Where would I be without my girlfriends?

As you get older you really find out who your true friends are, and, you find out who you truly want to be your friends.

I have many great friends from all parts of my life.  I am so blessed to have each and every one of them and we stay in touch the best we can.  Even if it's been awhile since we last spoke, we are able to pick right up where we left off.  No awkwardness, no lulls in conversation.  It's the best.

The friends that I have made more recently in my life are primarily parents of the girls' friends.  Which is great because with kids, work, houses, etc. how else are we supposed to meet anyone?  Especially genuine people who don't care that we look the way we do ;)

Through the beauty of the bus stop I have made some fantastic neighborhood friends.  I say neighborhood friends because they live in the neighborhood, but we are truly friends.  We laugh together, we vent together, we watch each others kids, and we enjoy adult beverages together.  Sometimes we do all of that at the same time!

Every other week or so the neighborhood ladies, and a few others, get together for coffee.  The last meet up I had to miss because my daughter had strep throat and no one wanted our Swann House Cooties.  So after a long weekend I invited some over this morning for cocoa, coffee and conversation.  We had a great time and I didn't realize until they left how much I needed that conversation. 

These ladies don't judge me.  They don't care that I show up at the bus stop in my pink-heart jammie pants.  They don't care that sometimes I don't make my way to the bus stop at all, but they do check in to make sure I'm OK if I'm not there ;)  They are just true, genuine friends that I am so blessed to have found at this point in my life.

This morning they tried Cold Stone Creamery Hot Cocoa with me.  We loved it.  It's very rich and creamy, with great flavor and yes, it's great in coffee.  I mean REALLY great.  It's also great with marshmallows- especially the snowmen ones :)  I think you should try it, and if you look below you can see a whrrl of me and two of my favorite people trying it.  I love cocoa.  I love my girlfriends.  I would be lost without both :)

More check-ins at House of Swann

Powered by Whrrl

Disclosure:  I was compensated by Collective Bias for my Cold Stone Cocoa Girlfriend Gathering.  All opinions are mine and mine alone.

Music Memory Monday

In hindsight, there were better choices.  If you travel back through my Music Memory Mondays you will find that a much more awesome choice was in the memory banks the whole time.

---

The one I didn't get sick of

I have never claimed to be the most deep of music lovers, but when the lyrics of a song tell a story I can relate to, the song usually becomes a life long favorite.

So, it would go without saying that any song I would choose for the first-dance at my wedding would have to be perfect, and long before I was even engaged I was on the hunt for that story-in-a-song.  I think the search actually began when I was in my teens when I started writing down lyrics in notebooks.

When I finally became engaged and our date had been set, it became my mission to find "The Song".  I went through a few drafts, if you will, each time becoming obsessed with my choice.  I  played them incessantly, imagining the moment in excruciating detail until I couldn't stand to hear the song one more time.  Back to the drawing board.

Kenny Chesney's Me and You, Tim McGraw &  Faith Hill singing It's your love, all fine on the surface but they just didn't feel right.

Then one summer night about three months before our wedding I was looking through my collection of mix tapes when I found the golden nugget.  The lyrics were perfect.  As far as I could tell it wasn't overused, and (major plus) it didn't make my fiance' want to vomit.

When I'm feeling blue, all I have to do, is take a look at you...

Wouldn't you agree, baby you and me, got a groovy kind of love...

Sure there are times when the cheese factor of Phil Collins rears it's ugly head, but I still get goosebumps when I hear "our song".  Looking back there were other choices that may have been better, but things happen for a reason and all it takes are a few key strokes on a piano to take me to one of the best days of my life.

Best. Day. Ever. (and the most overused title for a blog post)

*** a funny thing happened on my way to writing this post.  I had the best day, then a good day, then a bad day, and now another good day with bad undertones.  Just another week in my rollercoaster life. ***

I started this post on November 16.

Twelve days ago.

*sigh*

It started as a great post.  I had just finished a music deal for one of my clients and I was euphoric.  I was also picked for quite a few special projects with Collective Bias.  I was on top of the world. And then...

I was going about my day, my really great day, when I decided to sort through the bills folder.  Bad idea.  We have never "swam in cash".  But, and I am going to sound like a broken record here, since I quit that job two years ago (November 13, 2008 to be exact) we have barely dipped our toes in cash.  Every time I think we can exhale a little something stupid happens.  Truck repairs.  Checking account mishap *blush*.  Girls want to play indoor soccer. etc. etc. etc.

Of course on this day, that fateful November 16th my husband was also at deer camp.  I hate this time of year.  I don't care that he deer hunts.  I don't care that he travels to the far reaches of the Upper Peninsula to do it.  I just care that he goes in November.  When it's dark at 5 p.m. and cold, and dreary, and depressing to even the most non-depressed.  I really don't like November.  Bad things happen in November.  My kids get sick in November.  I quit jobs in November (wait...).  I find ways to rock the boat in November.

Do you get the picture?  November = hate.

The last 12 says have been up and down.  High and low.  Great and sucky.  Throughout all of that I just couldn't finish this blog post.  I was feeling too much, and I couldn't express it in words. 

In my rollercoaster of a week I did some thorough cleaning.  I started my one-month free pass to the gym, and I started eating better.  I am whacked.  Or perhaps, bipolar?  I just don't know anymore.

But today I decided to finish this post.  I hate unfinished tasks and I couldn't bring myself to delete the non-published few words.  I had to finish it, and move forward.  I am sitting at the new Biggby Coffee by my house and I am finishing things, and accomplishing things, and trying to be more up than down, and repeating one fact.  December is two days away.