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Crawling to Christmas…..

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Joining Kelly and her posse for a wrapup, because I’m waiting on a tow truck for the kiddo’s truck, so hey…..why not?

Advent is so relaxing.  said no one ever.  I don’t know about you but THE.  STRUGGLE.  IS.  REAL.  It’s so hard to reallllllly stop and slow down and focus when there is LIFE all around us getting in the way, isn’t it?  I’m on a podcast ROLL (greg and jennifer, girlfriends, among women)  and I am so completely affirmed in this universal feeling, but also in the constant pressure to make the perfect memories and traditions.  It can be completely overwhelming and overshadowing.  That said, while our Advent has been far from “PERFECT”, it has been pretty good for us.  Let’s get to it and see a few reasons why:

  1.  Band concerts.  6 years running.  Our last Middle School Christmas concert and I’m not sad.  Truly.  Bad mom?  Whatever.  Let’s be honest, beginning and intermediate middle school band are painful.  I love my kids but it is rough.  Although, it does make you appreciate advanced band.  Which leads me to this video of our 8th grader’s piccolo solo.  The piccolo she picked up TWO DAYS before her solo!!!  All those concerts?  Worth it.

2. And then, sometimes you have a little insomnia during Advent.  3 a.m. brain wake up call.  Pray, toss, turn all the things over in your head and finally cry “Uncle” and get up at 3:45.  Truth be told…..not entirely awful.  Coffee.  Peaceful.  Quiet.  Daily readings by the Christmas tree.  Did my retreat readings in preparation for our Wednesday night meeting.  And ready for spin class at 5:15 a.m. ON TIME.  Peaceful.  Productive.  But would really like that not to be happening on a regular basis.  You feel me?  I mean 3 a.m.?!?!?  #forthebirds

3.  Another concert.  Did I already post this somewhere?  Not sure.  I think insta…But it was lovely.  Our boy performing with the Floriday Symphony Youth Orchestra, opera singer, choir and ballet performing Nutcracker dances.  And outside.  THAT was a really good one.  Truly beautiful and time to just sit in this season.

4.  Some traditions stick.  Advent candle.  Lit several times this Advent, multiple weeks.  Even with the entire family at the table.  HUGE win there.  And peanut butter balls.  Every year.  If nothing else.  Always!!  This year a quadrupled batch, rolled 90% by our oldest daughter and her boyfriend.  (yes, I said boyfriend.  let’s move on, shall we?)  Another win, because while tasty, they are hugely time consuming and tiring….so happy to pass that off.  I did finish the final 10% while they watched Jim Carey’s “Grinch”.    And because they were rolling, I was able to whip out 3 other kinds of cookies, so roughly a gagillion dozen cookies last Saturday.  #happyneighbors  #happyfamily

5.  Last night EVERY SINGLE SOLITARY PERSON IN THE HOUSE WAS GONE. (mostly, the oldest kid was trying to fix his truck which wouldn’t start, so I left him alone–so mostly alone)    AND the Hubby (who very graciously drove our son to Orlando for his rehearsal and home because he’s had multiple rehearsals, performances and FINALS.  perhaps not our best parenting decision to allow this in hindsight.  for future reference, we must keep this in the memory. )  What’s a mama to do?  I’ll tell you.  Wrap ALL the presents.  This is pretty much the first time in parenting history this has not taken place on Christmas Eve, so I don’t really even know what’s going on here.

6.  What else did I do whilst having the house to myself?  Got all the Christmas cards ready to go (while I watched Bridget Jones baby.  Don’t judge.  I laughed and it was good.)  We skipped this tradition last year—breaking our 20+year streak.  And we lived.  And so did everyone else.  weird.  This year, the picture is totally casual, not dressy, a quick snap from everyone at Thanksgiving and I am A-OK with that.  This weekend we will throw a letter together for a few peeps and BOOM.  Done.  Maybe this weekend we will finally put the ornaments on the tree.  Who knows????  right now I just need to make the grocery list and figure out what dessert I am making for a Christmas party tonight.  AFTER the church Christmas play….but I digress

7.  In closing.  When your 13 yo takes a break from a melt down English project to “pet the dog for a few minutes” to recover her brain, this happens.  And  you know………….you probably feel it, too.  So take that rest when needed, life will go on and your brain, heart and sanity will thank you!

sleeper

7 Secrets of a Getaway

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Joining up with Kelly and ALLLLLL for a quick-ish little post.  And prayers for Kelly and her family as they mourn their dear friend.  Life is short y’all.  We all know it and yet, we are often blindsided by the reminder.  So take a minute today and be glad.

This is the day that the Lord has made, let us be glad and rejoice in it!  Psalm 118:24

About a month ago we received an email invitation from our friend and marriage counselor extraordinaire to come to his Marriage Conference, “Unveiled”.  The location was only an hour away, however, when I read the email I thought, “that’s nice, but December……”.  Hubby read it and said, “Let’s go”, made the hotel reservations and had me make the conference reservations.  The timing was on the back end of Thanksgiving and by the grace of God, my mom was still in town and gracious enough to stay with the kids and taxi them to school et al.  So, yup.  Right smack in Advent and the crazy, busy month of December the skies parted and our schedule opened and so we went.  As you do when things go down like that.

The conference was given by the JPII Healing Center  and is only one of the many retreats they host; based in Tallahassee they also travel to put on various conferences/retreats for priests, religious and lay people and I strongly, STRONGLY suggest that if you see there is one near  you……make your reservation ASAP, you won’t be sorry.  Heck, several people flew in from around the country to come!!  So just check the website and see what’s going on!

Our retreat was marriage centered (but we had singles, datings, divorced as well) but quite frankly, it contained truths every heart needs to hear. Bob has a way of peeling away the burnt and charred layers of your heart to encourage new growth and healing from within.  It was time of talking, listening, and experiencing visual interpretation of the Trinity and our different relationships in life; it was an incredibly powerful and moving experience that resonated deep, deep in my core.

 

Here are my takeaways from the long weekend:

  1. Married people, listen up, take the time away.  Beg, borrow, steal.  Do what you have to do.  Your marriage needs it.  Your soul needs it.  It needs to be long enough to disconnect from life, to breathe, to fully relax and to just BE together.  Fully focused.  No distractions. And  yes, I know there are seasons in life that just don’t allow for this time away, so make the time together:  after the kids are in bed, during naptime, dinner dates, whatever it takes.  The time is there. Reallocate it.
  2. Deep discussions are the portal to the heart.  Listening with an open mind, an open heart to REALLY hear what your spouse needs…..crucial.  It’s so easy to get wrapped up in the day-to-day which is important in survival—but the long term, needs depth.
  3. The ocean is a soothing balm to the soul.  Always and forever, amen.  Long walks on the beach, combing the sand for sea glass and cool shells while the sand squishes between your toes and the waves crash down and race up the shore to tickly your feet—yes, good stuff.  No beach?  I’m sorry.  Get outside and find your own soothing balm because God is good EVERYWHERE!!
  4. Regular meals are a farce.  Coffee for breakfast.  Biscuit for a snack.  Nice lunch.  No dinner.  Whatever.  Eat when we are hungry.  With no hangry teenagers about, there is no reason to worry, meals will occur when necessary.  I have no idea how to roll this into regular life.  All I can say is, it is FANtastic!!
  5. Marriage is worth fighting for.  Going in to the retreat, we were in a good place.  Granted we sure have our baggage, as all humans do, but overall a good place.  In our life, in our marriage, in our family.  Perfect?  No.  Not by a long shot.  But good.  This retreat showed me that all may be well, but marriage always needs tending and when we take a good long look at it and each other there are always areas that need a little TLC.
  6. Prayer is essential.  You may not be a FAITH person and truly, I have no answer to that.  I only know that I’ve been down that road before and between the two I KNOW that this God-road is filled with a peace, hope and strength that is beyond comprehension and nowhere to be found on the faithless road.  Bring that faith and prayer into your marriage and you have a foundation of ROCK that is undeniable.  Faith looks different for everyone and if you but dip your toe into that road you will be forever changed.
  7. Reconciliation and renewal.  Reconciling past hurts or areas that we might not even realize are in contention is but one more layer of concrete in that foundation.  Taking those to Christ adds the steel reinforcement.  Renewing your marriage vows whether in private, at church or a retreat along with 150 of your newest friends,  is powerful.  Intentional, reflective and if you have some marriage under your belt already, those vows will strike a chord in a way that resonates to your every fiber.  Do it.

OK, so that is the gist of the weekend.  So find yourself some time with your honey this weekend.  Snuggle, walk, if you can get away a bit do it.  Take some time this Advent to focus on your own domestic church.  It might not be easy, or maybe it will.  Either way, you won’t be disappointed.

Blessings!!

Another week bites the dust

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Friday fun with Kelly and the bloggy-verse!

Somehow even though I wrote the draft for this on Thursday, Friday slipped through my fingers and here it is Saturday.  C’est la vie, right?  Here we go anyway….

This week there was a fun little Instagram linkup of #onedayHH.  Did you play?  Basically, snapshots of regular life, ordinary days of people all over.  Which I always find interesting.  I loved when Cari used to do the Snapshots of the day where people were assigned an hour and you submitted a picture for your hour and she linked it all up.  Very fun to see a glimpse of everyone else’s lives.  Kind of like during the fall when you walk at night and can see a glimpse of life in the picture windows of houses.  Which has inspired my 7 QTs this week……A week in the life, but without pictures because well, I just don’t always have the time or energy to upload them to my computer, dropbox drives me nuts and it’s way to hard for me to blog from my phone, so…words.  words will do.

  1. Sunday was pretty busy since our girl had her Conference cheer competition for pop warner.  She had to be there at 715 and we were giving her friend a ride, so out the door we were at 615 to get them some Dunkin and time to finish hair outside the arena.  Her performance wasn’t until 230p.m. so I met a girlfriend for breakfast and puttered around the house with various chore stuff until I went back. It was predictably loud, but the girls did great and they move on to Regional competition at the end of the month.  yay.  I made it home juuuuuuuuuuuuust barely in time to make it to Mass, which was definitely needed and greatly appreciated.
  2. Work.  School.  Halloween.  On a Monday.  Can we all just vote to make this little event the last Saturday in October every year?  Seriously, because.  Ugh.  Our kids didn’t even dress up, but one was working—so I was nervous about him driving around with all the little goblins in the dark and another was handing out candy with friends—so I had to go get her which made me nervous–I drive about 3 mph on this night.  And then our son made it home quite late from work and which he informed me his window in his car wouldn’t go up so we had to shift cars at 130 a.m. to get his into the garage.  Then my brain just started rolling so I just cozied up on the couch until it stopped somewhere around 3 a.m.  My back is still paying the price on that one. I did, however, get lots of prayer in and fell asleep to this song by Jason Gray in my head which I just absolutely love and it was so timely.
  3. Tuesday.  Work.  School.  All Saint’s Day and the Hubby and I had a Mass date.  Twice in one week.  Good stuff.  Not to mention we went to bed pretty early to make up for the night before.
  4. Wednesday was the #onedayHH IG party and it made me realize that I really don’t carry my phone around much during the day, therefore when I see something photo worthy–no phone.  Anyhooo, we slept in on Wednesday, skipping the gym and it was glorious!!!  I do love sleep.  I drove our daughter to run her little loop after work, while I walked and then picked up our youngest from a friend’s house.  Wednesday nights we have our retreat formation group so it does make for a long day, but we finished a little early and I was able to enjoy a nice breeze and some quiet while waiting on the Hubby.  We came home to a messy kitchen but kids mostly ready for bed, so we will just work on those domestic skills as we go.  Rome wasn’t built in a day.
  5. Thursday.  Work. School.   Which some days consists of babysitting, talking people off ledges and letting them vent, and being a party planner and waitress.  Basically, motherhood has prepared me well for management.  Trust.  Me.  Not complaining though, because I actually love it and they pay me.  Winning.  Besides a friend of mine who is in a similar position entertains me with a daily snapchat trade of funny filters as we start the day!  Good motivation.  Our oldest girl is making her Confirmation this January, so she had class with her sponsor tonight which meant no taxi duties and so Hubby and I did some yoga out back after he rebuilt the wood shed.
  6. Friday.  Work day which would have been a half day since my room is having maintenance done, but stuff changes.  More like an extra long lunch break.  Took the dog to his annual checkup, which is brutal because this is the place that he just loves the acoustics and so it is an exercise in keeping him calm and quiet-ish; basically I’m a sweaty furry mess when we leave.  He was a little better this time and looks good, so yay, check that off the list!!  Snuck in a quick hair cut (back to bangs), ran to the bank, had a quick bite to eat for lunch with Hubs at home and then back to run a booth for our benefits fair. Somehow, once again, all kids disappeared for the night, so we watched The Way and ate ice cream from Publix–not a terrible date night at all and definitely budget friendly!
  7. Saturday a.m. and I’m about to take the pup for our weekly long walk and then hit the grocery store and chore list for the day.  The usual stuff.  There is a potentially great neighborhood yard sale on my way home from the grocery store, so I’ll pop in on that and see what I can see.  Of course with the time change tonight there will be a nice two week period of adjustment and trying not to put my pjs on RIGHT at 5 o’clock every night.  But Thanksgiving is coming and we are hosting this year with all my family, so I plan on nailing down our shared menu and working on spiffing up the place with our fall decorations and re-vamp of our back porch area.  Fun stuff!!

Happy weekend, everyone!!

Final countdown

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Welp.  I have 5 days to make up my mind.  I have contemplated early voting, but just when I think I’m ready to pull the sharpie cover off and color those circles in, I get cold feet.  And put it off another day.  Tick tock.  We shall see what tomorrow brings!

In the meantime, I’ll just go an about my business as usual and in reality next week won’t really bring about any more disappointment than we’ve had this past year.  The difference will be that we will know who we are stuck with and my phone will stop ringing from the robo calls and my mail lady might not stop every day to give me more tinder for the fire pit.

I’ll  be over here upping my prayer game for our country as well as hoping and praying for some seriously strong administration to guide whoever is voted in and for perseverance and strength for the rest of us to ride the upcoming roller coaster.  Buckle up, buttercup, it’s going to be an interesting ride.  Let’s all get through this together!

Authentic Sisterhood

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We are completely out of our routine this Sunday.  Cheer competition has re-routed us.  The girls had to be there by 715 a.m. with hair done, and since I promised a ride to our girl’s BFF that meant out the door by 615 so that we could get to the arena in time to do BFF’s hair (she’s at her dad’s this weekend and needed assistance) and have them on time.  There will be no sleeping in this weekend.  Cue the violins.

So, Mass will be at 6pm tonight which freed up my morning.  Which I promptly filled up with a breakfast date with one of my dearest and oldest BFFs.  (I don’t have to be at the arena until 245pm so plenty of time!)  Sometimes we walk the bridge, paddleboard (ok, that was once, but it was really fun), have sushi or in today’s case:  breakfast.

It was a great breakfast and I realized how blessed I am in my authentic sisterhood.  The kind of friends who are there for you in a snap, the ones you share TMI with, the ones who will call you on your BS and hold you accountable to life and friendship, the ones who will pray with and for you, give you tough love and give you a shoulder.  There is no judgement, only love and truth.

In this life, we have friends spread far and wide and to get to that place of honesty and authenticity takes time and effort and cultivation.  It has taken me years to figure out that sometimes friends come and go and that is just life.  I no longer try to force friendships or do all the work.  It’s mutual effort or it does’t happen and that’s ok, too.  Authentic friends are there with you over the years even if you don’t talk every day or week, maybe visits are infrequent as well, but there is effort.  There is love.  There is a mutual desire to work at the honesty and truth and love that keeps that friendship a priority.

My Hubby is my best friend, confidante and encourager and that is huge and not often the case in marriage.  However, there is something inherently different and important in girlfriends and their point of view, their confidences shared and their encouragement.  Competition has no place in an authentic friendship only shared life.

Yes.  I am blessed.  Friendship with my mom and sister.  My “sisterhood”.  My friends that I’ve had since middle school and grade school.  Friends from early marriage and motherhood from church, from playgroups.  My Christmas list is long, but my true and blessed sisterhood is far smaller, but keepers for life.

Happy Sunday, friends!  Now go make that friend date this week, your heart and soul will thank you!

Proverbs 17:17 A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity.