Babies...

I want to have babies, badly. I love the Yankee so much and want to create something tangible that's a little bit of both of us. I want to be directly responsible for rearing a little life and trying very hard to craft a happy, productive member of society. It's an odd thing: when you announce to whomever you tend to make announcements to that you are going to start trying to have a baby, the underlying message is that you are your partner plan to have copious amounts of sex on a regular basis. No one seems to acknowledge this, but it's the truth, isn't it?

Heh, my mom doesn't really read my blog so I'm not worried about what kind of thoughts that might give her :)

So we're all ready to start trying this fall. October is officially our baby month, so if you'd like to schedule anything and I say no, please know that I am too busy doing what pleases the Lord :) For this reason, I went to see a doctor to just make sure all of my equipment is functioning regularly- only to find out that I have PCOS. So my body is currently making too many "male" hormones (that MUST be the reason for all of my scandalous and innapropriate jokes!). One of the most tangible side-effects of this condition is that making babies can be difficult. As in the conceiving part.

At one point in my life, I was clinically obese- as in a BMI of over 35- and was in a kind of pre-PCOS state. At thats point in my life, my doctor said that if I could manage to get pregnant, I would have in be on bed rest the entire time and inject myself with blood thinners. No thanks. So I lost 65 pounds and thought I had escaped the beast, but it turns out I didn't.

I am still trying to decide how I feel about all of this. I get a bit weepy and pouty sometime, but most of the time I just resolve to make a plan and attack.  The typical first step to treating PCOS is to lose weight, if you have weight to lose. I am still overweight, although not even close to where I was. I hate working out- I mean I HATE working out. And yet I know that it will make such a difference when paired with a healthy, reasonable, sustainable diet. But seriously y'all, if you gave me a choice between a filling and a workout, I'm really not sure which one I would choose.

This is the motivating thought that I keep coming back to: I have loved my babies for years, even though I don't have them yet. I think about what kind of mother I'd like to be and various strategies for dealing with random baby-ish things and I feel love in my heart for little ones that I am still dreaming of. I wholly believe that I will do many things for my children and because of them; if this is what I have to do to create them, to have a shot at holding my beloved little dream-babies in my arms, then this is what I will do.

If I need to lose 30 pounds and stop drinking coffee- I will. If I need to get used to darn old Tony Horton every morning- I will. If I have to incorporate more discipline into my life- I will. Because I really want to be a mother and I really want to carry and birth my own happy, healthy, bi-racial, potentially sassy, hopefully-not-too-wierd children.

But I still hate excercise. Really y'all... HATE IT.

So tonight I am a Happy Girl and by Tuesday I predict I will be a sore girl....

A Very Valiente Thought On Beauty

This is a post about my eyebrows. Mostly.

Growing up, I was a very wierd kid. I mean the kind of kid who ate rocks. It took me a very long time to learn to exist in society. Approximately 26 years, to be honest. I have two cousins who taught me more than they realize about being a lady and being feminine. There are still some things I haven't mastered yet, sadly.

So yes- this is a post about my eyebrows. But it's really a confession about my inner lazy-fat-slob-frump-girl. I feel like The Yankee and I need to have a conversation about my appearance approximately every six months- and a reminder about my humor, at least quarterly.

There are all kinds of Bible verses that discuss inner beauty- reminders not to adorn oneself with braids and pearls, charges that beauty is fleeting, and statements about what makes a woman a true beauty. And while those things are very, very true, we must also acknowledge that there is a difference between ugliness from a rotten attitude, ugliness from a geometric abonormality in a person's appearance, and ugliness because you just look like as hot mess. I believe most of my ugly days stem from that third category, with the occasional from the first. I like to believe that I don't fall into category two- and please don't tell me if I do (I can't handle that kind of honesty).

My eye brows are the representation of my cyclical beauty slumps. It's effing hot here in New York and my skin goes from dewey to shiny to oil slick before 9 AM. It's one pony tail day after another here, as The Yankee and I hover, scantily clad, in front of our one lil' window unit. It's very easy and easily forgiven to have low-key beauty days.

I didn't start tending to my brows until right before The Yankee started dating- a little over three years ago. Before that, they normally looked like this ---------------------------------------->

Notice the fan shaped spike above my left eye, which gets a little pirate-y every now and then, thanks to a swat in the face with a plastic swing by my big brother (thanks for that, Bro).

Once I did start grooming them, I made the novice mistake of going too far- and all of a sudden the space between my eyes was getting wider and wider.

I've been letting my brows grow and trying to stay on top of them, but they've gotten a bit crazy. I've gotten a little too casual and lazy about my hair, make-up, and clothes just in general- again, laregly because NYC has not embraced the 1970's gift of central air. So now Pinterest has all these great tutorials for make-up- especially for the eyes- I I can't help but notice them wonderful eyebrows on these ladies. So today I decided to really give it a shot and try to make my brows look nice.

The thing about beauty and make-up and hairstyles is that it takes work and effort. I do care how I look and I do want my husband to be proud of me. My frump days are mostly lazy days, but I am going to get better at it. I hereby promise to shape it up, put on a little lipstick, and get out of my grooming rut.