I AM BACK!!!!

It has been a long time.  I got busy.  I got lazy.  Then I got inspired.  For a while, almost three years ago I had problems with my gallbladder and I had to get it out.  Once that happened, I had to change my diet and I started exercising.

I lost 30 pounds.  I lost the 30 pounds I had been carrying around since the birth of my second child in 2004.  Well, I probably carried 15 from the first daughter and 15 from the second, but you know what I mean.  But the weight came off and suddenly I was myself again, the old me, the before I had kids me was returning.

I kept the weight off for about a year and half and then I stopped exercising as much.  Then I got lazy, but I kept up my good eating habits.

I know I have gained a little back, maybe 10 pounds?  I have decided a couple of things.  First, I am not getting on a scale.  I became a bit obsessed with it when I was losing before and I knew if I got on now I would get depressed, so I stopped scales all together.

I am exercising again and enjoying it.  But I have to be accountable to people and to myself.  So, I have decided to run a half marathon.  OMG.

I will use this blog to track my progress, so it might be boring, but it will keep me in check.  The marathon is in November in Savannah, GA.

Be there or be square

Leigh

Clean your kids!

To shower or not to shower.

This is not a normal question, is it?  In my house it is the million dollar question.  I have children, well, really one child in particular, who does not like to bathe.  She never has.  Not as a baby, not as a toddler, not ever.  Okay, I will give her the toddler years because she enjoyed a long bath where she could trap me in the bathroom with her, but I could not ever let water go on her head without the scream heard round the world.

This kid is 10 years old now.  She will spend 25 minutes getting her hair "perfect" before a soccer game.  Seriously, perfect in a way I could not manage.  We are talking not one single bump to be seen perfect.  She analyzes her face, hair, arms, legs regularly.  She monitors the amount of hair on her legs and reports it to me more often than I can recount.  She is the most amazing sweet loving kind girl I have ever met, but she hates to bathe.

We get about one shower a week from her.  Could I make her shower daily?  Oh, of course I could.  I am not that Mom that lets the kid run the house.  My kids have told me I am one of the strictest Moms compared to their friends.  But, seriously, there are some things I can no longer battle with on a daily basis!  There are times when you just have to say she has to get this figured out herself.  Showering became that thing.

I used all of my Mommy brain on trying to get her to want to shower.  I gave her threats, I told her that her friends showered every day, I did it all.  She did not care.  And, I could no longer fight the fight.

So, I have the perfectly groomed girl who doesn't want to shower.  I am counting on the fact that peer pressure will win (just in this circumstance, I certainly do not want to be on an episode of 16 and pregnant).  She showers like a champ at her friends houses, at her grandmother's house and any other house but ours.

You have to think that middle school will make her shower more, right?  One day she might even shower before school???  One more year, and we hit middle school, here is to showering more frequently!

To raise yourself

Ever since my youngest daughter, Maggie, was a tiny baby people have said "you all look so much alike". She didn't have the red hair I was born with, but every other part of her face looked like mine. It was interesting to see yourself so clearly in another human, as my other daughter, Tyler, really looked (and still does) much more like her Dad. As it turns out, Tyler looks a lot like her Dad and has many (okay, almost all ) of his personality traits. He gets her. He understands why she may or may not do things. Then we have Maggie, who it turns out not only looks just like me, but acts just like me. Our personalities are very very similar. How wonderful right? My husband and I have our own little mini me running around. Well, the me I am today is a far cry from the me I was at 8.

I began to wonder if my parents simply ignored me and let my older sisters deal with me? Maggie, God love her, is a wonderful child. But the things about her that are like me can drive me completely insane. She will SCREAM when she does not get her way. I mean the girl can scream. She will continue to cry and scream for a long time. I will say to her, Maggie, this has never worked for you, right? I never give in when you scream, in fact when you scream it makes me dig my heels in more and NOT give you your way. But guess what? I am then behaving just like her! I am stubborn, I want to do things my way, I think that only I can do things correctly. I am old enough now that I can cover those things up, that I can give in without really giving in. But in reality, some days I want to scream.

It is exhausting always having to prove my point to her, to convince her that my way is the best way. In her mind, her way is the best way and she does not like to back down. So when I was so thrilled to have a little mini me, I forgot to understand what that really means. She is willful, strong, determined and completely content with herself, not feeling that she needs to change. Fantastic qualities when you can manage them as an adult.....................

I can only hope to get through the next 10 years unscathed. Luckily, she is also very good at making me laugh!

How far to push our kids???

I have two girls, Tyler is 9 nipping on 10 and Maggie will be 8 in 2 weeks. Anyhow they play soccer, in a relatively competitive soccer league. During soccer season my life looks a little like this: Skills training (Maggie) Monday, Tuesday/Thursday Soccer practice for Tyler, Friday Soccer practice for Maggie and then games on Saturday and Sunday. Gah! Let's say again, my girls are YOUNG. But guess what? This is typical for *most* of my friends.

I feel very very lucky because my husband has been able to coach both of the girls, and he still coaches our youngest daughter. Tyler is now on a team where she has a fantastic coach, and she loves loves loves it. That being said, I spend A LOT of time on the sidelines, cheering, reminding myself that these girls are young, and trying to just have fun. About two years ago, I realized that I was getting too invested in my girls success on the field. I was getting frustrated when my 8 year old was not "pressuring the ball enough", or being aggressive enough. I had a little heart to heart with myself and said, hello, these are your wonderful children and they should just have fun! In order to keep and maintain my calm I picked up my camera and starting shooting the game, basically watching it through my camera lens.

Yet, I still find myself in this soccer "family". I have realized that people are SUPER serious about it. They strategize about what path their 10 year old children will follow in order to be as successful as possible. There are politics involved in this sport. Serious maneuvering. It makes me sad. I have friends who will ditch me in a minute if someone more "important" in the soccer community walks up. And I have realized that people can talk soccer all.day.long, and I have realized that is NOT me. But, am I going to make my daughter's fail? I would hope not.

There is such guilt involved in not doing every.single.thing you can for your child yet, I also have this other feeling of seriously wanting them to succeed on their own! My parents (and I think most parents in that era) took more of a if you want to do X go ahead, but I do not remember ever having discussions with them about how I played, what I could have done better, what I did well, etc. There is just such pressure for your kid to be the best, for your kid to be happy, for your kid to be a star at age 10, and I just wonder to too much is too much?

For me, watching the game through my camera lens has helped me to see it for what it is, a game. Yes, I want my children to feel good about how they played, but the bottom line is this, will they get a college scholarship from it? Will they love the game in 2 years? Will they forever treasure their weekends being filled up with soccer? Bah. I don't know, but I am trying my best to just cheer them on, and congratulate them on a job well done!

Whew it has been soooo long

Now it is 2012, and I will become a blogger again. I vow to blog, I do love to blog, so here goes.

The power of the mighty muffin.

So, my girls are tracked out. They are in year round school, so they have 9 weeks in school and 3 weeks out of school. But, during December the school closes for 2 weeks (Christmas and New Years) then when everyone else goes back, my sweet ladies start their 3 week break. What does this mean? It means that for 2 weeks my kids get along great, they love each other, they have Christmas to look forward to, the elf on the shelf (named Sugarplum) is still reporting to Santa, etc so they are NICE to each other.

Then track out begins and somehow they turn into sister haters about 90 percent of the time. They can play nicely together for about 22 minutes out of every hour. I tell them to separate, but they must be together and I haven't figured out why, maybe to torture each other? Last night in the car they were listening to possibly the worst song in the world, I whip my hair back and forth, and they were singing it loudly. For those of you NOT familiar with this song, just sing the title about 300 times, add maybe 10 other words, and you have the entire song. They knew how much I loathe this song (as well as my ice ice baby loving husband) so they sang it, in unison, louder than necessary. As my husband's head was about to explode I looked lovingly at him and said "oh look they are bonding together for the purpose of irritating us, it is so sweet!".

Another issue with track out is the grocery store. Let's call it like it is, I hate the grocery store on a good day, on a day when I have a list, a menu, and I am alone in my food thoughts so I can sit, stare and compare prices. So, going to the grocery store with my 88 percent fighting girls is VERY unappealing. Instead of going to the store, I convinced myself that I am trying to save money and use the stuff we already have in the pantry. In reality, I really do throw too much food away, and I am tired of just being uninspired with food. So, I decided not to go to the store until we were desperate. For me that means out of almond milk, and tea and for my husband that means out of beer. For the girls being out of YoNanas is a crisis (if you are not familiar with them, they are half of a banana dipped in dark chocolate). So I have been working on the pantry......

Muffin time. I have been making muffins, I have gone muffin crazy. It all started when my sweet 9 year old (Tyler) asked one of her besties if "her Mom made breakfast for her every morning", and her friend replied, Yes, of course she does. Uh-oh. I had not been making breakfast for my girls during track out, they have been getting their own. You know, cereal, a bagel, or cereal and then there is cereal. I just kind of thought that I needed a break! Anyhow, the Mama guilt seeped through my pours while I was sleeping and I decided to clean out the pantry, save money and give my oh so neglected daughters breakfast.

So far I have made chocolate chip, french toast and peanut butter with nutella. The chocolate were very good but kind of like eating a cookie for breakfast. The french toast were seriously not great, but the kids liked them. The peanut butter with nutella were simply fabulous! And, my youngest daughter, Maggie, got to help me make them, but we will leave that for another blog. For now, I will keep working on the pantry........

A christmas eve to remember

As far as Christmas eve's go, this one was filled with the same people who are always with us....my family, my sister and her family, my other sister and her family and my mom. This year I was lucky enough to be the host for the dinner and dessert portion of our evening. Everyone also seemed to hang out at our house all day - and by everyone I mean a 6 year old, 5 year old, 4 year old, 3 year old and 6 month old - plus all of the adults that are attached to these children. For me, that meant a lot of chaos and a lot of kids fighting.

The fighting and crying, I think that it was put our chi out of balance. I had a great dinner planned, at least for me a great dinner (because I don't really cook). So, the plan was whole chickens on the grill (the kind with the beer can, ya know). Then some au-gratin potatoes, salad, asparagus salad thing, rolls, and dessert.

I thought I was ahead of the game as I actually went to the grocery store BEFORE christmas eve (as my friend Kathy can attest to, and I was so happy to see her while I was there with my list, in torn jeans, no make up and greasy hair......I was not so happy to see all of the other people in her family that were there along with her, but that is the price one must pay for going out without showering first). Anyhow, I was prepared.

Well, the chickens were still frozen on christmas eve. No biggie, the hubby was doing them on the grill, he had made an entire turkey on that thing just a month before, the grill could certainly handle two little chickens.

I was making a new recipe for the potatoes. You see, generally you should make the recipe first, eat it, then tweak it for guests. I read reviews on it before I made it....I thought that was enough. I cooked the potatoes before I put them in the pan. I made the augratin sauce twice because I did not have enough the first time. Then, I had it all done, and added the bread crumbs with some smoked papricka.

The asparagus was also a new recipe. It was grilled asparagus with garlic, salt, pepper, sun dried tomatoes and oil. Very simple to make, not too many ingredients.

My sister (the cook) made a brie wrapped in a puff pastry with brown sugar and toasted almonds. With the left over puff pastry she made these little mini muffin sized puffed pastries with peanut butter, marshmellow, and chocolate chips.

It sounds very very good doesn't it?

The chicken was still frozen after being on the grill for over an hour, but only frozen in parts, other parts were fully cooked - we ended up eating left over ham from the night before

The augratin potatoes were a bit crunchy despite being precooked and in the oven for well over an hour, plus the smoked papricka was a bit much and the cheese sauce was too thick

The asparagus was good, but I didn't pay attention while mixing it up and I added waaaayyy too much pepper so they had a garlic and pepper KICK

The dessert puff pastries were undercooked and are still sitting on my counter

Next year, we are going to someone else's house for dinner!

Why I volunteer

Earlier this week I had a lunch with my sister (who I always tell people is MUCH nicer than I, at least when it comes to our husbands), her family, my Mom, my kids and my sister's in laws. I was talking to my sister, Mom, and the in laws and relaying a conversation to them that I had recently had with my hubby. The hubby conversation with something like this:

him: why are you always so irritated? It seems like you are mad all of the time.
me: Well, have you EVER had a job where you fail every day?
him: what are you talking about?
me: (please note I do not think I am a bad mom necessarily, just in moments throughout the day) Well, as this stay at home mom I am suppose to cook a meal every night, help my children develop into fine human beings (without yelling at them on a regular basis), do laundry, clean the house, and be happy about it. I fail at AT LEAST one of those (usually all) on a daily basis.

So, I relayed that conversation to this group. I was not looking for sympathy, I was just saying holy crap, this stay at home parenting thing can be a challenge. So, my Mom completely had my back and totally agreed with me on how I felt. She said, that is why I worked the whole time you kids were growing up, I needed those kudos from the outside world. My sister, didn't want to make waves with anyone, so she stood silently (although in a private moment, she would totally agree with me). The mother in law looked at me like she had NO idea what the hell I was talking about. The father in law said "think about it this way, what you are doing is for your family. I had to work for 45 years, and I kept thinking, this is for my family". Of course, being the complete smart ass that I am, I said, "yes, but at work you got promotions, you had people telling you on a regular basis that you were doing a good job, and as much as you worked you gained self confidence and self worth from it".

That is when the silent stares began.

But it made me think. I do know I am a good Mom. I know that my kids are good kids. But, I also know why I volunteer during their activities and at school. It is just about the only time I consistently hear thank you! Everyone is so much more impressed with me there than at home! They are so appreciative that I come in and cut paper, or laminate, or shelve books (if you really want to feel appreciated volunteer for Mrs. Hershberger in the library, I walk out of there feeling like I have cured cancer) the smallest things I do are appreciated. I leave there feeling like I have done something good, productive and that people are grateful for my help.

I come home, full of the shine from the volunteering, and I walk into a messy kitchen, loads of laundry, and while I am trying to piece together some kind of semblance of dinner - let's say sandwiches and cut up apples, I am encouraging my child to "do her homework" (which is INSANE for a first grader, but I digress), while creating homework for the 4 year old (because after all she is a big girl). I tell my best joke only to get stares back from my children, and I let my mind wander back to bliss of the silent zone in the halls of the schools where everyone is giving me a thumbs up just for walking into the place!