Reasons why it’s been quiet around here, as of late…

IMG_9833– I’ve possibly been paralyzed with worry over what will happen to Jesse, and how Breaking Bad will end.

– We had dear friends from Idaho here, visiting, for a week. It was wonderful, but upon their return flight back, I caught a bug of homesickness.

– rainy days followed by heat advisories immediately then followed by 50 degree cold fronts are not friends of my fibromyalgia.

– I did not have Showtime was really busy when Homeland season 2 was on and so we’ve spent the last two weeks catching up, on Demand, to ready ourselves for Season 3. Suffice it to say, the amount of worry I’m feeling plagued with over the fictional characters of Brody & Carrie {and of course Jesse Pinkman and Walter White’s family from BB} are about to push me over the edge. Can we say “too emotionally involved?” Oy…

– I sent my youngest off to a real live life high school. No more homeschool for us. It’s been, well, an adventure, thus far. An adventure that inspires me to question what the cost is to retain both a hairdresser (grey coverage) and a massage therapist… Can they live with me?

– I’ve seen a few really great movies, a surprisingly great movie, a pretty good movie and so movie wise I can’t really complain too much… {Great= The Way Way Back; The Spectacular Now; Surprisingly Great: Austenland; And Pretty Good= The Family.}

– I lost my Kate Spade wallet, which had everything in it. I got it all back, and my faith in humanity was restored both BEFORE the wallet incident AND after… but it was still scary.

– We watched a car catch on fire outside a restaurant- and partially explode. (Same day as the great wallet loss/find)

– My mom found out that she has a degenerative disorder in her back and she is permanently wheel chair bound, leading our family to make some hard decisions in the near future… A lot to think about, for sure.

– My freshman daughter went to not one freshman event, but two. One, where a boy bought her a soda and spent the evening doting on her. She’s pretty much grounded until she’s 76, as she knows better. Such behavior is unacceptable. Soda accepting from boys? Inexcusable!

– I missed my very first PTA meeting, at the very real life high school, because I’m apparently really old and fell asleep on the couch at 6:40 in the evening.

– My favorite person ever won So You Think You Can Dance, which was unexpectedly AWESOME… My second favorite person EVER, did not. This pretty much sucked.

– I was on a crazy, unnecessary medication which was making me crazy sick, every day. I finally got off it last week and feel like I got my life back. Yay!

– I’m on a crazy stupid level in Candy Crush, which has caused me to question my reason for playing the dumb game and why I’ve devoted my time to over 300 levels in the first place since I will NEVER beat this level.

– I have a dozen or so books that I’m dying to read, right now.

– Right now I’m not reading much of anything. Boo.

– I wore a sweater out on a date with my husband the other night. It was pretty much awesome and made me happy.

– I have two online classes that I’m taking right now. I feel pretending they don’t exist is the worst course of action. *sigh*

– Mostly I’m trying to get my bearings and work out a routine. I haven’t been home alone since early 2007, and it’s flat out weird. Then, I worked about 32 hours a week from my home office for two different (local) companies. One was an ad agency and the other was a bigger company with their “hands” in lots of different types of cookie jars. Since 2007 I’ve consistently done something. Typically I did copywriting, or freelance for PR companies or other divisions of the entertainment industry. In 2008 I started a small Lifestyle Portrait business that did pretty well. Towards the end of 2011 though, we had a “family meeting” and I had to admit that I’d taken on too much. I was still freelancing for several entertainment outlets, photography was going strong, I was homeschooling and co-teaching through a local co-op and I was about 4 months into working on a novel. Nothing was really getting the attention it deserved, and I wasn’t really liking any of it. We decided to close the photography business after a wedding I’d booked in January. I felt so much peace about it. It had been a fun journey, but it hadn’t turned out at all like I’d imagined… I dropped most of my freelance accounts. We made the decision to no longer coop homeschool but to distance educate until we could find a suitable high school- and that the main focus (which is where my heart was really at) was the novel. AND HERE I AM… We took, together, all of the steps to get to this place. Not contributing (pretty much at all now) financially, is hard. It stresses me out. It makes me feel guilty…

– I’m feeling really guilty, and pathetic, and ridiculous when I do stupid things like leave my Kate Spade wallet on a bench. (it was worth revisiting twice.) I worked freaking hard for that wallet. A decade ago, i naively believed that when I’d made something of myself professionally, the purchasing of a “Kate Spade” bag (I LOVE her style!) Would symbolize success to me. Pretty much, it didn’t… Funny how, at the end of the day, it’s still just an overpriced handbag. (or wallet) but I certainly don’t want to lose it…

– mostly, I’m wandering around aimlessly. I wash some laundry, back some bread, write a note to stick in the mail, walk the dogs, check my email… Think to myself, this is a great time to finally start playing the cello! because, you know, I’ve always wanted to do that. But I have books unread, and a novel that’s written but in desperate need of being cleaned up… So I ignore it. I don’t know why. All summer long, I knew school would come so my time line was “the second full week of school!”

This is the second full week of school… It is here, today. Now. This minute…

And I just don’t even know where to begin. I feel kind of like that wallet is sitting there all alone on that bench, all over again. Everything important and vulnerable at risk, in the hands of someone else, because I was careless and left it there…

Not quite fifty shades, but enough…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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In case you missed the bedroom, before we painted it grey, here it is…

I’m beyond in love with this room. I could sit in here all day. In fact, I find myself finding excuses to go in there all of the time.

Our details:

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The dog bed at the foot of our bed…

 

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We’re saving our pennies for another chair to sit along side this charcoal slipcover chair for a seating area. I’m thinking one in a grey and chevron print.

 

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I adore umbrella art prints…

 

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Maps of our birth places…

 

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(Ignore the chords… I’ve not quite figured out how to not have them.) You can tell it’s my nightstand because I have a ton of journals… And I use them all.

 

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From Chw’s nightstand you can simply tell he’s a nerd. :)

 

 

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IMG_9765I LOVE my closet. LOVE LOVE LOVE it… His, well, it’s not nearly as cool, though it’s equally as organized. (though much smaller.)

So there you go…

 

to explain the sugar shortage…

This weekend recap is brought to you by my iPhone, if for no other reason than I honestly just didn’t want to lug my Canon around all weekend… There. I said it. It’s a sad truth. Mostly we just did running around and I feel like such a tourist when I cart it around to places like Trader Joe’s and the Farmer’s Market. When the irony that most of these photos are at home hits, we’ll just chalk that up to “I’m anal, I didn’t want the post to appear all inconsistent.” 

We made it to our favorite local {ish} bakery for their AMAZING homemade donuts, (after a super healthy green smoothie breakfast at home), and bought some of their amazing hamburger buns, as well as some graham crackers and marshmallows to do smores with our friends coming to visit us from Boise this week. Chw and I tried to catch up on Breaking Bad, (and failed) we made it to our Farmer’s Market early enough that we were able to spend the rest of the day doing super necessary things like reading this month’s book club book (me) and drawing fashion designs (Gen). At least Chw was super productive, grooming the dogs and grilling us an awesome dinner… 

At our farmer’s market we got the most amazing haul of local produce I’ve ever managed. It was incredible… And, Gen unearthed this ridiculous cookie. If your area of the country discovers a sugar shortage, I’d bet it’s to blame. The pups also got some treats! (Sugarless, of course.) 

I wasn’t completely lazy. I did laundry and finished up a small project in our bedroom so I could finally get pictures up on here. (tomorrow). 

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How was your weekend? Any big plans for the week? 

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– a morning lounging in bed a little later, reading, no interruptions or guilt. 

– the buzz of construction, the hum of jobs and families surviving and lives going on. 

– connecting with a friend two thousand miles away over the little things. 

– hand in hand, downtown evening strolls with my husband. 

– shared ice cream sundae laughs and family conversations. 

– screens to keep the bees out and let them do their jobs where they need to be. 

– an out door dinner with friends, laughter and ease. 

– bursts of blueberry breakfast bites. 

– the great accomplished feeling of productivity. 

– news of a strong and healthy heart. 

– repeat sunshine days, so seemingly un-Michigan. 

– the beauty of roasted beets. 

– a day spent cooking, snapping photos and reading. 

– our family night dinner plates. 

– the fun of making things (meals, memories, projects) with my husband. 

{702-717}

Umbrella {Week two…}

This week didn’t feel as WOW as last week… I don’t know. Maybe I’m just not as easily wowed as I was last week. Perhaps I lost my ability to wow somewhere between Sunday evening and Monday morning…

Anyhow…

Moving on.

This chandelier is absolutely amazing… Having just redone my bedroom in grey, (here is the before, reveal to come as soon as one last item that was ordered arrives) This would AWESOME in there, if we didn’t have (and need) the ceiling fan that’s in there instead…

I have heard many mentions of such magic as this, but it sounded so completely complicated. Being the total drag-my-feet baker that I am, pretty much anything is complicated, but this, this I think I can do. Have you made crackers? Would you attempt this? Don’t they look amazing?

Um. This may have restored my wow. I mean, come on… WOW. Now, you phone calendar types are probably mumbling to yourself about how much work it is, but seriously??? WOW… wow… wow…

These author quote posters kind of make me happy. I have an empty space in my office that doesn’t need anything too busy mounted. Perhaps a couple of these matted and framed would look great. Which two do you think would look suited for my office?

This might be the very best thing I’ve ever read. I LOVE it…

And lastly, I literally laughed out loud. I hate this song because although it’s annoyingly catchy- it’s pretty stupid. This though, was funny…

What greatness do you have for show & tell this week?

How do you care?

I am the absolute worst at a lot of things. My husband loves to joke that I’m super anal about the placement of specific things in the house, and I am. I’ll own up to it… I’m also the worst about starting a task/project and getting distracted, never to return to it. I’m the worst about talking on the phone, I hate it.

I am the absolute worst about a lot of things…

The top of the list, I’m learning, is self-care. Don’t get me wrong, this is not to be confused with taking care of myself. I eat healthy, drink tons of water, shower, etc. I’m talking self-care. You know, the advice we give a friend whose struggling and might need to decompress or heal. Yeah, that. From a very early (EARLY) age I was taught to take care of others, (that was my sole life’s purpose) and internally I learned that anything which didn’t fall into that category was selfish. As I went after my counseling degree I learned the vitality of self-care and encouraging clients to self-care, when I went into the field, but never practiced such things myself. Are you kidding? I couldn’t take such bold steps in selfishness…

Just in case you haven’t been reading here long, our family had a really rough 2011/2012 and by the end of it I found myself pretty deep in situational depression. I was just exhausted and beaten down. Come to find out, I had pretty much zero beneficial coping skills or an iota of how to take care of myself. On the same token, I had never really had anyone “take care” of me, because that was my job– to care for everyone else… pretty much I was all about the job security! *wink*

So yeah, things are a lot better now, but it’s a journey…

I was recently given a list of 218 Ways to Practice Self Care...

Technically speaking, I have a few issues with the list itself. Like, how “write a letter to someone”, “send a note to someone” and “write a letter” are all probably one item on the list and not three, but I digress. {or how “star gaze” and “Watch the stars” are probably just one item…}

Technicalities aside, there were a few things on the list that surprised me.

Rearrange a Room. Really?!?!?!? Well, I am the QUEEN of this one. I get a need that flares up and go crazy until a great portion of the house is different. So maybe I coped that way sometimes. I can tell you Chw pretty much didn’t see it as a healthy habit. Ha!

Surprise a child with a gift. Ok. I get it, but kind of don’t. While I see how this could make you feel good, I don’t know that it’s really “self-care”.

Study the issues/candidates/vote. Again, I don’t know. While several things on the list feel like they are reaching, this one really does. Is this important? Heck Yes! But if you are healing from abuse or trauma, this will not help your healing, or at least I don’t see how it will…

So, I really was inspired by some of these things on the list. I decided with school starting, this would be a good transition time to try to put some of them into practice. I thought I’d make a list and you guys can keep me accountable for how I’m doing… And by all means, if you have any self-care wisdoms/tips/etc- I’m all ears!

Listen to more relaxing music.

Relax more, outside.

Read poetry out loud

Breathe from my diaphragm

stretch/yoga

Do some worthwhile volunteer work

Go to bed early

Buy myself flowers

Eat Breakfast in Bed

Try a new word

Enjoy nature

Visit an art gallery

Go on a picnic

Do something to make the world a better place.

Practice relaxation techniques

Enter a Contest

Have a tv less night a week.