I know I have yet to post about Christmas (it was awesome and the kids got gobs of stuff) and our time in Portland during Christmas but I am still having a technical glitch with photos. I will report back with pictures on our Christmas holiday in the next few days when I can get them up.
In the meantime on the heels of 2012 and the dawn of 2013, I wanted to reflect on the year we had and pen my resolutions for 2013. As for 2012, it has been a pretty amazing year, might be the best to date. In 2012, Mae has grown from a toddler to a full fledged little girl, who happens to love everything princess, purple, and girly. She is creative, opinionated, hysterical, independent, talkative, imaginative, and dramatic. Whitaker has gone from a crawling little baby to a full blown toddler. He is still the sweetest guy I know and despite him wanting to throw everything, he will stop to snuggle in your lap. He is stubborn, lovable, busy, strong, and social.
A new year generally brings most folks to have quiet and not so quiet reflections on the past year and the year to come. I guess I am no different. 2012 was the year of busy for me. Not that everyone isn't extremely busy and by no means am I proclaiming I am busier then most, however, I feel that in 2012 I am constantly in a rush and have had less downtime then ever before, which seems very busy to me. I have had to learn to balance two fully mobile, opinionated, and vocal children. This balancing act has shifted how I parent and how I viewed parenting previously and how I view it now. I have become far less stringent about many things, including television time, food, discipline, and how my kids act.
There have been some pretty spectacular moments of 2012 for me. First and one that I am really proud of is organizing and volunteering at the family homeless shelter in my neighborhood for over 4 weeks in 2012. In May, I took on, in my opinion, the scary task of trying to recruit enough volunteers to fill an entire week of staffing for the shelter. I did it and did it again in July, and again for two weeks November, and again for a couple of days for Christmas. Now I didn't volunteer every shift but I did volunteer quite a bit. The time there has made me forever grateful for the many blessings of my family. Second, I completed my 7th marathon and got to run it with my sisters. Third, I got to spend an entire month at my parents new beach house with part/most of my family. It was truly great to be able to go on vacation for so long and to spend so much quality time with them. Fourth, Pearson and I got to spend an ENTIRE weekend away without our kids for a friend's wedding in April. Although this might not seem like a huge deal, it was great for us to reconnect and enjoy each other's company for 48 hours without any kid interruptions. It would not have been possible without my awesome parents, who I am sure thought it was a huge deal to watch my two kids. Fifth, I kept my kids alive and relatively accident free for another year. I know it might not seem like something I should be proud of but hey, it is a feat in itself, especially when I found Whitaker with toilet bowl cleaner in his hand one day. And both kids think it is fun to jump off the end of our bed into a pile of blankets. Sixth, my family and myself have been relatively healthy this year, except for my mom breaking her arm. Seventh, there were so many moments of hugs, laughs, smiles, kisses, and cuddles because that is what it all about.
Despite Pearson telling me that I think I am perfect, (this occurs during most fights we have), I am not. As for 2013, I definitely need some self improvement, slowing down, and QUIET reflection.
1. Remember friends and families birthdays. I am notoriously bad about remembering people's birthdays. In fact, one year I talked to my sister, Heather, three times on the phone before remembering it was actually her special day. I must be better about sending cards and gifts for the people I hold most dear.
2. Live with the clutter. Too often, I have a hard time relaxing or enjoying my kids company because I am constantly trying to pick up or deal with the mess in our house. The dishes, the dog hair, the spilled milk, the food crumbs, the toys everywhere, the dust, the dirt, the laundry that needs to be washed, dried, folded and sorted, always seems to be present. Instead of knowing that the toys will get picked up at the end of the day, the dishwasher ran, the clothes cleaned, the house semi-presentable, I run around like a chicken with their head cut off trying to clean, put it all back and organize it. I just need to keep reminding myself that there will be the rest of my life to have a clean house and that my kids are only young once.
3. Be more humble. Enough said.
4. Relish the moment. Too often, I am always looking at the thing ahead. Case in point, the kids and I will be having a delightful moment at a park or elsewhere but my mind will be racing about all that needs to be done. I want to remember that if my kids eat eggs and toast for dinner or I don't bring something homemade to a party it will be ok and that the event itself is what matters.
5. Bring less stuff into the house. - I am pretty good about holding the line on bringing stuff into this house. We don't shop a ton for clothes, toys, and other things since we don't have the budget available and we have quite a small house for four people and a dog so the stuff is always being edited, sorted, and donated but it seems that we still have much too much. This year I would really like to cut back even more on the stuff we buy and be mindful of what we do bring into the house.
6. Read more. Since having the kids I just don't read books like I used to. At night, I generally fall into bed and check a few things on my phone and then zonk out. I would like to try to finish at least a book a month this year. I know this isn't a lofty goal at all but think it will be higher then then number of books I read this year.
7. Learn how to really use my camera. I know I take a ton of pictures and sometimes a few of them turn out surprisingly pretty decently. However, I don't know a single thing about aperture or shutter speed or any of the damn buttons on my camera. So this year, I would really like to figure out what all those damn buttons do.
8. Be more kind and loving to my husband. This one should probably be number one on my list. I wouldn't say that I am particularly mean or nasty to Pearson, however, he is generally the person I take out most of my frustration and aggression on. He always seems to be in my line of sight. I would particularly really like for us not to have little spats in front of the kids. By no means do we have drag 'em out fights in front of them but I definitely think we can be more kind to each other in stressful situations or when things aren't just going right.
9. Get all our financial paperwork and wills completed. Ugh, this has been on our to do list forever and it just seems like it never gets down. This must get down this year.
10. Be healthy and lose weight. Since it is New Years I think I need to throw this one in for good measure, especially in light of the holiday weight I gained and my unhealthy ways as of late.
I think it is safe to stop with 10 because I need something to improve upon for the following year. With these written, I can say good bye to 2012 and a big warm welcome to 2013.
In the meantime on the heels of 2012 and the dawn of 2013, I wanted to reflect on the year we had and pen my resolutions for 2013. As for 2012, it has been a pretty amazing year, might be the best to date. In 2012, Mae has grown from a toddler to a full fledged little girl, who happens to love everything princess, purple, and girly. She is creative, opinionated, hysterical, independent, talkative, imaginative, and dramatic. Whitaker has gone from a crawling little baby to a full blown toddler. He is still the sweetest guy I know and despite him wanting to throw everything, he will stop to snuggle in your lap. He is stubborn, lovable, busy, strong, and social.
A new year generally brings most folks to have quiet and not so quiet reflections on the past year and the year to come. I guess I am no different. 2012 was the year of busy for me. Not that everyone isn't extremely busy and by no means am I proclaiming I am busier then most, however, I feel that in 2012 I am constantly in a rush and have had less downtime then ever before, which seems very busy to me. I have had to learn to balance two fully mobile, opinionated, and vocal children. This balancing act has shifted how I parent and how I viewed parenting previously and how I view it now. I have become far less stringent about many things, including television time, food, discipline, and how my kids act.
There have been some pretty spectacular moments of 2012 for me. First and one that I am really proud of is organizing and volunteering at the family homeless shelter in my neighborhood for over 4 weeks in 2012. In May, I took on, in my opinion, the scary task of trying to recruit enough volunteers to fill an entire week of staffing for the shelter. I did it and did it again in July, and again for two weeks November, and again for a couple of days for Christmas. Now I didn't volunteer every shift but I did volunteer quite a bit. The time there has made me forever grateful for the many blessings of my family. Second, I completed my 7th marathon and got to run it with my sisters. Third, I got to spend an entire month at my parents new beach house with part/most of my family. It was truly great to be able to go on vacation for so long and to spend so much quality time with them. Fourth, Pearson and I got to spend an ENTIRE weekend away without our kids for a friend's wedding in April. Although this might not seem like a huge deal, it was great for us to reconnect and enjoy each other's company for 48 hours without any kid interruptions. It would not have been possible without my awesome parents, who I am sure thought it was a huge deal to watch my two kids. Fifth, I kept my kids alive and relatively accident free for another year. I know it might not seem like something I should be proud of but hey, it is a feat in itself, especially when I found Whitaker with toilet bowl cleaner in his hand one day. And both kids think it is fun to jump off the end of our bed into a pile of blankets. Sixth, my family and myself have been relatively healthy this year, except for my mom breaking her arm. Seventh, there were so many moments of hugs, laughs, smiles, kisses, and cuddles because that is what it all about.
Despite Pearson telling me that I think I am perfect, (this occurs during most fights we have), I am not. As for 2013, I definitely need some self improvement, slowing down, and QUIET reflection.
1. Remember friends and families birthdays. I am notoriously bad about remembering people's birthdays. In fact, one year I talked to my sister, Heather, three times on the phone before remembering it was actually her special day. I must be better about sending cards and gifts for the people I hold most dear.
2. Live with the clutter. Too often, I have a hard time relaxing or enjoying my kids company because I am constantly trying to pick up or deal with the mess in our house. The dishes, the dog hair, the spilled milk, the food crumbs, the toys everywhere, the dust, the dirt, the laundry that needs to be washed, dried, folded and sorted, always seems to be present. Instead of knowing that the toys will get picked up at the end of the day, the dishwasher ran, the clothes cleaned, the house semi-presentable, I run around like a chicken with their head cut off trying to clean, put it all back and organize it. I just need to keep reminding myself that there will be the rest of my life to have a clean house and that my kids are only young once.
3. Be more humble. Enough said.
4. Relish the moment. Too often, I am always looking at the thing ahead. Case in point, the kids and I will be having a delightful moment at a park or elsewhere but my mind will be racing about all that needs to be done. I want to remember that if my kids eat eggs and toast for dinner or I don't bring something homemade to a party it will be ok and that the event itself is what matters.
5. Bring less stuff into the house. - I am pretty good about holding the line on bringing stuff into this house. We don't shop a ton for clothes, toys, and other things since we don't have the budget available and we have quite a small house for four people and a dog so the stuff is always being edited, sorted, and donated but it seems that we still have much too much. This year I would really like to cut back even more on the stuff we buy and be mindful of what we do bring into the house.
6. Read more. Since having the kids I just don't read books like I used to. At night, I generally fall into bed and check a few things on my phone and then zonk out. I would like to try to finish at least a book a month this year. I know this isn't a lofty goal at all but think it will be higher then then number of books I read this year.
7. Learn how to really use my camera. I know I take a ton of pictures and sometimes a few of them turn out surprisingly pretty decently. However, I don't know a single thing about aperture or shutter speed or any of the damn buttons on my camera. So this year, I would really like to figure out what all those damn buttons do.
8. Be more kind and loving to my husband. This one should probably be number one on my list. I wouldn't say that I am particularly mean or nasty to Pearson, however, he is generally the person I take out most of my frustration and aggression on. He always seems to be in my line of sight. I would particularly really like for us not to have little spats in front of the kids. By no means do we have drag 'em out fights in front of them but I definitely think we can be more kind to each other in stressful situations or when things aren't just going right.
9. Get all our financial paperwork and wills completed. Ugh, this has been on our to do list forever and it just seems like it never gets down. This must get down this year.
10. Be healthy and lose weight. Since it is New Years I think I need to throw this one in for good measure, especially in light of the holiday weight I gained and my unhealthy ways as of late.
I think it is safe to stop with 10 because I need something to improve upon for the following year. With these written, I can say good bye to 2012 and a big warm welcome to 2013.
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