Category: personal

currently

recommitting to getting 10,000 steps per day. Especially since it appears I’ll only be going running 1-2 times per week.

finishing the audiobook Big Little Lies by Liane Moriarty and really enjoyed it. The Light Between Oceans is on deck.

planning a coffee & blogging date with my friend Christie.

making My Sweetiepie ABC’s sampler and keeping up fairly well with the stitchalong.

cooking as little as possible lately. Thank goodness for in-laws and leftovers.

wanting a couple great summer dresses.

needing new work shoes and scrubs, and probably abnormally excited about getting them.

looking to make a solid budget and financial plan for the future. #grownupproblems

playing with the kittens every morning and night. Also: cuddling.

wearing Birkenstocks and getting what all the fuss is about. They are totally worth the money.

wondering what to get my mom and MIL for Mother’s Day; I definitely procrastinated this time!

hoping that my kids stay healthy and in good moods forever. Is that too much to ask? ;)

feeling in the best mood I’ve been in a long time.

Have a happy weekend!

May 8, 2015
LIGHT : april (one little word update)

I don’t have a whole lot to report about my journey with my word for the year except that for most of April I was definitely not feeling light. It was a super hard month of parenting and I wasn’t feeling proud of the way I handled the stress.

However, having the word “light” in the back of my mind allowed me to make the decision toward the end of the month to let some things go and release a lot of the pressure I put on myself. I had to get back to the root of why I chose my word: “light” is how I want to feel on the inside. Sure, I would love to completely declutter our house so the space is lighter. I’d love to get back to a frequent exercise regimen so I’m literally lighter. But with all I have going on right now worrying about those things (and others) was just stressing me out so that I wasn’t able to cope with challenges in motherhood, which is a priority.

So far the shift in mentality has been incredibly helpful, but I’ll report back. :)

This month’s prompt was to capture our word through photography. I simply went back through my photos from the year and chose nine that represented an aspect of what “light” means to me. (Also, to get this done I tried printing my photos on cardstock and they came out really terrible. Old me would have trashed them and ordered new ones, but new me is saying they’re good enough.)

Top left: this is one of my favorite recent photos of me and Meredith. It was a happy day and I want to focus on the good times we have.

Top middle: I love being outside and seeing the beautiful skies, and attending Texas Style Conference was such a positive and uplifting experience for me.

Top right: Liam is at such an adorable age and I want to soak it all in.

Middle left: Updating the kids’ room with string lights made me happy.

Middle middle: This is a photo of me at TxSC where I was really feeling lighthearted.

Middle right: I started a fun little cross stitch project, and as long as I don’t pressure myself to finish in a certain amount of time, this is the kind of thing I want to be able to do and enjoy.

Bottom left: Running is so good for me! I need to do more of it.

Bottom middle: Eating real food contributes to lightness of body and mind.

Bottom right: Our new kittens are so playful. They are what I didn’t even know I needed. :)

I debated giving up on the One Little Word project when I was deciding what to let go in my life right now, but it has been helpful for me so far and even keeping up with the prompts hasn’t been hard. If any of them are too involved I’ll just modify it and make it simple. I’m still really connecting with the word “light” and look forward to seeing how it changes for me.

May 6, 2015
my de-stressing regimen

It’s in my nature to be productive and to pursue many different interests. I truly enjoy so many different things, am highly goal-driven, and am constantly trying to achieve more, learn more, and be involved in more. For the most part I have felt like I have things balanced and under control.

However, I’m honestly struggling as a mother lately. I don’t blame the kids at all, but my reaction to the tantrums hasn’t been good, and I have less and less patience as we go. It got to the point where I felt like I couldn’t handle it at all, and I was considering going to counseling just so that I could move past the rough spots and enjoy motherhood again.

So far, though, I haven’t had to enter therapy because I am following some advice from my mother-in-law instead: to let some things go. As much as I believe in theory that we go through seasons in life, and this is the season where I’m a working mom with young children who are my priority, my thoughts and actions don’t always align with my values. I have about twenty different hobbies (okay, at least ten) and most of them aren’t kid-friendly. So I try to work on all of them in the extremely limited time that I have alone, and when I’m not working on them they are occupying far too much brain space. Even though I don’t realize I’m doing it, I’m putting pressure on myself to accomplish all these extra things.

For example, my monthly goals. I love making them and planning for them and doing them. But most of them aren’t really necessary. I have low-level stress about achieving them and I worry about trying to fit them in. So then if the kids are giving me trouble that stress is amplified and I lose my patience and get super frustrated because my goals are being thwarted. So I’m dropping them.

I’ve made an attitude change, but also some practical changes regarding my hobbies and lifestyle that have made this possible, and I wanted to go over those here.

Blogging

I’m definitely not giving up on the blog, but I’m changing my approach a bit. There are a few features that I’m keeping: book reports, Meredith lately, and Project Life spreads. On top of that, if I finish some sort of project I will probably post about it, and then I want to do weekly-ish personal updates with photos, like the around here or currently series. And that’s it, unless I have the extra time and inspiration.

Documenting

Memory-keeping projects are important to me but are definitely something I can simplify. Starting now, I’m going to be using the Project Life app for my spreads and then printing the 12×12 layout. I think this will save a ton of time and I can do it on-the-go instead of needing dedicated time alone at home. As for any extra albums, I’m going to finish 2014’s December album (since I’m in the middle of it) and then I’m thinking of just doing photobooks for this year.

Reading

I’m in a book club that meets monthly, so I’m going to start listening to the audiobook for that (and I’m cutting back on the number of podcasts I listen to). That way any reading I do is just for pleasure.

Home Life

David is taking on some extra chores that I normally do. I’m going to simplify my meal planning and cooking; I’m still using frugal real food meal plans, but instead of trying so many new recipes I’m going to rotate our favorites and do one new one every couple weeks or so. For now, I’m not going to worry about extra decluttering or decorating unless it just happens organically.

Miscellaneous

I’m reducing the number of days I’m willing to drive to the medical center to work. Other crafts (such as needlepoint, knitting, and sewing) are just going to happen when I have spare time and really feel in the mood. In general, I’m just going to say no more.

I haven’t been exercising lately, but I feel like that’s one thing that will actually improve my mood if I do more of it. So I’m going to make an effort to start running again 2-3 times per week, right after work. I also want to go on more dates with David.

So that’s my plan, and so far I’d say it’s working. I feel a lot less internal stress and pressure, which in turn increases my patience with the kids.

What are your strategies for when you feel like you can’t handle one area of your life? I’d love to know! Tell me I’m not the only one!

April 29, 2015
meet the forbes kitties

We weren’t really intending to get kittens, but I took the kids to an event at the animal shelter where adoptions were free and one thing led to another and here we are.

I have to say that so far I’m pretty happy about our decision. Having always had dogs, it’s amazing how low-maintenance cats are in comparison. And kittens – oh, they are just SO adorable! The workers at the shelter actually recommended kittens for us (instead of a fully grown cat) because of our young children. Kittens aren’t scared of kids yet, and they can be trained. Plus they are way more tolerant of being picked up and grabbed and squeezed. It makes me happy to think about these little ones growing up together.

We got two because everyone says they are happier having a friend at home, and we told Meredith one is hers and one is Liam’s. Of course, I consider them both mine. ;)

Ziggy is the black one. He is tiny, barely a pound, and he was born with a crooked tail. It literally looks like a zig-zag, at right angles, when you hold it out. Shout out to my brother for coming up with the name. We brought him home first (by two days) and he is super sweet and cuddly. He is more tolerant of being held and easier to be found.

River is a beautiful black and white. He doubles Ziggy in size at two pounds which makes him extra squeezable. He’s a lot more playful so far, but also more likely to run away when you try to pick him up. His name is shortened from RiverRun which is what he was called at the shelter. He technically belongs to Liam, which is appropriate because Liam is also chunky and wild. :)

Both of them follow us from room to room and sleep on our pillows or laps at night. They are already best friends. We are animal lovers and having them around increases my quality of life.

(Look for more of them on Instagram in the future under #forbeskitties.)

April 27, 2015
around here

The biggest news around here is that we adopted two kittens! Ziggy and River joined our family this week and we are pretty darn excited. Ziggy is the black one and is so named because his tail is crooked like a zig-zag. River’s full name is River Run so I’m assuming his former owners were Game of Thrones fans. They are both boys and are making us happy. More on this soon!

Around here Liam went through another two ear infections so we finally took him to the ENT. Currently his ears look pretty good and so far no serious damage has been done by his recurring infections, so we are going to do an antibiotic prophylaxis trial. He’ll get antibiotics daily for a month and if he gets an infection despite that, he’ll need tubes.

Around here I have my December album out so I can add to it little by little. I’ve also joined in on a stitchalong for the My Sweetiepie ABC sampler and am really enjoying getting back to cross stitch after a long break.

Around here Meredith is still sleeping in our bed even though we had two successful nights. Her tantrums are kind of bad at the moment so when we get them back under control we’ll try again. We are still really struggling with age 3 (understatement) and for all of you who keep telling me that it gets better at age 4…if I don’t see immediate improvement this July I’m coming for you. ;) Really though, I am holding onto that hope and counting the days, and hoping I don’t do permanent damage to her psyche in the meantime.

Around here I’ve been kept busy by doctor’s appointments, vet appointments, learning about kitten care, keeping my family fed, intense childcare, and frantically trying to make it through our book club book. I haven’t had much time to work on the blog lately (so posts might be totally random), am a bit behind on Project Life, and have hardly made any progress on my monthly goals.

This weekend I have a family reunion, my nephew’s birthday party, and book club. Around here life is a little too full, and I’m struggling to deal in some areas, so I’m evaluating my priorities and hoping to let some things go.

April 24, 2015