If you look closely at this photo, you will see the real reason women lose hair after having babies.

The other day, while taking advice from my lululemon water bottle, I decided to do one thing a day that scares me.  This only last a few days because, really, this advice isn't possible.  One thing a day?!  Everyday?!  Even inclusive of phobias, like "Go touch a giant nasty hairy spider" and death-defying stunts, like parachuting, you quickly run out of scary things to do everyday.  Especially while toting along your 6-month old.

But, recently, I did do one thing that scared me.  I posted an ad on gyos.com, the Sunshine Coast's local craigslist.  What did I post on there?!  Well, an ad for models.  So that I could practice taking pictures of them.  I know, sounds slightly creepy, right?!  Well, I didn't know what else to do.  Jody was getting sick of me snapping his picture every 5 minutes and Minnow never moves, so she isn't the most diverse subject to photograph.  In short, all this photography practice on strangers has cumulated to Red Fish Blue Fish - Photography by Melissa.  Come visit at redfishbluefishphotography.blogspot.com.  

Although I'm utterly terrified to begin this venture, I love the line from J.K. Rowling's Harvard Speech, 'The Fringe Benefits of Failure':

"... some failure in life is inevitable.  It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all - in which case, you fail by default."

If I don't try, I fail.  So I might as well try.  Plus, 'if he is for us, who can be against us?', right?!

:: 5 years ::

My Jody

(aka Jojo, Joey, Dody, Snookie-Woo)

 Five years ago today, I married my best friend and have not regretted a single moment.  Except maybe that one time that you snapped the toilet off the wall in your frustration and flooded the condo building.  And the old people were really mad at us.  And I thought your parents were going to kill us.  With their bare hands.  Even though they were too nice to say anything.  That one time, I briefly wondered if I made a mistake.  But then I just helped you cleaned up the water and found an emergency plumber.  And called your parents to ask if they have got insurance on the condo yet...  

My life is better because of you.  You make me smile.  You make me laugh, hard & often.  You sometimes make me mad.  And, in five year, you have only occasionally made me cry.  You have taught me the true meaning of unconditional love.  You have made me learn to trust, no longer afraid of my heart being crushed.  You have made my fairytale dreams come true, a life I never imagined possible.  You held my hand through so many hard times and always tried to find the right words, even when it was hard for you.

Some things I love about you are:

1.  You always know where everything is... my keys, my library books, my favorite shirt.  You always know.  I still lose things, but that number is drastically reduced because of you.

2.  You know how to fix things.  I really like this.  Because I'm clumsy and often break things.

3.  You are so supportive, ridiculously so.  I wanted to learn to play a musical instrument.  You asked your mom to pick up a keyboard for me from craigslist and listened, encouragingly, as I plunked "Tinkle Tinkle Little Star".  You'd compose songs for me and "jam" on my keyboard as I made dinner.  Then, a few months later, didn't say anything when I stopped practicing.  Because I couldn't get past nursery rhymes.

4.  Your gentleness.  You are one of the kindest, most tender-hearted men I've ever met.  But you are also really cheeky and funny, so the sweetness isn't annoyingly sappy.  You have never said the wrong thing to me, even when I complain about my thighs or jiggly baby belly.  You just encourage and support me and pretend I'm not trying to trick you into saying the wrong thing.

We have both changed, together.  We have learned a lot from each other and had adventures and laughed countless times.  I can't wait to see what the next five years have in store.  

My life is better because you are in it.  

I promise to be your wife and your best friend and your greatest fan until I take my last breathe.

Love

your wife

Sunday afternoon Jody was busy working on new molding around the living room doors and windows (did I mention our house is in a constant state of renovations?!), so I decided to try something new with Judah - finger painting!  Raising Homemakers just listed a homemade recipe and I thought it'd be safe considering Judah eating the paint was inevitable.

My assistant in the kitchen.

Flour Finger Paint

One-cup flour

1 1/4 cups hot water

1 1/2 cups cold water

Two-tablespoons salt

Food coloring or tempera paint

Mix the flour, salt, and cold water in a saucepan. Beat the mixtures (with whisk or rotary beater) until smooth. Add the hot water and boil it until the mixture is thick. Beat until smooth. Add food coloring to add color. Store this in an airtight container in the refrigerator.

 Approximately 30 seconds later, this is what we looked like...

It made a big mess. everywhere.  But we had lots of fun.  Or, I should say, I had fun while Judah was busy eating it.  

And it only took 2 days to get the bits of pasty-dried paint crust out of Judah's hair without pulling it all out *again*.

What do we do around our house on a quiet night?!  

Play with dollar store moustaches, naturally.

Judah had no clue we stuck anything on him.  But he had fun laughing at us laughing at him.

Today's feature (as per the package of assorted moustaches):

"The Partyboy"

"The Bandit"

Over the last week, I've felt really beaten down.  There, I said it.  I don't often talk about these sorts of feelings - because I don't want to feed them or allow them to grow, because I don't want them to fester, because I don't want to admit it.  But over this last week, it was the "small" things in life, left ignored, that were making me weary.  And it took reading an article on www.wellgroundedlife.com to realize it.

"When something big happens, we tend to get more intentional about seeking out support, taking things off our plate that we can’t manage, and focusing our energy on getting through the issue.

But the little things. The daily stresses.  The eating poorly.  The slight headaches. The few extra pounds we add every month or so.  The anxiety at work.  The frustrations at home. The late nights and poor sleep. The feeling scattered and disorganized. The weeks that go by without meaningful connection with our spouses.  

The little things are our life.  

Each one individually doesn’t seem all that bad…but collectively they can overwhelm us and leave us feeling drained, stressed and incongruent with how we truly want to live life.  Too many imbalanced little things just suck the joy from us.  If you were to take stock of your life right now…How are all the little things?  And most importantly what one small thing could you do today to help alleviate it?

Our lives really are made up of small choices and moments.  We too easily overwhelm ourselves thinking we need to solve everything that is out of balance immediately.

What really works is taking this moment right now and doing one small thing to shift direction.

What’s your one small thing you’ll commit to today?"

She verbalized how I've felt this past week exactly.  So, today & this week, I'm doing the little things that will ultimately make a big impact.  Because it is the little things that can slowly tear you down.  I don't want to be on auto-pilot, just passing each day and surviving.  I want to live each moment with passion and purpose.  I want to live the life my Savior died to give me.  I'm going to put away those yucky feelings, focusing on my blessings.

Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly.  1 Cor. 13