don't knock it....

tonite - i made one of our most favorite things for dinner.  it's an old family recipe that my parents used to make for us when we were little.  it conjures up images of my childhood new years eve on the living room floor. 

everyone i have ever told about this secret family recipe has screwed up their face all funny like - as if we meis's were crazy folk.  but when i introduce them to it - they usually fall in love with it.

this secret that i speak of - is - hot dog pizza. 

you read that right.  hot.  dog.  pizza.

in order to make hot dog pizza - you don't just go putting hot dogs on a frozen tostinos party pizza.  no.  you need a very special secret ingredient:

that's right. a chef boyardee pizza kit.  this is the key to what makes hot dog pizza so good.  i think the secret is in the grated kraft parmesan cheese.  then you add a little more because the kit doesn't quite have enough. 

is it healthy?  probably not.  is it cheap?  as long as you don't buy expensive hot dogs.  is it good??  oh heck yeah!  and it makes us happy!  bonus!!!

don't knock it until you've tried it!

tell me that doesn't look awesome!!!  

this is my brain on dry erase....

THIS - is my brain - on dry erase......

i spend the better part of each day gazing at this dry erase calendar - especially when i'm on the phone with my coworker Alex - who travels here as much as i do there - and we are trying to coordinate meetings.  it has become the only way i can manage juggling my schedule.  it is highly complicated and color coded:

purple:  programs - that's how we spend our money - and what is suppose to be the bulk of my job

green:  fund-raising events and/or grant deadlines

blue:  important meetings - usually involving staff or the board

orange:  days that the office is closed OR planned travel to KC

brown:  personal schedules.  big V's are my vacation days.  little notes in the top right corner indicate other staff members vacation days.  other little notes in the corner might indicate something nina has that i need to be around for.

red:  partner events or collaborative efforts

pink:  council meetings

i CANNOT emphasize how crucial this system has become to me.  (and yet, somehow i double booked myself on the 22nd with both a work event and a personal event.  the personal event won because it is a sunday and way more important.)

but today i discovered that both of my red and my pink marker are MISSING.  now my whole color coding system is going to go to hell because i had to switch the pink to black because it was the only color i had left other than yellow which i can't see from across my desk.

i bet you i'm at office depot before the week is out buying more markers because i can't cope....   

sharing my wisdom....

so while in KC the other day, the barista at the Starbucks shared a piece of knowledge that I am passing on to all of you.

the only difference between a venti and a grande is that the venti has one more pump of syrup and more milk. they both have the same amount of espresso. so if you get the larger one because you want more caffeine - like I have always done - you are only getting more calories. To get the biggest caffeine bang for your buck - go grande.

Use this knowledge wisely.

home (away from) sweet home....

so if you haven't picked up on this by now, i've spent a lot of time in the last nine months on interstate 70 driving back and forth between STL and KC.  what?  you didn't notice??  i'll try and make it more obvious next time i come - which is in exactly 7 days....
KC is kinda becoming my home away from home, and my residence is usually in one of the rooms at the courtyard marriott on the country club plaza.  the weirdest thing about staying here is that - um - the staff have kinda started to know me.  and i know them.

jaime always answers when i call - and always makes jokes about how i'm an old pro at what's where.  kerrie is the sales manager - she's always very helpful.  there's the cute girl who had a baby four months ago and we always chat about how fast he's growing.  there's the crazy girl who works in the breakfast cafe that i can't stand because she doesn't juggle hustle and bustle very well and will take my breakfast voucher and then try to charge me anyway.  and the nice man who works in the breakfast cafe who i'm always relieved to see is on duty and doesn't think it's weird when i order both oj and a diet pepsi.  and the night guy with the accent.  yup.  i know them all.

sorry - hold on - the phone is ringing.....

oh.  that was my buddy jaime seeing if i needed a wake up call for tomorrow or a car arranged.  i'm a gold status marriott member now - it comes with the territory.  62 more nights and i get to go platinum....

where was i.  oh yes.  this whole "learning to travel on business" thing has been an experience.  i remember my days at WU when we would work on itineraries and appointment packets and such and we thought about how luxurious it must be to travel on business to exotic cities and eat on the company dime.  and you know what i've learned (other than the fact that i can now direct someone from our office in overland park back to their office in columbia without google maps?) - i've learned that it's really not all that it's cracked up to be.

i wake up earlier here (jeff is kinda shocked by this.  i also wake up to an alarm all on my own without rolling over and going back to sleep and telling someone to "go to hell" when they call to make sure i'm up in moving.  in fact - i don't even need a wake up call - sorry jaime.  jeff is also shocked that my showers aren't nearly as long and that i don't leave my pj's just thrown on the bed). 

figuring out dinner is always a chore (although at least once a trip i hit up the olive garden in overland park for some capellini pomadoro - the to go guy - who i am also starting to know - always gives me about 7 chocolate mints - but tonite he forgot my fork so he's on probation).

when i get back to the hotel i kinda don't know what to do with myself.  i work harder when i'm here, so thinking about work is not on my list of desires.  i'm on pretty much all day and i don't really want to be around people.  (introverts!  unite!!)  and half the time i'm in a hole that gets bad wireless reception so i have no internet.  and even though i always bring my tennis shoes with the intention of walking on the treadmill - i'm always too afraid that there will be someone else in the work out room who sees me trying to figure out how to turn the darn thing on and laugh at me so i don't ever go.... 

i can't just curl up and go to sleep - it's too hard.  so generally i fall asleep while dr. drew or nancy grace drones on about whatever hot button topic they have been obsessing on for a month.  then i wake up at 3 in the morning - and they are still on which is really creepy.

and frankly - i find it kinda weird that every time i open a thing of soap to wash my hands, the housekeeping staff throws it away.  i mean, isn't that just weird?  and wasteful???

more than anything though - i miss my family when i'm gone.  i miss making my own dinner.  i miss my own bed.  i miss decent cable channels. 

i get to go home tomorrow.  KC is nice (except for the whole chief's/royals fans) - but i'm always so excited when i get to go home.  and it's proven when one sees how antsy i get once i hit traffic at 270.....

making a dent in the bucket list.....

so nina and i are on spring break this week.  and one of the things that i had hoped to do this week was work on an item from my bucket list for 2012. 

you will recall that the first item on the list was "clean out nina's old toy room and set up the extra bedroom furniture in it for guests - just in case."  with jeff out of town for the weekend at a bowling tourney - i thought it was a good time to ge started. 

now these pictures are going to be a little bit shocking.  i'm not very proud.  this is the room where all the barbies and petshops went to die over the years.  when nina would clean up her room she would take stuff downstairs to that room and toss it in and close the door.  with the door closed all the time - it was easily an out of site out of mind situation.  so i was a bit shocked when one day i peeked in for some reason and realize that it looked kinda like this:

i'm not proud.  please don't judge us.

so yesterday nina and i spent a couple of hours down there working.  but with only a few boxes and trash bags and a big rain storm that kept us from getting stuff out of the house - we didn't get as far as i would like.  and there was several moments of feeling extremely overwhelmed.  kinda like people on hoarders.  except without the rotting food and dead critters. 

so we sought the reinforcing help of a big trash can and nina's friend lucy.  in just four short hours - we saw this:

that's floor.  and carpet. 

we made three trips to the dumpster, and there's still some trash in the garage and in the big trash can that we'll have to get out to the dumpsters after they are emptied.  and i have five boxes and three trash bags to take to goodwill tomorrow.  but now it looks like this:

see how the door opens all the way?  and you can see floor??  and those boxes are full of stuff to sell in the garage sale that is also on my bucket list.  we aren't quite ready to move in the bedroom furniture yet - but this is such a step in the direction of crossing off the first item on my bucket list!!!

and here are my two sweaty helpers standing in the room:





i just ordered them pizza.  i think they earned it.  and i guess i will unground them for their recent report cards too......

true life conversations from the meyer house....

me:  i expected you to be in bed by now...

jeff:  i know.

me:  damn angry birds?

jeff:  something like that....

me:  i know you so well - i can read you like a magazine....

jeff:  a magazine??

me:  well yeah.  i don't think your complicated enough to be a book.  i mean  - it's not an insult.  it's not like i called you a short story...

jeff:  or a pamphlet? 

me:  or a brochure. 

jeff:  or a flyer?

me:  or an email.  or a status update.  or a tweet.  a whole person wrapped up in 140 characters.  so see, magazine is really quite a compliment....

this is not going to be the typically happy, funny, cheery post you expect from me - consider yourself warned....

this post will, however, be serious and passionate and from my heart.  it's something that has been on my mind A LOT recently for a lot of different reasons.  and so i finally feel that i have to say something....

for those who don't know - i have a a beautiful daughter:

she's smart, beautiful, talented, funny.  i couldn't ask for anything more from my mini me than everything nina is.  she's my world.  i love her.  and she's all i've got when it comes to kids.

for those of you who don't know - the fact that she's the only kid i've got - is not a choice. 

i cannot have any more kids.

the youngest of three kids, growing up, i thought it was god's law that a couple HAD TO HAVE a minimum of three kids.  in fact, i clearly remember being about 4 years old and telling a slightly older cousin who was the youngest of two siblings that he was obviously wrong about his mom not being able to give me a baby girl cousin closer to my age because she hadn't had three babies yet and everyone knew it was the law to have at least three.  so naturally growing up i always imagined that i would have at least three kids.

that dream started to fade when i was 16.  it was then that i was told by my endocrinologist that type one diabetics have very high risk pregnancies and that if i were lucky - i would have one child.  maybe two.  and all children had to be born before i turned 30.  i think for a long time my mom kinda blamed that doctor for putting me in a rush find a happily ever after. 

when i was 20 - i got pregnant and had nina.  it wasn't planned.  i wasn't married.  no one was happy about it.  and i got news for you - there are no cute pregnancy announcements when you are in that situation.  my pregnancy was very high risk.  i developed high blood pressure.  i spilled protein in my urine.  they thought i might do damage to my kidneys.  have you seen steel magnolias??  yeah.  my grandmother couldn't watch it in the last years of her life.  too close to home. 

nina was born 5 weeks premature.  i didn't have a baby shower.  i had a post baby being born shower.  and most of my friends didn't come.  and none of my daughter's paternal relatives showed up or celebrated it with their family. 

i spent a year undergoing constant 24 hour urine tests to assure that my kidneys weren't damaged.  i was lucky.  a perfect baby.  no kidney damage.  and then the bad news came.  i was told by doctors that if i were to get pregnant again - the risk of suffering all of the same complications was greater.  and the risk that those complications would be worse - was even greater.  the risk of leaving my child motherless - was even greater.  and as a result, it wasn't advised.

so at the age of 21 - my hopes and dreams of a happy family with lots of little siblings for nina - gone.  and when he and i split before i was 22 - i was certain that any dreams of a frame perfect family photo of mom, dad, and baby were out the window.

that - is a lot of information to take in before you can legally rent a car.

when jeff came into our lives, he knew the deal up front.  before we even dated.  he - surprisingly - was fine with it.  he said he would rather have me and nina than not have us at all.  it was then that i started to accept - that while happily ever after wasn't the storybook image i had at the age of four - it was still happily ever after.

i accepted it.  i made peace with it.  but damn it - that didn't mean it didn't hurt.  didn't mean it wasn't hard. 

i remember a time about 8 or 9 years ago where i sat in the bathroom at work sobbing because the woman who occupied the office next to me was pregnant, the woman in the corner office brought her newborn to work every day and used her secretary as a nanny, another coworker brought her new baby to work resulting in a game of "let's pass the baby around the office" and an online friend's wife was clearly the only woman who had ever been pregnant before.  i remember emailing jeff telling him i couldn't take it.

i didn't talk to a relative for over a month because she once said "when are you going to have a baby so i can get my baby fix" when i know she knew what i had been through.

i've been told so many times to get over it. 

and fyi - adoption is expensive.  i work in non profit.  i'm not rolling in the dough.

you never get over it.  you make peace with it.  you accept it.  you appreciate what you have.  but that doesn't mean that sometimes it doesn't still hurt.  it doesn't mean you don't still feel guilt because you can't give your beautiful daughter a beautiful baby sister to play with or your husband a son to give his own name to. 

i'm not going to lie.  i've asked three different endocrinologists over the years if the new developments in medicine would make it different.  the answer - "it might - but probably not."   

there have been times where i could not physically bring myself to go to a baby shower.

there have been times where i have walked the other way to avoid being asked "do you want to see the latest picture of my baby??" 

i'm better about it now. it helps that i have cute little bethel babies that i can squeeze and then send home.  i'm almost 35.  nina's 14.  starting over with another one now seems crazy. 

it gets easier.  but it never gets "not hard".

i don't expect you to understand.  the only ones who understand are those who have been there and experienced it themselves. 

the other night i told another one of my bestest friends who just learned her sister might not be able to have kids that there will come a time when she finds it hard to be around her nieces and nephews. it's not about her or them or that she doesn't love them. it's just...hard. just know that it's hard.

one of my bestest friends with fertility issues who had to take a 3 month sabatical from facebook because she would rather pluck her eyes out with pliers than read one more of post after post about "my baby kicked, laughed, farted, pooped, smiled, slept, etc." - i know she gets it. 

jeff gets it.

that's where i go when it gets hard.  and then i remember this:

it may not be that picture perfect image i had when i was four....

....but i still made out pretty good, didn't i?