Just The Two of Us

60 Years of Delight

Here's an interesting little tid-bit of information... Did you know that RW's parents and my parents got married on the exact same day of the exact same month of the exact same year?  June 29, 1951 - 60 years ago today. 

RW sometimes contests it when I say that our parents got married on the same day, because his parents actually tied the knot in Australia, which is clearly one day ahead of MN, where my parents got married.  International Date Line not withstanding, both of their marriage licenses say June 29, 1951.

Hazel & S.D (true name, long story) 
Weren't they a good-looking couple?  I grieve that I never met RW's dad.

Bonnie & Gordy

 

So to Hazel & S.D - I am so very thankful that you got married on that day so long ago, because without your union, I wouldn't have my husband, or the best sisters-in-law one can have.

And to Mom & Dad, Happy 60th Anniversary!  I love you two so very much.  Thanks for being such a great example of a long, loving, and enduring marriage.

Cracked Up

When one of our team members at work has the unfortunate duty of working on her birthday, I try to ease the pain a bit by making cupcakes.  You know.. fun cupcakes.

These ones were for Michelle - she lives on a hobby farm and is surrounded by all sorts of chickens and animals...

 
 
No really - I promise they are cupcakes..  For the intensely curious, they are mini-cupcakes, frosted with vanilla frosting, topped with lemon curd, and white chocolate "shells".  And let me stop you now before you start extolling my creativity - they weren't my idea, they came from one of my cupcake books.

One look at the finished product and we all cracked up, which to be perfectly honest, was the goal.  Sweet success.

Stoned

They say (and who, exactly, is they?  I've always wanted to know.) that there is nothing as painful as giving birth or kidney stones.  Unless it happens to be giving birth AND kidney stones - now I would imagine that to be quite painful.  Sort of in the category of beyond pain, if there were such a thing.  Seeing as I've never given birth, I can't really talk about that, but I do have experience with kidney stones, and I know that they are oh so fun.

I had 2 or 3 bouts with kidney stones 8 years ago, so when I was brutally awakened one night with lower back pain, I knew I was headed for the Dante's Inferno equivalent of pain. Can I just mention that I seem to be overcome with kidney stones at the most inconvenient of times. Granted, I'm not exactly sure what would be a convenient time for a kidney stone, but I have particular bad timing in this area. 

The first time it happened, RW's 2 cousins and 2 of their kids had come to visit us.  Trust me on this, one doesn't get many visitors willing to leave the land of fruits and nuts (that would be California, for the uninformed) to come visiting in weather-neurotic Minnesota, so one really doesn't wish to squander that opportunity when it arrives.  Be that as it may, it didn't stop me from keeling over in pain, pacing the floor on tip-toe (wouldn't want to wake the guests), and eventually giving in to RW's increasingly insistent suggestion that this type of pain is not normal, and perhaps he needs to drive me to the Emergency Dept.  So as quietly as we could (as quiet as one can be when they feel like a cannon ball is shooting into their kidney, sucking out every form of sanity one has ever possessed), these hosts left our guests home alone for the night.

Fast-forward to another very... inopportune time for kidney stones.  RW and I were about 1 week into our annual 2-week camping trip to the Black Hills.  Did you catch that?  Camping trip.  We went to bed, and about an hour later, something woke me up.  This time Dante was knocking at our tent door (zipper?), yanking me back into his Inferno of Pain, and making it worse was that it was a 30 minute drive to the closest Emergency Room.  Unfortunately for me, it was just that.  An Emergency Room.  One room, 2 beds, and a doctor they had to call in from home.  Apparently this wasn't exactly the big city.

However all's well that ends well (so they say), and a couple of hours later I was blissfully in that netherland of morphine and demoral, catapulting me back up to earth (well, and let's face it - possibly beyond.)

The next day I uh... passed... a positively gargantuan kidney stone - really, it was almost the size of a walnut (can you imagine now why they hurt?)

 
.. I did say almost. 

 

Thirty-Something

This year marks a big birthday for me, one that ends in a zero... And starts with a 4. And for those who don't know us that well, RW is a few years older than me. Like 16 years older than me. But enough about me...

A few weeks ago, this conversation occurred:

ME: "you know, I have a big birthday this year..."

RW: "Your birthday is going to be waaaayy harder on me than it is on you!"

ME: "How do you figure?"

RW: "It's traumatic because I won't be able to say I'm married to someone in their 30's anymore"

...incredulous stare...

Oh he's just so funny, isn't he?"

Rustling Up Some Conflict

Summertime has finally arrived here in MN, and for RW and I, that means camping season.  Although we have friends that think we are certifiably crazy for tent camping, we like it.  Particularly since our tent is larger than our master bedroom:

 
Considerably larger.  

There is one thing about tent camping that creates... dis-unity amongst the two of us - noise.  I am of the opinion that if you are in your tent, approximately 8 feet away from someone else in their tent, you ought to keep the decibel level down.  Granted, RW and I have differing definitions of noise.  In my (clearly correct) opinion, if it is past 10p and I can hear you talking to me without trying to read your lips and strain my head in your direction, you are too loud.  RW, on the other hand, does not suffer from that particular angst:

ME: [being oh-so-whispery quiet] "Babe - can you hand me that flashlight?"

RW: [oh-so-NORMAL voice, just to counter-act my whispery quiet voice] "SURE BABE."

ME: "ssshhhhhhh! It's quiet hours!"

RW: [now considerably LOUDER than normal] "PLEASE.  DO NOT SHUSH ME."

And thus the vicious cycle begins.

RW just may be bearing the brunt of one of my childhood traumas.  I starting camping as a young kid, along with my 9 siblings, parents, and whoever else straggled along for the adventure.  I have to hand it to my folks - I mean isn't it hard enough to keep a family of 12+ functioning at home, much less.. camping?  However, my parents were NOT ones to break with family rites, even when camping, and one of those rites was Family Devotions.  Enter aforementioned childhood trauma.

Imagine 12 or so people camping together at a state park.  To be precise, Bearhead State Park.  Imagine the rest of the state also camping at this state park.  Ok, maybe not the entire state, but certainly enough people to fill up the campground.  Now imagine... Family Devotions.  Now, if you aren't one of the lucky ones to a) be part of my family, or b) a friend of the family who occasionally spent the night with us and experienced it yourself, you may not exactly understand what Family Devotions entailed.

The first part of Family Devotions was singing.  Singing hymns.  We sang straight through that hymnal, 5 hymns a day, through the months, year after year after year.  If it was August, but happened to be in the Christmas section of the hymnal, Christmas carols it would be.  Are you starting to get my drift? We all gathered around the firepit and started singing our hymns.  At a campground.  In the morning.  Just in case you need a visual:

 
Can you see why I just might shush RW?  Can you see why he may need to perhaps... show his wife some grace? 

And for the record, I can't tell you how happy I am that Sun Chips finally stopped punishing the world with their infamous "compostable" bags.  Because when that other guy in the tent 8 feet away from you wakes up your husband with his thunderous snores, nothing says "quiet hours" more than a pre-breakfast snack of Sun Chips in a compostable bag. 

To Love, Honor, and.. Obey?

Last month RW and I were at the airport, waiting to catch a flight to California for our nephew Landon's wedding.  This got us talking about weddings, which then led to a conversation about the royal wedding.  You remember the one?  The one that just occurred a couple of months ago.  The one where 1/2 of our country dragged themselves out of bed at 4am to watch, but only 1/8 of our country could admit to it.  Yes, that one.

I was telling RW that even my mom got up early to watch it (which seemed like an "un-Bonnie" thing to do, but I suppose that just goes to show that surprises never end, or as my sister would say.. "wonders never cease."  Exactly.)  I then went on to say that she really liked the ceremony itself, which got RW animated.  Who knew that a conversational topic of  weddings could get RW to perk up!  Perhaps it was a better topic to focus on than the gate agent's announcement of "mechanical difficulties on our aircraft." 

As we were herded to another gate, 3 or 4 acres away, one with a working aircraft attached to it, we had this conversation:

RW:  "Well.  I heard that they didn't include the vow to OBEY in their ceremony."

ME:  "So?"

RW: "It's traditional.  I think that every proper wedding should include it." [he smirks]

ME: "Ours didn't."

RW: [long, silent pause] "Clearly not.  I didn't want you to perjure yourself."

Good thinking, RDub... good thinking.  And I'm so glad to know that you had my best interests in mind!

Feeling the Heat

Have you ever had that experience - that one where you need to say something to someone, let's say a friend... but you don't, and then it's awkward?  And because it's awkward, you avoid talking to that person because you didn't say that thing you needed to say in the first place?  And before you know it, 3 or 4 or 6 months have gone by, and every day you think "I really need to talk to that person", but because you've waited so long, you dread it, because now you need to explain yourself on TOP of saying that thing you needed to say a long time ago?  Yeah - that experience. 

I'm guessing we've all been there at some point.  Which is why I'm sure you'll be so uh.. gracious... to me now that I'm BACK.  Yes, I know i haven't talked to you in ages, but I'm here now.  I'm going with that. Not to mention that in the past 2 weeks I've taken serious heat from a couple of my cousins about the fact that I haven't posted since.. January.

Since I'm so sure I've been forgiven by you all, let's move on... to a different type of heat.  This year in Minnesota we had the spring that.. wasn't.  It was, for all intents and purposes, a spring that really was like winter.  Now I understand that we Minnesotans are a hardy crew, but I'm going to let you in on a well-kept Minnesota secret.  We live here in the winter strictly for bragging rights to the rest of the country (well, that and maybe our jobs and family, too).  But the bragging rights make it bearable.  Once it gets back up into the 30s and 40s on a regular basis, bragging rights are gone along with our tolerance of winter.  We want summer.  Immediately.

This year, although the calendar said April, then May, the weather said March.  And March, and oh! March again.  RW and I were glad we were going to California for 2 weeks in May, just to get some warmth.  Alas (how come no one uses that word anymore?), we took the Minnesota weather with us, clinging to us like mold clings to Saran Wrap (umm, not that I would know that.  Seriously.) So imagine our surprise when into the upcoming forcast pops a warm day.  As it turns out, very warm.  Record-breaking 103 degrees warm.  We had a 50 degree swing in a 24-hour period.  Welcome to our madness.

You may take a gander back in time (surely I've discussed this before?) and think about our house, built 105 years ago.  The house that was built without the foresight of central air.  Please.  They could have at least set up some anti-insulation system in our walls in 1906, right?  Some sort of sawdust and ice block process?   I'm sure that wouldn't cause any type of mold problem once those ice blocks melt in about.. oh... 15 minutes or so.  Anyway, the wild temperature swing caught us unaware, and we had yet to install our window air-conditioners.  Notice I said "we".  That may be an exaggeration, as let's face it - I've never, ever installed an air-conditioner.   However, RW has, and since the preacher declared us "one" 13 years ago, I feel it's my right to use "we" in such situations where I did not one iota of the work involved.  It's a perk of marriage.

So it's 103 degrees outside, surely with trees almost as old as the house throwing their long shadows over our roof, it has got to be cooler inside, right?  You be the judge:

 

For the record, this was in our bedroom.  And also for the record, RDub was installing the air-conditioner in there as I took the picture, so life wasn't really that hard.  I mean, it got down to 87 before we went to bed.  Bonus.  And as for the blog?  Pull out your sawdust and ice blocks because things are finally heating up again.