Let me give a mini-intro here. I have not really had time to blog because I have been busy entertaining my visiting mother-in-law. She leaves in less than a week, and to be honest, I am pretty bummed. But that is another blog post. Here is what I wanted to talk about today:
Some days, I feel silly and hilarious. So I write blogs that are silly and hilarious. Sometimes I feel artsy, or clever, or informative...so I post blogs that reflect that.
Today I feel none of those things.
As I am writing this, we are finishing up a super late breakfast and I am trying to enjoy a reasonably low-volume cup of coffee. I want to drink my coffee without hearing yelling, screaming, squealing, crying, fighting, animal noises, stories about angry trolls, ecstatic ideas from a 4-year-old, or silly songs that increase in volume at each verse. call me a miser. I like my coffee how I like my men - quiet right now.
Most of those things I described are happening now. I cannot comprehend facebook status updates. I cannot read my favorite blogs. I cannot even remember what I needed to get done on the computer. And, needless to say, I keep forgetting that my coffee is there, so it is getting cold.
I will reheat this same cup of coffee fifteen times today.
That may be an exaggeration.
Or it may not.
Trying to get my brood of babes to be quiet for a good ten minutes straight is interrupting my work. It is taking up so much time and effort, I find myself becoming increasingly frustrated and angry.
Pretty soon I am the one yelling.
My coffee is so cold, I am pretty sure it has developed ice crystals.
I finally shoo the kids off to their room in an attempt to blow through 30 minutes worth of internet time in five.
But the baby has finish throwing his food on the floor and he is bored. So I have to feed him (the real stuff - booby!) and clean up his mess.
At this point, I make a guttural pirate sound and rise from my seat.
Now I can see what's behind my laptop screen - and it isn't pretty. Apparently all those song lyrics about angry trolls jumping on the bridge was literally translated as crunchy toast jumping on crunchy toast and it has left damage to be dealt with all over my table. I'm furiously tranforming into Hurricane Ireallydon'twanttocleanthisup. My thirty minutes of work is overshadowed by the now-30-minutes of cleaning up breaksfast.
In the ten seconds it takes for me to think about whether I should clean or write first, the baby sounds off like a siren - and not the beautiful, alluring one. More like the "holy crap, there's a fire" one. And just as I sigh, knowing I'm going to have to at least take care of him first, I hear the creak of the kids' door and the tiptoes as Rowan whispers, "shh...let's sneak past the mommy troll!!!"
Okay okay....so when it is all filtered down into the plain, obvious truth - I waste a lot of time trying sweep my kids under the rug so I can do things that I need/want to get done. I don't think there is anything wrong with trying to get stuff done or even enjoying "mommy" time. The problem lies in the fact that when the day is planned out, you get the time you need for those things, the kids get the time they need bugging - I mean playing with you, and all the housework gets done.
I don't think it was the Lord's intention to give us children so we could never enjoy peace and quiet again. But having children is something we all have to learn to adapt to. Rather than spending day after day still trying to read that one funny blog your friend told you about, and trying to get your freaking loud children to quiet down, it makes so much more sense to spend time with them FIRST, clean up WITH them, sit down to a movie together, and then when they settle a little, read your dumb blog.
I am still learning to prioritize and use my time wisely. When it's not planned out, I spend well over thirty minutes trying to do five minutes worth of work. And that one is unfortunately not an exaggeration. The days that we stuck to a schedule, even the first draft that was not very well thought out, everything had a time slot and I did all that I needed to with time to spare!
So basically, if you find yourself fighting with all of your strength to accomplish tasks for you, you are a good candidate for scheduling. Trust me, it will make things so much easier in the long run.
I'm gonna go heat up my coffee.
Some days, I feel silly and hilarious. So I write blogs that are silly and hilarious. Sometimes I feel artsy, or clever, or informative...so I post blogs that reflect that.
Today I feel none of those things.
As I am writing this, we are finishing up a super late breakfast and I am trying to enjoy a reasonably low-volume cup of coffee. I want to drink my coffee without hearing yelling, screaming, squealing, crying, fighting, animal noises, stories about angry trolls, ecstatic ideas from a 4-year-old, or silly songs that increase in volume at each verse. call me a miser. I like my coffee how I like my men - quiet right now.
Most of those things I described are happening now. I cannot comprehend facebook status updates. I cannot read my favorite blogs. I cannot even remember what I needed to get done on the computer. And, needless to say, I keep forgetting that my coffee is there, so it is getting cold.
I will reheat this same cup of coffee fifteen times today.
That may be an exaggeration.
Or it may not.
Trying to get my brood of babes to be quiet for a good ten minutes straight is interrupting my work. It is taking up so much time and effort, I find myself becoming increasingly frustrated and angry.
Pretty soon I am the one yelling.
My coffee is so cold, I am pretty sure it has developed ice crystals.
I finally shoo the kids off to their room in an attempt to blow through 30 minutes worth of internet time in five.
But the baby has finish throwing his food on the floor and he is bored. So I have to feed him (the real stuff - booby!) and clean up his mess.
At this point, I make a guttural pirate sound and rise from my seat.
Now I can see what's behind my laptop screen - and it isn't pretty. Apparently all those song lyrics about angry trolls jumping on the bridge was literally translated as crunchy toast jumping on crunchy toast and it has left damage to be dealt with all over my table. I'm furiously tranforming into Hurricane Ireallydon'twanttocleanthisup. My thirty minutes of work is overshadowed by the now-30-minutes of cleaning up breaksfast.
In the ten seconds it takes for me to think about whether I should clean or write first, the baby sounds off like a siren - and not the beautiful, alluring one. More like the "holy crap, there's a fire" one. And just as I sigh, knowing I'm going to have to at least take care of him first, I hear the creak of the kids' door and the tiptoes as Rowan whispers, "shh...let's sneak past the mommy troll!!!"
Okay okay....so when it is all filtered down into the plain, obvious truth - I waste a lot of time trying sweep my kids under the rug so I can do things that I need/want to get done. I don't think there is anything wrong with trying to get stuff done or even enjoying "mommy" time. The problem lies in the fact that when the day is planned out, you get the time you need for those things, the kids get the time they need bugging - I mean playing with you, and all the housework gets done.
I don't think it was the Lord's intention to give us children so we could never enjoy peace and quiet again. But having children is something we all have to learn to adapt to. Rather than spending day after day still trying to read that one funny blog your friend told you about, and trying to get your freaking loud children to quiet down, it makes so much more sense to spend time with them FIRST, clean up WITH them, sit down to a movie together, and then when they settle a little, read your dumb blog.
I am still learning to prioritize and use my time wisely. When it's not planned out, I spend well over thirty minutes trying to do five minutes worth of work. And that one is unfortunately not an exaggeration. The days that we stuck to a schedule, even the first draft that was not very well thought out, everything had a time slot and I did all that I needed to with time to spare!
So basically, if you find yourself fighting with all of your strength to accomplish tasks for you, you are a good candidate for scheduling. Trust me, it will make things so much easier in the long run.
I'm gonna go heat up my coffee.
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