Shawn and I were married when I was 25 and he had just turned 27. Back home in small-town Oregon, many of my friends were already married by 25. But my friends outside of my hometown were somewhat scandalized. At some point during our engagement, I overheard one friend ask another, “how long have they […]
Holidays
Shawn’s Birthday, Part 2
As promised, I took the kids to the cemetery on their Dad’s birthday, which was Wednesday. I had no idea how it would go. They were at a tennis camp with my friend Christine’s two kids, and so when it came time to go, Christine decided that she’d come with her kids too. So we […]
Shawn’s Birthday
My kids always seem to have a knack of knowing when important dates are coming up. They are too young to use calendars, so they don’t usually recognize when something is about to happen. But somehow, in the past six months, they’ve known when a big event is on the horizon. Maybe that’s because I […]
Father’s Day
My anxiety around Father’s Day this year was out of control. I guess that’s to be expected, but I had a hard time focusing on the last few days of school because I was obsessed with what would happen on Sunday. It’s not like Father’s Day was this huge event in our house in previous […]
90s Party
When Claire was in kindergarten, Shawn and I teamed up with two other couples to throw a party to benefit our kids’ elementary school. Since that first time, the now-infamous 90s party has happened every spring at our house. This year would be no different, and part of that was because of Shawn. When he was […]
Mother’s Day
On Friday, Austin came home from first grade and announced he had made a card for me. He handed it over and I told him I’d put it away to open on Sunday. But the front of it was hilariously cute. On it, he’d written, “Happy!!! Mothers!!! Day!!! Mom!!!!” and drawn a stick-figure likeness of […]