I resolve……

Have you thought about resolutions lately? I do them every year, I don’t know how I feel about them.

For instance last year- (or was it the year before) I posted a resolution about my desk in my office- I resolved to keep it organized and clean this year.

I think about October, I took a Rubbermaid and just did a clean-sweep. I am going to do that again today. Did I really do better on my desk in 2009? Sort of…..

How about my resolution of playing more games with the kids. That was a bust- I have just come to realize I am not the board game type, so this year I will focus more on reading with the kids and leave the games to someone else. We can’t change who we are not.

So let’s be realistic this year with resolutions. Why is it after we just over indulge during the holidays, we feel so inclined to make goals?

Usually I have set- like 1000 goals by now…..this year, I am creeping…..

Do yourself a favor- don’t watch home movies from 10 years ago, before New Year’s resolutions are set!

We did just that last night. All of my realistic goals of doing worthwhile things were shot out the window last night as I saw myself wrinkle free, and 20 pounds lighter in Aruba roasting on the beach.

Oh to return to the days of our youth. Reality has set back in this morning and the bottom line is- our goals should be realistic too.

So for the next 10 days- I am setting 10 realistic goals and then we are all good with it right?

Right?

Joy is Detoxing!

Who feels like this after the holidays?

I swear if I have to…let’s rephrase i…..if I choose to eat another thing I am going to explode……

That is what January is good for the detox of life. I cant eat another meal, cook another meal, even looking at food is painful! I am just sick of the holiday food………

Laying in front of the fire right now…ready to explode………no more big Sunday dinners…….no more big lunches……no more big meals……..no more, no more, no more…….

Thanks Jenny for the awesome photo….going on the fridge!

Merry Christmas

The only upset of the week came with Elizabeth- Her American Girl doll didn’t arrive on time actually at all. Santa ran down and picked up the cheaper substitute and she didn’t even know the difference.

Joy is Fun Christmas Parties

We were invited to a Christmas Party this year that rented out the big ice house for the semi-pro hockey team in town for Ice Skating and then gave us tickets for the game. The kids thought this party rocked. This was Liz’s second time on skates……..

Joy is being more reflective!

Joy is being more reflective about our own lives and about the many blessings that are ours.

That is where I am at right now mentally.

You can tell Christmas is close.

Every morning I wake up to a different child excited about the season. Elizabeth wants a kitty and has made up various lists, handwritten with the details pertaining to it. Noah wants Lego Rockband for the Wii. Chase wants an iPod touch and Hillary knows better than to ask.

I don’t like the commercial aspect of Christmas, but it is fun to watch the kids.

Time to focus and find my blessings!

I have found that all of my blessings are creeping out in mysterious ways.

Recently, I haven’t taken too much time to notice all the things going around me because of the chaos of kids finals at school and just plain busyness.

I don’t want to miss a single moment of the next week. The pj’s, the cookies, the dinner, the redecorating of the tree for the fifteenth time, the fire, the night everyone goes to bed early without asking, watching the tree sparkle.

Blessings are overflowing.

Last night like every night, every kid came up and gave me big hugs, tons of hugs, everybody loves the king bed and loves to get toasty and snuggle with me daily.

Yesterday- Honda picked up 100 percent of the pilot’s car repair, which required a new engine because the time belt had indeed flipped off.

Huge blessings for me!

I can’t help but feel more charitable- now what do I do about it? I hate that there are those around us with less.

I love the sounds of Christmas, the harp music by Hillary and Noah pounding it out on the piano.

My mother used to play the Christmas music of Bing Crosby on the record player- I still hear that in my mind today.

And the list goes on…… but I will quietly reflect now!

PS: These photos were taken last weekend on my hunt for the perfect front page photo

Joy in Failure

Keeping with the theme of Joy- I am finding it really hard to write something. This week was about disappointment on a variety of forefronts, so I guess today I will write about Joy in Trials.

Friday night- Brian’s Honda Pilot had a huge issue on the freeway- The engine about dropped out. The source? We think the timing belt was put on wrong two weeks ago by Honda. We had to get towed and now we are waiting for the prognosis.

Hopefully- this is Honda’s fault since the car worked great before they changed and not so great after.

Joy to the world huh?

On the next note, at least three newspaper stories were completely slaughtered this week by the editor. I was hired to write on the town budget meeting and that was like sending a lamb to the slaughter. After 500 attempts, they finally kicked me off the story.

Honestly, I have serious insecurities about my writing and so for the first time in my life I am doing it with an open mind and not taking the ax as heavy as I did in the past.

History- I didn’t write a lot after senior year in college after being slaughtered on Capitol Hill for the Senator I worked for. I was in charge of responding to constiuents letters on economic policy. It was painful semester for me.

I didn’t write much after my master’s thesis first draft was slaughtered and mocked. I recovered and quitely just wrote in my journal and now blog.

I have a much more open mind to learning now from other writers. The freelance job was for photography, but this week they piled on real news stories and sped up the deadline for the holidays.

For two straight days I wrote- and for two straight days I agonized about the town budget, the widening of a highway and the town economic developer position. Frankly, I think the town should hire me for that position- it pays well and I would be awesome at it. I can brand, market and sell the town.

But then I have to ask myself – Why the heck do I even want to work? I don’t!

I am not journalist- but heck, I am learning a lot in the last 21 days about how to write, quick, easy to the point things. It’s been painful.

I rejoiced in seeing that I made the front page again for the second week in a row-but cringed because it was heavily edited.

They asked me to take the front page photograph this week but failed to tell me that it had to be local, this shot was taken from a town nearby and this is the type of photo they wanted. Infact this photo sold until I wrote the cutline and they found out the photo wasn’t taken in my town. It was taken 2 minutes over the town line. They failed to mention the criteria- then I was axed from the front page. They wanted loud, shouting holiday theme- I like this picture! My nighttime shots have improved so much!

So back to the drawing board- I am giving the newspaper six months (April) for the experience. I can write the stories right next to my kids as they study. I photograph them on my way to events for the kids to cut down on out of home time. I doubt they will ever ask me to write a hard news story again and I will be fine with that.

Frankly, I am confident at writing the lifestyle columns. I am good at reporting on the local fundraiser, or the boy scout tree pickup or the robotics club event. Throw me in a meeting with the town council not so good.

So I found joy in picking up myself from my floor- and moving forward starting tomorrow.

This weekends joy is about failure…..car failure- news failure, even some parenting failures, but I will leave that for the personal notebook.

For the record- this blog is never edited….and I intend to keep that way. So don’t get out your red pen and look for errors or you just might find some.

Joy is The Nutcracker!

Joy is last nights performance of the The Nutcracker Ballet by The Boston Ballet. Hillary and I have been attending for years. But what really made this JOYFUL was the fact that everyone in the family was now old enough to attend….so the whole family went enduring the 8 degree temps and freezing wind. It was so fun to see families from everywhere dressed to the nines enjoying themselves together..

Dogs lots of them!

Joy is photographing dogs for a client-

Half Way Checkpoint

Keeping with my theme of Joy, today I write on the joy of the end of the semester. Not for me of course, but for my 15 year old who just completed her first semester at community college as part of her home school program. This semester she took a college prep reading, writing course and one college level art class-photography which I am pretty proud to say that I think she received the highest grade in the class.

This choice to enroll her in community college was single handed the best decision we have made for her. It started out rough, a few tears, me-being completely ripped up inside when dropping her off to the pack of wolves that go there. But I have to say I recently did an interview for the newspaper at our local high school and the language and tone resembled about the same as the cc, so that fear quickly wore off. Questions of too much too soon raced through my mind. Critics giving me advice….and believe me they come from the inner circles and self doubt all accompanied this journey.

Initially it wasn’t manageable. It quickly became apparent to me, that there had to be some serious training on how to succeed in a college level class. Training on how to follow through, negotiate and proofread. The photography class even threw me for a loop in the beginning. I thought we had bit off more than we could chew. This was a good lesson in life…… if you endure something long enough, it will eventually become easier for you and that was the case with this semester.

So today we say goodbye to her writing teacher- Rita. When I first called the school I wanted the writing teacher that new how to edit and get the job done. Rita was the name they gave me. Picture this- NYC born and raised, red pen, no mercy whatsoever. I sent Hillary in twice to negotiate on a paper’s grade, Rita wouldn’t budge on a re-write what so ever. Wow- I have taught in the community college system, I couldn’t believe it. We got what we paid for with Rita. Now the wait is on for the final grade…she is borderline A maybe A-. Cross your fingers. Anything lower…..I may just have a word with her. Just kidding.

I don’t think I have seen anyone more excited to get out of a writing class than Hillary.
No more lectures from me on procrastination, no more strong words of encouragement to get going.

As the semester progressed, she really was not as busy, we maybe should have had her take an additional class, but we didn’t want to overwhelm her. I think that is an important principle to remember….first semester, light load.

Finally, if you are thinking about dual enrolling in community college to do an associates degree before college do it- The one on one interaction with the teachers, the small class sizes, the fact that the teachers are all masters of their subjects is well worth it.

Best choice we have made. Now we are onto next semester, where Hillary will take on World History course, College English, Public Speaking and College Algebra and the lectures from me will begin again.

Old Photos

Joy is finding an old photo of your husband and his Best Friends in college. This was a trip Brian (first row) took to Tag Romney’s (Mitt’s Son) San Diego House when we were in engaged. Just had to post it- Shortly after the trip we were married.