Savvy Toddler Mom

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.

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!

What a week!  A busy, fun, snow-filled week!

First of all, thank you for all the birthday wishes!  I am overwhelmed.  I have to share a couple of my favorite gifts:

• SavvyDad framed the James C. Christensen Shakespeare print we bought a couple of years ago at the Shakespeare Festival in Cedar City, UT.  The frame is beautiful and he immediately hung it in our room on my side of the bed!  Thanks again, hon!
• Thank you, Tiffany & Phil, for the AWESOME sweatshirt.  It reads, “I [heart] Mr. Darcy.”  I laughed and laughed.  Thank you!!!!  After opening, I said, “Oh, I can’t WAIT to blog about that!”  Then I opened my next gift…
• Thanks again, Anne & Matt, for the fabulous t-shirt!  It reads, “i am so blogging this.”  I love it!  And very true-to-life. LOL
• And last, but not least, thanks, Heather, for the Fairytale Brownies.  I am sad to say they didn’t last long.  The toot especially loved them and helped himself (toddler scissors in hand) at every opportunity.  Thank you again!!

Breakfast with Santa was a huge success.  Man, my MIL is amazing.  Really.  And her three daughters are following in her footsteps.  My SIL made this amazing cinnamon pull-apart tree.  She made it up completely on her own.  (Photo by SavvyDad.)

Santa was absolutely perfect.  I wish I could post some pics of the kids, but my internet paranoia is too strong.  But here is a shot of Santa himself (photo by SavvyDad):

We also had a really fun extended-family Christmas get-together for my side of the family last night.  It was so great to see my cousins and have our children play together.  We don’t do it often enough!  On that side of the family, there are 10 great-grandchildren and the toot is one of the two boys!  My nephew wasn’t there, so he and the five girls that were there played and played.  Matt & Anne, we really missed Liesel & Sage!  They would have had a great time in all the chaos.

My wonderful cousin Amber just announced that she is expecting her fourth girl.  She and her husband do daughters so well!  I am so excited for you.

My “little” brother and his wife are days away from having a little boy!  I can’t wait for little Coleby to get here.  I am so excited for them to have the newborn baby experience… the overwhelming love, the complete lack of sleep, the overwhelming love that keeps you from strangling this little person that has turned your life upsidedown.  It’s going to be awesome.  They totally deserve to have just the happiest New Year with a sweet little guy to make the rest of their lives that much sweeter.

Today is the second anniversary of the day we lost our little Elizabeth.  It seems a lot longer and a lot shorter at the same time.  A year ago last Thursday we lost our little James.  Needless to say, Christmastime is a little bit melancholy for us now.  I am trying hard to enjoy the season… enjoy not being pregnant trying to shop and cook and run around, enjoy not being in the hospital and getting sympathy cards and flowers instead of Christmas cards and goodies.  But it’s still hard when I think about the little people that should be here enjoying it with us.  The little people that shouldn’t allow us to have ornaments on the lower half of the tree… the little people that should be having their first or second Christmas and… the little people that their big brother should be playing with.  It just breaks my heart.  It seems like the sweetest things hurt the most, too… a double-edged sword.  The toot can be SO funny and darling… and it should be twice as much (at least).

I got some snowflake ornaments this year with all of our little babies’ names and dates on them.  They are beautiful.  If you are looking for something like that to remember loved ones you’ve lost, look at Things Remembered.  That’s where I got mine.

Okay, enough crying.  Gah.

Can I just tell you that I am SO stinkin’ excited for Christmas?!?!?!  I don’t remember being this excited in… probably 15 years.  I can’t WAIT to see the toot’s face when he walks into the living room on Christmas morning.  I can’t WAIT to see the magic happen as Santa brings him what he asked for.  I can’t WAIT to see SavvyDad’s surprise and delight at two things in particular!  I can’t WAIT to see my nephews and nieces enjoy the gifts I got them.  It really is better to give than to receive.

The weather was so frightful this morning, that I sluffed church (shhhh…) and made these ornaments/embellishments instead.  If you are wondering, they are by Cosmo Cricket.  Nothing like cutting and pasting to the sounds of Handel’s “Messiah.”  I was in heaven.

Also wanted to share a pic of our Christmas tree:

I got the polka dot and striped ornaments new this year (at Costco, of course) and just LOVE them.

Also on the holiday fun parade, we have the toot’s gingerbread contribution (thanks to Grandma Pam):

I helped him decorate and apparently I am terrible with frosting.  Oh, well…

Another very festive thing from last week was when SavvyDad was on breakfast duty.  He made the toot a snowman pancake!  How cute is he?

I am really looking forward to a fun Christmasy week… the toot has his preschool program and I am just a giddy parent thinking about seeing his first school program!  He also has his tumbling “program” so he can show off his wicked skills.

On Saturday, my hostess-with-the-mostest MIL is having a “Breakfast with Santa” for all the grandkids and great-nieces and nephews.  I think this will be the third year she has done it and it is just adorable!  My SIL’s neighbor’s dad (or something like that…) is a professional Santa, so they have him come with a bag of treats for each of the kids.  They get to sit on his lap and tell him what they want for Christmas in a safe, familiar setting.  The toot has yet to go up by himself or sit on his lap… but maybe this year!!! LOL

My birthday is also this week, so that will be… interesting.  For some reason, this birthday is kind of a hard one.  I keep thinking I should be excited to start a new year – clean slate, fresh start, since 32 hasn’t been the greatest – but I can’t help but feel a little melancholy about leaving this year behind.  Almost like I’m hoping for a do-over or something.  I don’t know.  I’m going to have to give that some thought.

Well, that’s a note to end on.  (Sorry!)  I hope you are enjoying this Christmas season as much as I am.  I’ve decided that 4-year-old Christmas is WAY more fun than 3.  So much more excitement and magic.  So much more to enjoy.  So much more to love.

This totally made me laugh today.  Thanks to SavvyDad’s cousin Ryan for sending it along.  (Sorry, Ry, I had to clean it up a bit for publishing.)

******

If you are 30 or older you will think this is hilarious!!! (If you’re close, you’ll probably think so too.)

When I was a kid, adults used to bore me to tears with their tedious diatribes about how hard things were when they were growing up; what with walking twenty-five miles to school every morning … uphill BOTH ways - yadda, yadda, yadda.

And I remember promising myself that when I grew up, there was no way I was going to lay a bunch of crap like that on kids about how hard I had it and how easy they’ve got it!

But now that I’m over the ripe old age of  thirty, I can’t help but look around and notice the youth of today.
You’ve got it so easy!
I mean, compared to my childhood, you live in a utopia!

And I hate to say it but you kids today, you don’t know how good you’ve got it!
I mean, when I was a kid we didn’t have the internet.
If we wanted to know something, we had to go to the library and look it up ourselves, in the card catalog!!

There was no email!!
We had to actually write  somebody a letter with a pen!
Then you had to walk all the way across the street and put it in the mailbox and it would take like a week to get there!

There were no MP3s or Napsters!
You wanted to steal music, you had to hitchhike to the record store and shoplift it yourself!  Or you had to wait around all day to tape it off the radio and the DJ would usually talk over the beginning and @#*% it all up!

We didn’t have fancy crap like call waiting!
If you were on the phone and somebody else called they got a busy signal, that’s it!

And we didn’t have fancy caller ID boxes either!
When the phone rang, you had no idea who it was!
It could be your school, your mom, your boss, your bookie, your drug dealer, a collections agent, you just didn’t know!!! 
You had to pick it up and take your chances, mister!

We didn’t have any fancy Sony Playstation video games with high-resolution 3-D graphics!
We had the Atari 2600!
With games like ‘Space Invaders’ and ‘Asteroids.’
Your guy was a little square! You actually had to use your imagination!!
And there were no multiple levels or screens, it was just one screen forever! 
And you could never win.
The game just kept getting harder and harder and faster and faster until you died!
Just like LIFE!

When you went to the movie theater there was no such thing as stadium seating!
All the seats were the same height!
If a tall guy or some old broad with a hat sat in front of you and you couldn’t see, you were just screwed!

Sure, we had cable television, but back then that  was only like 15 channels and there was no on screen menu and no remote control!
You had to use a little book called a TV Guide to find out what was on!
You were screwed when it came to channel surfing!
You had to get off your butt and walk over to the TV to change the channel and there was no Cartoon Network either!
You could only get cartoons on Saturday Morning.
Do you hear what I’m saying!?!
We had to wait ALL WEEK for cartoons, you spoiled little brats!

And we didn’t have microwaves, if we wanted to heat something up we had to use the stove or go build a freaking fire.
Imagine that!
If we wanted popcorn, we had to use that stupid Jiffy Pop thing and shake it over the stove forever like an idiot.
That’s exactly what I’m talking about!
You kids today have got it too easy.
You’re spoiled.

You guys wouldn’t have lasted five minutes back in 1980!

Regards,
The Over 30 Crowd

A year ago today I broke out on my own from a free WordPress blog.  What a year it has been!  Unfortunately, this blog hasn’t become what I had envisioned, but there is still time.

At any rate, I would like to take a moment to celebrate the life that is the blog — being a mom to my cute little guy, the toot, who keeps me running and running and running.  He is the light of my life and I can’t imagine another experience this life has to offer that would make me grow more.  Parenting is the quintessential life experience, isn’t it?

Here’s a shot SavvyDad took of me (and the toot!) at Silver Lake near Brighton last week.  He titled it “A Mommy’s Life.”

Here’s to a better year… hopefully more blogging, fewer miscarriages, and much, much more of the happy, wonderful things that make parenting so rewarding.