The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Mother

One word...one intention...one focus for 2017... Positive Funny, I'm still not "positive" it's the right word for me this year, but I'm going with it! It's everywhere now, lots of people, websites, books on the concept of one word as an intentional focus for your year, instead of a resolution. This is my 5th year choosing a word to focus my energy on.  My past words have been: happiness, think, peace and believe.  Some years I've done better than others at keeping to my word.  I think from what I've research, I need to make my word more visible; start each day thinking about my word, make an art piece representing my word, a Pinterest Board, journal about it, etc. Now, I kind of feel like I might be cheating a bit because I am generally a positive person anyway. Lately though, I've been feeling a slow drag to the negative side of life, letting things get me down that shouldn't, not always looking for the good in others, feeling lik...

I really love this thing we call "Winter break", as both a teacher and a parent.  Typically, I use the first week off for Christmas prep, and the second week is all about rest and recovery from Christmas. This year was no different.   I settled into the break nicely, balancing down time, fun time, feed them time and prep time.  The t.v. was stuck on the Hallmark Channel for the 5 days before Christmas, one cheesy Christmas movie after another.  This is one of my favorite parts of Christmas for sure.  It's funny too, how each kid took turns watching with me.  They'd just be passing through the family room and then suddenly be hooked. For the first time in 17 years of parenting, I actually had all the presents wrapped during the day on Christmas Eve and was not stuck wrapping into the wee hours of the morning.  I still stayed up late, watching Lacey Chabert in one Hallmark movie or another. Christmas is beginning to change a bit at our house as the...