Re-solving Resolving

After a month of visiting La Salette Shrine, cutting the Christmas tree, shopping, cards mailed, decorating, wrapping, attending Christmas parties, building gingerbread houses, donating, baking cookies, exchanging cookies, light show visited, outdoor lights out outside, hosting a holiday party, a visit to Santa, and three days of different family Christmas gatherings, I am sure to have time on my hands to blog now.

This time of year is exhausting. Although there are so many things I love about it, I just can't help but to be thankful we made it through another season without fail. I am always worried I will forget to buy for someone, or Santa won't bring the gift to light up my kids face. I worry that there won't be enough time and I won't make it all that I was meaning to do. And, well, that part actually happened. I didn't do my yearly cookie mason jars, I didn't set up some of my normal house decor, and I didn't make peanut butter blossoms this year. We barely made it to Santa at the mall, and we almost missed the cool house with a thousand lights, but in the end it was another perfect Christmas.

Now the hard part of what to do with all of this stuff! My house is looking bigger as I put away all the Christmas decorations, but the mounds of toys eyeing me for a place in it is overwhelming. Where do I put the stuff? The obvious solution seems to weed out the things the kids don't play with, and replace it with the new. The bad thing is when I have done this before, the toys I donated ended up being the toys I re buy. Rylan didn't like puzzles. I get rid of puzzles. Addison now lives for puzzles. Santa brings puzzles. Mommy brings puzzles. Aunts bring puzzles. And now I have puzzles out of my you know what! Puzzles I GAVE AWAY to donation a year ago! Now I come full circle trying to find a place for them.

It is a guessing game of what should stay and what should go. Will Addison start to like little people again? Will Rylan ever play with that learning robot? How many buses could one family own? And what about books? How can I store hundreds and hundreds of books that will still make a kid want to read them? Right now they sit in big ugly piles and the bottom ones never get read.

Ah. Just when I thought the stress of the holidays were over.

And so this weekend marks another new year. 2012. I usually have some laundry list of resolutions that usually include losing an ungodly and unrealistic amount of weight. This year I am switching it up and resolving to be more focused on being less judgmental, and better at organizing. Both cause me a great deal of clutter (one in the mind, and the other in my house). I need to declutter. I need to simplify. I need to be open to whatever 2012 has in store for me. Even if that means more puzzles.

The things about goal setting is although it can be completely great to have on paper, you have to be willing to let it go when life brings you another way. I feel resolutions often set people up to fail, and feel like a failure. What if we just turned it around to small things we know we can do, but do it better. Like, I know I can easily see the women in the grocery line with an out of control child and make many assumptions about her as a parent, while forgetting that of course has been me many times. I know I can be more focused on instead of in my mind making judgments, trying to help her out. Maybe let her cut me in line, or try to engage her child with mine to make time pass more quickly. Point being, huge goals can be motivating, but it is the small ones in life that can change your day to day. Why is it only January 1 that people focus on making big changes when a year of small ones could easily lead the way? You can only plan so much.

For now I stare at the pile of toys and know I have the power to at least plan on where they shall go. Everything else in my life there after involves wherever 2012 wants to take me.

Happy New Year!

Birthday Eve

In another 24 hours I turn the big 3-5! Half way to 40, yet smack in the middle of my 30's. It still sounds so old to the inner 15 yr old in me, since growing up I thought 40 was your last good years before the nursing home. My, my how 40 seems so darn young when you are in your "mid-thirties".

I declared a few years ago that I would look better at 35 than I did at 25. Obviously people physically this isn't happening unless Pete purchased a major plastic surgery birthday surprise in the next 24 hours! Even if I was down to the size 0 I once was at 25, my life all around is much different than the girl I was then. I no longer walk 10 miles a day at a high-speed in the greatest city on earth. I am no longer in my twenties, and that chick didn't have babies coming out of her body either! She also ate Ben & Jerry's for dinner--often and never gained a pound (I WISH says soon to be 35 yr old).

The good news is that chick was also a little psycho, and I'd like to think I seized her ass. I know I am not alone when I say early twenties are made for young women to be insecure, drama-loving beasts. I had not a clue who I was, what I wanted to be, or where I was going. I might have "looked my best" then, but I absolutely can say--I now FEEL my best at 35. I am no longer guessing who I am, and I hold no apologies for it.

Granted it is true--women are interesting species. We are strong. We can make mountains move, but.... ladies let's be honest---we also never graduate from the high school mentality. I imagine being white haired, and wheel-chair bound someday still getting my panties in a bunch because someone didn't include me in something, gossiping, and wondering if my cane matches my outfit. We grow up, mature to a point, and still in the end realize parts of who we are never seem to change! This makes great sense when comparing ourselves to boys and their sick obsession with fart noises, and Beavis and Butthead.

And so another year is passing, and new one's a go. I have come to a realization about a lot of things this year-- a) telling your truth-your story --should not be held back because of others judgements b) I am done having babies (and now I probably get pregnant stating this) c) it is easy to be taken advantage of when you are a "yes" person--I need to learn "no" d) There is always a silver lining. When you look at life that way--you are always thankful for everyday blessings. e) I might not be a size 0 but I a no longer psycho!

So long 34 ---you have been good to me. 35 my expectations are exceedingly high! Let's dance!

My Inner Tween

I am about to turn 35 in another week, and the number almost offends me. More often then not, I have to remind myself of my age. At heart I often still feel like a teenager, and wonder how my life thus far has flown by so quickly. How can I possibly be a MOM when in my heart I am 15? Then suddenly I realize I am in my 30's and to old for things. Like tween stuff.

I have never read Harry Potter or the Twilight series. There was something about the books aiming to tweens that made me think it would be like a middle-aged women driving with the windows down screaming her heart out to a Justin Beiber tune. It just didn't feel right in my old bones.

People kept telling me I was missing out. However, I kept thinking really Twilight Moms REALLY--you are going to drool over a teenage boy? I was also attending 9 year old birthday parties that were Harry Potter themed and thinking-- why is this so "in" in the adult world. When your book says Scholastic on the back of it--honey it ain't for the 20 and older crowd. So yes, I secretly rolled my eyes and couldn't imagine myself doing such things.

Until a few weeks ago I had the windows down and I was singing Justin Beiber's girlfriends new tune on the radio! It has ridiculously crap lyrics, but surprisingly catchy. Suddenly I was digging Selena Gomez's new song, and even find myself gitty that it is on the radio again for the 50th time today. Ok the "beep beep beep" can get a wee bit annoying, but the beat of the actual song reminds me of my own teenage world--enter THIS song from Stacy Q! Isn't it a little similar or am I just a weird old women blasting Selena Gomez in my car?

Just when I thought I had enough tween sensation going on in my life I saw this:

My husband recently read this trilogy (as well as others mentioned above), and he claimed it was great, but I had brushed it off until watching this. This little snipit of the movie made me read it---AND FAST!

I could not put it down. No matter what I did I was thinking about how I could get back to it. For a good 48 hours I lived the first book. I would go to sleep at night even thinking about it, and what could happen next. I could not remember a time I had ever been so sucked into a book like this before.

I am half way through book 2 and I spent today literally telling myself I had to pace my reading. I still have a life to live, and can't get lost in a book for days on end even if I want to. It is just THAT good.

And so here I am THAT old Mom digging the tween thing. I am now a lover of a Selena Gomez song (and Stacey Q still for that matter), and I am a CRAZY addict of the Hunger Games. And so Harry Potter adult fans, and Twilight Moms, I apologize. When something is catchy, written or made well, it is easy to love at whatever age. Scholastic on the back of my book still makes me cringe a little, as does the song I am gitty of hearing being from Justin's girlfriend, but that book and that song make my soul happy. And so, just like in life, we have to look past a few facts in order to enjoy something we never thought was possible.

While I patiently await the Hunger Games on the silver screen, I pace myself, and end this blog thinking, "I waited almost the entire time (now almost 8pm at night), I think I can allow myself to read" (my bet it will be another night I am turning the light off at midnight cursing it so late and wanting more!).