Thoughts on Being a Fire Wife

I recently joined a Facebook group for women with significant others that work for Cal Fire. Finally having women to talk to that deal with a lot of the things I do has gotten me thinking about how different it is from most people's lives.

People still ask me all the time about Jeff's schedule. He is on shift for three days and off for four days every week. No, he does not come home at all during the three days of his shift, because fires and other emergencies happen at night, too. He works for the state, not a local department, so his station is an hour away from home through winding roads that he prefers me to stay off of, so the kids and I rarely visit him. 

This means we don't see him for half of every week. That is unless he gets called to a fire or needs to cover a station for someone on a fire or any of several other things that could happen to cause him to have to stay at work. At 5:00 in the morning on the day he was supposed to come home from his last shift, he sent me a text saying that he would be late because they were sent to a local fire. I made sure to respond in a way that wouldn't add any more to the stress he was under (I'm not always so thoughtful), but all I could think about was that this fire could keep him away anywhere from a few extra hours to a few extra weeks. The worst part about when he's called to a big fire is not knowing when he'll be back, not having a specific day I can look forward to, just hoping every day that he'll be home tomorrow. Luckily, this time it was just a small fire that didn't keep him more than a few hours.

In the past couple weeks, I've had multiple people say something along the lines of, "I don't know how you do it without just breaking down!" As those who see me a little more often well know, the truthful response to that is: I do. I break down. Not all the time, but it happens. A few weeks ago, I brought my three children, all under 5 years old, to church with no husband. I had spent the previous week taking care of my kids, feeding them, entertaining them, driving them around, scheduling babysitters while going to appointments to get a root canal and rehab for a bulging disc in my back. It feels like a lot whenever I talk about it, but I didn't have time to think about it at the time. I was just getting things done because they needed to be done. I hadn't had enough time to myself to even notice the weight of everything. So when I brought my kids to church, and the older ones were in their Sunday school classes, and a very nice woman offered to try to put my crying baby to sleep, I had a chance to sit. In that moment of just sitting, the tiredness, the loneliness, and the stress all caught up with me. I sat in church and just cried. Sometimes all you need is a good cry, but I'm blessed to also have good friends and family who step in and help me whenever I'm able to humble myself enough to ask for it. I love them and I'm grateful, but there's nothing like having my husband home.

I don't mean to say that being married to a firefighter is all bad. I am so very proud of my husband and the work that he does. Our children love to tell people that their daddy puts out fires. When his schedule doesn't get changed, he's able to spend four whole days with us at a time! We could take a mini vacation every week if we wanted (at least when it's not fire season)! And when he is home, Jeff is so good at really being with us. He helps around the house, plays with the kids, and makes time to make me feel special. But I think my favorite part of having a firefighter for a husband is that I know he will literally walk into a burning building for a complete stranger, but I know that he would do even more than that for me and for our children. He is absolutely my hero.

Living the way we do can be very difficult. Having the support of family and friends isn't only helpful, it's necessary. I've had to learn to admit when I need help. I've had to learn to do things alone that I never planned to. But since joining the fire wife group on Facebook, I've stopped spending any of that time feeling sorry for myself. As much as I admire our firefighters for the life-saving work they do, I also have an ever-growing admiration for the women who support them. We are a big part of why our heroes are so strong.

I don't know who wrote this, but it really spoke to me:

Disneyland Trip!

Last week, we got to spend time as a family at the happiest place on Earth! We were so excited to go to Disneyland, and on my birthday, no less! I thought about trying not to make this post too long, but then I remembered it's for me to be able to look back on. If anyone gets bored with it, you're free to move on. 😁

We drove down the day before we went into the actual park. We had some fun in the shops at Downtown Disney, but I think Gideon was mostly just glad to be out of the car.

With some help from grandparents, we got a room at Paradise Pier. The lids loved being able to see all of California Adventure from our window, and the boys' favorite part was the pillows shaped like beach balls!

The hotel had a pool, and off to the side was a small pool for young kids. It was just the right size for Gideon, and the other kids spent most of their time there, too. At least it made it easier to watch them than in the big pool.

 

As soon as we got into Disneyland, the very first character we saw was Mickey Mouse. We even caught him before he got in his picture-taking spot, so he had some nice interactions with the kids. Lily was pretty nervous at first, but Mickey was very sweet and made it clear that he would keep his distance. Now when she talks about it, she laughs about how silly it was that Mickey kissed her hand. I wanted to see how Gideon would do meeting Mickey, but he was already crying because it was time for his morning nap, so I spared him. The kids saw Minnie later on, too, but they were with their aunts who joined us while I was somewhere else. So since SOMEbody hasn't sent me pictures yet, I don't have any.

     

Gabriel and I went on Autopia after we signed him up for Jedi training. It wasn't a huge part of the trip, but I figured I would at least add one picture with me in it.

Leading up to the trip, we asked Gabriel if he wanted to do Jedi training and told him what it would entail. We also showed him some videos. He thought it seemed cool until he realized the villains he would be fighting weren't from PJ Masks. But the day before we went to Disneyland, he decided to do it. He got his robe and his light saber and was mostly oblivious while they taught him the Jedi moves, but he listened enough to have an idea of what to do. Then when he was waiting in line to fight, he got nervous. Someone from the show knelt and talked to him, but he was still unsure. Luckily, I was sitting close enough to be able to talk to him and told him that they weren't really bad guys; they just wanted to help him use his light saber. So he did it. He almost backed out mid-fight, but he beat Kylo Ren. He wanted to be done, but he sat with the other Jedi trainees. Then they were supposed to change their position on the stage and Gabriel was terrified that he would have to fight again. He ran to where I stood, yelling, "I don't want to do it again!" and came at me so hard I fell to the ground while trying to catch him and his light saber to keep it from breaking. I comforted him while someone from the show came and took back his robe. Another person gave him a Jedi Academy button to wear the rest of the day and told him he did a good job. So, even though he had been scared, Gabriel spent the whole rest of the day excited about what a great Jedi he had become.

Soon after that, we saw Tinkerbell. The last time we went to Disneyland was two years ago. Gabriel was 2 years old and didn't care much about meeting many characters, but his cousins wanted to meet Tinkerbell and he went along. Ever since then, she has been Gabriel's "girlfriend" and he was VERY excited to see her again.

She saw his Jedi Academy button and asked about that. She said she knew some light fairies and was good at tinkering, so she could probably make a light saber. Then I let her know about the last time he had met her and that she was his girlfriend. She folded her arms and said, "Where have you been?" Then she gave him a hard time because it looked like he had been growing up and she would never want to grow up, because it seems itchy. It was adorable.

This was my favorite part of the Tinkerbell encounter. It was time to pose for pictures, so they all stood up and smiled at the camera. Tinkerbell held Lily's hand, but before she took Gabriel's, she leaned down and said very coyly, "Hey, can I hold your hand?"

Watch as that already huge smile of his gets even bigger...

We also saw Mary Poppins and Bert. My kids have never sat all the way through the movie, or even half of it, but they love "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious." 

Also, just FYI, I have TONS of the standing and smiling pictures, but most of my favorites are of the actual interactions with the characters.

Here's another good story. We saw Princess Aurora and tried to get to her, but they had closed the line because it was time for her break. So I made sure to look up what time she would be back and assured Lily that we would see her later. (Princess Aurora is her current favorite princess, but it changes pretty frequently.) So we went to do other things and ended up in line to see Rapunzel and Flynn Rider. I was trying to take care of Gideon when she got to the front of the line, so, again, SOMEbody owes me pictures. 

Lily ran and gave Rapunzel a hug wearing her Rapunzel shoes and Flynn assumed Rapunzel was her favorite. One of my sisters told them it's actually Aurora, and Rapunzel and Flynn joked and talked with Lily, as they do. After they talked and took pictures, but before they had a chance to wrap up and say goodbye, Lily saw Princess Aurora walk by and completely ditched Rapunzel and Flynn Rider, running and yelling, "Aurora!"

Here's some more pictures of princesses. The kids weren't really interested in many rides. Lily ran up and gave every princess a hug (except when she suddenly got too nervous and, instead, ran up and abruptly stopped right in front of them) and Gabriel decided to bow to each of them because, "That's what you're supposed to do when you meet a princess."

Side note: Elsa and Anna were cute, but Anna looked like she needed a nap REAL bad,

We saw a Disney Jr. Dance Party show, and that's when Gideon really perked up. He wanted to get up on the stage so bad, I eventually had to stop putting him down to let him dance.

These ones are just cute. And I love the bond Lily has with her new doll.

We also went to Universal Studios. Since my kids really weren't into rides for some reason and Universal doesn't have a lot of stuff for young kids, it just wasn't as fun. But hey, we had free tickets. Anyway, here's some pictures.

 Oh yeah, we had a hiccup on the way to Universal. Lily got car sick and threw up. We got it all cleaned up and a nice lady even gave us some water, paper towels, and a trash bag to help. But when we got back in the car at the end of the day to go home, Gabriel said it still smelled bad and held his nose for FOUR hours. He even fell asleep holding his nose at one point!

 Over all, it was a really fun trip, and I'm so glad we did it. I didn't expect to spend quite so much time seeing characters, and I thought my kids would like more rides, but they had a great time and I loved watching them have so much fun. I love my family so much, and I can't wait to have more fun adventures with them!

Update: I got some of those pictures I was missing...

Summer (or so) Recap

Okay, the baby is older, summer is over, and it's time to get my act together (like that will ever happen). So here are a few things that have happened in the last few months, in whatever order I happen to think of them.

I found a pretty good deal to sign Gabriel up for karate during the summer. He liked it for maybe 3 lessons and then it was always a battle to go. We made him fulfill his commitment to do it until the end of the summer, as it was something he had said he wanted to do. Toward the end of summer, he started to like showing off his cool super hero moves, but we decided it was best for him to stop anyway.

Lily has really started liking princesses and prefers to wear dresses over anything else. She loves to sing and dance, so we started her in dance classes. She didn't like the first one, but she warmed up to it quickly and loves it now.

Gideon started crawling at some point. He's been doing it for a while now and has gotten very good at it. And fast. He has no interest in learning how to walk, though, and will get angry if you try to teach him.

Jeff had to work a decent amount of overtime with all the wildfires, but we usually get to have a lot of fun when he is home and even managed to take a trip to the beach before summer ended.

I started working out really hard to lose the pregnancy weight that I don't think will be going anywhere until I'm done nursing. Then I totally messed up my back. I had a bulging disc and discovered that I have degenerative disc disease. I've been seeing a chiropractor and doing some rehab, and I'm getting close to being good as new, but I'm only slowly getting back into exercise.

Gabriel started preschool!!!! He had absolutely no anxiety about being dropped off. He's in his third week now, and he has a lot of fun, but if you ask how he likes it he'll say it's too long and it's not fair that everyone but the teacher has to sit crisscross applesauce. He's a goober sometimes. He is also SO smart. I already knew that, but it's coming out even more now that he's in more of an environment specifically geared toward education.

I think that's a pretty good nutshell recap. Here's some pictures!