My blog is SO last year!

My blog has been stuck in 2013! Sorry about that. The first month of the new year has felt a little like trying to pull myself out of bed at 8am after that New Years Eve Party.... or for a more appropriate metaphor: after my five year old has a nightmare and wets the bed at 1, and my two year old wakes up at 3 afraid of the dark and climbs into my bed. The rest of the night spent being kicked and trying not to fall off the bed without waking anyone else. Pick your poison.

Well it's almost the end of January and I'm just now gaining some momentum. It's the tortoise not the hare right?

The past few years I have not made a New Year's Resolution, or at least not in the typical sense. Last year, I decided to do a One Word Resolution, to encompass the general spirit I felt I wanted to carry into the year. Last year my word was CREATE. I had a lot of beginnings last year, beginnings of projects and ideas to work on, but also figuring out the blueprint for practical things like, where to live (buy a house)?

This year, my word is: COURAGE

I'm not a visual artist. Cut me some slack.
I do enjoy crayons and glitter, and symbolism, lots of symbolism.

I feel good about the things I created last year, but this year will be about taking the next step and seeing them through. I have said before that I am really good at starting projects but not so great at finishing them! So, for me, it will take courage to face the obstacles that get thrown in my path, especially my own fears of failure and stretching my comfort zone.

I already have one big ticket item I can check off, before 2013 ended I signed myself up for a writer's conference, and it's coming up at the end of February (ahh!! so scared, and excited, but scared...more on that later), and I'm taking everything else one step at a time.

I am not a planner in general, I don't like to make long detailed lists, but I do like to have a direction, and a motto or mantra to embody that helps me move where I want to go.

Do you have a word, motto, mantra, or resolution for the year? Are you still rubbing the sleep from your eyes?

Just Keep Running

I've been trying to come up with a metaphor for the way I've been feeling lately. All I can think of is trying to hop a moving train.

Sometimes my hand is mere inches away from the bar. Sometimes I'm behind, one stumble away from watching the train speed off without me. Sometimes I get my hand on the bar, but I can never quite get my foot on the step, never quite pull myself up.

Just keep running.

Is it just me, or has this year been going by at lightning speed? I can't believe it's already almost April.

While the frenzied pace is a little out of my comfort zone (one of my favorite animals is the turtle..hello?), I also see that there are many possibilities on the horizon, and that the running won't last forever.

House hunting is exhausting, and exciting, and scary, and amazing. Thinking about things like settling down, growing roots, redecorating a kitchen...it's all very grown-up, all very symbolic of our need to be "on the right track". But what if it's wrong? what if I pick a beautiful house but then I hate the neighborhood? What if I compromise on the house to be in a good school district and end up with a money pit? What if I regret being far away from family and friends? What if my son is devastated and miserable being taken out of the school he loves?

and What if it's great.

Like most SAHMs, any parent really, I watch a lot of kid's movies. Tangled was on heavy rotation for awhile, and there is one part at the end where the heroine is about to realize her dream. The conversation goes like this:

Rapunzel: I've been looking out of a window for eighteen years, dreaming about what it might feel like when those lights rise in the sky. What if it's not everything I dreamed it would be?
Flynn Rider: It will be.
Rapunzel: And what if it is? What do I do then?
Flynn Rider: Well, That's the good part I guess. You get to go find a new dream

Just keep running.

Thanks Flynn

Be careful what you wish for

When you ask God for courage, he gives you the opportunity to be courageous.

When you ask for peace, he gives you the chance to create it.

When you ask to know his heart, he shows you the pain as well as the Joy.