I knew this was going to be a good day when…

1. Clara slept from 6:00 pm to 5:00 am, woke up, had a little nibble and then went right back to sleep. Simple? perhaps. A total VICTORY? Youbetcha!

2. Millie woke up in a fantastic mood. When she is on, man! is she fun.

3. Clara did a big poop after her 1st nap (most moms groan when they smell a poopy diaper – not me, I CHEER!)

4. Found a new coffee table* and I didn’t have to wait six weeks for it to arrive.

5. FINALLY got a date for when the sofa and chairs will arrive, synchronize your watches – cuz this Thursday they are going to be DELIVERED!

6. When to get ice cream with Millie while Clara took her second nap (you heard me, her SECOND nap).

7. Vickie C. made an awesome comment on my blog. Cheers, Vickie!

8. Got to talk on the phone, a big, fat, long convo with AJ.

9. Dinner was leftovers from Sunday night – you know what that means, right? Dinner prep took about 10 mins. SWEETNESS!

10. Got an email from Alli, and our old sofa is sitting pretty in the Bronx and is now in a New York State of Mind.

Hey mom, these pictures are especially for you…

(Amanda, check out what she is chomping on. I have become the person that I once scorned.)

* True story: I have been working very hard on making our home the loveliest place it can be. I am grateful to be able to do this because I feel like it is important. I believe our homes, and specifically what takes place within the walls of our homes really matters to God. To make a home lovely takes real effort. It takes lots of work, searching, thinking (okay, obsessing in my case) over even small details, and when you are trying to do it within the framework of a budget it takes double the time. I have been searching endlessly for a coffee table, the other day I broke down and prayed for help. I  approached the Lord and said, “I understand that in the grand scheme of things this really isn’t that important. But I have been working very hard to find this item and I would really appreciate your help. And if I could get a great price that would be so wonderful.”

So check it out. Today I walked into a store, told them what I was looking for the Nadia coffee table by Mitchell Gold, they said, “Oh yes! We have that in stock and it is 40% off.”

A little gift from Heaven!

Last week my friend brought over some lettuce from her beautiful garden as a “thank you” for taking her to the airport.* Don’t you just love her presentation. Pretty, huh?

Good enough to eat even!

*(to be honest I am just relieved that she still wants to be my friend after I FORGOT to pick her up to take her to the airport and her husband had to call me to see if I was still coming…ARRRG! Please tell me I am not the only one who makes these kind of mistakes!)

I met Hugh Jackman in the park on Monday.

I know, it sounds crazy. But I did. And I have witnesses.

Just ask Neylan McBaine, or her brother-in-law Quen Smith. Quen was the one who spotted him.

When we realized it was him I pulled out my phone and called my mom. Our exchange went something like this..

Me: Mom, you are not going to believe this, but Hugh Jackman is in the park. He is standing 10 yards away from me.

Mom: NO WAY!

Me: YES WAY!

Mom: We’ll start praying!

Odd, your thinking right? What an odd response. But if you know me well then you will understand why my sister Tess sent out a mass text to my family to ask them to start praying for me.

Let me explain…

It was fitting that Neylan and I were together when we clapped eyes on Mr. Jackman. 18 years ago I read a book about a person who became a hero to me. Neylan read the book too b/c in those days there wasn’t a single thing that we didn’t experience together. She knows ALL about my years and years of loving this book. She loved it with me.

The book was about this darling man, Edward Sheldon.

I get a little emotional just looking at this picture – tied up in his sweet face is so much of youthful longings, my love of things beautiful, my desire to do what is right, and my yearning to understand God’s purpose for me.

Ned was a remarkable human being. He had everything – and I mean the world at his fingertips – and then it was all wrenched away from him. But he refused to be defeated. He chose to love in the face of massive disappointment and rejection and carry on when most of us would have thrown the towel in.

He was born in Chicago in 1918, went to Harvard, had a hit play on Broadway before he’d graduated, was engaged to the “it” girl and beloved by all who knew him b/c he was such a generous, humble, enthusiastic and loving friend. In his late 20’s he was diagnosed with a very rare form or rheumatoid arthritis which left him paralysed and blind.

He spent the next 30 years of his life bedridden. But these years were remarkable years where Ned became the epicenter of American theatre – he influenced EVERYONE from Eugene O’Neill to Helen Hayes.

The person I am most grateful he influenced was a 14 year old girl named Eliza Julia Kelly.

When I was accepted to the masters program at RADA I knew what I wanted my thesis to be about. Ned. So I went to Cambridge, MA with my mom to Harvard’s theatre collection and looked through the boxes of Ned’s personal papers. I saw his handwriting in the margins of his play manuscripts. I’ve done his temple work with the help of my parents and Cameron.

In London my adviser didn’t really understand what I was trying to do. He gave off the vibe that he thought my idea was pretty rummy. It wasn’t hip and groovie, he was more interested in the students who were writing about the globalization of theatre.  He didn’t really know what to do with me and left me to my own devices. The play didn’t work. So I wrote a screen play – not knowing anything about how to write one. This draft pretty much stunk. And for the last seven years I’ve wanted to write a decent screen play about Ned’s life. I have notebooks full of my efforts. Last year, by some miracle, I was accepted into Ela Their’s writing lab. Ela is NY’s best screen writing teacher, and in my opinion one of the best teachers in the whole world, period. Under her inspired tutelage I wrote the first 30 pages of a decent raw draft. Then I had a baby and the project was again put on the back burner.

What does all this have to do with Hugh Jackman?

Well, I realize that I am not alone in thinking he is an incredibly talented actor. He also seems to be a man of integrity and goodness. And to date he is the only one I know of who could play the part of Ned.

So when I saw Hugh in the park, it wasn’t just a moment to brush shoulders with “the sexiest man alive” it was a chance to meet the man who I hope will one day play Ned Sheldon. My family knew this, and so they started praying.

And so I did it, after an hour of pretending not to notice him, I approached him and spoke to him. I told him about Ned and that I was writing a screen play in-between changing diapers. I FELT LIKE A GIGANTIC GOOBER! But I did it to show the Lord that if he was generous enough to line up an opportunity like this I was going to have guts! and I was going to take it! I don’t think it really matters what I said, just that I took the chance to talk to him. Because it really and truly felt like a gift from Heaven.

And Hugh was so kind to me (aka the GIGANTIC GOOBER) and do you want to know the thing that struck me most about him? It was that he was a human being. A regular guy. He may be the top paid actor in Hollywood, a Tony award winner, the host of the Oscars, the star of last weekend’s top grossing film – and I am just a stay at home goober, I mean mom – but the thing we share in common is this – He is God’s son. And I am God’s daughter. And in God’s estimation, we are equal.

Standing next to him in the park I felt that equality.

And I am going to, with God’s help and His perfect grace, write my brother Hugh a stink’n awesome screen play to star in.

And you’re all invited to the screening.

BRING IT!

I should have know, I mean really I should have known that it would shape up to be a two kit-kat* day.

It started innocently.  Millie has a friend named Mia. Mia’s mom just had a baby and I really like Mia’s mom. So first chance that presented itself I had Mia over for a play date and told Margie, Mia’s mom, that I would bring them dinner that very night.

It was going well. I put the dinner together (a summer chicken salad, some brie and filo hors d’ oeuvres** a la Cafe Johnsonia, rolls, and homemade chocolate ice cream- that was originally going to be mousse, but it didn’t quite work out – I mention this just to make clear that I was not taking over a pan of Costco lasagna, I was working my butt off) while simultaneously making lunch for Millie and Mia. Clara, bless her heart, slept.It was tricky, but I was managing.

Then it started to unravel…

Mia had an”accident” and peed on the stairs.

While cleaning up the accident the baby woke up and just wanted to be held.

Millie and Mia had a fight over a penny – which ended sweetly, Millie, still crying told Mia, “I still love you. You can still come to my birthday party.” Ahh!

Then just as we were going to leave and I was packing up their dinner I went up stairs to find that Millie and Mia had taken water and dumped it all over her bed room. On the carpet, on the blankets, everywhere – all in an effort to wash Millie’s elephant, who was also drenched. The room smelled like wet dog. It was stinky. Very stinky.

As I was leaving the house with three little girls in tow I ran to the kitchen, opened the cookie jar and grabbed a kit-kat. Jan came up to see what was going on and caught me with my hand in the cookie jar.

“This is my version of a drink. And I really need one!” I told him.

When I got home from dropping Mia home I went straight to the kitchen for another kit-kat.

No photos for this entry, I’m afraid. I was too busy mopping up pee off the stairs and water from Millie’s room.

(*Not just any kit-kat, and English kit-kat – and those of you who have eaten an English kit-kat know that there are few things in the world as yummy.)

(** how the heck do you spell that?!)

Dear Grandma,

I miss you. I wish you were around to have bananas and coke with me (I drink diet now and usually skip the banana) and share a good laugh. Or I’d just love to rest my head on your shoulder and fall asleep. Or take you out to Chinese – we’d have to go into the city because I haven’t found any decent places here in Jersey. I’d pick you up in Jan’s car because his car has a sun roof and you could wear your dark sun glasses and we could drive fast because I know if a cop were to pull us over somehow you’d manage to get us out of the ticket.

The other day I was wishing you were here to hang out with me and my girls. I missed you so much that I look my powder puff and smelled it because when I was little you were the only one I knew who had one, so I will forever associate a powder puff with you.  That smell, the smell of a powder puff saturated in makeup is the closest I can get to you (unless you aren’t occupied with heavenly duties and feel like visiting me).  You had one and so did all those 1940’s actresses who would pull out their compacts and powder puff while at a party. They were dressed in silky, form fitting dresses and they looked perfect . To me you were all glam, Grandma. You were Claudette Colbert. My mom didn’t have a powder puff. Only you did. And if you did anything it was bona fide. It was special.

Something happened that made me miss you more than ever.

This…

Millie put on the dress you bought for me when I was her age.

Oh, Grandma Lil – how I loved that dress. It made me feel like I was one of those 1940’s glamour girls (only more 1980’s/Barbara Mandrel). I don’t remember much about Primary, but I remember sitting in that dress and feeling like a million bucks. I loved how the sleeves would allow my shoulders to peek through every once and a while. I loved how it almost touched the ground. I loved the little fake pearl buttons, I didn’t know they were fake at the time.

Millie loves it too.

Thanks, Grandma.

I love you!

Love,

The Dawsons