It’s simple.

My dear friend, Cher, wrote a New Year’s post yesterday.  She was inspired by this post to choose One Little Word as a theme, if you will, for her 2010.  I think that’s a fabulous way to avoid the dissolution of resolutions while still setting a goal.

So, here I go. 

I want to focus on what is important: family, friends, health, and home. 

I want to target my work as a mother, a wife, and a teacher.

I want to make choices that bring peace into my home.  I want to give myself, my children, and my husband the gift of time, and I want to spend it, not money, to make us happy.  I want to sit by the fire with cocoa and cookies more often.  I want to dig in the dirt together.  I want to party in our PJs.  I want to take walks and ride bikes and blow bubbles and color.  I want to smile at the sun and enjoy a cool, ocean breeze.

For the past week, ever since we’ve returned from our Hillbilly Holiday, my girlies and I have been a bit reclusive…and we’ve loved every minute of it.  I’ve cooked and crafted and sewn.  We’ve read and colored and played games.  I’ve worn yoga pants, a bare face, and a ponytail for days at a time.  It’s been marvelous.

In 2010, I’m not going to try to keep up with the Joneses – or, for that matter, the Millers, the Popes or the even the Nguyens.  I will search for contentment with where I am in life. 

I also want to CLEAN OUT.  How much stuff does a person REALLY need?? I’m a sentimental kind of gal, so this can be hard for me…but I’d like to try traveling light for a while. 

I will surround myself with things and people that make me happy. 

I want to simplify my life. 

My word for 2010 is SIMPLIFY.

What is your word?

The Good, The Bad, The Ugly of 2009

I cannot remember feeling like this before.  Ever.  

I cannot wait for 2009 to be over.

Always before, New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day meant very little to me.  It was just another day.  A new calendar.  A new picture looking back at me from my wall.  Another hash mark.  Another year older – which was neither here, nor there to me.

This year is different.  2009 just feels sour. 

In January 2009, my life was filled with highs and lows.  My marriage was strained with tension while my professional life was demanding, yet successful.  Over the course of this year, those highs and lows have traded places time and time again.  Finances have been like a roller coaster, and the truth has hurt.  I have shed many tears this year.

Yet, to put things in perspective, I really can’t complain.  I’m coming out on the other side still in a warm home, in a stronger, happier marriage, and still the mother of two bright, talented, and beautiful daughters.  Really, I have lost very little this year. 

Surprisingly, when I try to put my finger on the single greatest gift 2009 has brought to my home this year, I have to say the newest addition to my little family, our dog Daisy, definitely takes the prize.  She brought youth back to my Big Boy, Bo.  She makes my girlies and I so happy, and has been a wonderful playmate to us all.  I am so thankful for her.

Coming in a close second, the remodel of our front and back yards.  We’ve already reaped the benefit of the time, effort, and dollars FireDaddy & I invested into our back yard, in particular, at least five times over.  Both of us agree that watching the girlies run, laugh, sit, read, play, jump, chase, swing and otherwise revel in their childhood out back is one of our favorite pastimes.  They’ve camped, picnicked, splashed, dug, bubbled, chalked, planted, and meandered to their heart’s content.  It is truly a simple thing we treasure.

Unfortunately, 2009 is leaving me 10-15 pounds heavier than it found me.  Lately, my own reflection has been a bit gruesome – my hair needs cutting (and coloring), my 30-something acne has returned (destined to be a seasonal burden), and my new muffin-top makes my wardrobe more than a little less than flattering (or comfortable).  All of the above leave me unhappy with myself, in more than one way.  I’m disappointed that I have done this to myself – again.  I’m overwhelmed by the hard work that stands between “this me” and “the me I want to be” – again.  And, as my girlies are growing older and becoming increasingly more aware of their Mommy’s struggles, I’m disappointed that I’m setting such a poor example for them.  Pretty much, I suck. 

I still don’t place too much stock in New Year’s Resolutions and other such short-lived delusions.  But, everyone needs a kick in the rear at times, yes?  Everyone needs a new beginning – if even just a symbolic one.  Everyone deserves a second chance…or a third chance…or a thirty-third chance.

So there, 2009.  Be gone with you.  Don’t let the door hit you in the rear, bitch.

Catching Up

I found this draft sitting, unfinished, on my Blogger dashboard today.  Let's give it a whirl, shall we?
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November 7, 2009


As I blow the dust off my blog and reacquaint myself with my Blogger dashboard, I reflect on my life as of late. It would be very easy for me to rant and whine here...but that is not what I want my blog to become. So, I've been silent. I've been mothering my babies, problem-solving, and working my tail off. I've been turning over new leaves and looking into the future with fear-tinged hope. I've been reflecting on what is important in life, much like my fellow blogger and Tweep, Jenn.

Like many families recently, Jenn's family has been making changes. So has mine. Sometimes, life blows up in your face, you know? So, what do you do about it? The way I see it, like anything in life, you have two things to do: (1) deal with it, and (2) move on. I try not to get mad in life. I'm learning as I age that anger really doesn't do much for me....or you....or anyone. This is not to say, though, that if you hurt my baby or my doggie that I won't go all raging maniacal mother hen on you. Because I will. Hide and watch. But,what anger does do is waste energy and bring pain and suffering, mostly to the bearer. But that' s another post...

So, while FireDaddy and I try to catch up financially, and I try to get caught up mentally, and my girls try to get caught up physically (they've both been sick), and we as a family try to get caught up with our priorities, we're making changes. We're eating at home. We're playing in our yard and our park. We're using Netflix every week. And, I'm avoiding Target like the plague.

The holidays are quickly approaching, though. And the money just isn't going to be there. So, we're getting creative.

Yesterday, my girls and I spent the entire morning making Christmas cards. And, quite frankly, I think they're the best ever. They aren't finished yet (typical Mommy - I forgot some supplies at school), but I love them. No two are alike and many were made by the innocent hands of my babies. Even many of the ones from my hands alone, though, have a special meaning.

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Since that weekend, I've been busy stitching and gluing and clipping Joann's and Michael's coupons like a mad woman.  As with most things in my life, it's become a bit of an obsession.  Etsy is an evil, evil place. ;) Its creativity haunts my mind and compels me to do, make, sew, create.  

Have you ever realized that you - who you are - is really a lot of people rolled into one?  There's the Main You - the one you take to work and the grocery store on a day-to-day basis, but there's also the Little You from your childhood that wants your mama when you're sick and misses home at the holidays.  Inside ourselves, though, we all carry a rainbow of other "selves".  I, for instance, have the Fashion Designer - a former fashion major who cringes at wearing the same outfit twice.  The Interior Decorator who aspires to possess and wield my grandmother's flare for bold, courageous design, tempered by my mother's eye for designing with function, practicality and mass appeal in mind.  The Starlette, who dreams still of soaking up the hot lights of the stage "when I grow up".  The Girlie Girl, who looks forward to playing dress-up and turning cartwheels in the backyard with my girls.  I love sharing my inner Auntie Mame each year as I dawn my glorious, glamorous black and white large-brimmed hat to watch the derbies in my den.  And, of course, you know there's more...the Writer, the Artist, the Activist and Advocate.  I am a Southern Belle, a Baby Mommy, and a Clutz.

The bottom line is, I guess my Blogger has taken a step to the side to allow my other selves a chance to see the light of day for a while.  And it's been kind of nice.  But, she's still here...and so am I.