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.

Visits From Friends On Cross-country Drives

Because we live along a major east-west U.S. highway corridor, occasionally friends pass through town on their way across the country. It seems every summer friends from afar are driving through Albuquerque.

Just last night good friends from California, who have been on a cross-country vacation, asked if we wanted to meet up for dinner later this week. A couple of weeks ago we had the pleasure of great friends from L.A. coming to town while on a cross-country roadtrip. Such fun. We first learned they would be coming last winter so it seemed a long way out and then suddenly it was time for them to come.

We met up on a Friday morning to ride the world-famous Sandia Peak Tramway to the top of 10,378 ft. high Sandia Peak. We took a short hike and enjoyed the cooler temperatures and beautiful lush green forest and meadows you don't get in the desert valley!

It was fun to see the kids run wild and enjoy each other's company, for all of us to breathe in the fresh air and for the grown up ladies to be able to chat too. The tram ride is amazing and the immensity of the natural beauty and the size of the mountain are pretty astounding.

It was a great opportunity to reconnect and I am realizing that living along I-40 is a blessing for staying connected with friends from afar. Riding the Sandia Peak Tramway is one of the best and most enjoyable activities you can do in Albuquerque for the views of the vast desert landscape we live in, to see the city from above, to get close to the mountains and get close to nature. Once at the top there is a lot to take in and it is all so beautiful.

One of the things that makes catching up with old friends who are passing through town most successful is being very flexible. These groups are usually passing through town on a pretty exhausting driving schedule and they may be delayed or arrive earlier than expected. I think it's important to consider how they are feeling when they arrive and not put a lot of expectations on them.

So we try to be helpful, non-pressuring, considerate and amenable to what they feel they are up for. Our first questions are always "Is there anything we can do for you?" and "What are you feeling up for?" That may be a quick fast food dinner, a full New Mexican food feast, a visit to an indoor activity where it is a cool, a refreshing swim, time for kids to escape the car, stretch their legs and run around in a park, or any variety of things.

When my family keeps this in mind it's okay if we need to reschedule or cancel at the last minute. We understand road trips and know that being open to what works best for our friends is the best for everyone. So we go with the flow and try to be helpful and understanding and not be so excited to see our friends that we overwhelm or further exhaust them with energy, big plans or unrealistic expectations. This has worked out really well.

I am putting together a list of ideas for just such occasions since we know our city better than visitors would. I have a list of suggested hotels and restaurants in a variety of price ranges and excursion ideas and good parks. That way when they ask we can easily have ideas at the ready to share. Sometimes friends get in touch in advance and sometimes it's very spur of the moment so having some ideas at the ready makes this easy.

This ability to have so many friends visit our city was a completely unexpected surprise but we sure are enjoying it. It's fun to share our city, catch up and maintain lifelong friendships!

Summer Kick-off Trip

School ended near the last full week of May and then we had just the right amount of days to unwind and rest of before we headed off to visit family and attend sports camps. In the aftermath of our trip I will say that I really liked getting away and starting summer off with a bang right away. It was good for the soul to see family, get out of town out and be somewhere different, and start the summer fun of splash pads and picnics right off the bat.

Sometimes I find that if I don't really start summer off with intention for summer fun, suddenly it's late July or early August and we are just getting having our first barbecue, trip, big bike ride, night at the city park or baseball stadium and we've missed the majority of the summer. So jumping right into the spirit of the season the week after school got out was great.

Kiddo attended golf and basketball camps in the mornings and then in the afternoons and on the weekends we had time to spend with immediate and extended family. We met lots of cousins at a local splash pad one day and another day we took a fun evening bike ride around Midway, Utah. It is a wonderful little town that was settled by Swiss immigrants and has the look and feel of a beautiful quaint European village. After  our ride, that we had the best burgers and fries at a local food truck.

It was so good for the soul to be with our people, to see old friends and to be about different things than we generally are on regular days at home. I met up with a fun friend from California who is now an esthetician working in American Fork and had a great facial and chat. Things have changed so much since I lived in the area where I grew up that it's a challenge for me to find my way around anymore. But it is fun to adventure to new places that I often hear about from locals that I haven't been to.

I also had a chance to do a little undisturbed clothing shopping and scored on a few great deals on summer clothes. We enjoyed some great meals at my folks home and out to eat at fun old favorite eating spots and some "new to us" spots too. I think I got a bit of heat exhaustion one day and eating a lot of salads really helped with recovery. Fresh fruits and vegetables just make summer such a happy time for me.

We were sad to leave everyone, but once we were home we were also happy to be back in our own home, beds and routine. Thanks to our fun 10-day trip we came home in full summer mode. Even though we have work, home chores, classes and camps to attend to,we are still making the most of summer by taking some free time every day to relax, swim and watch a little TV or go somewhere fun. Bedtime has also gone out the window, for better or worse. It feels like it's okay so far and I think everyone in the family seems to be benefitting from taking a break from the rigorous and tiring routine of the school year.

It's been insanely hot since we got back and we feel like we're roasting a lot of the time, so that downtime really does help us keep our sanity and stay as cool as possible. Swimming has helped cool down our core body temps in the late afternoons and we stay cool the rest of the day. What a blessing it's been to have a pool, even though we kept telling our realtor we did not want a pool. But there are a lot of houses in the southwest that have a pool so it's not always so easy to find the house you want that doesn't have a pool. In the end I'm so glad we have a pool. Lesson learned. Living in the southwest and having a pool is a good thing.

Summer is in full swing now. Kiddo is in a local golf camp this week and I am working as much as I can while also making time for downtime for myself, with the family and with friends. One thing I still want to work on is getting out with friends to do things. I am not very good at initiating plans but am always so happy when friends call and invite us to do things. This summer I want to plan some mom and kids outings and a few night time family picnics. Better get on that!

Revisit & Update: Making Networking Less Stressful

I've come a long way in my courage to network in the past two years. Working in the tourism industry and interacting with local business and civic leaders as well as attending events with other tourism organizations from across the country I had lots of chances to get to know people and make new connections. It's much less intimidating to me now, but it easier when you do it often. It's been a little while since I've attended a lot of business events and I'm starting to do that more again, so I need to sharpen my blade to get out there and network.

I've been signing up for business networking events around town and my goal is to attend at least two a month. Last week I attended a Facebook Boost Your Business event at the convention center here. I think everyone was stunned at how many people showed up. It was a packed house. I learned some great things and met some people. Just what one needs to do when trying to network.

My next event is a business class at the end of this week. I'm going to go learn about making sure product pricing is profitable. It's always a challenge to sign up in advance and then keep the commitment to get there. The closer you get to the event the more one might chicken out. So it's good for me to have a goal and push myself to get there.

Networking whether it's at a child's school, in a new church congregation, at the gym or in business is always a little unnerving. Here's a post I wrote a while back about ways to make networking easier with some tips and how networking can help you get closer to your goals and dreams.

How do you make networking easier? I'd love to hear your tricks and tips in the comments below.

Two Things That May Make Kids Feel Unloved

I've been thinking about this for a bit and more importantly looking at ways I can NOT be doing these two things that I believe make kids feel uncared for. The first is Busyness and the second is Tiredness. A big facet of both of these is stress.

These two words seem to be somewhat synonymous with parenting, but I think we have to be very careful that those words do not become more a part of our household than feelings of warmth, welcomeness, love, peace, caring and togetherness. We grown ups seem to get very carried away with talking about our tiredness and our busyness and I think that rubs off on kids which makes them more distant and gives them a sense that they should not bother us which the believe will only cause us to be more tired and more busy - and possibly more grumpy and more unpleasant to be around.

When kids feel their parents are too busy and too tired they are less likely to choose to talk to them about things they are struggling with, that make them sad or that even make them happy and excited. They are more likely to retreat to far spaces in the house to be away from the busyness and tiredness (aka STRESS) and get involved in activities that are not that beneficial to them like long hours of gaming, texting, etc. They are likely not cleaning their rooms, reading, eating healthy food, and being otherwise productive as they might with more parental involvement.

This is a bad cycle to get into! I wonder how often we are actually pushing our kids away and not realizing it. Another big parent distraction that likely all parents will admit to shamefully is time on what my husband calls "fidget devices" - phones and computers. There is likely no parent alive who hasn't let a child walk away feeling a little uncared for when preoccupied on the phone or computer. I know when I am working at the computer, even on worthwhile activities, I can lose track of time and kid and that is not a good thing.

I think for me the goal I have to keep this from being a problem in our home is to avoid busyness and the very appearance of it. I have to keep paring down and cutting back and getting rid of activities that are not my top priorities, even if I love to do them. I have to prioritize what is best for the family and for me -- a mix of those things, but I have to have a very few items that make that list.

Next is self care. I've written about that here many, many times. If I'm not well I can't do my best with other people or myself. That means taking time to unwind, taking care of eating well, getting exercise and doing things that feed our souls. This  year I have been sleeping much more than I have historically and it has been a big difference. I have gone from 4-6 hours of sleep a night to 8-10 hours many nights. The difference in my abilities and functionality is a little big frightening. My physical health has improved a great deal too and gosh darn it, it feels good to actually feel good!

Lastly I think I want to be very cautious about how we talk around our kiddo. I want to take "I'm so busy" and "I'm tired" out of our vocabulary and incorporate the feelings and words that say "I have time for you.", "How can I help  you today?" and "Can we spend some time together?" into our every day. I want to open up the opportunities and dialogues that build stronger relationships, especially as we head into the teen years.

So even if I do feel a little "stressed", "busy" or "tired", I'm not going to put that on my Kiddo. She needs to know I'm "available", "looking for hugs" and am full of love, time and energy for her.

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.

Organizational Frustrations

I woke up yesterday morning ready to start our next Spring Break organization project and soon found myself quite frustrated. As I was making our bed I started tidying up the room and while I was putting away a half unpacked suitcase that has been sitting next to my bed for two weeks I got really mad at myself. You can't have organization if you don't take the few seconds or minutes it takes to put things away after you use them.

I put everything from the suitcase up on the freshly made bed and started putting things away two by two, one item for each hand. It took me only about three minutes to get that suitcase cleaned out and put away and I felt so mad at myself for letting that go for so long. Life is so much easier when everything has a place and is put back into place after it is used. I've let that slip, my family is terrible about that and it just hit a breaking point with me yesterday.

Next I quickly cleaned up my bedside table which had gathered an assortment of essential oils, lotions, pens and hairbands and put all that away in the drawer not more than one foot away where all those things have a place. Then I cleaned off my dresser which had gathered an assortment of small recently laundered items that needed to be put away, shopping receipts and dust. This all took me less than 10 minutes to do and that made me even more annoyed that I wasn't doing a better job keeping it tidy.

It's amazing how much lack of organization can wear on a soul, how cranky one feels to be around it and how the solution can be so simple. "A place for everything and everything in it's place" is a motto to live by! I have lived like that in the past and, as I have many times, I credit a dear friend for teaching me this. I was already part of the way there but when I saw her system it changed my life and made my life so much easier and organized. Then I went and got a family and things started eroding.

I had the luxury of living alone for long enough to really settle into that motto and I knew where my things were. Everything had a home, I lived with only what I needed and I could easily put things away and find things. That is not nearly as easy when you are dealing with a family's worth of stuff, have people moving things around, not putting things away and just a ton more stuff. Compound that by the fact that you married someone who finds sentimentality (like tee shirts from high school, 90s jeans, Sunday comics) and "I might need this in the future for something" (like bits of 550 cord and  advertisements for things he might need in five years) to be constants.

I keep thinking that if I can just set the example by keeping all my things tidy that it will serve as an example for the family and that will spread throughout the house, but I have yet not been able to keep my stuff together to a noticeable level. I have talked to enough moms and wives and working women with and without families to recognize that there is only so much time in a day and there has to be some logical realization that you can't do everything perfectly every day and there have to be priorities and that those can change fairly regularly or with changing needs.

Keeping a house tidy all the time with a family is a big challenge. Just upkeeping the kitchen throughout the day is challenging enough, let alone other main living spaces like living rooms, family rooms and bathrooms. Don't even get started on attics, yards and garages. Then there are jobs, church and civic work, family activities, needs for quiet time and attention to family members, doctors appointments, groceries to buy...it seems to never end.

I admire a family who can keep that all organized and together. And then I wonder sometimes at what cost that comes. Do we make our families completely miserable and make them feel unwelcome in their own homes because of our obsession with tidiness and order. Do we just become constant "cleaning police" and lose ourselves in cleaning hypervigilance. Some women just wear themselves out trying to do it all by themselves at the sacrifice of their own mental and physical health. I know that is the pendulum swinging the completely opposite direction but I do think that with each family it is different. Perhaps my situation is a bit unique because I gained a family instead of starting a marriage with one spouse and not much stuff. We already had two full lives of belongings and started with a young child. Some habits at midlife are pretty hard to change.

I don't know exactly what the solution is but it looks like I'm either going to find it or bounce around somewhere near the solution or make myself crazy trying to find it. Ha! How do you manage this and stay in your sane zone? What have you learned to let go of and what have you enforced that helped make your life less crazy and more organized? I'd love to hear your insights!

Spring Break Plans: House Projects & Fun

We're officially on Spring Break and since we aren't traveling I decided we need to make the most of it in two ways: we need to get some house projects done while we are all three at home and second we need to make sure our kiddo has some fun. Last Friday I sat down with a "plan your week" printout and started planning.

When we first closed on our house about 18 months ago we were hard charging to get things done. We ripped out the pond/planter in the kitchen and got the floors replaced, painted the walls, hung a chandelier and replaced the flooring in the office/laundry room, painted the downstairs bedrooms, replaced all the lightbulbs in the house with energy efficient ones...and then the holidays came and the week after that my foot accident. Screech went the brakes.

Then we moved into the house because is was so much easier for me to maneuver around in on crutches. And then we went into survival mode until summer while I hobbled, worked full time and we found ourselves incredibly busy. Now here we are months later and this house has just never gotten organized like it should have with a proper move in. It's just been survival mode and disorganized and I can't take it.

Now unfortunately the rest of the family has developed some bad habits about not putting things away and things not having a proper home and it's going to be crazy hard to create new habits now. But it has to be done for everyone's sanity, most importantly mine. So not only do we need to reorganize the entire house but we really need everyone to commit to keeping it that way. This is going to be a real challenge.

So I came up with a plan for Spring Break week where we'll do a project in the morning and then we'll go have fun in the afternoon. This way there is some earning and ownership of work in the mornings and then we have something to look forward to and relax doing in the afternoon. Hopefully I'll get buy in from the family. I called a Family Meeting on Friday night to have a conversation about how things got to where they are, what we can and need to do and how we can accomplish this during our Spring Break week. Hopefully this is going to get everyone on board for the duration of the week.

I was really committed to starting at the front door and working our way through the house but the more I think about it the more I think we need go start in the garage and work our way through the house from that direction instead. That way we'll have available storage for things we need to move out of the house in the garage. The Man has been working out there from time to time going through boxes and such and I have a feeling there are a ton of half empty or empty boxes that we just need to get out of there or finish cleaning out.

I think we are all ready to get rid of more stuff. I anticipate we'll have a big load for the thrift store this week. It will be great to get the garage in better shape and then move on to the house. I am learning that at times things are much easier to accomplish than expected and sometimes they are much harder. I'm not sure which the garage will be but fingers crossed things are in better shape out there than any of us expect and we'll be able to make some big progress quickly.

We need space in the garage for all the home improvement tools and products that are now set up in our family room. It was great when we were working on the house daily in the winter, but I don't think we need it in the house anymore. It could all be arranged nicely in the garage and we need to reclaim that space in the family room desperately. The Man continues to complain that there is no storage in this house, but in reality we just aren't using any of it to its proper use. We actually have a lot of space it's just not being used well.

I've come to realize what seemed like a very big family room really isn't and it has a terrible walking path from the sliding glass doors at the front of the house that leads right through the middle of the room at a weird angle that makes it almost impossible to place furniture in any reasonable manner in that room. Whomever designed this house really blew it in a few places.

This may sound a little crazy, but I smudged our house with white sage and lavender and gave the house a prayer/blessing. I thought I would hate the smell of the smoke in the house but I didn't mind it at all and it didn't linger or bother anyone else. In fact the family seemed to like It. Ideally you smudge after you've decluttered but I think we needed a little energy burst to get us going again and then I'll do it again sometime soon.

I do feel like the house needs a energy cleansing and fresh start. Whatever it takes. Especially after our neighbor made the mistake of telling The Man that both the previous homeowners died in this house. Fresh start, clean energy for them and for us. I bought the sage a few weeks ago and it had just been sitting on the counter until I studied up and decided to try it. I asked the family if they felt the energy in the house was a little lighter and we all felt it was a strong "maybe." We'll see what happens.

Anyway I digress. So the plan is the cleanse the house in body and soul and have some fun this week adventuring around to more local museums and attractions. Hopefully by the end of Spring Break we'll have a very happily organized house and we'll have had a lot of good adventures too. Fingers crossed!

*Late-breaking update. Okay so our first day of Spring Break went pretty well, despite some crying and me telling a little person I needed to take her to the ER if her legs suddenly weren't working when we headed out to start working. Amazingly they were fine before and all day afterwards including for some pretty hard core play with neighbor boys most of the afternoon. Thankfully 5 minutes with ice on the knees solved that problem and make the work seem much less horrible. To be honest it was little bit of cat wrangling to keep everyone on point but we filled out recycling bin that will go out this morning and my little car is packed up ready for a thrift store drop-off. Everyone contributed and let go of some things too. That is a success. Our garage is a little cleaner. Yay!

I may have secretly odios-ed a few 90s clothing items that I didn't say anything about to the owner. I generally don't believe in doing this but at some point enough is enough and the emotional attachment to hideous old clothing is tooooo strong. If it's been in boxes since for over a decade I think we're done. The comedic highlight of this was when he donned a 90s tee shirt and some of those multi-colored body-builder muscle/workout pants guys wore in the late 80s. To make his point he even wore that outfit around the house for a few hours. Oh my gosh. Kiddo and I laughed so hard. I still can't stop laughing at the thought. I've told him I need to make him a quilt from those because he's obviously very attached! Scary.

I tried to keep the project at two hours but with all the dramatics and cat chasing it lasted more like three hours, but I was happy to shut it all down at a reasonable point. I had to pull everyone off the job and stop the work, which I think was good. I really like stopping BEFORE everyone was exhausted, worn out and cranky. Tomorrow I will try taking some music out with us.

I think we're going to do another day in the garage since we're all in a groove with it and it still needs a lot of work and we're kind of on a roll about what needs to happen in there. Wouldn't it be crazy amazing if we could someday park two cars in there. Wow.

Lessons From Home: You Can't Teach It All

It's so easy as a parent to get caught up in all the things you "need" to teach your child to prepare them for adult life. I have caught myself in the past feeling like we need to be teaching in our home every good thing I see other parents doing. What a folly and too much pressure. I learned to focus on doing what my family needs, not what every other family I know is doing cumulatively. That's not even possible to do every good thing every other family does, let alone worth stressing over. Now I pray and ask what we need to do and try to listen to inspiration as it comes.

Recently I have found myself feeling pressured about all the things we need to teach our kiddo to prepare her to go out in the world as an adult. The time is short, we've only got 7 1/2 years before she's off to college. Panic.

She needs to know how to budget time and money, how to work and earn money, how to manage adult relationships, how to live through a breakup and how to breakup with someone. She needs to learn how to fix things, how to make things, how to solve all kinds of problems from a broken down car to any variety of possible crises.

She needs to know how to keep house, fold sheets, make meals, buy groceries, eat healthily, get enough sleep and take care of her body, keep strong mentally and emotionally, clean house and learn to live with less so she can have less stress and work taking care of things. She needs to know how to get a passport, how to plan a trip....oh the list goes on and on and on.

Seriously between school, extra-curriculars, church, friends and much needed down time there aren't enough hours to teach her all of that to the level I think is needed between now and when she graduates from high school. More parenting stress. I don't want to send our Kiddo out into the world like some girls I've heard of who never learned to make a meal or had never turned on a dishwasher before, etc. Agh!

Then I thought back on my own youth and realized how much I learned once I left for college. There are a lot of people to learn from there. I also learned a lot during my time living in Denmark when I was 21-22. There are lots of opportunities to learn the skills of adult life from other people whether that be during high school, college or young adulthood. It's natural and good because other people may be able to reach her in new and more interesting or inspiring ways that we could.

"Finding myself" as a young adult was very often a reflection of experiences I had with people who grew up in different types of homes or environments that I did. It was inspiring and refreshing and often exciting to see how other people did things differently than we did in our home and it gave me a broader perspective to decide who I wanted to be and how I wanted to do things. It was all that exposure to things that were different than I was used to that taught me there were many ways to do things and many reasons to do them outside of what I experienced in the place and way I grew up. That was so educational and satisfying.

As I looked back on my own experience and made this realization, it was a huge moment for me to take a deep breath and not feel so pressured that we needed to teach her everything she needs to know about life before she graduates high school. There are still many learning opportunities between parents and children after that time too. Those do not stop at age 18. Realizing this helped me to step back and chill out.

So here's another unnecessary stress I'm going to let go of. I'm trusting in good people she will meet all along her path, I'm trusting myself to chill out and be a little more natural about this evolutionary process called raising kids, and I'm trusting her that she will keep making good decisions. I hope she will take opportunities to learn and grow through healthy relationships with others and will take opportunities to see the world through her own eyes, others' eyes and still hopefully sometimes my eyes too.

I'm also going to trust that no matter where she goes, she will take her relationship with God with her and he will watch over her. I don't need to do it all. I don't need to do it perfectly. I just need to do my best. I can keep trying to do that, without feeling overwhelmed or fearful. We can do our best and believe that good will come from it. What a relief....

The Bug's Patio Birthday Party

Yesterday was The Bug's birthday and the weather was so nice that in the late afternoon I decided to have part of our family celebrations outside and invite our dear neighbors over for presents, cake and ice cream. Children's birthdays always feel a little bit overwhelming as parents, covering all the necessary details even if it's just a family party. There are the gifts, a meal, decorations, cards, wrapping presents, and so many little details that start to feel a little overwhelming. It's amazing how exhausted you can feel at the end of a child's birthday. I almost feel like a big birthday last year was about the same amount of work as a family party...maybe less since we ordered pizza in for 15 girls!

Around four o'clock, as I was coming home from grabbing a few last minute groceries and a beautiful cake, I thought it would be more fun if we invited the neighbors, so I sent kiddo over to invite them. Then I started thinking about how nice it would be if we did all that outside. So I started zipping around the house looking for furniture we could take outside to use on the front patio.

I was rummaging around the house and then headed out to the garage where I found a nice fold-up rectangle table I forgot we had. Grabbed that, a bunch of chairs from the dining room table since we were using our more formal dining table seating area for dinner. Then I found a pretty tablecloth that I actually bought for a different purpose all together and threw that over the table. Started grabbing candles, flowers, cake candles, matches and took that and all the presents outside. I found a few little flower garlands to hang out there in my stash from last year's party.

This also gave me a chance to use one of my purchases from last summer, a covered tray to protect food outside. I gathered all the plates, cups, napkins, cutlery, ice cream scoop, cake knife and server there and took that all out to our table and we were ready for a starlight birthday celebration.

Then it was back inside to make dinner. The Bug requested steak, so we did steaks with marinated mushrooms and grilled onions. Earlier in the day I threw some baking potatoes into the slow cooker and I was so glad that got done early, took absolutely no time and didn't require turning on the oven for over an hour. Then I made Crack Broccoli which we are still eating almost weekly. We're on a big push for more leafy greens and so this is a great addition to our regular menu of kale/spinach smoothies and spinach salad.

Dinner was relaxing and delicious and by the time we got done eating we had about 15 minutes before our neighbors would arrive. We gathered the cake and ice cream, went out and turned on the lights and lit candles. It was fully dark by 7:45 when we saw our friends coming through the trees from their yard across the driveway with a flashlight. So fun. Our neighbor Cathy said the patio looked so romantic, which her husband thought sounded odd, but I know just what she meant and was so glad to know that we'd achieved "magical" and "inviting" with the scene.

We opened presents first. Our neighbors were so sweet to bring her a little ornament from their travels. A woodcut with a bear and fish. Her dad and I gave her some piano books, a book on drawing animals - which is a great talent of hers - and then she opened a few bike accessories which was the beginning of a little trick we played on her.

We told her that since she'd been enjoying riding her bike a lot the past few weeks that we thought she would enjoy a few bike accessories. That included a water bottle & cage for it, bike headlight, taillight and lights for spokes, etc. When she had opened them all, her dad said he thought he might have forgotten one of the accessories and he disappeared to go get it. She was fully engrossed in looking at her new books and was not paying attention to where her dad went or what he was doing.

When he walked up next to her chair with a shiny new bike, she still wasn't looking up. As her dad was walking up to her the neighbors were "Oooh"-ing and she looked up and her jaw dropped. She was speechless. She jumped up and threw her arms around her dad and kept saying thank you. She said thank you didn't seem like enough to really say what she felt. It was a little too dark for an initial ride and we need to adjust the handlebars and seat for her but she walked it around, inspected it, threw her leg over and and got a feel for it for a few minutes.

Her old bike was a little too small for her and we've known for a while that she needed a new bike. She was also very tired of pink bikes, three in a row and had made it very clear that she wanted a
mountain bike that didn't have girl colors. So she got the very boyish Gauntlet bike in camo and orange - and loved it. No more girly bikes with tassles around here!

We capped the night off with a beautiful cake from Whole Foods. I was going to make a cake and was looking forward to trying out the "make a box cake taste like homemade" and "make a box cake taste like a bakery cake" tips from Pinterest, but when The Man suggested I just go to Whole Foods and get a cake I thought that sounded pretty good. Once I got there though it was hard to choose. I love their Chantilly Cake and it is a perfect spring/summer cake with white cake and berries inside and out. But that  is my favorite cake and so associated with my birthday now that I thought I wanted to do something else for The Bug.

Chocolate cakes sounded so heavy, carrot cake sounded wintery. So I settled on a cake we hadn't tried before Strawberry Boston Cream Pie Cake. I knew it was flavors that everyone in our family would enjoy and it felt spring-like and not too rich, dense or heavy. When I told everyone at the table what kind of cake it was everyone reacted with oohs and ahhs so I was glad it seemed like the right choice for all five of us. It was delicious and light and creamy, just as I hoped and it paired so well with french vanilla ice cream too. Even after it was served and eaten The Man had another piece and then cut off another small corner and Kiddo was picking at it. We'll definitely enjoy the rest over the next couple of days.

I am so glad we took a few minutes to throw together something a little extra special to enjoy our front patio, which we've never done, and party under the dark, beautiful, star-filled New Mexico skies. It turned out to be a delightful evening and a good reminder that spur of the moment ideas when implemented can make a night one to remember.

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.

Our Big Kids Need Us Too

As The Bug has gotten older and much more independent, it's been a real process to understand what she needs. It's easier when kids are little. They need to go to the bathroom, they need to eat, they need attention. But when kids get older they start communicating what they need less and it becomes a big learning curve to understand where they are at in life and to connect with them, especially when friends become more important, and grown ups (especially parents) seem less interesting to them.

I've been realizing more and more that even if they act like they don't really need you or want you to spend time with them, that they do and they often communicate this by being a bit challenging or by ignoring you.

We've been reconnecting with our "not to little" Bug lately and I am realizing in a deeper way how much tweens and teens need time with their parents. If you offer they will come. We have been spending time watching TV series together, working on small projects, taking drives, going to museums and running errands. Friday night we did a tough home workout together and a couple of times since then she's mentioned how much she enjoyed it.

Sometimes we watch separate movies, spend time on own tablets or read our favorite books and magazines but we're together, curled up on mom and dad's bed. Even when we're doing separate things together there are still repeated moments of "love you" and stops for hugs and cuddles. Even though she acts like she doesn't need us nearly as much as when she was younger, she still does and she loves having our attention and just spending time relaxing or talking together.

It makes our home calmer, it makes her calmer. It helps us to act with more patience and wisdom in trying moments. It helps her want to be more sweet, a better listener and more obedient. It helps us all remember how much we love each other and to be gentle and kind with each other. We see the good in each other when we spend quiet time together and I find that many more compliments are passed in our home when we enjoy down time together and work time together.

There is more gratitude one for another and we miss each other more when we're not together even if it's just for the school day. She is more likely to share part of her day and things that excite her or bug her when we've spent time together. It provides quiet time to have important conversations, calmly discuss challenges and to encourage and support.

I find that it's very easy to keep myself busy and time can go by very quickly, even just an afternoon. It could be easy to let a day go by without quality time beyond dinner and bedtime. While I try to be very available, especially in the hours after school, I am reaffirming my efforts to make sure we spend quality and quantities of time together. It has brought an added sweetness to our home and I realize it helps all of us get through hard times better and to not let hard things get us down as much when we feel like a team and not alone to tackle life.

Spending time with our big kids has a major impact on the decisions they will make in their tween and teen years and I want to keep working on being a connected and loving parent who can help a child make great decisions and find happiness in life. I can definitely see, feel and hear a difference in our home when we spend time together. Big kids need us!

Emotional Goodbyes To Stuff

As I continue to declutter and simplify our home life I am finding some challenging goodbyes necessary. These separations are making for some serious consideration and decision making. I was inspired yesterday by this Instagram post by Clean House With Kids. Tricia says, "...best tip for keeping the kids' room neat? Get rid of stuff. Keep the things you and the kids really love."

The other day I was looking at a gift given to me by a friend years ago. It is sweet, charming and inspiring in intent, but honestly it is attached to some really bad, stressful memories and every time I look at it, it makes me feel stressed and brings back memories I don't really want to be reliving every time I look at it. So I decided to give it to the thrift store with a kiss and gratitude to honor the gift from my dear friend.

I also have a lucky penny a friend gave me over 10 years ago. I'm not sure how lucky that penny was or is, but I'm just not feeling an attachment to it anymore. It feels so attached to the past. Maybe I could spend it on something that makes me happy instead of having it in a little frame in my office. I like that idea and I think it honors the love in which it was given and in which it was received.

I found an old gratitude journal that is only half filled. It was a great thing at the time I was using it, a place of peace and comfort, but now when I look at it I feel stressed. Looking through the journal it's a bit of a history of hard times and things that didn't work out, embarrassing situations and hopes I had that did not come to fruition. I want to let that go too and I'm going to.

I would never give away a real, historical journal, but this is more wishes and dreams and I am ready to let the ancient past be just that. I have enough embarrassing journals to cover the time period...ha. I could cut out the junk pages and continue to use it, but it's the cover and the pages and the whole book that bothers me so holding on to it out of obligation to use the last of the paper seems odd. Maybe I can cut it out and use it for scratch paper. I use a lot of scratch paper.

I also have a rock collection that I'm wondering about the true value of. They were meaningful to me once upon a time sometimes because of the giver of the rock and other times because of the lessons I learned from studying them, but now I feel like I'm holding on to them out of some sense of obligation. I think it's time for them to go.

I have so many little trinkets and treasures that meant something once upon a time that now just feel obligatory and I feel guilty getting rid of them and I shouldn't. I don't need to keep everything that I've ever owned or that once meant something to me. It seems that I am entering a place of deeper cleansing both in body and life.

Physically I have been feeling much better the past two months than I had for quite a few months before that. I might credit that to continued heeling of my foot, the surgery I had in early February, a change in nutritional supplements and even perhaps an adjustment of my stress levels or letting go of some situations I have no control over. Doing more self-care and taking more time to do things I enjoy since Christmas probably has some impact on that as well.

As I progress to a more healthy physical state, I feel a companion drive to have my environment in a better state as well. I realize more and more how far behind my life fell in so many ways while I was "cast-bound" last year and in the still continuing recovery as well as the stress and magnitude of our 2015 move. We are still catching up with all the things that has to be put aside so that we could just get through the days and keep the family functioning.

I continued to function as an amazingly high rate of speed for the situation but in the long run, the toll that took on me and our family is still being felt. Had I taken things easier, I would probably be in a much better situation now, but I didn't have a lot of options a the time.

One of the things that we are so suffering from still is feeling and being settled in this house. There is still so much to do to really get it in a place where we will feel like we're really here, living here and feeling "at home". One of the things that I am feeling the impact of right now is the deep need to reorient my life to our new home, city, etc. There are things to let go of from our old life and I want to simplify life here so much so that we can just enjoy life rather than always feeling like we're trying to manage belongings, schedules and work.

Saying goodbye to things I don't really love anymore feels like an important step right now. That crosses over into so many facets. We have so many towels that are in crummy shape but totally still usable. We also have new towels. We don't need THAT many towels. Some need to go and we need to finally get our bathrooms and cupboards organized in a better way that works for us where everyone knows where to go to find things and where to put things away.

For this week I am going to start saying goodbye to things I don't really need or love anymore. I am ready to do that and ready to have a new, refreshed life, less encumbered with things I don't love. Hopefully that will catch on with my family and they will feel freed to give up some things too. I think it's time.

Are We Busy Or Are We Focused?

This morning I read this Instagram post by The Minimalists about multitasking and how we're doing more than we've ever done, how we're working more hours than we've ever worked and how busy-ness has taken over our world.

It got me thinking about how I use my time and what I'm giving time and attention to that I don't want to be. It's a constant battle not to let things creep into our lives that just pile up, muddy it up, make us tired and cause us grief. I find it's a constant battle just to keep it all at bay and try to find some sense of simplicity in life.

Moving into a house has definitely added to that and I find myself frequently missing living in a small apartment. Definitely the old grass is always greener because all a person wants when they are living in a small apartment is a house with a yard. Ha. In a house, there is more to clean, more upkeep, a yard to care for and more stuff in the house itself. It gets a little overwhelming and I think it takes some careful consideration to figure out what you can manage without losing your mind, when you'll need help and how plus what that will cost in time and resources.

One of the things I read in the post that struck me was the question "Are we busy or are we focused?" Busy for busy's sake still amazingly something humans tend to brag about. How often do we say or hear "Oh I'm so busy!" or "You know how busy life gets." I like the contrast between busy and focused. I would rather be focused and make the best use of my time and not feel dizzy with busy.

I recently talked with a good friend who is working on a new business. She said she is focusing two hours every day while her kids are at school to her business, 10 a.m. - noon. I like that realistic acknowledgement that this is the time she can give it and that she's just going to be diligent in giving it that time. I was inspired. If you're giving any effort energy and every day, then every day you are moving things forward and you are gaining momentum and the benefits of consistency.

Consistency is really a tough one when you have so many, too many things pulling at you every day. Solid commitment to priorities is critical and as easy as it sounds so often as a mom and wife one gets derailed when you've been up all night with someone who is sick, school or doctors appointments, stayed up extra late to help with homework, or had outside commitments you have to attend to - and even occasionally are sick or worn out too -- I don't think women often give themselves much rest time.

I am trying to figure out how to better manage that but it is not easy. So often it feels like my priorities have to take a back seat to everyone else's priorities and I don't think that's right. But there are days when you just have to focus on keeping the family alive and afloat.

I think this week I am going to write my priorities in big letters and post it on my desk. Then make sure my time is fitting into one of those priorities with focus from the top down. I want to be focused rather than busy. Then I want to cut back on how I'm spending my time and create more open space in my days. It's time to do some spring cleaning of my life and cut out the things that aren't critical. I did that with my socks, underwear and makeup drawers earlier this year. I've been doing the same with our family room. I'm feeling like it's time to Spring Clean my life and cut away some of the unnecessary items and build in lots more time for things I really want to be doing.

Some things I'd like to be doing more of are meeting up with friends, business networking, reading the few but beautiful magazines that come in the mail that seem to pile up a bit. I'd like to spend more time studying things I'm interested in and doing more meditation and yoga. I want to put more time towards meal planning and healthy eating, time outside and exercise.

I'd like to take more outings to new neighborhoods and things I haven't seen here in the city. I would like to spend time working on the creative projects I have waiting for me like stripping down two old benches and making my planter I was supposed to make last summer. I'm sneaking all these kinds of things in but not to the extend that they are completely regular habits and must haves for me.

Here's where it gets tricky. What would I like to be doing less of...well it doesn't feel like any of those things are things I can actually do less of. I'd like to be doing fewer dishes but we still have to eat and I do get help with that, but it seems like I'm always the last one in the kitchen washing down the counters. I'd like to spend less time cleaning house but it feels never ending and never feels finished - and that is with help. I'd like to spend less time feeling like we have so much to do on the house and less time trying to do it. I don't know what else I can let go of right now. There have to be things I'm not thinking of. I'm going to ponder that.

Maybe what I could do better is think about how I use the free time that I do have. So often I feel like I fritter it away instead of doing something I really wanted to do. For instance I might sit down and watch a movie with that family that I'm not really interested in. I could still do that but maybe do something I want to do while I'm watching. Part of the challenge for women as well I think is that we're just too doggone tired by the time we do have any free time. Who has the energy? It's a big of a losing battle when one realizes that the older we get the less energy we seem to have or the more quickly we get tired. What I would give to be able to put some of the energy of my youth to good use now!

I think more routine and organization would help to. I'm big on these things but the rest of my clan is somewhat resistant. It's a battle for me to figure out how much it's worth fighting it and how much is absolutely necessary to teach skills and enforce order in the home. I think there is a little too much flexibility and movement in this area of our life right now. It would be better to have more structure. More focus.

What things would you like to get rid of in your life or could you realistically cut back on? How do you manage your time so that you feel fulfilled and happy with your own priorities while meeting the rest of the needs in your life whether it's work, family, etc? I'd love to hear your thoughts!

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.

Happy Valentine's Day To You!

I hope you are having a wonderful Valentine's Day with your loved ones. My goal is to get some frosted sugar cookies made today, which is a total tradition in my family. Other than that I think it's going to be a very low key Valentine's Day for us. The Man has the flu as of yesterday afternoon, so I don't even think I will make a special dinner which is also usual tradition. That's a little sad but we are (maybe I should just say "I am") tired this week so it's probably okay. Maybe I'll order a pizza or something fun for The Bug and me. I loaded up on enough ginger ale and 7-up last night for the entire family just in case the flu afflicts us all...again - (we were some of the first to get it in December l-o-n-g before it really started going around the past few weeks).

Yesterday morning, having just arrived back from three days in California, I realized I'd given absolutely zero thought to classroom valentines. Sigh. So as soon as The Bug got home we got working on those and didn't get done until 10 p.m. She made a super cute Fox Valentine's Box for her desk, from a plan I found on Pinterest.

She worked on it for quite a while and it turned out so cute. While she was doing that I worked on her class valentines, because I knew we'd be up all night otherwise. I made a quick template in PicMonkey (thanks for saving me PicMonkey!) and then printed them all out and cut them with a paper cutter and started coloring.This is not homework, so I didn't feel too bad about helping her out! Here's is the card template I created in the beginning to get this project going.

Then we had to run to the store to pick up Extra Gum to add to these. This began a string of frustrating events. First, we wanted the small rectangle packs of gum and all we could find were the larger, almost square boxes which really didn't fit my card...ergh. But we went with it. Then we got home and I realized I had not double checked The Bug's count and we were literally one gum pack short. Super frustrating but at this point I was so tired that I didn't even really get upset.

So once we double and triple checked we really needed one more valentine card with gum pack we got in the car again and headed back down the hill to our neighborhood 7-11 and got more gum -- which cost us twice as much as it had in the multi-pack. So on the way home we had a good conversation about how careless mistakes cost in time, effort, energy and money. Good math and preparedness lessons tonight!

All weekend in California, I was missing my little family and thinking so fondly of home. Then I came home to vomiting and valentines and a part of me wanted to jump right back on a plane for the coast -- sunshine, friends, a clean, quiet hotel room, brand new rental car and solitude -- I won't lie. I think to perk up this Valentine's Day I will go buy some flowers and make some pretty cookies and do something to make it special somehow. Keeping The Bug and me healthy will be gift enough I think! But I sure do hope everyone else is having a fantastic day!

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.

What To Expect At A Same Day Surgery Center

Hi again. Wanted to continue with a follow up post after same day surgery last week. This post is all about what to expect going to a Same Day Surgery Center. As I mentioned earlier, in the past three-an-a-half years I've had three surgeries all at different surgical centers. So I thought it might be comforting to readers to share what that experience is like and help you know what to expect. This is a long post, but I tried to cover all aspects of surgery day, plus illustrate with my experiences. I hope it's helpful!

First, expect that every surgery center will be a little different. So far I've had three pretty different experiences. My first experience was in Santa Monica and I now realize the facility was one of those fancy SoCal surgery centers that are tucked away, where celebrities can sneak in and out for things like plastic surgery. Ha. I just went to where my doctor sent me, so I really didn't know what to expect or that this spot was a little unusual. It was very upscale and very small. I never saw another patient. As far as staff I think I only saw maybe 5 people total from front door to departure.

We walked into a very well-appointed, small, upper floor waiting room. One staffer met us there, processed paper work and took me to a small wood-paneled pre-op room. There I met the anesthesiologist who did all his necessary pre-op work and a nurse was in and out with me. After about an hour of pre-op they took me into the most gorgeous operating room with one wall entirely of glass, overlooking the city all the way to downtown Los Angeles. It looked a bit like a beautiful sci-fi movie set.  I saw my doctor briefly along with the small surgery team. I was conscious only for a moment or so, woke up in recovery and was on my way home a couple of hours later. Slept all afternoon and was feeling a lot better the next day. Everything was very simple and things went smoothly and easily.

Second surgery was at UCLA Ronald Reagan Medical Center. You can imagine this was a vastly different experience based on the fact that this was a BIG hospital environment. There was one large waiting room, dozens of patients in surgery, whose families could track their progress by a number up on a big electronic board. The pre-op area was a large hospital ward, lots of patients and staff on the move all the time. The pre-op and post-op rooms were curtained areas. There was less staff around during my recovery time and I felt like I was alone much of the time. I think with this experience my recovery was many hours and looking back I probably should've stayed overnight in the hospital. I had the option and wanted to go home. Lessons learned.

My third experience last week was in a mid-size surgical center attached to a hospital. There were probably 10 other families in the waiting room and again each was assigned a number to track on the a much small electronic board. Again pre-op and post-op were curtained areas in a hospital ward. It was peaceful and quiet most of the time, except nurses talking in the halls. For the most part I was really impressed with the staff, energetic and very attentive. Appreciated that.

So beyond the differences in facilities, here are a few things to expect when you go to a surgical center.

1) FASTING: You'll have to fast from midnight until your surgery. For a variety of reasons they want your stomach empty. Plan on this. You may want to plan to have a meal at midnight if your surgery is later in the morning or afternoon. Since my surgery was at 11 am, I had a bowl of cereal and a big glass of water at midnight.

I was told I could drink until four hours before the surgery so I had a good drink four hours before. This conflicted with instructions from others along the way, but since I was told this by a pre-op RN who I had an appointment with, I felt okay going with it and didn't seem to have any problems.

2) LOOK SO YOU FEEL GOOD: I will tell you I got a mani-pedi the day before my surgery because I didn't feel like having crusty winter hands and feet that people might be looking at all day. I felt better when I looked better. Not a must, but wearing a gown isn't a pretty situation anyway, so anything you can do to feel a little better is a good move. You'll also want to shower, shave, buff, moisturize your skin all over or whatever else you need to do to feel clean and pretty when you get there. It's nice to take a little extra time.

3) NO JEWELRY: Don't wear any jewelry to the surgical center, just leave it all home. It becomes a security issue if you bring it with you and something that could get lost -- and they will ask you ten times if you have any jewelry you need to remove. Easier to not have to deal with it.

4) NO MAKEUP: Since I couldn't wear makeup but still wanted to look my best I washed my face well that morning and then heavily moisturized my skin a couple of times until it glowed. Then I curled my eyelashes so that my eyes would look bright and perky. I looked rosy, sunny and healthy which made me feel better about running around with no makeup on -- and I hoped it would give the medical staff confidence that I was happy and in good spirits.

5) SIMPLIFY BELONGINGS: This is a good time to go through your purse and clean out anything that isn't essential for you to have. Again this is a security issue and can cause delays later if you have a lot of belongings that have to be locked up once you get there or taken to your car where they are also at risk. I took the very least possible, just ID, wallet (take anything out you won't need and leave that home too!), my little toiletries bag that I carry in my purse and my cell phone.

6) PLAN FOR SCHEDULING CHANGES: Surgery schedules are VERY fluid, they change all the time. So keep your day very flexible when you or someone you love has a surgery scheduled. When The Man had a surgery scheduled a few years ago, it was pushed back several times in the day to the point.  They eventually ended up cancelling it and rescheduling it after multiple delays because it was getting too late and they didn't have enough staff who were fresh to start another surgery. Mind you he had been fasting since midnight the night before and things were delayed until early evening. Not fun.

For my surgery last week, the day before they moved it up by two hours. This messed us  up because The Man had a doctor's appoint two hours before my original check-in time. I was planning to go with him to that and then we were going to head to the surgical center. So instead he dropped me off an hour early so he could get to his appointment then came back when he was done. So I was at the hospital at 8:30 when our original plan was that I needed to be there at 11, then it had been bumped up to 9:30.

Once I got checked in they immediately started surgery prep and I ended up heading in to surgery early before The Man even got back to the surgical center.

7) BRING SOMETHING TO DO: If you do get delayed it's nice to have a magazine, book or something to do while you wait. It's good to have something to keep you pre-occupied and if you have to wait it's not so frustrating to feel your time is totally wasted. I took a small bag with my journal, a book and a couple of magazines. But I never had time to look at them.

8) PLAN FOR A VARIETY OF EMOTIONS: This past week I was super chill about going into surgery. Very relaxed and calm. I have had times where I got teary-eyed thinking, "what if I die and never see my family again?" I think I felt this even worse when The Man had surgery and I had those thoughts of what if something happened to him?!!  Going into surgery can be stressful. Be accepting of how you or your loved one is feeling and try to do what you can to calm the fears. Expect that you could have a variety of emotions hit you as they are wheeling you or a loved one out of Pre-op. Don't be surprised or too worried. If you are the one having surgery, in a few minutes you'll be totally unconscious and it will all be over before you know it.

9) PRE-OP IS A BUSY TIME: You will check in two hours or so early and you envision you'll be sitting around a lot. It's a pretty busy time with a lot going on. You'll check in at the front desk, then a nurse will come and get you and take you back to Pre-op. You'll change into a gown, pack up your clothing in a big plastic bag and hop on the gurney. At some point they'll bring you a nice warmed up blanket and you'll get your free prize, a pair of grippy socks to put on your feet that they always make sure you know "you can take home with you".

Because I checked in a full hour early last week I thought for sure I would have some wait time somewhere in the process. During the entire Pre-op process I probably was along maybe 10 minutes. You'll have lots of constant visitors from nurses, anesthesia team, your doctor, etc. You'll be changing, they'll be hooking you up to stuff and you'll get asked a lot of questions as they repeatedly review all the important forms, pre-op evaluations, etc. It goes by quite quickly, which is nice because at this point you just want to get things moving.

They will lock up valuables like your purse if you want them to or they give you a locker and key to do it yourself. Usually they will let your family come in once you are set up and comfortable for a few minutes before you head out for surgery.

10) IV HOOKUP: They'll hook you up with an IV pretty quickly. This week my IV insertion was really painful and it hurt and was uncomfortable most of the entire time. Looking at my hand, I did look quite dehydrated and it was in a sensitive spot. I talked to the nurses about it and we decided to just live with it that way for lack of better options. But I've never had it hurt as much going in or while it was in. They ran plain fluids for a while and then inserted the relaxation and further drugs later in the morning. I definitely started feeling the relaxation drugs around the time they wheeled me into the O.R.

11) MEDICAL TEAM VISITS: As I mentioned, you'll have different nurses and anesthesia team and your doctor will probably pop by for a pep-talk/quick review of what to expect during the Pre-op time. You'll sign paperwork and everyone who comes by will check to make sure you've signed in all the appropriate places. They will also ask you a pretty standard set of questions including:

• What are we doing with you today?
• Height? Weight?
• Are okay with getting a blood transfusion if needed?
• What is your religious affiliation?
• Who is here with you today?
• Do you have allergies?
• Have had any problems with anesthesia before like nausea, etc.?

It's great that they all come and introduce themselves and/or check in to see how you are doing. I never remember any of the team's names, but it's nice to meet them or see your doctor again one more time before you go to surgery.

12) WHEELED TO SURGERY: When it's time to take you to the O.R., a few people will roll you down the hall, through the doors and you'll be getting a little wazzy at this point because they've already giving you a hit of "relaxation". I only remember a few seconds of this phase every time and then I'm out. It's always a little fuzzy what I'm seeing and it feels like there are a lot of people buzzing around you for a few seconds getting you all set up once you enter the operating room and then your unconscious.

13) WAKE UP CALL/RECOVERY: At some point, you'll wake up in another place, Post-op/Recovery. It's a little weird to wake up in a different place than you went to sleep. You'll feel groggy or maybe a little worse and they'll keep a close eye on you during this time. You'll probably come in and out of consciousness for a while and you might have a nurse there with you monitoring your vitals and asking how you are doing. They may administer some drugs through your IV and they'll be watching your pulse, blood pressure, oxygen levels, etc. Your belongings (clothing, etc) will be there waiting for you and when it's a good time they'll let your family or accompanying caretaker come sit with you.

Depending on what you have had done and how you progress this may take anywhere from an hour to several hours. I've had both experiences. My first surgery I don't remember feeling too weird, I was up and out of the center pretty quickly. My second surgery was many hours and again I should've just agreed to stay in the hospital. This time I was really sick the first hour, started feeling significantly better 90 minutes afterwards and went home.

In my surgery last week, I would wake up and there was a big red digital clock right outside my room so I remember it was 12:08 when I first opened my eyes and then I thought I was out for a long time and it was like three minutes later. I've never had a clock nearby before so I was very aware of how I had no sense of time as I watched that clock and sometimes it seemed like I'd been asleep for a long time and it had only been a couple of minutes and other times it would be half an hour later. That was weird. But it was comforting that as time passed I began feeling less groggy and sick.

My curtain was all the way open and I seriously thought I was in a hallway all that time, but it was actually a corner room which lead straight out into a long hallway. (I didn't figure this out until I got up to get dressed.) I was fine with that, it was quiet and there weren't a lot of people around and frankly I didn't care. My first hour coming in and out I was really miserable. This varies a lot. I was never really nauseated with my other surgeries.  But this time I was. I felt like I was going to throw up at one point and urgently asked the nurses to get me a bedpan quickly. They hurried to grab one and hand it to me and before I could actually throw up I was passed out again. I thought that was really weird when I woke up again and realized I'd never quite gotten to throwing up. Weird stuff!

They gave me some medications for pain and I think for nausea too and they kept pushing me to breath deeper. Apparently I wasn't getting enough oxygen and I heard the nurse tell another nurse my pulse had dropped quite low at one point when they gave me some pain meds. They made me test my oxygen by breathing as hard as I could into a plastic handheld mouth device and while I thought I'd breathed very hard they both looked at me and one said, "You're going to have to do a lot better than that" in a nice way.

So I stayed there for a while longer. They were kind enough to go and get The Man and I was really ready to see him. I thought I would feel a little better when I saw him, comforted and not alone. So he came and sat with me for about 30 minutes or so until we could go home.

14) HEADING HOME: Once you are ready to go home, they'll get you up and if you need help, they will help you get dressed. The Man helped me unpack my bag and handed me clothes and I was able to do everything else myself. It felt good to get my clothes on, rather comforting somehow - like I was human again. Then I sat down in the wheelchair the nurses had brought. They sent The Man out to get the car and a few minutes later one of the nurses wheeled me out to the front entry way where The Man met us, got me in the car and we were on our way home.

Driving home was a little weird because I was still a little wazzy. Being in traffic felt fast and confusing. Thankfully I was just in the passenger seat. I was starting to get hungry so we planned to get me a milkshake. That sounded both delicious and easy to put down. By the time we got to ordering a milkshake I was so hungry I asked for a chicken sandwich too. I sipped on the milkshake on the way home and I was a happy camper. We were soon home and after I ate my sandwich I was in bed for the afternoon.

In the past I have gone straight to bed without eating anything and just focused on being dehydrated and needing to drink as much as possible. Drink, drink, drink. But this time I was hungry and not as sleepy. I ended up watching Netflix and dozing a bit on and off, but I didn't really ever sleep for more than a few minutes at a time. My mom, who is a nurse, recommended getting up and walking around every couple of hours to avoid bloodclots. Plus I think it's a good test to see how you are feeling.

One thing I noticed this time that hasn't happened before is that I had a headache all afternoon. I don't know if it was the anesthesia or dehydration but I think it was the dehydration. I tried to drink as much water as possible, but eventually supplemented that with some Vitamin Water XXX and lemonade. I think having options helped but it really wasn't until about 9 p.m. that the headache quieted down. By that time I'd had quit a lot of fluids and I've been trying to keep that going.

15) HAVE FOOD OPTIONS READY AT HOME: Last week I had no problems with eating afterwards. This varies so plan for all variables here as well. You may only want liquids, may want very bland foods like some soup or toast, or you may be dying for a steak or burger. Have some options at home.

16) FOLLOW INSTRUCTIONS AND REST: You'll come home with a list of directions from your doctor, number one of which is rest. They are all important and it's good to review them when you get home because you won't really remember anything they told you at the surgery center in recovery. But most importantly, get your rest. I am so bad about this but I really try to rest as much as possible. I never do quite rest enough. Enough this past week, even thought I was trying to rest I still think I did more than I needed to. I have noticed that I am still feeling a little ragged and I think it's because I have not been sleeping really well since last week. Not sure why but I'm letting myself have a little more time to recover this time.

17) BE GENTLE WITH YOUR BODY: After you've had a breathing tube in your throat it may be sore for a few days. I have found it starts to bother me if I talk too much so I've been trying not to talk. I also noticed my ribs were sore the day afterwards and in a follow-up hone call, my doctor explained to me that I'd been coughing while under anesthesia. I also later found a bruise on one of my arms from an IV I didn't know I'd had. You'll notice little things as you recover. Be gentle with yourself and don't push it. Ask your doctor questions if you have them. If you notice anything that doesn't seem right, call and talk to your doctor to make sure you're on a good path to recovery and to quell any worries you may have.

So those are my thoughts on what to experience when you go to a Same Day Surgery Center. My experience has been different every time and I think that's the case, everyone will have a different experience every time. But I will say that every time the staff has been great and I have felt well taken care of. When you know a bit what to expect that takes some of the anxiety out of the experience and when you can plan in advance and for a variety of post-op needs it sure does help. If you are reading this because you are anticipating surgery I wish you the very best. I'm sending you best wishes for a very speedy recover. I hope too that these tips are helpful if you are the caregiver for someone going through surgery.