An Eeyore Kind of Day

Eeyore, when all things are considered, is a sad and pathetic creature. The fact that Optimus Prime is his alter-ego does little to bolster my opinion of the sad, gray donkey. I always saw myself as more of a Piglet, always wishing to be more like Pooh. Oh, to posses the level of optimism that accompanies blissful ignorance.
I know, you want to know where the heck I plan on going with this. Well, while on my best day I might be a Piglet, here recently I've been very much an Eeyore. Case in point, check the time stamp on this blog posting. It will probably say something like 3:45am. That's if my hand doesn't cramp up from typing an entire blog on a cell phone. Winner.
This all started when I blew out my knee. Yes, the main reason I haven't posted in the last three months is because I tore my ACL skiing. Most people feel bad for me, but not me, I just feel completely embarassed. I'm supposed to be the one that knows how to ski, yet I was falling more than my husband who was only skiing for the second time in his life. People ask what run I was on when it happened then get this funny look on their face when I say Ute. Isn't that an easy one? Why yes, yes it is. And the reason my ACL completely disintegrated? Well, some say it's because of the deep powder and that my feet/skis went one way and the rest of me went another, others blame the skis for not coming off like they were supposed to, but I know the truth: it's because I'm so damn out of shape. You have to be in relatively decent physical condition to not get injured while skiing. I could pretend all I wanted when the snow was hard packed and I was doing a decent job digging in just using my extra weight, but I saw all these red flags start popping up everywhere when I fell 20ft into the first run the last time we went. Sirens started blaring in my head and warning signals flashed "You're Gonna Die!" in bright neon lights, but I spent a crap ton of money that day so I was going to make the most of it. One (partial) run, a ride down the mountain on a ski patrol sled, a trip to the ER, and an MRI later and I was a full-fledged handicap. No ACL left, tore my miniscus, cracked the head of my tibia, and had a bone bruise so deep I could practically feel it in my ankle. Apparently, after the first couple of falls, my lame, lazy, out of shape muscles just said, "Screw it! Every ligament for themselves!"
So long story short, that was February 29th and I still have an elephant knee. It won't straighten, it won't bend, and I can't walk on it for more than five minutes before my muscles start to feel like Jell-o. I know the doctor said that it would be six months or longer before I was back to normal, but I need to be normal now. I need to clean my house. I need to cook a healthy dinner for my family. I need to play with my kids. I need to spend quality time with my husband.
While the knee and all the embarrassment that goes along with it is enough, I then had to go and get myself a nasty little flu bug. The kind that nag at you for days, tormenting you by never revealing their true location, just bouncing around from your nose to your throat, becoming an ear ache, then a fever and body aches, then back to the throat again. It was bad enough that I was a gimp but now I have to be disease ridden as well? I'm not sure how much more of this I can stand. While the flu will have to run its course, the knee might just get a hack saw taken to it. My next post may be titled "Me and My Prostetic Leg."

New Year . . . New Me? Ha! Very funny.

Happy Friday the 13th everyone!

I know popular culture suggests we all make resolutions this time of year to change who we are for the better, but this year I'm not resolving to change who I am but rather figure out who I was in the first place. 

Every year I vow to change this or that, to be a better mom, wife, teacher, Christian, person, etc. I work at all of these things for about a week, a month if things go well, then life happens and reality sets in and I get flustered with my failures and give up. It donned on me this year that I've been going about things all wrong. I'm trying to change to fit a certain mold that I most certainly am not meant to fit. Like my voluptuous rear end and cute jeans . . . . some things are just not meant to be.

It's common knowledge that we're supposed to spend our 20's "finding ourselves." We're supposed to change majors, jobs, cities and significant relationships till we find what we love, then spend our 30's "settling down" into our new, lovely lives. My stark reality is that I was married and had two kids by the time my 20's started. I certainly don't regret any of it and couldn't be more happier with the way my life has turned out, but when contemplating my resolutions for this year, I realized that every other year was spent focusing on who I was expected to be and not improving who I actually was. Because I don't know who I am.
But I do know who I am not. So that's where I'm going to start. Who knows, maybe by the end of the year, I will have figured life out and while others spend their 30's getting their real adult lives started, I'll be coasting on pure bliss : )

My List of Things I am NOT:
1) School Teacher - I have been mad at myself for the past year because I still feel like I haven't figured out the whole home schooling thing and as a consequence, I am failing my children. I know very few home school moms, but the ones I do know are fantastic. They're also college educated school teachers. They sit down in August and make lesson plans for the whole year. They spend their evenings grading papers and going over the next day's subject matter. I'm lucky if I grade my kids papers at all. Not because I don't care, but because I am sitting right next to them while they do it and correct as they go. I also plan as I go. I find out what's on the page at the same time as my kids. Yes, this has gotten me in a jam with big projects I didn't know were right around the corner, but the joy of home schooling is that if you're not prepared, put it off till you are. It's not going to kill anyone to get a day or two behind in Botany because you didn't have an empty coke bottle and two tons of potting soil on hand. While I have learned that I'm not a structured school teacher type, I've also learned that I'm not the awesome un-schooling type either. I'm pretty convinced the great un-schooling moms I know are from another planet. I can't fit an entire days worth or curriculum into a baking project or a walk to the park. Maybe it's my lack of higher education or just that I have a hard time making my brain work on their level all day long. I know it's not lack of creativity, just maybe lack of wanting my entire existence to revolve around making sure I can put a history lesson in sandwich making. Also, I like books. Books give me guidance because I know I would probably forget to teach my kids how to conjugate verbs and then they'd come at me with fire in their eyes when they get lower than fantastic SAT scores. Also, I like the 15 minutes I get to screw around on Pinterest while they work on their sentence structure. So, I'm not a school-at-home-er and I'm not an un-school-er. I'm in the middle somewhere and now all I need to do is figure out where and what that is.
2) Maid - One blogger I follow is a perfectly nice individual who usually posts craft ideas, recipes and fun things to do with your kids on rainy days. When you read through her posts she seems like super mom meets Martha Stewart meets Mother Theresa. But if you scroll down, you'll see a little headline that reads "People I Want to Punch in the Throat." Priceless.
I have the same list, though I don't post it on line and instead keep it in my head where no one can see it. I am going to post one, and that is the over enthusiastic house cleaners. The ones that claim they LOVE cleaning house. I have determined three things about these women:
        a) They're liars. No one LOVES to clean, especially moms. Moms clean, then two minutes later everything that they've done has been undone. They have husbands who leave their dirty socks under the coffee table, sons who pee on the toilet seat, daughters that get nail polish on counters, dogs that shed mounds of hair, the list goes on. Liar, liar, pants on fire.
        b) They're on something. And I want some.
        c) They really do love to clean, and they spend all day doing it. If not, it's because their kids aren't allowed to bring toys or crayons out of their rooms which turns them into hermits, their husbands are afraid of what might happen if they leave their coat on the back of the chair instead of hanging it in the closet, and their guests feel like they can't touch or breath near anything for fear of smudging the shiny polished oak. Nope, not me at all.
Not only do I not love cleaning, I actually LOATHE it. Keeping a house clean with a husband, three kids and a dog is the definition of insanity. Every year I make a cleaning schedule for myself and every year it lasts a week or two. I can never get caught up and when I spend an entire day cleaning I feel guilty for ignoring my kids (who consequently have destroyed whatever room I've locked them in). So, I hate cleaning but I also hate a messy house. My cleaning resolution is to spend the half hour before my husband gets home cleaning up whatever mess we've made during that day, making the kids learn how to clean their own bathrooms and do their own laundry, and hiring a real maid to come in once or twice a month and do all the time-sucking stuff that makes me want to take up drinking.

3) Athlete - Yes, I pretended to be one in high school, but I never really liked sports. I liked volleyball, but mainly because it was the one thing I was better at than most the other girls. I hated running, hated lifting, hated that if I didn't run or lift I'd look like the Stay Puffed Marshmallow Man by the end of the month. I'm short, I have zero metabolism and hips that are perfect for delivering babies but terrible for losing weight. Thankfully my husband likes curves. Unfortunately, my curves are starting to get curves of their own and while I have the utmost respect for women who are proud of their bodies no matter what they look like, I am not. So here's my delimma. I can pretend that I love to work out, get a gym membership and quit because I don't have any kid free time to speak of while also pretending that I can live off of three celery sticks a day and quit because chips and salsa are just that good, or I can find a happy medium. I need to lose 30 lbs, but I'm not going to set a deadline. I'm just going to resolve to work at it, and when it happens it happens, as long as there's progress. I already eat a mostly vegan diet, so eating healthy isn't much of a change, I just need to eat more and eat earlier. I live off of four cups of coffee, an afternoon snack and a decent sized dinner. It's not good even if it is only 700 calories. I'm also getting an elliptical. I can do it while I watch the news in the morning and it won't kill me like a treadmill so I may actually stick to it. Here's hoping.
4) SAHM/HSM/WaM- If you follow family-related blogs, you'll interpret these to mean "stay at home mom", "home school mom" and "wife and mother". While I know technically I am all of these, I have a really hard time defining myself as any of them. I do envy those women who wear their SAHM title like a badge of honor. Their lives are filled with cupcakes, play dates and Starbucks. They drive mini vans and wear yoga pants . . . every day. They have routines and their kids and husbands are generally happy. There is absolutely nothing wrong with any of it. Except that it's not me. I have tried and tried to be these things, but no matter how fulfilled someone else might be, I am not. Though I know the world would fall apart if anything were to happen to me, I still feel like I'm not contributing or living up to my potential. So this year, instead of trying to be an acronym, I'm going to figure out what I really need to do to feel fulfilled. Not happy, because I really am truly happy, but instead not feeling like there's something missing. I'm going to finish my children's book, start a novel, make things, hopefully sell them, get involved in our new community, dabble in politics and do my best to give more.

So that's it in a nut shell. I'm hoping that spending ten years finding out who I am not will make quick work of figuring out who I really am. So buckle up, because this could get interesting : )

"Is your house on fire, Clark?" "No, Aunt Bethany, those are the Christmas lights."

 

Most of you either know my husband or know of my husband. But even his closest friends and family are completely unaware of his dark secret. My husband has a disability. A mental one. It's called OGS, or Obsessive Griswold Syndrome. 

While most wives would view this as a very expensive and time consuming handicap, I embrace it. To me (the creative, big project lover), his OGS is a gift wrapped in multicolored LEDs topped with fresh noble fir garland. I'm, of course, referencing the *Award Winning* Gingerbread House of 2010 and the blazing white spectacle that was the 5,000 sq ft my-neighbor-is-deployed-so-I'll-make-his-kids-happy-by-putting-lights-on-their-side-of-our-duplex-too Christmas display in North Carolina, affectionately nick-named the Icicle House. He was over the moon after that one because, for the first time since joining the military, our exterior lighting was perfectly balanced : )

He is so particular about his exterior lighting and decorating, that he has developed a point system which he uses to evaluate not only our home, but everyone else as well. I'm not sure how many points everyone starts with, but points are deducted for each day your lights are up and ON before Thanksgiving, sagging lights, blinking sections combined with fading/running/non-blinking sections, rope lights, blow ups (that's a lazy man's Christmas decor), using only one color (white is the exception) . . . the list goes on and on and, frankly, I don't even know it all and am pretty sure he makes up more deductions as we go. I'm sure there are bonus points, but no one's earned them yet to my knowledge.

This year is no different, except that he's been presented with obstacles we've never encountered before. First, we skipped decorating the weekend following Thanksgiving because my parents were in town. Big mistake. Apparently, the snow can't stay at bay long after Thanksgiving in Colorado. We had every intention of creating his Christmas masterpiece this weekend. That is, until we checked the weather forecast yesterday. Snow . . . all weekend . . . and lots of it.

The ground work can be done rain or shine and so can the icicles since we invested in a ladder yesterday, but the trim lights require climbing onto the roof and that can NOT be done on a wet, snowy, steep pitched second story. So last night my husband, completely overwhelmed by his OGS, mounted the ladder and ascended to the roof where he completed the trim lights in the freezing cold pitch blackness of night. And I, the ever faithful and always concerned wife, stayed outside with him (on the ground), tossing bags of gutter clips and extra strands of lights up on the roof for him.

By the time we reached the back side of the house, we had worked through all the spools of lights we had purchased this year. He was so careful, even spent a little extra per spool, to buy Phillips lights only, since that was the brand we purchased last year and they MUST match exactly. It was only after I retrieved the bin of lights leftover from last year's gingerbread creation from the garage and tossed a strand up onto the roof that he realized Philips had betrayed us. Some disgraceful schlub at Philips headquarters whose sole job is to come up with ways to make even more money off men who suffer from the same mental disorder as my husband, realized that if they added an extra colored bulp . . . purple . . . to the pattern of colored lights, men with OGS will be forced to trash last year's strands and replace them all with the new purple strands or be left to suffer with mismatched strands. So my husband had a decision to make: Use last year's strands on the least visible side of the house and deduct points, or descend from the roof and haul off to Target and risk being gone long enough for the storm to blow in. The stress was almost too much to bear. But finally, he came to the conclusion that missing an entire section of lights (all be it the far back corner) due to snow was utterly unacceptable. He hung last year's strands and took his deductions like a man.

Though, I have a strong feeling I'll be heading to Target this weekend just in case the Philips punks decide to add periwinkle or chartreuse next year.

At this point, my husband's poor fingers were near frost bite stage. I commented, JOKINGLY, that he didn't have to put a clip on each individual bulb and save his fingers by only putting a clip on every fifth bulb. Would go so much faster! What follows is his rebuttle:

"Not acceptable. I refuse to have flaccid lights. Each bulb must stand erect. Christmas lights on Viagra!"

I do love him . . . . so much : )

Hanging our "gingerbread" last year

Pics of this years lights will be posted after the snow stops falling this weekend.

And here they are! I love having a husband that can take any crazy idea I have for a Christmas theme and make it reality. I mentioned possibly doing the Calvin and Hobbs snowmen next year . . . . 

  . . . he's already researching do-it-yourself snow making machines.

Good grief :-p

Schedule, Shmedule

At one point, I had about six different calendars in my house. Chris hated it, always being reminded of how busy we are, so I consolidated and now only have one monthly and one weekly calendar, both of which aren't really calendars at all. My monthly calendar is on my computer, which I love because I can color-code everything without fear of misplacing my one purple pen that Annabelle insisted would be HER color. Another great thing about having your calendar on the computer is that you can, with just one click of the mouse, make it disappear all together. Even though you're fully aware of all the goings-on that are right around the corner, there's no big giant reminder burning your eyeballs every time you glance in its direction.

My weekly calendar is also not a traditional calendar, but instead a big dry erase board that my lovely husband made to look all professional, with days-of-the-week columns and blocks for each member of our little household. This is the calendar that gets a little nuts at times. I write down everything from daily chores to school work assignments on it. I'm pretty sure Chris hates this one, but I did him and favor and blocked it from his normal line of sight with a bookshelf. To be honest, I've really neglected this one recently, being summer and all. I am choosing not to patronize the kids by writing down every little thing they have to do every day and instead just letting them enjoy the summer.

While getting rid of all the obnoxious calendars has helped to lower the stress level in our home, it's made me somewhat lost. I'm a tangible person. I like things I can hold and touch and, most especially, write on. If I write something down, I remember it. I used to copy whole chapters of school books into notebooks just so I'd never have to really study. I assumed the computer would work, but apparently my brain does not process typing the same way it processes writing. Long story short, I'm forgetting a lot.

For instance, when planning out my Rita Project (on my nice, tidy little $.79 spiral notebook), I forgot to factor in my kamikaze trip to Wyoming, the week needed to introduce the kids to their new diet, the MONTH (or more) needed to rehabilitate the kids after three weeks of spoiling by grandparents and aunts, the four weeks I'd need to take off from "exerting myself" after my little procedure, etc. On paper, taking one week to conquer one month of resolutions seemed doable. But, as we all know, everything always looks good on paper. Applying what you've written to real life is something else entirely.

If there is anything that the Army has taught me, it's how to be flexible. Plans change, problems arise. Adapt and survive . . . or resist at your own peril. So in order to avoid certain defeat, I'm adapting my project. Rather than fail due to frustration from missing deadlines I set for myself, I have chosen to move at the pace of the household.

That being said, we're still on Week One: Boost Energy/Get Healthy. And that we have! We are all adjusting to the raw vegan diet really well. I think the part that I love the most is that Chris is so involved in the process. He's helping me prepare meals, the kitchen is almost always clean with his help, and he's taken over the job of "Master Juicer". It's amazing how something as simple as changing your diet can benefit your marriage in such a huge way.

The kids aren't as enthusiastic about the new healthy eating plan, but they're coming around. I'm pretty sure part of the problem stemmed from someone back in Texas spilling the beans (pardon the pun) before Chris and I were able to explain the diet and why we had chosen to do it. When I went to pick them up in Wyoming, I was greeted with, "Are we really never going to eat pizza again?!" and, "But doughnuts and ice cream are my favorites!" Apparently, after they'd put food in their mouths, someone would say, "Enjoy that because you never get to eat it again." Awesome.

But we've overcome and they're enjoying more every day (especially once they found out that cookies and ice cream are actually acceptable if made from the right ingredients). I'd be fibbing if I told you that everything is delicious. As much as I want to be able to say that I like Dolse and kelp noodles covered in ground nuts, I just can't. But that, my friends, is why I have my first commandment: Be Acasha.

And being Acasha means not liking stuff that tastes like a piece of seaweed fresh out of the toilet bowl or has the texture of paper mache paste.

But again, progress is being made, just not on my original schedule. I'll take it though : )

This week's focus is on organization and clearing the clutter. My bedroom sanctuary has been achieved (now if I could only keep the toddler out) and I'm moving on to the rest of the house. The idea is purge first, then organize. Purging has actually been quite exhilarating, and I plan on sharing my "Secrets of Purging" at the end of the week so that you can be as productive and clutter-free as I will be!

Maybe my initial approach was too ambitious. After all, slow and steady does win the race, so maybe slowing down and focusing more time and energy on each individual resolution will help me to have a more enriching experience. Who needs schedules and deadlines anyways? Not this girl!  

PS: I have lost an amazing 15lbs and Chris has lost 20lbs since starting this new diet just three weeks ago! And that's without exercising (since I can't "exert myself" till next week, according to my dr.)!

My Hero : )

Me, In the Raw

A few months ago, I picked up a book called "The Happiness Project" by Gretchen Rubin. To be completely honest, I purchased it intending to give it to my Co-Brownie troop leader for her birthday, but she mysteriously quit showing up for meetings and activities right around that time. By the time I saw her next, it was already two months past her birthday, so I just considered it a present to myself for all the hard work I had to do to cover for her : )
Back to the book. Just by reading the title, I assumed it would parallel and supplement my Rita Project, but it did so much more than that! I've decided to shape my Rita Project around the framework set by Gretchen in "The Happiness Project." The book is a set of 12 resolutions, a different resolution for each month. Since Gretchen and I seem to have A LOT in common (we're practically the same person), I'm making her resolutions my own. The great thing about reading the entire book before starting the project is that she's done all the research for me, so instead of taking 12 months to complete the project, I can warp speed it and complete it in 12 weeks instead.
What I love most about this book is that it's not about changing everything in your life (i.e. moving, quitting your job, leaving your husband to find "Edward", etc.) to create an empty, false sense of happiness, but rather taking everything you have right now and finding the happiness in it. Doing away with pessimism and negativity, finding the little things that REALLY make you happy and encouraging positive thinking are more what this book focuses on. It's for those of us who are happy with our situation, but just not happy with ourselves and really looking for the joy in life. That's me in a nutshell. As Gretchen puts it, "I wanted to change my life without changing my life, by finding more happiness in my own kitchen."
The first step is to lay down some rules, or commandments, that will help when I'm wrestling with keeping my resolutions. Again, Gretchen's commandments line up perfectly with mine, so I only had to make a few adjustments:
1) Be Acasha.
2) Let it go. (That's something I tell myself at least 100 times a day)
3) Act the way I want to feel. (or "fake it till you feel it" from my April 1st blog)
4) Do it now. Don't procrastinate.
5) Be polite, be fair, don't raise your voice for any reason at all.
6) Enjoy the process
7) Spend out, but spend wisely.
8) Lighten up, but sarcasm isn't always the answer.
9) Identify the problem.
10) Do what ought to be done.
11) Don't over think.
12) In the end, love matters most.
So now that I've conquered my commandments, it's time to tackle Resolution #1: Boost Energy/Get Healthy. This is probably the broadest of all the resolutions and most likely the hardest since I'm a junk food eating, movie watching, anti-running couch potato. Not that I don't LOVE to be outdoors, because I do, but I like doing stuff for fun and exercise just never sounds fun. And don't get me started on food. I could eat a steady diet of Dr. Pepper, cinnamon bears, cheeseburgers, cherry pie and coffee for the rest of my life and be perfectly content (aside from all the health issues I'd encounter). So week 1 will certainly be the most difficult.
But I have motivation, and a good one at that. I don't want to go anywhere near chemotherapy and I was recently blessed by a new friend who brought me a book detailing the benefits of the Genesis 1:29 diet, the biggest being that it's cured cancer. Who'da thunk it? Of course when I told my oncologist that I'd be skipping chemo and opting for a raw foods diet instead, she just looked at me funny and said "See you Tuesday." I'm sure we'll talk more about it then ...
So today Chris and I officially started the diet. We got up and made fresh carrot juice, fought through a glass of barley and alfalfa (it was AWFUL) then snacked all day on fresh fruits and veggies. Tonight we're making pizza ... no cheese, no egg, no meat pizza. Should be fantastic! (Really, no sarcasm in that one. I know, total shocker.) I know this diet will be super hard to stick with for the first couple months, but it's what I need to do and Chris and the kids are doing it with me, so that should help.
So Week 1/Day 1: Diet is in the books. Tomorrow I'm tackling the bed. Probably both literally and figuratively. Chris and I have a bad habit of staying up late, waking up still tired and totally blah. Makes for a very long day. So not only will the focus be on getting to bed earlier, but also getting better sleep.
By calling these resolutions instead of goals, I'll be making a permanent change each day and building on that. If these were goals, then I'd simply accomplish them and move on to a new goal, making it easy to forget about the last one since, technically, I'd already reached it. This way, I never lose sight of the resolutions I make early on, always focusing on what I'm doing rather than where it's getting me.
So here's to veggie pizza, carrot juice and a healthier, happier me : )
Question: What could you take out of your normal diet that could make you happier and healthier? Comment below!