Intentional Outdoor Hours: 51+ (of 1000)
Still running behind in outdoor totals for this same time last year, bummer, but with baseball season ramping up, I'm not too worried. Hours these past two weekends came playgrounds, and half marathon training (up to 8 miles now!), fishing camp, outdoor celebrations (see below) and time spent with the kids out in the yard. The weather is really starting to go into full blown spring which brings so much happiness to my soul. Sunshine seriously can make or break a day for me it feels like sometimes, so it is with a light heart that I embrace spring every year!
Reading The Gift of an Ordinary Day by Katrina Kenison and loved this poem she shared from Galway Kinnel, "...it is necessary to reteach a thing its loveliness, to put a hand on its brow of the flower and retell it in words and in touch it is lovely until it flowers again from within, of self-blessing." Isn't that just motherhood itself!
Family Biz'ing for The Hunting Daddies another weekend at the Johnstown Children's book festival. It was a fun weekend and we got to have one big kid with us for each day which was a nice treat for us and them! We also are so so excited and blessed to announce our newest member to our The Hunting Daddies family: Baby Tessa. Our best friends (and biz partners) Jon & Lindsay welcomed their sweet baby girl to Earth last week and we are over the moon to have our kids' lifelong best friend finally out in the world!
Celebrating our seven year old boy! Grey got to have a birthday school lunch with his Dad and friends and then had his best birthday to date as he got to sleep over at fishing camp and spend the whole day fishing with his cousins for Mentor fishing Day. He loves, loves fishing and was so happy - he has even mastered doing everything by himself: baiting, casting, and reeling in. Then on Sunday we had the most perfect, beautiful weather to have an outdoor birthday party for him (shooting the BB gun, playing in the woods, creek, and treehouse, playing soccer, and even getting in a little fishing at a pond near my parents' house).
Starting baseball season. Grey is in his second year of machine pitch and Gemmi started Tball for the first time. Brandon roped me into being his assistant coach for the tball team after the first practice when he came home to announce that coaching 15-18 year old teenage boys was easier than trying to coach 4 & 5 year olds, hah! We make a pretty good coaching team together at the last practice - I can break things down to the nitty gritty for explanation and keep little short attention spans focused, while B lays out the fundamentals and rules of the game. It will be a fun (and very busy) season!
Kissing Rusty and his booboo face as he has already started taking a few steps, at 10 months, before lurching forward to crash into whatever he's reaching out for. He's had bruises, brush burns, and scratches on his face and head for a solid two weeks. He really does prefer to walk though...actually he'd prefer to run but is quickly learning that life don't work like that, little man. Crawl, walk, THEN run. He just wants to much to keep up with his big bro and sisters!
Feeling proud of my baby sis Tasha as we celebrated the first year anniversary of the Little Red Mailbox downtown. It was a beautiful little celebration where we also were able to make inspirational rocks to add to the new rock garden around the mailbox. As I wrote in my facebook post, it means so much as parent to have real live people in our children's lives to point to as examples of a good person and our kids have so many examples, especially their Aunt Uch. (love you!!)
Being off my game, I feel like I've been in a little bit of a rut with my normal efficiency speed which is always annoying to me. I've been forgetting things and been more quick to say 'I'll get to that later' when it's so much better for my soul and state of mind to just do what I can right now. I know that my phone has something to do with it which is part of the reason I am so looking forward to Screen Free Week this year (May 1-7) and I know part of it has to do with clutter (ugh, always), and another part has to do with really having too much on our plates (ugh, always again). The other day for Grey's birthday party, I was rushing out the door with cupcakes melting in my front seat, trying to get to my CCD class to teach on time - I was telling myself, "okay, just get through Grey's party, and then you can relax....oh wait, then it's Easter. Okay, get through Easter...oh wait, then it's baseball.." I finally settled for, "Okay, get through eighteen years, yes only eighteen more years, and then we can relax." I keep wondering when I'm going to get the hang of this four kid-different schedules-house chores-appointment keeping- holiday tradition'ing-being on time to anything - balancing adulthood gig...and it appears that maybe the answer is never..? Maybe I need to be okay with it always feeling like you never get the hang of it, but finding the moments of joy where they come and looking around and realizing this chaotic messy life is perfect in its own right. It sounds easier than it is when it feels like you keep dropping your juggling balls, but I'll sure continue to try!
Making crumb topped chicken supreme, Taco tuesdays, chicken parm roll-ups (devoured!), frozen pizza, and mustard & dry rub country-style pork ribs on the grill, . The girls and I made these brownie mix cookies and they were delicious (do you know the secret to perfect cookies? It's putting the dough in the refrigerator for an hour or so before you bake them - makes all the difference!) We are heading into the season of concession stand dinners - so if anyone has any 'to go' type meals that are easy to make & pack & eat at the baseball field, please share!
Totally feel you on feeling off your game. I beat myself up so bad because of it, but I'm slowly learning that while life may never actually calm down (like now - house on the market, three in soccer!), my reaction to it all is really what matters. Here's to holding on tight to this crazy motherhood ride! :)
ReplyDeleteOh my gosh. Please don't let the answer be "never!" haha! I need to believe that someday juggling four human beings' needs & desires will not feel like swimming through pudding with my feet tied together. (How's that for an analogy?)
ReplyDeleteI hear you. All the things and the schedules and the homework and the living life... it's a LOT. If I'm doing well at one part of it, another is, inevitably, spinning out of control.
So proud of you running 8 miles (what?!?) You are AMAZING!
I also hear you about your phone being the culprit. I put mine down this weekend (miracle!) and it seriously felt like we had four days off instead of two. It was insane. I think I am in some denial about how much time I spend on it, and how attached to it I am. I am trying to leave it on the kitchen counter instead of in my pocket so I don't pull it out and "accidentally" mindlessly scroll... It's working so far. I hope I can stick with it because MAN ALIVE am I more productive without it!