mommy blog Archives - Page 2 of 20 - Adulting: Second- Half

And Another One Down

“so much happened this year it feels like i lived 3 years in one.” -@thedeepestmsgs, Twitter

It appears that I am going to end this eventful year with a bang. I just tested positive for COVID. I can’t believe that I made it this far without ever catching it. (in all fairness, I was too lazy to get the booster shot) I feel pretty lousy, like I have the flu. I haven’t been really sick in so long that I forgot what it feels like. (It feels crumby.) I know that I am going to be okay. I’m a generally healthy person. I am more annoyed than anything, although I am so grateful that my family and I made it through the holidays healthy, and together. Dayquil is my new best friend.

I hope that you all are staying well. 2022 had better have better plans in store for us, than the last two doozies. I have a sneaking suspicion that it is going to be a much better year for all of us. (knocking on wood with every appendage which I have on my body)

I need to go back to bed. See you tomorrow.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Monday – Funday

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Good morning. I woke up this morning to all of the evidence that all six of us are here at the house, fully living life, and the celebration of the holidays has been a hearty one. My skin feels a little crawly. No one would ever come close to accusing me of being a “neat freak”, but that internal switch in me, has been flipped, the switch that cries out, “Austere could be nice. Austere sounds like a strangely appealing aesthetic just about now. ” How do I we go from “Colossal Chaotic Christmas is Over Mayhem” to “Modern Minimalism” without much time, effort, coaxing or yelling? Maybe some year I’ll figure out how to just twitch my nose, and everything will magically go back to some semblance of order. In the meantime, my household is going at this, at a snail’s pace:

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!! I am sneaking on here to wish my beloved readers all of the best that the day has to offer. That’s the beauty of having older children. The festivities start well after sunrise, when the kids grow up. Although those of you with young grandchildren may be having a different experience right now. You’re sleepy and smiley and lucky and giddy right now, aren’t you?!!

Whatever feelings arise today, just feel ’em and then free ’em. Today can be a complicated day. There are no “shoulds”. Just try to savor the gift of a lifetime that you’re always unwrapping, every single day – the gift of experiencing a lifetime on Earth. It’s an interesting ride, isn’t it?

I appreciate you all. Your audience is what makes this a blog and not just another one of my personal journals, lying around, cluttering things up. You’re a vital part of Adulting – Second Half. I love you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

The 100 Best Christmas Memes For Friends And Family – Yellow Blogtopus

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

For the Love of Dogs

I messed around with this picture that my husband sent to the family chat this morning, as best that I could. I am always cognizant of protecting my family’s privacy. My family and my friends are kind and loving enough to indulge my need/inclination/passion/desire to write about our family and my friends and our experiences, on a public forum. My form and style of writing is called “confessional writing.” As a private person myself (believe it or not), I don’t take their kindness and gratuitousness for granted.

The above picture is one of our dogs, Ralphie, giving some morning love to our eldest son. Our eldest is a professional who lives in a different state. Our son was already in college when when we got Ralphie, as a puppy. Our son has lived on his own for many years now. And yet Ralphie unabashedly adores our son. Ralphie has this lavish, overflowing way of showing our son how excited our entire family is to have him home for the holidays, with his constant exuberant outpouring of adoration. Ralphie honestly cherishes all of us, and no one could ever question that fact. My friend recently brought up the old proverb, “Actions speak louder than words.” My other friend made the point that this can be read in a positive sense, too. You can show people how much you love them without ever saying it. Ralphie doesn’t have words, but his actions speak volumes. So many of us love dogs, because dogs have absolutely no shame about their love and loyalty. They don’t judge us. They don’t ask us to change. They don’t shame us. Dogs just love, like no other being on this earth. Dogs love. As they say, “Dog is God spelled backwards.”

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Women of Excellence

The good news is that my daughter’s COVID test was negative yesterday. We all sighed a big sigh of relief. She works at a local credit union. It started as a summer internship and they asked her to stay on and work part-time during the school year, which happens to be her senior year of high school. I was hesitant about this, for time management reasons, but my daughter loves working there, so my husband and I acquiesced. Recently, one of my daughter’s female managers got promoted, and she was moving to a different location. Upon leaving, the manager wrote a hand written thank you note to my daughter, in which she wrote that my daughter is “a woman of excellence.” I love that terminology, and this is not just because I am a proud mama. One, I love women who support and mentor other women. This is a rarer phenomenon than it should be. Second, I have honestly never seen that terminology in writing before. “A woman of excellence.” What does that mean? I want to be one. I want to be called “a woman of excellence.” I want to believe that I am “a woman of excellence.”

I looked up the word “excellence” in the dictionary. It means “the quality of being outstanding/extremely good”. That’s pretty general, right? I think that we all have things that we are extremely good at, and we all have areas that we could probably work on. Maybe we don’t care enough about certain traits, to work hard enough to become excellent at them. There are certain areas that I do believe that I am “a woman of excellence” and then there are other things in my life that I believe that I am more likely to be called “a woman of sub-standards.” To be “a woman of excellence”, does that mean you have to be good at everything? That feels like a lot of undue stress and pressure, and perhaps, a lesson in frustration and futility. Perhaps being “a woman of excellence” means knowing yourself, knowing your values, and your priorities, and your purposes, and being excellent at these things. I’m not really sure. All that I know is that I would like to be one. I would like to be known as “a woman of excellence.” And I also know that I am grateful that another woman acknowledged and appreciated this quality of excellence in my daughter, besides just her adoring mother. That was an excellent thing for that woman to do, for a young woman coming up in the world behind her. And this vital encouragement is something that all of us “women of excellence” are more than capable to do, for the future generations of excellent women, for whom we are paving the way. If this encouragement and inspiration for young women is the only area that we choose to be excellent at, I am convinced that this will be more than enough.

“Every job is a self-portrait of the person who did it. Autograph your work with excellence.” – Anonymous (probably written by an anonymous person of excellence and humility)

“Perfection is not attainable, but if we chase perfection, we can catch excellence.” – Vince Lombardi

“Excellence is not a skill. It’s an attitude.” – Ralph Marston

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Monday-Funday

My daughter has to take another COVID test today because someone at her work came down with it. Luckily, my middle son got to come home for the holidays. He tested negative for COVID right before heading home, despite his roommate catching it. His roommate was vaccinated and boosted and still came down with it. And now his roommate’s plans to visit his 95-year-old grandfather for Christmas, are ruined. His roommate only had mild symptoms for one day, and now he is left all alone at their apartment for the holidays. I will never turn this blog into a political or controversial or an inflammatory tirade, so all that I will say is “Sigh.” I don’t have the answers. “Sigh.” I (like everyone else) am so sick of this sh%t. “Sigh.” Deep breath. “Sigh.” “Sigh.” “Sigh.”

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Monday-Funday

Credit: @Emsrsue (Twitter)

This meme is truly not fair to my husband. I think there are times when he would have liked to have been more involved in the gift buying, but my alter-ego, “Karen Controlfreak” would not allow it. Still, this picture reminds me of every man I ever knew growing up. And I mean this fondly. These men worked their asses off for their families, and they always had a smile on their face wondering what their hard work was providing for others. Selfless, in many ways, really.

Here are some other tweets that captured my fancy, this morning:

One day I woke up and realized I am the dragon, not the princess. -@_desert_bones

Your confidence needs to be built from within. If it is built on compliments, it will shatter with criticism.- @WakeupPeopIe

Learn the difference between your intuition guiding you and your trauma misleading you. -@Positive_Call

Me: Ok, I’m wearing a nice outfit, I did my hair and makeup. I guess I look pretty ok! Camera: Bitch, you thought. -@momsense_ensues

Well before I agree to 2022 I need to see the terms and conditions -@frenziedlanes

Have a great week, my beloved readers!! See you tomorrow!!

****Friends, as I was wrapping up today’s post, this appeared in my backyard. Santa came early!!! There’s magic everywhere, all throughout the year. Notice it. It’s there.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Not You, Kid

“They’re just not you, Kid.” – @TheNostalgicCo, Twitter

The other day, I wrote a long, heartfelt email to an author about the difference her book (which is now out-of-print) made to me recently. The author is now in her late seventies, but still has an active website. To say that I was surprised by her response, would be an understatement.

“Who are you? Are you a real person? Are you some kind of telemarketer? Anyway, thanks. Maybe I’ll activate my book back up on Amazon.”

That’s all she wrote.

I understand that today’s society puts up a lot of roadblocks, in order for us to be able to trust each other. I also understand that this author is aging and may be going through mental challenges caused by her aging process. In short, I understand that her response has everything to do with her, and nothing to do with me. And my disappointment in her response, is all on me. My expectations are not credos for her to meet.

Along these same lines, my friend’s daughter was recently going through some real angst with some mean girls, in her freshman dorm in college. It was shocking the level of immaturity and cruelty that college-aged women still stoop to, especially in this day and age of careful, cancel culture. Actually, maybe it isn’t shocking. We mothers all agreed that we all know 50-year-old women who still behave like petty Betty, mean girls. And these vipers tend to raise mini-me mean girls, and the cycle continues on and on.

“They’re just not you, Kid.”

They all can’t be you. Only you can be you. Only you can raise yourself to the highest potential of your own best self. How others choose to respond to your growing and to your expanding and to your leveling up, is their business, their problem, their stuff. It has nothing to do with you. You be you. You surround yourself with those people who get you, respect you, honor you, and love you. You surround yourself with people who are for you, not against you. Send the rest on their merry way.

“They’re just not you, Kid.”

You are special stuff.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Flying Reindeer

https://twitter.com/filodxxn/status/1465850060235751425

When my middle son was a little guy, hedging his bets, he said to me, “You know, Mom, I still believe in Santa Claus, but flying reindeer, come on! I don’t believe in flying reindeer. I just don’t.”

After watching this video this morning, I kind of do. I kind of do believe in flying reindeer.

I saw this quote on Twitter today, too:

“Life is so subtle sometimes that you barely notice walking through the doors you once prayed would open.” – @meh_thinks

Isn’t this the truth? Look around you, just sitting where you are right now, and look at all of the things and comforts and relationships and friendships and conveniences and answered prayers that you, at one time in your life, fervently hoped and prayed would come into your life. As soon as we get these answered wishes and desires, we quickly start focusing on what we are still lacking, don’t we? Our center of attention always goes to our next wants, making all of our answered prayers seem so easy to take for granted, as if they were always there for the taking, in our lives. Desires are good. Hope is good. These are the attributes which lead to more invention and creation in life. But still, so is appreciation and gratefulness for all that we have already been given. Desire and hope are most potent when they are blended with big dollops of awe and thankfulness and recognition of our constant flow of blessings. Life is like a stealth butler at a luxury hotel or at a Disney resort. It makes sure that all of our needs are being met, quietly and magically, so as to not interrupt or disturb us, as we sometimes walk around impatiently and in a huff and with an air of entitlement, wondering, aghast, why we should have to wait in line for our next big adventure. The audacity!

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Big Brood

I figured that we could all use some holiday cheer:

My daughter asked me how to begin her letter to Santa Claus so I suggested she start with, “Hear me out …” (@Dad_At_Law Twitter)

credit: Rex Masters, Twitter

Happy Hanukkah to my Jewish readers!!!

****I know that a lot of you are worried about me and my family, but we are doing okay. A good night’s sleep does wonders. One Day at a Time. It’s the only way to live. You savor and experience your life more that way. Don’t worry. Be happy.****

When you raise a big family (we have four kids), you do a lot of dishes and laundry and driving and PTA forms. You do a lot of juggling of schedules and cars in the driveway. There is a steady hum of noise in the house, always. You are constantly cleaning up messes.

When your big family grows up and moves out, you honestly sometimes forget what raising the big family was like. And then they come home for the holidays, and you are swiftly reminded. As you are doing yet another load of laundry and the dishwasher is running yet again and your husband is vacuuming for the third time in one day, and you have to yell out over all of the noise for someone to move their car so that another car can get out of the garage, and you are trying to remember where everyone is and where everyone is supposed to be, you take a pause and you smile to yourself. You are reminded that you made it through 12 years of high schoolers, relatively unscathed. You are reminded that you helped to give a good, solid start to four wonderful people who are already making a difference in this world. You pat yourself on the back with sheepish pride. And although you realize that you certainly don’t have the energy to do it all again, you are incredibly happy that at one time in your life, you did have the energy to raise a big family. You realize that your big family helped to make your heart grow big, and a big heart is full of love and love is the stuff that sustains you, and that thought is what carries you through the final folding of towels and sheets, from the recent reunion of your big, beautiful brood.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.