Carving out time...

My blog has obviously taken a backseat as evidenced by my three week lapse in blogging. Free time isn't all that common these days as one might expect with a new baby around. However, I can't complain. I shower most days, the house is fairly clean and I even fit in a little exercise here and there. I'd say overall things are pretty darn good. Sure we have our struggles but we had those pre-baby too.

. 
All five of us actually got out of the house together for something other than church. We traveled to Ames, ate at Hickory Park and went to an ISU basketball game. We also made the rounds to four different cities for Thanksgiving with minimal drama. We are slowly figuring out this new life. Slowly.

My week days are filled with lots of time with these two.


If CJ is within earshot then Natalie is searching for her. There is strong mutual adoration between these girls. 



Really everyone has got it together pretty well around here. I'm probably the slowest to change. I still wear sweats more often than jeans. (It would help if my jeans would actually fit.) I let the dishes sit a little longer in the sink and laundry typically stays crumpled in baskets rather than finding their way into actual dresser drawers. I keep telling myself it's time to get some real order. You know, the wake-up and exercise, shower and conquer the day type routine that I used to live. But for some reason I'm just not ready for that yet. Maybe I'll give it a try next week.


I turned a year older last week so maybe that is part of my laziness. Age doesn't agree with me? Getting older makes me tired? Eh, whatever it is I'll get it figured out. In the meantime I imagine some serious lag time will continue to exist between blog posts. I'll just keep trying to snap cute pictures so I have something to share next time I carve out time to write.


I can't take credit for this one. Both the nap and the photo are Matt's handiwork. Too bad the cat tried to tiptoe over her a few minutes later and her beautiful nap turned to unhappy cries.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

October things...

Image
It has not been the easiest October on record. Kate had a couple of hospital visits to Rochester but she is somewhat better at the moment. She continues with chemotherapy and has not been back to school for quite some time but she is doing her best to set aside time for online school work between naps, loving on cats, and hanging out with her family. I was able to get the girls to visit their great grandma in western Iowa a few weeks back. Here's Claudia shortly after arriving at great grandma's house. She is very into jewelry and lots of it. Grandma had several questions for her about the number of bracelets and thankfully Claudia loves talking about them. Many she has made, some were gifted to her...it's a lovely hodgepodge of middle school girl goodies. Clearly the girls and I were blessed with height genes from relatives not named great grandma. We spent time relaxing, taking four wheeler rides, eating candy and we also received a visit from my aunt and uncle. Aunt Deb
Read more

The dark day of June 27th...

 June 12, 2023 We typically don't share a lot of updates about Kate's health, primarily because she wants to remain "a normal teenager." However, we still get asked how Kate is doing and I started thinking maybe it's okay to share updates now and again. Most people care about her and our family, some others could maybe be labeled as "tragedy junkies," but I'm going to operate under the assumption that most people have the best of intentions.  Today is June 12th and we are quickly approaching the dreaded dark day of June 27th. Have you watched, "Gilmore Girls?" It's a witty, comforting television show from the early 2000's. In it one of the main characters has what is dubbed, "a dark day." This is a day the character dreads each year and in response he goes into hiding from the world with no communication. Well for Kate, and the rest of us to some degree, the dark day of the year is June 27th and that date is closing in on
Read more

The other side of the dark day...

 Kate's dark day of Jun 27th came and went like any other day. Kate swam 100 fly in the Independence meet and finished 1st (she was the only swimmer in her age group to sign up, but who cares about details) and then she and Matt hopped in the car to drive up to Rochester for next-day appointments. The worst part of Kate's dark day was probably Matt trying out the Grimace meal at McDonald's. It was death by milkshake and yet he drank the whole thing. Can't let food go to waste, or something.  We braved June 27th with dread and came out on the other side. We enter year three into the cancer life. Two years of appointments, scans, blood draws, IVs, endless chemotherapies, daily medications. It is difficult to remember life before all of this, when Kate was able to get up at 6 a.m. to swim, play basketball, ride her bike, go to school and chase her sisters. We've all adapted even though no one wants to. Hand to God I keep hoping to have a tantrum and wake up from whatev
Read more