Painting... with a baby

Today we were painting all day.  Sort of.  The first part of the day was mostly buying stuff for painting.  Then we had to tape all the edges in all three rooms.  And now I'm so tired that it seriously took me 5 minutes and 3 trips to dictionary.com to figure out how to spell "room".  The taping part went smoothly because Bishop was content to crawl around in whatever room I was working in.  However, when we got to the actual painting, I couldn't have him on the floor.  He was not happy about that.  Hopefully tomorrow goes better.  We got a pretty good chunk done today and we don't have to spend any time shopping tomorrow. 

Pictured: Progress

Pictured: Cranky Butt

RCIA

Remember last year, how I became Catholic by going through RCIA?  I'm doing RCIA again this year.  It seems like I can't get enough of it!

I've actually been helping out with this year's class and I adore it.  I just wish I had more time to devote to my church; working two jobs makes that very difficult to manage.  I've been enjoying the experience from the other side of things, though.  I'm still learning a lot about the Church and my faith, but I'm also getting new insight into the conversion process watching others go through it and hearing their stories.  I even get to sponsor someone this year, which makes Easter even more exciting!

I feel like I've taken the long road to getting there, but I know that this is where I'm meant to be and I couldn't be happier and more content!

Headache of Doom

So, I'm working on another project for a post.  I'll probably do it tomorrow.  It can be tomorrow's post.  Tonight I have the WORST HEADACHE OF DOOM EVER.  I don't mind that people wear perfume, but it's unpleasant when said perfume wrecks havoc on my brain.

Today was another double-shifting day.  I feel like I've had infinite patience the last two days dealing with the kids at the alt-ed school I sub at.  I know it can only come from God, because typically I don't have that much patience to put up with their shenanigans.  I learned something, though.  Being soft-spoken, insistent, and overly polite manages to get you somewhere with those kids most of the time.  Not all, but most.

Tomorrow will be a much better update, I swear.  I'm not off to a good start this season!

Day Three

I just wanted to share this picture from yesterday cause I think it's super cute.  I didn't want to post all the pictures I took yesterday cause there's like 20 of them but I realized this one is pretty awesome.  It's like he's standing in a picture frame. 

I love the layout of our house.  It's very entertainment friendly.  Also it has a built in tap dancing floor... but John said I can't tap dance on it.  At least I can still sock skate on it.  It's very slippery though; I'll probably end up on my butt.  It's okay, I'll have plenty of time to practice.  Then we'll have the sock-skate-lympics. 

Patience, John, Patience

I had spent today coming up with a blog post, but it seems I need to put some priorities in order.  I was on my way home to blog when I received a text from John demanding my explanation on why I hadn't posted.  Angela claims she had nothing to do with it, but I'm dubious (and totally just threw you both under the bus!).

I'm going to have to pass the torch to Angela this year in regards to early posting.  I now work 14 hour days between two jobs just to make ends meet.  I don't really want to go into all the details, but ultimately my life is rather chaotic at the moment.  So expect late night posting.  And in the meantime, bear with me!  I'll make sure to my daily blogs in!

Patience, John!

We bought a house!

We got our keys today!  Then we hung out on the floor for a couple hours.  Bishop got busy exploring...

Oh hey!  Just dusting your floors

And John got comfortable in the living room.

So we're gonna paint on Saturday and then a week later, we're moving in!  Then we'll clean this place up and be done with apartments forever. 

Ash Wednesday!

This year is my first Ash Wednesday as an official Catholic.  Last year, Ash Wednesday was one of my favorite services, but I was sad because I couldn't participate in mass proper.  This year, I was able, and it was pretty neat.  However, I think my favorite part about this year was helping serve soup instead of helping to make it.

Our Parish requires a day of fasting, but that just means you eat two light meals and you're done for the day.  It was nice to be able to serve people one of those two meals.  They were all really thankful to receive it!  I know I was really thankful to eat dinner tonight after going most of the day with only a light breakfast.  I'm glad that we weren't required to fast all day, though.  I remember fasting on Good Friday and how difficult that was!

In preparation this year, I was considering adding eating only two light meals a day to my Lent list.  I actually feel like I have more energy after doing this today, and even though I'm kind of hungry, I don't feel like it would be terrible to cut down the amount of food I eat.  Not to mention I can see how it would make me cook less portions, waste less, and lose weight, so all around good things!

This year, I feel like I'm in a much better place to give up more for Lent and to stick with it than I have been in the past, so I'm going to give this a try!

Lent list of give-ups/add-ons:

1. Daily Blog of course
2. Eating two light meals and supplement with one light snack/day
3. Stop swearing
4. Be more outgoing towards others, including praying more for others

That looks like good stuff.  Sorry about the weak first post.  I promise I have much more to talk about this year!  I just didn't want to blow all my material at once, despite my excitement!  Since today is Ash Wednesday, I'm going to stick to the subject.  Come back tomorrow for more things!

Day One: I'm probably gonna talk about my baby

Just get used to it.  Being a stay at home mom means you have very little else to talk about than the little person you hang with 12 hours a day.  He's like my bff that I'm required to hang out with all the time.  You know when you get tired of hanging out with your bff so you go home and then the next day you go hang out with them again cause you miss them?  That is now called nap time.  Bishop waking up from nap time is now my favorite time of day.  He's been asleep long enough that I start to miss his cute face and he wakes up happy because its only been a few hours since he ate so he just talks to himself in the crib.  Then I walk in and he smiles and talks to me!  The mornings are less enjoyable because he's hungry so he wakes up crying so I have to deal with a crying baby while I'm still waking up myself.  Therefore nap time is the best. 

Currently nap time has just started so I'm enjoying my alone time and not constantly checking the floor to see what Bishop is getting into.  He's very curious and mobile and while I have secured most of the hazards on the floor, there are a few cords I can't do anything with so naturally that is what he is most attracted to. 

Anyway, on to lent.  It is the first day of lent and I have decided that since I'm not pregnant this year, I can give up sweets again.  I thought about doing a day of fasting too cause I've never fasted and I wanna try it but I'm still nursing and I think that would be a bad idea. 

Lastly, how awesome was Kris's lent poster?  It looks pretty epic.  I feel like I have something to live up to now.  I hope my blogging is entertaining enough to warrant that awesome promotional material.  I guess if its not, Kris will pick up the slack. 

Coming this Lent...

The epic tail of two women and their lives continues.  You'll laugh.  You'll cry.  You'll read like you've never read before.  This year, it gets personal.  And then it gets personal again.

Getting ready for lent

So last year I was pregnant during lent and I wasn't sure if I would be able to write this year.  But now my son is almost 8 months old and he's the most easy going baby on the planet so.... I'm all in this year!  We will be moving at the beginning of lent though so I might have to do a few shorter phone posts. 

I'm lucky to have a friend like Kris to harass me to write every year during lent.  Even though I'm the one who started doing this, Kris is always there to make sure I stick with it so that our blog isn't neglected during the 40 days a year we obligate ourselves to write. 

Anyway, here's a picture of my cutie.  You'll be seeing a lot more of this face. 

"Hey mommy, you trying to sleep? That's funny"

NaNoWriMo

Every year I attempt to accomplish NaNoWriMo and fail.  It has become a disheartening tradition.  The worst part is, I've been defeated so many times that I've already defeated myself in my mind this year.  Writing a 50,000 word story shouldn't be that difficult.  It's just over 1500 words a day.  A lot of the papers I've written for classes have been way longer than that.  Not to mention I just finished knocking out a master's thesis on a topic I'm not even that passionate about.

As a side note, I just went to check how long that paper actually is.  As it turns out, it's completely gone from when I wiped my hard drive.  I somehow didn't copy that particular folder over and overlooked its importance.  That's really kind of depressing considering how much time I put into that thing.  I'm not even sure if it's available online where I had it loaded anymore.  Probably not.  And since I didn't have to print it out, it's well and truly gone from this world.  Sad.  Face.

The point is, I know that once you're defeated in your mind, you've already lost.  So how can I possibly get undefeated and come back?  I'm talking about being on the verge of quitting something I've been passionate about since before I was able to write.

Then I remembered this blog.

Sure, much of the blog is incoherent thoughts all kind of thrown together onto a page and published out into the uncaring world of the internet for whomever to read and judge, but it's also something else.  This blog?  I wrote in it every day during Lent.  EVERY day.  Except the one time when I forgot.  Or two times.  I may not have come anywhere near 1500 words, but I did it.  And I doubt I would have stuck with it so tenaciously if I didn't enjoy what I did, right?  I mean, I'm stubborn and I've stuck with a ton of stuff that makes me miserable, but surely this must be something I enjoy if I'm willing to cling to it year after year as a Lent tradition.  Hell, I even get excited to write in it during Lent.

Maybe I'm just trying to convince myself of something, but I'm feeling like I need a win here.  I already missed day 1 of NaNoWriMo due to writer's block and doubt.  I have around 3000+ words to make up if I'm going to get back on track.

We'll see how this goes internet friends.  I feel like this year is do or die, sink or swim...and the water has already started out murky.

Being a mommy

I just read my last blog post.  It's been a while.  My life has changed drastically since June 1st.  For instance, instead of setting the iPad on my giant tummy and typing, I'm reaching around a sleeping baby with the iPad propped up on the nursing pillow.  Bishop ate and then passed out on me.  Now I'm hanging out till he's done napping because every time I try setting him down, he wakes right up.  Luckily this does not happen at night.  We have the best sleeper ever.  I told John that it feels like we don't even have a baby at night cause once I put him down, I know he wont be awake again until at least 7 am.  This allows me to be a functioning human being during the day instead of having to make sure I get enough naps.  

It seems like so far we are getting the best of everything as new parents.  I had a pretty standard, uncomplicated pregnancy, I had a 4 hour labor (not easy but short), and we have a relatively chill baby that is now sleeping a 10 hour stretch on a typical night.  Not to mention he's pretty much the cutest thing I've seen in my entire life.  And he has my nose.  It looks way cuter on him.  

Hopefully baby #2 is this good.  I wont keeps my hopes up though.