All I Ever Needed to Know About Love I Learned From Nicholas Sparks

The Longest Ride

• Swimming in a pond is necessary to solidify your relationship
• I love Cowboys
• Every girls dream is for a man to love her and only her, that true pure love
• Fine Art and Cowboys are a perfect match
• Sometimes you have to love someone enough to let them go and hope they come back
• Maybe good smart girls win a really kind good smart guy in the end
• Bring flowers, ask her on a real date....plan something, take the lead..be a MAN...Are there men like this out there? 
• You should collect fine art
• Girls should act like girls
• It is much better to be kind than a jerk, being a jerk always loses
• Men, set up a picnic and a fire and bring good food...win-win
• The forties had the best clothes and dresses
• Problems get resolved and people still love each other
• Love grows deeper with time
• Love letters are necessary
• Love isn't always easy
• If you get invited to an art show by the old guy in the rest home that you have been reading his love letters to, you should go. Because the man you love will probably be invited also and all of your problems will magically be solved.
• It is important to surprise your wife with the things she loves. Like Art. 

I watch Nicholas Sparks movies and they do something to me. They pretty much suck the life out of me like a dementor. Mostly because I cry a lot in those movies. The really ugly cry like the hopeless romantic loser cry. My friend said it best tonight, "Maybe I screwed up my one good chance to have a love like the love in "The Longest Ride." Inside I agreed but I didn't want to give up hope that maybe true love still exists somewhere out there for me and my friends. However, that hope is dim. Really Dim. Then I try to tell myself this is not real, it is a movie it is fiction. But how come inside I hope it isn't? Why do I still think maybe someone might love me like that again? Like carry me over the threshold of our brand new yellow house with white trim. Why is there a big black hole of sorrow in my chest when I watch movies like this? I think the problem lies in the fact that I hope but I don't believe. And that is probably the problem, I just don't care anymore. But then there is that black hole that feels like maybe I do care because it hurts in that big black hole. 

And then I remember that Nicholas Sparks is getting a divorce. So what does he know anyway about lasting love? 

XOXO- Debbie Downer.......Sorry. The Sunny D

The Fabulous Wolf and the Three Little Swimmies

The big bad wolf has a bad rap,

The truth in fact is, 

She just wants a nap.

Instead let's call her fabulous 

And get a swim cap.

The fun thing about getting older 

is you get to rediscover

things you once loved 

When you were younger

The fabulous wolf in her childhood days

was compared to a fish 

and could swim a long ways

Getting in the pool was her favorite thing

along with running, violin,

and trying to sing.

As she grew older things got in the way

like work, life,

and children 

she forgot how to play

This was bad news for the fabulous wolf,

A reprieve she needed 

her stress through the roof.

So she tried to remember the things that she loved,

Besides teaching, child rearing, and house cleaning so much!

One day she remembered her time in the pool

swim team and mermaid dreams

Realizing,

She could swim before school!

She started to swim again

It was easier on her knees

She sweat just as much

as running the streets

Which is weird in the pool....

But who cares,

She was pleased!

She quickly noticed

Swimming was hard work

Some things had changed

From child hood swim team 

To now middle age

Her swim suits though cute 

Weren't quite on cue

For swimming laps

Her body revolted and things were askew

Tugging on straps and stuffing parts in

It slowed down her time

She was chagrined,

At this point she knew,

A swim team suit was needed

To the sporting goods store

She headed one day

Three little swimmies

to the wolf seemed to say

Try me, 

I'm so pretty, 

I will not disappoint

Your lap time goals improving

No more struggling and stuffing

as you swim down the lane

YAY! Thought the wolf

This will be such a treat, 

to swim like I did as a child in a meet

She picked up the first swimmy

blue reversible

That would be nice 

Thought the fabulous wolf

Two swimsuits in one,

She tried on the suit,

She huffed and she puffed

The LYCRA was TIGHT

Sweaty and tired she looked in the mirror

Boy, some things had sure changed

She tried not to sneer.

This was for good health!

But her thighs screamed NO WAY

This suit is too tight

Next one, they seemed to say....

The next swimmy she tried 

was a black little stunner

Black is a favorite color

When the scale reaches a certain number

Slightly dismayed, she eyed the second suit

Maybe this one will work

After all this is a healthy pursuit! 

She huffed and she puffed 

as she tried numero dos

It seemed okay,

Until she turned to the back

Squished together by lycra

Was a roll of FAT! 

EEEEEEEEKKK! Cried the wolf! 

This will never do

I can't go in public

With back fat in full view! 

Downhearted the wolf thought 

I'll never find a swimmy............

That pulls in my thighs, my back, and my tummy

Swimmy number three 

Black with a pink swoosh

Had a simple design

maybe it would hold in her tush

holding the hanger 

for a short minute

She tried to get courage 

to squeeze herself in it

Deep breath, here she goes,

A puffing and huffing

Swimmy number three

Was the perfect little darling

A little more coverage in the back and the front

Everything where it should be 

She had found the right one! 

Hooray! She thought as she skipped to pay

Don't worry keep trying

Was the theme of the day

So here she goes now 

With swimmy in tow

A new cap

and timing each lap as she goes!

Hooray for Summer! Old hobbies are new again! XOXO- The Sunny D

She Yodels a Tale of Single Mom Burn-Out

Our Spring Break Trip to Disneyland

I know the title of this blog is filling you with envy and wonder. Yodeling. 

It isn't so much about yodeling as it is about exhaustion. I had found myself around the time of this picture and afterward burnt out, exhausted. There were so many factors that contributed to this burn out it would be quite unfair if I named just one. Let's just chalk it up to single Mom problems and a hectic schedule. My exhaustion was becoming hard to mask as I am so good at doing usually. I cried at work one day, lost patience with my own children at home, it wasn't pretty. Something had to give. 

When someone says to you, "I don't know how you do it all. You seem to pull everything together so seamlessly as a single Mom. You're doing it better than a lot of families with two parents."

I want to cry, IT IS A WELL DISGUISED FARCE! I can't do it all. There is one of me doing a job that should be completed by two. I also know that this is a compliment and gladly take it. I am happy that my skillful job of tricking those around me into thinking I have it all together is working. 

Shouldering the work of Mom and Dad is not easy. Neither is sharing your kids 50-50. I think those are the hardest things. They contribute to single mom burn out or maybe just Sunny D burn-out. Plus, I know everyone has a hard line to tow. Everyone has tricky spots in life even if there are two of you. I'm just saying it sure would be nice to bounce ideas off of someone before conking out for the night. Pillow talk. Miss that. 

However, it is really nice being single and having all the good idea's. Oh, You want to spend $100 on Lulu's instead of an Easter dress?? GREAT IDEA....glad I thought of it. These are the actual thoughts that go through my head and they are always the BEST ideas. Especially since I don't have to talk 

them over with anyone. SO there are SOME pluses to being single. 

When I get to Single Mom burn-out stage I realize that it is up to me to be happy. Plus, I knew when my Mom said to me one Sunday in a kind way......"It just doesn't seem like you are enjoying life." I realized the jig was up and I had been discovered. I wasn't enjoying life. I was burnt out. 

It was time to create my own beach. By that I mean, the beach is my happy place. It was time to carve some of that into my life. Find my own personal Beach. So I did. 

1. I focused on serving others, if opportunities knocked I answered the door

2. I bought a bike and am riding it to and from work and all around town with my kids most Monday nights to get a treat.

.......Single Mom problems....my back tire is flat and off the spoke part so now I'm going to have to figure out how to fix it....thank goodness for you tube!

3. I started back at the gym at 5 am every morning. I am too tired to go after work. 

4. I took a personal day from work and organized my house, bought myself a new dress for work and church, and ate a big fat chicken pita by myself. We had dentist appointments in the afternoon so I would have had to take a half day anyway. That morning off when I was supposed to be at work energized me. I didn't have to wake up until seven! 

5. I spent time with friends

I made my own personal beach. I feel much better now. So what does this have to do with yodeling. Well, my Grandpa was the first yodeler. I can say that I learned all I need to know about being an amateur  yodeler from listening to him. If you know me or the home I grew up in there was a lot of singing going on. Not like sitting around the piano together singing because I think that's weird but just walking around the house singing. My Mom sang all the time and so did I. Or, so do I. However, 

when I am burnt-out the singing stops. I have noticed that. The other day I was getting my children ready for school it was AZ Merit state testing week. I told them I was going to sing them my good luck testing song. I didn't have a song ready so I just started to yodel. I mean that's a natural response, right? Yodel if you can't think of a song? Anyway, they laughed and were happy and I realized in that moment that I was happy once again too, and that made me even happier. 

I arrived at school and was getting my class ready for the AZ Merit test when I told them I was going to sing them my good luck testing song. They looked at me with eager eyes and I began to yodel. They laughed, the testing tension was broken and they began their test. The funny thing is my little class wouldn't take their test each and every day after that unless I had sung them my good luck testing song. I even let some of them try their hand at yodeling. I know that is kind of weird of me but you have to be a special brand of person to be a teacher and yodeling is totally included in that brand. Think of it as Dumbo's feather, with that feather he could fly. Whatever it takes to help a child believe in themselves, even if it's the long lost art of the yodel. 

And so I am happy again and that is the best thing. 

XOXO- The Sunny D