Expecting

The floor of our little, one-bedroom apartment is cluttered with stuffed animals and colorful toys. There is a "diaper bag" in the corner of the room, ready with all the supplies needed for an outing. Up until about 2 months ago, Jonny and I were woken up several times a night by little whines and cries. Our budget has expanded to make room for the extra mouths to feed. My greatest fears have been realized: I'm a dog mom.

Sometime mid-April, my sister, Natalie, came across a craigslist ad for two Doberman-mix pups that desperately needed a home. Jonny and I ventured out to Topeka with the promise that we were just going to take a look. No adoption, just looking. Well, that's what Jonny thought. Meanwhile, I was making a mental list of the supplies we needed.

Truth be told, they were the saddest, most pathetic looking puppies I had ever seen. Seven weeks and crawling with worms, they were thin as rails with no energy to spare. They were nothing like the chubby, clumsy little pups I had seen online and on TV. I would like to say that my heart was overtaken with the desire to save these little babies... but that's not exactly how I felt. In fact, as we drove to PetCo with the two of them in the back seat, I had this sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach that we were in for a rough ride.

We brought them home, showed them off, and named the girl, Laila and the boy, Apollo. (My dreams of owning a girl dog named Thirteen will be realized someday, but when we named him Apollo, I just couldn't bring myself to link us that closely to NASA.)

When I mentioned earlier about being woken up several times a night, I wasn't kidding. These little ones required a LOT of attention. They had been sick most of their lives and as a result, their immune systems needed a lot of work. I remember one night in particular with Apollo. He had woken up with horrible diarrhea somewhere around midnight...and 1:30...and 2:15... and 3am... At some point around 4am, I took him outside again and stayed there with him for over an hour. It was quiet and warm and the two of us sat on the grass outside of the apartment. I had gotten zero sleep. I was exhausted. He lay by my side with his head on my lap and I stroked his soft fur until he fell asleep. He became my dog that night.

...and Laila will forever be tied to Jonny. I have no idea why. That little girl won't listen to a word I say until Jonny comes around. She jumps obnoxiously high when he comes home from work. It's adorably frustrating.

It's been five months of training, and accidents, and cleaning up messes, and constant supervision, and missing social/church activities, and lots and lots and LOTS of purchasing, and I don't think either of us regret any of it. It has been a small glimpse into what it's going to be like to have little humans running around.

Speaking of which...

Just kidding.

3 Cars Down...

I seem to be quite attached to my emotions. I have dubbed myself an "emotion-dweller". Once I pick an emotional theme for the day-usually chosen based on vital factors and events such as the success of my hairstyle or the way my breakfast tastes-I usually make that emotion my constant companion. When my emotion is a happy one, life is amazing, no matter what. My job is amazing, my car is amazing, my husband is amazing, my socks are amazing... I am just one big bundle of red-headed cheesiness. Conversely, when my toe gets stubbed the minute I get out of bed or if I end up in the same old hoodie because none of my outfits look quite right, the emotion I get stuck with is: crabby. On days like that day, I walk with hooded eyes, glaring at patients and coworkers alike, convinced that the world may as well end if it's going to keep going in this direction.

It was on such a day that our car broke down. Again. We have three of those. Cars, I mean. Three cars that don't work. Let me begin this story of breaking cars at the beginning:

Last Saturday night, Jonny and I were joined by my sister, Natalie, her husband, John, their baby, Brianne, my other sister, Andrea (whose husband, John, stayed in Colorado), and Andrea's baby, Mojo (a hyper-active, fit, noisy, little pug.) Three women, two men, a baby, and a pug, all camping out for a weekend in a little one-bedroom apartment. It was, for the record, one of my favorite weekends to date. Nothing, I thought, could scare Happy away from me after being with my sisters for two straight days.

Well, Sunday morning came around and we all bundled up and got ready to head off to church. We discovered that our Ford Contour had a flat. Well, good thing we still had my Mazda and Jonny's 1986 Buick.

Strike that. We HAD my Mazda. It's constant screeching upon start-up finally convinced me to take it into the shop. Monday afternoon, the mechanic called. It would take $1,100 to fix that car. I'm not even sure if it's WORTH over a thousand dollars. I cried a little, panicked a lot, and called my husband. He seemed to be unaffected by it, saying it will all work out and to just have faith that we are doing the right things. Oh if I could just have convinced Crabby to move out of the way so that I could possibly see the silver lining in all of this. I took a deep breath and remembered that we had been through the one-car routine before, and we could do it again if we had to. We have a friend who could probably fix the Mazda for cheaper, and at least I still have family and friends and a warm place to sleep and really cool socks.

More deep breaths.

Then the next day, on the way home from picking up Jonny from work, the Buick started sputtering, then knocked a little, then smoke started coming from the hood. We were minutes from home, in the middle of what was projected to be the biggest blizzard in years, and our last car was breaking down. I couldn't stop laughing. And then I couldn't stop crying. Every single "woe, is me" that I could think of came spewing angrily from my mouth. I was giving up. My husband sat silently in the passenger seat next to me, waiting for all my theatrics to work themselves out of my system. I don't know how he remains so calm when his wife is so obviously not. More reassurances, more helpful pats on the knee, more effort to convince me that everything was going to be ok because the Lord won't just abandon someone He just handed a trial to.

I would love to say that I sighed a heavy sigh of relief, and happily sputtered the remainder of the drive home to our apartment, but that's not exactly what happened. Crabby stuck with me through most of the day, I am ashamed to admit that I just could not shake the feeling that everything was hopeless, and that life could not possibly get any worse.

In my massive pout, I found the following quote posted on my friend, Debbie's, facebook status:

"What I am trying to teach is that when we keep the temple covenants we have made and when we live righteously in order to maintain the blessings promised by those ordinances, then come what may, we have no reason to worry or to feel despondent."
—Richard G. Scott

Ah, what perspective appeared so suddenly in my little torn-apart world! Something suddenly changed. For the record, our problems weren't suddenly solved. I didn't have a magic car appear and our car(s) didn't repair themselves, but I realized that my embarrassing lack of faith had made it very difficult to see that there is a way out of this mess; that things could-and someday probably would-be worse, but if I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing, the Lord would take care of us. Jonny and I are being taught very valuable lessons. Appreciation for each other, and the things that we DO have; that ARE going right.

Eventually, I will look back at this experience and giggle a little at the struggles of newlywed life, but for now I'm just trying to conquer Crabby and make more room for a little bit of faith.

Steph-1
Crabby-0

Planned Poetry

The desire to start a family blog has been a consistent little pester since Jonny and I got engaged on May 2, 2010. Too many excuses saw me through until the end of that year, thus, we remained a blogless family. Recently, my brand new, shiny sister(s)-in-law have inspired me to re-visit that little pester. So I will begin publishing experiences that can only be deemed interesting by the individuals involved. Still, there is something to be said for the simplicity of life in Kansas. Lowest gas prices in the nation? Yes, please. Who could ask for more than that? Plus, Kansas has its own very own, celebrated state flower. We are a proud bunch. (Sorry, Chiefs. I still have Bronco blood.)

Jonny and I were married September 30, 2010. By far the best day of my life thus far. Grandpa Saunders sealed us in the Nauvoo, Illinois temple. Family and friends assembled, and there was much joy and laughter and a little bit of disbelief. Funny how Stephanie Birdsall somehow ended up with Jonathan Miller. Two families with more than a little bit of history were joined together. I'm not sure anyone saw that coming.

For the record, what they say about redheads is true, for the most part. We are stubborn and hard-headed with a big helping of temperamental. Jonny handles all that beautifully. I'm not really sure how he accomplishes such a mountain of a task. Some days I question his sanity. There are so many things I get to learn about him on a daily basis; there is organization to his disorganization, he loves the unlovable, he is open to any and all recipes I submit him to, and he eats pistachios with reckless abandon. Also, his family is wonderful. There are so many mushy metaphors that should follow here, but I will spare you, poor Reader. Just know that they're swell and I wish we could play together all the time.

Married life is basically fantastic. More fantastic than I will admit to my single friends. It's in the "Marriage Pact" somewhere to leave out the reality of "wedded bliss" in conversation. At least it was when I was single. No one told me how much fun it would be to leave single life behind. I don't even mind all the screaming children in the family ward.

And so, I greet 2011 with promises of regular blog posts, a bright and shiny new Hot 100 list (to be published shortly for any who are interested), and a hope that someone out there will read this and think, "Wait, does she actually KNOW the state flower of Kansas?"

I absolutely do. It was taught to me by a well-intentioned history teacher. The image of the jumper she wore on "Sunflower Day" has been burned into my retinas.