Flashback: June 2003

Moving day. We leave Janesville, the only home we've ever known as a married couple, and head east to a new everything: a new job, a new home and, eventually, new children.

(then-- that's Hank)



(now)



The June day is warm. Sunny. Joe and I arrive at our new house alone-- Madeleine and Hank are with my family. We spend the day cleaning and unpacking and, later, the children are brought to their new home full of boxes, apprehension and excitement. We eat carryout pizza.

(then)



(now)



This was to be our home for a short time. The theory was we would find something bigger. Later-- someday down the road. This house was to be a stepping stone and meant to be lived in for a few, short years.

Of course, that was seven years ago and we're still here. The boxes are gone, and so is the excitement and apprehension. Our neighbors are no longer strangers, but familiar faces and good friends.

(then)



(now)



I feel though, lately, as if the end is near. This dear, sweet home that has housed so many wonderful gatherings, welcomed home two daughters and stood comfortingly by during the death of a beloved mother, mother-in-law and nana is growing smaller and smaller as we grow bigger and bigger and, as much as I love this house, I feel we may part ways at some point.

(then)



I might be wrong. It's always easier to do nothing than to do something, and buying a home, selling a different one and moving from one to the other is no small something.

But yesterday I realized we are now finally ready to make that jump. We didn't make the jump, ultimately, but we realized we're ready. The idea of calling mortgage lenders and all that implies wasn't just an idea, but a reality and we were ready had the house we looked at been The One.

(then)



(now)



I love this dear little house and today, a day much like the one on which we moved in seven years ago, has me feeling a bit nostalgic.

Flashback: July 28, 2002

We all have those days; days that aren't great, but not bad, either. Things go right, things go wrong. Still, though, who wouldn't trade the things that go right on this bitterly cold day (high of 7, I think, and windy!) for the dog days of summer. Specifically I am thinking--dreaming-- of the day pictured below. A hot, July day swimming in Mom and Bob's pool with my almost two-year-old daughter. I had just quit my job and become a stay-at-home-mom after (almost!) two years of wishing to do so. Joe was a law student, summering at the firm where he now works. The pool water was a perfect eighty degrees. Family was around. Mom was still alive. Hank was kicking happily inside me, eager to come out in just a few short months.

And, did I mention, it was hot?

Madeleine's Ninth Birthday

First off, let's just get this out of the way: I can't believe I have a nine-year-old daughter. Nine! For some reason her turning nine has been a hard to digest number. It just seems so old (kid-wise).

But today is the little girl's birthday. Today she is, in fact, nine-years-old. If you're interested, her birthday story is here. Today the neighborhood children will come over for cupcakes and lemonade in our backyard (if anyone who is not a neighbor and would like to come, just give me a call and let me know!) and tonight, as a family, we will pour over Madeleine's baby book and reminisce about her birth.

Yesterday, though, we celebrated the event, one day early. In attendance were grandparents, a great aunt, aunts, uncles, cousins and godparents who were all gracious enough to make what was, for some, a two hour trip. It was such a perfect day.

On the way home from church we stopped to pick up a large balloon bouquet. A few made it outside, but most loomed over the food table.



By mid-afternoon we were ready to eat Madeleine's birthday request: BBQ ribs and sweet corn (and a lot else too, obviously).





The beautiful weather allowed us to take our heaping plates in the backyard and eat in the sunshine (good thing, too, since ribs are messy!).

Later we came in for cake.



Can you see the horse in the middle of the cake? Ace of Cakes I am not but, still, I thought it was pretty cool.



All in all a very nice day. Happy Birthday, NINE-year-old Madeleine!

Flashback: March 14, 2001

Joe is first year law student. He has successfully completed one semester of his graduate degree and is settling into his academic routine. The student chapter of the Federalist Society, to which Joe belongs, secures Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia to come and speak at the University of Wisconsin, where Joe is enrolled. Federalist Society members also have the opportunity to dine with Justice Scalia the evening prior to his speech. Spouses (and perhaps dates?) were allowed to tag along, which I did. I remember the intimate dinner well and enjoying the company of a man I had previously known only a little of.

I don't know if we ever appreciate the great moments in life enough when we have them, but looking back, the enormity of dining with a justice of the Supreme Court of the United States with only twenty or thirty people present occurs to me. I am thankful I remember the low lights of Restaurant Magnus, the din of casual conversation and my position in the room in relation to Justice Scalia as well as I do.

Joe did appreciate the moment at the time and, as an aspiring lawyer, made sure to get his photo taken with the man.


Why in the world on an unexceptional, cold February day seven years later am I thinking of this moment? Joe has been pleading for months for me to get this picture of him, along with the menu Justice Scalia autographed, framed for his office. I have tried ignoring, mumbling and outright denial for long enough; my hand was finally called and I had to confess to Joe that I could not remember where the picture was.

Oh, sure, I knew it was somewhere. Even though I couldn't locate it, it wasn't lost.

And now, just today, I scoured CDs and external hard drives and voilà! Success! See, I knew it wasn't lost.

Flashback: August 3, 2000

Today Madeleine is seven-years-old. Seven. I still can't quite wrap my brain around that fact that here I sit with a seven-year-old daughter. In some ways she still seems so young, and in others so mature; so, so mature that it's hard to remember that's she's only seven.

I've never been one of those women who has embraced pregnancy as if I were finally fulfilling a life-long physical dream. I mean, sure, I always wanted to be a mother, but I learned quickly while pregnant with Madeleine, and even faster with subsequent pregnancies, that the sickness, fatigue and general feelings of cowish-ness outweighed any enjoyment I might have experienced while pregnant.

I think as sort of a joke, or maybe as payback for not appreciating pregnancy enough, God has given me the gift of longer than average pregnancies, each one extending longer than the last. Madeleine, as you might then guess, was the shortest of my pregnancies. She was born only five days past my due date.

I remember the day clearly. Labor began, as they often do, the afternoon of the day prior to her birth. I didn't realize that's what it was at the time, of course; I attributed the contractions to more Braxton-Hicks, or warm-up, contractions. Other mothers who have been overdue will understand this: you reach a point in your pregnancy, well after your arbitrarily designated "due date," where you just sort of give up and figure pregnancy is a condition that will plague you for a lifetime. Silly, I know, but it's how you come to think and feel.

By early evening I was finally convinced that the contractions might really be the real thing. I panicked. I called Terri, my only friend who had ever experienced labor, and asked her opinion. She offered the only advice possible from a friend sitting on the other end of a phone line over sixty miles away, "Um, it could be labor."

It was. After multiple visits to the hospital, and enduring the embarrassing ordeal of being sent home by nurses because I wasn't far enough along in my labor to be at the hospital, the irritation of Superdad falling asleep while timing my contractions and the final exciting moments of knowing that, within minutes, I was to become a mother, Madeleine was born on Thursday, August 3 at 3:39 p.m.

With Madeleine we hadn't found out the sex; we wanted to be surprised. The moments following her birth were a blur: the realization I had a daughter, a mop of thick, brown hair, hearing our families in the hallway, not ten feet from our door, chomping at the bit to meet who, for some, was a first grandchild and who, for others, was the second.

At times I feel as if the following seven years have been just as much of a blur as the moments following her birth; some moments are clear and locked away in my memory, undisturbed and perfect and others are difficult, if not impossible, to recall.

But one overriding thought exists: the past seven years have been much more beautiful, meaningful and, mostly, enjoyable, than they ever could have been without the gift of my sweet little Madeleine.

Happy birthday, Peanut!

Flashback: July 22, 2004

I've been combing through old emails and digital pictures lately in an attempt to organize my laptop. Probably a futile undertaking.

In any event, I came across the following picture, which was one of my mom's favorite pictures of herself. It was taken on a memorable trip to Washington in which she was treated to a private tour of the White House by a former senior staffer.


Can't you just hear her asking,"Yes, Ms. Thomas?"

Flashback: Spring/Summer 2006

It's almost spring; the snow is melting, the mercury is rising and the forecast looks good.

No, still far too soon to contemplate getting out in the the gardens, but it doesn't hurt to dream of what's just beyond the bend.

My backyard.


The back end of my backyard. This is my favorite tree.

Madeleine standing by my rose tree that I bought last year. Unlike my mom, I don't have a propensity for gardening and can never remember what anything is called, but I especially liked this rose tree because it was wonderfully fragrant. I have it wintering on the side of my garage now, protected from the wind. Hopefully there will be more pictures like this in a few months.


And, finally, my prize rose collection. I rescued these from my mom's rose garden before the Japanese Beetles could move in and destroy them. All five managed to survive the transplant and thrive in their new home, along my driveway, last summer. I'm anxious to see if they wintered over for me as well as they seemed to for my mom.

Ah, warm weather, you may not be here quite yet, but you're close, and I'm carefully watching for you. Come quickly!

Photo Follow-Up

Against my better judgment I've decided to succumb to the requests in the comments here.

Superdad said I shouldn't. "Why embarrass yourself?" he reasoned.

He's right, of course. So, I won't. I'll embarrass us both. Here we are circa 1999. Ahhh, the memories. Aren't we just the coolest? Totally.


Wasn't Superdad a studly, single college dude?

This picture has always mortified Superdad. Mor-ti-fied. I'm sure within seconds of me posting this my phone will ring. But don't fret over me folks; we have caller ID.

As explanation, there were four other people there drinking those bottles of wine and we did drink them over a civilized dinner that involved real food and real cooking. And, hey, we were in college.

To assuage any fears that we may have ended up as miscreants, let now put those to rest. Here we are just a few, short years later and, in this picture Superdad has a law degree. Well, that and a wife and two kids. So yes, even stupid, irresponsible college kids have to grow up sometime.

Flashback: September 1996

I'm a sophomore in college. I'm a punk but I think I'm pretty cool. I am wearing clothes I won't now confess to wearing (though I have little doubt Terri, my roommate at the time, will out me in the comments). I've just declared my major as political science, though what I want to do with it I'm not quite sure.

It's a Monday, Wednesday or Friday around noon. I'm sitting in my first political science class as a political science major. Sitting there talking to friends and --dare I confess it again?-- thinking I'm pretty hot stuff. How I could think that in cut-off train conductor bibs and blue bandanna I know not, but I did (did I just admit that out loud?).

I look up and notice an attractive guy sitting one row up and about three desks over. I've never seen him before in my life. He's later to become my husband, Superdad.

How we got from there to here is a long, complicated story that I refuse to thoroughly delve into on my blog. It might unjustly tarnish the opinion you have of me now, which is a one of a mature, coherent woman who thinks through all momentous decisions completely and rationally. (That is your opinion of me, isn't it? Isn't it?)

Suffice it to say we first noticed each other there, though it wasn't for another year, the fall semester of 1997, that we'd officially meet and start dating.

Flashback: June 2004

Pictured are Madeleine (age 3) and Hank (age 20 months) in June of 2004 at my mom and Bob's house in Silver Lake. Their Nana (my mom) took this photo of them on her patio. As I mentioned once before, Mom was a phenomenal gardener, and she was also good at showing off her green thumb in photo ops like the one featured below.


Going into a weekend that predicts snow, snow and yet, more snow, I long for spring and the days like this that I know are waiting for me just a few more months down the road. Doesn't the scene look so warm and inviting?