Years ago, I worked in a Scandinavian store in the good ol' Mall of America and made some wonderful friends in the four years I was there. I worked with Hilary fairly briefly but enough to get to know her. I ran into her a few years ago and caught up briefly with her. I got an email a few weeks back saying that her Mom passed away suddenly and unexpectedly. Hilary's Dad found her Mom on the floor when he went to check on her because she was napping for longer than usual. They think the cause was a massive heart attack.

And it all comes flooding back... losing my Dad in the same way almost two years ago. It's amazing how quickly the ache in my gut can come back and the memories of finding him on the driveway and all that came after that. I miss him so very badly. I wish he could have met Owen. It's just not fair.

I'm working on a memory book with photos and memories of my Dad because I feel like the memories are less vivid than they used to be. But, the process is so heartbreaking. I thought I had done a lot of healing but it's amazing how fresh my wound feels when I allow myself to open back up to the heartache.

I miss you Dad and I long for the way things were when you were here.

I've been slacking when it comes to blogging lately. It may have to do with me being in a bit of a funk lately but I think I finally snapped out of it. I was feeling stir-crazy and overwhelmed...I think because all of our classes and outings came to an abrupt end. Things should be picking up over the next few weeks so that should be good. I think I'm going to sign Owen and myself up for swimming. We're already signed up for ECFE but I need to see how that will work out with (hopefully) watching another kid. [Details are still pending on the daycare bit.]

We're starting to serious think about Owen-proofing which most likely adds to my feelings on being overwhelmed. He's close to crawling and we are not prepared and I don't want to spend a day of frantically chasing him around to make sure he doesn't kill himself. I bought some cabinet locks that we need to install and we need to put away our cleaners and fragiles. I took care of some of these things today but there's still a lot to do.

On the fun side of things, we took Owen to the state fair yesterday. Last year, he attended as a little peanut in my belly and hopefully enjoyed all the crap I ingested. He seemed to have fun this year and I told him that there are many more years to come! I love love love love the Minnesota State Fair. He looks like he enjoyed himself, no? ;)

I'm a little late in talking about it, but Owen turned 6 months old on the 29th of July. We had his 6 month well-baby appointment last week and confirmed that he's quite the chunk. Mister (as we like to call him) weighed in at 24 lbs (off the charts) was 27.5 inches long (75% percentile) and has a pretty big head at 17.6 inches.

One interesting outcome of his appointment was some suggested dietary restrictions because of the shellfish allergy on both sides of the family. They suggested holding off on wheat and dairy until he's a year old. So, we're going to focus on the fruits and veggies and start meat around 8 months. He pretty much despises solid food at this point, but we continue to offer.


A photo from his half-birthday (he was SO serious and wouldn't smile - highly unusual!).