T Minus 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1

The countdown ends tonight at the end of another, annual countdown!

I'll be honest: I'm not a big celebrator of holidays. I almost feel like I'm missing out because I see others who get so excited that they argue over how early they can shamelessly listen to seasonal music. Me? I look forward to time with family. My love language is quality time. Dennis teases me that sometimes I want quantity time instead of quality. What can I say? If I like you I want to be around you.

As for New Years Day I find the looking backward something I look forward to.
I have to pause here. I can't help it. That pun made my day.
I love nostalgia - the double edged sword that it is. I also love choosing a focus for the next year. I don't do New Year's resolutions because I know me. I had to name this blog "Almost Daily" because I already knew I wouldn't succeed in actually writing daily. But I also don't want that to stop me from trying.

In lieu
of a resolution I pick a word to focus on for the year. I wish I could remember the year I started doing this and had kept track of the words I picked. Last year was "reliance" - as in rely on God for things and stop trying to be in control and have things my way. I prayed for me to grow in my reliance on God for everything. ALMOST IMMEDIATELY my family was attacked financially with the sudden and unexplained death of my soccer-mom-mobile. I can honestly say that God has raked us through the financial coals so we can better learn to rely on Him. I never saw myself as someone who didn't trust Him with my finances until this year. This trial is carrying over into the new year but with much more hope and faith behind it.

I've picked my word for 2016 but I want to write about it later. It gets its own blog entry. Hopefully tonight after the countdown. See you all next year!

T Minus 8

And like an amazing catharsis my last blog post, and some prayer and hugs from my husband, worked wonders and I feel so very much better.

Today is Christmas Eve Eve!

We baked Gingerbread cookies and peppermint cookies and are eating them while watching my favorite Christmas movie:
The Muppet Christmas Carol

I feel like dancing, or painting, or doodling. Feeling the love on this fine day :)

Merry Christmas!

T Minus 9

I thought about not writing but, for the same reasons I think I shouldn't, I think I should.

Don't try to make this logical, because it's not.
I saw it coming. I noticed it a couple of weeks ago.
I felt isolated, even when around people.
I felt like people were probably getting tired of me.
Well, they'd probably been tired of me for a while.
I am tiresome.

I felt like I should withdraw from friendships.
They're only posturing anyway - out of a sense of decency, most likely.
I can do them the favor of backing out, slowly, so they don't have to worry about how to do it themselves.
I don't really need friends anyway, right?

I have to keep a normal, happy face on - for my kids.
I don't want them to be affected.
I want so much more for them.
Crap. I was probably too short tempered.

I told Dennis it was coming. I've noticed that when I start feeling like withdrawing from friendships that I usually struggle for a while.
Struggle.
Probably not the right word.
Struggle implies more action than I'm capable of in this.

Raw.
This post is raw...And it makes me nervous.
Maybe I shouldn't post it.

Either way - it's here.
I couldn't stop it from coming.
Even though I saw it from a mile away.

T Minus 16, 15, 14, 13, 12, 11, 10

Yeah. Been busy. . . And sleepy.

I'm cheating today and posting a story that Annie, my 2 1/2 year old daughter, just told me. She was holding a blank memo pad and making up a story while "reading" the empty pages.

Annie's First Story:

I went to outer space! And I drank from Henry's yucky cup. And Greyson went to school. Daddy went to work. Pops went to work, too. Pops was working on Mimi's chair. And Greyson went to Pops. I saw a trick and then I got your hat. Then I went to this outer space - to these outer spaces. I went and Greyson go over where Pops is working. And Dennis is not working; he's in the kitchen.

These kids were walking and there's a boy! He fell off! The boy fell off! And then on the mirror in my room there's my bed and my blanket. And this face is Shelby's face. This is not a face. I'm going to make it a tower like you!

T Minus 19, 18, 17

See that blog title? This is why my page is called "Almost Daily." I knew I'd miss days and I didn't want that to stop me from keepin' on keepin' on.

We've gotten to about 3/4 of the way moved into our new home. We hosted a game night tonight and it felt good to have the place put together and cleaned up enough to have friends over. I brewed a pot of hot coffee - which turned into two pots. We rolled some dice, bantered, quipped, quoted, and laughed ourselves to tears. I love our game nights. . .

Because I missed two nights I'll try and make this post a bit longer than the others.

I'm staring at the bookshelf across from my bed, thinking about how it's organized, and it reminded me of something. I participated in a Facebook status game where you listed the top ten books that have influenced you or left an impression on you or something of the sort. It was incredibly hard for me to come up with this list. I've read so many books and I can't even begin to think of them all let alone categorize them into least to most influential! Yet I can, out of the physical copies of books that I own, organize them on a shelf and choose which ones I will store and which ones I will proudly display.

The top shelf is lined with bibles of various translations, Schindler's List, A few Christian commentary type books (Think CS Lewis), bible studies, and scripture reference books.
The second shelf holds two fantasy series then our classics (Les Mis, Pride and Prejudice, etc).
The bottom shelf is almost exclusively David Eddings (My favorite fantasy author) plus the LotR series, then my poetry book collection.

This really bugs me. Since we're downsizing Dennis and I had to whittle this down from one tall shelf and one short shelf to ONLY one short shelf. That's a big downsize for book lovers. BIG downsize. It threw off my hard earned and glorious flow of organization. Used to the classic novels flowed perfectly into my poetry books with The Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poe as the transition piece. The bottom shelf was dictionary, thesaurus, reference books, into mine and Dennis's favorite college books. All of my classical history studies books flowed effortlessly into his chronologically ordered history books.

This right here is the kind of idle stuff that makes me happy. A flawlessly ordered bookshelf full of books that I want to remember I have and have read or am planning to read. It's thrown off now with the added mixture of fantasy novels - which absolutely belong on a different bookshelf where they won't be interrupting the flow of classics to poetry. C'est la vie.

T Minus 20

I have this thing about projects. I start them and have ideas and plans...they don't usually pan out. It's not that I'm wishy-washy, though I can see how it would seem that way. The problem lies in the fact that I have some weird complex where I don't feel like anything I do is worth actually doing unless it's amazing. This project falls into that, unfortunately. I'm hoping that I can fight the discouragement and keep on trucking with this thing.
Why do I feel like everything I do must be absolutely amazing or else it's worthless? Why can't I do something and it not matter if it is anything more than what it is?
Oy. To be inside of my head is a dizzying thing.
The goal of this blog is to write daily. The thing is I won't be inspired daily so most of the time my posts might seem bland or read like a diary - but the idea is that on the days I AM inspired or end up inspired I will have an outlet where I can post what I write.

Meanwhile others write amazing things and I can't help but fall in love with their words and wish they had flowed out of my head. . .

T Minus 21

Occasionally I internally narrate things that are happening. I don't say it out loud...that would be weird. It makes the mundane a little more interesting and it helps me find my voice. There are times where my voice changes, however. When I read a book - especially a really good one - my narrative takes on the voice, dialect included, of what I'm reading. Reading books like The Help, Lonesome Dove, Little Bee, and so many others make for an interesting change in my narrative voice.
I haven't read a book that's done this for me in a while.
All of that being said I'm planning on writing at least a short paragraph every day for the next year and I'm already discouraged. Day two and I'm discouraged. I read other people's blogs and stand in awe of their narrative voice.
Ultimately I want to find my own voice and I want it to be a good one. Lofty goals, right?

T Minus 22

We've lived in the same house for five years now. We've had three children, gained a dog, lost a dog, rescued another, planted a tree, watched it grow, painted walls, ripped up carpets, and laid down floors. We've always said the house was a major blessing that God made possible.
Now we move. We move into another house. It's smaller. I'm okay with that. It's been an adventure of sorts - trying to learn how to fit our family into this new house. We've reorganized, downsized, stored, and scoured Pinterest for tips. In all of this my kids are excited to be somewhere new, especially since it's closer to their Mimi and Pops.
My older two have set out learning where things are and what it's like to walk out of their rooms and have their parents' room be only a few steps away.
I hung pictures on the wall today. I've cooked in the kitchen and served my family meals at the dining table. My kids are sleep in their beds and my husband and I are relaxing in the living room together. Now it's a home - our home - and we're already making memories in it.