It's beginning to look alot like Christmas

I woke up this morning all ready to decorate for Christmas!  Christmas shopping yesterday with Donna got me all in the mood...the smells of cinnamon and baked apple pie candles, listening to Christmas music (which reminds me, I might want the new Lori Line christmas cd.  I haven't actually listened to it, but she's a brilliant pianist and she looks amazing on the cover, so it has to be good and they sell it at Hearts Desire - in case Mr. Wonderful is watching).

After Donna, Dave and Rose left this afternoon, we started with the Christmas decorating prep.  This involves my annual dusting & oiling of the woodwork, and cleaning of the windows, ledges and screens.  I realize most people do this in the spring, but we march to the beat of our own drums and loud clangy symbals around here, so when it's time to move the furniture around to set up the tree, that's when I do my deep cleaning for the year.  At least in the living room.

Once all the boxes were brought up from storage downstairs, and I finished my cleaning binge, I promptly took a nap until my boys got home from their dad's, and it was time to make supper.  Tonight it was chili and tacos...yum.  Then, the fun commenced.  The kids dug out their santa hats and began assembling the tree, with Vince's guidance and help - which I must say went very well this year!  No one broke out in fights or tears and Vince is learning not to be so militant about the tree being perfect.  We listened to my favorite Christmas album - Rosie O'Donnell Christmas (which incidently Vince hates, but he humors me - especially after I listened to Josh Groban and Andre Buccelli all afternoon with him).  It's just fun and it's a tradition for the boys and I to listen to while decorating the tree.  We didn't get that far tho...we got it all assembled and lights on, then it was time for bedtime routines.  We'll finish all the decorating tomorrow.

The house is in disarray, half Christmas and half mess, but we'll get there.  And we had a good time tonight.

Vince thinks they're ugly but I don't care....doo-dah, doo-dah

Vince thinks they're ugly but I don't care....oh-a-doo-dah-day.

They are my new shoes, and they make me happy. 

They especially make my feet happy.  I have had plantar fasciitis on and off for prolly 14 years (which may or may not coincide with the number of years that I have been overweight).  If you are not familiar, plantar fascitis is when you injure the tissues in your heel and it takes forever to heal.  Runners get it alot, and coincidently so do people who buy a cheap pair of clogs that do not have enough cushion or arch support, but you wear them everyday anyway and ignore the developing heel pain because you love them so much until one day you wake up and can't walk.

I have tried many types of shoes and inserts over the years, with varying degrees of success and price, and I can honestly say that these shoes are the most comfortable shoes I have ever owned.  Seriously.  They are like  "Shape-ups" by Sketchers, but are supposedly just as good for about 1/3 of the price.  (My dad in me just did a little happy dance over that - he loves a good deal, and so do I.)  They have curved heels, which takes the pressure off your heel, and also apparantly give your legs a work out as you walk in them.  Bonus.  Sounds like a gimick, I know, but the reviews all say that they work.  I don't care about that so much as the comfort.  They are like walking on big cushy clouds.  The only downside is that because the heel is so curvy there is a slight rocking motion and if I lose my balance I may just tip right over backwards like a weeble. 

I was on a shopping excursion with my sister in law, Donna, today and might I say we had a marvelous time!  We spent a significant amout of time at one of my favorite stores in downtown Winona...Hearts Desire, where we sampled various dip mixes and drooled over the cute snowmen (ok, maybe that was just me).  Then we got beverages and sat and talked at Blooming Grounds, the best little coffee shop evah.  I got an orange-mango-guava green tea smoothie, which if you are looking for something cold and icey and fruity,  is THE bomb. 

Then we spent way too long at Shopko, where I did my usual...picking out things I want and/or need, then after walking around the store for another hour or so I begin to have buyers guilt and put things back before I buy them.  Hey, at least buyer's guilt is better than buyer's remorse, right?  I should have gotten that jacket, tho. 

Speaking of jackets, I have lost mine.  Both my winter one and my spring/fall one.  It's the weirdest thing.  So if I have been to your house in the last 6 months, and you have either a white, black & burgandy Columbia jacket, or a long navy jacket with a hood and a hole in the right pocket hanging in your closet and you have no idea where in the world it came from, please let me know as they are mine and I am cold.

I love to journal, and I've decided I'm going to be turning a corner with my blog.  I plan on getting a little more personal.  A little more descriptive. A little more rambly and possibly a little more boring...but hopefully not.  I am not focusing on entertaining anyone (althought that quite likely will happen as I write more about our crazy life), but rather, I want to documenting memories.  In writing or in pictures, I want to be able to look back and read this and remember the day to day stuff that makes life what it is...a journey.  OH!  Have you ever noticed that journal and journey are nearly the same word?

A whole lot of nuttin.

Why do I do this to myself? 

I am tired, and since 8pm I have been vascilating between falling asleep on the couch and waking up to change the channel from HGTV to the Food Network.  But I refuse to go to bed.  It's Saturday night and I don't wanna.  I am an adult and I can stay up if I want.  Nah.  But I will regret it tomorrow, when I will really need a nap but will feel guilty for missing time with my family to indulge in that Sunday afternoon luxury. 

Vince is not home, that's part of the problem.  He's at a movie with Trevor tonight, and I hate going to bed alone.  I won't be able to sleep knowing that he will be coming in later, so I will just wait up for him and think of something to babble about.  That shouldn't be too hard.

What do you call it when you babble on a blog?  Blobble?  Blaggle? 

Pause...

It is now 49 minutes since I wrote the above sentence.  I dozed off on the couch again, with my computer on my lap, until Mr. Wonderful got home all cheerful. 

Gooooooooooooooood night!

Time

Why does life have to be so difficult sometimes?  I mean really.  When is it going to be my turn to have the stress free, uncomplicated, and unimaginably blissful existence that I have always thought life was supposed to be.  If I do things right.  Aren't I supposed to eventually end up "there".  Where things are easy and calm? 

Hmmph.  Just a tad unrealistic, perhaps.

I can't go into it, but basically I am feeling torn between the demands of my job and the needs of my family.    I'm almost paralized by fear of making the wrong decision and regretting.  I am very passionate about what I do.

But...

My family needs more from me, more than I have been giving them. 
Our kids need me to be there for them...to drive them to their activities and pick them up. 
To be sitting in the bleachers cheering them on. 
To be there after school to help with homework,
to talk about their day and help them work through issues with their friends or their teachers. 
To give them love, guidance, encouragement, laughter....

Time. 

I need to be home in time to make a meal and sit down together as a family, rather than getting home late, throwing some frozen pizza at them and then rushing back out the door.  It's not like that every night, but all too often it is.

I am asking my blog-reading friends to please pray for me.  I need some wisdom!  And some open doors - at least one with an obnoxiously bright flashing light saying "ENTER HERE!"

Yoda talk and bobble head syndrome. Oh dear.

Here I am, sitting at home and my world is spinning.....literally.  I have vertigo, which is all kinds of fun if you enjoy living on a tilt-a-whirl, which I happen to not.  It makes it quite difficult to walk straight and function...which is difficult for me anyway, so yea.  Not so much fun am I having.  And talking like Yoda again as well, I am.

So, now that I'm not able to go to work today, or do laundry or dishes or anything else productive that requires me to move my head, what a wonderful opportunity for me to catch up on my blog, which has been severely neglected of late because of my new photography adventure.  (And, you know, working full time and living life with a husband and 5 kids at home takes up a wee bit of my time as well).   I'm surprised I can be on the computer at all with this "bobble head syndrome" going on.  But as long as I am sitting upright, and my head is facing directly forward, I'm relatively ok...any change in position left or right, or up or down, and I am sent spinning and falling in the alternate, wacky universe inside my head.  Soooo much fun.  Do you realize how often you have to move your head?  You move your head ALOT when brushing your teeth.  And incidently, you need to look down to spit out the toothpaste, and if you don't you end up drooling it down your chin, which I  may or may not know from first hand experience.

So I'm sitting straight up on the couch with my laptop on my lap, the phone by my side, and the tv firmly planted on HGTV, so I'm all set.  As I mentioned, I've been pretty busy with my new photography adventure...and I couldn't be more excited about it!!  Well, actually I could...as I dream of cameras and lenses I'd love to have, I'm reminding myself to be grateful and appreciative of what I DO have and not to covet.  Ooooh, that's a hard one, especially as I see other people's blogs and pictures much more amazing than mine.  That's ok, my day will come, God willing.  In the mean time, I will thank Him for bringing photography into my life and all that He has blessed me with already.  It is truly a gift - one that I intend to continue to use to bless others. 

I have a passion for helping those that God brings into my life, and using the talents that He gives me to invest in the lives of others.  I've been praying alot about this lately, not only myself but with our children.  How can God use us?  What can He move through our lives into the lives of others?  Is it money?  Cooking a meal?  Visiting a lonely friend?  Giving someone a ride?  As I have prayed about this, I have seen God bring more and more opportunities for me to live this out - or maybe the opportunities have always been there, He just opened my eyes to them when I asked Him too?  I'm thinking the latter is true.  Either way, I am thankful.  I am learning how to reach out more, how to live beyond myself, and so are our children.   I believe that God has brought photography into my life, not only for me to enjoy (which I DO!) and to create memories of our family, but to bless others and help them create lasting memories for their families as well.  My perspective on the world around me has changed too.  I see beauty in nature, in our children, and even in a candle on a table with the light streaming down...where I may not have seen it before in quite the same way. 

Oh, dang it.

Now all this talk has me wanting to go take some photos...but alas I can't with the bobble head thing going on.  Oh well.