Rachel Callahan

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July 25, 2009 Rachel Callahan A Bit More Vulnerable Than I Usually Am, Blogher, I embarrass myself just for your amusement.

When I was a little girl, my parents often let me go spend the night with friends.

You know, because it’s what little girls did. You stayed up way past the point that you should have, played house, barbies, pretended to marry your friend’s little brother, and promised to be best friends forever and made the bracelets to prove it.

And, of course, in an all-to-foretelling of my geeky future self, I played “Office”. Office was my favorite childhood game – and my Mom was the best facilitator of “Office” in the world. For my birthday spend-the-night parties every year, she would drive me around to all of the banks and ask them if they had free pens and pads that we could use.

She would help me create and print out personalized checks for each friend that was coming over. We would even cut them, stack them, and glue one edge and set them under an Encyclopedia to dry, thereby making actual BOOKS of personalized checks.

(Ali will read this one day and say, “What’s an Encyclopedia? Do you mean WIKIpedia? “)

We would order big rolls of “Tickets” from Oriental Trading – like the kind that you got at the fair.

(Not sure what that had to do with “Office”, except that it was another fascinating paper-pushing activity. And I LOVED my paper-pushing activities.)

So yes – I have been destined to be a geeky accountant since birth.

And yes – I STILL love writing checks, at least when I am not in a hurry and have the time to savor the activity.

But that’s beside the point. (I just thought you needed something else to laugh at me about.)

Whenever I spent the night at a friend’s house, there was a 50/50 chance that it wouldn’t “stick”.

I really have no idea why my parents put up with this, but I had this bad issue of getting “homesick”. I would literally have the 8 year old version of a full-on panic attack – uncontrollable sobbing, illogical reasoning, the whole bit. And I could not be solaced by anyone but my parents. And not over the phone, mind you. Only by them coming to PICK ME UP and TAKE ME HOME.

And (at least the way I remember it), I never got homesick at a convenient time – like, say, 8pm.

It was always more like, say, 3am.

Like I said, I have no idea why my parents put up with this. They were obviously more determined than I would be as a parent in that situation. I imagine their reasoning for allowing this to happen more than twice was to help me “grow up” and “learn to be away from them”.

At any rate, I’m having a bit of childhood relapse.

It’s currently 9:30pm, and I’m on my second day of Blogher, and there are at least half a dozen parties going on downstairs and in the surrounding areas.

But, here I sit, in my hotel room, by myself.

I COULD tell you that I needed a bit of alone time – I’m certainly used to having some of that on a daily basis, and being that I have three roommates in a two-full-sized-bed hotel room, coming to the room during all the parties is a good time to be alone.

Or I COULD tell you that I needed to work on uploading videos to Say it Face to Face, the website I’m promoting this weekend, because that’s true too.

But no, I’m going to be a bit more honest (and scarily vulnerable).

I came upstairs to “freshen up”.

i.e., to try to get ahold of my emotions and make it look like I wasn’t trying not to cry.

I really hope that no one at the conference reads this while we’re still at the conference, because I certainly don’t want to be branded as the Blogher Wuss, but if I had to over-analyze my irrational feelings (and I certainly can’t help but do that CONTINUOUSLY whenever my normally-rational self starts going haywire), I would say that it is a combination of:

4 hours of very fitful sleep last night,
2 days of hardly eating (it’s hard to eat when you’re trying to make small talk with complete strangers, don’t you think?),
674 Miles between me and my amazing husband and precious little girl,
1,492 Strangers with which I’m attempting small talk (1,500 Blogher attendees – me – the 7 people I know = 1,492.)

AND, I think that about sums it up.

I’m going to go now, and head to the half dozen parties. I’m sure it will be great and fun, especially if I can learn how to make small talk and SHUT MY HEAD UP.

I know, I am not worthy to be at Blogher.

I’m just not the party animal that these two were:

Saturday Morning – It is now a bright and sunny day, I enjoyed a great night of sleep, and I am liberating myself from the morning keynote and sitting outside the hotel, on the riverwalk, in the sunshine. I am about to go get more free stuff from the exhibition hall. Life is good, I am reenergized, and today will be great. But, although this post is a bit on the vulnerable side for me, I have to stay true to recounting my TRUE Blogher experience for you.

(And, if that postscript seemed a little odd (which it probably did not), it is because I can not use contractions at the moment – I am typing on The 5 Minutes for Mom laptop that I am using this weekend, and the apostrophe key is typing an è – and with shift, it is È. Do Canadians not use contractions!! Augh! No question marks either! Canadians must not be a punctuational bunch.)

In Which I Recognized Four People

July 24, 2009 Rachel Callahan Blogher, I embarrass myself just for your amusement.

To mitigate my Mommy Guilt of LEAVING MY CHILD FOR THREE DAYS, Ali and I cuddled and talked a lot yesterday morning. On the way to my Mom and Dad’s house (which is where she will stay until Chris gets off of work tonight), we were discussing all of the things we’ve done this week that she should tell Gramamma about.

Then she excitedly told me, “And I can tell Gramamma about pooping!!”

Conversationally, I asked, “You’re going to tell Gramamma about pooping?”

And with a teasing tone, she answered, “Noooooooo!”

I think she’s been secretly reading my blog and picking up on my potty humor.

Oops.

After I got home from delivering my child and finished packing, I decided that my jeans (which I had run around in all morning and was planning on wearing during travel) needed a wash and dry to get back to their “natural” shape.

However, in doing so, I forgot that I had my boarding pass already in my pocket.

Halfway through the wash cycle, it hit me.

In a panic, I ran to the washer and opened it,. only to see my jeans now COMPLETELY covered in itty bitty bits of paper.

Nice.

If I’m WEARING my boarding pass, will they let me board?

It’s my Blogher fashion statement: the boarding-pass-washed look on Jeans.

So, after figuring out how to reprint my boarding pass, I was a good girl and got to the airport 90 minutes early, and then waited at least 14 hours – I’m pretty sure there’s a time warp at the airport that stretches every minute into an hour. Plus, my flight was delayed half an hour, which game the the opportunity to peruse the rest of the waiting public.

Almost everyone else was obviously on business trips: ignoring every other human on earth, memorizing PowerPoint slides, reading business reports, etc. . .

But I think there might have been some other people besides me going to conferences.

Like this lady – she was OBVIOUSLY going to a hair styling convention:

I seriously wonder how people make their hair stand up that tall.

So we finally got to Chicago, and I managed to get my luggage and get on the RIGHT shuttle (after one failed attempt) that would deliver me to downtown.

The first girl to be delivered on our shuttle ride was quite unlucky: She needed to get to a building past the soccer stadium, and all the roads were closed for “you know, the big socca game!!!”. So, our driver dumped her out at the roadblocks. And she walked.

He also informed us that President Obama was in town (presumably to speak at Blogher, obviously), and so we might find more roadblocks.

Luckily, we made it, and even arrived in time to see the unbelievably talented Chris Mann perform.Who, by the way, gave me two signed copies of his as-of-yet un-released CD – one for me, and one for his biggest fan, Trina.

(If you haven’t heard his version of Kanye West’s Heartless, you MUST watch the below video – it is breathtaking!)

But the only SLIGHT problem with his performance, however, was that it was more like his lips were moving, but no sound was coming out.

But I assure you, it wasn’t his fault.

Imagine a room sardine-filled of hundreds of women, all talking louder and louder to talk over each other.

It was truly cacophonous.

And I recognized NO ONE.

I finally found a couple familiar faces, and was SO relieved.

I got some GREAT hangout time with Erica of 5 Minutes for Mom (who, by the way, is hilariously entertaining!),

And, of course, the famed (and gorgeous!!) 5 Minutes for Mom twins, Susan and Janice: Well, okay – that’s Susan and NOT Janice. At least one of them had to be running around in a blinding frenzy interviewing people and taking live video.

At any rate, once I got past my indimidated overwhelmed non-social-butterfly self, I really enjoyed the insanity!

I slept from 1:30 to 6:00 and am currently running on adrenaline, which will need to be replaced with Starbucks VERY soon. So, I’m off in search of caffeine.

Off to Chicago!

July 23, 2009 Rachel Callahan Blogher

As you could probably guess, I am in a blinding frenzy today getting ready to fly to Chicago for Blogher ’09.

Although I’m usually pretty logical, I’ve been running on an emotional roller coaster. I have gone from unbelievable excitement, to sheer terror, to complete panic, to wondering why I’m doing this, and back to unbelievable excitement.

(Except right now, I’m somewhere in between queasy nervousness and nauseous overwhelmedness.)

Obviously, this trip is WAY out of my normal routine. But totally thrilling!

The reason I decided to go at the very last minute was because I was offered a sponsorship from my good friends at 5 Minutes for Mom. Susan has just launched a brand new site – Say it Face to Face, which I will be promoting at Blogher.

She just unveiled Say it Face to Face yesterday at 5 Minutes for Mom, along with a cash prize contest to kick it off!!
Say it Face to Face is a brand new idea in the social media realm, and is completely different than anything else out there. The basic concept is to create conversations through video – somewhat like vlogging, except more conversational.

You upload (via YouTube) a video of yourself asking a question or starting a conversation topic, and then other people will answer it, also via video.

The reason that Susan really wanted to create this site is that in the social media world, our relationships grow in leaps and bounds when we meet in person – it really takes a friendship from “this is my bloggy friend” to “this is my friend in real life”. And so, by video conversing, it helps create friendships and take existing ones to new levels.

Other benefits of Say it Face to Face are:

It helps you expand your social media community – you can have all of your blog, Twitter, etc info in your profile, and connect with like-minded people.
Unlike Twitter, blogs, Facebook, and all other forms of social media, SIFTF is organized around TOPICS, rather than friends. So it helps you create NEW friends based on a topic of conversation that you’re interested in.
It’s a great way to help you start video blogging and make new friends who are doing the same.
This site is about to have a TON of promotion, so by starting early, you will have a head start on being an integral part of this new idea.

So, check out Say it Face to Face while I’m gone and see if it’s something that you’re interested in! And by doing so, you’ll be registered to win $250 or $500!!!

In the meantime, I am off to ~~have a panic attack~~ Blogher! I will be meeting a ton of new people, learning all sorts of things, promoting my blog and Say it Face to Face, and hopefully not completely shutting down from being overwhelmed by all that will be going on!

Wish me luck, and I’ll be blogging from Chicago next time you hear from me!

…and Here’s the Rest of the Story.

July 22, 2009 Rachel Callahan I embarrass myself just for your amusement., Parent of the Year, The Blissfulness of Life

In general, I am against writing posts about trips after the trip is over – it seems rather anticlimactic to write. So I either write it when I’m there or not at all. However, since there was so much other excitement going on this week besides our quick weekend jaunt to the beach (i.e. Baby Tessa, Blogher, etc), I still have a few tidbits from our trip that I feel the burning need to share with you.

So, forgive me for breaking my own silly and arbitrary principle, and accept this post, late though it may be.

One thing that I always try to make a priority on vacations is to teach my child devious past-times. So Saturday morning at breakfast, I tackled the “shooting your straw wrapper at Uncle Leo”:
You see, I think the reason that more parents don’t teach their children to do mischievous things like this is because it’s been too long since they’ve committed these crimes themselves, and so they forget how much fun they are.

However, I’ve always thrown and/or spit my straw wrappers across the table at Uncle Leo, so it was a natural transition for me to pass on my talents to my daughter.

Daddy, a bit more grown-up than me, watched with bemusement.Funny. He gives me that very same posture/look when I throw/spit my straw wrappers at Uncle Leo.

Shortly after breakfast, Ali was ready for her long-anticipated sandcastle building at the beach.

And let me tell you – if your child doesn’t like walking in the sand, GO TO CHILDREN’S PLACE AND BUY THOSE SHOES. She was completely unfazed by sandy walking, which is a complete turnaround from our last beach trip.
We like going under the bridge to go to the beach, which allows for the option of sun or shade.

AND the option to dive off of the bridge piers, which Chris always takes advantage of:
His splash is like that of an Olympic diver. Barely a flutter in the glassy surface of the water:
Or not.

He asked me to jump with him, and so for the first time ever, I jumped the bridge with him.

I looked super graceful:

Until I got in the air. Then I looked like a floundering whale.
Yes, I didn’t crop that picture closer on purpose.

Ali was at first scared of Mommy and Daddy’s dive, then excited and clapping, then acted completely unimpressed when we got back to shore:

She much preferred to “go fishing” with Daddy
So, the beach was great for all. Except for that half hour after our jump where I had to lay, left ear down, for half an hour to get the excruciatingly painful water out of my ear. But after that, it was great.

****WE INTERRUPT THIS BLOG TO SHARE A FASHION PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT****

I promised more information on these “Skinny jeans” that I bought. I know, I know, they go against all that I stand for. But seriously – skinny jeans aren’t what skinny jeans were last year at this time.

In fact, I’ve been noticing people at the mall lately with these ever-so-slightly flared jeans that were really flattering, because the overall effect of the leg was slimmer. Then I realized that these were the “new” skinny jeans.

Now granted, they aren’t nearly as slimming on me since my thighs themselves do me no slimming favors (QUITE the opposite), but the overall effect isn’t as horrid as I thought skinny jeans would be:

See, they’re not exactly skinny, certainly not tapered, but not all the way to flared:
And since I know that everyone will ask about the non-Mom jeans pocket placement, they fit the requirements of starting halfway down the butt, continuing through the leg, and not flaring out, which would, in fact, make my butt look like elbows:

****FASHION PSA NOW OVER.****

Back to the trip:

We actually convinced Ali to give the “little boats” (jet skis) another try – I was shocked that she would even get on it after her last experience.

However, I PERSONALLY believe that the difference was the third rider:That’s right: Mommy makes all the difference.

Um, right?

Okay, maybe she’s just grown up a little bit more.

Now, she still rode with a deer-in-the-jet-ski-lights look on her face:

(I REALLY wish I could have photoshopped that droopy booger out of her nose, but such is life. Which, by the way, Chris got the boogers out of her nose last night, and she said “I wanna see!!!”, and when he showed her, she proudly proclaimed: “They’re Mommy’s favorite color!!!!”. Sorry kid. Not THAT color of green.)

Um, where was I?

Oh yes. Although she had the slightly ~~boogerfied~~ terrified look on her face, she never once whined or complained. And she MIGHT have even enjoyed it.

We rode out of the bay and into a backwoods creek, which might have resembled the scenery in the Amazon in the Anaconda movies:

ESPECIALLY when we came up to this rope that looked like it had a dead animal for bait hanging on the end of it:

(We’re pretty sure it was just a rope swing though. Hopefully.)

And then REALLY especially when we rounded the corner and saw this menacing boat wreckage:

I’m pretty sure this IS the boat from Anaconda:

But we didn’t find Jennifer Lopez or Ice Cube’s body anywhere around.

We did, however, take the opportunity for a family photo op:

I told you Ali looked thrilled the whole time.

But, luckily, no anacondas. The scariest thing we saw all weekend (and it WAS scary, let me tell you) was THIS awful creature:He was furry….and striped…and HUGE.

I’m pretty sure he was one of those human-eater ants from Africa.

For perspective, I made Kitty stand near him (I stayed far, far away):

Shortly thereafter, she lost that little big toe.

Okay, not really. But I wouldn’t have put it past that evil creature.

And, just in case the green booger story wasn’t enough to make this blog Grade-A Gross, Leo took this picture on his iPhone of Ali rejecting a little-bit-too-big-to-eat-in-one-bite tomato at Sea N Suds:

I think he took that picture in payback for the straw wrapper spitting at breakfast.

For more pictures of our fun on the beach, check out this post at B-Sides.

A “Moving” Picture Show: First Ice Cream Cone.

July 22, 2009 Rachel Callahan Wordless Wednesday - as IF I could be wordless.

Study…
Study harder…

Test…

Roll around on one’s tongue to analyze the quality:
Secondary test:
Tertiary test:

Quaternary test:

Result: face down, on the seat, hole in the side, multiple hazmat crews needed for cleanup:

I’ve always wanted to use the words “tertiary” and “quaternary” in a post. I now feel completed as a blogger.

For my other Wordless Wednesday, head over to B-Sides!
For everyone else’s, check out 5 Minutes for Mom!

Winners of the Start of Summer Giveaways!

July 21, 2009 Rachel Callahan Giveaways and Contests

The Start of Summer Giveaways are over, and it’s time to announce the winners!

First, the five winners of the Taubl Family CD:
Tina at My Own Party of 5
Carol at Joy in the Journey
Contin Kandy at Striving to be Perfect
Kitty
Christen at Sparks’ Notes

Next, the winner of Historic Photos of University of Alabama Football:
Gina at Blessed Lane

And last, the winners of the Birmingham Menus $25 Gift Certificates:
Stacey at Stacey~Stace
Ann Marie at Le Blog De Ree

Congratulations to all of you!! Be sure to leave your thanks here for our Start of Summer giveaway sponsors, Birmingham Menus, The Taubl Family, and Turner Publishing. You can also tweet your thanks to The Taubl Family and Birmingham Menus!

If you won, please go ahead and email me your address at rachel@graspingforobjectivity.com. I will try to get out emails to all of the winners, but there are just so many that it may take me a little while!

Remember, there were more giveaways at Alabama Bloggers, so if you didn’t win here, check the winner’s post there!

Tessa Vu

July 20, 2009 Rachel Callahan Newsflash, The Blissfulness of Life

Ali and I excitedly went to the hospital today to meet her new baby cousin, Tessa Kate!

This is the second time in under 2 months that we have sat in that very same waiting room in anticipation of a Tessa being born, of course. So Ali knew the drill and was ready to meet COUSIN Tessa!

When we got the news, Ali did a few cheerleader “YAY”s for baby Tessa Kate:

Shortly after she was born but before we got to meet Tessa Kate, the rest of the family arrived, including newly Big Brother’ed Eli:

Ali waited with Mammaw:

And Eli called all his friends to tell them the news with his Granddads:

When we got to go back, Eli’s initial reaction was a smile,

Very, VERY quickly followed by screams of protest, when it sunk in what just happened here.

In fact, he wasn’t happy until he ousted Tessa Kate from her center of attention and got to crawl up and give his Mommy a huge hug!

Meanwhile, Ali found an out-of-the-way spot to sit and clap half-heartedly. (She may have been clapping because it wasn’t HER but Eli that was getting the shock of a lifetime.)

Mommy, Daddy, and Baby Tessa Kate are doing great!(And Lindsay looks amazing considering that she was super duper brave and had NO pain meds whatsoever – I’m impressed!!)

Tessa was born around 1:30pm, at 7 lbs, 5 ozs (ironically the exact same weight as Baby Tessa Faith) and 19 1/2 inches. She was very awake, alert, and not fussy:
And had a bunch of dark hair:

Eli refused to even look at her for the rest of the time we were there. Every time he sensed her presence, he would turn his head as fast as he could:
But he’ll come around. In a day or decade or two.
But, needless to say, the rest of us are completely thrilled, and excited to tell her

Blupdate? Blogdate? Upblog?

July 19, 2009 Rachel Callahan A Day in the Life, Newsflash, The Magical Perfume

We are currently on our way home from the beach. I’m sure I’ll post more pictures later in the week, but there’s just a ton of tidbits that I haven’t had the chance to share on here in the past few days, so this post is the ever-random update post.

First of all, if you’ve seen any of my Twitter statuses scroll by over the past few days, you might have noticed that I’ve been all aflutter with crazy planning to do something extraordinarily spontaneous for me: I’m going to BlogHer ’09 in Chicago on Thursday!!

For those of you that are saying, “huh?”, Blogher is a very large blogging conference for women (took me forever to figure out how to word that – it started out as “very large women’s blogging conference”, but that just wasn’t coming across right) that happens annually.

I wanted to go, but just didn’t really pursue making it happen (i.e. paying for it myself or knocking down doors trying to find a sponsor).

However, last week, someone whom I’ve worked with through blogging for a long time contacted me and offered me a sponsorship if I would come and help them promote a new website they are starting (more details about that later).

I was immediately thrilled with the possibility, and have been working like mad trying to obtain a ticket (they’ve been sold out for months), flight, and hotel room. PLUS trying to figure out where I’m supposed to go, what I’m supposed to wear (still confused on that one), and on and on.

To say the least, it’s been completely overwhelming, yet exhilarating! But panicky too – I don’t usually travel without Chris and Ali. I will miss them terribly!!

So anyway, I’m sure I should have much to blog about at the end of this week – I mean, where is a better place to find blog fodder than at a BLOGGING CONFERENCE?

I also need to update you on The Magical Perfume.
Several people have asked me how the perfume was once I bought it.

And, I’m sorry to say, that the journey of discovery isn’t over.
Once I bought it, Chris wasn’t as sure. He would give me doubtful sounding responses such as “I LIKE it. . .”, and “it smells NICE. . . ”

NOT the responses that would be obtained had it been, actually, the magical perfume.

Luckily, I bought the tiniest itty bitty travel size they had, and he DOES like it, so it will do until I find The One and Only Magical Perfume.

So, the journey of aroma discovery will surely continue. And Chris keeps reminding me that all worthwhile treasure hunts take time, the gathering of clues, and, oh yeah, TIME.

So I shan’t be discouraged. I SHALL smell magical one day!

I’ve also gotten a few questions about the As-Yet-Un-Exorcised Fridge.

It has gotten better, but it’s still iffy. I turned the temperature down all the way, which seems to have helped, but my last half gallon of milk still went sour five days early.

I asked the milk guy at my grocery store about it, and he said that their milk normally lasts over a week past the expiration date for him (mine has been going bad 5-10 days early).

Then again, he WAS the milk guy.

Chris put an independent thermometer in the fridge, and it’s reading at 29 degrees – which seems surely cold enough for a fridge!! But I need to research it and find out if, indeed, that is the right temperature.

And, I anti-bacterialized the whole thing again.

I think I need a new, purty, fancy Fridge. Don’t you?

My Mom’s Leg.

She is MUCH better – in fact, she is allowed to put her whole weight on her foot, as of last Monday!!

Apparently, the doctor WAY over-emphasized the healing process when she was in the hospital, presumably because he could sense that my Mom was a very very busy lady and would potentially cheat the process if he didn’t make it sound super grim.

(Maybe it was my Mom begging “Can I still teach at Vacation Bible School next week?” that clued him in.)

So everything has gone quicker, smoother, and less painful than we were told, which is awesome!

My sister-in-law, Lindsay, is having Tessa Kate tomorrow! I’m sure she and I will have pictures and updates up tomorrow for you, and Eli will be a very proud big brother.

And, last thing – tomorrow is the last day to enter all of the Start of Summer giveaways (except for the Zoës Kitchen one) – so if you haven’t entered, be sure to do so!! Links to each one are at the top left sidebar.

Well, that’s it! I think I’ve addressed everyone’s questions, and in doing so, there’s enough update in this post to be a full-fledged newspaper! So feel free to print this out, lay it out on the floor, and let your dog pee on it. (Do people still do that?)

Snowmen, Skinny Jeans, and Storms.

July 18, 2009 Rachel Callahan Shopping: A Girl's Best Friend, The Blissfulness of Life

Ali, of course, was overly thrilled to use her mad card-making skills to make Daddy a Birthday Card:

However, the first thing she said when I told her we needed to make Daddy a birthday card was, “Yes! I want to put a snowman on it!!!” – so the back (or rather, front according to her,) looks like this:

Yes, quite fitting for a July Birthday. Especially the one-eyed snowman. He melted only enough to leave him in a permanently flirty wink.

Anyway, Chris worked half a day, and then we used the other half of the day to drive down here to the beach to visit Kitty and Leo.

Chris very lovingly dropped me off at the outlet malls while he and Ali went and unloaded (I tried to convince him that it was HIS birthday and so therefore we should do exactly what HE wanted to do, but, being the wonderfully logical person that he is, he said that this was the most sensible use of our time. I love it when logic equals shopping.)

So I went to my favorite store first, BCBG Max Azria. I would never buy ANYTHING that was BCBG except at their outlet stores – they have TRUE outlet deals (unlike most outlets). I have bought many shirts for $19 that were originally $180+.

It is The. Best. Outlet. Ever.

Plus, they always have some interesting new fashion trends for entertainment value. I wish this next picture really illustrated how crazy this is (I would have set it up better with my hand as a point of reference, but I was trying to be sneaky and take these pictures for you – I’m SURE the store clerk would have frowned).

The dress on the left is a sweater dress, made EXTRAORDINARILY teensy to ENSURE that it would be as skin tight as possible. The dress on the right is a normal dress, for point of reference:The waist of the sweater dress was seriously less than my the length of my pinky finger. It was crazy small.

I also felt like I was in the famed “0-2-4” store from the movie “Mean Girls”. You know, the store that only sold things in sizes of 0, 2, and 4. For instance, there were twenty XS’s in a particular shirt. I only managed to find one other size:

Yeah. XXS.

But you know what that means? This is an OUTLET store – you know – the store that sells the things that don’t sell at full price. So, if there are a ton of XS and XXS’s left over, then that means that there aren’t that many girls around that shop at “0-2-4” after all.

At least that’s what I told myself in consolement.

At any rate, I managed to find a few non-XS things to try on and headed to the dressing room.

The first shirt I TRIED to try on was a really funky wrap shirt. It literally took me SIX tries to get it on, which was my first clue that this shirt was probably too smart for me to purchase.

Then I tried on a silk shirt with a zipper on the side. However, I didn’t realize at the time that the zipper was broken. After I got it on, I literally couldn’t get it off again – I worked on it for at least 10 minutes. I tried getting it off with the zipper up, but no luck.

Finally, I had to sheepishly ask the saleslady to please get me out of this broken shirt (I’m sure she thought I broke it, but I swear I didn’t!!!). It took her half a second.

Apparently to work in retail, you must possess zipper magic. But when she got it off, she gasped – “It pinched you!!”. Sure enough, I had a big red whelp where the evil shirt had not only attempted to ensnare me, but eat me as well.

THEN she asked if I wanted it in another size.

Uh, no thank you.

I DID, however, actually find a pair of jeans. And I ventured into new fashion territory for me: skinny jeans. I actually (gasp) liked them!

I know, I know, I pretty much dissed them in Mom Jeans and the Dreaded “Long Butt”, but I think the reason that I actually liked them is that fashion is finally catching up to the “normal” (i.e. not 0-2-4) body, and they aren’t quite AS skinny as skinny jeans originally were.

Or as tight.

Or as spandex-gripping.

However, to try them on, I needed a bit more heel than the flat flip-flops I had with me. So, my rescuing saleslady brought me some heels.

And I don’t wear stilettos.

I know people say they are comfortable, but I swear my feet were hurting before I even got them on:

So obviously, I got the jeans and threw the shoes to the Venus Girl-Trap shirt to contain it’s ravenous appetite.

Chris and Ali came back and picked me up, and we headed to dinner. We were watching a wall of storms come in waaaay off in the distance while we were eating – great lightning, wall clouds, and a few spirally looking spouts (which I’m sure weren’t what they looked like, but it was fun to pretend anyway).

However, the storm was moving much faster than it appeared.

By the time Chris was eating his last Birthday Buffalo Wing, we could literally see the clouds surging toward us. When we got to the car (still well within daylight hours), the sky looked like this:

So, of course, I took it as a photo op:

I call these “Nightmare at the Outlet Mall”:

We managed to outrun the storm, and even have time to stop at Publix for birthday cookies before it caught up with us.

So, it was most definitely a perfect storm. It gave us the allowance for awesome pictures and EVEN cookies.

Brave, Brave Sir Chris

July 17, 2009 Rachel Callahan Storytime, The Blissfulness of Life

Today is Chris’ Birthday!! But instead of subjecting you to an ooey gooey Birthday post (I’ll save that for the card), I’m going to tell you a story.

Because, you see, not only is this his 33rd birthday, but it is also the 10th anniversary of when we started dating.

And the fact that we started dating is, in fact, an ode to my dear husband’s bravery.

Let’s start in February of 1999. I was 17 years old, and a senior in High School. I had never been on a single date. I met Chris on a Wednesday night, after one of the guys on the Church praise team (on which I played guitar) invited me to this “thing”.

This “thing” was somewhat akin to a Christian “jam band”, for lack of a better explanation. They met at our Church on Wednesday nights after all of the rest of the activities were over, which meant it started sometime around 9pm, and usually ended after midnight.

(However, being that I was 17, I was never allowed to stay out until it ended.)

So anyway, I walk into the little house that the band (later named freeforall) met in. There were four people there – the guy who invited me, two other people who I already knew, and one person that I’d never met before – Chris.

Chris was 22, in his fifth year of college, working full-time, living on his own, and QUITE the adult, or at least compared to my High School self.

I immediately fell in love with the band, and quickly became a part of the group, playing classical guitar and singing. (Chris played guitar, keyboard, wrote some AMAZING songs, and sang.) We started doing youth events and playing in Churches. Chris and I got to know each other in this band-setting, then started talking on the phone, then hanging out, and becoming better and better friends until we would have unequivocally referred to each other as our best friend.

(While everyone else in our lives were raising their eyebrows and saying “Yeah RIGHT you’re just friends!”)

I was not interested in anything more than friendship at the time – I had decided several years before that I wouldn’t date anyone until I met the man I was going to marry. I’ve always been the overly practical sort, and just saw no point in repeatedly getting my heart broken. So I had promised God that if He would make it clear when it was time, then I wouldn’t date anyone until I met my husband.

Sometime between February and July, I remember someone trying to set me up with a single guy at work. I immediately responded “No thanks –“, and then caught myself before I blurted out, ” — I already know who I’m going to marry.”

I was shocked. I had never consciously had that thought before that moment, but from then on, I recognized it (only to myself) as the truth – I was going to marry Chris.

I still, very oddly, wasn’t in a hurry to start dating. Looking back, I’m really not sure why – the only thing I can surmise is that we just had such a great friendship and had so much fun together, that I was, for the time being, quite happy with that.

However, due to several different events (one of which was another guy showing interest in me and therefore creating an urgency in Chris’ mind that helped him get over the “I’m a horrible, dirty old man for liking a SEVENTEEN YEAR OLD” feeling), we ended up having the “DTR talk” (“Define the Relationship Talk”) right before Chris left to go to the beach for his birthday.

At the time, for whatever reason, I was saying that we needed to back up and get back to our friendship. Or at least define what in the world we were. At any rate, I left the conversation thinking that we were going to back off a bit.

However, Chris left the conversation, and for the beach, with a five subject notebook. In which he apparently used to completely and totally pray through and analyze our relationship and pro/con the potentiality of marrying me.

(I have never seen nor read this in-depth study of my marriage potential – wanna come over and help me dig around in the basement for it?)

And, after coming to a decisive conclusion on Saturday (his birthday), he left the beach in the middle of the night and drove straight to our Church, in order to catch my Dad right after Church was out.

He had a talk with my Dad in the parking lot, and his basic request was, “May I date your daughter with the intention of marrying her?”

Wow.

Now, my (Ex-Cop) Dad was not exactly Mister-Touchy-Feely with guys interested in his only daughter.

QUITE the opposite.

He was more of the cleaning-the-pistol-and-telling-them-that-he-had-70-acres-on-which-to-hide-their-dead-body (and totally serious about it, too) type.

And, if you tack on the fact that I was 17 and Chris just turned 23, this conversation took real guts. And decisiveness.

(Which, I suppose, is why it took four days and a five subject notebook to ensure that this was, indeed, the course he wanted to take.)

My Dad told Chris that he’d get back to him. Then, that night, Dad wisely had my Mom ask me if I wanted to date Chris, and if I didn’t, then he would tell him no and keep me from having to do it.

As shocked as I was of the timing of this request, I knew without a doubt that he was the man I wanted to marry, so I readily agreed. And, quite shockingly, so did my Dad.

A year and a couple of months later (when we were 18 and 24 years old), it was time for Chris to come back to my Dad to ask another question. This time, it was if he could marry me. Knowing my Dad’s favorite answer to any question was “Do you want my answer right now?” (meaning, of course, that if you DID want an answer right now, the answer was “no”), he chose to send my Dad a very detailed, well thought out, and eloquent letter.

And then, silence.

TWO WEEKS of silence.

Dad didn’t even ACKNOWLEDGE that he got the letter.

Finally, after two weeks, Chris called to talk to me, and before Mom went and got me, she whispered to Chris, “I just want you to know that Vic got your letter. He just takes these sort of things very seriously, and is still praying and thinking about it.”

I don’t know if Mom was worried about Chris giving up, or felt sorry for him, or was concerned for his sanity, but it was quite the nice gesture.

A few days later at Sunday Lunch, Dad pulled Chris out onto the porch (somehow I was quite oblivious to all of this), and they apparently had quite the talk. Amazingly, the talk ended with another “yes” from my Dad.

A “yes” that my Dad had agonized and prayed about until he KNEW that it was the right decision (which, by the way, I cannot BEGIN to tell you how much I appreciate my Dad taking my future so seriously as his responsibility – I highly recommend this approach to ALL dads).

And so, for all of Chris’ bravery and determination in winning my hand in marriage, and in honor of our musically based relational origins, I present to you a song.

No, I didn’t really write it. It’s actually a Monty Python song – I just modified it slightly for my brave, brave husband’s sake. Hopefully you know the song and can hum along in your head. . .

Brave, Brave Sir Chris

Bravely bold Sir Chris rode forth from the Beach.
He was not afraid to die, O brave Sir Chris
He was not at all afraid to be told no in nasty ways
Brave, brave, brave, brave Sir Chris

He was not in the least bit scared to be mashed into a pulp
Or to have his eyes gouged out and his elbows broken
To have his kneecaps split and his body burned away
And his limbs all hacked and mangled, brave Sir Chris

His head smashed in and his heart cut out
And his liver removed and his bowels unplugged
And his nostrils ripped and his bottom burnt off

Brave Sir Chris said what he had to say
Bravely asked to take me away
When silence reared its ugly head
He bravely waited two weeks in dread
Yes, brave Sir Chris stood stout
And gallantly didn’t chicken out
Bravely taking my Dad’s heat
He didn’t for a second retreat
Bravest of the brave, Sir Chris!

Happy Birthday, Babe!