Tomorrow (Five Minute Friday)

Tomorrow is a very special day. Two of my wonderful twitter-turned-real-life friends are getting married. So, this post is for you, Sam and Elaine.

Dear "Mr. Sam" and "Miss Lainey":

We wish you a beautiful day filled with sunshine and smiles. We wish you lots of great hugs, dancing and laughter. May some of your pictures turn out well enough to hang up in your home and may the rest make you laugh enough that you want to print them too. May all the readers get through their assignments without tongue twisting. But even if we do, may everyone understand the heart behind the words if they don't sound just right. May you dance as if no one is watching, even though we all are. May you enjoy the celebration with friends and family - know that we all love you so much.

May you remember that tomorrow is about you - not about the rest of us. Focus on each other, enjoy the ride. For tomorrow begins a new journey together - may every day be an adventure. Some will be fun, some will be amazing. Some will be less fun, and some might even be lousy, but always you will have each other. There will be tough times for sure - may you trust each other enough and lean on each other to weather the storms and come through to the side of the rainbow.  And for all your days from here on out: may there be more ups than downs, more smiles than tears, more hugs than stompy feet, more kisses than complaining. Thanks for letting us share in your beginning with you.

Congratulations, my dear friends. Hugs and kisses from all 3 of us.

Love,
Jen, S & A



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Also linking at Five Minute Friday.

Relief (Five Minute Friday)

Relief. 

This is what I feel on Thursday nights when the kids go to bed. We have made it through another week of homework, piano lessons, soccer, meal preparation, school and work. I breathe easier on Thursday nights. The weekend awaits. When we can sleep in (because 7am IS sleeping in). When we can stay up late (8:30pm IS late). 

Friday nights sometimes stink in my house. Kids can be crabby. More than once we've all crawled into bed at 6:30pm and just collapsed from the exhaustion of a "regular" week. Work for me, and school for the littles. The grind of the routine  wears us out. To the breaking point. And we need the weekend to rejuvenate.

In sweet, sweet spring, we can leave it all behind and head to the ballpark.

Sometimes, we have a Friday night baseball game. And like their mama, my girls love a good trip to Nats park. The Friday crabbies don't usually come on baseball nights. There's something about nachos and cracking bats and baseballs thumping into catchers mitts. It takes the crabby away and instead we find our sweet solace. We snuggle down in the seats with stuffed animals and blankets and scorebooks. Pencils and Uno cards and notepads.  And we watch. We listen. We cheer. We sing. We dance. And on those Friday nights, relief sets in ... that our little family of 3 is in our home away from home and all is right in our little world. 

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Linking up over at Kate's place with the rest of the Five Minute Friday crew.

Where we get a word, we write for 5 minutes (no edits, no backtracks, typos are permitted and never chastised), and then read the words of our fellow writers, and leave them a little love.

Join us. 

Good (Five Minute Friday)

Five Minute Friday - where we stop for 5 minutes, throw some thoughts on the screen, and then go share in the words of friends.  You can see all of this week's FMF posts at Kate's place. And you can find us online every Thursday night tweeting with the #FMFParty hashtag.


GO.
A few weeks ago I got to be a guest poster over at Citizens of Natstown - about how baseball is always good.  So when GOOD was the prompt for Five Minute Friday this week, I was a bit stumped. It was opening day for the Nationals this week and frankly baseball has been on my mind. We returned from our Spring Break adventures and I was solely focused on baseball.

Baseball season is my happy place. Work is chaos and school is getting frantic as the end of the year approaches. And when I need a break, my beloved Nats give me what I need.

The first few games this year have been a bit rough. Some defensive miscues. Some early season rust. A few of our main guys on the Disabled list and some of the fans are restless. A few have hit the panic button. HELLO, we play 162 games. And hopefully more. So on game 3 it is not yet time to panic. Unless the stadium is on fire (which it is not. And even if it was, they would find somewhere else to play.)

And today, on my late lunch break as I was listening to the game, I found myself sucked in to the crazy. Trying to defend my team from our own fans. Fans who were calling for player benching and manager checking and marketing phrases and I don't even know what.

And then I stopped. because they were were invading my happy place. Baseball is good for me. baseball is a break from the world of chaos. And so I decided ... I am going to exercise my mute functions on twitter. I am going back to the radio to listen without the temptation of a device that can access social media if a game gets nuts. Because while I love chatting with friends online when the games are going great, I am not going to let the crazy take away my good.

So - if you don't see me online during a game, chances are it has nothing to do with me missing the game, and everything to do with me making sure the game gives me what I need.

STOP.