How Does God Speak?

I know that blogging twice a day breaks some sort of blogging protocol. I know there are all sorts of blogging rules I break if you want to get noticed. Let's be honest part of you (and me) does. I would love it if someone happened upon my blog and randomly offered me a book deal. I would love it a lot. Of course it would probably involve deadlines, which if you read my last post you know I really suck at. I also think I am a little late in the game for have a blog and get a book a deal, then a movie deal. Then a following. It isn't happening now. Publishing has moved past that.

So I am not concerned. Here it is my second blog post for the day. In all it's protocol breaking, sloppy blogging, misspelled and grammatical nightmare glory!


I have been reading.

A Lot.

I finished 3 books in just under 10 days.

This is not normal for me.

It took me a year to read Anna Karenina.

I renew my library books several times. Usually because I take out 3 at a time.

I am a slow reader.

In my defense I usually read some heady stuff. I rarely pick up fiction although I do like it. I just usually find myself more interested in something else.

All that being said. I find myself once again resonating with the ideas in these books. I like how they are presented. However there is a part of me that feels like for me there is still something missing somewhere. Not in the books but in me. Like I still haven't quite found my niche in the Christian community. I really don't have much more to say about that, other than I take comfort in knowing that God is in it. I suspect that all this praying I have been doing for clarity in call may have lead to God telling me something in this reading. I am just not sure what yet.

Thoughts?

Deadlines

It's March 31st. Today was my personal deadline for getting the blasted Documentary done. It didn't happen. There is no way it will be done by the end of the day. Hopefully sometime soon-ish though. There is not one person in this world that wants this crap done more than I do. I want to put it to bed. I want to say here it is. I am done. I will never ever under any circumstance agree to do something like this again. The idea of being a one woman production crew was a stupid one in the first place. While I do have Paul who does what he can, I am the one who needs to get shit done. I wanted to make a documentary for a long time, it's just that when you are producing for someone else, the ideas, the stories aren't yours. You have to try to translate it into something on the screen. This is where someone who has been editing for other people would have been handy. I have only edited my own projects. It's hard to translate someone's ideas into something on the screen, with no guide other than a few conversations. It's like writing the biography of a person you have never met and lived a pretty normal life. There isn't much information to go on if there is no historical record of the person. Add to that trying a few times to make shorter versions and they are disappointing. It's like trying to meet a standard but you don't know what the standard is. At the end of the day you can't be in someone's head. You can't see their vision. All you have is your own and the hope that when it is finally complete it is good enough.

Rant Complete.

Today I am grateful for... it's hard to say... maybe the ability to feel even if it is frustration.
May you be blessed today by the lack of deadlines.

Extreme Couponing

So lately there is this phenomenon of extreme couponing sweeping the nation. It is gaining a lot of public attention now, but it started awhile ago. At least a few years ago. There is a show coming out on TLC about it. I am interested in this because I like to save a buck where I can. I used coupons a lot in stores that e-mail or mail them to you.

Last week I was behind such a person in Target. She warned me that she had a ton of coupons and I might want to switch lines. I did not however, I couldn't let my inner sociologist miss this chance to learn. I also didn't think she meant she had a coupon or two for every single item she was buying. So we struck up a conversation. I learned about where to get the coupons, how she keeps organized, matching a coupon up with a sales flyer or gets them doubled. It wasn't a ton of new information for me.

I have never gotten into the coupon thing. I use some here and there. However I always say you aren't saving anything if you are buying stuff you wouldn't have bought with out the coupon.

Then it hit me why this strategy doesn't work for me. It is predominately a grocery thing. People save money on name brand things like Cheerios and Oreos. The thing is the way I prepare our meals I used mostly whole foods. I buy very little that comes in a package. How often do you get a coupon for fresh broccoli or chicken or cheese? I do buy some prepared foods but not many. Maybe that is why super couponing hasn't worked for me. I know you can save a bundle on things like toiletries and household cleaning products. I haven't been able to find those coupons.

If you are a super coupon mom... good for you. I don't think it's for me. I saw an interview that said someone could spend as many as 6 hours getting ready for a shopping trip. I barely have the hour free to shop let alone do that much prep work.

May you be blessed today with making healthy choices for your family.
I am grateful for my little lady today.

Happily Ever After

So nothing has changed, I am still stressed out. Tonight there is a realtor coming to look at the house. I know I am going to hear it after that. Bracing. I am cleaning out my entire life. The house isn't going to look good.

I think lately what I really need to do is pray. I need prayer. However I can't seem to find the words. I also lack the desire, motivation or something to pray. This should probably be my blog topic of choice today but it isn't.

This morning I took a solo shopping trip with La Bebe. I know that moms do this all the time with children much younger than mine. However, I just recently mastered this skill. I really think it was the purchase of a new shopping cart cover which actually fits the carts. Before that I always put her in the stroller.

Disney's Tangled released on DVD today. I had a coupon for it and it was on sale so I picked it up. Of course she only took a ten minute nap on the way to the store so she was out of her mind when we got home. After lunch I gave up on getting things done and popped our new video in the dvd player. I haven't watched a new Disney movie in a long time. We watched half of it together before she finally gave in and took a nap. I watched the end on my own. I really enjoyed it. I forgot how much I like Disney movies.

Now I get they aren't realistic, I am after all grown up and married and all that. I haven't discovered that I am a lost Princess, that the Beast I am in love with is actually a handsome Prince, I have not ridden a magic carpet, bitten a poison apple, fallen in love with a prince. Not one story from a Disney movie has ever come true in my life. Some people will insist that happily ever after is a farce. I generally agree, there is no way you are going to be happy every single day the rest of your life. However, I am inclined to say that I think you make the choice. You decide how happy you are. If you sit around waiting on Prince Charming, you might be pretty miserable. If you have found Prince Charming, he won't always be well, Charming. He will probably fart way too much and leave his smelly laundry next to the bed until you empty the hamper and then refill it with his personal stash of secret laundry. He will likely disappoint you at some point. Chances are he won't ride up to you at sunset on a horse. That's all OK though, because that is life, real life.

I used to have a friend. He was the male version of the hopeless romantic. He might have even fancied himself to be prince charming a time or two. We used to banter for hours about movies like Tangled. What they were about if they were realistic. He would call me out on my closet hopeless romantic. I would call him out on how he wasn't royalty. It was great fun. I have kind of run the gamut on the princess movies. I have loved them and I have hated them. I have hated them because I felt like they set you up for disappointment in real life. I have loved them because for the hour or two you are watching them, you are lost in a fairy tale where true love falls out of a tree in the form of prince charming. It helps you escape reality for a few minutes.

I came to the conclusion today, that I am going to let my baby girl love these movies. I will let her get the princess make over in Disney World. I won't however let her believe she is actually a princess past the age of 10 anyway. That will set her up for sheer failure. I am sure at that point she will think she is the lost princess! Balance, I think that is what it's all about.

Today I am so grateful I have a little girl to watch princess movies with. It is one of my most hidden and girlie-est parts.

May you be blessed in sharing something hidden about yourself, with someone you love.

The Melt Down

It is nearly two in the afternoon. Baby Girl has been sleeping for a little over an hour. This means I have an hour if I am lucky to get a whole lot of crap done. Then there is the stuff that I can't get done until she wakes up, like food shopping and dog walking. I have been going nonstop since I woke up this morning. I want to settle into the chair and just relax. While I am currently in a chair, I am working from it. I wanted to take a few minutes to get some writing in, since I try to daily write something of purpose.

I am so stressed out lately. There is just a lot going on and a lot of deadlines. The two biggest tasks at hand are prepping for the move and getting this blasted documentary done. We have to work on these things after Lilia is in bed. Usually by the time she gets to bed we are so freaking tired we have no energy left. This week though we have some serious tasks ahead so we will be staying up late and getting up early and trying to survive.

Add to my plate that tomorrow my mother has a realtor coming to asses the house. So I have to have it some what decent at 5pm tomorrow. It is decent now, but that is over 24 hours away and with a toddler impossible to maintain. I spent the morning cleaning up all of yesterday's messes. Every time I see the house is a disaster again my breath catches in my throat and I feel the tears coming. I feel like I clean up messes for no less than 18 hours a day. I have so much other stuff to get done. When I am not cleaning up a mess I am spending time cleaning up a half mess. Let me define, this is when Paul helps with something. So let's say he fed the baby. She is clean and fed but the high chair tray is a wreck, there is dried up cheese in the high chair and somewhere there is a bib thrown and a wipe.

I also took on planning a party for someone else to bring in a little extra cash. We need every penny of extra cash we can get to make this move work so neither of us is in a position to turn down work.

I have cried twice in the past two weeks. This is totally abnormal for me.

My left index finger is messed up. It hurts no matter what I do for the past week. I am also starting to physically feel the stress. The tension in my back, the random sweating and the heart palpitations.

So all of this to say, I am going to have a major melt down soon. I am not sure when but I can tell you I will probably be somewhere awkward like church or Target.



The good news is however, that we may have found a way for Paul to work and I to be in school and avoid childcare cost all together for the first 6 months to a year. This is an incredible relief.

Today I am grateful for the little things that keep me going.
May you be blessed by some small happy thing today.

My Morning

I couldn't sleep last night. I was up from 4-6:30. I woke up again at about 8:15, I was supposed to be somewhere at 8:30. So I didn't go. There was no way I could have showered and dressed and got there even with soaking wet hair.

So I am officially failing miserably at all those Lenten goals. I am behind on my blogs and devotionals. I missed both weekend activities because I over slept. I drank soda all day yesterday while gutting our back porch.

I also learned that we have considerably less money in our bank account than I thought. This massively complicates my life. It was a simple misunderstanding but shocking and unnerving. I need to change some serious plans.

My house looks like a tornado went through it, save the back porch which we polished nicely yesterday.

Only the back porch though mind you, we did not get to part of the garage or the office.

I had crazier than average dreams last night, which probably explains most of my sleeping issues.

I need to go buy three gifts with my less than stellar bank account today.

I think I am skipping church all together.

In much happier news, our dear friend gave birth to a lovely little boy this morning. That is worth a smile!

The Pregnancy Brain Lie

If you are like me, when you found out you were expecting your first child, you were mildly euphoric amid all the other emotions that come with the positive pregnancy test. What you didn't know that while those same hormones that were making you so very happy, sad, sleepy, sick, and anything else pregnancy brings; they were also eating away at your brain slowly liquifying it and sending it straight to your placenta.

Let's use the analogy of an egg. The shell is a precious membrane that holds all your brains in and together in a way that functions. Those hormones crack open the egg and the liquid inside comes out and then your body uses an electric egg beater on the whip setting to mix them all up and send them down into you placenta. Leaving you a very small bit just to run your body enough to keep you and the baby alive. You start to loose things and forget things and get clumsy and then you read about pregnancy or placenta brain. You read about how afterwards your brain will come back to normal because full blood flow will return to your brain.

I am here to tell you it is all lies. It doesn't return. It makes sense though. All those liquified brains going back into a shell that was broken into pieces and glued back together. Of course it isn't going to work right. Not to mention I think the kid gets some of the original brain matter.

What brings this rant on you ask? Well last night I was watching the local news when I tease for World News Tonight came one. I saw something and said oh I need to see that. So I sat here and watched the whole show not remembering what it was that I was waiting to see in the first place. Needless to say nothing caught my attention in the full 30 minutes enough to justify delaying the making of dinner further. I got incredibly frustrated because I couldn't remember what I was waiting to see.

To some this might seem like the everyday. To me it feels like early onset dementia. Before I had this love named Lilia, my head was different. I could go to the store and forget my shopping list, visualize it and get every single item on it. I always kept lists as references. Now they are like air itself. I am useless with out them. I also always kept a calendar merely for reference of when I was going to be places. This served more as a reminder for those I lived with to figure out where I was. Now I have no less than 4 calendars and I am lucky if all four of them together have every date and time I need to be somewhere on them. I could recall charts in my head when test taking. I could see bits of books I found interesting. I could remember a situation in my head with great detail like it was yesterday. Now I am lucky if I can remember what store I was just in and why I was there. Forget it if I saw something interesting that inspired an idea for later.


I guess I will take solace in the fact that at least my long term hasn't been affected yet. I am terrified to ever have another child and loose more of my head. This is why they tell you to finish your education before you have kids. Not because of the work load and time constraints. It's because you loose the ability to think and remember.

I used to be a super multitasker I could do up to 10 things at once. Now I am lucky if I can type and listen to a song with out starting to type the lyrics.

In the end I guess I just feel like my brain is clogged.

I am very frustrated.

I hope someone out there has had or is having this same experience. Other wise I am convinced it's dementia.

Today I am grateful for the few things I can remember.
May you be blessed with some memory making today.