Red Letter Day

lI had a great week this week.  I am finished with PAWS testing at the Jr. High.  Although I will miss the association with the people I have worked with this past month, it will be great to have a day off once in a while. 

Friday turned out to be a red letter day for us.  It was my daughters’ tenth birthday so we got to go to Chuckecheeses and uild a Bear Workshop.  We went to Billings to watch Michael test for his blackbelt. 

He did such a good job.  I am proud of his ability to set this goal for himself and put in the work required to achieve it.  He is an awesome young man and I am really excited for him. 

National Nap Day

March 15th was national nap day, I am sure it is because the day before, March 14th was the first day of daylight savings time. 

National nap day, was never so poignant as it was this year.  I get up unreasonably early as it is.  I wake up at 5:30 a.m. and exercise for about a half hour, then I get showered and dressed for the day. On the 15th, (the first day back to work after daylight savings time), my husband woke me up and said “5:30, time to hit it.”  I drug my sorry self out of bed and headed downstairs to my elliptical.  It was a hard work out, I was so tired.  I couldn’t believe how much difference an hour less of sleep made.  I drug myself upstairs and showered.  About an hour after I got up, I flipped open my computer to check my email.  I glanced down at the clock,  it said 5:30.  Crap, my computer hadn’t switched, maybe this was because the idiots in Washington keep moving daylight savings time up.  Just then my phone rang, it was my husband.  “What time does the clock say”, he asked.  “My computer says 5:30”, I responded.  “So does my car clock”.  I sat there in stunned silence.  It was 5:30 in the morning, and I had already been up for an hour.  That means in real time, like two day ago time I got up at 3:30.  Unreal, nightmarish, horrendous. 

I was going to be  tired all day and there was nothing to it.  I pulled myself together and managed to head to work .  On the radio in my car, they announced that it was ‘national nap day’.  How appropriate, and also how wonderful.  My day brightened immediately.  I usually don’t have time for the luxury of a nap, but if it was ‘national nap day’ who could refuse me, how could I possibly ignore this.  It was perfect.  It was going to be a good day after all.  Well starting about 6:30 p.m., after I got my national nap.     

Spring is here

What a beautiful week we have had.  We even had snow one day, but it warmed up and melted by noon.  Mud season is pretty much over and I have been able to go back to weekly floor mopping instead of daily mopping. 

My daughter has been playing outside constantly.  She throws her backpack in the back door and takes off.  I remember those days.  I remember being a kid as the days got longer, when it was almost impossible to go inside and go to bed.  It seemed almost sacrilegious to waste a great spring evening sleeping.

Daylight savings starts tomorrow, it is going to be hard to get up, but I am going to love the long evenings.  My mood has magically lifted and everything seems better, just because of the sun.  So bring it on, I am ready, I have been ready since September. 

Here comes the sun!

Getting Old

I had big plans for myself when I grew up.  I remember thinking that if I had to get old, I would at least go full out.  The interesting thing is, as I have gotten older, I have noticed that the things I was interested in, no longer interest me.  I think this is because, I don’t have time, energy or money to do the things I thought I would die if I couldn’t.  I thought I would love to travel the world, write books, plant huge gardens, maybe have a green house, have a perfect house, run marathons etc, etc.  Reality hits and I have found that life isn’t so bad without all of the big dreams.  I have found pleasure in much simpler things. 

Lets just say, it doesn’t take much to make me happy.  A clean dining room floor makes me smile.  A little girl with bobbed hair skipping off of the bus, a drive with the window down, a good song on the radio, a sunny day, a good book with time to read, a 30 min. ride on my elliptical, a phone call from a daughter or sister, a free class period at school.  I know this sounds boring.  It sounded boring to me when I was younger also.  I was determined to be different, special and bigger than life.

Life hasn’t turned out that way, life is just full of simple things, and great kids.  The horrible boring life I was anxious to avoid when I was younger, has been my bliss in middle age.  Thank goodness that the small decisions that I made growing up, lead to this simple, ordinary, wonderful life.