rose goes greetings 2.

what's up ladies and gents? I haven't had a free moment to sit here before my bloggy blog in quite some time. today I am... wait you'll never guess... tired! I know, it is shocking. last night Moses woke up at 3, he seemed a bit warm, maybe teeth are on the way. what joy.

today a very dear friend of mine is in the hospital about to have her baby, I am very happy for her, as I remember being 15 and making each other mix tapes. now we're mamas. what a magical thing it is to journey through life with people. for an old nostalgic soul like mine, it's my favorite treasure of all, the relationships I have with people and cruising through the currents of life with them. before I know it we'll be entering the grandparent stage, wondering what the hell happened to time. sigh. one day at a time.

now that I am older and a mother, I can remember all the scoldings that I now give my daughter being given to me. the most infamous ones: "quite down", "not so loud", "please be quiet", "don't scream", "you don't have to yell", "please for the love of god be quiet!". I remember these well. I remember being in junior high and getting my report cards that read: less talking, too much socializing, less talking, chatty cathy, LESS TALKING! I suppose I had a lot to say. it was good when I became a crabby teenager and was selective with who I chatted with, though those few were still enough to get me into trouble. I feel a bit guilty when I am giving those scoldings to Vae, as I do not want to break her spirit. I remember well what it felt like to hear those things all of the time and I remember feeling so full of energy and excitement (much like Vae) and it would just burst out of me. loudly. I hope to not silence Vae, although my mental health might benefit from doing so. :)

I have a few more Rose Goes Greetings to share with you as a departing gift.

lies.

there are reasons people lie. they lie to protect themselves. they lie because they think they are protecting you. they lie because they are afraid. they lie because they don't want to appear to be afraid. they lie because they are broken hearted. they lie because they don't understand why their heart had to get broken.

oh people. we are a funny breed. there have been some awkward situations going on in my life lately. I have constantly been wrestling through the "meaning" behind said situations. basically, I've been carrying around a load that isn't mine to carry and need to learn how to not waste energy on things that I cannot change. I am thankful for prayer, and that I can constantly remove these loads and hand them over. sure, they come back again. but I keep trying to let them go.

I never thought I cared what people thought about me. I had a very punk rawk attitude growing up. I was under the belief I could do and say whatever I wanted, dress however I wanted, and that I didn't care what people thought about it. oh I thought I was so sure. I was so far from right. The older I get, the more I realize I do care. and I find it safe to say, I care way too much. In fact, I seem to care too much about what people who I don't even like think about me. people who are mean, bitter, and think everyone in the world is wrong and they are right. yes, even those people I wish think I am a sweet and awesome person. I guess we all do. I have heard the older you get, the more those expectations fall away. if that is the case, bring on the 30s because I am ready! my goodness.

today a friend told another friend, you never give up. I want that to be true about me. I want to fight for what is right. I want to have victory over lies. I want my children to grow up knowing the truth about who they are and I want them to love others more than themselves. I am realizing more and more how much I am robbed of my joy and of my freedom by worrying about what people think about me. then there are all the barriers. the christian and the non-christian. the republican and the democrat. the liberals and the conservatives. the feelers and the thinkers. on and on it goes. certainly you can't please everyone. and you can't be sorry for who you are. I won't be sorry for who I am.

I am someone who hates when people put down others. I hate when people blab and blab out there asses about stuff they don't know the first thing about. I hate when people are closed to other ideas, other opinions, when they are closed to the very idea that their own way isn't the only way. I hate division. oh but isn't that the way the world works. let's see how many ways this world can be divided. let's see how many ways we can tear each other down. even within our own groups we do this. our own families, our own churches, our own schools, our own campaigns for things we strongly believe in, our own political parties. it's everywhere among us. how are we supposed to be encouraged? how are we supposed to feel good about raising our children among this? my brother would say, don't have children. there's the answer. let's stop making families.

oh goodness.

I could go on and on. I don't want to be stuck in the slum of this shit all the time. which brings me back to, thank God for prayer. thank God for my faith and the fact that I can give my burdens to him.

I will have victory. I will learn. I will teach my children how to LOVE, if that is the only thing I do. and people will say, that natalie rose, she never gives up.

salsa and sentimental hearts.

I am considering a few things. one of which, is I hope that when I am a grandmother, I have garage sales every weekend. I am pretty sure I want to scout out random treasures and lay them out on tables, serve chips and salsa, and garage-sale-it-up as much as I can. I might even wear a visor. I am pretty excited about this. my family has always made homemade salsa to sell at our garage sales. it is one of the random little things that I love about my Mexican family. we have a bowl of it out with some chips for people to try, and then we have about a dozen jars of it for people to buy. they'd always sell out literally within minutes. we've got that magic touch. it is called "nana's salsa". my nana has the greatest salsa recipe ever. or at least I thought she did until chris got his hands on it and made it better. no offense nana, that's just what chris does. at least you're not married to him. anyway, next weekend we get to contribute jars of salsa to a friend's garage sale and let's just say I'm pretty pumped about it. pumped, do people still say that?

it has been said that one can make any house a home. I am learning this, as I move from one location to the next, always waiting for that house. the house that is in my mind. this house will surely be mine one day. until then, this apartment is my home. that is ok with me. it is roomy, it is warm in the winter and cool in the summer, it has our totally amazing decor keeping it real. the kids each have their own room, which is vital since Moses still wakes up quite a bit and if they were in the same room waking each other up, I might just run far far away. ah yes, I am ok here. I am sure of it. even the sound of the kid upstairs running laps has become apart of the coziness. ok not really, that dude needs a leash tied to a tree if you ask me.

for those of you who don't know. I am an extremely sentimental person. like seriously sentimental.

sen·ti·men·tal [sen-tuh-men-tl]
–adjective
1.
expressive of or appealing to sentiment, especially the tender emotions and feelings, as love, pity, or nostalgia: a sentimental song.
2.
pertaining to or dependent on sentiment: We kept the old photograph for purely sentimental reasons.
3.
weakly emotional; mawkishly susceptible or tender

you can define me with number 3. just call me mawkishly susceptible from now on ok? I am so sentimental, I'll keep a piece of toilet paper if it really means something to me. (I am not a hoarder, do not confuse sentimental awesomeness with hoarding, don't do it. do I need to post the definition of "hoarder" as well?)

today I glanced down at my wedding rings that my mother had passed down to me and started thinking about passing them down to Vaelyn. I thought, what if none of my kids end up being sentimental? not all people are sentimental right? as a super strong feeler, (I am not a thinker. I think a lot, but only about what I feel) I can not imagine what it would be like to not be sentimental. Vaelyn might find the rings ugly, old fashioned, she may want something totally different and not even care if they end up in a pawn shop somewhere. Moses might not care about them either. they might not care about their scrapbooks or about anything that I've kept for them. (although I can't imagine moses not wanting to show his girlfriends his first-haircut-whispies in a plastic bag) what a strange thought. I've always been that way too. I remember being four and carrying stuffed animals around the store, explaining to them that I couldn't rescue them but reassuring them that someone surely would. I remember getting new shoes and telling my old ones "don't worry I won't forget about you, I'll still wear you". I suddenly feel like I'm sharing too much.

"what can you do with a sentimental heart?"- S&H