And so it begins...

We're into the third year of it; yet, I haven't found it any easier. Tax Season!!! Steve is now gone from 6:30 in the morning until around 7 at night and gone on Saturdays, too. We all miss him. "A" struggles waking up and not seeing his daddy...several mornings I've had to run to him (so he doesn't wake up the baby) as he is calling (not screaming or crying) for daddy. No, I'm not sad he doesn't call for me and it doesn't surprise me. For a while now, he has been getting up and spending morning time with daddy (either playing, watching cartoons or reading). Of course, this all started when I had the baby and Steve wanted to give me a little more sleep so he would get up with the older one and I could take care of myself and the baby. It has been great! As for the baby...she notices that her daddy isn't around much, too. As soon as Steve walks in the door at night, she starts kicking her legs, grinning and doing whatever she can to get his attention. She has become a little Daddy's Girl. As for me, oh how I miss him. I've never taken him for granted, but tax season reminds me how nice it is to have him around. I want the kids to get to see him at night, so I let them stay up a little longer than usual, but at the same time, I want some alone time with him as well. So it's been kind of tricky getting a routine that we can all work with.
I know that I reflect on my joys on this blog, so you're probably wondering where it's at. Well, I think about the rest of the year when we get to have Steve home on a lot of Fridays, it's pretty easy for him to take time off for family vacations, his hard work allows me to stay home with the kids, and April 15th is just around the corner...kind of. Okay, I know it's still a couple of months away, but who's counting? We haven't made our chain-link count-down (you know, the ones you made in elementary school to count down the days until Christmas) and hung it up...yet! And so, it is just the end of January and it has already begun!

Mamma Mia!

Here I go again....So, can you guess what this post about? I really don't know when I started liking ABBA, but I don't ever remember them not being one of my favorite groups. I know, I'm not really old enough to be apart of that era, but I love their music. ABBA Gold was one of the first cd's I ever bought (second to Yani...remember him?). Anyway, several years ago, before I was even married, I had the opportunity to go see the broadway production of Mamma Mia in Tempe, AZ with several good friends of mine. I really enjoyed it then and I was so happy I had all the songs on cd already...that meant I could sing along at the top of my lungs right away. But, after a few months, it went back into my cd case and was listened to only on occassion. Well, with the release of Mamma Mia, the movie, my love for ABBA has been renewed. Over the holiday break, we (my mom, sisters, sisters-in-law and nieces and even the "men" occasionally popped in to watch the flipper scene) watched it a couple of times and everytime, we all belted out the songs and, when possible, broke out in spontaneous dance. Even my little girl got a few dance moves in with me. It was so fun and just shows that ABBA is a classic. Mamma Mia definately ranks right up there with Grease and Girls Just Wanna Have Fun. I don't own the movie; yet, but one day it will be added to my classic movie collection!