How did this happen?

I swear, I was in this state below (aka HUGELY PREGNANT) for approximately ten years with Baby Girl.

 It was the pregnancy that went on and on and on.

 Now I can barely believe that exactly one year ago, I started off the day looking like I did in that first picture, and ending it by staring into this beautiful face...

 And then I blinked and now she's 1!!! HOW DID THAT HAPPEN???

 Having a girl has inspired me to new heights in crafty-cutesy-mommyness. (AKA, I actually tried to be crafty and cutesy at all. Because usually? Not so much. Not that my boys' parties weren't good... I just didn't put so much, um, "homemade" effort into them. Party stores were my friend. They're boys. Pretty sure they didn't care and never will that I didn't handmake their basketball or Tonka Truck birthday banners.) But I've been dreaming of Baby Girl's first birthday party for months. I knew I wanted to do butterflies as the theme, and I think it turned out about as well as I hoped! (And yes, I went blonde again for the first time in a really long time. SHH is the one that told my cute friend to make me "as blonde as you can." Still not sure if I'm going to leave it long-term. I kinda like me dark. But we'll see... Anyway. Random tangent there. Back to Baby Girl and the party of butterfly-epicosity.) (Yes, that's a word. Phrase? Something.)

 Look! I made and decorated a cake! This is almost earth-shattering enough to signal the end of the world as we know it.

 I made cute cupcake displays! (And my awesome sister helped by making the butterfly cupcake toppers. And the darling hat, too.)

 I pinned it so I did it.... Lanterns with butterflies, ceiling decorations, stringing balloons on thread (so not a great idea for an outdoor party btw). I loved how it turned out.

The girl of the hour, who daintily picked at her cake and spit it out when I tried to put some in her mouth.

WHO IS THIS GIRL AND HOW DID I GIVE BIRTH TO HER???

Heh, just kidding. She usually loves sweet things, but for some reason, cake does not seem to be one of those things. She did the same thing in her cake smash photo shoot.

But even though she doesn't love cake, I still love her. Adore her. Am so incredibly grateful for the gift of having her in our family. Happy Birthday Baby Girl!

(Yes, I know this post had nothing to do with writing. But she is so cute, I had to let you get a peak at her special day. And also, it gave me the chance to brag about my frawsome party throwing skillz. [ok, all you people out there who have incredible parties, no laughing at me. I mean, I DECORATED a CAKE. That's a big deal for me, people. Anyway. That's all.])

Happy almost weekend! Anyone want a cupcake?

Ooooh and Aahhhhh!

So, have you heard of Kasie West yet? Let me refresh your memory :

She's the beautiful one in blue with the dimples. Love her!

If you aren't already, get your butt over to her blog pronto and start following. Then go HERE to see the cover for her amazing book PIVOT POINT.

The premise for this book is absolutely amazing. The cover is gorgeous. Like drool over it, wanna pet it, can't wait to own it and stare at it and pet it some more GORGEOUS. And the book itself? Even better. If you haven't added this one to your TBR yet, you'd better do it NOW.

Congrats Kasie!!

Phwew! That was heavy...

Do you remember that phrase from Back to the Future? It was supposed to be all cool and futuristic. And now that movie is so old, most of my target audience for my books (YA) probably have never even seen it.

Anyway, the point is.... wow, that post yesterday was heavy. And yet you guys completely and totally lifted me up. THANK YOU so much for every comment and email. I can't begin to tell you how much it meant to me. Hugs for everyone! Unless you don't like hugs. Or if you're shorter than me and then that awkward moment happens when your face is in an inopportune location and I have to kind of shlump down and it's just totally lame. Let's just throw out cupcakes instead. CAKE FOR EVERYONE!

And you know what? I was sick to my stomach about posting that yesterday morning, but by the afternoon, I was so much happier. And then last night, as I was driving my three amazing kids home from SonA's baseball tournament (the last sporting event for two months until soccer starts up again!! YAY!!), we had the windows rolled down, Muse (Best. Music. EVER.) was blasting, and we were all rocking out. It was a perfect moment. We were laughing, dancing, singing. The wind was blowing through the car, the sun was setting, it was amazing.

So you know what? Yes, sometimes life is hard. Sometimes things don't go how we hope. Sometimes I'm not as kind as I want to be, and sometimes others are not kind to me. BUT. Life is beautiful. There is joy to be found in the journey every day.

I am grateful for how sad I was when I wrote that post yesterday morning, because it made the joy of driving home with my family that much sweeter last night.

The Kindness Project - JUNE

Too often kindness is relegated to a random act performed only when we’re feeling good. But an even greater kindness (to ourselves and others) occurs when we reach out even when we aren't feeling entirely whole. It’s not easy, and no one is perfect. But we’ve decided it’s not impossible to brighten the world one smile, one kind word, one blog post at a time. To that end, a few of us writers have established The Kindness Project, starting with a series of inspirational posts. We post the second Wednesday of every month.

Disclaimer: this is long and not very uplifting, so feel free to not read this post. Seriously. You've been warned.

So you know that part in our mission statement about "reach out even we aren't feeling entirely whole...?" That's me right now. More days than not recently, I haven't been feeling whole. In fact, I have been feeling like I am full of holes, with my good intentions and hopes and dreams leaking (sometimes gushing) out of me. I've been debating all week whether or not to tell everyone in this amazing group that I couldn't post this month. Because the honest truth is that I don't feel like I deserve to. I have tried every day to focus on this project, particularly when I've heard someone is in need or feeling down. I've tried to reach out and help others, even when it wasn't convenient for me. But I still feel like I've failed in many ways to truly embody the goal of this group. There are two big reasons why, but part of my struggle with this post is deciding how personal to get. I don't know for sure who does or doesn't read my blog in my circle of "real life" friends, family, and acquaintances, and I don't want to put in enough detail to cause anyone embarrassment or point any fingers. So let's try and keep it really vague, shall we?

How do you show kindness to people who often are unkind--even purposefully cruel--but are a permanent part of your life? This is a question that I have been struggling with all month. And unfortunately, I have more often than not tried to just avoid those people, rather than make an effort to be kind to them. Part of my excuse was that being kind is a double-edge sword in this case, because in the past, the majority of my efforts of kindness have been rewarded with more meanness.

The second part of my failure has been more in my internal thought processes than any outward manifestation. I am having a very hard time being kind to myself right now, and I think to be able to show true kindness to others, you have to first be loving and happy with yourself. And right now? I'm struggling with that, on so many levels. My internal dialogue is full of negativity at myself, if I'm being totally honest. I'm always surprised when people tell me "you seem so confident!" "I was so glad to hear that you doubt yourself, because you seem like you're so knowledgeable/sure of yourself/etc." I have done acting in the past, I even got to say, "They go to Hell, sir!" (in a British accent) in Jane Eyre, the Musical at a local professional theater (I know, right? I'm, like, practically famous), but I must be an even better actress than I thought! Because I am a mess of insecurities.

While everyone around me continues to have good news and more good news and happy, wonderful news (and I am genuinely so so very happy for them, and they know that!!); I, on the other hand, do not. In fact, I often feel as thought I'm falling further and further behind while everyone else is scaling (sometimes flying) over the mountains I'm trying to climb. And not just publishing mountains (although that is one big sucker and sometimes I feel like I'm barely clinging on), but in other ways, too. As a mom, as an athlete, and more.

Some of these doubts are self-inflicted and others stem from the doubts put there by others--including the people I hinted at before. Some come from having to adjust my expectations of life, based on things out of my control. Like the fact that I absolutely adore babies, and I've always wanted a BIG family. I'm talking 5, 6, maybe even 7 kids. But life has a different plan for me, and I am having to adjust to the fact that my sweet, beautiful Baby Girl is going to be my last. She's going to be 1 in just a couple of weeks, and the realization that she's getting so big, so fast, and that I will never again have a sweet baby of my own to cuddle takes my breath away, and leaves me feeling hollow. And then I think of others who can only have one, or maybe can't have any children at all, and I feel even worse. Because I am SO grateful for the three children I have, and I shouldn't feel sad that we can't have more. I shouldn't dare complain. I hated people like me when I was going through infertility. "Oh boo, poor her with her three, beautiful children." We went through infertility and loss, I know the pain and agony of that trial--and I know how lucky we are to have the three children that we do. There were times when it looked like SonA would be our only child. And yet, I still struggle. I'm being decidely unkind to myself about my inability to follow through on this goal and dream. And how is that helping me or anyone else at all? It's not.

I guess I always try to be so positive and upbeat on my blog, but I decided maybe I should just be honest. And I'm not always like this. But this has been a hard month, and so there you have it.
Man, this post is hard. I keep writing stuff and then deleting it. And I'm pretty sure these are intended to be inspiring and I'm thinking this post is anything but that. I probably should have just decided to not post this month and try harder in June so I had something to write for July. Oh well, too late for that!

So, yeah, massive #sarafail in the Kindness department this month.

Let's just say this: making a conscious effort to be extraordinarily kind is hard sometimes. And it involves taking risk. And it opens you up to being hurt sometimes, too. But I'm still going to keep trying.

Check out these (probably much more inspiring) posts from the other members of this group:

Sophia Chang
Erica Chapman
Jessica Corra
Elizabeth Davis

Christa Desir 

Sarah Fine
Claire Hennessy
Elana Johnson

Liza Kane

Amie Kaufman
Alina Klein

Sara Larson

Matthew MacNish

Sara McClung

Tracey Neithercott
Katherine Owens
Elizabeth Poole

Lola Sharp

Michele Shaw

Meagan Spooner

Carolina Valdez Miller

SURRENDER Launch Party!

Last night was the launch party for Elana Johnson's latest book, SURRENDER. I love living so close to so many amazing authors and other incredible people. 

For example, my beautiful and amazingly talented friend Erin Summerill--she of the photog skills spoken of in legend and hushed voices, she who now has photo credits on multiple agent blogs, AND she can write, too. And she's hysterical.

 And of course the woman of the night: Elana Johnson! She did such a fabulous job speaking. There was a great turnout for her launch. And I will never think of taxidermy the same way again. ;)

 And my other beautiful, amazingly talented friend Brodi Ashton. I still tell everyone I know to go get her book. (have you read EVERNEATH yet? If not then get off your butt and go buy it right now! NOW! What are you still sitting there for???) She is seriously so nice, I'm so happy every time I get to see her.

 Me and Elana! She is so kind, caring, genuine... the list goes on. I just love her! (BTW, let's not comment on my bad hair day, okay? I didn't have time to wash and blow dry it, so, yeah.)

It was an awesome night (and I unfortunately didn't get enough pictures of all my friends that were there). SO happy for you Elana!! I've heard such great things about SURRENDER and I can't wait to read it!

And then this happened today... SonA graduated from 1st grade! *swells with pride* *sobs* How does time fly by this fast?? I can't believe how big he is. He wrote an entire card to his teacher in Chinese characters, telling her "Thank you for teaching me Chinese. I love you and I will miss you." and even more, but that's all he translated for me before he had to run out the door. I can't believe he already speaks Chinese so well.

And now, summertime, here we come! What have you been doing this week?

Friday Four or Five

1. My baby sister is on her way to Africa right now (to Capetown) to do service--helping teach children English and to read, building a home or school, and more. I have to admit, I'm jealous of her. Back when I was in nursing school, I used to dream of going to Africa on a medical service trip. My mom is a Medical Technologist and we used to talk about going together. Honestly, sometimes I think about finishing my degree someday just so I can still go do that. What an amazing opportunity for her! Just hoping she stays safe and has an amazing time.

2. I think the pools are officially supposed to open today. It's been in the 80s and even 90s for the last two weeks. Want to guess what the weather is like today? Yep, raining and chilly. Heh. That's Utah for you.

3. Change can be exciting, but it's hard, too. Another one of my sisters bought her first home this week and we are helping her move this weekend. She's staying close by, so I'm just excited for her. But one of my closest friends is moving to Texas (we're helping them move out of their house early next week) and I'm so sad to see them go. I'm happy for them to have this opportunity, but I will miss her and her family so much! Interesting how the same thing--someone moving--can cause such different feelings depending on where the move takes the people I love.

4. I opened a WIP that I started in March this week. I had two different ideas that month and started them both. Then the second idea kind of took off, and I finished that one. Now that I've got that one revised and polished (at least for now), I went back to my other one. I'm about 8,800 words in and as I reread them I thought, "hey, this is actually pretty good. It's unfortunate that I can't remember what I was planning on doing with some of these characters. Hmmm... I obviously intended for that object to mean something. If only I had a clue what it was." And so on and so forth. I have a document where I wrote notes for this book, so I remember most of it, but apparently I wasn't thorough enough. Wish me luck as I try to remember the rest of my plot so I can keep writing!

5. I think there is a skunk outside right now. It suddenly smells very strongly of skunk. Hopefully my dog doesn't need to go outside to do his bizness anytime soon.

What's on your mind today? Any fun plans for the weekend? Happy Friday!

Friday Four or Five

1. My friend Natalie had a baby last week and boy is he cute!! I adore babies. It makes me kind of sad that Baby Girl is getting so big, so fast.

2. I love reading really good books, but there are two downsides to finishing one. First, I'm sad it's over. That's always a great sign, when I wish a book would just keep going. (And yet, I am racing for the end because I need to know what happens!) Second, I feel so inadequate as an author after. Thinking, man, I wish I could write a book like this. But hopefully reading great books helps me learn how to become a better writer. I've read a couple recently that were so well written, so engrossing, just wow. I love that, when a book exceeds expectations.

3. Summer is almost here. I looked at the calendar and realized there's only just under three weeks of school left. Whoa, how did that happen?? Since I missed most of the summer last year (on bed rest for a month, then having a newborn and not really being able to go out much), I am SO excited for the pools to open and to enjoy the sun and heat.

4. I only got about three hours of sleep last night, and I can't seem to think of anything else to write about this week. All I can think about is my empty inbox and how tired I am and how sore I am and that's all boring stuff. Oh, and now my kids are up, so I better go put on my Mommy-Hat.

What's on your mind this week? Happy Friday!