Fall Changes

Ah, life. I feel like I'm so busy all the time, but when I look back and try to write about what's been going on that's had me so busy, I come up empty-handed. What have I been doing with myself?? I've come to the conclusion that just life in general is busy and crazy. Even when I don't have events going on. And that's okay. Its my life, and I love it. ( :

Not all the time, of course. Well, maybe I shouldn't say that, exactly. Its not that I have true moments when I just hate my life. Hate certain situations, yes. Either way you look at it, I'm not happy-go-lucky all the time. My glass is not always half full.

I'm on the quest to find a new blog to follow. I know, I know, I need another blog to read like I need another hole in my head. But this blog I'm looking for will be different. All of the blogs I follow are written by stay-at-home-moms. And I love that. For them. I'm truly happy that these women can be with their kids every day. And I love that they have enough time to blog so people like me can read and learn from them.

But its hard to relate to SAHMs. And I feel like maybe they can't really relate to women like me, who have to work full-time and still figure out how to manage a family. I would love to be able to stay home with my daughter (and any future kids we may be blessed with), and I would love to eventually homeschool her, but right now that's not a possibility. No, I'm not giving up my dream of doing just that. Maybe one day it'll happen. But its time to stop daydreaming and start living in the here and now.

I'll still follow my beloved blogs by the SAHMs - they are good inspiration for me, and I truly love reading their stuff. I just want to find a good blogger who is a working mama. There's got to be some of us out there, right? Or are we all just too busy to do it all and blog about it? Cause I know that's my problem. I struggle with keeping up with all my normal, every day stuff - throwing a blog into the mix is almost impossible. Which is why this baby doesn't get updated daily. Or even weekly sometimes.

I want to read about someone else who is struggling like I am. Struggling with having to be away from home 50+ hours a week and not having enough time after work to get things done that need to be done. Struggling with the fact that I leave my child every day to be raised by someone else. Struggling with the fact that I miss out on so many moments with her, and that I missed so many of her firsts. Struggling with coming home and trying to be the wife God has called me to be, and the mother He has called me to be, all while being exhausted from working all day. Struggling to cook good meals for my family when I am home just a few waking hours every day. Struggling with wanting to spend time with my daughter after work, but needing to wash clothes and cook supper, etc.

Don't get me wrong, I know SAHMs struggle, too. I know they're busy. I know that. I know when you're home all day with a toddler or a baby its hard to get stuff done, and I know how an entire day can go by without you realizing it. But its still a different struggle. Cause us working moms have to deal with all that, plus our mommy-guilt over not being with our kids all day. At least, I do. Every day, it kills me to leave C with her grandma. Even though I know my MIL is doing an excellent job with her, and C is shaping up to be a nicely mannered girl.

So when I get home at 5:45 with her, I want to just drop everything and play with her, make memories with her, do stuff with her. Instead, I have time to take just a few minutes to talk with her, maybe read a quick story, then I have to rush around and start supper, do laundry, what have you. Otherwise, I'll spend my entire Saturday doing nothing but cleaning. As it is, I spend at least 1-2 hours on Saturdays just cleaning. And I feel guilty for doing that, cause Saturdays are supposed to be our days together. Guilt is so powerful.

Sure, C helps me around the house. She likes to "help" in the kitchen when I cook - but not all the time. She likes to help get clothes out of the dryer, or put them in. She likes to help hang wet clothes on the drying rack. She likes to "sweep" with her little broom while I sweep the house. So we're spending time together, and I have to remind myself that that's what's important. It doesn't really matter what we're doing. And I know that having her help me do housework is good for her.

But some nights I lay her in her bed and think wow, we didn't do anything fun tonight. We just worked. And it makes me sad.


So, I'm gonna make a few changes in my life. (Again. I feel like I am constantly doing that! But I guess that's good, cause it means I am constantly trying to improve myself, right?) Three weeks ago, my iPhone was stolen. (Yeah, that was a fun day.) Since then, my boss hasn't given me a new one. At first, I was pretty bummed, and couldn't wait for a new phone. Now, though, I kind of like it. I didn't realize how attached I was to that thing. I still have my other cell phone, so I've gone back to using it. I can talk and text on it, and that's it. Sometimes it would be nice to have a smart phone (like when I need directions!), but for the most part, I don't need it. Its been nice to be "unplugged" a bit. I don't have my phone attached to my hand at all times anymore, so I'm not constantly checking facebook and my email. Or taking random pictures. I have, however, taken way more "real" photos with my nice camera.

However, I still have the iPad. Its big and bulky and heavy, and I don't like using it, but its easier than my laptop, so I do use it quite a bit now. I don't use it to check email and facebook as much as I was with the phone, but I still do it more than necessary. So I'm gonna put a stop to that. Starting tonight. Tonight, I will not touch the iPad until I'm rocking C to sleep. Instead of taking a few minutes after supper (and before bath time) to scroll through facebook, I'm gonna play with my daughter. I'm gonna squeeze in as much time with her as possible. When she's asleep and I lay her down, I'm gonna put the iPad away for the night. If I don't go right to bed, I'm gonna talk to my husband. Instead of ignoring him like its so easy for me to do.

And tomorrow morning when I'm eating my breakfast, instead of opening up the iPad and checking facebook and Instagram, I'm gonna do a Bible study. It just hit me earlier today that during breakfast is the perfect time for me to do Bible study. I always eat alone, since DH is gone by then and C's not up yet, but every morning I eat and stare at the iPad. I attempt to do Bible study at night, after C is asleep, but I'm normally too exhausted to do it then, and some nights I don't even lay her down until 11 or after, then I need to get to sleep myself. So breakfast and Bible study it is. I'm kinda excited to start tomorrow. And I wish I had thought of this sooner!

What else? Well, I'm finally gonna make a budget. I've been talking about it for a year almost, and its time to get serious. That's my plan tonight, actually. I want to sit down with DH and get him to help me. I want to be smarter with my money. Even if I'm never able to be a SAHM, I need to do this. And if I'm ever gonna be able to be a SAHM, I need to do this. No matter how you look at it, I need to do this!

Starting this week, I'm also gonna get back into meal planning. I haven't done it for several months, and supper time has been so stressful. This time, though, I want to do it a little differently. I want to meal plan and shop accordingly. The last time I did meal planning, I just planned meals based on what we had already. Which was fine, and its a good way to go through your pantry/freezer/frigde. I'll be doing that again, and then when its time to buy groceries, I want to shop with a plan of what we'll be cooking. Eventually, I want to try once a month shopping, but at first I think weekly or hopefully bi-weekly shopping will do. We need to cut out these little quick grocery store trips. And I want to cut out all this eating out we've been doing lately. (Well, its only once a week or so, but it adds up!)

The last change I want to make is to employ a home management schedule. I started one a while back and stuck to it for a while, but for whatever reason I just abandoned it. I need to go back and think on that, figure out what went wrong so I don't make the same mistakes this time around. My house cleaning goal is to do a little bit every day, so that I can have the weekends to have fun. A little cleaning on Saturdays is okay, but I don't want to be doing heavy cleaning every Saturday. Plus, more often than not, I end up gone for at least part of the day on Saturdays, so my house needs to be in order prior to that.

In reality, I end up just doing the bare minimum during the week (keeping the kitchen clean, washing clothes, sweeping - which is a daily task for me), and on Saturday mornings I find myself having to vacuum, dust, clean the bathrooms, etc. Luckily, it doesn't take me all day since I live in a small house. But I feel like I could be using my time better during the week.

No, I don't have a lot of time between the time I get home from work and the time I put C to bed, and I want to spend as much time with her as possible, but I also want to spend as much time with her on Saturdays as possible. If that means sacrificing just a few more minutes with her each night to do something quick (like wiping down the bathrooms so they don't need to be scrubbed on the weekend), then so be it. More likely, it'll mean "sacrificing" a few minutes on facebook each evening. I can do that. I'm already halfway there, since I don't have the easy temptation of the iPhone to deal with anymore. I can do it!

Okay, normally when I write things down and blog about it, I do it. Hopefully that'll be the case this time. This blog will hold me accountable, like it has for so many other things before. Wish me luck! Oh, and if you know of any bloggers who are in my situation, please share! Cause I truly want to read about other women like me! ( :

Fresh

This is officially the last post about my living room curtains. (Insert fanfare here.) I made my decision on Friday, and as soon as I got home that afternoon I took "before" pictures, then hung the new curtains. And was extremely pleased with how they looked!

Not much to say here, so I'll let the pictures speak for themselves. ( :

Before:

You'll have to excuse the multitude of pink toys in here. I've tried several different storage/organization solutions for them, but nothing has worked. So I gave up! Normally, C's toys are confined to that one space. She's good about picking up after herself (most of the time). So I've learned to just live with it. Our house will not be featured in any magazines, and we actually live here, and this is our life. ( :

And now for the "after" pictures! (Sorry, I was having trouble getting great shots. The lighting was terrible! But you can get the idea.)

What do you think? Its a HUGE difference to me. The new curtains make the whole room look lighter, more fresh. And a little bit more modern. Which is not really my style, but I like the little touch of it here. In the store, these curtains looked off-white, so I was a little worried they would look dingy next to the white trim, curtain rod, and ceiling in the room, but they look white in there.

For now, we're still living with the old throw pillows on the couch. One is red stripes and the other is green stripes. (The couch is on the opposite side of the window.) I'm gonna take my time and find pillows that I really love. Or just some pretty fabric and make my own covers.

At Christmastime, I'll probably swap out the new curtains for the old red ones. Because I really do love the way the red curtains look during the holiday season, especially with a pretty Christmas tree right next to them! ( :

And that, my friends, is THE END of the story of my living room curtains! ( :

Decision Made!

I promise, I am almost done talking about my living room curtain situation! ( :

When I get something on my mind to do, I want to do it NOW. It consumes my every waking (and sleeping) thought - well, not quite, but it feels like it! I might have an idea to do something and hang onto it for a few months (or even years), but once I make the decision to do it, I want it DONE. Like ASAP. I guess there are worse character traits to have, right?

So this is why I've been obsessing over my living room curtains this entire week. Every night while rocking C to sleep I imagine what new (blue) curtains will look like in there. I've thought about it and thought about it. And thought about it. Even though I can see it plain as day in my head, I know blue curtains in there might actually look ridiculous. Which is why I've been hesitant to buy the ones I've been blogging about all week. (Sorry.)

I had the bright idea the other day that making my own curtains might be cheaper. I researched no sew tutorials and felt confidant that I could handle it myself. I'm pretty handy with an iron (haha). So today on my lunch break I hit up all the fabric stores in town. I just knew I'd find the perfect fabric and it would be the perfect price.

Yeah, right!!

I was completely overwhelmed in the first store. So many fabrics in there...I'll probably dream about that tonight. I looked and looked, but nothing was screaming I'm the one! at me. On I went to the next store. I actually found a fabric I was in love with. It was an outdoor fabric, but I figured that doesn't matter. It was a gorgeous blue and white pattern, similar to the blue curtains I had picked out at Lowe's this week. Unfortunately, it was $18 per yard. Way too pricey. My goal was to make the curtains myself if I could make them cheaper than I could buy them ready-made. At the third store, I didn't find a single thing I liked. My friend J suggested shopping online, but I wanted something TODAY. I either wanted to hang curtains tonight, or start making them tomorrow.

So I headed back to Lowe's. I looked through all their curtains, just to make sure there was nothing else there that caught my eye. Thank goodness I did that! I stumbled across these beauties:

(That's a picture of the packaging.) The design is navy blue. Once I saw them, I was torn between them and the original blue ones I liked.

Furious text messaging with a few friends ensued. I even grabbed a Lowe's employee and demanded her opinion! I probably hemmed and hawed over these dang curtains for a good 10 minutes. I was leaning towards the pattern on the left, but I kept thinking, what if I regret not getting the other blue ones?? (I know, first-world problems, right?!)

In the end, everyone I asked voted for the one on the left in the picture above. And the more I thought about it, the more it made sense. Since that blue is a true navy, it will be easier to match. The other blue is more of an indigo. While I love the pattern and the color, it will probably be frustrating to find fabric or pillows in that color - and that will drive me nuts (just like my wall color does when it comes to decorating!).

Plus, there was a nice price break with the new pattern: $19.95 versus $26.95 per panel. Sold!

I can't wait to get home and put these babies up to see how they look. I hope I'm not disappointed. Its gonna be tragic to have this much lead way and then totally hate them in my living room! We shall see. And then, I promise, that will be the last time I talk about my living room curtains! ( :

Again With The Curtains

Still trying to make up my mind on the curtains for the living room. I'm still in love with the blue ones I posted about earlier this week. Actually, I'm still in love with the multi-colored floral ones, too, but they're definitely out of the running (sadly).

Monday night, I showed DH the pictures of the 4 curtains I had selected from Lowe's. He immediately nixed the multi-colored floral pattern. Its pretty girlie, so I didn't argue with him. Its his house, too, and while I have the main "pull" when it comes to decorating, I don't like to do things that he absolutely hates. (Although I do put my foot down on some things, like colored walls. When we were fixing up our house before we got married and moved in, DH wanted every room to be painted white. Boooooriiiing!! I knew I'd hate plain white walls everywhere. So I put my foot down and said we were having colored walls - and a different color in every room! After we were done painting, DH admitted it looked good. Boo-ya.) Anyway, he wasn't in love with the brown and green floral curtains, either. But the blue ones, he seemed to actually like!

Of course, he immediately said I don't need to be spending money on things like that right now. He's right, which is why I haven't ran back to Lowe's to purchase those babies yet. Then he said "and what else will you have to buy after you get new curtains? Pillows for the couch??" Umm....well, I can't exactly have the same red and green striped ones if I get blue curtains, now can I? ( ; He just rolled his eyes. Which means if I come up with the money for this little upgrade, I'm good to go.

I have dreamt of curtains every night this week. I'm such a nerd! But I'm still basking in the fact that this is the biggest decision I have to make right now. Something so trivial and meaningless. Its wonderful. ( :

BUT, I am now havin a hangup over these darn blue curtains. My mother pointed out that they don't "match" my rug. Grr. Do curtains have to match the rug??! The colors "go" just fine, but now I'm concerned that there will be too many prints goin on so close together... Help me decide!

The middle picture there is what my floors in the living room look like. And there's my rug. A new rug is completely off the table. The curtains won't be touching the rug; there is maybe a foot or so of exposed floor between the rug and the curtains. Does it matter, though? I can't decide!

These blue curtains have opened up a whole new world of decorating in my living room. I'm kicking myself for not considering blues before now. So I may keep looking for a subtler pattern in the same rich blue color. Or I may go to the cloth store and see if a blue fabric sings to me, and have someone make curtains for me. (Or find an easy DIY tutorial online...hmmmmm!) That would probably be the cheapest route, huh?

Regardless of what I decide for the curtains, blue is gonna play a part in this room eventually. Lately, I've been obsessed with peacock colors. I don't have anything in my house in those colors, but I find myself admiring decor in them. So my plan is to make a wreath for the front door with peacock feathers and flowers in that color family! I can see it in my head, and if money wasn't an object, I'd have already started on that little project. ( ;

So, yay or nay on these particular blue curtains??

New Projects!

Today on my lunch break I did some exciting things! Okay, so they probably aren't exciting for anyone but me, but that's okay. ( ;

First, I headed to Lowe's to look at curtains. Lately, I've been itching to get new curtains in the living room. We've had the same ones since we moved in (going on 5 years!). I've never really loved our curtains, they've just always "worked" and I haven't looked too hard or been too inspired to think about it much. DH actually picked them out. There's absolutely nothing wrong with them, they just haven't been "the ones" for me (haha). I read a ton of blogs, and I've really been inspired lately by all the gorgeous curtains I'm seeing in other people's houses. All I've ever know is simple, single-color curtains, or those really country lookin ones with lots of ruffles (shudder). Or maybe lace panels, which is totally not the look of my living room. Anyway, here's what we have now. Please excuse the Christmas picture, I don't have just a picture of my curtains (yet).

Its hard to see in this shot, but the curtains actually have green in the plaid, and it matches perfectly with our walls. (Our walls are pained La Fonda Plaza Green by Valspar, by the way.) I am in love with our wall color. It was a bold choice, but I've never once regretted it. I get so many compliments on this color! It is hard to decorate, though. Its such a specific green color that I can't just go to a store and find something that matches. Which is why our couch and chairs are just brown. Safe. The pillows on our couch are striped - one is green stripes and one is red stripes. It sounds hideous, but I promise it looks good! I think I'm just tired of all the red in here. It constantly feels like Christmas, you know?

I'm ready for new curtains (and new throw pillows, of course!). I want a different look in this room, and with such a big window area, curtains will quickly do the job. I've been casually looking for a few weeks now. Saturday afternoon I looked at Lowe's website and decided today to see it all in person. I found 4 curtains that I love.

Completely different looks, huh? The flash of green in each picture is the color of my walls. Luckily, Valspar still makes that color. I think I can eliminate the green and tan flowers on the lower left - too plain, and I want more color. I worry that the red flowers on the top right will be too much red for me again.

I am totally in love with the bold floral pattern (bottom right), but worry that the greens will clash. What do you think? If the greens "go" together, I think it would be so fresh to see these hangin around my windows! It would also open up a lot of color options for me to decorate with. I could do throw pillows in several of those colors to tie them to the other side of the room...

Finally, the blue. For some reason, it has never occurred to me to use blue in my living room. I thought my options were green, white, or brown/tan. (I also love the way yellow looks with green, but that's too much like John Deere for us red tractor lovers! lol) Orange would look nice with the green, but I'd get tired of that I know. But blue....I'm kinda diggin how it looks! My friend R says the blue curtains may be a bit too formal for my space. But maybe that's just what I need in there to balance out the countriness of the room. I do love that its a classic pattern and so crisp. And I could do blue throw pillows on the couch...

I'd welcome any opinions from blogger land on this! Help me choose my curtains! ( :

Keeping with the decorating theme....I also stopped by Michael's today. This morning I read a post by a blog called A Beautiful Mess about preparing for fall. Fall is my favorite season, though it unfortunately doesn't last long around here. We go straight from the dog days of summer to the bitter cold of winter (even though Northerners would argue that winters in North Carolina are not so "bitter"), it seems. I like to decorate the house for fall as soon as possible - which means I decorated on Saturday. ( : I have a ton of fall floral arrangements that come out of hiding this time of year. Anyway, the girls at ABM linked to an older post of theirs about making a fall wreath and it really inspired me. Its never occurred to me to make my own wreath before. I have an every-day wreath that hangs on the back of the living room door (our door stays shut most of the time to keep the cool air in) and a Christmas wreath (both of which my aunt made for me), but a fall wreath? When I saw this DIY tutorial I knew I had to have one.

While I was at Michael's, I took note of their fall wreaths. 40 bucks for the same size I wanted! No, thanks. I can make it cheaper than that, I know. I gathered my materials and it turns out that I can make a wreath for around $25. I splurged a little and bought some extra goodies to throw in there. ( ; I can't wait to get started! I probably bought way too many flowers, too, so $25 is probably overstating it. I'll definitely share the final result, hopefully later this week. I wanna get this baby hanging on the door ASAP!

I also went to Target today. (Target and Michael's - a deadly combination for someone with little money to spend!!) I needed some hair spray (since I am not pleased with the Not Your Mother's spray), but of course I had to look around while I was there. I ended up buying a few things for C: a few new puzzles (which I think are good for her brain), some watercolor pages to paint, and this:

I am super excited about this! (Even more so cause it was on clearance, haha.) I'm sure there are better preschool books out there, but this one looks pretty good to me. Some of it I think will be a little too advanced for C right now, but a lot of it she can dive right into: Colors, Shapes, Patterns, Pre-writing, Letters and Sounds, Beginning Writing, Reading Readiness, Early Math, Science, Social Studies.

C won't be going to preschool, but I want her to learn what she can before kindergarten. If I was a stay-at-home-mom I'd definitely have a daily plan for this in place by now. As it is, though, we'll just do what we can, when we can. She loves learning, so I know she'll enjoy this. I'll probably make some sort of binder for all this, and make copies of each page so she can do them more than once. And I'll probably send some with her to my mother-in-law's house so they can do some work there. I figure the more she knows by the time she'd ready for kindergarten, the better off she'll be. Especially because more than likely, she'll be heading to kindergarten when she's just 4. Her birthday is in December, and if we hold her back until the next year (when she's almost 6), she'll be one of the oldest in her class, and I think she'll be underchallenged and bored at that point. She already knows all her letters and their sounds, and a bunch of colors and shapes, and some numbers. So I feel like she's already ahead of the game. Maybe I'm rushing it with a preschool program, but I don't think so. I think my kid is kinda gifted and needs to be challenged. We'll see how it goes. I can't wait!

Lots of new stuff goin down around here. Exciting! ( :