Savvy Toddler Mom

I am torn!!

I am running the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure in Salt Lake City on Saturday.  I would LOVE to recruit some sponsors from my readers (if I have any left! ), but I don’t want to post a link to my sponsorship page because it gives away more personal information than I am comfortable with.

So… let’s do this: if you know me personally, please go to the Komen Salt Lake City DonorDrive site, search for my name, and PUH-LEASE donate!

If you don’t know me personally, please donate to this important cause by visiting the site and clicking on “Donate Today.”

I will be lacing up my pink & black sneakers on Saturday and heading down to the Gateway with SavvyDad and the toot in tow!  We will be running (okay, probably walking and maybe a little jogging…) to raise money for the fight against breast cancer.

My sister-in-law started our  team in honor of her step-mom who officially began her war with breast cancer by undergoing a mastectomy on April 7, 2010.

Our thoughts and prayers are with her and all other cancer survivors as they fight their personal battles.

I would love your help in supporting my sister-in-law, her step-mom, and our other family and friends as we participate in this year’s Race for the Cure.

(I will be the one pushing the 50 lb. 5-year-old in the stroller probably half the way…)

If you can, please donate generously to this cause.

Thank you!!

P.S. I ordered this awesome t-shirt for the event — isn’t it great?

Blah, blah, blah… I’ve neglected my blog again… blah, blah, blah.

And on to the point…

I went to a retina specialist today.  I have a “floater” in my right eye.  So, for the second time this year, I got my eyes dilated and remembered too late that when that happens, I CAN’T SEE.  Everything is totally blurry.  My pupils are so huge!  I look really freaky.  They really shouldn’t let people drive like that.  So, here I am, trying to drive, use a computer, text/email on my blackberry (not all at the same time, of course)… and all are completely futile.  I wind up calling a coworker and having her relay the office happenings and ask for one favor after another.

Once I’m home, I have to wear my sunglasses for the rest of the evening.  Making dinner, reading bedtime stories, and paying bills, all take on a new level of challenge.

Lucky me, though!  I get to do it again tomorrow. The doctor wants to look at my eye under his super-duper powerful scanning machine (which is at his Layton office, not his Salt Lake office).  He’s trying to see the same blot in my vision that I see, so that he can make sure it is “just” some vicorous (spelling?) condensation and not a closed blood vessel.

A glimpse into my life today!  “My future is so bright… I gotta wear… shades.”

So, I procrastinated, but I am going to finish by New Year’s!  Here are the other 8 “Things of STM” that I am going to do in 2010:

5 & 6: Water & Caffeine.  One I need more of; the other I need less of.  64 oz water and a max of 2 Diet Cokes a day in 2010.  Should help me be healthier and sleep better.  It’s a win-win.

7: Boundaries.  Finding a balance between work, family, extended family, friends, church, etc.  I have unfortunately let work take over more of my life than I would like… I need to find a way to come home at a reasonable time and spend more time with my husband and son.

8 & 9: Be Realistic & Say No.  Do you ever take on too much?  Well, I have a bad habit of doing exactly that.  I can’t do everything, be everything… no one can!  I want to make a point of taking a step back, thinking about what is most important, and saying no now and again.  Good, better, best.  Release the guilt!

10: Mom Saturdays.  Saturday is my day to be 100% mom.  I sometimes don’t take advantage of it as much as I wish I did.  I am going to!  I am claiming them as Mom Saturdays.

11: Ask for More Help.  I have a hard time asking for help.  From my husband, my mom, my coworkers.  I like to do things myself and I like to be self-reliant.  However, as we have already established, I am not super woman!  I have GOT to learn to ask for help more and to accept it more graciously.

12: Personal Discovery. Last, but not certainly not least, I resolve (for my husband and for ME) that I will continue to discover who I am, what I want, and what it all means to me.  Nearly 11 years of marriage and you think I would know by now!  However, life isn’t easy.  Ever.  Bends in the road require constant adjustment and… change.

So, these are the 12 Things of STM… my 12 resolutions for 2010.  The things I want to change next year to spend more time living.

Seriously.  They are my Achilles’ heel.  I actually bought a whole bag for my husband to put in my stocking.  What was I thinking?!?!

I am going to eat them ALL before next year and then that’s it.  No peanut butter M&Ms in 2010.  Say it with me now…

(Playing a little catch-up here, but I’m going to get my 12 things in by New Year’s!)

Me time… I love it, I want it… I hardly ever get it.  Oh, and when I do, I usually spend it cleaning the house, doing laundry, paying bills, etc.

What I’m talking about here is some serious “me time.”  What I want to do, not what I have to do.  Examples: reading, scrapbooking, photography, sewing, daydreaming, etc.  Things that fill the soul and give you time to think about who you are and what you want in life.  I don’t remember the last time I spent any significant amount of time doing any of those things.  Our time is so scarce — spread out over responsibilities with family, work, home, church — I think we lose sight of our “self.”

So, “me time.”  Starting with 15 minutes/day.  Every day.  Take 15 minutes and do what YOU want to do.  If you have longer than that, great.   If you don’t, start with 15 minutes and see if you can grow it.  15 minutes this week, 20 minutes next week, 25 the week after that.

Feed your soul.

Okay, I know this is an obvious one, but after sleep (or lack of it), it is the lack of exercise that makes me feel the least healthy.

So, for 2010, getting 30 minutes of exercise a day is going to be a priority.  Even if I have to run up and down my office staircase during my lunch hour.

And don’t forget weight training!  Cardio burns calories, but building muscles is a faster way to burn fat.  So, weight training at least 2 times a week… to start. (You reading this, CTM?)

I really am going to get 12 things in by the end of the year!

The first thing is SLEEP.  We all need it.  Most of us don’t get enough.  I certainly don’t… and I think the last week has been the worst sleep deprivation I’ve had since the toot was a newborn.  I burned my candle at both ends until I couldn’t function any more.  It wasn’t pretty.

So, the 1st thing of SavvyToddlerMom is getting enough sleep.  Eight hours, baby.

Not too much, mind you… just enough.  Enough to keep me (and you) at the top of our game.  Too much will make us groggy and lazy.

Eight hours.  So, my new bedtime will be 11pm — alarm goes off at 7am.  It’s a plan.

Since I started working full-time in April 2009, I have had little time to blog!  However, I am regularly thinking of things I’d like to share… just at times when I don’t have a computer handy, like in the shower, driving to/from work, as I’m falling asleep.  The funny thing about that is that I spend 90% of my waking time in front of a computer!  Or, at least it feels like it.

I continue to juggle work and my family — husband in grad school and my son, who is now 5!… oh, wait, is there anything else?  YES.  I have spent a lot of time this year just trying to tread water.  I need to get back to living.

My birthday is next week and this year it’s almost a painful reminder of how much my life isn’t what I want it to be.  Don’t get me wrong… a lot of it is GREAT.  Fabulous.  Blessed and lucky and miraculous.  But there are a few big things that loom large when I wake up in the middle of the night and can’t go back to sleep.  All of us have something like that… sometimes it is so hard to reconcile what we have with what we want.

Some of the things I want I can’t do anything about.  Blech.  That’s what Zoloft is for, right?

Some of the things I CAN do something about.  So, forget the 12 days of Christmas.  I am going to come up with my 12 Things of SavvyToddlerMom.  (Okay, it was more clever when I put my own name in, but for the sake of internet anonymity…)

Between now and the end of the year, I am going to identify and make a plan for 12 things I can improve or change.  “Yes, we can.”

These 12 things will become my New Year’s Resolutions — New Year’s Goals — for 2010.

Feel free to do it with me!

My darling friend, fellow blogger, and faithful reader, Heather, gave birth to a darling baby girl last night.  Congrats to Heather and her family!  We are already in love with Surfer Girl and are so glad she finally made her appearance!  We are thinking of you and sending all our love your way.

My youngest SIL also found out yesterday that she is expecting daughter #2.  That is another niece for STM!!  Let’s see… that makes SEVEN!  Seven nieces and four nephews.  Whew!

I am thrilled to announce that as of a week and a half ago, the toot has graduated from diapers.  Yay!!!!  He’s been potty-trained for almost a year, just not at night.  So, he’s been wearing pull-ups at night… until week before last!  He had been able to keep his “big boy diaper” dry for two weeks straight and I finally convinced him to just wear his “big boy pants” to bed instead.  Bam!  That was that.

He has had a couple of accidents since — too much to drink before bed once and the other time was my fault (I forgot to have him go to the bathroom before bed) — but I know it won’t be long until even that is a thing of the past.

Hurrah!  No more diapers for the toot!  Congrats, little man.  I can’t believe how fast you are growing up!