family – hannah ananas

Terrible blessings

I wasn’t ready to go back to school today. I felt it with my whole being. But I couldn’t afford not to go, financially. I’m only paid by the day, and I had already taken off yesterday.

So, I went to school today.

I had my first class. We did our work, and it went well. Then I went to see the one teacher who knew. We chatted briefly, but well.

And then she asked/told me that how about she go ahead and take my other class, and I go ahead and go home now, so I could rest. So, I cried some more in gratitude, told the department head what the other teacher was going to do and that I needed to leave – and he accepted without question – and I left.

It was a terrible thing that made any of this relevant, of course, but it made the blessing all the more powerful.

My mom and I had planned to meet at Costco after school today, so we could get groceries for Sunday. So, instead of going this afternoon, we went this morning, basically right as the store opened. After we finished, I had a slice of pizza that I had been longing to have for some time, as well as a soft serve and a frozen coffee thing, both of which I had also been wanting for some time, and enjoyed my lunch thoroughly.

Then I went home and rested.

I talked with my dad, and it was a really good conversation.

I got the body wash I had been wanting.

I visited my grandma for what was likely the last happy hour at her place, and my mom and husband joined, too.

And I rested some more before going to adoration… which wasn’t actually happening as the church had advertised. So, I jumped into the end of the Spanish Mass that was happening instead and adored Jesus through receiving Communion with immense gratitude.

And then I went back home to rest some more before bed.

Now, I’m ready and going to bed.

Oh, and my best friend surprised us with a beautiful bouquet of flowers delivered to the house today with a kind note.

So, goodnight.

God, thank you for the many blessings of today, including my ability to spend time with those I love and who love me. Help me to heal fully, especially with and through your grace and love. Keep my family safe and well, please. Stay with us, powerfully, please. Help me to feel your arms helping me, healing me, guiding me. In your name, I pray. Amen.

Post-a-day 2024

Carnival

Tonight, we attended the rodeo carnival. My husband and I went in with my brother and his wife, because a friend gave us some carnival packs he never ended up using or reselling. Plus, we had a few free ride tickets from the volunteer appreciation brunch the rodeo had this year (which was quite cool, by the way).

I think we all went into it a little tired, but game. And I think we all ended up having actually a really good time. We walked around a bit to get an idea of pricing and availability, and then we rode the gondola across first (after I got a corn dog with the food card we had). It was actually quite neat, but also slightly terrifying. Something about it just felt kind of janky, when compared to ski gondolas, and we had this paranoid feeling that our phones were going to plummet at any second, and our hats would go flying, forever lost to us. It also stopped twice, though briefly. That didn’t make it feel any better. But it was still cool, and I’m glad we did it. Definitely a fun view to have of the whole complex.

Then we all needed a bathroom break, so we went over to Center to use real bathrooms and to see the youth agricultural mechanics contest. My committeemen who told me about this contest were not wrong: these kids make aMAZing things. We talked with one girl who is a senior in high school, and she presented her project to us. It was an automated washer and dryer for sheep, goats, and cattle (they do this for showing constantly, and it is actually kind of hilarious to watch folks struggle to clean and dry these animals by hand). It was immensely sophisticated, it boxed up neatly for transport, and it took her over a thousand hours of labor, which she did by herself, and cost $24,000 in materials. She plans to patent it in the very near future, her siblings will use it for their show animals this next year, and she hopes to get it contracted for production and sale at about $80,000 a pop. Oh, and she also demonstrated its functionality for us with life-sized stuffed animals. That was both awesome and adorable.

Pretty neat, huh?

Then we wandered back to the carnival to use up our tickets. Should have done it earlier, we quickly discovered, because the place was packed and the lines were long now.

Nonetheless, they rode a swing ride, a spinning ride with almost no line, and another flipping-spinning ride that went super high up and, somehow, had an almost-zero line as we walked up to it (which didn’t last).

We spent the final tickets on a game we had seen and called unfairly priced early on, where you get to throw baseballs at overturned beer bottles and try to break them. But you only get two balls per turn and have to break two bottles. (So, if you miss the first, why bother throwing the second? Exactly.) However, we had tickets to spare and no one wanted to wait in any lines for rides anymore, so we went for it.

The boys enjoyed it and did not succeed in breaking the bottles. They did, however, succeed in getting tiny bits of glass all over their hands from the used baseballs that had been falling on the piles of broken bottles all day (and all rodeo, most likely). So, that sucked. After they washed their hands, it was immensely better, but not all the glass was gone, apparently. I’m just hoping it’ll be fully clear from my husband’s hands during his shower, so he can come to bed with fully clean and safe hands. I’m too sensitive for stuff like that, and probably would freak out for weeks if any ended up in the bed.

Anyway, we then went to the club we enjoy, partly just to use he tickets my mom had given us, but also so my brother and sister-in-law could try the awesome frozen (think frostie-style) Jack & Coke and the awesome Milk Punch (also called Rodeo Punch), a milky drink with nutmeg that is like horchata, but not. On the way, a girl from one of my committees was clearly leaving and she could tell we were going up to the club, so she handed me a handful of drink tickets she was not going to be using before tomorrow night. (Not like we needed those, but more to share! And we did both sue them and share them, which was great.) We still ended up with three drink tickets leaving in my hat, but those had been a gift in the first place, so no monetary loss on our family’s end, anyway, and more money for the kids (scholarship money).

We finally left to go home at eleven o’clock, all of us wiped. But the highways were actually open tonight, free from construction shut-downs, so it was a quick drive home for once. (Yippee!)

So, yes, another night both out and up late for me. And I had a very nice time with my family, doing something we don’t usually get to do. So, that was fun, and so am grateful.

Thank you, God, for such a nice time with my family and for keeping us safe. I love you. Amen.

Post-a-day 2024

Reminiscing

I know most brides want to look at photos like crazy after their wedding. But I am enthralled by the videos of the music from our wedding. If we had a play count for the Ave Maria that my friend sang to start the Mass, I’d be probably close to twenty at this point. And I’ve only had the video since Tuesday night. It’s Thursday night right now. She just sang it so spectacularly and with so much love… it’s hard not to listen to it on repeat… and to play it for everyone I know. (I already played a clip of a practice recording she had sent me the other week for one of my classes… This recording is even better than that.)

I was a little worried when a lot of the photos didn’t turn out. I was very worried when the Zoom sound wasn’t set right, and I found that none of the music had registered on the computer at all, and so the recording of the Mass had no genuine music in it – just blips here and there of random sounds that make it sound like maybe music was playing somewhere in the background… or something? However, I expressed my sadness and frustration and let it go.

And then God blessed me.

My brother truly took to heart that I wanted the music recorded on my man’s phone. I only made him confirm that he would do a recording of the Ave Maria, but had expressed that I truly wanted all the music recorded, if it were at all possible and feasible. And he had made it happen. I was crying in relief watching all the videos he had done. He had basically gotten the entire service that had to do directly with us or with songs. The only one he missed was one that probably wouldn’t have turned out great anyway, as my cousin had been too far from the microphone for it in the first place. ::shrugs

But I accept happily – with immense joy, really – the videos my brother did get. And, as a special bonus blessing, he also got most of the photos I had truly wanted, too. I think my cousins got in their heads about what wedding photography was “supposed” to be, and didn’t remain present to what I had specifically requested. I’d given them a list of about twenty photographs I wanted, and they were extremely open to interpretation, but were clear and easy to make happen. But, like I said, I think they got in their heads and created a stress from pressure that didn’t actually help them do the job requested, and they missed the majority of the opportunities for the photos I had wanted. The few they did get were not of very good quality as a photo – meaning not something high enough resolution etc. that I could print for the wall… which was what I had specifically requested for these photos. So, I was saddened greatly by their photos, and also disappointed. They both do great photography usually, and this was not at their par.

However, my brother seemed to nail it on a good handful of those photos I had requested. Not just the photo framing and contents, but also the quality and resolution. I haven’t gone through them all specifically yet, but I definitely saw a handful that were just what I had hoped to get. So, we might only have five good photos, but we actually have them now, which is beautiful.

Thank you, God, for this unexpected blessing. Help me to release this depression and stress I have carried with me lately, especially around my job and finances. Help me to see clearly and to take my next step in fulfilling your will as I take care of my family. Keep us safe, happy, healthy, and holy with you. Thank you for this life and for my husband. Thank you. In your name, I pray. Amen.

Post-a-day 2024

Feeling like crap

For me, when I am going to someone’s wedding, especially a family member’s, I check in ahead of time on any extra activities that they have where I am wanted or expected to attend, separate from the actual wedding and wedding day. Before I make other plans, I confirm what all of their plans are.

It seems that almost none of my family did this, and they have almost all made other plans, to the point that some of them likely won’t even be at the rehearsal or rehearsal dinner (This includes folks who are part of the actual wedding and need to be at the rehearsal.). And some of them basically ignored what I said about plans over the weekend, and made other plans. So, I only will get to see them at the actual reception, with everyone else, even though they’re coming in from all over the place and are never in the same place at the same time anymore, which makes me miss them loads usually.

And it just feels really sh***y, and makes me not at all look forward to seeing any of them.

I feel crushed and like no one is really even coming for my or my man’s sake but for themselves and their other plans.

I had expected my wedding to be awesome and exciting and a wonderful reunion with all our loved ones…

Post-a-day 2024

Getting there

I have been quite stressed today. Actually, I was quite calm about everything this morning. I was calmly and efficiently working this morning on the things that still need to be done for the wedding (and that I could do today from home). But, for whatever reason, when my man got home, he was on edge. He did eat some food, when he realized he was quite hungry, but I think it wasn’t enough and was too little too late. He was already in a tough mood and he was getting hangrier and hangrier. It wasn’t a good combination.

So, we had a tough time doing errands together. I’ve been working so much on every detail for the wedding – mostly in my own, because he had work while I didn’t over the Christmas and new year holidays – that I have already thought through things enough to have determined which route I want to take on most things. For the ones where I’ve not been sure, I’ve asked for input and help. For many of those things, he has been very helpful. For some, he has shown that he genuinely has no preference one way or the other and trusts me to pick what I like best. Which is still helpful in its own way.

But today was one of the times where he tried to give help where help was not wanted and not needed. Yes, it could have been helpful a few weeks ago, even a few days ago. But he was a little too late to the mark for it to help today, and it, combined with his generally sour mood while we were doing something I had thought would be a fun time just being together intentionally, kind of set me off.

I have been under a lot of stress, and of all different kinds lately. There are deadlines for the wedding; goals and hopes and dreams for it; weather concerns, missing something important that will make everyone think I’m not good enough for him; the fact that I even feel like certain people (who really don’t know me very well, so it ought to be irrelevant, yet the brain clearly doesn’t care and won’t let it go completely) might think I’m not good enough for him; knowing that I am an amazing and wonderful person and that I love my man immensely and always the best for him, and sometimes feeling like I have to prove that to others; my grandma not being well and going up and down so much; the stress that gives my mom in general; the time that takes from my mom, preventing her in playing as big of a role as she has always wanted to play in helping to plan and prepare my wedding; my family who have always been there for me being pointedly absent throughout this whole process; the same family asking if there’s anything special I’d like for my wedding, and my not knowing how to say that all I want of for them to be here, helping me, enjoying this process with me, having fun with me; the dog throwing up and still getting black hair all over the house; struggling to find a pillow that lets me sleep well again; figuring out why on Earth I still haven’t taken the time to organize and put away all my clothes in the new dressers I got months ago, now; why going to bed alone is such a depressing piece of my day almost every day; not knowing what to do about it; not knowing yet how best to care for my family; struggling to find some calm and reliability in terms of having a consistent, decently-paid, fair job that makes a difference in the world; not being sure if I’ll be invited to work more permanently at this place I love and where I have felt called to be and to contribute; noticing that I have fears that I am misunderstanding God’s wishes for me, thereby doubting God; not feeling good enough because I doubt God through my fear; how stressed my man seems to be about his own career path and work future, as well as finances; not knowing how to ease his pain in all of that; forgetting that God is here for us and will support us always, so long as we choose him and let him support us…and that my hands keep cracking and bleeding and staying unrealistically dry, despite my efforts to avoid washing them anywhere near as often as I used to do.

Those are just the main ones of the moment… the ones on my mind every single day lately.

No wonder I’m exhausted.

And no wonder I kind of flipped on my man when he tried to help but kind of made it worse, having me feel like all my tie and effort so far on that particular matter wasn’t good enough for him, since he was suddenly doubting it and thinking we needed to adjust it.

Nonetheless, I still apologized immediately, before I even had relaxed enough not to be fussing with my words and stress popping out of me. It wasn’t fair for me to be angry towards him… well, it was absolutely fair for me to be angry towards him. It was, however, not kind and loving for me halfway to yell at him in the store. It was not respectful of me to react that way, and it put me further on edge that I had just done something unkind as an automatic response. I want my automatic instincts and reactions to be loving with my man. This one was not, and hurt all the more.

(I feel like Forrest Gump now…)

Well, that’s all I really have to say about that for now… so, goodnight.

Thank you, God, for this life and your love. Please, continue to guide me, and help me to see clearly my next step, always and forever, in pursuing and fulfilling your will for my life. Also, please, please, please, give us perfectly wonderful weather on our wedding day and evening and night, so we can do all our awesome stuff and everyone can travel safely. Please. In your name, I pray. Thanks be to God. Alleluia. Amen!

Post-a-day 2024

P.S. Thanks for getting him home safely from the poker night. Please, get him home safely to me from the gym, too. Thank you. Amen.

Wine Night

Tonight, we had our wine tasting dinner. The neighbors, one by one, ended up with a cold and couldn’t make it at all, though they still made and dropped off the planned wonderful salad. My sister-in-law was just relent not feeling up to getting out. But I managed to get my mom to come, after all, so it was still a small party of sorts with her, my brother, my man, and me. My mom and I definitely had to start spitting after a while, as, even just tasting a single small sip or two adds up like crazy when you’re tasting 18 different wines and Proseccos. And that’s excluding the five we didn’t even open. Nonetheless, we ended up having a great time testing and comparing them all together. And it was quite helpful to have two other palates and opinions to contribute to the considerations.

In the end, it seems we have selected our wines. Just need to go get them all tomorrow. Supposedly, we are doing something like 70 or 76 bottles of wine. While that is a lot, we are getting most of it at Costco, which makes they group all returnable, so long as they’re unopened. And that is a wonderful thing. Thank you, Costco. Well, same deal with the liquor store attached to Costco. Same policy and great pricing, too. Only the Prosecco we preferred seems to be cheaper at Total Wine than at Costco.

Whatever the case for all of it, I really hope folks enjoy the wines we picked. My man has an understanding of wines – because apparently you can’t not when you spend several years living in the smack middle of wine country in California, surrounded by vineyards 24/7 – and he seemed happy with the selections we made. They aren’t awesome wines, no. But they are decent wines. And they are wines that we can afford. And those two are what really matters for it all.

So, thank you, God, for this lovely evening together. Keep us all safe, please, and grant us nourishing sleep tonight. In your name, I pray. Amen.

Post-a-day 2024

Nails

Having a father-daughter date tomorrow. We’re getting our nails done together, Jen going to lunch. And, as girly as that sounds, it isn’t. My dad has some foot fungus or something on one of his toes, and needs to keep it tidy and clean, so he has to get a pedicure about once a month. So, not so girly after all, ne? 😛

As for me, I’m hanging with my dad while also fixing up my feet and hands as best as possible in early preparation for the wedding. So, that part is girly. Much more so than usual for me. 😛

Thank you, God, for this opportunity. In your name, I pray. Amen.

Post-a-day 2023

Birthday party

Nothing quite like going to a small child’s birthday party and being the only ones who aren’t actual family. And the only ones besides the mom who aren’t Mexican. And we don’t even have any kids of our own yet. But this baby and her big sister feel like they’re part of our family from back when I lived with them for a couple months, so we went to the party across town for a one-year-old. Fortunately, all the family remember us from the last birthday party for the older sister, so it was no biggie today, not even for my man, who didn’t live with any of them, but is just now my future husband, and has thereby absorbed these guys as extended family. 😛

Ridiculous, I know.

Thank you, God, for the love and friendships we have. Keep us all safe, please. In your name, I pray. Amen.

Post-a-day 2023

A dinner party

Tonight we had a dinnertime gathering at a neighbor’s house. I was telling my mom about it yesterday, and said that we had “a dinner party thing with some neighbors” and that I was going “to pick up Costco pizza” for it. She laughed, and explained that the ideas ‘dinner party’ and ‘Costco pizza’ don’t exactly go together.

I agreed entirely, and clarified what I’d meant and how my use of “thing” was intentional, as a dinner party is a very different event than having Costco pizza together…

And yet, I still wish we could have Costco pizza for our wedding reception food, despite the conflicting styles and expectations of the two things… 😛

Post-a-day 2023

Boots and belts

Today, for the second time, I went to a warehouse scratch-and-dent sale for this boot company that I love, Tecovas. I was going simply to meet my mom and stepdad and see if he might be able to find a pair of boots – his first pair of western boots, actually – for the upcoming rodeo season. He’s on a committee with us all now, so he needs to have at least one pair for the shifts he works for the committee.

Anyway, I went for them, grabbed some things to keep them available while waiting on them to arrive, since I live much closer, and I also grabbed a few belts for my man’s and for me, since the belts were half the price today that they had been Friday. Eventually, they arrived, and my stepdad liked and bought a very nice pair that I had grabbed for him. (When he tried them on and walked around, my mom and I both were impressed with how nice it made him look as a whole – what we wear truly does make a difference!) I was there an hour before they arrived. Then we three spent about forty minutes working on my stepdad’s boots.

However, it took me another two hours before I left. Why?

Because I asked my man about a pair of men’s loafers.

He got too stressed, so, yet again, I got to wait at this sale while he went to the regular store beer our house to try on boots in the store in order to confirm fits and sizes. And yes, you read that correctly. We did this already on Friday for a couple hours. One benefit, though, was that prices dropped while I was waiting, so we got them all for even less than they already would have been at the already-amazing prices.

Eventually, however, after four hours of being in the store with no bathrooms (because it’s a pop-up shop situation, not a real store), I left with, for the price of one pair of boots new at the store – approximately $300, though they are $600-$700 comparable quality – one pair of loafers, two pair of men’s boots, and five very nice leather belts belts. Not bad. Not bad at all.

I actually had a really great time doing it all, too. I also noticed how much I like to help people. I was consistently either chatting with a waiting person or helping people find what they were seeking or, get this, helping to organize the products. I even went through all the women’s belts to confirm that all but a few were size XS, pulled the few out and set them next to the huge plastic bins, and then adjusted the sign that read S to read XS, and split the XS belts in the two bins evenly. Yes, I pulled out a pen from my bag to write the X on the sign, very similarly to how they were adjusting all the signs around (one-time paper signs, you see). So, anyway, I had a good time helping people. And I also found great satisfaction and delight in getting things for someone that are both useful, solid quality, wanted, and a treat all in one.

Thank you, God, for such a lovely start to the day today, and thank you for the lovely continuation and finish it has had. Thank you for this beautiful life. Please, heal those in need of healing and help them to ask for healing and forgiveness in all ways. Thank you for this love I receive. Please, keep my man safe. In your name, I pray. Amen.

Post-a-day 2023