I woke up at 4am this morning to wake Zeke up on time for work. I decided that for his first day back on the job I ought to send him off happy. I made sure everything was set out all nice and neatly and I was going to make him breakfast.

I decided to make him breakfast for the simple reason of, if there is something Zeke and I differ on, it is breakfast. Zeke is a serious warm breakfast type guy. I can’t personally fathom making a whole breakfast meal every morning (or even half the time!) I just can’t. I am perfectly content with cold cereal 6 times a week. Warm breakfast is a weekend thing to me. But not to Zeke. So I decided I would complement the cold cereal with some cheesy eggs. I would have done pancakes, but I realized right before bed as I was getting things ready for this morning that we didn’t have any maple syrup and a limited amount of jam or other toppings. So just eggs, since we haven’t gone out and done serious grocery shopping yet.

I would like to point out that I don’t do well with cooking eggs. I used to do alright and now I have no idea. All I know is that the pan is burned and my stove top is a disaster area. I made a tiny amount of semi-suitable cheesy eggs for Zeke and sent him on his way after watching another episode of Pokemon. (It was an awesome gift from my friend Ricky. I’d forgotten to get his address and all this stuff - but he still made an appearance and bought the first set of Season 1 for Zeke and I [Zeke’s never really seen much Pokemon.] and because it’s so short without commercials, we’ve been throwing it in there now and again to make our way through the series.)

But Zeke still loves me. He told me so. He ate every bit of his overcooked cheesy eggs and told me that he didn’t expect me to wake up EVERY morning at 4am with him.

Whew. Dodged a bullet there.

But no, seriously, it is my plan to make sure from now on Zeke gets to work on time and showered. Later today, I may swing by CVS and buy a brownie mix to make brownies for him to take to work.
I am so awesome.

After Zeke left I tried to go back to sleep and couldn’t. I wandered around the internet some and then fell asleep listening to Zoe Keating’s new album, Into the Trees.

Today I will be getting a new hair style because that’s what married women do.

It’s true. I read it somewhere.

It’s hard to blog when you have so much to say at once. You want to start with the most important stuff, but fear that you’ll forget something big. Someone asked me a few weeks ago if I was excited. There was no context to the question and it garnered a long confused look from me. She looked at me, and repeated with the addendum of “Your wedding.“”Oh. Yes. Of course I am!”

It’s like I’m on fastforward and rewind all at the same time. That dream state where you have to run and you feel like you’re moving through molasses.  Not having internet does that too.

With everyone asking me questions about the wedding I feel like a broken FAQ page. I’m broken because I’m offline and unreachable so often that I’m pretty much useless.

Am I getting married? June 19th. Manchester. Be there. Ceremony wise, I don’t care who shows up. Reception is what’ll do me in. I only have so much food and space there.

Honeymoon? Zeke and I are going to Disney World. Cause we couldn’t think of a place we could both have fun AND relax. Also, it’s amazing.

I have a dress. I got it for pretty much $89 dollars. Kelli is getting it dry-cleaned right now. I have no shoes yet. I might go sans shoes at this rate. Or maybe I will fashion myself armored slippers.

I am looking for the words to say for vows. Some of the most important words I’m gonna say and I’m speechless. How does that work?

I’m moving into our new apartment in Manchester, which is a constant battle up three flights of stairs. Not to mention down my stairs at the House, which is another whole deal. Plus side, I love the apartment. I really really do. I love being in the city, even if it is a whole new cacophony of sounds to get used to. And there are a LOT of sounds to get used to. Luckily Zeke and I can sleep through most things. However, for everyone else I recommend earplugs or an iPod.

There are a few things left to do now. Some are time sensitive, some aren’t. Some cost money, some cost me time. Trying to squeeze in an SCA event, a birthday party, a bachelorette party, a wedding rehearsal and my father and stepmother coming to visit me in my new home and then plan/execute a wedding?
All in eleven days now. Granted, I’ve had time to prep and get this stuff done, but really now, somethings have to happen on assigned days. I have people offering to help me but really, there’s only so much that everyone else can do for me. And most people offering to help me can’t help me where I really need help. When most people offer me help they’re really offering the following: food, small amounts of physical labor when it is in a time slot of their convenience, the ability to maybe drive someone that they would have been driving anyway, or possibly help me with set up.\Well here’s the thing. I’m not organizing food. I handed that over, the best that I could, to Zeke’s mom, Sally. Because trying to organize tens of older women that’ve done this sort of things loads of times before is not something I really find fun. All of them have amazing ideas and points. I don’t want to hear them all, but I appreciate the thought that they feel they can help me in some way that I cannot help myself with. To maintain sanity, I gave it to Sally, who, also, has apparently done this sort of thing before. So I’m going to let it stay there. Anyone who wants to give us food instead of gifts, great! Call Sally and label your food or card so that I know what to send you a thank you card for.

Really, all I’m trying to do is escape this whole thing with a Zeke on my arm. Secondary I want people fed and dancing. Ta da! You’ve found out my secret plan. Oh, third is that all drama is checked at the door. I don’t want to hear about it before or after. If you don’t like someone, or you once dated some one and you both are attending my wedding, just don’t talk to the other one. Just don’t. I don’t want to go into the bathroom and find someone crying their eyes out. Please please please. Don’t bother with gifts. Just give me this.

In a perfect world, I would not feel compelled to be nice. There is a line folks. There is living to make other people happy, which I’m not trying to do, and then there is just being nice and saying, hey, yeah, this person can come too. Even if…. (and yeah, you get the idea, right? So much of this is being nice in a last Hurrah.)

I am alive and marrying the man I love. I can’t wait to start just being with him 24/7. 12/6 isn’t cutting it right now. It really isn’t.

I want to turn my vows/speech thingy in the ceremony into a rant about love sometimes. Seriously, so many people I know have it all wrong now. And I’m not trying to say that what I have is perfect   Well, actually, it is. For me. But I’ve got an idea guys. We shouldn’t be putting drama into this whole relationship thing. We shouldn’t be run by fear or anger. We shouldn’t be fueled by the forbidden fruit (by the way, the definer of forbidden fruit is You.). You shouldn’t be breaking up and breaking down. Breaking up is a terrible term, by the way. I’m so bad though. I can’t say any of that at my wedding because that would be “taking the focus away from the Bride&Groom.”. Frankly, I waver between wanting all the attention and not wanting anything at all.

Holy smokes guys this entry is like a Lady Gaga song. Which might be because I’m listening to her right now. But that’s not the point. I’m venting publicly, properly, for the first time in weeks. Months? Such a long time. You gotta forgive me.  I’m just sick of seeing things done wrong.

And I breaking down or building up? Suddenly I’m standing by somethings and saying the biting, true comment to someone because it needs to be said and I have the courage and the balls to say it, apologize for being blunt but I’m being honest. It’s been working for me and against me, and I love it and fear this new Kiaya who is quiet and then enraged over things and loud. This Kiaya who is trying to shape younger children so they don’t become pricks or drama queens like their other influences. And yet I’m breaking away from babysitting until this whole new Sex thing mellows out.
That’s something about getting married. Older maternal figures think it’s okay to talk to me about sex things.  Sometimes this is hilarious, other times it is embarrassing or just weird. Contrary to popular belief I have an okay idea of what’s going to go down for the next few weeks.

Amen and I love you. Are you excited? I am actually. Very much so. As Zeke and I like to say, We’ve got this mostly in the bag. And it’s cause we’re awesome.

Another one!

I like the blues in this, and that’s pretty much it.

I am kinda proud of it, what with my computer being prone to lagging (the pen’ll skip every so oft.) and me really not getting along with making art on the computer. It almost looks like my paper sketches.

Done with ArtRage2 Free edition, cause I’m still trying it out… and the DigiPro tablet thingy that Zeke is kindly letting me borrow.

It needs work. But so do I as an artist in any respect. I’ve barely sketched in the past few months and it really shows. So does my inability to use fancy-schmancy pen/tablet tech-no-ology on this ‘ere com-pute device.

(also, she’s all in pencil. You don’t want to see me mess around with the inks on that thing yet…)

Much love and goodnight.

Kiaya

And it’s me.

:::WARNING THIS POST IS SAPPY, SWEET, CUTESY AND DOWNRIGHT UNBEARABLY LOVEY-DOVEY. IT IS ALSO IN-YOUR-FACE AND NOT ALWAYS NICE. I’M GONNA BE STRAIGHT WITH YOU. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!!:::

Soon, I’ll put my thoughts down properly to explain the amazingness of the proposal that was ‘Project K’, that involved so many of my close friends and even family. How thinking back makes me cry for so much love and how amazingly blessed I am to have such incredible friends.

I’m even more blessed though for the guy who asked me and planned the whole thing.

A lot of things flashed through my head when he got down on one knee and asked me to marry him. One of them was that seeing him on one knee made my heart stop. There was something about that gesture, of getting down on one knee, that made everything stop. It went by like a moment and at the same time, time seemed to stop.

Why am I getting married? It’s a question that people have been skirting around asking me. They put it in different terms like, “So… why now?” and things about my age.

If there is a topic of much debate, of concern, of tears and laughter, it is my age. (That is a topic for a different post.) A few people have asked me if I feel ready, etc. They are all skirting around the big question of ‘Why are you getting married NOW? Why not in a few years? Why not—?’.

There are lots of smaller reasons. But here, for you now, is the big reason, I, Kiaya, am wanting to be married.

I want to get married because I have a best friend. A friend who isn’t “perfect” by anyone else’s critera but my own. A best friend that I can (and have) tell anything to. A friend that knows more of my facets than anyone else has ever been allowed. He can laugh, he is polite, he’s clever and makes me laugh. He makes me laugh and makes me feel more like myself than I am around anyone else. I can relax around him. I feel safe with him.

I need to clarify there though. Just because I feel safe does not mean I am with him because he himself is safe. He is not. He does crazy things like doing donuts in a snowy empty parking lot to scare me. He wants to hop trains and he plays with the kinds of fireworks that simultaneously scare me and thrill me. Don’t even get me started on ReMine and the tetnus/chemical fears I have. Zeke is not always safe. He is not always the most graceful. To be frank, he’s a complete clutz who very often walks into people who have the misfortune to stand behind him (which is why you will often see me behind him, peering over his shoulder - a shield of sorts to save us. ).

He likes philisophical hiphop and that weird ambiance techno music that can go on for hours (or at least, it seems that way to me.) He’s full of energy and has a happy-go-lucky side that can match mine step for step. That’s a pretty big step right there.His mind is open to all my ideas and so many of the ideas of others and yet he still has his morals and beliefs close to his heart. He’s smart: I could go on for ages about the many things I’ve tried to do that he’s stopped me from doing; foolish, stupid things that he’s been there to help me not to do. He’s guided me that way. Showed me other ways. Other things.

I have a best friend: he inspires me in a thousand ways - to paint, to write, to create. More than once he’s given me the resources to do these things when I had no other way. He is my muse and the force behind me sometimes. He pushes me creatively in ways nobody else has or can do. He loves my work. He loves me. He listens to all the nuances I put into something when no one else could start comprehending and he gets it. He gets me.

He gets why I do things a funny way, why I get mad at other things. This man has, for the most part, given up pig latin for me, because he knows how much I cannot stand pig latin or other half-languages, because I don’t understand them (minor childhood tramas are FUN!), and when I’ve broken into tears over little things - and over big things - he is right there. Always right there. Taking care of me and reminding me of the bigger picture.

He laughs with me, prays with me, plays with me, cries with me and has been unerringly constant. He’s what I’ve always wanted, always needed and always want to have around.

And you know, that’s kind of a tall bill to fit, the wanted, needed stuff. It is exactly like he was made to fit right with me; because he kinda was.

I’ve scraped just the top of the barrel of my reason. My reason for getting married goes so much deeper than what I’ve just listed here. It goes beyond lists and words.

I’m getting married because I love him. Because I want to be able to wake up next to him and go to sleep next to him and say things like, “How are we going to plan out this month together?”, “Can you get the mail?” and “Hey, did you eat the last of my yogurt? Because I really wanted some. Can we go get some more?” and things like, “Oh, yes, this is my husband, who is made of awesome, BEE TEE DOUBLE U, and we are having FUN.”

And that’s just the superficial stuff. I am very well aware, from the many sources telling me, on the hard parts of marriage.

I’ve seen marriages fall apart. I’ve had people telling me for years all the ‘reasons’ and ‘problems’ of my own parents’ “failed” marriage.  It’s really funny, in a dark way, having people who have no idea what it was like, or saw it from the outside try and explain to me, (like I don’t have a good enough idea already, thankyouverymuch) why my parents split up. I mean, I get a pretty bitter laugh from it all. I am aware of what married people fight over. I’ve overheard and seen the shouting and throwing of things in a fight. I’ve read up in books on how to both fix marriages, how to avoid bad ones… It’s something I’m really familiar with. Please do not think for one instant that I am unaware that a marriage will face hardships. Please do not think that I am saying I know every kind of hardship either. I’m saying right now that my mind isn’t shut up to just let in the happy. It only seems that way. Please also, remember, that I am paraphrasing and going over simple things, right now, because I don’t feel like gracing the cyber world with the emotional and spiritual connections of marriage right now. KTHXBYE.

With that stuff being said and off my chest, I’d like to go back to my Reason & some other accompanying statements, which shall be numbered.

1)  I am planning on attending NECCO either in the Spring or next Fall, which ever they say. I’m going in for my Associates in History.

2) We are not planning on having kids right away. My body and I aren’t ready for that for quite a few reasons that I’m not going into.  I just felt that I’ll nip those very personal questions in the bud right now.

3) Zeke and I plan on being one of the most kick-butt awesome married couples ever. We’ll wear shirts that say ‘ASK US HOW’. Or something like that.

On that note? I’d like to say some awesome things. I’ve wanted to be part of an awesome married couple when I saw my Dad and stepmother being able to have fun and do awesome cool things together and still be married. They had Chris and me as part time (and full time) kids and they did awesome by us.  I wanted to be awesome the way I remembered my Mom and Dad being. Zeke and I want to be awesome like we see other people being awesome, like his parents Dan and Sally, like some people at church. Like Caroline and Doug. Like so many others. We want to be our own brand of awesome. And that’s what it really gets down to. It’s weird being seperate and yet together, but not actually together, in a really permanent way.

It makes sense to me and him.

All I know is that things make sense. Things are good. And I’m happy and so is he. And we want to be together for the rest of our natural lives, if not longer.

And 2010 will be kind of amazing.(I am well aware this post is edited strangely. Wordpress and I got in a fight. Work with me here.)I love you,Kiaya

When did I begin to love stories? When did finishing a book become more important to me than sleep, friends, food, and health?

Did it start with my parents telling me stories? Did it begin with Wishbone and the Jewel Princesses and Homer’s Odyssey?

Did it continue with the Dragonriders of Pern and all the Tamora Pierce stories, Digimon and so forth?

My love of stories continues with things like Doctor Who and Heroes, Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

I’m tired. I need to think about stories now.
I love you.

-Kiaya

No, in all seriousness, I’m thinking about it already. Less than three months.

If I start planning out now and figure something out for it, I’m thinking I might try for more words, like, 100,000 instead of the usual 50,000. I’m not sure yet. It’s a decision to be made still.

I’ve been acting off lately. And I’m aware that’s something I say a lot, but it bears saying again this time. Is it something as simple as PMS? Or is it something else? I haven’t been creative in a while. I’m wondering if that’s it. If it’s cause I haven’t thrown myself into a project lately.

I figured NaNoWriMo was a better topic than the other things on my mind today. The Back-To-School season. Work. The upcoming Wedding that is not my wedding no matter how many people ask me, nor say it by accident for reasons I really truly cannot understand. NaNoWriMo is in November. Sooner than I’d like to believe.
Christopher’s birthday is tomorrow.
Payday is tomorrow.
Maybe I’ll sleep in tomorrow.

Before I fall asleep on my keyboard, you should do a YouTube search on ‘Def Poetry’. It’s good stuff.

Good night.

You know you haven’t written in a while when you can’t remember how to type.

Working 5 days a week is difficult for me, when I’m used to the randomosity of homeschooling. Now I have to get used to the randomness of ’steady’ work days and weekly schedules that aren’t very similar at all, except that I work 39.5 hours a week. And now, even that is changing. In about two weeks I’ll be cut down to 33.0 hours a week. Which is still Monday through Friday, except I’ll have a four hour day one of those. Which is strange, in my opinion. Four hour days? Who does that?

Me, now.

I spend my free time snuggling Zeke and painting pictures, looking up the Wikipedia articles on 1950’s pin-up girls and thinking about how I would go about making my own ARG. I’m still fuzzy on why I do some of these things.  
I spend my time with Zeke and Brandon mostly now. I have my own car now, which I drive to and from work. I have a commute.

My car is something I bought myself. I paid for all of it. I pay my part of the insurance on it. It’s a 1990 Chevy Cavalier 2 door coupe. I call it The Machine and I already have an SCA bumper sticker, because, frankly, it’s mine. I can do with it what I like.

Lately, I’ve been concerned with going out to Eugene, Oregon, for Zeke’s older sister, Jen’s wedding. She’s getting married to (who I hear is) a lovely gentleman named Tommy. And it shall be an affair to remember for me, because I am so unused to weddings still; and also because this will be my immersion into all of Zeke’s extended family (aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, etc.,) as well as to his older sister, whom I’ve only met briefly, a few times and have never left a good impression with, I feel. And I’ll be in a place I have never been before. And while all of Zeke’s family that I already know and love will be there, they’ll be very busy with all their own cousins and family and such that they never ever get to see.

I am, to say the very, very least, a bundle of nerves on the situation. I never make a good impression. I’m either too quiet or too loud upon first meeting people. And I can’t find a dress.

Oh, Lord Almighty, the dress.As any one who has been clothes shopping with me can attest to, I’m not exactly the easiest to shop for or with. I’m funny shaped and big. And, when it comes to this dress, I am also very picky with my limited sized choices, because there is no way, and I mean, NO WAY that I am spending more than $40 on a dress that I am not going to absolutely love. It’s just not going to happen.

Of course, this leads to today’s decision, which is that there’s no way, with the current styles being, well, in style, that I am going to find anything that is not DROP DEAD UGLY on me.Already a few people have just mentioned to me that I ought to just make my own, so I suppose I’m going to have to bite the bullet and do just that. I can’t stand any of my options (borrowing or buying, at this point.).

This dress needs to be exactly what I want. It needs to fit and it needs to be able to be dance-worthy. Because there is no way I’m getting out of that wedding without dancing my feet off. It’s just not the way Zeke operates. And I respect that.

And this all means sewing.

More sewing. It engulfed my life at Pennsic and now it shall engulf my mundane life as well. I can’t escape it. I’m honestly terrible with figuring out the insides and outsides of sewing. I can operate a sewing machine. And SOMETIMES I can even figure out how pieces get together. So I’m going to have a stab at it. I’ll be heading over to the fabric/craft stores soon, to look for a pattern.

*sigh*

*

*

*

I’ve been on a Harry Potter kick, what with the 6th movie coming out during the summer. This has led to a re-reading of the books, starting Zeke on the series and a discovery of ‘A Very Potter Musical’ which is absolutely a brilliant piece of fan work and I recommend anyone who likes a good Harry Potter joke to go watch it on YouTube. (StarKidPotter)

For one thing, Draco Malfoy is played by a girl. And it doesn’t even matter.

To give you an idea:

Dumbledore: “And I’d like to welcome the newest addition to Gryffindor, Miss Ginny Weasley!”

Ginny: “Um, yeah, hi, but, um, Professor, aren’t I supposed to be sorted by the, uh, Sorting Hat?”

Dumbledore: “Well, see, a funny thing happened to the Sorting Hat, see, he actually got hitched to another piece of enchanted magical clothing, so he and the Scarf of Sexual Preference won’t be back until next year.”

 *all students exchange confused and awkward looks* 

It’s brilliant and I can’t wait until they release the soundtrack. I love rabid fans. Speaking of which, Imogen Heap’s new album should be out by now and it will be made of utter awesome-ness so you should check it out. And MuteMath is coming out with their own new album as well and both are eagerly anticipated additions to my musical library. I’ll probably add them in time to head out to Oregon.

Which I’m still nervous about, BTW. (But say it as B.T.W., because that’s how I said it this time around, instead of really thinking of it as ‘By the way’. Don’t ask why.)

Which is why I’m making my dress. Because I want to not give off any weird signals by wearing black. Which happens to normally be my color of choice. Nor do I want to look too… I dunno. Lame? I want to make Zeke look good and at the same time, not be so flashy as to everyone thinking I’m showing off. Or something. I dunno. The drama queen, peacock in me wants to say “LOOK AT ME I’M SPECIAL” and then the wallflower is whispering “I’m not here. Look at everything BUT me. I’m just going to hide here, behind Zeke.”

Which will probably be a good portion of my time, will be hiding behind Zeke. Normally, I’d say ‘Behind Zeke and his mother’, but his Mum will be busy, so I need to stay out of her way.

Any good book suggestions for the trip?

All my love,

Kiaya

   An arrangement of thoughts: 

• Today is the day you see the sun and feel like it’s the very first time ever seeing it. Never has anything felt more glorious than that bright life giving orb in the sky and everything around proclaims it and seems to be aware of the beauty of the simple day.

• Today is the day you breathe in the air outside and can feel every hair on your body respond to the movement of that one deep breath. You feel like everything is alive and that flying from pure simplictic joy is completely possible.  

• Tonight is the night you see that shooting star you’ve imagined seeing since you were so small that you still spoke to stars and they answered back and whispered stories to you about the great vacuum beyond of deep cold space. 

• Today is the day that you wash dishes and have the epiphany everyone has during that same age old chore. And then as the dirty water rushes down the drain, it takes your epiphany with it into that self-same ocean of dreams and subconsciousness that the epiphany dwelled in before it came up on the screens of the awareness of your mind. 

• Tonight is the night you lie awake talking to a person you love because there is no where else you would rather be even if there was any place else to go at 2:30 in the morning on a weekday.  You are tangled in sheets and you might not remember which way is up after tumbling around a bit more in your foolish abandonment as you laugh to the sliver moon above you: the same moon above the one you love. 

• Today is the day that you discover a dream will never come true and that maybe you can dream up a new one to take its place. Bittersweet feelings fill your heart and mind as tears similarly fill your eyes as a dream empties out of You. Our body is just a sponge for the nebulous liquid thoughts in the air around us. 

• Tonight is the night that you dream about falling so fast through the sky that you fall in and through your pillow and your body won’t move once you have landed back into the darkness of your bed. You are, for the moment, paralyzed where you lie and that makes moving a moment later all the more strange and frightening and necessary.

• But Now is the time you imagine and dream and create and despair and live.

The people at what might be called my ‘new job’ call me ‘Kaila’. It’s probably spelled in their minds as Kyla, but they seem to sound out those ‘A’s’ nicely. Boston/New England accents. People in their 60s or so. Of course, I don’t correct them, because the first time, I don’t notice. The second time, I’m like “Did they just call me that?” and by the third time, when I realize the truth, I feel too bad to correct them. Of course, this fits in with the new haircut I have.

The moment Zeke and I stepped out of the salon where my Aunt works, we bounded out into the parking lot. We looked different. We could have been different people. New identities, almost.  We were like on the run prisoners, attempting to hide from authority.

It seems fitting that with this new identity, I receive a new name. Zeke of course, already having a perfect alias/handle (two, actually. Lucky duck!) doesn’t need a new name. But I have always been some mispronounciation of Kiaya. Once or twice, I was referred to as my last blogging handle, GreenDragonRider, but really, that gets old quick. Not catchy. Not identifiable.

Zeke’s handle ( @ZedFable, for instance) or his nickname, The Gov’nah, are pretty awesome already. My gaming handles/names, never really took off the way I wished them too. Maybe someday the names of Arabic stars will be in fashion again. But for now, Mintaka/Saiph/Meissa are retired names of mine. No one uses them. Chris teases me for them.

I’ll stick with Kiaya.Cranapple as my general user name for now, thank you.

The topic of user names is on my mind because recently, my brother got a YouTube account (he hasn’t done much with it yet though - don’t get excited.) and he had a very interesting user name. I was pleasantly surprised by it. My brother has used ‘Chris’, or some abbreviation/variation thereof, for many years now, never opting for a more exotic user name on games and the like. It’s something that has driven me batty many times. It’s hard to keep track of all my Chrises.

Have you seen Hulu.com recently? You should, if you haven’t. This past week was their one-year anniversary, and they added a bunch of pretty awesome stuff. I myself am going between Felix the Cat and a documentary called ‘Confessions of a Superhero’. I’ll let you know what I think of them sometime.

-K.