Wittle bitty kitty love.

Guess what we did yesterday? I'll give you a hint.

Right? We bought a kitty. I'm not sure if it was the emotional celebratory high we were on from da boi's birday, whether someone slipped us some NZT and we were suddenly thinking of things we never would have thought of before, or whether we just plumb lost our little minds, but we did it. She is a DOLL and so playful and loving and gives little kisses and we adore her.

Now let's talk about our home. We sleep on the floor. In the main living area. We're not only the type of people to dust our baseboards every couple months - at the first sight of a scuff we pull out the white paint and a mini paintbrush and fix all the lines while we're at it. Everything is out of place upstairs, so much so that we have to keep crocheted pool stick covers on the end of our pool sticks to avoid scratches and bumps. We sleep on the floor. In the main living area. We have a big cement hole in our back yard surrounded by a ridiculous assortment of piping and coping and other such construction-type-thingies [official term]. Also we sleep on the floor. In the main living area.

WE DIDN'T THINK THIS ONE THROUGH, PEOPLE.

About two hours into her non-stop meowing and pouncing after we laid down to [try to] sleep last night, we realized this probably wasn't the best spontaneous move we've ever made. It's axiomatic that buying a kitty is near as much of a life-altering-commitment as having a baby and guess what people? We don't have a baby yet, for a reason.

So, tomorrow shall bring the finding of a new happy home for the little one. Somewhere that people will be able to let her roam free and enjoy spending [every waking] moment after moment entertaining her cute little rambunctious self.

In the meantime.

Today I love that cute little lady! I love watching her roll around at my feet while I'm doing the dishes. I love watching Levi cuddle up next to her and play with her so gently. I love that she'll come hunker down right in between our heads while we we're watching TV and watch right along with us. I love that she chases yarn balls and rolling mice toys and fingers. I love having her scurry at my heels while I'm walking from room to room. I love her cute little striped cheeks and her bright blue eyes. And yet, I still mostly just love Levi and I's quiet life together right now and I LOVE that we're equally excited to get back to good ol' us time!

The BIRTHDAY Boi.

Please welcome the studliest, most determined, ever so accomplished, most DROP DEAD GORGEOUS, seriously intuitive, understanding and devoted BABE of a man into the land of the 30s.
[Drumroll Please.]
[Redoble, por favor.]

LEVI CHELL ROBERTS.

Oops, sorry girls. Let's try this again...

LEVI CHELL ROBERTS!

Oh, my BAD again! I could swear his face was in one of these...Last try now...

The One, The ONLY

LEVI CHELL ROBERTS!

Mmm, finally. My sweet, contemplative man.

As excited as I am to get to celebrate this man of mine, I won't lie. The Joey inside of him is definitely coming out. So if you could click that little "Comment" button below and leave him some birthday love that would be just stellar of you. Have a great day, friends!

Dear Levi:

You are the brownie to my batter and the icing to my cake. THANK YOU for letting me get to be the one to love you on your day. Do you remember telling me that you'll be able to cope just fine as long as I keep calling you my stud? You can expect to be held to that. Cause I just love you, stud. Happy Freakin' Birthday.

Love, Amalie

PS: It's okay if you feel a little funny celebrating you because it feels oh, so normal to me. LOVE you!

Today I Love: A first date edition.

I love first dates. Or... 3 billionth dates that may feel like first dates. I imagine that if Levi and I had had a normal first date, it would have gone something like last night did. I love the flirting and the giggling and the heart-racing. I love that I got almost pushed into the lake at least 752 times. I love that we held hands and sat huddled together listening to sprinklers while we ate. [Pita Jungle, if you're curious. Which I also love.] I love that everyone who walked by looked down at their feet as they did because they realized that we were having a moment and didn't want to interrupt. I love that we didn't really talk about anything in particular, but the back and forth banter never ceased. I love that he asked me if there was anything I wasn't doing that I wish I was, just so he could make sure he was pushing me and helping me move forward. In short, I loved last night and any night really, that I get to spend entirely with the one who makes my whole soul soar.

Speaking of him, [Who am I kidding? I am always speaking of him!] It's his BIRTHDAY tomorrow! Come by the blog and show him some comment love, yeah?

Cheers to the weekend!

Today I Love

Today I Love how determined he is when he has something that needs to get done. I love how supportive he is. I love how believing he is. I love how consistent he is. I love running errands together. I love when he holds my hand. I love when we're running errands while holding hands and he pulls me out of the way of something or someone I didn't notice. I love that yesterday when I responded too quietly to his "Babe!" he came running down the stairs calling my name worried that something had happened to me. I love how he makes me feel safe. I also love making the little things exciting. I loved making Levi a "You're Invited!" card to clean up the living room the other night before bed and I've loved keeping the downstairs bedroom a secret stasher to hold his birthday presents! I love love LOVE that every day is exactly what we make it.

Sorry for the lack of picture...I'll be better tomorrow?

One sweet gentle reminder later and she's back in the game!

"Baby! You gotsa come back to the blog real soon. I know you've been hard at learning
Spanish and reading up on classic novels lately which is so impressive and I'm so super duper proud of you and I definitely don't want you to stop any of that awesomeness but if you get a free minute, just maybe one or two, could you perhaps just possible maybe pretty pretty please blog a little for me sometime soon. :) Pwease? PS... I love you."

Says the boy in a comment on my last blog post. Tell me people, how, oh HOW are you supposed to say no to a sweet gentle reminder like that?? I mean, you can only imagine the poor, wide-eyed, quivering-lip sort of face that he made with it. [In fact I was already asleep when he wrote that so I can only even imagine it right along with you, but, I imagine it was pretty heart-wrenching.] Something like the look that Arwen gives Aragorn as he rides out of sight, no doubt. Something like that just can't go ignored.

So what do you think people? Is there room enough in this vast blogging world for me to jump back in? Hmm...what did you miss?

You missed the concrete-ing of the pool! Here's Levi checking it out right after they finished it. It is SO pretty. We are really really excited for them to start making it beautiful this week. Eek eek eek.

You also missed the boy and I trying to set the world record of longest period of time in between grocery shopping trips. I imagine those days the "Today I Love" posts would have gone something like this:

Today I Love: eating cereal for three meals a day. Cutting off a hunk of cheese when I feel like I need some protein. Reading stories of people in prison living off of dried crusts of bread and slop and being jealous. Finding new and improved ways to cook the ever-versatile vegetable....the potato. And accidentally being the discover-er of the most effective diet created to date - the We're Too Lazy To Go To The Grocery Store diet.

Then, after the world record largest shopping trip of both of our lives last night, I would have sounded something like this:

Today I Love: HAVING FOOD!

Let's see, you missed  the almost break-down Levi had when I got my hurr did the other day. Admittedly, it looked real real bad before. I let it grow out for way too long and it had like three different levels of roots showing, the layers were meeting up with each other and having little power-wars all over my head. Not kidding, it was like the middle east up there. So, when I finally went down to get it done, I told my friend Megan I wanted it really different. We added a lot of blonde and made it shorter and summery-er and fun-er. I even stopped by Ulta on the way home and loaded myself up on texturizer and wax and I finally replaced my [God bless it's little heart.] straightener with a nice, reliable CHI-babay. When I got home, Levi came bounding down the stairs and stopped short at the bottom. Trying to make the transition smooth, he walked towards me smiling and said something like, "Wow! So different!" but I'm sure I'm not alone in this world of self-criticizing-women when I say that "different" isn't exactly the compliment we're looking for when we make a change like this. I hurried into the bathroom and started straightening some of the ends out a bit and doing it more how I would probably end up doing it on a day to day basis and he followed me in and quickly answered YES to all my "So do you like it?" type questions. It wasn't until the next couple days passed that I got the actual reason for his hesitance out of him.

Apparently, I look older. Older and wiser I suppose because he finally stopped me in the middle of a game of pool and told me how intimidated he was by me now. He said that this new hair was like a whole new me and he was just hoping that the "New Me" still loves wittle him. How ADORABLE is he? I of course, quickly assured him that underneath it all I was still just Amalie. Amalie who is madly in love with Levi. Since then he's been talking quite a bit more about rings and white dresses and things of that nature so in my humble opinion? New Hair WIN.

You also missed a couple days ago when I was doing the dishes and childishly and girlishly imagining in my head that I had a little toddler running around "helping me put them away" when in my imaginative world the little guy dropped a dish and it broke. I was just imagining how Levi and I would react to this when I dropped a pan myself. I chipped the handle on it and I reacted probably pretty close to how the little toddler in my dreamland would have. "LEVII'MSORRYLEVII'MSORRYLEVII'MSORRY!" he came in and laughed. "It happens baby. Should we risk gluing it back on or just leave it?" "LEVI I'M SORRY LEVI I'M SORRY." Another little laugh. "You can just put it back I don't think we'll worry about it." He put the chip in a drawer, kissed me on the cheek, and went back to what he was doing.

Sigh. My children are going to have such a stellar father.

There's another couple weeks worth of things you missed of course, but in order to not over-load anyone with explosions of love and cute-boy-moves, I'll try to spread them out over the next little while. For today, I'm pretty sure there's no question as to how this post should end. Here's what I love today.


Today I Love: the creator of Skittles [who I sincerely hope get's a fruit basket and a kiss every day of his blessed life]. I love all the fruit that make up the flavors of things like Skittles and Starburst and the like and I love it even more when they're all in season making packs of strawberries at Wal-Mart only 80 whopping cents! [That's not a joke people - I will totally understand if you stop reading right here to go stock up!] I love the things the boy gets excited about like peg boards and having toilet bowl cleaner on hand. I also love that he knows the line between being indulgent and being realistic and he knows that needing to purchase a little Hot Wheels car for us to roll back and forth while playing poker or eating dinner is COMPLETELY realistic and unarguably necessary. I love that he humors me when I speak Spanish to him. I love that he realizes the little moments that are important to me and he takes the time to enjoy them with me. I love that he knows the things that make me happy and that he pushes me to strive for them. I love that I get to spend every day with my best friend.

 

Dear Levi,

Thanks for the reminder. Love you more than Red Wheat Puffed Cereal, Jicama, and poker-chip Hot Wheels tracks. How about a couple games of pool tonight with a daring and exhilarating reward system?

Love, Me

My blogging sabbatical.

Yes, I took one. A blogging sabbatical. I took a blogging sabbatical because I was feeling mundane. Mundane and overworked yet bored and frenzied. I took a blogging sabbatical because I didn't want to feel like I ever HAD to post. I wanted to post just because I wanted to. It was a quiet week. Not filled with much. I found a couple Spanish grammar workbooks on the side of the road the other day and I've been pushing myself through those. I also read. A lot. Novelas y periodicals. I slept some, too. Okay, quite a bit. I feel completely caught up in that area - and that, with me, doesn't happen very often. Last but not least, I of course, spent time with Levi Chell. Not doing anything horribly dramatic. We've talked a lot. About our every day lives. He tells me about work, about the stresses in his life, then the things that make him happy and everything he's excited for. If I'm lucky he'll tell me something he loves about me that day. Or he'll remember something from our first days together in this big house and we'll laugh at ourselves and how new everything used to be. Then I'll practice my Spanish on him. Or I'll tell him what the little boy I nanny did that day. I'll dream with him about school and babies and life. Then I might get lost in that boys chiseled face for a moment and when I snap back into reality I'll tell him how lucky I am to be stuck with a such a stud of an almost-thirty-year-old.

The truth is, I've just been living. My life seems to go in cycles. Every time I start to think I've got it all figured out I get to a point where I have to step back, away from it all, with my eyes closed take a deep ten second breath, and start from the beginning again. It's kind of a back-to-basics kind of therapy.

On the other side of it all, I MISS this. You can rest assured that as I push myself back into the swing of living life outside of my little safe zone, this blog will definitely be a part of it. Today I Love's and all the jazz that goes with it.

Ready, set, go.

Thinking on love.

Ready for a little peek into my brain?
I've been thinking a lot lately about people. About how we're all in this life together. I've thought about all the people you come in contact with in a lifetime and how they all have their own lives to live through. A friend from across the street stopped by to chat with Levi and I the other night and told us how he just got laid off and was hoping to make it by for his wife and three little kiddos with work from his uncle and father-in-law. I listened to another friend talk to me for half an hour the other day about a brother whose wife and 4 children are [every one of them] dealing with some form of ADD, OCD, or Bi-polar. I've met said brother. Probably one of the most optimistic, genuinely happy people, I've ever come in contact with. Then I heard this song, and fell a little deeper into meditation.

I also watched Eat, Pray, Love recently and - this is where you judge me - I fell in love with people learning to love. I won't claim to be any source of wisdom, I'm no Dante and let's face it, I'm only 21. That being said, I'd like to believe that at this point in my life I have a pretty good understanding of what love can be. Not what love is. I don't actually believe that love "is" any one thing. It means so much to one person and so little to the next. However it can be so much. It can mean so much. I honestly believe that it has the potential to change lives. I've been wishing lately that no one I come in contact with ever feels like they have to ask "what love really is".


It's a tall order.
I'm aware.
But I watch Levi race out to the truck when he hears me pull up because he can't wait till I get inside before hugging me, and I listen to him dream with me and plan with me and talk with me, and I feel him pull me close before I get up in the morning just to wish me a great day and I can't help but think that with all the love that boy fills up muh cup with on a daily basis - there's got to be a way to turn some of it around.

Anyway. This post doesn't have a "wrap up" or a "conclusion". It's just what's been on my mind and what I thought maybe - just maybe - might inspire someone else out there in this cosmic void tonight wondering about love in this life.

Meanwhile. I found this picture on my camera the other day from when the boys were still digging the hole in our yard. I love the boy for capturing the things I don't think of needing capturing.

Their long past this step now. They lined it with steel rods and laid the piping and the electrical. Waitin' on the concrete next. It's such an exciting process to watch! These guys are GOOD at what they do.

I'll talk the boy into another photoshoot soon. I miss having fun pictures to post! Night, y'all.