Friday, May 29, 2015

What, What??

The weirdest synchronicity just happened.

The kids both fell asleep at the same time. At 4pm.

I have a babysitter scheduled for 4:30 to watch them while I do a massage at the house. So at 4 I kinda freaked out. What do I do now? My mind started spinning. Quick! Pay bills! No! Fix your hair! Laundry! Sleep (can't do that, too little time)! Drink wine (that one was autopilot)! Check Facebook!

So I have 10 minutes now. And my brain exploded so hard that I figured I would catch the moment here. The babysitter is here. The boys are asleep. I have nothing to do for 10 minutes. It's.... like the universe is about to implode with quiet.

8 minutes now......

Tuesday, May 26, 2015

Product Review

Because it's 9:30pm and BOTH BOYS ARE ASLEEP IN BEDS. Yes. We did the sleep training stuff with the baby over the long weekend and lots of prayers and whatever other magic happened and he got with the program within 20 minutes the first night. Since then it's been amazing. He cries for not even 5 minutes and is out for up to SIX HOURS. Yes. He slept for SIX HOURS the other night.

Anyway, for Mother's Day my mom gave me a Fitbit One. She asked me to research Fitbits for her, and when I compared and contrasted them online we came up with the two most useable ones. She kept one, and gave me the other one. I waited an entire month to write this just to make sure I loved it as much as I thought I did.

And I do. I love that I can see my steps during the day. I love that I can stuff it in a pocket while I'm doing massage (although it doesn't count massaging as "stepping" so that's a bummer). I TOTALLY love the app that I'm addicted to where I input all my foods and water for the day and it automatically tracks my calories in vs calories out. I've never been good at counting calories. And maybe I'm still not great at it. But it's been amazing for me to see what foods I eat a ton of for almost no calories (air-popped popcorn anyone??) and what foods I indulge in that cost me an entire day of walking (french fries are the DEVIL). I'm a numbers person, so I'm totally motivated by thinking about the calorie deficit I need to maintain in order to lose weight.

So far I've lost 6lbs this month.

The saddest part is realizing that the old saying of "weight is lost in the kitchen" is completely true. I once ate french fries for lunch and figured I would just walk them off later. Nope. 3 miles later I wasn't back to baseline. Food is SO much easier consumed than burned.

I'm still not running, so getting the 5 miles (about 10,000 steps) a day is really hard. Luckily, when I sit on the exercise ball to soothe the baby it thinks I'm walking, so I can get a few extra steps in that way. I don't feel like it's cheating since bouncing takes a lot of coordination and core strength.

Wow. A coherent blog post. See what happens with sleep and a quiet house??? I may run for president next.

Sunday, May 17, 2015

Breathe

Maybe it's because I now have two boys, but everything lately is centered around the bathroom.

This morning I was volunteering at a marathon and had to stop at the starting line to pick up a bunch of stuff. I was hoping to be quick enough to miss the start of the race, but I was about 45 seconds too late. As I was trying to turn my car onto the course, the first runner crossed in front of me and I knew I was about to watch the world's most boring parade.

So I backed out of the car line and parked it. I started walking back to the start line to hit the porta-poties since there would be no line. I thought to text the people I was meeting that I was stopping at the bathroom, or Stephan, or.... no. No one needs to know where I'm going.

As I sat in that porta-potty, I realized that no one but God knew where I was. It might be the first time in months that I wasn't trackable. And it was weird. And awesome. "No one knows where I am right now!!!" was a thought that kept circling my brain. It was so cool.

Honestly, it was hard to leave the john. Except for the terrible smell and being inches away from other peoples' poop.... I would have stayed in there for a really long time. I'm going to hold onto that memory for at least a few weeks.


Then later, Stephan saw me get completely frustrated with the boys (it was 10pm and they were both awake). He shoved me into the shower ("but I already took a shower today!"), and handed me a glass of iced gin and cherry juice. I started to just scrub the day off, but then stopped. The soap I use is hand made from natural ingredients. I held my hands over my face and just inhaled the smell of the actual lavender buds in the almond scrub.

It hit me... I paid WAY too much for this stuff to shower quickly. I took a lot of time to pick the products for their ingredients and scent... why not make sure I use up every smell I paid for? So I opened each bottle and pretty much just huffed my entire bathing routine. I love smells. And, of course, I stepped out a whole new person.

Really, the bathroom is the center of my home.

Friday, May 15, 2015

A Letter

Dear Neighbor-who-is-selling-drugs-150'-from-my-front-door,

Last weekend you were visited by a few police officers late at night. That must have been scary for you. It must have really shaken up your routine, because I've been noticing a few things since then...

1. Your new friends drive very fancy, very LOUD and fancy sports cars. This makes them very easy to hear when they're a few blocks away. It's made preemptively calling the police much easier for me. Thanks for that.

2. Your system of turning the porch-light on to signal that your store is open is particularly annoying because that light happens to shine into my bedroom window. While it's also contributing to the ease of phoning the police, the glare is getting annoying.

3. The friends who walk up and down the block at very regular times still look pretty relaxed. My husband has gotten a few great pictures of them, since they walk so slowly and seem to almost pose for the photos.

4. Lastly, that blonde who jumped out of her car to buy drugs from you totally blew the stop sign at the end of the street. Your clients should be more careful. Reckless driving could be a cause for the police to stop and search their cars. Just a tip.


It is really annoying that law enforcement hasn't been able to stop this yet. But for someone with laser-like attention to detail, I couldn't have asked for a better hobby.

Tuesday, May 12, 2015

New Rule

Read books, not magazines.

I have a confession. Don't tell my husband. The "stomach problems" I had last weekend were mainly my desire to finish reading a very good book I had started last week. It's the first book I've finished in months. Maybe since the baby was born. I found myself drinking a ton of water, just to read a few more pages. The few minutes every few hours or so were like stealing time. It was kinda nice.

So my new rule is: Read books, not magazines when I'm in the bathroom. Books are better for you anyway... right?

Friday, May 8, 2015

About Showering

I came up with this title last week. It seemed funny at first, but now I'm realizing it's a symptom of something more serious.

I thought it was funny that I've stopped showering regularly. I usually end up being shoved in there by my husband who declares "enough is enough" every 3-4 days.

That's not me. That's not me at all. When I was challenged with depression in college, one of my coping strategies was to take showers to clear my head. For a while I was showering three times a day. It's my happy place. I love the shower. Being clean.... smelling nice..... something about the water....

And to realize I've let that completely slip away should have been a sign that things weren't going well. Because they really haven't been. Forgetting to pay electric and gas bills is one thing. Forgetting to put on the calendar (and then totally missing) my best friend's baby shower is another. And breaking down in tears as Stephan physically puts me in a car to drive to a friend's birthday party (which I spent in the car in a parking lot down the street because I didn't want to talk to humans) was the last straw.

Something needs to change and we're working on it.

In the meantime, The Blogess has posted some very beautiful things about life. I highly recommend checking out her work.

Friday, May 1, 2015

Simple Things

Someone posted to Facebook about her husband tossing a sandwich out the car window at her while she was on a long run. And I can't think of the word "toss" without picturing this:

And then this:


And then remembering one fantastic therapy session where I talked about running the Tough Mudder and figured that big people could just toss littler people over the walls. Which was a very fun distraction from whatever personal misery and self-pity I was experiencing that day.

Just don't tell the elf.