Dear Hallmark,

I cry at commercials. I don’t normally bawl at commercials.

Until this year.

This whole keepsake ornament campaign you’re running? Allow me to hand over my credit card so I can give you the applause you deserve.

The one with the little girl doing the victory dance after she makes a goal? And then her parents buy the soccer goal ornament?

Gargantuan amount of tears. Messy snotty tears.

Because that’s exactly what the moosh would have done.

So, the moosh asked Santa for a big big Cinderellla Dress and big big Cinderella shoes and a big big Cinderella crown.

Guess the ONLY present the moosh is getting from Santa?

Uh huh.

I know.

Then I walk into my local Hallmark store and guess what ornament is hanging there?

Uh huh.

I know.

Remember the moosh’s birthday cake?

Remember that the moosh got a dress and a doll and a movie that matched the moosh’s birthday cake?

Enter Hallmark.

Uh huh.

I know.

Your marketing is impeccable.

I was honestly shedding tears while purchasing these ornaments. Shedding tears over the cheesy memories that are going to come from these ornaments for dozens of years from this Christmas. Shedding tears over my own personal Hallmark moment.

Oy.

Hallmark, dudes, wow.

Seriously.

Love and kisses,

Casey

P.S. If I just happen to end up living in Kansas City in a couple years, hire me. Okay? I’d be the best thing that ever happened to your company. You let me know who to talk to. Honestly.

There are so many of you who LURVE Indiana. Indianapolis specifically.

Um, why?

Just asking, there just seems to be an awful lot of you LURKERS from Indianapolis that made yourself known when Jennifer announced she was going Hoosier.

WHO ARE YOU AND WHY AREN’T WE FRIENDS?

Most of my Indiana friends are transplanted Utahns.

And none of us really dig the Indy so much.

But back to Jennifer.

SQUEE!

If you don’t read Playgroups are no Place for Children you’re stuck in the dark ages.

I am going to dig my claws in this girl and claim her in the name of Hoosier Velveteen Shake-Shake Oblivion.

Sorry to you who are losing her.

Really, I am.

Really.

Heh, so I’m not that sorry.

Jennifer, see you in Indiana baby.

I am not a small town girl.

Period.

xoxo-Casey

Princesses have overtaken my life and thrown up on every part of it.

Princess purses, princess cakes, princess phones, princess pillowcases, princess dresses, princess toothbrushes, princess CDs, princess movies, princess dolls, princess bows, princess shoes, princess balloons. Princess, princess, princess. Anyone with a three year old girl is nodding their head in commiseration.

I swear I didn’t mean for it to come to this.

I avoided princesses.

Happily ever after, phooey.

But somehow they snuck into my life and dug their perfectly manicured nails into every part of the moosh’s (and therefore my) existence.

Unrealistic ideals? False idols? Too much pressure on beauty and materialism?

Yep. Probably.

But you know what?

I’d prance around in a princess dress every day if I could. I could easily break out into song at a moments notice. And these princesses are nice girls. They love their parents. They love their princes. They’re monogamous. They love their friends. They love animals. They love personal hygiene. They love nature and they love a good tea party.

And we all know how a good tea party can turn a bad day good.

So until some princess comes along with a roach clip, a forty, a potty mouth and a pack of condoms. I’m going to let them stick around. There’s nothing wrong with wanting happily ever after.

Now if I could just get that damn fairy godmother to show up…

 Wondering what kind of birthday cake you’d get if you were my kid?

Well, you’d get a chocolate fudge cake (from scratch) with dark chocolate buttercream (from scratch) covered with fondant (from scratch) that pretty much looked like Barbie as the Island Princess.

And it would sing.

Four different songs.

And it would have a matching tiara for you.

Yep, that’s what you’d get.

The party is in 12 hours. 

 Here’s to hoping Barbie makes it that long and that no one gags from princess overload tomorrow.

Because it’s totally likely.

**********

A big disgustingly humungo thank you shout out to Laurlee of Cakes de Fleur  in Salt Lake City for making and tinting the fondant for me. And for supplying the dress mold. And for giving us cupcakes when we went into her shop. She’s known me since I was in Kindergarten if not longer, and I want to be just like her when I grow up.

Now go buy cakes from her.

She’s even better than me.

Honestly.

Ooh, this should be fun.

Do you have a recurring element in your dreams?

the moosh dreams about kitties and puppies and occasionally a pony is thrown into the mix.

I used to have dreams about all my teeth falling out, chewing on them and then spitting them out.

It’s just as gross as you’d imagine it to be.

I looked up “teeth falling out” in a dream dictionary and apparently it’s one of the worst omens you can have in a dream. It’s supposed to mean imminent death and horror.

Unless horror is a two year old roaming the halls at 3 am that dream dictionary was a bunch of malarky.

But I have a new recurring element to my dreams.

Elevators.

More specifically out of control elevators.

And they’re only out of control when I’m the only one on them.

Last night in my dream the elevator started to descend way to fast as soon as the old lady next to me got off. And in my dream I thought “Oh geesh, not again.” My dreaming self remembered what my dreaming self dreamt about.

Does that happen to you?  Are you supposed to remember previous dreams in dreams?
Methinks that’s not entirely normal.

I also dream in color, fully restored in all its glory technicolor.

I’ve heard that’s not normal.

Have you heard that too?

Eh, back to the elevators.

So when I’m the only one on these elevators they go up normal, they fall too fast, they go sideways, I can never get them to go to the floor I want them to go to and they’re all different kinds of elevators. Some are in hotels, nice hotels, seedy hotels, swanky hotels, old hotels. Some are in shopping malls, some are in parking garages. One was even in outer space. Some are big, some are small, some smell good, some smell like that one at the train depot in Chicago. Remember that one dude? (Just realized maybe it’s not so normal to smell in dreams either. Especially when one of the smells is a bodily fluid.)

Last night crazy elevator let me off in a Mexican beach resort. Another time I was let off in a creepy parking garage only to realize there was a man waiting there to rape me. There was another one where I was let off in the middle of a ski slope in Switzerland.

Crazy dreams people, crazy. And it’s all because of the elevators.

It’s not like the crazy elevator is taking me to my doom every time, while rape in a parking garage and skiing in Switzerland is definite doom for me, I had a really good time at the Mexican Resort last night. I even remember thinking “huh, I should bring Cody here when he’s done with finals.”

Are anyone else’s dreams this vivid and specific or am I swallowing a little too much mouthwash each night?

Maybe someone slipped me a roofie in my toothpaste.

Hmmm…

So I’ve been brought to this.

Consulting the Internet.

Oh great and mystical Internet, what does the elevator mean?

Internet says:

“To dream that you are ascending in an elevator, signifies that you will quickly rise to status and wealth. You may have risen to a higher level of consciousness and are looking at the world from an elevated viewpoint. Descending in an elevator, denotes that misfortunes will crush and discourage you. The up and down action of the elevator may represent the ups and downs of your life go emerging out of and submerging into your subconscious.

To dream that the elevator is out of order or that it is not letting you off, symbolizes that your emotions have gotten out of control.

To dream that an elevator is falling out of control, refers to your fears of letting go. You may also be expressing your desire to give up and escape from some demanding situation. If the elevator stops just right before it crashes, then it indicates that if you hang on long enough, everything will turn out all fine in the end. “

Wow, thanks Dream Moods.

That was vauge.

*cough*marlarky*cough*

Anybody remember the boy I told you about? Patrick?

The one that got away with crushing me and breaking my heart?

Anyone? Anyone?

If you don’t remember or need a refresher course go read about him here and I’ll wait.

After writing that I realized that I’m not alone in the unfinished business department. An awful lot of you have boyfriends who hold a strong hold on your hearts. Stronger than they should have.

Well, I called him.

I called my unfinished business.

I called Patrick.

I was looking for closure.

What I found was a whole lot of nervous energy and twitchyness.

He’s engaged. Lives in a house. Has a job and three dogs.

He’s incredibly normal. (And he may even be reading this…HI IF YOU ARE.)

Nothing like what I had built him up to be in my head after all these years.

Truthfully? I’m kinda disappointed.

But incredibly relieved.

My heart rate no longer quickens and my stomach no longer drops at the thought of him. In fact, he never even crosses my mind anymore. So much so that I just barely remembered to write this and I talked to him over two weeks ago.

Kinda anti-climatic huh?

Sorry.

It’s life as usual.

Only now with closure and a lot less baggage.

When the moosh came out I didn’t instantly fall in love with her.

I thought it was cool she came out with all her parts in the right place in seemingly right proportion.

But I was not in love.

I wasn’t in love with her when I brought her home.

I wasn’t in love with her three months after  I brought her home.

I felt a sense of obligation to her. But I didn’t feel love.

She was pretty, yes. She had a darling smile, yes. I even liked her sometimes. But I felt like I was going through the motions of making sure she was fed, clothed and clean.

She felt like a job. An exhausting job that payed crap. A job that I was supposed to love.

I feel like I faked it well. But I was tormented. Everyone else was so in love with my baby, I was not. I put up a good front though.

However there were nights I put her in the crib a little too hard. There were nights I left her wailing in the the other room while I shoved my head under a pillow and screamed if only to drown out her crying. She was never in danger, she was always taken care of.

She just wasn’t loved by her mother.

I felt broken, yet obligated.

Try telling anyone in this world you don’t love your baby and you’ll hear “Oh yes you do, you’re just tired and overwhelmed.”

“Excuse me, no I don’t.” is what I wanted to say back, but never did. I just forced a smile and said “Yeah, maybe you’re right.”

Then at seven months it happened.

I fell in love.

I had been reading Harry Potter to her before I put her to bed. I turned her around to burp her one last time. She snuggled into me and fell asleep. Her chubby little hand over my heart.

Just like that I fell in love with her, and I never looked back.

Those were a long seven months.