Talk About it Tuesday - Forgiving Yourself

 

Picture it:  You have a huge To Do list and by the end of the day, only half of it is checked off

Or

You have company coming and your house is a mess.  You aren't able to get everything cleaned up in time, and every crumb at the baseboard is laughing at you.

Or

You let your kid stay home because getting out of bed to take them to school is more trouble than you can deal with.

Every single one of these is something I deal with.  (Though not as much on the last one.)  I want everything around me to be perfect - a perfect apartment, perfect cleaning job, being the perfect wife and perfect mother.  Being the perfect friend.  I don't expect this perfection from anyone else.  If Rich can't get to helping me by cleaning the kitchen, I don't (usually) get mad, especially if he's had a hard, busy day.  If Pete gets 90% of the living room cleaned before his attention wears out, I count that as a positive and let him do more the next day.  If a friend isn't able to meet me for coffee because their day got busier than they'd expected, I am disappointed but I understand.  They are all allowed to be imperfect beings.  But I'm not.  I should be able to handle it all.

Now, please don't think I have anyone else telling me that I have to be perfect.  In fact, Rich tells me more often than not that I need to go sit down, that I've done enough.  He reminds me that if I push myself too much one day, I won't have the body to do anything the next.  But there's always a niggling part of me that knows I'll be letting people down if I don't get X,Y,Z done.

I'm trying to learn to forgive myself when I don't have enough spoons to accomplish everything I plan to do in one day.  Part of that is keeping up my Today I... notebook so the little things that so often get done, things like taking my meds, showering, brushing my teeth, will still show me that I did do SOMETHING and it was something important.  There are days that I need that to look back on, to remind myself that I regularly get a lot more done than my depression will let me remember.  

Many times, on FB (or in real life), I will proudly crow that I did "the thing!"  A lot of times, it's something small and many people would wonder why I'm talking about THAT.  But it's another way to remind myself that I did something that was either scary or difficult for me (see: making phone calls, cleaning the house).  Luckily, my friends and family generally understand that that is what this is.  The hard part, of course, is forgiving myself when I do make those posts and declarations because I have to remember that I'm trying to build myself up more than boast.

I know that all of this - the need for "perfection", the need to apologize when I didn't do anything wrong (yep, that's a big one of mine), are all part and parcel of my depression.  I have difficulty, in the midst of it, remembering that I can take days to myself as long as I don't let myself wallow for weeks.  And it's something I am trying to change for my own mental wellbeing.

You can see the imperfect clutter around (though the picture was more about how my SPDer was watching something on his phone).

A reminder to myself that I need to focus on.  And more background clutter.

Monday's Musings: Trying to get back to where I belong

One week from Thursday will be the quarterly pest control spraying for my apartment (at least, based on my calculations - I haven't gotten the calendar from the office for September yet).  I always freak out and worry whenever they come to spray, because when we first moved in to the apartment, I was having problems keeping on top of cleaning.  When the pest control people came in, they gave this information to the office.  The office then told us that unless we got things cleaned up, they wouldn't renew our lease.  I worked hard to clean things up and they renewed our lease.  Ever since, I go into panic mode every three months, scared to death that the cleaning I do won't be enough.

During the year of quarantine, the complex didn't do regular pest control.  Having all four of us home meant that trying to keep on top of things was nearly impossible.  You'd think it would be easier, but there are just some fights I can't get into.  And with Pete, asking him to do anything is a fight.  I was grateful that I didn't have to keep on top of things, but it meant that I had so much more to do once they started pest control again.  I managed to get to bare minimum with help from Rich and the kids on the days before, but the kids were still home and Pete still forgot how to put things away.

My grand plan was once the kids were back in school, I would dive in and be productive.  I would have plenty of time to clean, to organize, to deep dive into some of the big projects, and to write every day in my blog.  The kids are now in their third week of school, and I've managed to get done... nothing.  Well, not nothing.  I did get the dining room straightened up on Monday.  But I still look around and think, "There's so much to do.  Why am I not doing it?"  Rich thinks I should go easier on myself.  I've been dealing with back spasms, dizziness and depression, all of which make heavy cleaning more difficult.  But physical/emotional problems or not, I keep beating myself up for what I'm not doing.

The fact that I'm writing a blog post today gives me hope that maybe, just maybe, I'll be able to get some things done.  No promises, of course.  But it's a step in the right direction.  And I know that, even if I don't get everything done this week, I have next week.  I will be successful, because I always manage to make it through.  

But by the heavens, do I wish I could afford a maid!

It's the Little Things

 Tomorrow, two things are happening.  My apartment complex is coming to do the quarterly spraying and I'm getting some furniture from a friend.  As such, today is a day of cleaning. 

I came downstairs and told Pete that we needed to clean and his job was to clean the living room.  Rather than fussing or "waiting for Tedd", he got started.  When I was done with my breakfast, I went in and found he'd done a pretty good job.  There were still a few things to do, and he patiently picked up the things I pointed out.  It's not the way things usually run.  I'm grateful for it.

While he working on the living room, I was working on the entryway and the kitchen.  Tedd was working in the dining room.  Unusually, he was giving me a bit more grief than Pete in terms of cleaning.  But I knew that, unlike with his younger brother, he'd actually get the things done eventually so I left him to it.  I finished up the entryway and got started on the kitchen when I ran out of mental spoons*.  I must have looked like I was flagging because Tedd came up and put his arm around me in a hug.  "It's ok, Mom.  You've done enough.  We'll get the rest done."  For all the slight annoyance earlier, I needed that. I'm grateful for it.

Next I called Rich to let him know that I might need his help tonight.  He's been working in the office today and has to stop at the grocery store tonight, but so I was hoping that he could just do the vacuuming, maybe help a little in the kitchen.  "Tell me what the priorities are and I'll work on them.  It's ok, love."  I needed to hear that right then.  I'm grateful for it.

When I ran out to grab "thank you for helping" lunch for the boys, I dealt with kind people in the drive-thrus.  I was wished a blessed day and told to drive carefully with a smile.  It helped make my day a little better.  I'm grateful for it.

On Kind Words, I had someone tell me that my message asking to share something positive that my message WAS her positive for the day and thanked me for bringing joy into her life.  I always hope that my words, my messages asking people to share their joy with me, is helping.  Hearing that it does made me smile.  I'm grateful for it.

A lot of little things didn't go the way I wanted them to, but that's fine.  I'm choosing not to focus on those little things.  For today, I'm choosing to focus on the little things that lift my spirit rather than the little things that destroy it.  Because life is made up of the little things.  We just have to choose what little things we choose to make the focus of our day.

My books and games are little things that bring me joy.  Strange camera angles do as well.

* If you've never heard of the Spoon Theory of Chronic Illness, the whole story is here.  But basically it's about having a limited number of spoons, or things you can do, in a given day before your illness (be it mental or physical) kicks in.  Some days, I have more spoons than others.  I try to plan my days as though I'm going to have fewer spoons to do what I need to so those get done, and only worry about the other things if I've got any left.  The spoon theory is a more concrete way for me to understand why some days are more difficult than others.

Trying to Find my Balance

 I'd really thought I was going to get back to blogging regularly back in February.  Then school happened and life happened and I didn't quite get back to it.  But now school is out for the year here in Nashville, I have my own computer and (hopefully) I'll have a bit more time to post on my journal.  After all, today is the first day of the month.  I might as well try to make some changes.  I even entered all the books I've read since February into GoodReads and posted my first review in about 8 years on Views from the Reader Side.  I've got my BuJo set up for the next month, I'm getting some things organized around the house and I'm actually feeling pretty good about it all.  I'm feeling good about a lot because a lot of things are seeming to be ok.

I've started joining a few events on Eventbright that is working toward both making me healthier and more creative.  I've got a couple regular journaling events, a couple of regular yoga events, and a few book clubs that I haven't had a chance to join in yet but I have signed up for.   I'm getting a head on the reading because even if something happens and I can't keep up with it, I'll still have read some awesome books.

Speaking of reading, I'm also participating in the Nashville Pubic Library Summer Reading Program.  I've already made the first goal of 600 minutes reading (though I haven't logged them all yet).  I'm hoping to put reviews up for all the books that I read on Goodreads, mirrored to Views from the Reader Side.  If any of my readers are also participating in a reading program, I'd love to hear what you are reading as well.  Either here or on VftRS.  Books are always good.

I also found an older... I don't like to use the word "game" because it's not really a game.  It's more a way to help bolster people anonymously.  It's called Kind Words and I check it out a couple times a day.  You can post your own 7 line thing that you want to talk about - good, bad, curious about the others that are in the world as well.  And then you can browse through letters others have left to give them kind words of support, encouragement, and just general goodness.  (And sometimes you may even have advice to give!)  The only problem I have with it is that there are times I get replies from people and I want to write back so badly and it's not set up for that.  It's still all pretty cool and it helps when I'm having a rough day.  

With that, I will close this post for now.  But, because I'm actually pretty proud of it, I'm going to share my June Layouts in my Bullet Journal.  I promise this will be in separate blog posts for those who have no interest in it later.  

My June in Review data page.  I fill this out at the end of the month to cover the numbers and give me a place to look at the month over all.

This gives me a place to write down the books I read, the TV shows and movies that I watch and the games that I play - whether they be board, computer or console.

This is my tracker for the month.  I haven't figured out a tracking system that I like yet, so I'm still messing with this.d

I'm trying to get back into FlyLady, so I put all my routines down in writing.  This way, hopefully I'll be able to keep on top of things a bit better.

This page breaks down my home by zones and what needs to be done in each of them monthly.  Like with the daily and weekly above, I'm hoping this will keep me on track.

Working through it

The last few weeks, I've been having more bouts of depression without really knowing why.  Most of the time, it's in the evening, just generally feeling down but not having a focus for it.  The things that I think should make me happy (working on my BuJo, keeping my List a Day and Today I...'s updated) haven't been.  I suspect some of it is the state my house was in for the longest time - total complete and utter disaster.  I was finding myself in that horrid catch 22 where the state of the apartment was making me so depressed that I couldn't find the energy to keep up with the state of the apartment.  

Some of that has changed today, though.  I asked Tedd to work on cleaning up the kitchen, I was going to work on the dining room, and I asked Rich and Pete to work on the living room.  We all spent a couple hours working hard on it and, while none of it is perfect, I feel more comfortable letting people into the house.  I'm hoping that I can get the boys (primarily Pete) to keep up with things so I can feel more comfortable diving into something like the bathroom on Monday.  

I'm trying to work on one very important part of me, and that is the part that is just trying to let go of the need for perfection.  I don't really expect it from anyone else, but I let it weigh me down when I don't meet my own expectations.  I constantly worry what others think of me and the state of my house/car/clothes/life.  I'm trying to let that go.  (Well, beyond trying to get and keep the house in good enough shape that they don't ask us to leave.)

It's a hard thing to do, letting go of my need for perfection, letting go of the blame I heap upon myself when things don't go quite as planned.  It's hard to not berate myself for not being the perfect wife/mom/housekeeper/friend, because I've been doing it for 40-odd years.  I'm trying to find more affirmations to remind myself that perfection isn't a necessity and that what matters most is what my boys and my husband think of me.

I read an old post on Facebook the other day that was a reminder, even all these years later, that I've never really been a bad mom.  The post was this:

FhuSebtrSuarplylSrona 4, shruoraeg201dan2ld  · 

Shared with Your friends

While Teddy was having an awesome time at the prerelease tournament, I got a chance to find out what I sound like through Pete's. Ears. There wasn't a lot of room for Pete to be Pete, so I brought him out to the van to play. After turning me into a variety of barnyard animals, he pretended that he was the mommy and I was the baby/boy. He read me stories before putting me to sleep, got me up and ready for school, drove me around on errands... and as I listened to this, I realized more than anyone else could tell me, that I really am a pretty good mom. It was an awesome day with my family. Today's grade: A+

I knew this 9 years ago.  Even if only for a day, I knew it.  So I need to keep reminding myself that the surprise hugs, the "I love you, Mom"'s and the fact that Pete will still come to me when he's upset mean that I'm still a good mom, especially in their eyes.  So while today, getting everything cleaned up in our own separate corners, felt good the important things was that we were doing it together with tears, yelling and screaming.  And that I could walk into the other rooms and see them for the great job they were rather than telling myself, "Later I'll have to take care of X, Y, Z in here."

I'm getting better at being the best me I can be.  It's still a work in progress.

Here I come again

Well, here comes another attempt at blogging.  I'm not sure if it will be any more successful than it was before, but I'm going to give it a try.  I've both got a lot more on my plate as well as having not as much on my plate.  More because I'm working now, just two days a week, but it is cutting out time for being home to get things done.  But I less because Teddy is trying to step it up with helping more around the house, as is Rich.  So I'm able to set a schedule and get things done.  For the most part, I'm keeping everything at a baseline daily or weekly.  Starting next week, I'm planning on going through the house for organizational and decluttering.  It'll take me a long time to do it because I'm planing on doing it in small batches, like a shelf or a drawer at a time.  Eventually, it will all be good.  Or so I hope.

One of the things I'm trying to work into my plan is all the TV that I'm trying to watch.  Between catching up on shows that I'd left go by the wayside but want to see and the new shows coming out, it's a lot of time.  I've been catching up with a lot of watching this week while the kids are on break (trying to get things done while they are home is near impossible) so hopefully, I'll be down to just the new eps each week.  I'm hoping to do reviews of various eps weekly as well, once I get everything scheduled and organized.

I'm not sure if anyone would be interested in what shows are on my watchlist, but I'm going to list them in case anyone is interested in my reviews of what I'm watching (or if anyone wants to say "Make sure you review this show!  I'm really curious about it!")

Saturday

• Doctor Who 

Sunday

• Quantico 

Monday

• Gotham
• Scorpion
• Blindspot
• NCIS: LA (still catching up with season 5 and 6, so I'm recording the new season to watch when I'm done playing catch up)
• Supergirl (when it starts)

Tuesday

• NCIS
• The Flash
• Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.
• Limitless
• Best Time Ever with Neil Patrick Harris
• Wicked City (when it starts)

Wednesday

• Arrow
• Criminal Minds

Thursday

• Heroes Reborn
• The Blacklist
• Angel from Hell (when it starts) 

Friday

• Grimm

There are a lot of other shows that are supposed to come on later in the season that I'm planning on watching.  I'm not sure if I'll actually be able to keep up with all of them, or keep up with reviewing them, but hey at least I'm going to try.  I'm also going to try to get back to updating my 101 in 1001 blog.  I've been doing things for it but not really blogging so... we'll see how it goes.

Now I'm off to take the boys to lunch.  They've had to spend an hour every day cleaning their room and when they do, I do something special with them each day.  If they get their whole room cleaned by Friday, they are going to the movies.  So far, they've been keeping up with things pretty well so they've got a chance.  

In the meantime, I'm going to post a few pics from the last week or so:

Pete getting his karate on

Teddy with his good karate form

Super Peter

Teddy, falling asleep at the computer

Progress

Initially, I'd planned for today to be a heavy brainpower and low body power day.  I was going to rework the boys' earn points, set up chore lists, work on my control journal... that kind of thing.  But I decided, after almost tripping (again) over things in the boys' room that today was going to focus on cleaning that up instead.  I know, I know.  "It's their room.  They should be the ones responsible for cleaning it."  And it's true, up to a point.  But when it gets to the point it was at, trying to get them to clean it is almost worse than having a root canal.  So I've set it up so that, even though it's clean, there's still things for them to do.  All the toys aren't in the correct bins, and several are just in an extra bin.  And since I'm trying to be more on top of everything from this point forward, I'm going to make sure that it stays that way.  Especially since we're supposed to have workmen come in and put new energy efficient windows in, so I'll need to move their bed as it is.

Now I'm at a starting point where I can start to look around me and decide what needs to go where.  There are still several boxes that haven't been unpacked from the move, and several things that will need a permanent home that doesn't have one yet.  Tomorrow is supposed to be bedroom day, but after everything I did today, I don't think it's a necessity.  Instead, I think I'll try to get some of the brain work done and, if the mood to be productive strikes, work on some of the boxes.

I'm making steps forward.  That's what matters. Little by little, making steps forward.

Trying to get back on track... again

I was tired of the mess and tired of the stress, so I decided it was about time to do something about it.

Yes, what I really wanted to do was lay in bed and play on the computer for hours on end, but every time I did it, I got bored or I felt guilty.  So I figured it was time to try to turn things around again.  Or at least try to.  I've stumbled so many times in the past, and I'm really hoping that this time maybe, just maybe, I'll get the routines to stick.

I'm trying to start (relatively) small.  I'm starting with a focus on cleaning.  I've started back with the baby steps of FlyLady Baby Steps and (somewhat) ignoring the daily missions.  I am working on cleaning a different room a day like I used to do, with a little wiggle room in case something comes up to make a particular day harder than others.  Every night, I'm straightening up the kitchen, getting the dishes in the dishwasher and making sure my sink is shining.  I'm trying to keep up with the little declutters during the day, as well as begging Rich and the boys to take care of their things so I don't have to do as much.  I'm trying to do a load of laundry a day so I'm not overwhelmed with all the laundry to fold.  And each day, I'm trying to add a little more.

I bought a planner at the end of last year/beginning of this year that seems to be working well for me.  It's dated, but not yeared (basically, it has all the dates but none of the days of the week listed in it).  There are several lines for each day, 2 days to a page.  It gives me room to make notes, keep track what I need to do and feel a bit more on top of things.  It's probably not going to be the only thing I use - I'm still using Cozi and I'm actually hoping to have a control journal one of these days.  But it's a start for me.

I think a lot of this is coming out of a group therapy study that Teddy and I are a part of.  It's for people with depression and their 9 to 17 year old child.  Part of it is trying to find ways to help eliminate stress and some of it is trying to find ways to help our kids not have to worry about depression - ours or theirs.  Tonight is week 3 and I'm trying to let the lessons into my brain.  I think it's working, because I'm feeling better about some things.  Partly, I'm sure, because of the changes I'm trying to make.

I'm trying to make sure that the changes I make aren't only related to the apartment.  I'm trying to drink more water and less soda.  It's easiest when I don't have it in the house, though days when I have to pick the boys up from school is a little harder, since I'll stop and grab something to eat and drink while I wait for them.But even if I get myself down to one soda a day, it's a good start.  I'm also wearing my WiiFit meter constantly.  I haven't started back with exercise yet, though I really need to.  That, I'm hoping, will be next week.  I just don't want to over do things, y'know?  When I feel like I have a handle on the cleaning, then I'll feel like I can add more to it in the form of exercise.

It's little steps, little things.  And I'm hoping that if I can make my environment nicer, then I can make my brain easier to deal with and become nicer myself.  Often, I feel like I'm the screaming mom, the nagging mom, the annoying mom.  I feel like I'm angry so much of the time and that I don't know how to be happy.  But I know it isn't true, so I'm trying to make steps to change that part of me.  Maybe then, I can ask my family to help our rather than yelling and screaming for them to.

I'm hoping that I'll be able to do a little better job of keeping up with my blog, but no promises.  Today, I happen to have the time on the computer to be able to do it.  So I'm writing.  Even if it feels like the same thing I always write, at least I'm writing.  Who knows?  Maybe tomorrow I'll have more time and I'll be able to write something else.  I don't know.  All I do know is that I'm ready for the me I want to be.

New Year's Resolutions

Okay, so there's still a few weeks left until 2014 is a thing of the past.  And honestly, I'm not really "resolving" to do and not do these things.  It's more like goals that I'm hoping to make happen over the next year.  And some of them, I'm hoping to start before the year is over.

Yeah, I'm rambling.  I figure why not jump back into my blog in typical "Amber" style.

Anyway, it's Monday, I feel like making a list and this is the one I'm going to make.  So here we go!

1. Update my blog at least 3 times a week - I'd love to update it daily, but that's asking the impossible.  Yeah, Pete's in school now (and has been for a few months) and, in theory, that should mean I have more time on my hands.  Instead, I feel more brain frazzled than before.  So 3 times a week, and trying for more actual updates than memes that only require me to write one or two things.  That sounds plausible - at least until the end of January when I forget and my blog goes dormant once more.
2. Take more pictures - I realized how badly I'd fallen down on the job this year when I really had to scrape to find enough pictures for our yearly calendars.  (The best gift we've ever come up with, year after year.)  You'd think with a digital camera, a smart phone and a tablet with a camera that I would have had MORE pictures.  Nope.  So this year, that's gotta change.  I don't want another year of just finding pictures of the back of the kids' heads everywhere.
3. Actually review some books - I love to read.  Always have.  And I love sharing what I've read.  But for some reason, I have this mental block about actually DOING it.  I've even got my reading blog out there that should be the perfect vehicle for it.  But do I ever make time to sit down and do my reviews?  Nope.  Instead, I end up sitting at the computer playing game after game of Bingo and feeling like I'm doing nothing with my life.  So this one kinda goes with the blogging thing.
4. Make up a cleaning schedule and STICK TO IT - We moved to a new apartment at the end of October and I refuse to let it get to the state the old apartment was.  So far, I've been doing a (semi) decent job of not letting things get too bad.  But I don't ever want to get to that point either.  So I'm going to try some FLYing, some of my own stuff, remembering the use the white board to update chores that need to be done and by who.  Because I can do this!
5. Have all the boxes unpacked by summer - Ideally, I'd love to have them unpacked before the first of the year, but I'm trying to be a realist here.  I may want to get my house in perfect shape, looking great and having a place for everything, but life happens and I'm naturally indolent.  I can only push myself so far with things.  So by summer... yeah, that's possible.

There are more things that I want to resolve, I'm sure.  Less time on the computer.  More time with my family.  More exercise and more focusing on me.  But it's good to start small and add rather than overwhelm myself now and set myself up for failure.

Daily Challenge - Clearing Off the Baker's Rack

Almost every room has one.  Most of my rooms have more than one.  The places that clutter migrates.  But in the dining room, one of the most egregious is the baker's rack.  Rich and I bought this when we first got married to give us a little more room in our one butt kitchen.  When we first moved to Nashville, we had room in the slightly larger kitchen to use it for our microwave and other appliances.  But in this apartment, we're back to one-butt kitchen time and the baker's rack has become a place to hold things in the dining room.  We (sort of) have the room in the kitchen for our appliances, and even if we didn't, where we currently have the baker's rack is not close to outlets.  So it's become a place for other things that need to live near our kitchen.

About once a year, I get too frustrated with the cluttered mess that it's become and decide to tear it all down and start from scratch.  I'd let it go a little too long this time, so today's challenge was

Clear off the Baker's Rack

Of course, in order to do that, I needed to clean the rest of the dining room.  I didn't have the free area to put the things I had to pull off it!  At the end of the day, though, I have a much nicer, neater looking dining room.  And I can once again find things that live on my baker's rack.

Since it's boring talking about how I cleaned everything off, this is more a photo essay than anything else.  So follow me in pictures, as I show how I went from mess to semi-clean to a bit more of a mess to finally neatness that will hopefully last for more than a day.

To start, here's a picture of the disaster area baker's rack and the small drawers next to it.  The drawers started life as a craft storage area.  They've now become half-craft storage and half towel storage.  The wire baskets that slot into the bottom right are supposed to be potatoes, onions and the like, as well as trivets, storage containers and other odds and ends that I want to get my hands on.  The bottom-most full shelf is supposed to be the kids' plates, bowls and cups (so they can get their own dishes at meal times).  The next shelf had just become a catch all.  And the top shelf was supposed to be a combination of cookbooks and things the boys weren't allowed to get their hands on.  Instead, everything ended up everywhere.

I decided to start at the bottom and work my way up, knowing I was more likely to find things on lower shelves that belonged on higher shelves than the other way around.  I took everything out of the wire baskets, took out our George Foreman and cleaned both it and the shelf it rests on off, then took a look at what I had to replace.

Onions and potatoes and butternut squash, oh my.

It didn't take as long to put everything back as I'd expected.  Rather than putting the placemats back in one of the baskets, I instead chose to put them under the baskets to catch anything that sloughs off the onions.  I put the trivets in the next basket up, and the carrying case for my 9X13" baking pan and my crock pot in the top most basket.

Not thinking, I forgot to take a picture of the mess that was my boys' dishes before emptying it.  But this is what came off that lowest shelf:

The biggest problem with these isn't me putting them away - it's everyone else.  Things get pushed into whatever spare spot they can find and I'm left with a mess.  So after looking briefly at pure order

I started figuring out where things are going to go.  Plates in the back, with piles of bowls next to them..  Glasses to the front, since that's what gets used the most.  School stuff (sandwich keepers and thermoses) toward the back but visible.  And the container with lids for various glasses all the way to the right.  I ended up with a much neater view.

I'm still hoping to figure out a way to separate them so it will be easier for the males in the house to put things in the right place.  If anyone has suggestions, I'm glad to hear them!

Next up was the nightmare shelf.  This shelf held batteries, medications, Pokemon cards, two lidded bins with who knew what in it, food that had never made it to the pantry and other things that I just didn't know about.  I mean, look at this shelf. Would you want to go delving into it for things?

It didn't look much better once I got everything off the shelf and on to the dining room table.

This shelf actually took me the longest amount of time to go through.  I had a lot of things to separate out - figuring out what was in the various open baskets, trying to decide what Pokemon cards were supposed to go where, and just figuring out what's else belongs where.  A lot of the things that were on this shelf found other homes - many in the pantry (which is going to be my husband's challenge this weekend, I hope!)  But by the time I was finished, everything looked pretty neat up there, if I do say so myself.

I even managed to find a place for the silverware caddy I'd made.  And it doesn't look overfilled, either.  Not bad.

The top most shelf was one of the easiest, in some ways.  There were quite a few things that needed to move to other homes, but most of it was going back up there, just in a slightly different order.

One of the biggest issue, and one I lay fully at my feet, is the fact that I have a tendency to not put the recipes that I print out into the binder that I put together for that reason.  Fully my fault.  Instead, they end up cluttering the top shelf.  So I made sure to three-hold punch those and get them put away in the binder - even if they aren't organized yet.

I also made sure that my most important item got put back first - the Grey Goose Vodka!

In the end, I not only had room for all the cookbooks, but a few decorative items, as well as the nice smelling sprays that keep my dining room smelling good.

All in all, I think I did a great job getting my baker's rack looking the way I wanted it to.  I've had a pretty productive day.  And I'm feeling good about it!

Tomorrow, I'm tasking myself with two challenges again.  Partly because one of them is something I've been putting off but not something I can really blog about.  The other one, however, is fully bloggable.  And I'll make sure to talk about the non-bloggable one briefly in that post.  (Though it'll probably be more a mention like "Yep, got it done.")

What are these challenges, you ask?

Reply to all the Comments From the Last Week Plus at Sanity

and

Choose One Positive Quality That You Have and Talk About It

See you again tomorrow!

Daily Challenge - Day 9

Alright, I told y'all that today would be an odd one for the challenge.  I challenged myself to

Match Up Single Socks.

What a topic to write about, right?  Well, I also promised pictures, and I'm going to tell you a little bit about my process of matching up socks.  (I guarantee, this will probably be the most boring post you'll read all year!)

When I do laundry, I make sure to match all the socks that I can.  But due to both my husband and my kids having a tendency to take their socks off anywhere and leave them, I always end up with a bunch of mismatched socks.  They go into a bag and usually wait there for years and years until I force myself to try to match them up.  Ok, not really years and years, but several months at least.

Today was a great day for me to tackle this chore.  I have a clean bedroom floor, several episodes of NCIS that I haven't watched yet, and the time to work on it.  I started with my two (yes, two) bags of mismatched socks.

Those sheets that come in bags?  The bags are excellent for this job!

At least they weren't lying all over the place.  No, that came about a minute later when I dumped them in the middle of my floor.

Climbing to the top of Mount Sockmore!

I settled on the floor, turned on an episode of NCIS.  Requiem, which I'd seen the beginning of last night, but it was too late to watch it all.  So absolutely perfect for sorting socks.

I usually sort my socks into three piles - pure white, pure black, and colored or character socks.  I find it easier, especially when I have as many socks as this, to find matches.  And I can do it pretty much automatically while being engrossed in what Gibbs is up to now.

I got my socks sorted into their piles and, just as I was about to take the picture, a visitor decided to stop by.

Lemon wanted to get into the action.

Yep, my cat decided it had been too long since I'd last taken a picture of him, so it was going to happen now, darn it all!  I'm just glad he didn't start playing with the socks.

Now, a better picture of my three piles:

To each his own.

I always start sorting the character or colored socks first.  It's so much easier to spot matches that way.  So I moved the other two piles over to the side and started laying socks on the floor, on my legs, anywhere I could still reach them while seeing them.

Can you guess what my kids have the most of?

I managed to find matches for most of the socks, but I still had a handful that were without their match.  I usually just set those to the side for the moment, because I've been known to sort socks into the wrong piles.  With both the white and the black socks, I separate them again into piles of Amber's, Rich's and the Boys'.  The only problem with that is Teddy's feet are getting bigger and sometimes I can't tell the difference between his socks and mine.  There's enough difference that they're just a touch small on me if they belong to him, and just a touch big on him if they belong to me.  And it's so hard to tell by sight!

Anyway, I managed to match the last sock with about 10 minutes left of NCIS to go.    There were more socks than I'd hoped in the unmatched pile, but I should have expected it.  The last time I matched up the socks, I threw away all the unmatched ones.  My family doesn't lack for socks.  I decided to do the same here, but for two socks that I knew had been missed this round of laundry.

Begone, unmatched socks, out of my sight!

The only thing left for me to do was put away all the nice, clean, matched socks into everyone's drawers.

No one better complain, "I can't find any socks!"

So all in all, I've had a pretty successful morning.  Along with the sock matching, I did bathroom cleaning, a load of laundry and healthy eating.  I certainly can't complain about that!

So what's on the schedule for tomorrow's challenge?

Write About What Makes You Strong

See you back here tomorrow!

Today was a kick butt kind of day

As I mentioned in my Daily Challenge Post today, I spent 5 1/2 hours cleaning my room.  Honestly, when it come to house cleaning, my bedroom and/or the boys' room usually lands squarely at the bottom of my priority list.  Instead, I focus on the areas of the house that more people will see - the living room, dining room, kitchen and downstairs bathroom.  And with my ankle still healing, my bedroom just got worse and worse.  When I wrote up my soft schedule for the week, I put cleaning the bedroom as today, and set aside an hour for it.  I'd also expected that Rich could help me out with it.

Originally, my plan was to get the floor cleaned up, bring the glasses that had migrated upstairs back downstairs and maybe vacuum.  Instead, I cleaned everything while watching Numb3rs.  I started on my side of the bed, the narrow little walk-way that seems to become a home for dirty clothes, books and anything else that I drop to my side of the bed.  I got on the floor and cleaned as far under my side of the bed as I could.  I tackled something I'd asked Rich to work on the last time we did a big bedroom clean - the top of his dresser.  I took loose books off the bookshelf at the end of my bed, along with our nightly meds and all the computer software we had there and did reorganizing.  I went to Rich's side of the bed and cleared the floor near it, also going under his side of the bed.  I cleaned off the headboard.  I cleaned off my dresser.  I went through boxes and bins.  I put things away in the newly cleaned out hall closet.  I cleaned off the second bookshelf.  I made myself a bedside table out of three crates that had previously been filled with books and things.  I, not to put too fine a point on it, kicked ass.

When I finished, I ended up with two bags of trash, one huge box of recycling, one bag of recycling, one bag of clothes for Goodwill, three hampers full of laundry (keep in mind that I also stripped the bed and Rich and I remade it with the bed-in-a-bag set he got me for Christmas), along with 4 boxes and 2 bags of things that belonged downstairs and will be put away when I work on the dining room next (since that's where most of them belong).

I'm feeling really good about myself.  I'm feeling good about what I'm doing and where I'm going with things. Yeah, I ache.  I couldn't expect less with everything I got done today.  But It's that sense of accomplishment that I haven't gotten for a long, long time.  My house is getting to where I want it to be and how I want it to look.  Which means that I, also, am getting there as well.  And it just fills me up with so much joy.  Strange, huh?

I'm going to be taking some pics when I go up to bed for the night.  Not only will I use them for my motivational poster, but I'll also post them here because I'm really proud of what I got done.

Pour Your Heart Out - It's Not All Bad

This year has been filled with a lot of negativity here - the problems with the van on our trip north, Rich not get assigned classes and money being tight, the engine blowing this November, the sprain in my foot just in time for the holidays.  Since so many of these things have happened in the second half of the year, it's been hard for me to remember that the year hasn't been all bad.  But really, it hasn't.  And I'm not just talking about the usual good things of having a roof over our heads, food on our table and being together.  There's been so much more.

It's been a year and a half now of Rich being cancer free.  I still remember the fear last year when we found out that he had colon cancer.  The worries as he went through surgery.  Would they get it all?  Would it reappear somewhere else?  How badly will the surgery effect him for the future?  And yes, some of those worries are still there.  We both know that there's a possibility of the cancer returning in the future.  And there have been some changes that we've had to make since his surgery.  But the important thing is that for 18 months, cancer has been out of his body.  And that's enough reason for anyone to celebrate.

This summer, we were able to take the first long vacation as a family since both boys were born.  Yes, there were problems with the van.  But the time we spent with family and friends was priceless.  We'll always have the memories of the week at the beach with Rich's family, watching the cousins play together and getting a chance to chat with other family members.  I'll always be able to rewind the video in my mind of my boys playing miniature golf with their Pop.  I still feel the hugs and love from stopping to see my heart-family, Dave and Barb.  I will always remember the peace of visiting with my mother and sister and watching my boys play with my sister's kids while remembering the fun I had with my own cousins as a child.  It was a summer that I won't forget.

This year, we were able to leave diapers behind.  It was sometimes difficult, trying to get Pete to use the potty, especially in the beginning.  He just preferred pull-ups.  But sometime after PDO was over, something clicked with him and it was all potty, all the time.  Of course he still has occasional accidents.  He's four.  But 99% of the time, he is dry.  Of course, 99% of the time, he also doesn't want to wear clothes, which makes the problem moot.  But he's making steps in the right direction.

In May, I was able to watch my son say good-bye to Kindergarten, then watch him say hello to First Grade in August.  I watched him receive an award for his reading at the end of the school year, and watched him surprise his first grade teacher with how well he could read.  I watched him deal with a bully in kindergarten and not let it break him, and I watched him gain a lot of good friends in first grade.  Every day, he impresses me, his dad and his teacher with his brains.  And just as often, he impresses us with his heart.  I've watched him become a great six year old and that's something else that I could never replace in my mind.

And Pete... along with his success at potty training, I've gotten to watch him become the little clown that he is.  His sense of humor is something that I swear I'm going to get on video one of these days.  He is growing so quickly, showing how smart he is and how different from his brother he is.  He's still small enough that he can snuggle with me on the couch (especially right now when I can't do much more than snuggle on the couch) and that fills my heart with joy.  He's my little scientist, my super hero with his enemy invisible man and my imaginative child.  He's part of what's made the year great.

One of the best things of the year was watching my dad regain himself.  For so long, he'd been in pain. There was so little that he could do - physically and mentally.  But he was able to let go of baggage, have his back repaired and lose a lot of weight.  And now he's doing so much.  He's even dating again, and I couldn't be happier for him.  My relationship with my dad has always been strong, and I'm still a Daddy's girl.  (I doubt that's something that will ever change.)  But I feel even closer to my dad now, somehow.  I've been able to spend more time with him, able to see him more (both at my house and at his) and I'm continuing to make memories with him just as much as I'm making memories with my own children.  The best is that I'm able to let him continue to make memories with his own grandsons.  I can't regret that.

I've made a lot of positive changes in my life as well.  I'm continuing to lose weight.  Slowly, yes.  But I've lost over 35 pounds since I was at my heaviest a few years ago.  And I'm noticing the difference not only in my clothes but in my ability to do things.  I don't hurt as much as I used to.  I don't feel as tired as often.  And I'm heading in the right direction.  I'm also starting to figure out how to keep on top of the things that I need to do around the house.  For awhile, my house was a disaster.  There was a time when we were being threatened with non-renewal of our apartment because of the state it was in.  But now I'm able to keep things clean and I'm even working through my clutter.  This moment in time, when I can't do as much as I was because of the sprain, is a momentary set-back.  I've internalized what I need to know to get back on track.  And that's what is important.

So I may often say that 2012 sucked.  It's been a year when one thing after another has gone wrong.  But I can also remember the things that have gone right, the things that, when I remember them, will fill me with a sense of pride and love, that will make me smile when I remember them.  Like every other year, 2012 has had it's good and it's bad.  But I want to try to remember the good as I step from 2012 into 2013.