My grandmother sewed, my mother sewed, and now I sew.  I know in this day and age it is much cheaper to go out and actually buy clothes from the store, but I love sewing dresses for my daughters.  Sewing Halloween costumes is fun, even though it is an awful lot of work for something they'll wear only once.  But the pictures I get afterward are worth it!  I'm not sure which stage of a project is my favorite: picking out the patterns and material, cutting, piecing, sewing, or the final product.  It's all very relaxing and rewarding.  I think the rhythm of the sewing machine is very calming, and I love the patterns and textures of different materials.  I also love that my husbands and kids have no interest in this hobby, which makes it all mine.  My biggest issue at this moment is that I've lost my sewing room to another long-term house guest - my brother.  Don't get me wrong I love having him here, but I was very bummed to lose my craft room.  I refinished an old sewing table I got from a thrift store, but I need a way to keep everything looking neat and tidy in my big family room.  I came across a furniture piece that I'm currently lusting over - and what do you know they are giving it away.  For those of you in the same position here's where you enter:

ScrappinCricut.org
TurnedGypsy.blogspot.com
SewManyChallenges.com
Kathyand3Kids.blogspot.com
Infarrantlycreative.net
Tatertotsandjello.com
Busy With The Cricky Spartansusscraper.blogspot.com
Thirtyhandmadedays.com
TheIdeaRoom.net
RachelleWrites.blogspot.com




Isn't it perfect?  I'm crossing my fingers!

Trophy wives are supposed to give back.  It is virtually impossible to envision someone you want to emulate in every way without admiring their charitable nature.  A few years ago I was able to become a victim's advocate.  This volunteer position included rigorous training, and many painful challenges that I had to come to grips with.  I would be "on call" for 24 hours at a time.  If the police were called in for a domestic violence dispute or a rape, an advocate would be summoned to the scene.  We would comfort the victims, talk to them, take their statements, help them file protective orders, hold their hand at the hospital - whatever they needed.  The logic was that the last thing a woman needs after an ordeal like that is to talk to a man wearing a gun.  I loved the work, but statistically speaking they usually go back to their abuser.  That was a hard pill to swallow.  Since I had young children the position was too demanding so I had to give it up.  One day I will volunteer as an advocate again.  If you have the stomach and patience for it the rewards are immeasurable.

Due to my busy schedule I have had to find another way to volunteer that worked around the other demands in my life.  I found a project called FamilySearch Indexing.  What an interesting way to volunteer!  Basically the service keeps every kind of record about every human that's ever been recorded.  You are able to access the records to gain insight into your family history.  Volunteers download record images and key in the information, so things can be in an electronic format.  Lately I've been working on the 1930 census, mostly in New York.  I've become a very creative and visual person as an adult.  I find my imagination creating entire lives as I'm entering the names of strangers.  The census takers recorded families with names, ages, their title in the family, race, where they were born, where their parents were born, when they immigrated to the US, how much they pay in rent or how much their house is worth, marital status, and a whole bunch of other stuff. 

As I enter the names I find myself recreating their lives in my head.  Take Sophia, for example.  She's 59 and widowed.  She lives in a modest home in the city.  She's white and was born in the US.  Her parents were both from Italy, and her mother lives with her now.  I picture her work-worn hands that provide for her 6 children at home.  She also has two boarders that live with her.  Sometimes I pretend the boarders are there because the Sophia needs the extra rent money, sometimes they are relatives of close friends in Italy.  Sophia loves to play records and dance in the kitchen while she is cooking.  Her apartment is modest and clean, but there are a few treasures she proudly displays.  Her husband was killed in an accident that occurred while he was working on the Brooklyn Bridge.  Her children adore her, as does her mother on her good days.  Mother suffers from dementia, and often gets very cranky wondering when her beloved Frank will get home from work (Frank's been dead for nearly 20 years now).

I love the classic names - Annie, Stanley, Edna, William.  I love the beautiful penmanship.  Nowadays everything is printed from a computer.  I miss handwritten letters.

This work has become very dear to me.  Last week I was entering draft records for WWII.  With every name I entered I wondered what became of them.  Did they make it through the war alive?  Did they earn a medal?  Was their mind "right" after the war?  How did they transition back to the everyday routine?

There are millions of people on this planet.  We have no idea what each one has been through, is going through, or will go through.  It is important, especially during this recession, that we remember to be especially kind to others.  Don't just offer to help, insist on helping.  We can all do better.  I can definitely do better.  My neighbor's father has been sick for some time and is expected to die any day.  I haven't even called.  That settles it - I'm taking them dinner tomorrow.  What are you going to do to help someone in need today?

Finally, 9 coats later (plus whatever was on the wall previously) it is just ok.  I'm sure no-one else thinks anything about it, but it doesn't look anything like what I was going for.  I will redo it someday, but for now it will just have to do.  I hate this wall.

There are times that I think life would just be easier if I drove away, got a job and a little apartment and a cat.  I don't feel like a bad wife and mom, daughter, sister, friend.  I don't know at what point I lost myself.  I guess it's been off and on now for 6 years.  Through the many surgeries for the endometriosis I feel like my soul has become degenerative like my ovaries.  Now that they are gone, along with my uterus, and any hope of having more children on my own, I feel such emptiness.  There are moments of bliss - when I'm lying with my husband, when I'm having tickle fights with my daughters, and glimpses of normality throughout the days.  I am sure that without these amazing people in my life I would have ended it long ago.  I don't think about suicide, like I've said before - I just sometimes wish to fall asleep and never wake up.  I haven't had a traumatic life.  My childhood was amazing, and my parents are more than I could ever ask for.  Any pain in my life has been the result of my own poor decisions.  Two bad breakups that hurt the boys so bad it was very hard for me to move on.  One boy actually started self-medicating and self-harming.  I hear he's married now and I hope he's ok.  Not to say that the loss of me in anyone's life up until this point was so unbearable, but I do know how certain relationships can leave scars that don't heal.  My freshman year in college was an incredibly stupid, painful, destructive learning experience.  I let many people down and made many poor choices I'll never be able to redo.  I was angry for a long time even after forgiveness from my Heavenly Father.  After going through an abortion by myself I don't think I've ever been in so much pain - both physically and mentally.  An angel appeared to me in the form of a little girl.  I was crying in bed and she smoothed my hair and said "Don't worry Mommy.  I'll come back.  Everything will be ok."  That moment of peace and comfort has remained as clear today as it was 13 years ago.  I love my husband and my amazing girls more than anything in the whole world and I want so desperately to get better, and be better.  If not for them, than for my Mother in Heaven.  As a mother myself I can't imagine how hard it is for her to see her children suffering and not be able to comfort them.  They say "fake it till you make it" which is my mantra these days.  I just wish I could feel the comfort in my soul.  I was reading through the Psalms today and will continue to do so.  They are so very lovely.

I love being a wife and mother.  My family is my greatest joy.  In fact tonight I cuddled in the rocking chair with both my girls and watched "Ramona and Beezus".  We all cried during the sad parts, and I even cried during the happy parts.  It fills my heart to spend time with my girls.  They are getting older, in fact daughter #1 has new found independence and attitude that I'm not adjusting to very well at all.  But she still loves to spend time with me, she still allows me to hug her and kiss her owies better, and she still loves to cuddle.  I know these times are precious and will be over before I know it - which leads me to my current state of confusion.

Maybe it was the full hysterectomy at age 30 that has led me to an early mid-life crisis.  Maybe it's this crappy weather (I loathe winter and snow).  But lately I've had a very hard time feeling like myself at all.  It seems I'm just this robot that acts as wife and mom.  Alone time is laughable.  I can't even go to the bathroom without someone barging in needing me urgently.  I was so fed up a few days ago that I actually announced that I was locking my bedroom door and Heaven help the person that interrupted me while I took a long, hot, well-deserved shower.  I still want to be the trophy wife and mom, but I need to find something for myself as well, some sort of balance.

Which led me to my latest adventure/humiliation.  A girlfriend took me to a play a couple of weeks ago in this amazing little theater-in-the-round.  They are a quality operation and I notice they were holding auditions for an upcoming play.  A play - not a musical - which is a rare thing in these parts.  I have acted/modeled since I was old enough to walk, but I cannot carry a tune in a bucket.  I went onto their website and got the audition sides yesterday.  There was 1 female role - a British speaking female role.  There are several dialects I can pull off, but British is not one of them.  I spent most of the day yesterday listening and mimicking the BBC.  I felt decent about my days worth of progress so off I went this morning to my audition.  Let me make this clear - I had no delusions of being cast.  My husband challenges me each day to be and do better.  We've made a New Year's resolution to do the things we don't want to do, or are scared to do.  Without doing those things we stay stagnant - and become totally boring!

The audition wasn't horrible.  There were 6 people in my line, 2 males and 4 females.  I don't know that I was the worst, but I definitely wasn't the best.  They posted the callback list rather quickly (I think they have their favorites that work show after show) and I was not on it.  For a moment I felt really rejected.  But I had to let that go.  A British accent?  Me?  Let's be realistic here - I wouldn't even buy a ticket to see that.  So I went and did a little "retail therapy" at the most amazing thrift shop in the world.  I finally got the fabric to sew a cushion for the bench in my mud room.  Onward and upward!

I know the obvious answer to this question is that everyone deserves love.  I think it's impossible for a human to survive this life without feeling the love of somewhere along the way.  When I was 21 years old I was lucky enough to marry my amazing husband.  He has been with me through depression, illness, trials, and those amazing times where I'm top of the world.  He's patient with me no matter what.  Recently my mom told him that she wouldn't blame him for leaving, that this kind of pressure is too much to ask.  I know where she was coming from but man it hurt.  There is not doubt that there is only one transgression that would ever cause him to finally give up on me, and that one thing is something I would never do.  I know what I have in him, and I am not willing to give it up under any circumstances.

Depression was never really a part of my life until I got sick.  It would come in waves, but I was always able to keep it at bay.  After the birth of my second baby girl the demons came in full force.  I was suffering from depression, severe post-partum depression, and pain killer addiction.  We were in a new home in a new city, away from family.  I felt isolated at best and I had two perfect little angels that depended on me for everything.  The darkness that filled my days and my every thought were frightening.  Thoughts that my baby would be better off without me.  I remember hallucinating one night after a 3 am feeding after weeks of no sleep.  Daughter #2 has these enormous blue eyes that are breathtaking.  At 3 am when you are hallucinating you start to imagine some pretty strange things.  I was entirely convinced that she was an alien.  I had no idea what to do with my alien baby.  I will never forget the terror I felt in that moment.

Luckily I was able to find a prescription that worked for me, Lexapro.  It's been a life saver over the past 6 years, although I'm on the maximum dose.  It also seems that every January - March the darkness returns.  I never think of hurting my children, and seldom think of hurting myself.  There are moments when I understand why people self-mutilate.  I cannot believe I am actually writing these thoughts, but who knows - maybe they'll help someone somewhere going through the same thing.  I am not naive enough to think I am the only one having these thoughts.  I live a charmed life.  I stay home in my beautiful home with my amazing little girls.  My husband supports me in everything I do.  But the loneliness I feel is almost crippling.  I force myself to get out of bed in the morning and pretend like everything is ok.  It seems the busier I stay, the less control the darkness has over me.  I am ashamed and feel unworthy of anyone's love.  That includes my wonderful husband, my children, my Savior, and especially my Father in Heaven.  Several times a day I fight back tears that come from nowhere.

I am so thankful for all that I have been given.  I am thankful for all my many talents and achievements.  I have been so blessed to live the life I have.  From this point forward I know it will only get better.  My husband - for some odd reason - thinks I am the sun, moon, and the stars.  If only I could see myself the way he sees me.  I try so hard to stay strong for them and not let them see the real me as I know it would only hurt them deeply.  Depression is a terrible thing.  Self loathing is something I wish no one else will ever have to experience.  Without my husband and children I think I'd like to just cease to exist.  Not disappear and start a new life, not injure myself, just fall asleep and never wake up.  For their sakes I would never do that, since I'd give my life to prevent their pain.