Life

Sometimes you need to take a little break and head into the forest. Life gets busy and it doesn’t matter if you live in the city or if you live in the country, a little peace and change of scenery can do you some good.

We camp a lot during the summer. Sometimes we tent camp and sometimes we take our travel trailer. Either way it is not always about getting out and roughing it. Sometimes it is just a way to check out of day to day life.

We have had a busy summer so far. This weekend however we hitched up the travel trailer and headed to the mountains for a break. We’ve been on a lot of trips this year but none as relaxing as this. When you’re headed someplace new or spending money on a big vacation you tend to try and fit everything in that you can. I don’t know about you but those trips are both fun and exhausting. I don’t always come back refreshed and ready to get back to life again.

So here we are, the weather is not great, but we’ve checked out. We’ve sat around the fire, we’ve made s’mores, we’ve went for a couple drives to nowhere, we even threw our hooks in the lake and caught absolutely no fish but it was peaceful just watching our bobbers float. My son has build a small fort for his action figures out of rocks, tree bark and moss and made a fishing pole out of a limb. He has to get a bit more creative away from home which is great for him. We’ve also played board games, card games and attempted to build a house of cards, although that didn’t go well. Point is sometimes you need to just hang out together with no plans for your day. Now everyone is taking a long overdue nap which none of us get at home.

Everyone should try to get away for just one weekend this summer with no great expectations. Grab your sleeping bags and some food and find a spot all alone to hang out as as family and take a nap.

I was recently nominated for the Blogger Recognition Award. I was happy to see that I had a notification on my phone a couple days ago from Steph at Lifestyle of a Non Trophey Wife and she had included me in on her list of nominations. Thank you to Steph for including me.

What is The Blogger Recognition Award?

This is a way for bloggers to build up other bloggers who they feel make a positive impact not only in the blogging world but the world around them. This is a way to get these bloggers websites to be seen by more people that may be missing out. A way to support your fellow bloggers.

Why I Started My Blog

I signed up for my wordpress sight over a year ago in April of 2018. Life happened and even though it was always in the back of my mind I just couldn’t get going. I felt overwhelmed trying to learn the basics. Come November of 2018 I decided to just go for it. I had taken a blogging course and went back to review and posted my first blog post. I decided to write about life, family, food and travel. I would love to make an income eventually but am just going at my own pace and not rushing the process. I like to write, cook and hanging out with my family. This gives me the opportunity to do these things and share about it.

Advice for New Bloggers

Be patient and set goals. This is not a quick process. Be patient with yourself as you learn and figure out what works for you. Set attainable goals for yourself. Don’t commit to doing more than you are actually capable of right now. Once you reach your first few small goals and start figuring out your own system you will be able to start moving a little faster.

Blogger Recognition Award Rules

Once you have been nominated for the award, there are some rules, as with any of these awards:

1. Thank the nominating blogger and give the link to their page.
2. Write a blog post on your website about winning the award.
3. Describe the story of why you started your blog.
4. Write two pieces of advice you have for new bloggers.
5. Nominate 15 other bloggers who have your vote of confidence for this award.
6. Notify each of your nominees of their nomination. I’ll be doing that here and Twitter.

So I have come across so many great blogs since I started my journey. It is hard to narrow down to 15 blogs. Here are the 15 that I am nominating:

• Lifestyled You
• The Recipe Bandit
• A Word From Momma Bird
• Loving Life’s Imperfections
• Insecure Housewife
• Our Balanced Mess
• Your Cruise Girl
• The Salty Mamas
• Goldfish and Chicken Nuggets
• Secret Life of a Real Estate Mommy
• Happy Mom Hacks
• Bold Truth Mama
• Mojo and Moxie
• Our Lives With Bella
• I Love This Place

So this is my list. I hope you take the time to check out some these blogs and show them your support.

I was nominated for the Versatile Blogger Award. I’m super excited and want to thank Beth, from Finding the Road to Simple and Heather from Mamabefrugal. Check both of their pages.

If you want to read all about the Versatile Blogging Award click here. So, here’s the deal, I have to share 7 random facts about myself and then I get to nominate 15 other bloggers that I think are great. So here you go:

1. I live in the country.
2. I LOVE pizza!
3. My son started Kindergarten the same year my daughter started college.
4. I have the sweetest black lab.
5. Something About Mary is one of my favorite movies.
6. I love watching home makeover shows.
7. I like road trips.

So let’s nominate some more people for this award.

For the Love of Cooking

A Modern Mom’s Life

Confessions of a Mommy Freak

A Mom Inspired

Deb’s Decorative Life

Pine + Peach

Grands Living Grand

This Blog is Popular

House on Toffee

The Middle Years Journey

Step Back to Simple

Shay & Sons

Pine Tree Farmhouse

Simple Wife, Happy Life

Momma Managing

Well it’s Friday and my day off! Now that just means I’m not physically going to my office and that I am going to try to ignore most all of my work emails unless it is really important. It also consists of groceries, cleaning out the refrigerator, straightening up the house and getting a start on laundry. So you know….”a day off”.😁 But it does mean I will have a short amount of time to myself. Normally I do my shopping on Fred Meyer’s Click List the night before. This is my favorite! I have a 25 mile drive to the grocery store so this is the beginning of my mini vacation. A 40 minute drive with no one talking to me! I can just listen to the silence or I can listen to my own music. This is great. Then I pull into Dutch Bros. to get my drink. After this because I already ordered my groceries I actually have a few minutes to go in any store I want to. I can shop or just wander and look around. Then I pull in the pick up spot at the grocery store, dial the phone number, and wait for 5 minutes for my groceries to come out and get loaded right in the back of my vehicle. I don’t even have to get out! Then I have another 40 minutes to drive home before I actually have to start the rest of my tasks for the day. This is great! Just like a mini vacation for the week. Some weeks I choose to go in the grocery store though. This is almost equally as great. I can just wander the store, look at new items, get ideas for meals and see adults that don’t want to talk about work. Either way, as much as I love my family, I really enjoy having a little time to myself, even if it is doing something that has to be done. Appreciate your family time but don’t forget a little me time, even if it’s as simple as the drive through at Dutch Bros. and a drive to the grocery store.

I consider myself a fairly intelligent person most days, but sometimes I have a day where I wonder what just happened to my brain. It amazes me when I get through a week with fifty million things going on and being juggled in my head and then boom…it’s over…brain shut down. It was working right up until I got my kid on the bus, then that was it. It literally just took me 30 minutes to get out of my driveway after I thought I was ready to go! First off, car was warming up while i threw my makeup on. Perfect, right on schedule. Head out the door, no house key. Find house key and try again. Nope dog is staring at me, forgot to feed. Go do that. Almost to door and notice fish tank. Forgot to feed them, better do it now or I won’t remember later. Ok, ready. Not quite, all the lights are on and I forgot to lock the back door. Let’s try this again, everything is fed (except for me, because I forgot), doors locked, lights off, ready. Finally make it to the car! I might still be on time and the car is definatley warm now, haha. I put the car in drive and make it almost to end of the driveway…I forgot to lock the shop up. So back I go. I get out and lock up, get back in. As I glance up in my rearview mirror I realize that the entire back of my Suburban is packed full! I forgot to take out the two boxes of birthday party stuff from last weekend, two giant dog beds I bought for xmas along with random other items that probably should have been taken out last month. So I get out and do the only logical time saving thing that I can do at the moment…I throw it all in my husband’s truck. He will be thrilled and I will just have to deal with it later. As I head back to get in the car I realized that my debit card was in my back pocket…I just got really lucky that I hadn’t done laundry and wore the same jean’s I had on yesterday! Yes, I showered just didn’t do laundry. But admit it, sometimes you dont have time for either one as a mom. 😂 Ok, I am finally in the car and heading out of the driveway. I make it about a mile down the road before I realize that I forgot to put wood in the woodstove! Another thing that my husband will love to see when he gets home and the fire is out.😂 Oh well, too late, there’s no going back now. Well I hope that my day goes smoother than it started. I really need my brain to kick back in. I think moms brains have so many things to juggle that eventually they have to shut down for a day or two to reboot. I just wish we could schedule which day that was going to be. We spend all week working, keeping track of numerous peoples schedules, answering calls, planning meals, getting kids where they need to be, taking care of household items….and the list goes on and on and on. We schedule everything else, why aren’t we able to schedule our brain to shut down at a convenient time? Maybe Saturday afternoon from 3pm-5pm? That would work for me way better than Friday morning while trying to run errands in the only 5 hour time period that I have all week before everyone is home for the weekend. Off to Get caffeine and food I guess, maybe that will help.😁

So as a mom I’m 100% sure that whether you are a stay at home mom or working mom you have not been sitting around all day with nothing to do, all by yourself, enjoying the peace and quiet. If so please let me know how that happened!

So far today this is how my day has gone….I started out by getting my son up and ready for school. He followed me to the bathroom to read me his word list while I was getting ready for the day. I then got him ready and out to catch the bus for school. Once he was on the bus I came back in to get my things ready to go to work. The dog followed me back and forth across the house until I went to feed her. I head out the door and the dog is following me again as I walk to the car.

I finally get to work and ready to start in on my day. I actually shut and locked my door so I wouldn’t be disturbed but someone had followed me to my office. It’s ok, I know sometimes people just need someone to talk to and I ended up being that person today. I continue on with my day and need to go to the other building to pick up my mail, so I do. As I’m leaving and trying to make a quick trip without being noticed back to my office, I look back and I’m being followed by another person wanting to talk about work.

I work for a couple more hours at which time I then have to leave to take snacks to the school, a PTO mom job. Then to lunch bunch with my son, which is a once a month lunch with your kid at school, which you feel obligated to go to as to not disappoint your child or have them sitting there alone while everyone else’s parents are there. Then back to work with my son in tow. I try to finish up another hours worth of work in the blazing sun and wind while he plays outside on the playground equipment. (All of which I am extremely grateful for. Not many jobs that are this flexible) If anyone has been following me during this time of my day I was too busy to notice. We then head home where the real work begins.

We get home and my husband is not due home for another hour so I get my son a snack, get him sent off to play, grab something to drink, turn on a home remodeling show, sit down on the couch and think ok…..I’m going to sit for 1/2 hour…..NOPE….nice thought though. First the dog is staring at me and wants out, follows me to the door. I sit back down and literally 5 minutes later my husband walks in the door. So that means his work phone starts ringing non stop. I can’t hear the TV and this is not relaxing so I give up. The dog wants back in anyways.

I go to start laundry, my son follows me, I need to see his Lego creation. I head to the bathroom, because I forgot that I needed to pee like 3 hours ago! I just get in there and here comes footsteps, I was followed again! My son wants to talk now and as he points out he can’t see me so he so he is actually giving me privacy. I head to the kitchen and he follows, he’s still hungry.

I decide to try to sit down and log onto my computer to try to get a little more work done. I get started and 10 minutes into working a mouse runs across the floor! Seriously! My husband is on work phone calls, the TV is on mute and now on a very depressing documentary on North Korea, my son needs to show me how he is learning to snap his fingers and the mouse has now been seen from the corner of my eye run across the kitchen 3 times. I give up! I shut my computer down, head to the store to buy some mouse traps, because of course there aren’t any left here. I proceed slowly back home so I can drink my energy drink and eat some candy that I bought myself at the store in peace. I’ll feel guilty later about that while I’m doing my crunches.

My husband follows me to the kitchen so he can get the mouse traps set. I start some more laundry and get dinner started. While I am cooking dinner the dog is now following my every move because her dinner is late and then get this, and this is no joke, the goldfish is swimming back and forth following my every move until I finally go feed it.

Everyone has been fed,the husband, kid, dog, fish and tortoise (the only one who can’t actually follow me). Bath water is run, kid is clean and ready for bed. Now I can go do dishes and swap laundry, just what I wanted to do.  I’m going to go sit down, finally, as the dog follows me to the couch. I am thankful to have these followers but could use a moment of peace to maybe just use the bathroom alone once a day or zone on the TV for a little while with a show that doesn’t involve politics or cartoons. I guess I wouldn’t know what to do if no one followed me though. Enjoy your followers while you can, I’m sure it would be lonely without them.

I have been lucky enough to experience motherhood at two completely different times in my life. I have a daughter who is in her first year of college and I have a son in kindergarten. Having kids later in life has good points and some not as pleasant.

In my younger years I worked and had so much more energy. Who needs sleep. I worked full time. I would look forward to weekends as much as the kids did so we could go hiking, fishing, to the park, swimming, whatever we could find to do that we could afford. Then start right back into the work week.

Now, I don’t have that same energy. I really need sleep. I still work and look forward to our weekends, but hope that it will include a little rest also. We still go camping, hiking, to play basketball or just work outside together but it takes a little more “mental” motivation to go do some of those things. Don’t get me wrong, I love doing these things with my family, but I could easily be convinced to just sit on the couch and stare at the TV or read a book all weekend.

Now I will say that I appreciate my time with my kids more now that I’m older. When you’re younger you think you have forever. Let me tell you that you don’t get a chance to redo things. You need to enjoy every moment you can with your family while you can. Time goes by fast so go build those legos and play go fish for the hundredth time, someday you’ll be glad you did.

When I look back at some of the things I did or let my kids do the first time round I wonder how we made it. I definitely put a little more thought into my parenting skills now, although still not perfect by any means. My youngest child is a little more spoiled than my older kids but he also gets a lot more one on one attention than my older kids probably did which is a plus for him. I would say though that if you’re going to have one kid you might as well go for two. I always think I wish he would have been twins, one pregnancy with two kids. We kept putting it off until it was a little late and I think that it would have been easier to have a playmate at times. Luckily he has friends and cousins that gets to come hang out sometimes. We live where we have no neighbors so we have to make  a point of staying involved at school and some outside activities with other kids.

I feel that you are capable of being a much better parent when you’re older though and wouldn’t change anything. So many women wait until they are a little older now to have kids, it’s become a little more “normal” now. Be warned though that you may get mistaken for a grandparent on occasion and you have to be able to laugh it off and move on. I have, on more than one occasion, been out with my teenage daughter and my son and had people assume that he belonged to her instead of me, haha. She finds it hilarious. I go to events at school and a lot of the parents are the same age as my oldest son. None of this matters though because we’re happy and so much more mature to handle all of the things that come up as parents.

Side Note: If you’re worried about a big age gap like I have with my kids…..don’t. They love each other just as much and they will fight with each other like all other siblings do. You’ll forget that one of them is an “adult”, I promise.