Impromptu cleaning day

R overslept Saturday and missed work. Which means I had a helper, and got way more cleaning done than I had hoped.

Which was good, because it turns out there was mold growing on our windowsills. Not just mildew. Mold. Green, slimy, yucky....yeuggh.

The hives, the congestion, the repeated sinus issues, my red eyes -- it's all making sense. Especially since the worst rooms were the bedroom and my office.

So we scrubbed and washed and sprayed everything with mold control spray. I was still stuffy the next morning, but am hoping this helps.

I also cleared out some of the knick-knacks from the bedroom, to make it easier to dust in there. I had almost all of them put away anyway, but I have since put up the rest. And I washed up the curtains, pillows, and other infrequently cleaned things, just for grins. I still have Anya's room and the kitchen to go, but the house is in pretty good shape otherwise.

Dealing with my allergies is a top priority this year. Not just for me, but for my kids, as it seems they have each inherited at least some of my sensitivities. I don't want them to go through what I have. I want to get a handle on things early, so they don't spend half their lives sick.

New year, new shoes

In terms of clothes, I tend to make do. In some respects, I've had no choice; short of having my clothes custom made, I have to deal with ill-fitting clothes, and have since I was a small child. Short torso, long legs, small upper body, squishy tushy...I'm now in my fourth decade of life, and though the "typical" body shape has changed a great deal in that time, at no point was mine it.

There's also the brokeness factor. I've worn cheap shoes my whole adult life because I can afford them. I won't wear uncomfortable shoes, so I have been spared the corns and bunions my peers suffer from, but I have tended to put fashion above function, and quantity above quality.

My ankle has been letting me know my sneakers are worn out. It took a couple of years, but they're finally dying on me. I've been halfheartedly trying on cheaper sneakers (Mom took pity on me and bought my current pair), but nothing is as comfortable -- even in their current broken-down state.

I have walked the tread off my current shoes.

Finally, I decided to replace them with another pair from the same brand. No -- two pairs. One for everyday wear, one just for exercising. They ought to last twice as long that way. And it's not like I require a vast sneaker wardrobe; two pairs is all I need. If they last 4 years, that comes out to $75 a year. Way cheaper than another bout of PT.

I also sprang for a couple pairs of flats. Usually I wear sneaks, but occasionally I want to pretty up a bit. I've been wearing a (quite comfy, really) pair of Target flats, but they don't provide enough support for my ankle. So I upgraded to a pair of Kenneth Cole and a pair of Born. Those two pair should fill all of my dressier shoe needs for...well, years, really -- I've been running on this one pair of Target flats since Anya was born, and they're still in great shape. So in theory, I could wear the new shoes for a decade, even. No way my cheapie flats could last a decade.

Sure, I've saved money. But now that my life has changed, my wardrobe needs have dwindled. And I'm tired of wearing unsupportive shoes. I deserve better.

Now, for clothes, I'm content to rock the cheap stuff for a while. Little kids = stains, and also my weight is still in flux. But once the kids are older and I'm back to normal, I want to start buying better quality stuff. I don't need an entire closet full of clothes for each season; I don't go anywhere, don't chase trends, and tend to wear the same items of clothing week in and week out. I'd rather have fewer, nicer pieces and use layers to transition between seasons. 

Which leads me to my biggest current wardrobe woe: Bras. I am the not-so-proud owner of a ribcage deemed too small to nurse babies, or so the nursing bra market has led me to believe. I recently purchased literally the only three bras I can find that come anywhere close to fitting me. None of them fit me well. In fact, one of them has rubbed sores on my sides. And even the one that is my size is too broad through the shoulders, meaning it digs in and leaves marks on me.

That red mark is the imprint of the cup clasp.

But I haven't found a workable alternative, so I will persevere...and probably wear band-aids a lot. However, when I quit nursing, I am absolutely going to splurge on a collection of bras that actually fit me. Because I have come to realize that ill-fitting bras are as big a damper on one's mood as worn-out shoes. If you are persistently uncomfortable, it affects your entire outlook.

I am tired of bras that chafe, pants that won't stay up (and take my underwear down with them), shoes that provide too little (or too much!) support. I am tired of feeling ill at ease in my own clothes, my own skin. It is worth it to me to find things that fit my body, or pay someone to make them fit.

If everything in my closet actually fit, I would no longer have to weigh myself and/or gauge what sort of "body day" I am having before getting dressed. I could just grab an outfit and put it on. If I simplified the range of outfits I own (like Obama and his suits), I'd have even fewer changes to make. (I can't go full-on uniform, because Anya likes it when I dress pretty, but I could streamline my options a bit.)

I would also love to support small businesses and independent artisans, but that's a whole other journey. For now, I'd be content to not have to tug at my clothes all the time.

Five minutes

One goal I have for myself in the coming year is to make more time for self care. To start, I am promising myself 5 minutes a day. In that 5 minutes, I can:

• Meditate for 2 minutes
• Plank for 60 seconds 
• Do 2-4 yoga poses 

It's not much, I know. But I've had trouble making time for a 10-minute meditation or 30 minutes of yoga. I can always squeeze in 5 minutes.

I know from past experience that just 60 seconds of planking a day makes a serious difference in my core strength. I imagine that I will see equally impressive results with 2 minutes of meditation and yoga if I stick with them.

And as I get better about upholding that 5-minute promise, I can extend it to 10, then 15, then 20. From small things, big things grow.

What I want (the 2016 edition)

I want to get back in shape. In some ways, I am already in shape -- at the very least, I can lift and carry way more than I ever could. And thanks to the pounds I lost to the stomach flu, I can see that yes, there are still abs in there under the loose skin. But there are refinements to be made, certainly. Also, much of what I need to accomplish is maintenance; if I do not exercise regularly, my old injuries flare up. So I need to make time for yoga, for planks, for walks. If I can get my allergies under control, I may even give running another shot.

I want to get my allergies under control. Resume immunotherapy, keep the house cleaner, buy a dehumidifier. I am tired of my itchy eyes and runny nose, tired of feeling bad so much of the time.

I want to feel better. I want to get enough sleep and eat better food and meditate. I don't like the cranky person I have become of late. I want to be a better me.

Because I want to do more. So much of my daily activity is...mundane. Not the kind of stuff I'm going to lay on my deathbed and think, "My gosh, I am so glad I kept my kitchen floor so clean all those years!" I want to write more. Practice graphic design more -- I've been doing some design for my day job and finding I have really, really missed it. I've also been designing jewelry in my head; I'd like to make at least some of it. 

There are other things on my 2016 list. Things like scaling back my debt. But while it is a high priority and I am especially motivated, it's not an interesting goal. Not to me, anyway. It's about hard work and discipline and curbing thoughtless spending. So don't expect blog entries on it, because while it needs to get done, it doesn't exactly melt my butter.

Now, the things I can do once my debt is under control...that is a different story. But those are off on the horizon. I'm trying to rein myself in on the long-term focus. I don't want to get so caught up in 5 years from now that I miss today.

Focus

It's that time again. I don't necessarily make resolutions anymore -- instead, I determine my focus for the coming year. This year, I think a lot of that focus is going to self-care.

Went to the doctor yesterday. My ear started hurting Christmas night, and by Sunday my throat was so sore I could barely swallow. I don't have an infection (thankfully...finding an antibiotic I can take while breastfeeding is not fun), but I do have fluid buildup and drainage. Rain = mold = allergy overdrive. And it's pretty soggy out there these days.

My eyes are also driving me crazy. They are bloodshot and burn pretty much all of the time now, even though I use allergy eye drops several times a day, and I wake with them matted shut most mornings. I was starting to worry that my contacts may be damaging my eyes, but the eye doctor said my eyes look fine. Just allergies.

"Just." Ha. I like that. I "just" can't open my eyes when I wake up in the middle of the night.

I really need to get back on the shots. It just got to be too much for a while there, financially speaking. And also in terms of scheduling. It was so much easier when we lived in Memphis, and even then it was kind of a pain. But I need to get my allergies under control again. I don't have time to be sick. (Don't have the patience for it anymore, either.)

I have the tendency to put myself last. When R has to get up and go to work in the morning, bedtime is a strict affair. On my work nights, it's more a suggestion. Granted, his job is far more dangerous than mine, so it is extremely important that he be well rested. But my health is no less important.

So on my list of goals for this coming year, I must include taking care of myself. Allergy shots and adequate rest and nutritious food and time for yoga and meditation. And walks; I need to start walking more.

As I proved these past two months, things fall apart when I put myself last. And then nothing gets done.

Be the water

So this past week has had me thinking a lot about the coming year. I'm finding that I need to make some changes in order to "be the water," so to speak. Some of it sounds very Serenity Prayer, but there's a lot of wisdom in those lines.

I need to accept that certain people are going to treat me a certain way. Always have, always will. It may not be fair, but there is no changing it. Nor I cannot cut them out of my life, so I need to adapt how I react to the treatment instead of stewing over it and then getting all bent out of shape over little things. Some days it feels like everyone is against me. This is not so. (At the very least, Baby Kai always has my back.)

I need to accept that my family's priorities are not necessarily my priorities, and do what I can to compromise rather than becoming Crazy Germaphobe Harpy Mommy. This may mean I do more work than they do. But it really is a priority to me to keep the kitchen clean, for instance, so I will just need to make time for it.

(They do need to pick up after themselves a little better, though. I found a string cheese wrapper under the bed, for Pete's sake. And an empty soda bottle behind the recliner. Like I said...compromise.)

I need to accept that my personality is a large part of what makes me so stressed out, and work with that energy rather than against it. I spent so many years wallowing in apathy that it's nice to have so many interests now. But if I let my frustration at my lack of free time rule me, I will go bonkers before the kids start school. I must resist the feeling that I am running out of time. My time is finite, yes, but odds are I have many good years left in me.

I need to take more responsibility for my own calm. Because I'm on the merry-go-round now, and it won't stop for a couple of decades at least. What's going to happen when the kids start school? Driving? Dating? College? How will I handle moving? Getting a new job? I cannot control the stresses that enter my life, but I can control how I handle them. I need to make yoga and meditation a higher priority in the coming year.

I was doing really well spinning my plates, but then I came apart emotionally when they fell due to circumstances beyond my control. I tend to assume that if I want something bad enough, I can just make it so. Sheer grit and determination, while useful, do not guarantee a win. Sometimes my bullheadedness works for me, sometimes not. I need to work on dealing with disappointment when my best efforts fail, and give myself credit for doing all I can regardless of the outcome.

So that's all nice and vague, huh? Thus far, my 2016 credo consists of "All life is precious" and "Be the water." I basically want to be Morgan from TWD, sans all those zombies and personal tragedies. It's a nice goal, but I have no idea how to translate that into a resolution list of any sort. I still have a little time for that, I guess.

Shoulda coulda woulda

After spending much of last week trying to pull off several last-minute Christmas tasks, I finally stopped and asked myself why I was making myself nuts. Would the people I was killing myself to please even care if what I was doing did not get done? The answer, I think, is no. Would the absence be noticed? Again, likely not. And if it were noticed, it would at least be understood. So...why? Why am I doing this?

Because I felt I should.

Not that I need to, or even want to, but because I am afraid of what people might think if I don't.

Much of the pressure I put upon myself is self-inflicted. I have always held myself to crazy high standards, and I have not improved with age. I'm getting worse, actually.

So...I'm dropping the ball this year. As an experiment. To see if the world keeps turning -- and, when it does, if I can live with that.

At least my house is clean now

Once again, this year is proving that I should not make plans. Even my scaled-back schedule has been demolished. This time by a stomach bug.

Last Sunday (not the one that just passed), Anya vomited much of the day. We thought it was an isolated thing; her doctor even chalked it up to an upper respiratory infection. Nobody else got sick, so we thought the matter was finished.

Thursday night, Kai threw up several times. Friday morning, it was R's turn. I spent Friday cleaning up vomit and diarrhea, and Saturday cleaning the house. Sunday was going to be my second shot at my to-do list, but I woke with stomach cramps at 4 a.m. and spent the day learning what used veggie egg rolls taste like. (Not the worst thing I've ever puked up, but yergh.)

No Zoo Lights. No Build-A-Bear. No mall activities (train, carousel, play area, cookie the size of Anya's head). No shopping. No photo books for presents, because I didn't have time to order them; calendars will have to do for this year. And the Memphis Union Mission gifts are still sitting on my counter, and my recycling bin overflows. I desperately need to dig through the gift pile and find Anya's remaining Advent gifts.

Some of that stuff may happen still. If everyone can get well, I might be able to pull off a few activities between now and Christmas. But some of it just won't come to pass. And I am sad, because I have really been looking forward to the activities this holiday season.

But my house is clean. (Except the bathrooms; they need cleaning again. :/) Really clean -- not just tidy. So there is that.

Why is dinner so hard?

I have a goal to eat dinner as a family. But getting my family to wait until dinnertime is only part of the problem. The other part is what the hell to fix.

My children and I are vegetarians. (Not that this is a huge issue with Kai at the moment.) So our boxed-crap options are pretty slim. And I'm sick of them all. I love pasta, but am burned out on store-bought sauce. And that's pretty much the food industry's answer to prepackaged vegetarian food, at least at my grocery store. (Oh, Schnucks, I miss you.)

My daughter thinks macaroni and cheese is a food group.

My partner thinks ramen and freezer burritos are acceptable meal options.

I have a collection of recipes that I am working to expand, but right now it's pretty small. And when I ask "What do you want for dinner?" the answers never come from my recipe box.

I tried making a menu planning board. I put the names of recipes we all like on cards and put the board in the kitchen. All we have to do is select and post a handful of recipe names each week. We did that once. The same dishes have been up there since around June.

I created a similar list on my phone. The names and recipes for all our standby meals are all there -- I just have to pick a few, then go to the store and buy what we need. But apparently even that is too much work.

When I lived alone, I made a pile of new recipes and planned menus around them. I shopped every two weeks, and tried out 4 or so recipes between shopping trips. I planned the menus to reduce food waste but still afford myself a little variety. I ate healthy food, dropped a few extra pounds, and felt great.

Suggesting we try a new recipe to this crowd is about as popular as suggesting we play a fun new game called Russian roulette. Even when I promise we can go to Sonic if it sucks.

I am not completely innocent here. I hate going to the grocery store so very much that usually I buy whatever we used the week before, toss in some healthyish junk food for Anya to nosh on, and call it done. So my pantry remains full of pasta and tomato sauce that I don't want to eat.

I need to get a handle on this before Kai is old enough to grab snacks on his own, or it'll be anarchy around here.

A long December

So it's December. Where my life usually veers wildly out of control. A poorly balanced diet and erratic bedtimes and extra freelancing and holiday-related craziness. This is the month that I send the rent check late and oversleep and totally forget important appointments. It's only the beginning of the month, and I am already dragging.

Our bootcamp theme this month is "Wrapping up 2015 with Great Balance and Poise." I've not done yoga once this month. Haven't meditated in weeks. Other than the walk I took on Thanksgiving, the only exercise I've gotten recently has been shopping. And shopping with my daughter is not the greatest example of my poise. (Especially when she runs off and hides in the clothes racks.)

In a way, I am glad for the disintegration of my routine. It usually means I slide into January head first, begging for some structure to my life. I hit the ground running January 2, and uphold my resolutions faithfully...oh, until March or so. But some of them do stick, so it's not a completely wasted effort.

For this month's bootcamp goals, I'm knocking out a lot of holiday-related tasks, but also looking ahead to those resolutions. My big three (exercise more, sleep more, eat better) will of course be on there. And working on my debt -- that's a biggie. But more and more, I'm beginning to realize that I need to rein in my gaze. Instead of always looking out ahead of me, I need to look at the ground I'm standing on. Make more time to do special things with the kids, even if it's just a walk to the local playground. Put a little more effort into making the house look nice; Anya can't stop talking about "Anya's beautiful house" since we've put up the Christmas decorations. Find a way to add a little more peace to my days.

It's so easy to hop on the work treadmill and fix my gaze on the horizon -- buying a house, getting a larger vehicle, getting married (yes, that is on my radar, though not an immediate goal). Plow through the days and weeks and months with little thought beyond my long-term goals. But the process of achieving those goals will be far more pleasant if I spend a little effort on the here and now. I just need to figure out how I want to go about doing that.

Fluidity

A fellow Clogger recommended this article, and it's given me some things to think about:

http://themindunleashed.org/2015/11/the-art-of-fighting-without-fighting.html

Love this article. It's good advice to keep in mind when my daughter is pushing my buttons. My favorite quotes:

It is useless to fight against people’s rigid ways, or to argue against their irrational concepts. You will only waste time and make yourself rigid in the process. The best strategy is to simply accept rigidity in others, outwardly displaying deference to their need for order. On your own, however, you must work to maintain your open spirit, letting go of bad habits and deliberately cultivating new ideas. –Robert Greene, emphasis mine

My daughter is very rigid. And I deal with it badly because her rigidity directly affects me. It's important to me to not fight with her, though, so I need to start working on my own fluidity.

Years ago, I dated a guy who loaned me some books on the Tao Te Ching. The part that stuck with me was how being soft is more powerful than being hard; the water will, over time, wear away the rock.

I have been working on my softness, but it's easier said than done. Particularly when I am already stretched thin and my child digs in her heels over stupid things. Because we are both bull-headed control freaks, apparently.

In these moments, I need to learn to flow. Make her laugh. Indulge the whims I can. Or just get over myself. In the immortal words of Bob Seger,*

As you step out in the night, take a lesson from the trees
Watch the way they learn to bend with each breeze.

My second favorite quote from this article is this:

Like E.E. Cummings said, "To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else, means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting.”

This feeds nicely into my Be Awesome goal. And it's an example I would very much like to set for my children.

In the coming year, I want to focus on these concepts. Maybe I'll have more luck with them than I have been with getting up before dawn.

*"Little Victories." Because everything goes back to either Road House or a Seger song in my mind.

Gratitude

I thought I understood the concept of gratitude. I completed the "List 5 things for which I am grateful" goal -- on both 43 Things and PopClogs. I can pull gratitude out of the worst days, and can find the silver lining in just about any situation. I thought that this meant I had gratitude down.

I do not.

This week has just not gone according to plan. This week was supposed to be cleaning and wrapping Advent gifts and putting together care packages for the Memphis Union Mission and cooking Thanksgiving dinner. We were going to go to Zoo Lights and Starry Nights, have dinner with our families, and I was going to go shopping a couple more times before Freaky...er, Black Friday. I was going to knock out a little freelancing and clean my office and prepare my list for Cyber Monday. I was going to send my daughter to her grandparents for a sleepover so I could go through her toys before Santa dumps another load of them on our house. I was going to get. stuff. done.

And then everybody got sick.

We saw the doctor yesterday; the kids and R have colds, and Kai also has impetigo. Which, given Mom's precarious immune state, means we are on our own for Turkey Day, and pretty much housebound besides until everyone gets to feeling better.

I feel okay. A little scratchy throat, a barely there headache. Probably more allergies than illness, as I have been dusting that which has not been dusted since I got pregnant with Kai. But I am seriously bummed that my big, beautiful week isn't shaping up as I'd hoped. I've been planning this crap for over a month. I took time off from work. Of course it all fell apart.

That's fine. Disappointment is fine. The trick is to be grateful anyway.

I may not get everything done, but I can get most of it done. The rest can be rescheduled.

The important part -- the family togetherness -- will happen regardless of whether or not we check off every box on my list. It just may be more hot cocoa and jammies and Netflix than lights and music and outings.

And isn't that what my list is really about -- spending time with my family? Doing fun things with them?

So I will suck up this internal pouty lip and get over myself. Be grateful for the time I have with my loved ones, even though our activities may not measure up to my highest hopes. And I will enjoy Thanksgiving no matter how we end up spending it.

I hope you, too, are having a pleasant Thanksgiving.

Boredom

Looking back, I think much of the angst I experienced when I was younger was a product of boredom. Not that busywork cures boredom -- more like the more you try to accomplish, the more you want to accomplish, and before you know it, you're too focused on what you want to achieve next to be bored.

Or maybe that's just me.

And of course nothing fills your days like being a parent. I set out immediately after work the other day to do a little early Christmas shopping for Thing One, because I can't very well shop when she's with me (and she is always with me). So I snarfed down a bowl of cereal at 3 to tide me over, dashed into Cordova, shopped Michael's and Target, then zipped home ahead of the storm. Hugged my babies, fed Kai, showed off the non-gift purchases I made, ate a little dinner, showered, and went to bed.

Today will likely be more of the same, only with added guilt because Mimi and Kai will be going with me.

So between the must-do list and the want-to-do list, I am rarely bored. And I am still not doing everything on the want-to-do list. Currently falling through the cracks are my daily yoga and meditation sessions. I've been too tired to get up and do yoga, and haven't had time to sit still long enough to meditate.

The funny part is that after I returned home last night, my daughter complained "Where'd you go, Mommy? I missed you. I was so bored."

I'm actually kind of jealous of her boredom.

Be awesome

One of my goals on PopClogs is "Be awesome." My adding it to my goal list was completely tongue-in-cheek, but I find it a good tool for focusing my intentions.

What does it mean to me to be awesome? First of all, it is to be genuinely myself. Which means to take others' feelings into consideration. To refrain from saying or doing something that would intentionally or unintentionally hurt someone else. It is important to me to treat others as I would be treated, and this is a huge first step. I sleep much better in my own skin when I do this.

I could take that one step further, though. Go out of my way to say and do things to make people feel good. That's less passive, though. It sets me up for being rebuffed. Takes me out of my comfort zone. But it would mean so much more than merely doing no harm.

As a parent, my goal is to be the kind of mom who steers her children with love and gentle humor. I am not this kind of mom right now. I am more the bribe-and-bark sort of mom, with the occasional guilt trip and threat thrown in. I have a very headstrong daughter, and barking orders is efficient. But it makes me feel like a heel. So I am working on this.

I'd like to do more than that, though. I want to be the mom who helps her kids fly, not just the mom who keeps her kids safe. I could stick them in a hole for 18 years, and they would be perfectly safe. But what kind of life would that be? What kind of life would it prepare them for?

As a citizen, I want to take a more active role in my town, in my community, in the world. Recycle. Reuse. Repurpose. Give. Get involved. I don't know how I am going to go about this when I can barely stay on top of the laundry, but I'm giving it thought. If I want to live in a good place, I need to do my part to make it a good place.

It's a tall order, being awesome. An open-ended prompt. I could never possibly finish being awesome.

I like goals like that, though. It's satisfying to create a to-do list and check it off, but you don't grow that way. You grow by setting a bar that you can never stop raising.

5:30 a.m. sounds so much better at bedtime

When I go to bed, a 5:30 wake-up sounds utterly doable. I'm going to bed at a very reasonable hour these days (9-9:30). I just haven't been getting much sleep. Kai is in power nurse mode, and has also been incredibly gassy. I'm thinking the culprit may be all the dairy he's eating. (Which would just figure; I bought him a bunch of yogurt at the store last night.) When my alarm goes off, I mentally give it the finger and snooze until time for work/Anya wakes me.

Kai is never the first one up. He is nothing like his sister in that area.

But even when nobody is kicking me in my Cesarean scar (Kai) or attempting to stick their little toes up my nose (Anya), I don't get up. Because my kids tend to make a cozy Mumma sammich while they sleep, and that feels pretty darn nice. I know that it won't be too long before they no longer want to snuggle with me, so I'm soaking it up while I can. Me time can wait.

That's all well and good, but I need to squeeze the yoga in somewhere. I'm working on it.

Or I will be, once I get a little more sleep.

So...yesterday was Monday

And there was no blog post. Oops. This weekend was...ugh. Anya has been in Purple Minion mode, which means I was tearing my hair out by Sunday night. I totally forgot about the blog until just now.

Don't feel bad. I also forgot my flu shot. For which I'd even made an appointment. Things fall through the cracks when the Purple Minion comes to visit.

But my garage is cleaner now. I can park my car in it. We even bought a garage door remote that doesn't require reassembly to use. (The old one got dropped a couple times. It did not take kindly to being dropped.) So while the car is still leaking and moldy, at least it won't get more moldy while we figure out where the leak is. That's a load off.

Now I just need to figure out why Kai is nursing half the night, so I can get some sleep and get back to my 5:30 wake-ups.

And hope that the Purple Minion's stay is a short one. I miss my sweet girl.

November 2015: Never say die! (And be grateful, bitch.)

The above is the title of the November 2015 PopClogs Bootcamp. If you're not on PopClogs, the Bootcamps are basically a set of monthly goals we set for ourselves. Largely fitness related, but not entirely. Each month has a theme. I'm particularly fond of this one, because it captures perfectly my current mindset.

I had big plans for October. Through no fault of my own, I did not accomplish everything I set out to do (or even most of it), but I am not giving up. I have refined my list and added to it (probably too much, to be honest), and am approaching November with a Goonies "give-'em-hell" grin.

Despite my big list, which I will refrain  from sharing so you can't laugh at me a few weeks from now, my main focus is to get my mornings in order. I've found that when my mornings go well, my whole day goes well. So it is my goal to achieve the following each morning:

• Get up at 5:30.
• Practice yoga.
• Meditate. (Even 2 minutes would be nice.)
• Write a blog entry.
• Write a paragraph on my book.

I have a weekend cleaning routine going, finally. The house does not get 100% clean every week, but I get the big chunks. The laundry gets done -- sometimes it even gets put away! Each Saturday morning I get up, practice yoga, and clean the house before we do anything else. Sundays are free days, or I repeat the Saturday process if there is still cleaning left to do. I've been doing this for a few months now, and it's finally become routine; even Anya is into the "clean on Saturday morning" groove. So now I just need to get my weekdays in order, in order to accomplish the things I want to before the work day starts.

This is my focus for November. Everything else is just gravy.

Speaking of gravy, some of my subgoals this month are to work on teaching Anya about gratitude and taking over some of the Turkey Day preparations. I'll talk more about both later. Should be interesting.

Do all the things!

Though my projects this month haven't necessarily been creative, and I have had damn good reasons for not accomplishing all I set out to do, I still feel like this right now:

I haven't been able to keep up with my webcomics, but I still heart Toothpaste for Dinner.

That green bit? That's this week. I have probably doomed us to fail with my overplanning, in fact. But sometimes, things go right. So here is the agenda:

• Tuesday: Hair cuts (though no color...I will just have to be sparkly rooted in our family pics) for Anya and I, also a quick shopping trip 
• Wednesday: Corn maze if it's not too muddy; pumpkin carving if it is
• Thursday: Flu vacs for the kids; family pics
• Friday: Corn maze if Wednesday was too muddy and the kids don't feel yucky; pumpkin carving otherwise
• Saturday: Cleaning; shopping for Poppy's birthday present; trick or treat; Halloween festival

Also, somewhere in there I will put in a few hours of editing for one of my clients. In addition, I will be starting my day job an hour early and taking short lunches to make up time for Monday's visit with Kai (I thought he might have an ear infection, but was just being paranoid :) and Thursday's shots.

So yoga might not be happening this week, either. I will have to work on that in November.

And the meditation. I only managed to squeeze in a couple of sessions all month.

I have kept the house relatively clean, though. And kept up with the blogging. I also may very well meet my (modest) step goal. Not all of the plates hit the floor. Just...most of them.

So this week will be crazy. And for what I do not accomplish, there is always next month.

NaNoWriYo

I'm writing a new novel. (Yes, I realize I have yet to finish the first two.) It's a slow novel. Right now I only have two paragraphs. And I have no idea what it's going to be about, who the characters are, if there will be a plot...none of that is decided, or even much thought about. But I have decided to write a paragraph a day until I figure it out. And then keep going until it's finished. Whenever that is.

I sense that it's going to be a long story, though, so I call it a novel.

Actually, right now I'm calling it "buncha words," because I am a master of pithy titles.

There is no way, given my current schedule, that I can participate in NaNoWriMo. In retrospect, I really wish I'd done it before I had kids; I had crazy free time then. But I didn't, and now I can't. Perhaps when the littles are more self-sufficient, I will attempt it. But this is not the year to try to write a novel in a month.

A novel in a year, however, is doable. That's like 140 words per day. Granted, my paragraphs are a bit short starting out, but I tend to ramble more the longer I write. I'll catch up.

So I have declared NaNoWriYo. (Should be NaNoWriYe, but Yo flows better.) I don't have a ton of time to write (or pee, eat, breathe), but surely I can squeeze in 140 words a day. And who knows? I might even finish a novel this way.

Celebrating the seasons

I find myself working to establish seasonal family traditions. The Thanksgiving/Christmas/New Year's trifecta is pretty well set, though I have tweaked it over Anya's lifetime. I'd started out trying to implement a tradition I had with my parents (giving a small gift for each of the 11 days preceding Christmas*), but it's evolved into a longer time range with smaller presents thanks to the advent calendar I made last year. And there are other activities, which do not involve gifts. We do Zoo Lights. Starry Nights. We visit Santa. We bake cookies. We eat Thanksgiving dinner with both families. We decorate the tree the day after Thanksgiving, and take it down around Little Christmas, January 6. I take a picture of Anya (new this year: Anya and Kai) in front of the tree in a Christmas outfit for our Christmas cards. Actually, I take about 50 pictures, and never quite get the one I want -- though I always get one that captures her personality perfectly.

I have personal celebrations, too. A quiet reflection on the year that starts with 10Q in the fall and culminates in my revising my goal list and recapping my year on PopClogs. I try to start the year in the manner in which I intend to continue -- full of energy and hope and good intentions. It usually falls apart by March, but I mean well.

I love these traditions. They pull me out of my head, out of my to-do list, out of my present worries and future plans. They make me focus on what's in front of me: A loving partner, amazing kids, and an imperfect but pretty awesome life. I need that.

That's just one season, though. Just a month, really. I need that sort of pause all year round. So I have been slowly testing other seasonal celebrations. For fall, I've made the following list:

• Go to a farmer's market
• Bake mini apple pies
• Walk in the park and collect fall leaves
• Visit a corn maze
• Go to Zoo Boo
• Pick out pumpkins
• Carve/decorate pumpkins
• Bake mini pumpkin pies
• Make soup
• Do a leaf-based art project
• Make an autumn centerpiece for the kitchen table

I've been working on this for a month and a half now, and it's really helped me savor the season. Which is nice, because it's my favorite season -- I would really hate to miss it.

Gets me to thinking, though. I should make lists like this for the other seasons. Things that I want to be sure to do and make and experience. Things I want to share with my family. The highlights reel. Because time often gets away from me, and you never know when your last chance to do something will be.


*A tradition I started as a child, I must confess, in order to get a few presents early. It was a lot of fun, though. And yes, I gave presents back.