Throwback Thursday - June 21st

Welcome back to another weekly edition of Throwback Thursday where I look back at this day in my blog's history! You can click on the links to be transported back in time to read the different blog posts.

On this day in 2016 work had just begun on our new covered deck. We have loved that new deck so much and it has been a place of some of the best memories... I just wish my mom had been able to enjoy it longer. I feel her presence more on that deck than anywhere else in the house. She loved it so much. Since it's covered it's comfortable in all but the hottest days of the year. We had Cosette's 2nd birthday party out there... so this blog post makes me a little weepy, realizing that it's only been two years since they started rebuilding the porch... but happy that mom did get to enjoy it for awhile.

In 2015 it was a special "Reasons to Love" post but this time it was Reasons to Love Helen - my sister-in-law! It's been three years since that post and I could probably do a hundred reasons to love her now. We have the BEST text message chats! She posts the sweetest pictures of my nephew Finn! She is always concerned about how I'm doing and always asks about my kids and... we could not have chosen a better wife for Bryan. And now she's incubating another niece for me... quite possibly another red-headed niece... and I'm planning a visit to New York later this year to welcome the new Gant Princess!

I was really thinking deeply about our food choices in 2013 and what might be out there that really isn't good for us. I was also having a little trouble with the youngest kid and wondering when he'd step up to the plate (he has, trust me!) I was deep in the swamp with disability and all that fun stuff. Not my best post ever but it's good to see where I was on this day five years ago.

Oh goodness... what a mess was this time six years ago! Moving back down south... trying to sort Austin's situation out... not knowing if I was going to go back to work or end up filing for disability. It was just so much chaos. The important thing is that I survived it all! Moving in with my parents felt like the lowest of the lows at the time but of course, I didn't know then how little time my mom had left and how important it would be for me to be with her. I read this post now and think... Poor Heather just didn't have a clue. How different would we live our lives if we knew what lurked ahead? Lots. I'm telling you, we would live LOTS differently.

In 2011, I was blogging about Vacation Bible School and the pledges we used to make in the assembly every year. They don't do that any more... at least not around here... and I think it's important to learn those things. But it's more important to know why you believe what you believe. I'm still sorting that part out. When you pledge allegiance, what are you really saying?

I was back on the Weight Watchers bandwagon on this day in 2010 and was really encouraged about my food choices. We had also just recently been to the Fox to see the Little House on the Prairie musical, which was great fun! Somehow that particular day ended up being a double post day and I wrote about a customer who hit a bear with his car. You just never know what might happen here!

AND finally... in 2009 I was having a fabulous weekend watching old movies and staying indoors to beat the heat. I have a long history of hating Summer!

Hope you enjoyed this trip back in time on my blog! Happy Thursday!

Throwback Thursday - June 14

That awkward moment when Throwback Thursday becomes Flashback Friday... Wednesday night into Thursday became the worst headache I've had in a long time and I could not bear to even do something as simple as post a blog post that was already written. Boyfriend Brag Time: my guy gave me the most relaxing, amazing week(end) (which is actually most people's midweek but it's our weekend. It's complicated.) and took such wonderful care of me. If you've never been a single woman... or a woman married to a man who just doesn't give a rip what you're feeling like... which describes my entire adult life... you cannot imagine how lovely it feels just to have something as basic as, "can I bring you a cool compress for your head?" or to hear "I'm sorry you don't feel well" from someone who means it. He watched over me and let me sleep and made a superhuman effort to keep a quiet, cool space for me to be in so that I could be comfortable. It just melts my stone cold heart into a little babbling brook when he does these sweet things for me. He also fed me so that I didn't have to leave the house until time to go home. And I had to go home because there was this med that I've been missing, as described in my last blog post. I got home... called the pharmacy, they got it ready quickly and Austin hurried over to pick it up for me and although I have bit of a residual headache today, I'm so much better than yesterday!

So let's pick up where you were supposed to be yesterday with a review of blogs from YESTERDAY in blog history. I hope you enjoy!

It's that time of week where I look back to this day in past years on my blog and share a few clips and updates. Since 2017 and 2016 were a bit crazy... I'm going to start with this day in 2015. We had just returned from Connecticut (where we attended my brother's wedding, see Wedding Wednesday from last week if you missed the flashback). Cosy was here and melting my heart but Oliver was not yet here. I was looking forward to holding both babies at once and I have so many times since then... but what I wasn't prepared for, that has been the bigger joy for me, was their sweet interactions (and sometimes not so sweet) with each other. I never, ever, ever talk to Oliver that he doesn't ask me where Cosy is. Any time I say, "guess who is coming to play with you this week?" she immediately guesses Oliver. They might... possibly... who knows... be my only grandchildren and they might very likely be only children. I so very much want them to have each other to lean on! That's another thing about grandparenting... you find yourself focusing on helping your grandchildren foster relationships with other people who will be in their lives long after you are gone. Cosy is really attached to Austin's girlfriend, Jessie. I would be jealous every time Cosy asks me to let Jessie push the shopping cart instead of me... but then I think, if Jessie is involved in Cosy's life long term, I want Cosy to WANT to be around Jessie. I want her to be surrounded by people who love her and make her feel loved. This perspective helps me a lot in dealing with the fact that Oliver is so far away... he sees his other grandma and her mother and sister more than once a week and me just once a month, usually. As much as I wish I could see him more, I'm so glad that there are three other ladies loving him to pieces when I am not around!

In my blog post on this day in 2013, I talked about my thoughts about boys and girls (men and women) and their different perspectives in relationships. This was while I was in sort of an "I'm not ever doing that again" stage of life when it came to relationships but I still stand by what I said. If anything is different with this whole "later in life love" this time around, I'd say that it's taking my own advice of not trying to change him...

Girls fall in love with boys hoping they can change them.... boys fall in love with girls hoping they don't change a bit. And what happens? Guys do what they've always done and if they want to play video games from dark til dawn, they do. And girls get lazy, feeling unappreciated and... let themselves go. I've done it in every single relationship of my life. I've seen a guy as a rough draft that I can improve on... a fixer up, so to speak. And they see me as "move in ready" and expect things to stay perfect, with no attention from them. Relationships fail because we love people for who we want them to be, not for who they are.

If anything is different with this whole "later in life love" this time around, I'd say that it's taking my own advice of not trying to change him... just appreciating who he already is. I don't mean that we never have anything to gain, no opportunities to grow. I hope that I'm always going to learn new things throughout my life and I know he feels the same way. I'm talking about someone's fundamental personality and character traits not their knowledge and abilities.

On this day in 2012, I was getting ready to move back to Riverdale for (what I wasn't sure then would be) a short time and looking for gainful employment / trying to decide if I should go ahead and file for disability. When I look back to that period in time there was so much uncertainty in my life. I'm really glad that things are so much more stable now. Obviously, life can change in the blink of an eye but wow! that was a time of really big decisions. I moved to Riverdale in June and my parents bought a house in Cleveland in August. In the meantime I found a job in Fayetteville (near Riverdale for those who aren't local) and it was exactly what I needed to end my career with a little bit of self-esteem but also with the documentation that was crucial in getting my disability approved. Being able to attempt to work as little as an hour or two a day and not being able to do even that small amount of time consistently was key.

I really focused on finding humor in the situation back in  2011 as we were sort of figuring out that things were not going to get better. I read these posts in 2011 KNOWING that my house is about to get struck by lightning (literally) and I'm about to have to move and what little rest and comfort I had at the time (my home base) was going to be ripped out from under me. Of course, I also didn't know that I was going to find a cheaper, quieter place closer to work... and because of Renter's Insurance the move was going to be done by someone  other than me, including the packing. Yes, it was a real stressful situation at the time but it ended up ok. That's the important thing. It always ends up ok.

In 2010, I was getting back into Weight Watchers and did lose a good bit of weight before my back problems started and I had to get on meds that really don't allow me to lose weight. Even when I eat practically nothing for an extended period of time I don't lose. It would be great to have less weight to carry around but I'm not too stressed over it. I'm ok with me.

And that's all I have for this week! I hope you enjoyed this look back on today in my blog history. Happy Flag Day!