, if I can make it through the actual events I can surely make it through their processing! I know that I'm at the beginning of a whole new (albeit totally unknown) life for myself. I have no idea what the future holds, but I believe that the best is yet to come.