I haven’t cried this much in years, and my eyes are huge. The stupid thing is that it was really my fault. And immediately after he walked out that door I felt like I had made the biggest mistake of my life. I took Jill to the groomers this morning, and when they asked for her last name, I burst into tears as I told them his. She must have thought I was completely batty.

I’ve had people say that they can see the issues between Cowboy and I. I guess what I created was my fault, and it’s my own monster. The stupid thing is, that most of the time when I had an issue with something, I didn’t speak up, and I just filled myself with resentment. Kept quiet, and resentful.

I feel as though I deserve to be treated with respect. Most of the time I got that, but at times – I felt trampled on. Does one deserve to be treated well most of the time? Or all of the time? I stopped giving him the time of day, and that wasn’t fair either.

All I can think of right now is coming home to an empty house, sleeping in an empty bed, cooking for one, and celebrating Christmas without him. It hurts more than I can imagine.

My house is quiet. Everytime my phone goes off I jump, hoping it’s him again. I just want him to come home.

A lot has happened in the last few months. Cowboy and I moved down about 10 blocks, into a townhome. 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, and a yard for Jill to hang out in. It’ll be nice to not have to take her for a full walk a couple times a day in the middle of winter. It’s especially nice to have a basement. We’ve set up a “man-cave” of sorts for Cowboy, and the other side is a hairdressing station for myself. In fact yesterday I went and picked up a hairdressing chair to replace the wood dining room chair. It just needs a screw put back in place and then good as new! I can’t wait to cut someone’s hair and be able to move them around again. Our second bedroom is just that – a second bedroom. It’s got a walk-in closet which is a perfect storage opportunity for all those clothes of mine that still don’t quite fit. We’re waiting to see if we can perhaps get an exchange student from the UofA for the school year, in which case they will move into that bedroom.

My mom got married July 17th. Everything was short and sweet. Ceremony, reception and cleanup was all complete in 3 and a 1/2 hours.  I really realized just how MUCH I missed the island and my family. I hadn’t seen my sister since September, except for an afternoon in May. I got to meet all of Kara’s work friends, and even give her a hand at the resort a bit. Everyone was just so fabulous and friendly. I spent most of my 2 week visit there catching up with everyone, and getting a ton of driving practice under my belt. Mom moved in with Duane the day after the wedding, and anyone who knows my Mom knows she is definitely the hoarder of hoarders. I gave her a hand packing a bit of her house and it was SO overwhelming. It’s funny how I had the messiest room as a kid, but the cleanest house of all the adults. My trip just flewwwwww by and I wish I could have spent more time with everyone, even though I was missing Cowboy.

So I came back to AB, and got to spend some time with friends before I went back to work completely. Sara had a BBQ at her place with her roommate Dave, and I ended up spending the night there. It was just so nice to spend time with people I really have fun with. It makes me wonder why I don’t do it more often. I told her the other day I really have to start seeing her more, and I mean it. I love shindigs at her place Soon when I have my car it will be MUCH easier. Kindof sucks that she lives the furthest possible neighbourhood away from mine.

Back to work it is. Although I’ve had a lot going on with work. I picked up a 2nd job at a liquor store between the lingerie store, and I’ve been working between 12 and 20 hours a week over there. I love it because it’s NOTHING like my day job, and the manager over there is super relaxed. It turns out he’s good friends with one of my favorite clients at the lingerie store, so the manager, and this couple and I are all getting together this Saturday for some dinner. I’m pretty excited about that. The other thing is that my boss at the lingerie store came back from AUS this week, and I’ve been pretty much a wreck. I’ve become increasingly frustrated with my position and been doing some job hunting.

AND I got a job!  AND it’s at a salon! So I start Sept 2nd, and that means I have to put in my notice at my other job. I feel pretty awful, considering she just lost her two night girls and just got back from AUS, but no time is really ever more convenient than the other. I have to let her know tomorrow and I’m feeling soooooo nervous. Today was a day off for me, so I went downtown, picked up my birth control, and popped over to the apprenticeship office to chat with them about how to proceed with AB licensing. Pretty much I have to file apprenticeship hours for the next year, submit my theory exam that I did in BC, and complete a practical exam and a provincial exam. It’s all so very exciting and I can’t WAIT to start working with hair again. Shampoo, scissors, hair product. Yum!  I love doing hair, clients back to back, and soon I’ll be back into the swing of things. *dances*

Well, thats my update for now. I’m just making caramel corn, and gyoza (a weird combination, I know). Toodles!

I often feel as though I’m trying to play catch up, or trying to clean up everyone’s mess. Quite often. In fact, more often than not.

Lately, I feel as though I cannot say no. Especially when it comes to Cowboy. When he comes to me asking for something new and exciting, it’s really hard for me to say no. Hockey, going out with the guys, beer for the house, truck parts we dont need, personal training, ice skates. You name it. Maybe I’m soft, but I feel like I can never say “Look, we can’t afford this”. Instead, I make room and sacrifice things myself in order to make sure he is accomodated and happy.

Once I get things in order, and the purchase has been made or planned for, all of a sudden three more things pop up and I don’t know what to do with myself.

I need some fucking balls.

So, I’m taking a leaf out of Thai’s book today and posting a recipe I tried out last night! My grandmother got me this cookbook for Christmas, called Christmas Gifts From the Kitchen. It’s actually really snazzy. It’s got all sorts of yummy recipes, as well as cool ways to wrap things, etc. This one was out of the section to make mixes to give away as wrapped gift. Remember those sand art brownies that school fairs used to sell? Like that. So what I did here with this recipe is just went ahead and did all the instructions together.

All-purpose flour    1 3/4 cups                                                                                                          

Sugar                            1/2 cup

Baking Soda                1 tsp

Brown Sugar, Packed 1/2 cup

White Chocolate Chips 1 cup ( now, I was out of white choc chips, so I used milk choc instead. still turned out great!)

Dried cranberries/craisins  1/2 cup

Beat 1/3 cup softened hard margerine (or butter), 2 eggs, and 1 tsp vanilla in large bowl until smooth. Mixture may look curdled. Now add all the dry ingredients listed above. Mix well.

Next I’m told to drop 2 tsp, 1 inch apart on a greased cookie sheet. The mixture ended up a bit dry it seemed, but I molded ball-ish shapes together, probably 3/4 the size of a golfball and plunked them on my cookie sheet (probably about 3 across and 4 or 5 long).

Bake at 375 degrees Celsius  for 6-8 minutes until golden. (In my oven 7.5 made them perrrfeecctttt, but people’s ovens are different, so I’m told) My recipe made about 3 or 4 pans of them. I can’t remember very well.

1 cookie: 58 calories, 2.2g total fat, 0.8g salt, 8 mg cholesterol, 9g Carbs, trace fiber, 1g protien, 40 mg sodium  <—– not that most of us cookie makers really care THAT much, teehee!

All in all, they went over wonderfully. I brought out 8 or so on a plate for Cowboy and a friend of his for guinea pig purposes, and when I looked back I saw one left. I also gave another baggie of them to a mutual friend of ours and later on I got a text message: “Best cookies on the face of the fucking earth. No joke”.

 It seems baking does wonders for a woman’s ego

Last year my Mom got engaged. I don’t recall if I ever really chatted about the circumstances of their engagement, but now seems a bit of an appropriate time to bring it up. See, the thing is: His kids are CRAZY. Seriously, crazy, somewhat deranged, and a little… to be honest with you? Stupid. They’re quite a bit younger than me, I believe at 13 and 15. My Mom’s fiance, Duane, lives out in Cedar/Yellowpoint area, and it’s a bit of a trip out there. At any rate, my Mom told me that she didn’t want to have the stepmom issue to deal with, and she hasnt moved in with her hubby-to-be because one of his kids smokes quite a bit of weed. Since he’s up and taken off, it seems like things over with her have gotten easier.  They hadnt set a date until just this month. It seems that his boss’ wife had passed away rather suddenly, and it got him thinking/worrying about my Mom. I’m glad I’m not the only one who worries about her.

Anyways, their wedding date is set for this July, the day after their 3rd year anniversary. Mom tells me they’ll be getting married in a park and having a potluck, and she doesnt know if she’ll even wear white or send out invitations to begin with. “I’m getting married here at this time,” she quoted to me, “you can come and bring some friends if you like”. I love how nonchalant she was about the whole thing, it’s really cute. 

I’m really excited for this whole year. Things will hopefully be looking up financially, and my Mom is getting married! Her wedding date happened to fall when a few of us had been planning on coming out to the island. Cowboy, Joebob, and I are camping our way out to the island, around the island, and back. Now with this whole wedding thing, I believe I may branch off from the boys for a few days in advance to hang out with my family and help them all prep.

On the other hand, now that Cowboy is back at work, I’m waiting impatiently for his pay to even back out. I watched another episode today of “Till Debt to Us Part”. I watched it quite a bit before he went to school and picked up some tips about money saving, and budget making. So today after I watched the current episode, I ran over to Gail Vaz-Oxlade’s blog - she’s the host. All sorts of wonderful articles and gadgets to make budgets, set up a debt repayment schedule (it calculates how long it will take to get out of debt), and other snazzy things.  I love finding cool things like that; However it scared the crap out of me. I’ve been aware that Cowboy and I aren’t doing very well financially due to a lot of things, mostly of which has been him going back to school. But to see it all compiled together is scarrrryyyy. It’s going to take a lot of giving things up to get us out of the whole that we’ve dug and where we want to be.

I’m beginning to go through my priorities about “stuff”. Things that I could not live without, and things that I would be willing to sacrifice in order to have my “can’t live withouts”. Someone I saw posted on a blog. She talked about how she pays a cleaning lady $45 a week to come in and tidy, and that is worth living without extra stress as well as coming home to a clean home. However that means she is willing to sacrifice fancy shoes and $5 coffee daily, etc. It’s all a matter of what you’re willing to give up for your must haves. I’m all gung-ho for this. The thing is… is Cowboy willing to sacrifice some of those same things with me? Lets say eating out. Is he willing to sacrifice that in order to have more money to put down on a house? It sucks when all you want is pizza/chinese food/amazing steak, but is a house worth more than a piece of pizza?  We’re going to sit down this week and have a chat about it.  I’m learning that we can’t just start to have important conversations all of a sudden, because if either of us is grumpy or pissy or anything else, it’ll turn out horribly. I made a date for a chat this week with him. Hopefully our discussion goes well.

My Mom is FINALLY coming to visit with me in April. I’m excited to organize our spare room/office/library/extra space for her to sleep in for the week she’ll be staying here. I’m going to be so happy to show her places I’ve told her about, and to meet Jill, my little one-eyed wonder. I have this weird feeling that I’ve been noticing though. It comes up whenever I think of seeing my family and I know it’s not very sensible. But I always have this feeling like I need to show them I’ve done well, that I AM doing well, and I really really want them to be proud of the person I’ve become. I always feel like I have to prove myself to them. It’s silly, I know. My mom told me for the first time this Christmas that she was proud of me, and I damn near cried. I hope when she gets here she is as well.

I’m watching Cowboy and Jill play on the floor with her bone. She’s just gotten too tuckered out and is snuggled right into his side, watching a Val Kilmer movie. I think I’d better get in on some of that snuggle action.

I suppose I could say that I’m still learning about myself.  More and more since leaving the nest that is Nanaimo, Im discovering things that I didnt think meant much to me, but really do. I’m figuring out what parts of me I miss, and what parts of me I’m glad that I’ve found.

My friend Mike sent me a message today. He said ” I miss you. We need to talk sometime! I feel really detached from you and it makes me sad =( Hope you’re still doing well! ♥”.  It kindof took me aback, and made me think a bit. I have been feeling REALLY detached from everyone who isnt directly in front of me. I’m getting to be horrible at returning phone calls and emails. The last couple nights Cowboy has been out, so Ive just been sitting on facebook, zoned out on the tv, taking baths, etc, and I’ve gotten to have chats with people back in Nanaimo who are missing me something awful. It makes my heart sore to think of how many people I’ve left behind.

To be honest, If I could take everyone I love from Nanaimo and plunk them in Edmonton, it would be perfect. I’ve began to fall in love with this city I call home now. I love this small town in a big city feel. I love the quirky shops on Whyte Ave. I love walking to work all bundled up with my cute white cap on, wrapped up in a scarf. I always know theres a fresh coffee waiting for me when I get there. What I miss about my hometown however, is coffee trips with Mike where I always had a green tea latte instead of a coffee. I miss walking the waterfront with Dayne, I miss Rock Band parties at my sister’s place. I miss quilting with my mom and crafting with Kara. I miss the Christmas panto at the Bailey Studio. I miss visiting my chiropractor who drove the old VW bug, I miss spending hours at a time at the piercing studio because I knew my piercers so well.

Speaking of piercings, Im really missing all my old piercings. I miss my nip ones, and really my microdermals as well. Cowboy and I went to the peelers on Friday with a bunch of guys from his apprenticeship class, and one of them had breasts very similar to how mine looked pre-surgery. Her nipples were pierced and it realllllyy made me miss mine. Now that I’m all healed up I’m looking into getting them both redone – in the hopes that sensitivity will come back even an eeensy weeensy bit. I miss feeling sexy with my breasts, and I miss feeling them in general. A friend of mine had hers done about 10 years ago, and she claims her feeling came back, but no such luck with mine this far. Im wondering if getting re-pierced will help me claim back some of my sexuality, and perhaps a bit of sensation.

Cowboy is going back to work after a short break for his schooling. He goes to NAIT for two months out of the year for his apprenticeship, and so going back to school is going to help things a lot. I couldnt believe how stressed out I’ve been for the last few months. Now that this period is soon over, I can’t wait to get back on track. I guess wintertime just isnt for me. Now that it’s warming up an eensy bit, maybe our luck is improving. Just maybe.

Im watching the series Re-Vamped on Slice right now. Its really opening my eyes to a few things. If you’ve never seen it or a preview of it before, you should definitely check it out. Basically, a bunch of women who have been “scorned” by men come together to “re-vamp” themselves – discover their sexuality, who they really are, and gain back some confidence/self-esteem. They learn burlesque dance, train with a trainer, and do a series of challenges and workshops to help them emotionally.

This is one of the first episodes. I tuned in close to the end and now with repeats on I am watching it again to see a bit of it from the start. But, man.. this show is emotional. I was almost at a loss for words regarding how much these women can make a viewer feel so strongly. These women are relearning trust, finding out what kind of person they really are without depending on a partner, and pretty much kicking ass showing everyone how much of a diva they can be.  I just watched an exercise that really hit home with me. Each woman had to stand up in front of everyone in the group, and say anything that they would want to imagining their ex in the  room. I watched women question “why?”, I watched women scream out in anger and frustration, and I watched a couple others still shy and scared, mumble out a few words.

Another was a sequence in which the hosts asked each woman to burn something that was a memory for them. It was all about how we gals keep emotional baggage in the form of cards, letters, his t-shirt, emails, and all that other sappy shit. One put her diary in, another, her favorite photo of the two of them. One picked up her wedding memories box, and pulled things out, before tipping the whole thing upside down and chucking the box in altogether. One really hit me. She stood up, and held up her hand in which was a garter. “This is the garter from my wedding night. I’m throwing it in, because obviously marriage doesn’t mean anything anyways”. Tearing up, she threw it in and walked away.

So what is marriage, anyways? I mean, Im all for it. I’m dying to get married. But really…what is it? A lot of marriages dont mean anything though. And its funny to actually think about it anyways.

I find it difficult to make up my mind sometimes. I mentioned in my post yesterday how I feel stuck in two places of my life.

I’ve discovered that a lot of people in my life are having babies. A lot of people in my age range. Often this seems a little confusing. You see, my sister is nine years older than I am. She got married in October 2008, and has been wishing and wanting for a child for a few years now. She’s frequently asked when her and her husband are going to have children, and I can see how much she wants to have one. During our chats she often tells me that they aren’t financially ready, and I can really tell that it kills her. My sister just turned 28, and sometimes I wonder if she’s panicking about perhaps having children too late in her life.  It seems odd to me that so many women my age are having children and just giddy about it, and here my sister is almost a generation older – and childless.

Back when people lived to what we call middle-aged and were considered elderly, women got married at 13 or 14. To us nowadays, that would be considered ridiculous. But the body is made to reproduce. That’s why when puberty hits it’s nature yelling at you to make babies. Now, I’m not condoning being sexually active at a very young age. But what I’m getting at here is that it’s no surprise people my age are having babies. My sister and I call it “baby fever” – different spurts of time in which you just crave having children. All you want is a baby. And you see babies everywhere. I’m going through baby fever. My sister is going through baby fever. Half the people I know are going through it.

This year I’ve been thinking of all the things I want to accomplish. Things I want Cowboy and I to accomplish together. The problem is that I can’t figure it all out. So many things I want to happen say.. in the next one or two years. Realistically I know that all the things I want to happen are not going to happen in the next year or so. Some things are three, four, five years away and I am impatient. What sucks is that a lot of what’s holding us back is money. I’ve read a lot of blogs over the Christmas holidays, and I found one a new husband wrote about his quest to save up a down payment for a home. One of his suggestions was to give up EVERYTHING  you don’t need, as well as pick up a weekend job – putting everything you earn with the 2nd job into savings. It makes a lot of sense, but I have a really hard time denying Cowboy things. Which is probably why he plays hockey year round, and got a new vehicle. One of my major sources of stress is trying to find the money to pay for his hockey leagues (summer and winter), and I know it wouldn’t be pretty for that to have to be something he gave up.

I guess what I’m saying here is that I’m trying to be patient. We have a lot of time together and ahead of us, and I know the things we want to accomplish will happen eventually. Any suggestions on how keep a little more patient?

For some reason WordPress saved my last entry as a draft instead of publishing it. Although it’s not a very good excuse, considering even the unposted entry was quite some time ago.

I’ve  been keeping really busy lately. Cowboy is back in school for his usual 2 months out of the year, and I’ve been working six days a week to try and make up some of the difference, financially speaking. I got a new job, at a lingerie/”sexy living” type store. It’s called Alluring Intimates. I’m really loving it there. My boss is kooky and sometimes a little more on the strange than funny side of the line, but all in all I really enjoy it. Three quarters of the store is lingerie – mostly corsets, and there is a smaller section dedicated to sex toys, educational books and dvds, and all sorts of neat little odds and ends.

I’ve been finding that my job is helping me balance out my life. Thai and I used to talk about sexy times, and it was something that I really was thankful for – an outlet in which to talk about things that most people wouldn’t dare bring up. She was always great for that. Nothing was ever really too much information for either of us. Now that she’s married and has a baby, she doesn’t really have a whole lot of time. Not to mention I know sometimes she’s still a little wary, and this new family she has become a part of is really a little more.. ‘proper’ I suppose. I couldn’t imagine censoring myself so much – I have trouble sometimes as is! At any rate, now at work I can let loose a little more. Work is the place that I get my “sexy time” talk. Not that I talk so much about my personal sex life, but it still helps a bit, you know? I’m meeting all sorts of people, and some I’m really glad that they have come into my life. I’m finally working somewhere that I really enjoy it, I’m way less stressed, and the hours aren’t crazy unless I ask them to be.

Christmas felt really different this year. Maybe it was not being with my family, or maybe it was getting adjusted to being around big families on holidays. I remember silly little traditions, like every Christmas Eve opening pajama’s my mom had made us, or snowball cookies my grandmother made, and how we would just hang out at one house all day - no rushing around. Here, Cowboy and I opened gifts at our house, and then went to his parents to do more. Then over to the Katzenback’s house, and then back to his parents. I felt odd opening gifts with everyone. Very odd. When I was younger and living in Nanaimo, we would hand out everything, and everyone would take turns opening a gift at a time. Everyone watched, and everyone was much more appreciative. Here, I found that everyone tore open their presents, barely glancing at the card. Everyone all at once. I didnt even know what was from who or even who to thank after Cowboy had opened some presents for the two of us. When I looked over to see how someone had liked their gift, it had been cast aside for the next ribbon covered box. It all seems very confusing. I’m not sure if I liked it or not. I’m not even sure if I like the whole idea of gift getting in the first place. I sortof wish it was a little more about family to everyone.

All in all, I’m feeling a little content with how life is going ,and still somewhat weirded out. I feel stuck in the middle of two stages: one part of me is loving Cowboy, Jill, and I being a happy little family. I look around and realize how much life I have ahead of me and the freedom I have and I know I will not have forever. The other part of me is screaming at myself to get married and pop out oodles of gorgeous babies. I feel as though I want to get settled, and have my children early so that I’ll still have lots of spunk and energy once they’re big and moved out. The lady who owns the store I work at, her daughter just had a baby a few days after Thai did. Baby Brooklyn is often in the store while her Mommy runs some errands in the west end. Some days I love her and can’t get enough of holding her, kissing her, feeding her, burping her, changing her, rocking her…. you name it, and I love doing it. Others I look at her and think to myself… woah. I’m so not ready to have a baby. I have lots of time and I know I’m not letting myself think about that part enough.

Anyways.. signing off for now. It’s bedtime!

Today is Remembrance Day. I did my best to pay my respects throughout, although my work pretty well managed to spoil that. For some reason my manager decided to call AT 11, which is completely disrespectful. Nonetheless, today was a bit eventful.

After quite a few rude and disrespectful phone calls, V and I decided that we were going to leave her letters and inform her we would not be in for any more shifts. It wasn’t so bad on my end, because I only had two shifts left, but she hasnt given any two weeks. Anyways Im really happy she’s getting out of there too. I have to go in to drop off my keys at some point but I dont want to give it to her… it’s just something my mind can’t handle. Hopefully I can drop it off to another coworker or something.

On a more pleasant note, I got another job! Im starting work at a love boutique on Monday. Its a bit of a smaller, more tasteful shop (more lingerie, and less toys, all of which are in cabinets). A woman owns it, helped a bit by her husband, but she’s so bubbly and energetic that it’s just fantastic. Im really glad that I got this position, and even more glad that I dont have to panic over not having a job after finishing at La Senza. It will be really interesting learning about sizing corsets, and meeting all sorts of quirky people! The store is also only open in the evenings on Thursdays and Fridays, and I was given the impression I wouldnt work evenings or weekends anyways, which is awesome. Gives me some more time to go to the gym.

The gym is actually going really well! I’ve been going 2 or 3 times a week, and I’m even all the way up to doing 9 boy pushups. The next couple days after my big workout really suck, but at least I know it’s working. Im feeling a little stronger already, and my cardio has really been improving (Im up to a half hour!). I weighed myself and I’ve lost 5 pounds, which is exciting and really a motivator. Cowboy’s sister has been coming with me, and she lost 7 when she weighed herself. I’m so excited about her and I getting healthy!

A trainer there let us know about this wicked awesome snack to have too ( And Shapeofagirl, you will love this!). It`s a caramel rice cake, with peanut butter spread on top, and sliced bananas on top of that. It`s soooo good!

I’m feeling more and more comfortable with the place that I call home: Edmonton. It’s great to know where Im going and how to get here, and even better to know more people and go out with people who are MY friends. I love not feeling like I have to lean on Cowboy because I dont know anyone.