Friday, August 22, 2008

I know who my friends are

I’m blessed to have the best friends ever. There’s nothing cooler than having people in your life who you’ve known forever and better yet, who’ve known you forever. The best example of this is Beth – we were inseparable as kids – from about 1st grade until 9th grade. And now, even though she lives far away, I talk to her more than I talk to anyone else – it’s the magic of email. I am so thankful for her – for a lot of reasons, but one of which is that I can tell her the things I would be horrified if anyone else knew I even THOUGHT them, and she never judges me. Plus, she makes me laugh.

I’m thankful for ALL my girls from high school – it’s so fun watching the people who you grew up with have babies and get married. Surreal, sometimes, but fun, especially when I think back to our escapades in younger days.

I’m thankful for the wide circle of friends I have – I have the youth group kids who treat me like I’m one of them, and who I can completely let down with.

I have my soccer mom friends – three moms from Abby’s soccer team that knew each other already but who were fun and we hung out on the sidelines laughing and making fun of our children learning to play soccer. We went out to dinner the other night and drank a ton of wine and laughed our asses off – it was so fun. We put the kids back on the same team for fall season because we wanted to hang out again.

My work friends – we made a four square court in the parking lot behind our building and a bunch of us played four square all lunch hour yesterday and laughed and laughed. There's a group of us that hang out quite a bit, and we just went camping two weekends in a row and had the best time.

My fellow adult leaders on the youth group trips – it’s funny how you can meet someone for the first time one day, and a week later, it’s like you’ve known each other forever. All of the adult leaders at camp did a skit where we worked in an ice cream shop and three people came in and ordered shakes, but our blender was broken. So all of the “workers” took marshmallows and bananas and chocolate and chewed them up or melted ice cream in our mouths and spit it all into cups. Then the three “customers” drank the shakes. The kids freaked – they totally did not think they’d actually drink it. I get to see them once a year, sometimes more, but it’s as if no time has passed in between. They’re so much fun.

I have Sally and Nancy and Anita – my three extra moms who are helping me figure out logistics for our wedding – they all live next door to each other and have been friends forever and they take excellent care of me. They’re a perfect example of how friendships can weather a lot of storms and how no matter what happens, you always have your girls – they truly value each other and make time for each other and it’s really cool.

So yeah. I couldn't ask for better people in my life.

I couldn't possibly fit it all into one post

I have had the busiest week and work and maybe like the worst two weeks or so at my job since I started working here. So I haven’t had a lot of time to write, and even though I recently got internet at home, half the time I can’t even muster up the mental energy to get online.

Anyhoo, that’s neither here nor there. I was thinking today about how much I have – like the ridiculous amount of blessings in my life. I have awesome parents who not only love me, but love Chris and especially the girls. A perfect example of this was a few weeks ago when we needed my parents to babysit for us on a Friday night. My mom was like, “sorry, we’re leaving for Breckenridge on Friday afternoon”. So whatever, I started looking for someone else (which is difficult because I’m very picky about who I’ll leave the girls with) and then my mom called me back “Um, your dad was mad that we couldn’t watch the girls on Friday, so he was wondering if we could take them to Breckenridge with us.” Hmmm. Let me think ab- OKAY! So they took them with them, and Chris and I went up there Saturday and we all stayed another night and had a great time.

I was always afraid that because I didn’t get married earlier that my parents would never get the chance to enjoy grandkids or that my kids wouldn’t understand what amazing grandparents I KNEW my parents would be. So having the girls in our lives is a gift all around – of course I love them, in fact, I love them as if they were really mine - and I love them even more because I get to see how happy being grandparents makes my mom and dad. And they’re a gift to my parents, because they love little kids and my mom was just dying for little girls to play with like when I was little and my dad couldn’t wait to read them all of he and I’s favorite books from my childhood. So awesome.

I’m blessed to have Chris – he is the best (future) husband I could have possibly asked for. My mom told me about a conversation she and my dad had with this couple who has been like our grandparents – they’re in their 90s and very crotchety. Anyway, they asked my parents “what makes you think Chris is a good mate for Amber” and my dad said “well, he has a good job, he owns his own house and you can tell that he really loves Amber – he always kisses or hugs her.” Which is true – he’s always affectionate with me, but not in a space-invading way. He tells me he loves me and he does stuff so that I know he does. Like every morning he makes my coffee the way I like it and sits it on the counter in my travel mug so it’s ready when I leave for work. And besides that, we have so much fun together – laughing and talking all the time. It’s true that he’s my best friend, because we talk about everything. I really like being around him – we love each other, but we also totally enjoy each other’s company.


I'm blessed to be friends with my brother now that we're older. He's fun to be around and really funny and gifted and he sends me text messages to tell me he loves me. The age difference was hard when we were younger, but now we're allies in the parental fights and he can hang out at my house with Chris and I and drink a beer and talk. It's so weird to see him grow up, but I'm so glad that I was as old as I was when he was born because I'm able to remember his entire life.

So that's part one - blessings, the family edition.