#life

ONE YEAR LATER

Hiya, Elise!!!!!!

It's been A WHILE since you've seen an old-fashioned update from me, hasn't it???? I just finished up my "One Year Later: Where Are They Now?" Interview with E!, and thinking back to our AMAZING FINALE just made me... nostalgic.

Although I don't think I'd actually WANT to go back to that horrible moment when I realized that my husband had been KIDNAPPED BY A PSYCHOPATH and might be ON THE BRINK OF DEATH... but thinking through how much fun -- and trouble -- all our CRAZY KIDS were for us during that first season, well, it made me sniffle a little and feel JUST A LITTLE sad.

And then my little Ryder started fussing -- he came with me on this one-day trip back out to the Bridge to Nowhere, which was AN EXPERIENCE IN ITSELF, let me tell you -- and I picked him up and thought that, all things considered, I'm happy to be where I am now, with a baby (and starting to get BACK IN SHAPE FINALLY, OMGosh I AM A WHALE) and a much, much happier husband -- seriously, that sports camp / reality show that Jeff pitched to us really had me thinking he was OFF HIS ROCKER, but you know, between Kate & Alexander, and Ben, and of course the Hubster, they've really made something of it. AND HE IS SOOOOOOO happy. I wish I'd clued in back then on HOW MUCH HE HATED that office job... I think we wouldn't have LOST TOUCH so much...

Did I ever tell you? Back when Lila (bless her heart, I hear that she's been moved from prison to the maximum security area at Tiffany's old stomping grounds, Sunshine Acres) went completely OFF THE DEEP END and you managed to write down the bulk of her Evil Gloat AKA Villain Speech... I sat and pondered over what she said about me. (Minus the appearance stuff, BC WHATEVS, clearly she had issues.) But you know, I started to think about how I'd been treating the Hubs, and how much I'd let him drift away and spend all his time banging on things out in his "Man Cave", and how little I really KNEW HIM anymore... and... well, it was probably all PREGNANCY HORMONES (which are NO SMALL THING, let me tell you), but I couldn't stop myself from feeling worse and worse about it until finally one night the Hubs caught me crying and made me tell him what was the matter, so I read that out to him and told him how sorry I was about being so self-involved and I wanted to be better and...

Well, anyway, it actually ended up being a really good thing for us, because that was the night that he told me that he's been miserable in his job and afraid that I wasn't happy that I'd married him anymore and... Oh, there was a lot of stuff. But anyhoo, on the other end of it we ended up UNDERSTANDING EACH OTHER SO MUCH BETTER. So thank you for recording faithfully all of Lila's EVIL GLOATING (and I'm even sending a big thank you to Lila for helping me realize how in the wrong I'd been. Not that I intend to go see her.)

So he's taken on a sort of dual producer / sports coach role, and he's EVEN BETTER AT IT than anyone had imagined! Since Kate and Alexander are... kinda unrelatable... and Ben tends to be a little overwrought, DH has served as a sort of SOUNDING BOARD and PROFESSIONALISM STANDARD for all of them. And the camera crews LOOOOOOOOOVE him. It's kind of sickening, really. (Srsly, now that I've had the baby they're PERPETUALLY trying to get us to pose together. And always INSIST that I wear that PARTICULAR SHADE of blue.)

WHATEVS.

I heard from Noah the other day... Hasn't it fun to see how BIG his show has gotten? SRSLY, I think it's competing with our mothership, #life, for viewers now!!! Anyhoodles, I'm sure you'll be TOTES THRILLED to know that he's grown about THREE INCHES and is even starting to look like a YOUNG MAN now... well, kinda. He's just as silly and charming as ever, although it looks like his fan base is starting to include some of the OLDER segment as well as the TWEENS. He told me that Mario has become QUITE THE TYRANT behind the scenes and INSISTS on looking over ALL OF THE MUSIC ahead of time, even writes some of it for their contestants. His whole laid-back, quiet persona has been (I gather) a helpful foil to Noah's OVER THE TOP-NESS. I'll be joining them with planning/producing once we get MY LITTLE TYRANT on a regular sleeping schedule so that I can ACTUALLY THINK again.