What's Up Buttercup?

Goodness it's been a while. It seems I stay in touch with so many of you more often on Instagram and Facebook these days but oh how I've missed the blog. I look back at the 2009-2010 era and how much of our world of communication was through blogs and blog comments. How things have changed.

Life has changed a lot since that time. We now have a teenager in the house, who is busy running to sporting, church and social events, doing math we don't understand and writing essays in a class called Language Arts that we used to call English class. I spend a lot of my time driving her to activities and events, spending long hours at track meets and golf tournaments - and working and studying, while waiting to pick her up from activities, in parking lots around town. I try to make that time really productive since there are a lot of small clusters of time spent that way. It's amazing what I can get done with my phone and a notebook.

We now live in a house on a large lot that requires upkeep...no more depending on the apartment manager to take care of issues and tend all the landscaping. Keeping things in good order, watered and clean takes up an amazing amount of time, but it usually is a labor of love when you see how nice the house looks afterwards.

We live in a state I never expected to live in. New Mexico. It's strange to adjust to being closer to states like Texas, Oklahoma and Colorado when I've been so used to being on the left coast most of my adult life. Living closer to "the middle" always throws me. And just like living in any other state, city or town, there are things we love and things we don't always love so much about our new state. But we try to see the best and contribute our best and enjoy every good thing. Sunsets are definitely one of those. This image is from our street. It's dreamy sunsets here just about every night.

Creatively most of my focus has been spent on the house. Reimaging and redecorating, repairing and reorganizing as we go along, trying to learn who we are in the house and how it will best work for us. It's interesting how after three years you can go back and wonder why you ever did things the way you did in the beginning and to see how much some things just haven't worked for the family. I took over our never utilized family room for my office and have absolutely loved having the open space, a big work area/counter and lots of storage for supplies and tools. Plus it has a lot of windows facing out the front of our house, so there is lots of natural light and nature to watch outside.

We have settled into a wonderful social circle here in New Mexico and that is probably the thing I am most grateful for. When you don't have family support nearby, having a strong network of friends who are family is priceless. We have been so blessed and I hope we are blessing others and helping and supporting as well as we are receiving. I'm looking forward to doing more blogging. I have a long list of things to talk about with you.

Make Time To Spend With Friends

It is so easy to get busy and find that weeks or months have gone by without checking in with your friends. I have some terrific friends here and in different parts of the country. I'm trying to do better staying in touch from a distance, thank goodness for social media which helps a lot, but can still be rather impersonal. I've been trying to shoot emails to friends more often to just say "Hi" and "How ya doin?"

Over the summer I have made it a priority to meet up with girlfriends for brunch or lunch every couple of weeks. We've had some great talks about schools, creative pursuits, home design and decor, about challenges we are facing and we've even read some personal development books that we've been sharing.

It is so nice to once a week or so be able to leave the grind of housekeeping and work at home and just get away somewhere different, to talk and think about other things and leave feeling renewed of soul. It's definitely a great when a friend can help inspire you and you can inspire them with your past experiences and dreams for the future. Plus it's giving me the chance to get to know friends' favorite cafes and eateries around our area.

While I've tried to do this as a habit over the years, this is really the first time where I've been able to maintain it regularly and it's been a joy. One of the best parts about our community here is that there are a lot of friends who have kids about the same age, are at the same school and often the same church. So we are able to do both family activities, fun kid things and parent get togethers with the families we know quite easily.

Because we live in an area where people have yards, backyard parties are easy to throw together and there is space for everyone to spread out and have fun playing or talking. That may sound weird to some people, but living in LA, most everyone lived in an apartment, so very few people had yards. We had to meet at parks or other places and it was not so easy. Not to mention we often had to pay for parking or entrance fees to many places. Things to be grateful for!

One of the things a girlfriend and I are doing is keeping a list of cool places in the city that we want to check out. Then when we decide to get together, we can choose something off the list. We've been to a cool book signing, a hip store grand opening and to some fun cafes. On the list we have added going to breakfast and to the farm shop at my favorite working farm/upscale hotel, happy hour at a favorite downtown historic hotel, a new french bakery, some local boutiques and museums we have yet to see. It's great to have a buddy to adventure to new places with and that helps me make it a priority to actually get to those places that I so often think I want to visit. This way it becomes a plan, rather than a wish that never happens. Having someone fun to go to those places with makes it even better. On our list are a few things we want to do with husbands too and families too.

Making time to spend with friends has been such a gift to us here and I think it's a great thing to do no matter where you live or what station in life you are in. It might be taking babies to the park with other mom friends or going to lunch with a bunch of empty nester friends but it's good for the soul no matter our age.

Where Did That Summer Go?

I can't believe we're two weeks into the school year already! Shocking. I don't understand how this happened. It seemed like the shortest summer ever. It was full of fun, but I feel like I would've like to pack so much more into it. I realize it's been a month since my last post, which is poor on my part. Let's catch up!

It seems like it was Memorial Day just a couple of weeks ago and we were celebrating July 4th with visiting friends and so many wonderful friends from here just days ago. Since then we were able to pack in another golf camp for Kiddo and a visit to my family. Kiddo stayed for a week and had all kinds of fun camping and playing golf with my family. Lucky girl. The best part is that my sister brought her home and we had a fun weekend with her here in ABQ, even though it was WAY too short of a visit.

 We ended off the weekend before school started with a fun barbecue dinner on our back patio. Only the second or third we've had all summer. Aunty Tru made copycat Levain Bakery chocolate chip cookies which were delicious! Here's the recipe she used. For our dinner we had all kinds of fresh fruits and vegetables, chips, barbecue bacon dogs...oh it was so good and such a beautiful night outside. We need to have a few more of those nights before summer's official end.

It's been rainy and overcast here much of the past four weeks, which makes it feel not very summery. I feel like fall hit us towards the end of July and isn't going to let go. I can't complain about the cooler temps and less intensely hot sunshine but it's a bummer to not be swimming in the pool in the afternoons when it's overcast or raining...not to mention that everytime it rains it leaves a huge amount of water on the pool cover that has to be cleaned off before even thinking about uncovering the pool. Needless to say we haven't been in the pool the past few weeks, which is a big drag.

We've had some crazy, amazing torrential downpours and major lightning/thunder storms in the past few weeks. It's fun for a change of pace, but still I feel like summer is cheating us a bit. Autumn is undoubtedly the most completely enjoyable season of the year here in New Mexico. Along with it comes Balloon Fiesta which is such a fun time to be here in the city.

We are gearing up for school and extracurricular activities to get very busy for the next couple of months. I have always been that parent who insisted kids schedules are not overbooked, but despite my best efforts we're going to be a little bit overbooked for about 8 weeks. But by then we'll just about be into the holidays and things will quiet down again until we get into spring. Life in middle school seems to be going okay which I'm happy about. I'm staying plenty busy during the day managing my little empire, squeezing in some service opportunities and catching up with friends now that all the kids are in school again.

I think this will be a nice fall. Looking forward to it. Yesterday while I was driving home from brunch with a friend as I looked up at the mountains I thought I like my life right now. Things are good. This is not to say there aren't life's major challenges, heartbreaks and frustrations, but counting one's blessings makes if apparent that there is more good than bad in life.

How are you feeling about the last month of summer, the beginning of school and the changing of seasons?

Saying Goodbye To May: Patio Outdoor Space Ready

May is pretty much my favorite month of the year and I am always sad to see it end. With Mother's Day, my birthday and Memorial Day weekend it's pretty much a month long party. Not complaining!
I have so many beautiful cards on my mantle along with fresh flowers and potted plants that have come my way the past couple of weeks. It just makes everything feel so festive.

I have been working hard on outdoor living spaces as I have talked about repeatedly here. I am happy to report that for the past several night we have been out on our front patio, with the solar lanterns lit playing games and having fun. Every day it seems I add something new. First it was a couple of tea lights in jars, then I broke open a big box of wicker lanterns like these on the table above.

Story about those wicker lanterns. In December 2011 (!!!!), we had just gotten engaged and I was in full-blown, excited wedding planning dream land. I found these wicker lanterns at TJMaxx and ended up driving all over the Los Angeles metro area buying them out of every store so that I had enough to use them on the long tables for our wedding. You can see my original blog post full of enthusiasm about having found them here. Well fast forward 6 1/2 years (oh my gosh....) and we never had our big wedding thanks to a little detour called Afghanistan.....and these lanterns, along with anything else I purchased for our wedding have been languishing in storage ever since.

I didn't have the heart to get rid of them, thought perhaps someday we might actually have a vow ceremony/reception of some kind that we could share with family and friends. So in boxes they have sat. Finally I brought one box out and opened it. Along with six lanterns I found a couple hundred really cute paper napkins I had purchased for a pre-wedding picnic or rehearsal dinner or something. Wow. Anyway I put three of these lanterns out on the coffee table on the front porch and they look so fun and festive and create such a lovely light in the evenings...and I feel a little sad that they are going to get used and get ruined without every having served their true purpose but whatever. I have to get over that...

I started making a small buffet table for the back deck with two towers of four cinder blocks and a pretty wood top that I built. I spent part of Friday night at Home Depot with my building plans, trying to figure out the best materials to use and pushing one of those gigantic pull carts that was so heavy I had to totally lean my entire body into it to get it to move. Then I packed everything into my little VW Golf (crazy amount of cargo space, even fit 6' wood plants and 10 cinderblocks with room to spare!).

I have been working on this table since Friday night and hoped to have it done Saturday but it's definitely a work in progress and I should have it done by Wednesday. I have the top done, just need to even out the edges on each side and then stain it and polyurethane it for outdoor use. It's a bar height and will fit our new little portable barbecue grill and leave room for serving food too. You can see the example of the table I'm building here. I'm not doing the sides, just one long 6' length. I figured we can add the sides later if we feel we need them but I think the three-sided table is more than we need and doesn't fit out space all that well. We have a fairly narrow patio but it's very long so a long table along one wall makes great sense for us. I'll share more details when I have a finished product to show you. Excited about it! Really makes my soul so happy to have a creative project.

We also got our temporary, but large and fabulous, bi-fold door/sawhorse dining table out of the shed last night. Hooray! throw a giant tablecloth over that and we have a table to eat at outside. I made a makeshift grilling table out of a 3x3 stack of cinderblocks to hold the little portable grill I picked up at Ace Hardware on Friday. I was looking for a different grill which they have on line but apparently don't carry in the stores.

While they didn't have the one I wanted, they had this little grill on sale for $12.99 and how could I beat that?! Some day we plan on having a nice big grill in the back - and are so lucky to already have a gas line from the house out to the patio -- but until we decide what we want and how we'll configure it all, this little grill will work just fine. I probably should've bought two or three and we could've had an awesome little grilling station for $36. I might still do that. That would get us through some fun entertaining and they are so small and easy to deal with. I like the idea of having three of these on a long table and cooking up all kinds of fun things that way.

I couldn't let Memorial Day Weekend pass without a barbecue so that was my big goal for the weekend. I kept the menu easy and light. Burgers with cheese, lettuce, tomato and onion. Here's a link to my hamburger recipe I've been refining for a few years now. I think I've found my groove with the spices in these and they always taste good. I picked up some already cut up pineapple, a big watermelon and chips today and we were in business!

We ate dinner just as the sun was setting with our cafe string lights on, wicker lanterns on the table and a delicious, simple summer feast. We had a great time and after the meal we played with Kiddo's plethora of glow-in-the-dark bracelets, necklaces and other trinkets she's been stashing in a drawer. Nights here in Albuquerque are so perfect for outdoor time. Little to no wind, no bugs, perfect temps so you don't need a sweater. It's just lovely being outside on summer nights here! I hope we'll start eating outside every night we can throughout the summer.

Now that we have everything set up, it should be a cinch to enjoy our outdoor areas as much as we can throughout the summer. Looking forward to having friends over and swimming the summer away. Speaking of which, the pool is up and running as of today --- with just one little challenge. Our heaterless pool is still a little cold. Water temps at 63 degrees. We need some hot sunny days!....or I need to finally order that solar pool heating blanket I kept looking at last year that is supposed to heat pool water up by a good 17 degrees. That would work.

I am so happy we're set for summer finally. Being able to go outside to read, have a cup of tea, relax, take a nap or eat a meal is the best and it just makes our home feel tons bigger when you add these outside rooms where one can go. Hooray for summer. Here are a few more things I am thinking about building for the backyard this summer.

Sectional seating
Dining Table
Outdoor Rugs
Two by Four Bench
Simple Concrete Planters

Seeing Our Positive Accomplishments: Home Decor

I have been feeling discouraged with the progress (or lack of progress) on making our home look lovely. I am highly motivated to have a home that is comfortable and welcoming and we have been struggling. That means I really struggle because having this feels so vital to my soul. While ruminating about this over the past couple of days, it came to me that things are getting prettier around here, I just haven't let myself see that.

Last week I finally FINALLY got a plant and pot that I bought last summer out on the front porch of our house. You may remember I had planned to make a wood plant stand to put the pot it. Well just didn't have time for that. So here we are 10 months later and I found this wonderful stick table I bought 18 months ago and put the pot and plant on top of that and suddenly I have a front porch look that I like. It goes well with the basket I bought last winter for the door that I can update for holidays and seasons with a cute little sign on the front and rotating flowers or plants inside.

I happened to pick up these patriotic fan decorations at Target last week and they were sitting on my desk and I thought, hey I know what I can put in that basket for the summer. Since the front door is well protected and shaded they should be fine there for the entire summer. If not I have another set I can replace them with. The doormat I bought last fall some time and I love it and it all works and speaks my style. Needed that! Okay, progress is happening!

Even if the house hasn't been painted a color I actually like and I'm a little unthrilled with the turquoise front door (some days I like it, but I would love to get rid of that middle section with all the scrolly stuff!) I can still be happy with things done the best they can for now. Wanting everything done right this second isn't really very realistic and why make myself miserable. It may not be magazine worthy but it's the best it's ever been and I can be happy with that for now.

Before I updated the front door basket I took a small whisk broom and swept down the entire door. Then I used a really great squirt bottle that has a good strong sprayer on it and squirted down the front door really well with just plain water, getting into all those nooks and crannies. It was like a mini-power wash for the door. I dried it off and wow did it look a million times better without all the silt and dirt deposits on every edge!

That entire front door update was not that hard and in fact took just a little over 30 minutes. The Man had stacked some small boxes of wood near that door which was making it look a little messy and they had been there for a while. Making those go away was just three simple trips to move those boxes where they needed to be.  None of this was as overwhelming as it feels sometimes.

Next I realized that I'd made some valuable improvements on our "curb appeal" by hanging the silk lanterns together in a tree, adding the new chairs and a little "As-is" IKEA table I picked up just before we left California that has been waiting for a home. Now when people come up to our home they don't see dry ground, scraggly juniper trees and sagebrush. Hopefully they see a welcoming patio! Plans are to add an outdoor table here shortly with some chairs for outside meals, newspaper or magazine reading, journal writing and early morning tea. Can't wait.

On the back patio we still have work to do, but just adding my pretty white and terra cotta pots of vegetable and herbs has cheered up that space quite a bit! Progress!

It sure helped to turn my attitude and perspective around when I started really seeing the good things that are happening around here instead of feeling discouraged and overwhelmed by the mass entirety of the project. Life really is constantly about baby steps and when we get overwhelmed and discouraged it's usually because we're looking beyond the mark a bit and forgetting those baby steps that are what really get us to our goals, hopes and dreams. So today I am going to again take baby steps towards my home and life goals. Recognizing my small successes has been a major source of encouragement to keep taking small steps forward!

Wax Museum Project: Meet Rachel Fuller Brown

Wax Museum projects seem pretty ubiquitous here in the U.S. these days but just in case you don't know what that is, grade schoolers pick an influential person, create a report or tri-fold poster about that person, then dress up as them and do a brief oral presentation for students in the school. Our kiddo came home with the name of a person I had never heard of before. After all I learned about her, I thought I would share some of that with you.

image via

Dr. Rachel Fuller Brown (on the right) and her research partner Elizabeth Lee Hazen discovered Nystatin, the first anti-fungal medicine and it was introduced to the world in 1950. This was the second great medical discovery of the 20th century following two decades after the discovery of penicillin. Nystatin is used to treat fungal infections like athlete's foot, thrush and candida as well as used to treat fungal disease in trees and artwork that has been damaged by fungus.

Rather than take the 13.4 million dollars she earned from the royalties of Nystatin, she donated it to further scientific study opportunities for women and other good causes. She received many awards for her scientific contributions and spent her entire career contributing not only to scientific research but also to helping the next generation of scientists get established.

Wax museum day at our school was a great opportunity for me to learn some new things about Susan B. Anthony, Clara Barton, Sally Ride, Helen Keller and other notable women. There were some terrific costumes including Stephen Hawking, Teddy Roosevelt, Neil Armstrong, Amelia Earhart. and my very favorite character of the day, Bob Ross, the PBS painting teacher.

I thought this was a fantastic project for the kids because they had to practice doing research, creating an artistic display, costume design and most importantly I think, the art of public speaking. There are so many elements to public speaking including eye contact, voice intonation and volume, organization of thoughts, appropriate use of time allowed and more. The Man and I invested time in visiting all the booths and found them very interesting. It was fun to interact with each of the kids and ask them questions. I know for sure that our family will never forget Rachel Fuller Brown or her contributions to medical science.

Shaking Up The Routine

Yesterday I ran away from home for a while. I've been at home working too much lately and it was starting to make me a little loopy. I also needed to have one of those regroups where you just feel like you need to start sprucing yourself up a little better -- you know getting in a rut of wearing the same thing over and over or wearing your hair up in a bun every day.

So I took myself out to breakfast and enjoyed a peaceful half hour or so eating a yummy bagel with cream cheese and sipping on a hot chocolate while writing in my journal. I went a little later in the morning and the bagel shop was pretty quiet. It was so lovely. It felt so good to eat something I didn't have to make for myself or for anyone else. It was a cold, gray, rainy day so sipping on something warm and nibbling on warm toasted bread was so nice. Even though it was only for a few minutes it was perfect and it fed my soul to sit there alone and be able to think without disruption, which doesn't happen that often at home.

Then I ran a couple of errands. I bought myself some high quality shampoo, conditioner and leave-in conditioner. I currently have three bottles of shampoo in my shower and none of them are really doing anything good for my hair. When I get out of the shower my hair just feels like it's in knots and is so hard to get a comb through, even after I've conditioned it in the shower and put on leave-in conditioner as well. I realized again today that we live in a VERY dry climate and my hair is feeling the effects. So this weekend I am going to deep condition my hair and then I decided to upgrade to a new moisturizing shampoo and see if that will help my hair a bit. This is one of those things I've been putting off. One area where I need to and deserve to take better care of myself. I do have to say, however, that I've been doing a lot better on the self-care in other areas though, especially sleep, vitamins, essential oils, lotions, etc.

I also made a quick dash to one of the big craft stores and even though I was just popping in to grab two quick items I made a round around the store for inspiration. Those trips always get my mind percolating and help me see new creative projects I'd like to explore whether they be interior decor, gardening, painting, knitting...so many things. I always leave inspired.

When I got home I felt happy to be home and be with my family again, refreshed and ready to continue accomplishing things. I spent some time outside admiring the new growth on the trees The Man planted last year, playing with the dog, looking at the moody, cloud-covered mountains and enjoying a few rain sprinkles on my face before we came inside.

I was able to get quite a few things done after my mornings adventures out including blazing through 40 pages of the textbook I am studying, which I told you about last week. Thank goodness! I was beginning to feel like I would never make any progress on that book. The first 80 pages took forever, but then I got into a section that I more easily breeze through which got me to the section I was really most interested in studying. So I made some good progress and that felt so good! I can almost see the light at the end of the tunnel. What a relief to be halfway through the book now. I think I've found my groove with this book so I can move more quickly now. Yay!

Some days shaking up the routine is just what is required so we can return to the routine and blaze some ground. Other times we just need to leave the old routine and come up with a new one. I think both are somewhat in order in my life right now. Last night the thought came to me "My life is a grand adventure." For all the ups and downs we have, it really is a great adventure and when I think of it as an adventure rather than a "challenge" or something hard to be suffered it sure makes it all look brighter and happier.

I want to live shining and happy so thinking of life as an adventure and continually looking at new ways to experience it, to shake up the routine, seems like the perfect recipe. I am going to shake up my routine more often. You never know what might come of it. Serendipity seems to happen when we step out of the expected and try things in new and different ways. You never know who you might meet or what might happen when you shake up the way you normally do things or try something in a new and unusual way.

Spring Break Home Reorganization Recap

Even though we didn't hit all five days last week with home organization projects I'm going to say it was a big success for a few reasons. First it got a lot of reorganization done. Second and probably more important it got some big home fixing up momentum going again. It was great to see progress made and every one of us got into it. Good stuff!

This is one of the corners we tidied last week, heading out to our garage on the left. The doors on the right are the new "mud room closet" for school backpack and other items that seem to get tossed on the family room floor or sofa right inside the entry door from school. Now to instill the discipline for the items to get put away every day. That may be tougher than the actual clean up!

I am trying to hold back from going too "minimalist" on the family but in the last week have put on the minimalist movie on Netflix and put up this quote temporarily (maybe -HA!). The Man doesn't like motivational quotes on walls, He calls them "-ISMs". Clearly he has no idea what's going on in the world of home decor and signage right now because I seriously only have this hanging in the entire house right now. He has no idea how sign crazy his life could be with other women. Ha. He needs to spend some time on Instagram so he can appreciate my restraint. Haha.

But I do feel some responsibility to help our family see that less is more, everything needs to have a place and that we don't need a lot to be happy. I have to regularly remind myself of that too and I am pretty minimalist already. This all plays into having gratitude, living frugally, making good financial decisions, managing our emotions, our recognition of wants vs. needs and so much more. It really is important to our overall well-being.

I'm going to keep trying to schedule in at least one of two projects each week to keep this momentum going. Even if we do 30 minutes on a weeknight once a week and an hour on Saturdays we will still make a lot of progress. I'm convinced that the more we work,the more efficiently we'll work as we go forward so we can get more done, more quickly. I think that will come along in part because along the way we're making final decisions about where things will be stored and what is of value and necessary to keep. As we continue to make these decisions it gets easier and faster to make them. I also think it really helps that we've lived in the house for a little over a year now so we understand out patterns, habits and what entryways we use most often, where we like to keep things handy, etc.

I've never really done this in a house before now but I really think it is wise to continually re-evaluate how you are using your space and what works best for your family. Things change over time, we learn that some things don't work as well as we thought they might and our families living in our homes change too. What worked well for babies might now work well for the grade school era, what works for grade school might benefit from changes made for middle school years and so on.

I think we're all seeing enough progress to see some light at the end of the tunnel. We'll get settled into this house yet! Yay! I hope along the way we're gaining some new skills in working together as a family, learning to live with less, the best ways to organize a home for our needs, appreciating what we have, what we don't need to be happy and other lessons we may not even recognize yet that will be valuable to all of us going forward and will also make our home even better in a variety of ways. This is exciting to think about. It makes me want to jump up and start a little project right now.

Things We Can And Can't Deal With

The other day I was going through a temporary but frequently repeated experience that I really was not enjoying. Because it was an experience that I have to go through somewhat frequently, the thought came to me, I cannot live the rest of my life like this. I can't deal with this forever!

When we are in the midst of unpleasant experiences it does feel like they are taking over our entire lives and that we will break to pieces if you have to live like that all the time. But this thought came to me that completely changed how I was feeling and my thinking. I realized that this unpleasant experience never lasts more than two hours often it is only 30 minutes or so. So that's not nearly my entire life or an entire day. It's a pretty short time and I get through it every time. On a bad day it's not even 1/12 of my 24 hour day.

Then I started thinking about what fills the other 22-24 hours of the day that aren't affected by this situation. I started counting the blessings I do have in those hours and the things I gladly deal with -- that I love and are deeply meaningful. I thought about the day before when I got to spend a leisurely afternoon alone with The Man and how peaceful and relaxing and restorative it was to just be with him, enjoy the outdoors and relax. It was like medicine for my soul! I CAN deal with that and want more and more of those moments.

I thought about the wonderful, sweet, bonding moments I've had hanging out with The Bug the last week and how nice it is to snuggle up to watch a movie, read books and be still together...or to talk lots and laugh and workout together. Sweet, sweet moments, especially when it feels like she is suddenly growing up faster than ever. I CAN deal with more of those moments with her, many, many more.

I thought about sipping my favorite hot cocoa and nibbling toast. In a few weeks it's going to be way too hot to sip cocoa and I will miss the comfort and coziness of those quiet times and needing to warm up. I would gladly take more of that cozy, warm, chocolate-ness. I CAN deal with making the absolute most out of those moments.

I thought about how much I am enjoying workouts and hours at the gym and how motivated I am for progress with my fitness and the recovery of my foot. It's painful, but I'm enjoying pushing through and reaching for goals. That's another thing I CAN deal with in my life right now.

I have a lot of projects that I'm working on and am excited about right now. I am deeply interested in them, enjoying progress and I CAN deal with that. Inspiration and motivation to create are such a big part of who I am and what get me really excited. More good things in my life.

I am really passionate about getting our back patio furnished for entertaining and family enjoyment this summer. That's another thing I don't mind dealing with one bit. Inspiration boards, checking lots of online resources and budgeting out options in my free time is another project I CAN deal with in my life right now and that I am having fun with.

So, while in those few moments of misery when I thought I just can't take this anymore, it struck me that I need to not think in those short periods that the unpleasantness is my entire life! I realized I have so much more in my life that I CAN take, that I do love and that is wonderful and delicious to my soul. That realization really helped me to turn around my attitude about the small, unpleasant moments of life. They truly are just a bit of time and we do get through them over and over again. But they aren't our entire life and we don't have to let them feel like they own our entire life or our happiness.

When I started seeing things in this new light, suddenly being in the midst of an unpleasant experience didn't matter so much because I knew it would end and it would end soon. I saw that I have all those other lovely things to be excited about. Now, the next time I have to endure an unpleasant experience, I hope I'll be able to remember that it will be just for a short time and it isn't my entire life. It's a few minutes of a day with many more minutes still available to enjoy with loved ones and doing things I love.

So next time I'll remember I can deal with those unpleasant experiences and they don't have to color so much of my world and I'll try to focus on all the great things about life, about my life. Good life lesson that will serve me well.

California Catch Up

I flew to Los Angeles on Friday to attend the funeral of a dear friend who passed away at age 83 on February 3. My friend Dave was a wonderful man, who was successful in business, raised a wonderful family and was so good to people around him. Everyone liked Dave and it was a great experience to celebrate his life on Saturday with his family and many friends.

A side benefit to attending the funeral was a great reunion with so many friends in Los Angeles. I shared a hotel room with a dear friend and we spent many, many hours talking. The great thing about this friendship, we said, Saturday night is that our conversations always lead us to three things, 1) knowing that we are doing okay, 2) knowing that we can carry on and continue to do what we need to do in life and 3) feeling loved and accepted no matter what. Such great blessings! Such a great friendship.

I had three goals for my trip beyond the funeral on Saturday. I wanted to see a few friends, eat only at restaurants/fast food chains I missed from living in LA and 3) to go to IKEA. I did pretty well achieving those goals although there is never enough time to do them all.

Friday I got into town and met up with a wonderful friend who years ago wrote this blog post on living happily in the current moment. After we had eaten lunch we had a good laugh saying "gosh it's too bad we have nothing in common and nothing to talk about anymore." We chatted and chatted and could've chatted for many more long hours. We covered home decor, creative projects, career goals, time management, staying sane, exercise, health issues relative to our current decade of life, marriage and family life, elementary school and so many other topics. It was a very fun and filling afternoon.

Then I buzzed back over to the Westside to get a mani-pedi at my favorite nail salon that I went to for years just around the corner from our old apartment. It was fun to see all the ladies and I will say I splurged a little on the extra massage add-ons. But it felt wonderful. I also picked a polish for my toes that was a little too bright for my liking but I'll live with it for a couple of weeks.

I had a classic LA moment next when at 7 p.m. on a Friday I tried to drive six or seven blocks and it took about an hour trying to get from one side of the 405 under it to the other side. Ugh. Don't miss that. But when you're not is a big hurry it sure is not as irritating.

I was still awaiting the arrival of friends from out of town, so I decided to have my favorite Chinese Chicken Salad at California Chicken Cafe. I don't know why but when I get that salad and I'm hungry it makes me so happy I can barely stand it. It's so good and a feast for the taste buds. I took it to the hotel and enjoyed it while watching HGTV.

Once my friend arrived we chatted for several hours until we were so tired we couldn't carry on. There were laughs, tears, deep thoughts and silly ones. Saturday morning we were up early to get to the funeral early enough to get parking and a seat in the chapel. We knew there would be a big crowd. By the time the viewing, services and luncheon were over it was last afternoon. We were quite tired by then and three of us stopped in at a little french cafe in our old neighborhood for a drink, some food and a nice chat. So that was the third place I hit for food that was an LA favorite eatery.

After that we stopped to visit with Dave's family, which his wife had asked us to do earlier in the day. It was fun to sit with his wife, children and grandchildren and catch up and decompress from the day. By the time we left there it was well into the evening and we headed back to the hotel to change clothes and then we chatted while we were collapsed on the bed, nursing good, hydrating beverages.

The next morning the friends were off early for their long drive home. I attended church at our old congregation which was lovely. Saw so many good friends. I went for a walk afterwards, grabbed some lunch and headed to the airport in the late afternoon. When I got back to ABQ it was snowing heavily which I was not expecting at all. Such a change of environment! It was a wonderful weekend and so filling for the soul and exhausting for the body. I slept for a good long time the morning after I got back.

This was my first real trip back to our old home stomping grounds and it was so wonderful in so many ways and it was hard in some ways too. There were so many things that were so familiar. There was much that I miss and so little time to do all many things I wanted to do. There was much that had changed and felt strange. I found myself torn between wanting to go back and feeling some weird regrets about things I wish I would've done differently while I did live there and things I wish I'd done that I didn't. Then there was a wave of gratitude that we did move and all the blessings that came from that too.

It was kind of intense and a lot of that hit me while I was alone Sunday afternoon. It was a bit of a challenge to process and part of me just had to remind myself not to get sucked into overthinking anything too much and appreciate all the good things. I am so happy to have gone back and hope I'll be able to process all my thoughts and feelings and be able to focus on the things I gained from the trip. I really did leave the funeral and conversations with friends committing to focus on things I took away from those moments and make them more a part of my life. Those are great blessings.

A Quick Return To Our Old Stomping Grounds

I am in Santa Monica today to attend a funeral tomorrow. It's a sad occasion but also my first real return to our neighborhood and circle of friends there since we moved. It will be good to see many much loved faces and to be back in our old city for a while.

I am traveling alone and planning brunch with a friend, taking care of a couple of business items, getting a mani-pedi at my old neighborhood nail salon, and will get some beach time Sunday afternoon when it's supposed to be warm and sunny. Friday it's supposed to rain all day and I'm debating whether I take full rain gear or just a slicker to go over a jacket or sweater. I was hoping to just take one pair of sandals and a pair of flip flops but that doesn't seem like it's going to work now.

I'm trying to make a list of favorite places to eat and fun shop areas to wander while I'm there and it's crazy to say I've already forgotten a lot. I find that so strange when you live in a place most of your adult life and two years later you are having problems remembering street names and favorite restaurants and fast food joints. I will have a decent amount of time on my on on both ends of the trip so I want to make sure I make good use of my time and make it great and soul-filling. There are a hundred friends I'd love to see that I won't be able to see, but wouldn't it be lovely if I could.

This funeral I am going to is going to bring together a lot of people I dearly love, so despite it's sadness there will be a lot of reunion there too. I am looking forward to seeing friends I haven't seen in years who have moved to other states, friends from all over SoCal and on Sunday friends from our former church congregation. Love all those people and look forward to catching up a bit as we can.
I am sharing a hotel room and car with a dear friend and looking forward to some good chats and down time. Sitting by a pool, dipping the toes and hanging out together sounds quite lovely.

There are definitely some mixed emotions going back "home" to California. We miss it there a lot. California has been a major part of both my and The Man's adult life, so it really is where we feel the most us and the most at home.  Moving has brought many blessings too, so there is always that loss and gain in making a big life change like we did. Had there been a crystal ball before us when we made the decision to move we probably wouldn't have done it based on the way some things didn't work out as we'd hoped. But we would've missed out on all the blessings we gained when we did make that decision. Life is interesting, isn't it.

I was looking back at old family photos from 2008-2012 yesterday morning and The Bug was so little and we looked so young. Wow. Even pictures I didn't like at all back then were so lovely to me now. There were so many photos of beach life and palm trees, major league baseball games, year-round warm temperatures...made me a homesick for California and more grateful for the past. I hope I'm living in the present a little more to realize all the lovely blessings I have right now.

I am looking forward to the quiet time and change of scenery this weekend will provide. I hope you too have some time for quiet, rest and happy enjoyment this weekend! Thanks for coming by today.

Difficult Phone Calls And The Heavens

Two days ago I received an email from a sweet friend letting me know that our dear friend's husband was on hospice and would likely pass away this week. She told me their family had gathered and that the kids were spending time there every day. Even though this was not a huge surprise, it sure did hurt my heart. My friends are in their 80s and have had an amazing influence on my life, which I will carry with me forever. While I am grateful that he will no longer be suffering there is never an easy way to let someone go.

The friend who emailed me encouraged me to give them a call. I so wanted to and I was so nervous to. Those are scary, stressful, sad calls to make.You never want to catch them at a bad moment, or cause them further stress, or say the wrong thing....there are so many fears associated with doing hard things.

What does one say that could possibly help such a situation? Well, nothing really. I guess the only answer is love. Love really is the answer to so many of life's challenges. We can't make them go away but we can love others -and even ourselves- through them.

Yesterday I had a same day surgery which went well but the recovery has been a little rougher than I anticipated. I've had this small procedure before and my memory was that I came right out of the anesthesia feeling fine and chatting away with the nurses. Then I went home and slept all afternoon and was feeling pretty normal afterwards. But my memory may be failing me.

Yesterday, I struggled that first hour out in recovery and they kept me longer than they expected. I was miserable. But after about 90 minutes I was feeling better, craving a milkshake and ready to go home. I spent the rest of the day in bed trying to sleep which was very on and off. Happily I slept most of the night at least. Making a phone call just wasn't on the radar yesterday. I did feel that I absolutely needed to do it this morning though.

I woke up early and it was too early to call. Then I went back to bed, so when I woke up again at 11 a.m., there was a sense of urgency I felt to make the call. I wasn't exactly prepared, didn't feel like I'd thought through it enough in my mind to have the right things to say. My one worry was that I would call right in the midst of him passing away - the very worst moment possible.

These kinds of calls are such "grown up" things to do. Why is it that they reduce us to feeling awkward and 12 years old? I grabbed my phone and went upstairs, got their number out of my address book - for some reason it wasn't in my phone, even though I know I called them not that long ago. I dialed and it kept ringing and I started preparing myself to leave a voicemail. That was good I thought, I wouldn't be bothering them.

Then a woman's voice picked up. I knew it was probably one of several relatives, so I told her who I was and since I know most of their family she recognized me. It was their oldest daughter.

I told her I didn't want to bother her mom but just wanted to leave a message and let her know I love her and was thinking of their family. I can't remember the exact words she used but she implied that he was in the process of passing away right then and would be gone soon. She said she would gladly give her mom the message. I told her I didn't want to keep her so she could return to her father's bedside and I said goodbye.

It was less than a minute on the phone, maybe only 30 seconds, in moments like this it seems like time has no relativity. I was so glad I did it even though my worst fear that I would call just as he was passing may have been the case. I will have to wait to hear an update later. I was glad I didn't wait any longer. Another experience added to my "grown up-edness". I am so sad for their family. The past few years have been difficult with his failing health. Though his imminent passing comes as no surprise to them and is relief of suffering for him, I am sure it is still very hard to say goodbye.

I find the older I get, and the more good friends and family I have in heaven, the less it scares me. I know who will meet me when I get there. It makes me teary-eyed to say that, but there are people there I dearly, dearly miss. My wonderful friend PJ, I miss all the time and I think of her especially today when our mutual friend is coming her way. I can't wait to hug her, see her beautiful smile, twinkling eyes and to laugh with her again. She was taken very suddenly and it was such a shock.

There are other faces I cannot wait to see again and laughter and tears I cannot wait to share when we meet again. There are people there I love and have never met, like my inlaws. There is a best-friend cousin who died when we were toddlers. Okay now I'm crying. Ack. I know there are all our ancestors there who are cheering us on and loving us daily. Oh, heaven is a good place.

But wow, is it hard to let people we love go there. I know they are not so far away and still loving us and watching over us. It will be a comfort to some day know their world and how they've been caring for us and loving us all along. I will look forward to seeing all these people I love again and thanking them for all they have meant to me both on earth and in heaven.

Parenting Lessons: They're Ready When They're Ready

I have been experiencing a great reminder in the parenting department lately. Not all kids develop at the same time and in the same way. Duh, right? But I'm definitely getting a refresher course. Life experiences, personalities, energy levels, motivation, skills -- they all come into play in how a child grows and learns. This has been a learning experience for the two of us as parents because we are both very motivated and pushed ourselves to excel pretty much from birth.

Our kiddo, while also a #1 child, is also an only child, and is very different. She just is not as energetically motivated as we are, so things that would motivate or deter us as children do not work at all with her. Tell her she will lose out on dessert or other rewards doesn't motivate her. She doesn't push for what she wants and then sometimes is disappointed when things don't go as she has hoped, even though she hasn't let us know what she's interested in or wants. She had not picked up on things as fast we we did as kids. She went through some pretty traumatic things in her first five years, so we certainly can't compare our experiences.

Having said that, it's been great to see her evolution recently and to be reminded that kids learn and grow at their own pace. She may not have the same desire to jump into things with the passion and motivation her dad and I did when we were young, but when she decides to do something and is ready she goes from zero to sixty in a day. This is opposed to her dad and I trying things at a younger age and having a longer, slower learning curve.

We tried to start her in skiing four years ago for one day and it went okay. But when we finally got her back on skis two weeks ago she went from zero to riding the chairlift by herself and making down the mountain in just a few minutes, even if she fell a time or two - and was absolutely fearless. She'd jump right up.

In our concern about her commitment, we had talked to her several times before that day telling her that this was a big financial commitment and something that we both really loved to do. We really hoped to see a real commitment in her and that she would make the financial investment worth it by giving it her best. I wondered if she'd make it through the first morning lesson, especially because it was a nasty cold day. She did! Then was gunning to get back out to the afternoon lesson. She was the first one they announced was ready to ride the chair lift at the end of the afternoon lesson. She was gunning to get off the tow rope and onto the lift with dad and up on the big mountain.

She zipped up and down with Dad for four runs and then announced that Dad had told her she could ride the lift to halfway by herself and she wanted him to go back to the big boy runs. I was not thrilled about this, but I could see the enthusiasm in her eyes, and her dad was okay with it, so I bit my lip and said, "Go for it!" Then my stomach knotted up as I watched her hop on the lift and head up the mountain all alone. I wondered if we'd told her enough times not to lean over in the chair. Was she holding on?!!! I share this panic as a former ski lift operator for two seasons and yes I did see someone fall out of the chair once. I watched our kiddo and held my breath all the way in a bit of terror.

And soon she was off the lift and zipping down the mountain in her cute little beginning c-curves. She's been begging to go back again and I think this coming Saturday we'll get her back on the mountain again and this time I'll go along too.

The day before this she went to a friend's birthday at an ice rink. Last year she'd gone on a field trip to a roller rink and fallen and hit her head and just didn't get the whole skating thing. So she and we were a little hesitant about how ice skating was going to go. But once she got there with all her friends, they helped her, which I loved, and she learned to ice skate and had a great time. that was another victory for her and I was so happy to hear how it had gone afterwards.

I've been trying to get her interested in cooking and taking more responsibility in meal prep for years. She's done pretty well, but never taken an interest in baking or cooking which I was doing very early on. Recently I've been giving her specific cooking tasks that she can own for the family. For instance, she's our official rice maker. She can throw rice and water into the rice cooker and turn it on. Easy peasy. She knows how to make a few other simple things too.

Last Saturday afternoon I came back from the gym to learn that she's made a big meal for her dad, reheating some roasted vegetables and a big plate of eggs and was already cleaning the kitchen. I've been underestimating her! I was impressed. And now I see all those years of little lessons coming into play in a big way.

I think that is another lesson, sometimes we just underestimate what our kids can do. She's suddenly ready for more independence and is making leaps and bounds right now. She is clearly in a positive growth spurt with her skills and abilities. That's exciting and I'm looking forward to seeing the leaps she'll take in the coming months! Fun stuff. She'll be turning 11 in just a few weeks and suddenly I'm realizing 11 is a pivotal age. Ten still feels young, but 11 is just 12 short months away from turning 12-years-old, which opens up an entirely new world for her. So I'm feeling inclined to be very thoughtful about this year of 11-years-old and preparing her for middle school and many other new experiences coming very quickly her way.

I told someone recently that parenting is hard not only because we're raising kids but we're also raising ourselves as first time parents to each and every child. No experience is ever the same with different kids. It's a constant learning curve and the idea that we'll ever be perfect at it is silly. But it's a fun adventure to keep trying and to learn along with them. We love our Kiddo and even though it's hard to see her growing up so fast, I try to keep reminding myself that there are a lot of joyful adventures yet to come. I'm excited to see how she'll choose to tackle them and I'm hopeful that we as parents can help her in the best way possible.

It's The Best Day Of The Year So Far!

When I read this Ralph Waldo Emerson quote on January 1, posted on Instagram by LatterDayHome it really inspired me and turned into a project I hadn't anticipated. I decided that at the end of each day I would write a Facebook post on my personal page sharing how that day was the best day in the year so far.

image by kalanicut

While it was still the holidays it was pretty easy to have something fun and/or adventurous to share each day. Days were relaxing, the world was quiet and we were at ease. After a few days I started getting comments from friends about how much they loved the posts and how it was inspiring them to think about each day as the best day. I was surprised because I could kind of imagine some of my snarkier FB friends were quickly getting annoyed with my daily Pollyanna posts!

When I started this FB habit I really didn't know if I would do it for a couple of weeks, or the month of January. I certainly couldn't imagine keeping up with it for the entire year. Not sure it's something I can just stop now though.

It's been a real lesson in seeing the positive. Some days that is so easy to do. And then there are "the other days" when things go crummy, when one doesn't feel well, the family is all grumpy or some little but painful tragedy strikes (like losing all your Word files on your computer, which happened to The Man last week.) Those days are not so easy to be cheerful and grateful for and it is indeed a challenge to see how a day like THAT could possibly be the best day in the year so far.

I certainly don't want anyone to think we don't suffer some days or that we don't have hard days, because we definitely do and I would even say part of every day is hard in some way.  Hardship does not escape any of us. I also don't want to imply that I don't see and deeply feel those challenges or that I don't feel sad or angry or many other negative emotions. But I do work really hard to limit the amount of time I spend wallowing in those emotions. I try to climb out as quickly as possible so that I can move on to something more productive and less depressing.

There have been a couple of days where I have been tempted to skip it altogether because it felt totally dishonest to say it was even a great day, let alone the best day in the year so far. But then I took a few minutes to review my day and I remembered the amazing, good things that had happened. Things like finding a pair of jeans that fit and that I actually liked! Miraculous! Having a friend give us a big cheery cheesecake pie. Delicious! Taking a nap. Fantastic and rare! Every time I was tempted to skip, I realized that there were in fact things that made that day a best day that I was overlooking or that had been overshadowed in my emotions or lack of emotion by other things.

It's been fun to push myself to feel gratitude for each day and in a way this is another type of gratitude journaling that I have done in the past in a bound journal or on a sheet of paper numbered for each day of the month. Sometimes I feel a little "exposed" sharing our daily events with a few hundred people but it's an opportunity to SHINE some positivity out into the world and that is one of my top five goals in life so I think it's worth it, despite the vulnerability. 

The positive comments from friends have definitely been the guiding light. One friend even started posting her own "best day in the year so far" posts each day which I love reading. Yesterday I posted the above photo and a challenge to all my friends on FB to start posting their own "best day in the year so far" gratitude posts and then to challenge all their friends to do the same. I challenge you to do the same whether it's on Instagram or Facebook or any social media channel. What a happy chorus of gratitude and seeing the good that would be across the internet! I'd love to hear from you if you take the challenge!

*Update: A friend commented on my "best day so far" post last night on Facebook that she hoped I would print a book with each day's entry along with a photo at the end of the year. I thought that was a fantastic idea. I told her I wasn't sure I'd make it the entire year and she wisely suggested that even a month would make a great picture book. I will try to do that. I was so glad she shared this suggestion!

My Word For The Year 2017

I usually have my desk sign for my word of the year created a few weeks before the new year or at the very least in the first week of the year. This year for some reason after Christmas I had a hard time getting around to some of the smaller errands, one of which would be going to the craft store to get supplies for my sign.

Last week I had two appointments early in the mornings so I decided that on my way home from both appointments I would run a few errands that I'd been wanting to take care of. They were both fun, one was going to the craft store for supplies for my sign and the other was doing some January sales clothing shopping.

My first attempt at my sign was going to be to use a blank white canvas with some colorful, bold sticker letters. They were pretty, with lots of different patterns to choose from, so my sign would be very high energy and bold.

Unfortunately when I got home I realized that some of the letters in the pack were especially wide, much wider than others, particularly the R and S. So when I tried to layout my sign, the canvas was not wide enough to fit all the letters. Ugh.

Disappointed, I decided to take another route. I had purchased some 6" round plain wood pieces, a chalk marker  and chalkboard paint to make new Valentine's Day themed signs for my door baskets. So I decided to also paint my canvas and try a simple but bold chalkboard treatment for my sign instead.

It took about 3 coats of paint to completely cover the canvas and while I was at it I painted all my wood rounds too. I let them dry for a couple of days before I could get back to them. Making this sign was the first time I've ever used a chalk marker. It has the same potential messiness of the metallic markers I like to use...sometimes it can bleed a little too much, etc. But the great thing about the chalk marker is that it's not permanent like the metallic markers. It's easy to clean up and fix mistakes. I made a couple and I just used a damp cotton swab to clean up the errors and straighten up lines.

So my word for the year is fearless. I think it applies to my life in a variety of ways, but one of the things I've regretted in the past is not asking enough questions, not asking for what I want and not asking for help. I think all those things happened because I was afraid to ask. So I want to be bold this year in telling people what my goals are, asking for their help, not being afraid to trust my instincts and to be bold in my attempts at everything I do. I don't want to be afraid to just for what I want, need or think might be exciting. Because it really is true that you can and should ask for help in getting what you think you want. Even if it doesn't work out exactly like you expected you are always ahead of where you started.

This year, I'm working on several new ventures and I need to be bold. I have this little sign by my desk to remind me of what I need to do. It now joins Shine and Simplicity, my previous words of the year, in reminding me to live courageously, stay focused, keep it simple and let my light shine. Fun stuff! I'll be interested to see how the word fearless plays out in my life in 2017! Whatever happens, the goal is that all my decisions will be run through the FEARLESS filter before I choose a direction to go.

More on words of the year.
Word of the Year 2015: Shine
Word of the Year 2016: Simplicity
This Is My Time 2014

Do you have a word of the year? I'd love to hear about it in the comments. You always inspire me.

Yay! I Survived The First 20 Days of January!

Well I can't tell you how happy I am to see that we are 20 days into January 2017. Here's why. For some reason during most of the previous five years I have had major tumult happening in the beginning of January EVERY year and all of it unexpected. So I am absolutely celebrating that we are at the 20th of January and my life has been calm, cool, peaceful and uneventful.

To give you an example of what has been happening in past years, here are just a few of the January surprises I/we have experienced. All of these events happened in the first three weeks of January.

In 2011, I had my potentially fatal mastoiditis infection and hospitalization. That lead to six months of hearing loss in my left ear and some other challenges that were very challenging to deal with. Learning to live without the gift of hearing is chock full of some difficult lessons. It is scary to have someone or a car come up behind you when you can't hear anything coming!

In 2013, we got married while The Man was home for two weeks R and R, got custody of his daughter and she came to live with me while he went back to the war. That was a tough day when we sent him back for six five more months and I became a full-time stepmom by myself.

In 2015, with two weeks notice, we uprooted our family and I moved to New Mexico for an exciting new job while The Man and Kiddo moved to San Diego and we lived apart and I commuted on weekends to California for 8 months. Every weekend in January I flew home to pack up our house. That part was awful.

In 2016, I broke my foot in five places and ended up in a cast until May. Still recovering from this doozy. After lots of therapy and such, my latest blessing is yoga, which has really been helping me recover my balance and stability on my feet. I think it's also got to be helping some with swelling in my foot and ankle too, getting the blood and energy flowing throughout the body.

Given all that there's no doubt that this year I was feeling a little nervous about facing the beginning of January again. But I am a little more confident that the first month of this year may be without incident and we are all healthy and well. Looking back I am also recognizing again the blessings that came from all those experiences, even though they were beyond challenging. Even though some of the events were great, great things -- there were also some very difficult pills to swallow with each big change and quite a bit of acute stress at the time.

So here's to 2017, may she be a great one. Monday I'll share with you my word for the year. It actually ties in quite nicely with the theme of this post. If you have a theme word for 2017 I'd love to hear it if you want to share it in the comments.

Re-establishing A Morning Routine

I am working on establishing a new morning routine in 2017. This includes getting more sleep. Which is always a challenge for me...as has been mentioned here a multitude of times. Another part of my mornings now is my yoga practice. I have to tell you that after I finished yoga and meditations/positive affirmations this morning I felt so amazing I couldn't believe it. My body felt good, my spirit felt light and I was ready to take on the day.

This was our sunrise this morning. I pays to once in a while be the one who drags the trash can up to the street. Sunrises and sunsets in New Mexico are just one of the very best things about living here! This view is an amazing way to wake up and get going in the mornings.

Yesterday evening I fixed up our former storage room, that is actually our family room. I started it a while ago and then yesterday got the push to move it forward again. It's a really weird space so it has been frustrating to try to decorate. I'll share a bit more about that soon. Our house is all tile and brick floors except for two small bedrooms on one side of the house, so one thing we miss is a nice soft, carpeted floor to stand and walk on.

With a big, cushy vintage rug, we bought at the estate sale from the house we originally hoped to buy, now covering most of our family room we now have another soft spot for our tootsies and we couldn't be happier. Unfortunately the dog also quite likes this rug which leads to the necessity for constant vacuuming, even though his kennel and a big dog rug/bed is just a couple of feet away from our nice rug.

But today I finally had a soft spot to lay down my yoga mat for my morning practice. It was heavenly after lying on a yoga mat on brick and tile floors trying to find a comfortable spot. The family room is now my space and I love it! Had the most fantastic morning doing 20 minutes of yoga and then 10 minutes of meditations. I just made up my own positive affirmations this morning and it was great. I have been reading again about the power of visualization and I really want to make that a more powerful element in my life!

Part of my morning rituals are also some scripture reading, prayer and journal time. Right now I am keeping two journals simultaneously. One is a health and fitness journal where I am tracking my food intake, exercise, and progress in my journey to better self care and overcoming some current health challenges. Then I have my regular journal where I keep all sorts of thoughts, plans and a record of daily events, progress, etc. I have noticed that being consistent with my journaling the past month has really helped me stay more even-keeled and less uptight and worried about life. Being able to unravel and deconstruct moods and thoughts helps a lot.

Another thing I have been working on is praying in the mornings, throughout the day and in the evenings about specific goals. I feel like it has really helped me to seek calm and peace in God, which helps me to stay more grounded and centered and thus more focused on the important things. I'll share more about that soon too.

It does take a couple of hours to get this all done in the mornings but it's so worth it and when I take that time for me first thing in the morning I feel much more empowered and cared for during the day. It reminds me of some great advice a friend one gave me about giving to myself first in the day so I can better give to others the rest of the day.

Taking time for important things that feed the soul first thing in the morning has always been an valuable and joyful part of healthy living for me. I believe it helps me to be a better person throughout the day. It lowers my stress levels - which improves my health too. I'm feeling so good with a better morning routine in the new year! The best part is all of this healthy living and good feeling is that it is absolutely free, doesn't cost a dime and is so much better than seeking temporary comfort in food, shopping, TV or other less filling attempts to fill one's emotional bank account.

Mom Pains: Sending Kids Out Into The World

Our Kiddo is halfway through the fifth grade now. Hard to believe. Seems like just yesterday I was walking her to her first day of school at her new school in January 2012. I cried that day with joy. And still all these years later I am amazed that every morning when I send her out the door I still feel a little pang of maternal protectiveness and sadness that I have to send her out into the big world alone, even though I know she's excited and wants to go.

It seems that in parenthood, we're always looking to get out of the current phase, newborn sleeplessness, diapers, potty training, nigh terrors, peeing the bed, toddler tantrums and right on up to disrespectful tweens and limits-pushing teenagers. There is so much talk about "Ugh, these kids, this day!"

But one thing no one ever really prepares you for or perhaps we can't be prepared for is how fast it all goes. It seems that every empty nester gets it. Truly the days ARE long but the years ARE short. With ever passing year they become more independent and more excited about things happening away from you and away from home.

Oh, to have more of this perspective when they are tiny and be able to drink it in more - those days when they think the entire universe revolves around you, your arms, your smile, your hugs and kisses. Just like an infant, every week or so, our kiddo looks different: older, taller and right now, more gangly. She's exhausted from growing and learning and seeing so much every day. I still even now, need to be reminded to enjoy these days. When I can't understand why her room is a mess, even when she cleans it every day. When we are talked back to. When a few minutes of screen time results in grumpy, zombie behavior.

I know that 18 is not far away. I remember when she was three years old and very much wanted to do something that you have to be 12 years old to do. I remember how we talked about it being nine more years until she would be old enough. In a few weeks she will be 11 and after that it will be just 12 short months until she turns 12. Where did that time go?!

Because she is the only kid we'll ever raise in our household- and certainly not by choice - I think the pain of her growing up may be a little more acute. We got one chance and soon enough it will be over. No chance to experiment on another kid or fix mistakes we have learned. No other toddlers to hug and kiss and be agitated with when they draw crayons on the furniture or red permanent marker on the white kitchen floor.

Every morning as I hear the sliding door close behind her and the "love you"s and "have a great day"s have been hollered across the house, I feel a little sad for us, but try to always remember to be happy and excited for her. She wants to go out into the world...and she must. But I wonder now if it always pains a mother's heart a little to send her little ones out of the nest, knowing they'll come back now and then but that the time will get shorter and shorter each time.

What amazing lessons parenthood teachers us and how much bravery it requires! I made a comment on a social post about motherhood the other day saying not only is raising a child difficult but it becomes even more challenging because we're also raising ourselves as parents. That is not easy. But what a fantastic experience God has given us, in whatever capacity it may come, as a parent, extended family member or family friend to be a part of a child's life, to see life through their eyes and have the chance to inspire, guide and love them -- and BE loved by them. I'm glad it stings a little every day because it reminds me to be grateful and present in that moment.

Favorite Gifts From The Holidays

Now that the holidays are packed away and we're full steam ahead into the new year,  I thought I'd take a few minutes to share some of my best gifts from the holidays. I got a few things that are really just so ideal for me.

I think it's incredibly hard for little kids to figure out a really valuable and useful gift for parents. So I try to think of things that are in a kid budget and that can be personalized by a kiddo for parents. This year I asked for a binder that I could keep all my latest recipes in. I have a set of beautiful green and white binders where I organized all my printed and clipped recipes I've collected over the years. Unfortunately they are all still packed in boxes because we are still waiting a year later for our contractor to fix our brick floors which continue to sink. They've been "fixed" once but it didn't really work and we've been waiting for them to come back. Sigh. So I haven't really unpacked or set up one side of our kitchen yet where a bookcase will be and where I can store all my binders.

So I have printed out a few old recipes and then I've been collecting a few new recipes and just putting them in a stack in a kitchen drawer. Not super tidy, effective or pretty...plus the recipes were getting food stains on them. Ick. Kiddo, with a little help from The Man, decorated a nice binder with plastic sleeves that I could put those recipes in. I loved it and it's going to be a favorite keepsake for our family, I am sure. It is so nice to have all my most used recipes all neatly organized in the binder!

image via Kohls

Another gift I received that I am really excited about it a great new blow dryer. My old blow dryer died a month or so before Christmas, well it didn't die, but the heat element went out. So that didn't really work so well for me, but it's being used elsewhere for other things that don't require a lot of heat but do need forced air. One of my gifts from The Man was a new Conair Infinity blow dryer and it is the best blow dryer I have ever owned. My hair gets dry so fast and my hair looks super smooth. Amazing.

And there is one gift that hasn't arrived yet that I am very excited about now that it has turned true winter here in New Mexico. My parents got us an oversized king down comforter that should be arriving sometime in the next 48 hours. My parents gave us the money and I did the research to figure out what to buy and then ordered it. It has been so cold here the past week that I cannot wait to add a big fluffy comforter to our bed. We have a queen size one that we threw on the bed a few weeks ago, but it's just a place holder and not very pretty.

image via Amazon

Now with the down comforter I can finally finish up the bed decor for our room. I purchased a dark blue embroidered Nate Berkus comforter cover early in 2016 and it has just been waiting for a down comforter to fill it. Along with that I purchased an olive herringbone quilt to fold and put along the foot of the bed. I wanted to go for a more masculine bed and paired with white sheets I think I definitely hit masculine.

I picked up some pretty light gray velvet 12x18 pillows at IKEA last summer while in Utah to give our bed some feminine touch. I also want to add just a touch of fuschia with some embroidered or patterned pillows of some sort at some point. I did find some I loved at a ridiculous price last winter and I blew it and didn't pull the trigger when I first saw them and when I went back they were all gone. Lesson learned. When  get the bed all pulled together I'll post a photo with some details.

Oh I should also share with you what I got from Santa Claus. He was very good to me and got me quite a few things that were exactly what I wanted. How did he know???? The best thing I got were four books that I've been enjoying since Christmas and am looking forward to looking at again -- all home design and decor books that I've wanted for a while. I got both books from the Young House Love team of John and Sherry Petersik: Young House Love and Lovable, Livable Home, Gabrielle Blair's book Design Mom: How To Live With Kids and Emily Henderson's book Styled.

It was fun to have beautiful and inspiring books to thumb through the week after Christmas! I have read all four of them now, but am looking forward to thumbing back through them and just taking in all the images again for more inspiration. I grabbed a composition notebook and took notes for our house, room by room from the ideas I got from each author.

So there is my "gifts I received" holiday wrap up. I am so grateful for people who love me, know me and were so generous in their giving to me. I love my family. I like that all these things are things I needed and will use - a lot. Can't wait for that first nights sleep under our down comforter and every time I make a meal or blow dry my hair my gratitude warms my heart!