Frazzled Schmazzled

I always, always say I am going to simplify for Christmas, but I NEVER seem to pull it off. I am NOT organized, and seem to live spontaneously and chaotically. This usually does not make for a relaxed Christmas season for sure.

But this year, I am determined, will be different. And shockingly, so far so good. (Yes. I know it's only December 3. Just shhhhhh.)

1. First and foremost, our Christmas elf isn't here. And guess what? No one has really mentioned him much.  I did, at one point, ask my youngest if he wanted the elf to come. He said, "Kinda." So that, to me, translates into, "He can wait a week or two before Christmas to eventually come." So many people are sick of this tedious elf tradition, but remember, YOU are the boss of your elves!!! They can come if and when you want them to! Or, like an episode of Lost, you can even kill them off...KIDDING!

2. I have a group of dear friends that I love so, so much. And truly, I would LOVE to pick each one of them out a gift that she loves. But, as the woman on YouTube says, "Ain't nobody got time for that!" Therefore, this season I am hosting a very small gathering where we will each bring ONE gift which we will swap during a spirited game of Dirty Santa. And if everyone just wants to just sit and talk and eat chocolate and take home their own gift, I'm good with that too. So...be sure you bring something you like for your own self ladies!!!!

3. This year, I am not room mom for both of my boys. In fact, I am only room mom for one and not even the only room mom. Last year I tried to do it for both children. It was all fine and dandy throughout the school year until Christmas, and then I was so overwhelmed I wanted to curl up and suck my thumb in my closet. This year when the school signup lists were out, for once, I listened to myself.

4. I'm trying to stay off Pinterest. One year I became all crafty during the holidays, which would have been fine if I hadn't been routinely getting my craft on at 1 and 2 am. This year I am limiting my Christmas browsing. In fact, I may only look for yummy recipes. But they will be SIMPLE. If it even involves separating an egg, I'm moving along...

5. Just like the past two years, we will have our "Christmas Dinner" on Christmas Eve. Christmas day is for staying in pajamas, playing with new toys, soaking in the magic of the day, snacking and napping, and family... NOT sweating it out in the kitchen. The only stress I want to endure on Christmas day is possibly screaming at a new tablet and trying to figure out why I am so inherently stupid with all things technological.

6. All pre-Christmas gatherings will be potluck. Because...why not?

What I am ATTEMPTING to do this Christmas season is to slow it down, relax, and spend more quality time with the family. Every night in December I am going to try to have the whole family spend special time together. It's not going to be special time making impressive crafts off Pinterest. I'm not printing out special Polar Express tickets which summon my children to the car in their jammies for hot chocolate and a special ride around the town looking at Christmas lights. We may look at lights, but I'm not making special tickets, and hot chocolate in my car would be a tongue-burning disaster. We may not construct a jaw-dropping Christmas card with pressed shirts (people iron?), twinkling eyes, and impeccable smiles, but we might all pile up in messy pillows in front of the fire and read.

So far, our special time has been coming together at the kitchen table and playing a heated game of Farkle. No cute crafts were made, there were no magic cooking moments together worthy of a tear-jerking Publix commercial. Just a heated, risk- taking dice game complete with one child finding delight in anything sounding like it alludes to passing gas as he repeatedly reminded us "It's not polite to Farkle at the table."

And that is just fine. Because Christmas doesn't have to be about excessive baking and shopping and busyness.

It's about baby Jesus, and giving, and family. Plain and simple.

It doesn't have to involve complicated meals, carefully planned Norman Rockwell moments, or staged perfection.

This Christmas I hope we have a messy, fun, real Christmas.

And it might just be our best one ever.

Extreme Input

Do you ever wish that at least for a while you could be oblivious? Ignorant to every disturbing detail of every wrong thing going on in the world?

Don't misunderstand. It's important to stay informed. Important to know about issues in our world and injustices so that we can do our part to make them right. We should be doing our part to make things right. And I am talking to myself here. I have got to start getting involved in real issues. I'm involved, but only in the fluff. I need to get involved in the trenches.

But do you ever feel like you need a little time, a break from knowing? A break from knowing exactly what is in every fast food burger you are eating? That maybe you don't need to know that your chance of a horrible disease is increased because of this or that every single day? That suddenly hearing about all the horrible ways that people are torturing each other, bullying each other, scamming each other, abusing each other, is not something you feel like you can handle while you are still in your pajamas working on your first caffeine jolt for the day?

The missing children, riots, abuse, cruelty, addiction, kidnappings, injustices, pain, political rhetoric, on and on and on.

Sometimes do you wish that you could simply be ignorant? Oblivious? Just for a while?

Never before has a generation been so "informed." We have more input than any other generation before us.

Are our psyches able to handle all of this misery and turmoil streaming into our brains constantly at a rapid pace? I'm not sure we were made to have constant input. Constant connection to everything.

Look at depression rates. Suicide. Psychiatric medication rates.

Is it possible that information overload, social media, knowledge overload is slowly killing us? And not only are we tolerating it, we are inviting it to kill us.

But what's the answer? We can't, and SHOULDN'T turn our back on injustices going on.

But what is it they always say about "doing something to make it better." That is the cure.

And maybe therein lies the problem. We aren't fighting back because we are frozen. Frozen by the input. Frozen because it never stops. There never seems to be a break where we can pause, pull up our boot straps, develop a plan, make a difference in the world.

Because as soon as we begin to soak in and process one emergency, yet another one is thrown at us, and another, and another.

We are never allowed to become truly passionate about one thing, because the second we begin to feel that itch to DO SOMETHING we are given another crisis, another itch, until we are so overloaded that we just sit there in a foggy haze trying to process one crisis after another, without ever actually taking action. Action that would make a difference and fill us up with purpose.

We just sit there in a fog until we finally feel overwhelmed so we shut it down, walk away, and block it out.

We hardly have time to "feel" one thing, before another thing is thrown at us.

No wonder so many of us are embracing the concept of minimalism. Less is more. Cutting back. Uncluttering. Because our minds and souls are cluttered.

We lack direction and focus because we are overwhelmed.

I honestly don't know what the answer is. But I do know that something has got to give. Something has to give so that we can enjoy, truly enjoy this life before us. Something needs to happen so that we don't feel overwhelmed and frozen, but fired up, hopeful, ready to change the world and make a difference in some way.

I'm not sure what the answer is. It can't be to turn off the TV, because we need to know things. It can't be to stop reading, because haven't we always known that knowledge is power?

Lately things seem even more overwhelming. The Ebola scare, Enterovirus 68, ISIS, on and on and on.

Extreme input is certainly making us more informed than we have ever been before, but it certainly doesn't seem to be doing much for our mental health.

I truly believe the stress placed on
parents today is unsurpassed. It's a technologically savvy, information rich, brave new world that we have been thrown into, but none of us ever got the instruction manual.

We are the lab rats. We are the test dummies.

If you are like me, you don't normally sit around and fret over one thing. I don't sit on my couch and stew over Ebola. It's more of a slow burn. You slowly but surely become overloaded until you find yourself in a funk. If someone asks why you are blah, you can't really even pinpoint it. You may not consciously even know.

I truly think that all the negativity on the news, all the evil in the world, the corruption, social media, etc. I think it's truly affecting us in more negative ways than we can even imagine.

What do you think the answers are?

Ain't Nobody Got Time For That

I have a friend, who when asked to do something she is not interested in, simply says, "Thanks, but I don't think that really sounds like something I would be interested in."

At first, that phrase seemed totally foreign to me. Crazy foreign. I couldn't imagine looking at someone, or even texting for that matter, something like that. Wouldn't the person be offended? Upset even?

I have always been the type of person to worry about hurting someone else's feelings. Overboard even, to the point that I over analyze things I have said hoping they weren't possibly taken the wrong way. Sometimes it's exhausting, but I can't stand thinking I have ever accidentally offended someone.

Luckily, as I have gotten older, I have realized that saying no to someTHING is not saying no to someONE.

I remember once being asked to go to a concert. I really didn't want to go. It was expensive and wasn't really a group I cared that much about. But I didn't really know how to get out of it without a valid excuse. I was certainly free that night. It was with friends, and I was happy to be included. I had no other plans. So I went. What was I going to say? That I appreciate being asked but I wasn't really interested in seeing that concert?

Ummmm...yes!

I totally could have. And should have. But I didn't. I forked over the money, and sat there thinking the sound would have been just as good if I watched them in concert on a big screen with surround sound, and could have perhaps used the money to get a new outfit that I could enjoy for much longer than the two hours the concert lasted.

But, at the time, I hadn't learned or matured enough to realize these words that I just heard the other day uttered by Lysa Terkeurst of Proverbs 31 Ministries.

She says,
" Do not confuse the demand to love with the disease to please."

I admit that many times my "spread too thin" times are totally of my own making. My own ego.

"Oh my goodness, they asked me to (insert task). I should really be honored they asked me. Honored they thought of me to do this! I have to say yes!"

Many times the things we are honored to accept in a moment of flattery, are the things that later give us much stress and turmoil as we snap at our husbands, "Why on EARTH did I ever agree to do this?!?!?"

Another thing I have had to learn is the power to think things through and not get caught up in the moment. One year, the same year I decided to start substitute teaching, I also volunteered (yes, happily volunteered) to be room mom for both of my boys.

It was all fine and dandy until the Christmas parties rolled around, and I worked myself into a Pinterest and crafting stupor.

See, here is what I've learned. Sometimes I say yes to things if I'm able to squeeze them in. But what I need to stop and think is...yes, I can fit that in. But if I do, will we have enough time to relax? Will there still be time to fit in a family movie night? Will there be enough time to just be?

Just because I CAN fit something in, does not mean I should.

We have been lied to all these years. We CANNOT have it all. It is NOT possible. You cannot have a breakneck career, and be a stay-at-home mom, and spend enough quality time with your kids and husband, and workout an hour a day, and cook elaborate meals, and spend time with friends, and go on enough dates with your husband, and have a clean house, and have a hobby, and volunteer, and spend enough time reading and sleeping and vacationing, etc. It just isn't humanly possible. There are not enough hours in a day to do everything "they" say we are supposed to do.

We have to choose which things are the most important and let the other things go.

I guess we can have it all, just not at the SAME time.

I have decided this new school year to set realistic ideals. I'm trying to figure out what's most important, make those things a priority, and learn how to say "no thank you" for now to the rest.

It's not easy to do, but a must for my sanity. When, and more importantly WHY, did we start glorifying busy?

We only get one life. Why would we want to play it at warp speed?

My goal is to learn to respectfully say no to little things that take away from the bigger things.

I guess the old phrase "can't see the forest for the trees" might apply here.

I will try to learn to say "no thank you" more, so I can just "be" more.

Those 1950s people who used to say, "I can't, I have to wash my hair," may have actually been brilliant.

Nobody Puts Baby in the Corner

This weekend a group of couples went out to celebrate a friend's 40th birthday.

The night began with one of those places that serves endless meat. Let this sink in . Endless. Meat.

Vegetarians? No point in even darkening their door. If you aren't a carnivore, you should just cleverly move along in your search for kale.

Not to mention the endless array of side items. I joked that after my Survivor feast-like eating, surely in my stomach, in the crevices along the meat, there would be space for two creamy bowls of lobster bisque. Like stomach Tetris. All spaces utilized. Of course there would be room.

By the end of the meal, I was nauseous. Would I do it again? Absolutely. Meals like this only come along once a decade. All you can eat gourmet food? Yes, please.

After lots of good conversation and regaining our momentum, we left the restaurant. But as one of my friends once joked, I guarantee if I had rubbed my belly and peered at it lovingly, I could have easily parked in the expectant mother spot at Buy Buy Baby.

After the meal, this group was going dancing! Turning 40 is, seriously, a big deal.

We went to a local place to chat, listen to the band, and dance. We were definitely older than many in the place, but not the oldest by any means.

At one point in the evening, because they were playing all of the right music, all of the ladies hit the floor and began dancing like it was nobody's business. Unabashed, happy dancing.

And then, after a half hour or so,
I happened to notice a group of very young girls at a table laughing. It didn't take me long to realize they were laughing at us.

At first it stung a little. Were they laughing because we were older? Or maybe because I wasn't a size 2? One of them even apparently made a comment to one of our husbands, not knowing it was one of our husbands, that we were funny. It dampened my spirits for all of about 30 seconds, and then I resumed my less than perfect dancing.

Later on, after a wonderful night with wonderful friends, I thought about it again, and it hit me.

I don't think they were laughing because we had twenty years on them, or even because we weren't all stick, model thin.

I think they were laughing because we were amusing and shocking to watch because we had absolutely no inhibitions. We didn't care that we were older. We didn't care that we weren't size zeroes. We didn't care that we didn't dance as well as Jennifer Lopez. And we certainly didn't care if a table of twenty- somethings self- consciously huddling in a booth found us amusing.

We had moved from that phase of life where you walk into a room wondering if people like you, and had moved into the phase where you walk into a room and wonder who you like.

The term 40 and fabulous has a lot of truth behind it. I think, or at least I choose to think, that they were laughing because we were a rare sighting to them. They are at the age where you worry when you leave to go to the bathroom if your friends are secretly saying you should audition for Bert on Sesame Street if you don't hurry up and get those eyebrows waxed. They are at the phase where you won't dance in front of a room full of people, because heaven forbid, what of your dress shows a little back fat or what if you lack perfect rhythm.

See, my group was past all that. We are imperfect, as everyone is, but also past the point of letting it dictate our actions. That is what is surprisingly great about the 40s.

It's always a little sad to me to see people desperately holding on to their youth. Becoming obsessed with their imperfections to the point that they are not truly happy in their own skin. I've always thought that the more obsessively you fight to look super young, the older you seem to look. The ones who look young and happy, are the ones enjoying their families and friends and life in general.

These people should be embracing life, and laughing. And as we know, like in Hollywood, some are so obsessed with looking younger that they are to the point that you can't even tell when they actually ARE laughing.

I'm not suggesting that health and how you present yourself to the world aren't important.

I'm just saying that in your forties you begin to realize that life exists outside the realm of self-obsession.

You begin to distance yourself from the people pointing fingers in the booth, and surround yourself with the happy ones on the dance floor.

See, now I know why those girls were laughing. They hadn't seen
many like us before. This laughing, carefree, imperfect group of women not caring a thing about what the world thought if them. Only having fun...together.

Someday those 20-something girls will get it.

But one thing is for sure. None of them had as much fun as we did.

And I would like to change that saying, "Dance as if no one is watching."

I say, "Dance like everyone is watching...and feel GREAT about it!"

Long Live Dorothy Hamill

I so wish I could be the woman in my dreams.

Just last night I dreamt I solved a
murder.

And I was BRILLIANT with it too. I even talked to the murderer and got information out of him with my impeccable, Academy Award winning role playing. I tricked that sucker and got all kinds of info out of him. AND, in this SAME dream, I also donated items to an older woman in need AND found a really pretty yellow bath mat for my house on sale for $11.

All in the same dream.

Then it's possible for me to wake up and shuffle to the kitchen to see a big pile of damp laundry.

Yeeeeeeeeeeeep.

Remember that feeling when you were little of wanting to be a figure skater, and a marine biologist, and a writer, and a scientist, and Nancy Drew, and Angela Lansbury where crimes you could solve fell into your lap, like every Sunday night?

Well, I still feel that way.

So much to do and so little time.

I'm pretty sure the figure skating thing might be out, but I'm still waiting for a crime to fall into my lap. One time I heard people talking over a baby monitor and got really jazzed hoping they were planning a murder, but it all ended up being rather disappointing.

Time just seems to be moving too quickly.

As my friends know, I'm an avid suspense novel hoarder, and just this summer my mom and I decided that I might not even live long enough to read all the books I've collected. Ouch.

It's no secret that my dream is to publish a book. People tell you things like, "So-and-so was rejected 113 times" and "Stephen King wallpapered a room with rejection letters" and "John Grisham ended up having to sell A Time To Kill out of the trunk of his car," well...I know these comments are supposed to make you feel better, but honestly, in your mind you are thinking, "If flipping STEPHEN KING and JOHN GRISHAM were rejected that many times, maybe I should just give another go at that figure skating gig."

And let's be real, I'm already past the point I had hoped. It would have sounded WAY cooler to be tied to the phrase "was published during Junior year of college." But I wasn't even trying to write then and was more concerned about how to stamp "I love AOPi" on the back of my boxers for the ATO pajama mixer.

Some people simply blow me away with their productivity. You know, the ones who wake up and make homemade pancakes and then play a board game with their kids after painting the bathroom and making homemade salad dressing for that night's dinner. Then they head out for errands, and it only takes them 10 minutes to leave the house because in this magical world everyone knows where their shoes are and have brushed teeth without being told.

When they get in their cars, the gas tank is full and it doesn't say they have 11 more miles until they are sucking fumes.

Then when they are home from errands, they water their vegetable garden, pressure wash the driveway, and play a second board game with their kids after correctly teaching them how to dice carrots for their fresh dinner salad, from their garden of course.

Then after dinner, everyone takes a brisk walk together, has plenty of time to read stories before bed, and all the kids are in bed and mom and dad have plenty of time to relax and unwind before bed.

Oh, and these people iron. They actually iron.

As if.

Hello de-wrinkle button for the fourth time...

(I even posted a pic of my once-spotless laundry room on Facebook so it could be documented like Haley's Comet. Fleeting and beautiful.)

Oh, and in these households, no one ever has to say, "Just slide those clean socks and folded T-shirts over a little and try not to get ketchup on them."

These are also the same ones whose kids have done DreamBox Math twenty minutes every day on the computer since school got out. Hey, I had grand plans too.

And we are half way through City of Ember, thank you very much. We still have 48 hours for crying out loud.

But back to the issue at hand. Time. There is not enough of it.

I have always wanted to experience everything I possibly could. And I want the same for my children. I want to eat pasta in Italy under the stars on a crisp night, campout with the whole family in an elaborate treehouse with little white lights and fireflies swarming around, go on a mystery cruise (and solve it of course), expose a major government coverup, act in a play as an adult, solve a murder, publish a book, show my children the whole world, open a small mystery bookstore that looks like the one in the movie You've Got Mail, write a political speech for a candidate who is actually ethical and can make a difference, take the family on a mission trip, serve in a soup kitchen, meet Tom Selleck, and have a clean laundry room.

I absolutely KNOW all of these dreams can come true.

I just have to go back to bed.

Look out Angela Lansbury.

Elf Anarchy

You know that phrase "Shut the front door"?

Well, it has just officially changed.

It is now "Shut the box." No. Seriously. Shut the elf box. Just shut the box containing the elf. Put your hands over your head where we can see them, and quietly, ever so quietly, move away from the box containing whatever type of elf is inside. Do not make any sudden movements or the evil critter might jump on you like a flying monkey and suck your breath out.

The. Elves. Are. Done.

Let's end this now.

All of these elves sitting on these shelves who are now not only celebrating Christmas, but also BIRTHDAYS...Must. Be. Eliminated.

The creators of these little festive demons are probably now multi-millionaires at our sweaty, overworked-mommy expense.

It's time to fight back.

Just like a train wreck where you can't look away, I decided to Google this new birthday elf and see exactly what tricks he is trying to pull. We older, more seasoned elf-experienced rebel mothers are ready to take a stand. But these newer mommies who are worried about doing everything right???

Look. Away.

Look away right now or your soul will be turned to stone.

Here is what the new birthday elf entails...

Apparently the elves have a "special" way of celebrating birthdays at the North Pole. (Yippee Ki-Yay)

SO...there are special instructions for how you can invite your elf to spend your birthday with you!!! There is even a special birthday outfit you can slip your elf into for the big day!!!! Of COURSE there is ($Cha-Ching$)

Now, I WILL say that there was a place on the website where you could donate to kids in need, kids whose needs are as simple as a clean glass of water. And THAT is where we should be spending our elf bucks- for SURE. So, if you have an elf, or want an elf, I think this part is wonderful. Lets do just THIS part.

Maybe our Christmas elves, since many of us seem to already be stuck with them, should do random acts of kindness at Christmas time for the less fortunate. It seems to make way more sense than rolling them down the stairs inside a roll of toilet paper.

I will readily admit, I love to be creative. But I'm not sure around Christmas or birthdays is when we need extra tasks.

"Oh, sure I can organize the class Christmas party, and work, and decorate the house, and buy and wrap all the Christmas gifts for both sides of the family, and find an angel costume for the church play- but wait!!! First I have to dump a bag of powdered sugar in my floor at 1:00 AM so our pretend elf can make a snow angel so my children can smile for 1.2 seconds about it, and then I can spend a half an hour cleaning it up while I'm already running late."

Anyhow, the Elf anarchy must end.

If we let this continue, there will soon be an Arbor Day Elf and we will have to gather up our elves and go plant trees. Then there will be Columbus Day Elf where the inventors of this hive-inducing tradition encourage us to build a replica of the Nina, Pinta, or Santa Maria so our elves can board these vessels and pretend they are searching for new land. I say we let our elves celebrate Halloween, perhaps sitting on a ledge somewhere on Elm Street, give them a little Benadryl, wish them sweet dreams, and see how they fare with a man in a green and red sweater (See? Festive!)... named Freddy.

Seriously.

Moms unite. We can do this.

*Virtual fist bump*

Who needs Norman Rockwell?

If you are like us, any day involving high expectations usually takes a nose dive. A major one.

Like I said yesterday morning, if we ever have to be somewhere on time, looking nice, with pictures taken, you might as well go on and cue the Jaws theme song. Because there is trouble in the water.

In my "mind" I would want Easter morning to go something like this. We would all rise to the smell of fresh cinnamon rolls (special morning treat) while the kids relished their Easter baskets.

Reality was that I have no idea what the kids had for breakfast because I woke up with a sinus infection feeling so bad that all I could do was pull the covers over my head. My husband took care of it, whatever it was, and my breakfast was peanut butter spread on a slice of bread that had surpassed its freshness washed down with a Coke, all which was scarfed down in the car on the way to Easter service.

I had truly, truly planned the night before for Easter morning. I even laid out the boys' clothes so everything would go smoothly in the morning. I really, really should just go on and eliminate the word "smoothly" from my vocabulary. Somehow one loafer was missing. I accused the boys first and then ended up peering inside the dog crate to see if he was enjoying a new leather treat. He had an Easter basket too, and maybe he got confused. My sons finally ended up finding the shoe in one of their Easter baskets where it was reportedly thrown. Don't. Even. Want. To. Know.

The day before I had even planned on wearing a dress I love that I hadn't worn since last year. My how times have changed! My husband had laughed as I breezed by him the night before muttering under my breath that now in the dress I look like Humpty (#%#^) Dumpty.

Darn that dress for somehow still having the exact same amount of material it used to have.

With my pollen induced puffy eyes, and while suppressing the need to stop up my nostrils with Kleenex (not a good look), I simply told my husband to go take a picture of the boys on the porch. I knew I just could not deal. I hoped for the best, not even looking at the photos yet. I thought it was important that I still liked everyone as we walked into church.

Of course the church service was perfect. The pastor spoke about God's unconditional love. And thank goodness our families love us unconditionally as well, even when we don't fix a decent Easter breakfast and become a little Mommy Dearest-ish when we can't find shoes (this has been going on for ten years).
Yes, we have a designated shoe spot. No, it doesn't matter.

In my mind we would all go home to a wonderful home-cooked meal which I had carefully planned. After eating we would take a stroll through our neighborhood, some of us perhaps even holding hands.

Reality was that the pictures on the front steps of our house were a disaster. We finally got a decent picture after church, not in front of flowers or even a cross, but in front of some wood paneling inside Chili's restaurant.

It is what it is.

Our lunch consisted of the boys being a bit boisterous. The youngest one entertained himself by embarrassing his brother and using a line he learned from an episode of Good Luck Charlie. He mischievously announced that his brother was, "Single and ready to mingle," to those walking by.

Nothing like Norman Rockwell.

But then, a few hours after we got home, something truly amazing happened. The boys, together, in sweet harmony, grabbed their baseball gear and went to the backyard. My 10-year old worked with my 7-year-old on his baseball skills. I heard no fighting. I did hear words of encouragement. The oldest helped the youngest of his own free will. The littlest listened to the wiser older brother, paying attention and never arguing.

Cue the Hallelujah Chorus.

After two hours of the Twilight Zone, the two of them came to us wanting to show us what they had been doing.

They performed four "phases" of skills they had been working on together. Lo and behold, the youngest had improved by leaps and bounds with just two hours with his brother. It was such an extreme transformation that my husband and I were almost rendered speechless.

So, since Easter is a very important day, I had been feeling like a failure because I hadn't made the day as special as I had intended. But that's when the little bit of unexpected magic was sprinkled on us. What is that saying about how there are no perfect days, only perfect moments?

Perfection isn't attainable anyhow. Even very special days are never totally perfect.

But to be honest, I think Norman Rockwell's stuff is a bit boring.