Our sunshine, princess, and best friend.Let me get real, I love animals. A little fanatically as you may already know, but let me just describe a little bit. Going to the zoo is one of my favorite activities (I have been to the Hogle Zoo three times in the past year). Going to the national zoo in D.C. with my family still goes down in history as one of the best days of my life. Another dream is the San Diego Zoo, which will hopefully be visited this summer sometime. My family knows me as a horse fanatic. I have an entire collection of porcelain and glass horses that all have special meaning to me. Up until I was probably 10, if I saw a horse while driving I screamed "HORSIE!!!!" and felt compelled to say horsie for as many horses that were in the field. So, if there were a bunch in a pasture, you better just know that I'm going to annoyingly scream horsie multiple times. We went to Utah about every two years when I was a kid to visit family, but one of the main reasons I would be excited to go was always to see more horses. Tess has taken horseback riding lessons for a few years now and I couldn't be more jealous. She can jump and everything. When I was a senior, I went with her once and got permission to ride with the other students in the arena for a while. I was ecstatic. Another horse freaked out for some reason and caused my horse to bolt into a full-on gallop. I was freaking out, but loving it at the same time. As the horse slowed down, I had completely come out of the stirrups and was barely hanging on. I knew I was going to fall off so I just spread my legs into a beautiful split (ballet dancer perks). I had one foot on the ground and one foot on top of the horse and my body was somewhere in the middle. Tess's teacher started clapping and claimed it was the most graceful fall off of a horse she had ever seen. Still now I occasionally neigh really loudly and Ed loves it. Okay so you get it, I love horses. Well, I also love dogs. Our family dog, Spur, was the best. I remember begging him to talk and telling him that I wouldn't tell anyone if he did, but I just needed to know that he could hear and understand me. I would sing songs to him, tried to teach him how to jump over things (unsuccessful), and video taped Tess shooting her own African safari movies starring Spur as a deadly and dangerous lion (these tapes are hilarious by the way, Tess is like 14, I will definitely be showing it to her husband to ensure full-on embarrassment). When I knew Spur was getting old and maybe should be put down or something, I was too afraid to talk about it with Tess. This one night we were laying on the roof of the house (not allowed, but we got around that) and we were looking at the stars silently. I said, "Tess, do you think Spur is going to die soon?" and we both just started crying and hugging each other. Oh gosh, I love my Spur boy.
And now we have Kona. Ed and I have been married for a year and 8 months today and we have had Kona for 7 months. The first year of marriage was great and fun and wonderful and all that gushy stuff, but it was also hard and new and different and all that difficult stuff. When we got Kona, I swear she made our marriage better. It sounds weird, but it's kinda like a baby, just not as extreme. She's something to laugh about together, take care of together, and love together. We often send each other pictures of her being cute or crazy on our phones during the day and always have a story to tell the other when we see each other at the end of the day. She sleeps in between us at night and we both baby talk to her constantly. We love her sooo much. For some reason, my whole life I kinda thought I wouldn't be a good parent. I'm not the typical mommie driven girl who sees a baby and absolutely has to hold it. In fact, I've always been pretty afraid of babies and avoided holding them. I'm getting better about that, but still, I always felt like I wouldn't be able to be an unconditional loving parent because I really sometimes get annoyed with kids. Okay I'm sounding so heartless, but anyway, loving Kona together has made me feel like Ed and I could love a baby together. It's cool. Now I know that our babies will be so loved and even though it's something that most other people would be like "DUH!", it really is a comforting thought for me and it's all thanks to Kona. I'm not hinting at any baby-making by the way, that's going to be years. Anyway, that's a really long explanation of why we love Kona and why the obsession has progressed to a harness and leash.
And now we have Kona. Ed and I have been married for a year and 8 months today and we have had Kona for 7 months. The first year of marriage was great and fun and wonderful and all that gushy stuff, but it was also hard and new and different and all that difficult stuff. When we got Kona, I swear she made our marriage better. It sounds weird, but it's kinda like a baby, just not as extreme. She's something to laugh about together, take care of together, and love together. We often send each other pictures of her being cute or crazy on our phones during the day and always have a story to tell the other when we see each other at the end of the day. She sleeps in between us at night and we both baby talk to her constantly. We love her sooo much. For some reason, my whole life I kinda thought I wouldn't be a good parent. I'm not the typical mommie driven girl who sees a baby and absolutely has to hold it. In fact, I've always been pretty afraid of babies and avoided holding them. I'm getting better about that, but still, I always felt like I wouldn't be able to be an unconditional loving parent because I really sometimes get annoyed with kids. Okay I'm sounding so heartless, but anyway, loving Kona together has made me feel like Ed and I could love a baby together. It's cool. Now I know that our babies will be so loved and even though it's something that most other people would be like "DUH!", it really is a comforting thought for me and it's all thanks to Kona. I'm not hinting at any baby-making by the way, that's going to be years. Anyway, that's a really long explanation of why we love Kona and why the obsession has progressed to a harness and leash.
I think that's a normal worry that most people have-- especially when it gets close to the baby actually being here! I'm glad you've been blessed with that comforting realization. It's scary to think of all the changes that a baby brings, but I just have to keep reminding myself that, just like marriage, the outcome is in my control.
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