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.