Taking charge of life, one step at a time

Today I rescheduled a plethora of tiny doctor appointments for the kids (all part of the vaccination routine) into one big appointment on the same day. My life has suddenly become much simpler, or at least the forecast has improved substantially over the next two weeks, just from that one phone call.

Yesterday, I encountered a problematic situation and actually acted! Details omitted for privacy reasons, but the end result was that I actually dealt with something rather than just worrying about it and doing nothing. Now, to find a way to transfer this accomplishment mode to apply to house work . . .

We need a dog

This is what I have decided today, that we need a dog. I mean really, Really, REALLY NEED one. Unfortunately, will be at least another 3 years before we can think of having one. Why do we need one? Let's just say it has something to do with cleaning up toddler-cracked eggs for the second time in one week . . . I guess we could make do with a lock for the refrigerator.

Success, at least in the cross stitch world

Today for the very first time every I actually completed a cross stitch and it is now hanging on a wall in our home. It is the third counted cross stitch project I have undertaken, and I started it back in Feb or Mar 2007, but I have finished it! Next move: got Amanda a mini cross stitch to try &, what else?, picked up another cross stitch for myself.

The laundry saga

Today's post is inspired by my friend at Just Our Thoughts, who once again blogged about something that was on my mind, too (how does she know?). The subject: laundry.

My friend described her mountain of clean laundry, a sight I know well, as I have often created such a pile on our bed in hopes of putting it all away, only to dump it all into the baskets again when night comes. This usually continues for a week or so until the baskets have mostly emptied themselves because we've been living out of them. Then it's time to do laundry again, and the whole big pile of clean clothes plus a plethora of other excuses sets everything up for yet another week of living out of laundry baskets. Sounds so lovely, doesn't it? You're right, it's not, and the dad of the family particularly resents it if he has to hunt for his clothes outside of their designated places, which makes everything even nastier.

Last week after many weeks of the laundry life described above, I somehow became resolved to have my laundry DONE, as in really done, not just washed and dried but put away, too. And, somehow (read: by the grace of God), I did finish. Since then, I have striven to maintain that finished state. The first thing I had to do was do laundry the day after the laundry pile disappeared. This was not hard to do, since there was still plenty hiding in nooks and crannies. The next day it was time to work on "extra curricular" laundry, i.e. the things that really do need washing periodically, but which do not usually make it to the hamper without conscious effort. Sunday came up not long after that, and I felt quite all right about leaving laundry alone for the day. However, I knew that laundry work would have to resume on Monday if Mt. Washmore was to remain banished.

The beginning of the week went pretty well, with a couple of days of doing and load and getting it put away before going to bed. But, by today a very full basket of clean clothes had made its way back into the master bedroom. I realized that such seemingly innocent baskets are probably the usual seeds from which Mt. Washmore grows at our house. I vanquished the basket and emptied the hampers into the washing machine. For now, Mt. Washmore is at bay. It will not stay that way, though, without continual effort. Looks like it may be time to change some sheets tomorrow for the sake of building the laundry habit.

Shoes, inspired by Elizabeth

My niece Elizabeth put up a post about shoes as a reflection of their owners. Aside from the fact that it was an extremely interesting and well written piece, it struck a chord with me thanks to my own experiences with shoes lately.

Last summer was my fashion summer, and while I did get some incredible $3 items from the clearance racks, one of my favorite things that I got was a pair of shiny, open toe, platform heels for full price. Normally I'm a flats kind of gal, but for some reason I just fell in love with those shoes. I added another pair or two of shoes to my wardrobe that summer, too, all with the goal of being able to achieve a certain look. Why? Because I was tired of what I perceived to be my existing "tired mom" look.

Well, fast forward a year, and I cannot deny that I am a tired mom. My cute shoes are still around, but most of the time I wear the pair of SAS shoes my folks got for me as an early birthday present while baby 2 was on the way. They are, or were, the most practical, comfortable shoes I've ever owned, and every time my folks mention an outing to SAS it's all I can do to stop from begging them to get me another pair. Why? Simply because the shoes are looking a bit worn. It's been a while, after all; baby 4 is 3 months old.

Today I made it to Target for the first time in well over a month. I love Target, especially around seasonal changes because that's when I find my clothing bargains. Target is where my beloved shiny black shoes came from. And my cute brown wedges, which no longer fit my post partum mom feet. And the clunky boots for winter, chosen because they actually have tread on them for our frosty days with slippery sidewalks. But what caught my eye today? The pink platform/wedge sandals with jeweled turtles on them, on clearance for $17 odd dollars and available in a size that fit my sock covered mom foot. I looked, I drooled, I even put them in the basket for a second before I considered our starving student situation and the effect of witnessing impulse buying on my watching children. So, I left them.

Why did I want them? Because they scream "cute person who cares about having her feet noticed" instead of "busy mom who needs serviceable shoes." The more I think about those shoes and about my outings in my similarly-constructed brown wedges, the more I know that my mom shoes are really much better suited for the life I've been choosing, the life of a mom. Yes, I love the cute shoes, but face it, if it makes me trip when I need to dash, it's just not a good idea. I threw away a couple of shoes last winter simply because they didn't have enough traction left even for smooth, unfrosted asphalt. I need shoes that serve me, not shoes that demand service.

I decided to look up my mom shoes and see how much they cost, since maybe they might be worth saving for. The manufacturer wants me to shop in stores rather than online, but they did provide a catalog showing a picture of my shoe. My style is called Viva. "Live." Which is exactly what I want to do, come to think of it. Live, not just survive, live. And, that's exactly what they let me do.

At the end of her post, Elizabeth concluded that maybe it was time to revive her tired shoes a bit. You know, I think my husband has some black shoe polish somewhere. And I'm pretty sure at least some of the spots on my shoes could be washable. Maybe I don't need different shoes. Maybe I just need to take better care of the ones I have. And hey, that $17 I didn't spend on the pink shoes today is almost 10% of what I remember my current shoes costing; maybe I can round up the other 90% before they truly fall apart. For now, they still protect my feet from stray toys; time to do some polishing.

A random memory for possible future expansion

Today I had the fortune to tap into a heretofore undiscovered vein of the back home blog network. In the process, I was reminded of a story: The star couple from one of today's blog were courting not too far before Dad & Mom were getting together. She (from the couple, not Mom) lived within a couple of blocks from Mom during college, which Mom knew for one reason: He, from back home, was frequently seen haunting a certain doorstep as Mom passed by on her way to school. I ended up in a class with him around that time, and someone in that class was selling tickets to a big holiday show. I bought tickets for Dad & me, and so, apparently, did he for him & her, since who should have the seats right smack next to ours but themselves. So, how did I know that I'd found he & she for certain, even before I saw the family pics? He comes from a stomping ground even more obscure than my own, at least ancestrally, and so the blog post announcing a vacation in that location was a dead giveaway. Although there were a lot more people around in their pictures than I remember seeing when we were there.

Another installment in the sleep saga

Sunday night, I got to bed by 11 and felt reasonably awake throughout most of Monday. Monday, I got to bed by midnight, and already I feel myself slipping into zombie mode. Coincidence? I think not.

Hypocrisy 101

So, here I am up ridiculously late, contemplating, of all things, doing some google research on sleep. LOL

Lost in the past

I've been getting lost in the past tonight, and I've got to stop it and get to bed, which means I've got to blog about it a little so that my brain will go into sleep mode. There was that magic couple of years when everything was looking so nice, first with a fairly tale year in which we were actually having income instead of solid out go, followed by an expected "next chapter in our story." And then the storms blew in, and blew in, and blew in. We seem to be in a time of relative calm now, or at least a time of some other sort of disaster, but the storms have definitely taken their toll. During the calm, I began coming to terms with the realities of housekeeping, but only now some three years or more later am I beginning to feel up to it again. The biggest issue I'm realizing I have is an almost complete lack of positive routines. It's all about survival mode most of the time, with only occasional glimpses into the world of thriving. Those glimpses are powerful, though, and leave me just recharged enough to forget about doing whatever it was that helped me in the first place, leaving me back at the beginning again. I need routines, but it is very difficult to rebuild from my current level. Oh well. I guess that's what baby steps are for.

An educational sort of day

Somewhere I'd heard something about ward conference coming at the end of the month, and so I was a little surprised when two members of the stake presidency showed up at our ward today, since I wouldn't have expected them to be there so many times in a month. Turns out they had a reason, though; time for a new bishopric (if by chance someone not belonging to my church reads it, authority is a really big deal in my church, so it was important to have the next person up from the bishop there so that there was officially someone with authority present for the meeting during the whole changing of the guard, so to speak). Well, that plus the announcements I started realizing I'd forgotten basically rendered my whole newsletter working from last night useless. And then, as if I didn't already have a plate full of humble pie, my sweet baby, bless his heart, managed to get me quite messy, thus destroying the "I look so great" feeling I'd had going out the door earlier. So, today's lesson topic, regardless of what teachers said, was obviously humility.

Also gained some interesting insights into the world. There's an individual in our congregation who seems unreasonably annoyed by me, as in my attempts at extending smile & wave friendship are neither reciprocated nor ignored, but rather met with a sort of "you, you, you, annoying person, you!" expression. Today thanks to some context clues coming together, I figured out that this person does have legitimate cause for bitterness. Interesting, to say the least. In fact, the circumstances in question are the sort that kind of slap me in the face with just how blessed my life actually is these days. However, despite my general tendency to see the glass as half full, anyone who actually knows me knows that I really do have days and even longer of non-hunky-dory times in my life. In the end, though, I have to go with the Marjorie P. Hinckley quote about getting through life by laughing instead of crying. I'm not trying to criticize the individual in question; I'm rather simply struck by the power of choosing one's perspective. If one has hope that there's more to this life than just the sum of the hum drum, then it becomes easier to try to put things into more manageable perspective. Still takes work, but I think it can be learned like any habit. To borrow a Mr. Collins quote from Pride & Prejudice, "It is a gift of nature, but constant study had enabled me, I flatter myself, to make a kind of art of it." Anyway, all you Pollyanna haters, remember that she lost her parents at a young age and was determined to make the best of things anyway. It wasn't that she had no appreciation of sorrow; she just decided to try not to wallow in it.

A good day

Besides the obvious goodness of having a roof over my head, plenty to eat, clean water, climate control, adorable children, a loving husband, and knowledge of truth in my life, today was an especially good day for these reasons:

#1: I witnessed a truly amazing phenomenon on twitter: #iamblessed. Not only did the trend make the top 10, it was even #1 for much of the day. I truly believe that universal gratitude could go a long way in solving the world's problems. O that there were more days when more of the world was more grateful. Glad I got to see what I saw today.

#2: I was blessed by the comments of a kind friend I've never met. Made me feel very loved. Thank you. :)

The other eternal quest

. . . which is of course to find the perfect background for one's blog. In some cases I solve the problem by creating my own. However, in the case of my "butterfly diary," (see "personal progress") I have yet to actually create my own and instead have installed who-knows-how-many things in an effort to find *THE* background. Interesting project, but I think the latest incarnation may stick for awhile, since it's actually a complete template. Here's hopin'. :)

The Elusive Dream . . .

. . . which is, of course, world wide popularity, with absolutely no critics, of course. Okay, so that's a little extreme, but I'm afraid that perhaps part of my drive to blog, twitter, facebook, you name it is all in quest of some sort of visible evidence that I have friends. The results thus far: I have one true friend on Blogger, 1 true friend on Facebook, and have met several nice people on twitter who have graciously taken notice of me via following (never met them, but they're nice!). It's a bit odd coming to terms with this bit of insecurity, but my comfort is that at least through blogging I have something nice for me when its all said and done. Also, Twitter & Facebook have some nice photo options, which is good, too, since I've become a bit of a photoholic. Anyway, enough, I suppose of the "poor me syndrome" (the other PMS). Mayhap some sleep will help set things a bit better. :)

On this day in 2002 . . .

I had a really bad day that was part of a really bad month (or months) following a really bad weekend around this time in July. It was so terrible at the time that it is now extremely humorous to me. It all revolves around one of the more deliciously sticky, complicated, nasty, and pointless parts of my college dating career. But, oh, it sure makes for great stories! Even while the particularly nasty events of that weekend were still giving me pain, my inner satirist was nevertheless rubbing her hands and cackling in the background. Shall I share the story? My inner satirist is telling me I must, or else she won't let me sleep because she'll be chuckling too loudly about it all to let me do so. However, my inner entrepreneur has an alternate proposal; mayhap I should just send this off to my top secret author blog so that I can let you read it sometime when you can pay me for the pleasure. *wink*wink* Off to the secret lair! :)

(By the way, I actually had a very nice day this year, basically a complete opposite of seven years ago. What a difference about 2555 days make . . .)

Blog envy pt. 2

Interesting twist in our (my) blog envy saga: I've got more followers on Twitter than in Blogger, by a long shot. Granted, some spammers appear sometimes (in a Twitter way), but today 3 reasonably legit ones signed on to my follower list. The funny thing is I don't know any of them, but they nevertheless "listen" to me. Does this mean I sound best in 140 characters or less? Is the verbosity enabled by blogdom overrated for those wishing to be heard? These and other mysteries of the online world to be considered further later, mayhap. :)

Blog envy, blogging, blather, etc.

I have a confession to make: I have serious blog envy for some of those blogs out there. Is it the backgrounds? No, I've now figured out where to get them, how to install them, and even how to make some basic ones of my own. No, it's the comments I envy. Comments, glorious comments, the one thing besides a counter or other such widget that can let an author know that someone is actually reading the blog. *Sigh* (My apologies & thanks to those of you who have commented :)

However, despite this blog envy, I realize that there is greater purpose, for me at least, to blogging. Once upon a time I was a journal writer, but after about seven good years of that, life changes and perfectionist issues pretty much killed that. A year or so ago I first heard about blogs, mostly in the context of "use your blog to share the gospel." So, I tried setting up a blog with that in mind. Didn't get very far. Later, I started actually reading blogs, including friends' and relatives' blogs, and began to understand the whole thing a bit more. The big lightning bolt came along with baby #4 when I realized that a blog was a great way to share baby pictures. Then I realized that it could also be electronic journaling. Just think, a digital scrapbook maintained by Google, and easy to do, too! So, I started blogging. Later, I realized that writing is good for my sanity. So, even though I usually blog to the wind, I blog.

On to the blather: I mourn the exit of bloggers from the blogosphere. If you read this, you know who you are. Those of you who declare yourselves done with blogging. I shall miss you! But think, why call yourselves done? Do you feel some sort of obligation to your blog? Is it like an odious task master chiding you for not making additions according to some abstract schedule? O my friends, be masters of your own blogs! Do not let a little web page intimidate you, especially a web page you created! Why not just consider yourself on vacation maybe? Just because you don't feel like blogging everyday or even every year, why issue such a final sentence as "done" when your blog will wait patiently until you do feel like you have something to say?

All right, glad I got that off my chest. Yes, I am a novice blogger, but I find that I go in cycles with my passions, and I'm glad to know that even if/when my enthusiasm for blogging fades, the blog can still be there whenever the fire returns, just as my genealogy stuff waits for me online across the web or a book waits for me to finish reading it. :)

Writing, ahhh!

One of the first assignments my wise English teacher gave us in college was to write about the process we went through before actually writing papers. That way we could find out what our big "to do before the paper" list was and use the knowledge to get the paper writing done sooner by starting the to do list sooner. The big point that came out of it all was that most of us have lots of things we do to justify procrastinating the actual writing. I never considered myself much of an English-y person in school, and certainly I never had writing at the top of my "want to do" list. However, the tables have turned. In a world full of dishes, laundry, and children, I now find myself wanting to procrastinate those tasks by, you guessed it, writing (chiefly in blog form). How things do change over time. :)

Congratulations, Dad; your Google OS wish is coming true.

Just found this story on the BBC RSS feed today; Dad has been saying for some time that Google rocks and should/can do their own operating system. Well, they are!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8141964.stm

The Mac is back!

My Grape keyboard arrived today from Mac Pro Online, and so here is a post produced using said keyboard. Works just fine, and the manufacture date on it is from the same year as my beloved Mac, so I guess they were made for each other, despite the color differences. I've also ordered a backup hard drive, and some extra RAM, too, since I found a place online with a 1 GB stick for $25 before shipping (and still under $30 after shipping!). So, now we wait to see if it all comes through, and if these sellers are worth recommending. And then there's that operating system still on the purchase list. Anyway, time to get back to one of the main projects for which this keyboard was intended.

More tech stuff & bargain hunting

My mac consultant answered my email question, and yes, it is possible for my eMac to have 2 GB of RAM thanks to advances in RAM technology. Naturally, Apple would not provide support for any problems I might have with modified memory, but since my extended warranty expired over a year ago, that's not too much of a concern for me.

I've ordered a keyboard, a new Grape keyboard (old, but still new in the box) from the iFruity days of iMacs. So, that just leaves RAM upgrade, and external hard drive, and a new operating system on the shopping list. The one problem is that, although the funds I have were clearly sent with the intention of fulling my Mac dreams, I know full well that SOMEBODY doesn't care for the idea of my proposed upgrades. Current solution: bargain hunt; get stuff at such great prices as to have leftover money from the original allotment. In that spirit, I chose the old-but-new Grape keyboard. (OK, so I also liked the purple aspect of it.) I have found a refurbished memory stick on Amazon that is about $15 dollars before shipping. Do I trust refurbished? And is it really compatible? Also, I've found lots of hard drive options, and eBay says I can have 8% off anything I want that I get through them. The operating system is $116 after my educational discount, but it may be possible to find something even lower with a bit of hunting? Anyway, more on that later; must retire now in hopes of reviving the real brain.

Becoming tech savvy

I may have the chance (or rather funds) to upgrade my eMac a bit, which would be absolutely wonderful. So, I've been doing some research, which provided some answers and led to more questions. The basic issue: how much memory (RAM) can you put in an eMac? According to welovemacs.com, the max is 1 GB. However, I don't know whether this includes the possibility of using 1 GB sticks. (If anyone knows, feel free to comment.)

Meanwhile, in the absence of a functioning eMac (actually it's just the keyboard that's out; kind of makes the whole thing hard to use, though), I've been investigating photo editing software. I own a version of Adobe Photoshop, but of the three computers we have, only the eMac will run it. So, what to do until then? I specifically want a program that supports layers and has an option for layer transparency. Also, something with great layout potential, all so that can try making some of my own blog backgrounds, etc. Shabby Blogs had some great insights for me on blog decorating, thanks to their new blog post dividers, and Cutest Blog on the Block has lots of how-to info as well. Unfortunately, nothing is coming up in the way of free software with those specs. Guess I should just order that new keyboard and move on.

The Network (of blogs, that is; sorry, Verizon)

They say you're never more than a few people away from anyone within the LDS church, meaning that although Jim doesn't know Sue, he does know Tom whose sister Liz knows Amy whose roommate's brother used to date Sue, etc. In trying to build my blog link network, I've just found an actual instance of such a chain:

1. I know Amy
2. Amy knows Mike & Kristen
3. Mike & Kristen know Matt & Chris
4. Matt & Chris know Ben & Celeste
5. Ben & Celeste know Bonnie's parents
6. Bonnie's dad's brother was in our ward in Seattle

So, yes, it really is a small world after all.

Birthday stories, volume 1

In the midst of birthday season, it seems appropriate to leave backup copies of a few relevant memories. Very rarely have any of my birthdays been completely centered on a single day. However, three birthday seasons stand out as being particularly long and lovely. The first was the year I graduated from high school. Between graduation gifts and birthday gifts, birthday season lasted nearly three months that year. The next season of interest came the year I got married. Again, the gifts kept coming for months. Perfect for a present happy person like me. The last season of note was the year my first son was born. That time, however, it was clear that many of the presents were not intended for me. But then again, perhaps in a way they were. After all, what better present for a girl than cute clothes for dressing her baby doll? And baby boy clothes turned out to be much more fun than I'd anticipated; good thing, too, since I've had three of them now :)

Blankety blank bureaucracy

Just got a note in the mail from an office saying that they couldn't process my request because of "no return address." So, if there was no return address on the request, how did they send me the note saying it wasn't there? Grrrr....

Farewell, Mo

Sometime during the last 24 hrs or so, Mo the miracle fish crossed over into the great beyond. About Mo: Mo was a dalmatian molly who far exceeded his predicted life expectancy, given the obstacles facing him when he first came to us. We had chosen dalmatian mollies to live in our living room aquarium when our neighborhood pet store didn't have a blue male betta I liked. We named the first two George & Gracie, but after a month or so, Gracie passed on, in a rather emaciated state. We bought Mo to keep George company, but when I went to fish Mo out a few weeks later, since he seemed to be dead, we realized what was happening: George was bullying his tank mates out of their food. Mo was not actually dead then, but he'd gotten so weak that he could no longer fight the current and had gotten stuck on the side of the filter. George got sent to live with the goldfish, where he lived prosperously until his mysterious death a few months later (probably a pH problem or something; the goldfish were and are still fine). Meanwhile, although Mo never had and never did look particularly robust, he nevertheless hung on until today, even after contracting some sort of unknown fish disease that attacked around his gills. So, today we bid Mo farewell, but we are glad that he is out of pain.

Funny story about Mo's name: Big girl Amanda likes to have a say in naming things, so after we bought Mo, I started offering her suggestions of names to pick from. After Amanda rejected seemingly hundreds of names (exaggeration, but it felt like it), I finally said "Mo," to which Amanda said "That sounds good." So, Mo it was. The "miracle fish" tag got added when he survived the incident with George and the filter. Mo came to us in the fall of 2008, so he spent at least 6 months with us, if not a little more.

Blogger discoveries & photography

Today I found out that you can set the date for your posts on Blogger. This is important for me, since I've been working on blogs for the kids (basically digital online scrapbooks), but I wasn't sure how I was going to keep things straight if I started posting current events before I got done catching up on the past. No problem now! Just change the date on the past postings, and Blogger files things just where I want them. Thank you Blogger (and Google)!

Otherwise, while out snapping pictures of the kids playing today, I remembered how much I like playing with our camera, trying to get really nice pictures. (Digital cameras are so great...I grew up with the throw away kind; no zoom lens, no digital stabilization, just film...ugh!) I got a fairly decent flower shot today (thank you, unsuspecting neighbor, for planting this peony), but I am also realizing that photography really is work...fun work, though.

Couple celebrates 81st wedding anniversary!

While checking the BBC headlines as usual and trying to decide which if any controversial issue stories to click on first, I found an actual bit of good, happy news: A couple in England is celebrating their 81st wedding anniversary. They're both 101 (or almost there). Congratulations to them! Here's the link to the story:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/devon/8067752.stm

23 May is Liverwurst Day

For many years now on May 23 my mom has sung a song about "Don't buy the liverwurst," which includes a bit about how the liverwurst in question has been sitting at the store since October 1st and "today is the 23rd of May." Well, although this post isn't on Liverwurst Day, I nevertheless had snippetts of the song going through my head yesterday. I googled it today and found out that it's an Allan Sherman song; guess I should have figured he might have written it. Anyway, just for fun and just because I've been curious, here are the lyrics (imported from allthelyrics.com):

(Sung to the tune of Down by the Riverside)

When you go to the delicatessen store,
Don't buy the liverwurst.
Don't buy the liverwurst.
Don't buy the liverwurst.
I repeat what I just said before,
Don't buy the liverwurst.
Don't buy the liverwurst.

Oh buy the corned beef if you must,
The pickled herring you can trust,
And the lox puts you in orbit AOK.
But that big hunk of liverwurst
Has been there since October First,
And today is the Twenty-Third of May.

So when you go to the delicatessen store,
Don't buy the liverwurst.
Don't buy the liverwurst.
Don't buy the liverwurst.
It'll make your insides awful sore.
Don't buy the liverwurst.
Don't buy the liverwurst.

Menu brainstorming

I can prepare a variety of meals, but when dinner time hits, I usually feel at a loss. So, time to move some of the menu options to the external hard drive to make them easier to access and hopefully promote better meal planning and grocery shopping. I've done this before, but the papers I've used have gotten lost. So, here comes Google to the rescue, storing stuff for me. :)

• BBQ chicken (either crock pot or stove top)
• Sour Cream stroganoff
• Sour Cream enchilada casserole
  
• Lasagna casserole
  
• Lasagna
• Strawberry spinach salad
• Pasta with red sauce
• Green bean casserole
• Beans
• Burritos
• Chicken/meat ala onion and Worcestershire sauce
• Tuna wiggle
• Meatloaf
• Fettucine alfredo
• Creamed peas
• Mexican rice
• Bullion flavored rice
• French dip sandwiches
• Grilled cheese/cheese toast
• Macaroni and cheese (boxed or otherwise)
• Cheesy chicken & rice cassarole