Why I personally started this blog.

I won't bore you with my life story, (ok maybe I will, because it has so much to do with how I parent)----but this blog is an idea I had because I woke up one morning thinking about my mother. 

My mother, with my brother, my niece, and my nephew (my brother is taken btw.)

In my dream that night, she was sitting on the edge of my bed in the Bronx (all of my best and worst dreams are always in this apartment that I lived in for some creepy reason)-----but anyhoo. I was telling my mother how I felt about this or that, and I started talking about my husband, who at that moment walked into the room, rolled his eyes, and left. I said "I wonder if he heard me", and my mother said, "It doesn't matter. You need to speak your truth." Then of course, I realized I was dreaming and I started yearning for her, and she faded away. 

My father cheated on my mother after I was born, and she got HIV from him. He then killed himself, after my little brother died from it, and my mother herself succumbed to AIDS related illness in January 2004. I was 19, and I changed on the inside. Some fiber of whoever the hell I am, lit up like a spark. I realized if I did not live life to the fullest, I would die immediately. (Also known as hypochondria lol)---anyway, I watched my mother struggle with homelessness and drug addiction as far back as I remember her, but she was SO WISE and KIND, and CLASSY, and yes I can go on, regardless of what she had been through! I did not see it until she was gone, like we tend to do, but I intend to live her legacy through my own duty to my children. 

Look at this sexy beast. 

So Mommy, and cyber-world; here I am, pretty well-rounded despite it all, and with plenty to be thankful for. I have a budding marriage, and two amazing children. I want to be the best mother on the planet, and every single day, I think about how I can be a better person, and instill these values in my offspring. But most of all I want to speak my truth about it.              --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I met Erika Layne a summer ago, and seriously within 2 weeks we were best friends. I have never connected with another woman like that, and I didn't expect to make besties at age 28! We are both hard-working self-employed millennials (minus the sense of self-importance)----ok eff that I feel pretty important---and we find enjoyment in everyday things.  Erika is like, the softer, kinder, more whimsical half to my cynical, driven, competitive spirit, and we complement each-other well.  When we are not making up our own really stupid lyrics to a pop song, we are thrift shopping, creating art, or drinking wine and having "work sessions", where she is editing her photos and I am talking non-stop about any and everything. (And I buy her bubble-gum ice-cream on special occasions.) We love to shop organic, live green (Ok Erika is more green than me, Im more of a teal?)---and we live for the hand-made.