My beautiful sister-in-law threw me a baby shower today. It was a wonderful, relaxed one and good friends came. We didn’t have a lot of people but it was really nice to have one nonetheless. I am reall thankful that they came all this way just for us and played with David so much too. She bought some yummmy food and did some traditions from each family member.
Here’s my brother in law, Danny, and David.
Here’s a tradition my other sister in law, Andee, does: we gave candles to everyone so they could light them when I am in labor.
One from Lelia herself: she bought stickers and got the guests to pick the ones they liked and write some words on a picture frame so when the baby comes we can put the photo in it with everyone’s sentiments around it.
And finally one from my sister: a sheet torn by everyone and then candy wrapped in it.
And that’s it. I hope your day was as nice as mine.
Did you know there will be Friday the 13ths this year? We’ve already had one in January and here’s the second one and we will have another one November. So if you believe it’s unlucky, you’re in for a long year.
I hadn’t had tulips in a week or so, I missed them. Look at all the colors. It’s just so stunning to me. Even though it doesn’t even smell, I love it nonetheless.
Not feeling up to saying much today, so I will leave you with a lego shot I took at David’s school. Happy Friday.
This week’s question was “name 5 movies that inspire you creatively…”
I’ve had to think about this one for a long long time for some reason. At first, I thought about my favorite movies but then I reread the question and it talks about creative inspiration. Then, the first thing that came to my mind were these set of three movies made by a Polish director called Red, White, and Blue. So I decided instead of choosing five, I’ll just stick to this trilogy.
This week’s technique was fragments. I honestly had no idea what to do with them so it was an interesting challenge for me. I went through all my scraps and picked all the red, white, and blue paper I had and glued them to the back of the fragments and then just had fun with it. I painted the tag with denim distress ink and then embossed it with clear, shiny embossing powder. The fragments I had were the ones with the holes so I tried to align them interestingly. I am not sure how I feel about the outcome but it was fun. I am sorry the photo didn’t turn out that well, especially the butterfly.
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I am combining Emily Falconbridge’s art journal questions with trying a new technique each week. You can see the full list: here
I love this smile. I spent some time with David at school this morning. I love watching him work his way through the class, seeing the activities he chooses, the way he interacts with the kids. It’s nice to get to see how he’s with his peers as opposed to us.
Started on the tag last night. Finally picked the theme and the technique but I am not finished yet. Not sure if I love it, but the point is to experiment and I certainly have been experimenting.
One week left to my Big Picture Scrapbooking course, Telling Stories Deeply. I am really excited and nervous. You can get more detail here and of course you can ask me questions as much as you need. I hope to see you in my class!
Another school shot today. I love watching David at school. Many days I am loathe to leave him and go to a meeting.
We’re halfway through the week already and I feel like I’ve accomplished too little. My wonderful brother in law is coming to town tomorrow so I am excited to see him and his wife is coming on Friday. I haven’t seen her in so long and she’s so wonderful that I can’t wait to see them. They’re flying across the country just to throw me a baby shower, aren’t they the nicest people in the world?
I’ve been thinking about my tenth tag but I haven’t decided exactly what to do yet and even what technique to use. We’ll see when and if inspiration strikes. It doesn’t strike very often laltely.
Lately, I’ve been thinking about the power of expectations. Or more like the downside of having too many of them. I’ve decided that one of the biggest contributors to unhappiness is when expectations don’t align with reality.
When I was pregnant with David, Jake and I took a baby prep class and a month after our kids were due, we all came back to the same hospital to meet and talk about our babies and how things went, etc. We noticed, at the time, that the couples who had an unexpected problem (however small it was) felt like their hospital/birth experience was terrible and in the cases where everything went smootly, the parents thought the hospital was amazing. There might have been some cases where the staff varied enough to cause this, but I really think it had more to do with the alignment of expectations vs reality. If you go into it thinking you’ll have a one night stay at the hospital and end up having to stay 3 days, suddenly it’s the hospital’s fault or something went wrong. Instead of focusing on the good, like how your baby is healthy, you focus on how things didn’t go as planned.
This is true in the smallest things in life like getting caught in a red light when you expect to be somewhere at some particular time. It’s also true in the biggest things like career, love, home, etc.
I’ve been trying to figure out what this means to me. Do I lower my expectations? Do I purposefully not set expectations? But aren’t expectations also a bit of a driving-force behind acheivement? How are they different from goals? I am not entirely sure of the answers. But I did decide that I will spend more time thinking about the crux of the issue and try to figure out what matters most to me and hope that, that particular thing goes well and try to refrain from having any more expectations than that. So, for example, concentrate on having a healthy and happy baby and let go of getting to control the timinig, location, and other, smaller issues.Or focus on getting somewhere safely even if it means I have to be a few minutes late. Cause safety matters more. Spend the extra few seconds to hug or calm David down even if it means I get that much less sleep.
I guess it’s a way of learning that you can’t have it all and you should stop expecting it. And it’s also taking your expectations, especially the subconscious ones where you just take things for granted, and living each day more aware of them and making sure you’re not expecting more than what’s realistic and, more significantly, more than what matters.
Today’s the Purim celebration at David’s school so all the kids and the teachers were dressed up in costume. Being the great mom that I am, I completely forgot. So I was really thankful when the teachers put together this quickie for David. He even had a crown and all. But he said he’s not “king David” he’s a prince.
I’ve also been meaning to write this little story that happened between us last week. It was one of those nights Jake was working late so I had put David to bed and he was being whiny and I was almost at the end of my patience and took a deep breath to make sure I wouldn’t blow up at him and changed course. So I slowed down and said “I’m so happy you’re my son, David. I love you. Thank you for being my son.” There were a few moments of quiet and then he said “You’re welcome.” and then he said “I’m so happy you’re my Mommy.” It made me feel so much better and it made me realize the importance of taking a breath and stepping back every now and then.
On another note, today’s my best friend Levent’s birthday! Happy Birthday my wonderful friend, I love you!!
Another fun day at school. David was elated to find out that he can cut the little piece of foam. Small things make him so happy. Of course, on the other side of the same coin, small things set him off too.
A long day today as Mondays are for me but then the week gets lighter so I know that I just have to get through today. Not much else to write so far today.
Daddy’s back and it has brought much rejoicing into our household. It’s wonderful to have our wholefamily together. David was so happy, he kept giving him hugs all day long.
I had planned to take the whole day off and just relax and be with Jake and David and not worry about getting things done and it’s been a lovely day so far. Despite the strong heartburn, I feel calmer and more positive than yesterday.
The household is quiet as everyone takes a nap and relaxes on this Sunny Sunday. I finished the latest Grisham novel I was reading and honestly it was so bad that by the end of it I was mad at him for taking my time and wasting it like that. Who wants a “whoddunnit” novel that doesn’t actually tell you who did it. What a waste of hours I won’t ever get back.
Off to read another book and take a short nap myself. Hope you’re having a happy weekend.
My words:
I’ve always been a worrier. All the time and about everything. When I was pregnant with my first baby, I put a sign over my door that said “give up that there’s something wrong.” and I looked at it every day. Over the last four years, I’ve gone up and down on this. And this year, I’ve decided to put extra focus on achieving peace and letting go of worry. Though, I must admit the relatively rough pregnancy hasn’t helped a lot, I really have been working hard at letting it go. If there’s one thing I’d love to learn, it’s letting go of worry.
Technique Highlight:
This piece is inspired by the amazing Kelly Rae Roberts. I used several of the techniques she teaches in her book “Taking Flight.” The wings have glitter glue on them that makes them shine and they are made out of wire and tissue paper.
The rain has finally stopped and I am really glad. It was starting to get to me. The nice thing about all this rain is that it makes some beautiful greens in the backyard.
A relatively productive day today. I did two catalysts, a bunch of laundry, read some, played with David a bunch, and prepared tomorrow’s catalyst for posting. However, it was also a pretty rough day emotionally. I seem to be up and down a lot and maybe suffering from a bit of this. Hoping to go to bed in a few minutes and get a good night of rest. It’s amazing what some rest can do.
Jake comes back tonight and I am excited to see him. I miss him when he’s gone. I know many women like taking time off but I seem to be happiest when my kid and my husband are around me. Even if it’s more work, I just love having their presence.
As someone who struggles with feeling creative constantly, I found this to be an inspiring and thought-provoking lecture. It’s worth the 20-minutes of your time. [thanks to viv who led me to the link]
Also, I loved Eat, Pray, Love and look forward to her next book.
