I miss my mom blog.

Life since I’ve stopped really mom blogging it up? It’s been invigorating. It’s been deliciously warm to the soul happy. I have been going to school to pursue a lifetime goal of becoming a CPA only to discover along the way that my calling in life isn’t about crunching numbers for somebody else….nope, it’s actually about the rewarding feeling I’ve been feeling as I’ve been helping and changing people’s lives with essential oils. I’m still in school, but I know within the very depths of my soul that I was meant to help others. The life changing things that have happened to people because I ventured on this new journey of sharing oils is humbling. Very, very humbling.

So back to the mom blog. I’ve gone back and did this whole reset button on what’s happening in our home. I’ve stopped looking outward at what so and so on Facebook is doing or said. I’ve stopped comparing myself to the mom blog that somehow just full on has it together. I’ve stopped stressing out at how perfectly clean friends homes can be when mine seems like a constant struggle. I’ve realized that perspective is so much more important. I’ve realized that the time spent in my home with my children is so much more important than the playdate I couldn’t find time for, or the mom night out, or the millions of kid activities I could be suffocating our lives with.

We’ve just learned to be.

We have our days where guess what….the TV is on for the majority of it, and Aliyah learns some pretty cool stuff while watching it. We have our days where I pull a frozen pizza out of the freezer and pop it in the oven and watch my childrens’ faces light up at the idea of having crap for dinner. We have our days that the TV is off and I’m completely involved and doing what “society” deems to be a good mom. Well, guess what….that day that she got to watch more TV than her routine morning Sesame Street and Daniel Tiger, I was being a good mom too. I was either cleaning or networking to give her a college education paid for one day. Most days, I cook a delicious, home cooked meal for this family, but sometimes you have to just pull out the mac and cheese box and smile at your kids as they’re stuffing their face and asking you what your suck was for the day. The moment that we were all just there together in the end was truly all that mattered.

See, I got to the point recently where it all was just exhausting…. the judging and the Facebook posts and blog posts that make you feel like you just suck at your life. You don’t suck at your life….it’s YOUR life! It’s all just about perspective. I could have freaked out and tore myself apart for giving my kids something every mom in my area would probably gasp at (I’m over exaggerating here) I just felt grateful that they had food, and we were still able to have that dinner as a family, because that’ what’s important to us. 

So, now, I just scroll down….if it’s a post on Facebook that is geared towards ‘I do this so much better than you’ I smile and think…thank goodness you do you and yours so well! I love the way I do me and mine.

It’s a relieving feeling.

We all are crafting these beautiful lives, and we need to all be proud of our lives. We need to embrace our faults and our failures and pick up the next day and try to be a little bit better than who we were the day before, but only for us. Reach within and find who you are. Reach within and discover what you’re passionate about. Focus on that. Life can be so beautiful when your perspective is on the beauty.

So I’m going to tippie toe back into blogging. There’s going to be a lot about my kids, because they’re my world. There’s going to be a lot about oils, because I believe in them. I’m going to talk sometimes about my church, which is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints….also known as Mormon, because that’s what I believe in. You’re going to get positive, inspire your soul words, because I want to inspire.

So welcome back to my journey in blogging.

I am so happy to say that we have raised $775.00 for this family!!!  Thank you to everyone who has helped make this possible.

The winner of the giveaway is…..

Out of 246 raffle tickets, #59 is the lucky winner!!!  Brenna Guderian, CONGRATS!!!!

I will email the winner and she has 3 days to respond 🙂

Sometimes the unthinkable in life happens.

This happened recently to a very dear friend of mine’s sister.  She lost her baby boy in a very tragic accident only 2 short months of her husband had a very horrible accident at work leaving him paralyzed.

When you hear of stories like these you rush to your children and squeeze them tight.  As a parent this is a very unfathomable thing – I just can’t even begin to imagine what emotional heartache they are going through.

The financial burden from her husband’s accident has now been intensified with funeral costs of having to bury their baby boy 🙁  I wanted to help in any way that I could, so I have contacted some of the best of the best indie authors who I love and adore so much to see if they would like to donate a signed book for a raffle that I’m going to hold.

To win ALL of these signed books you can purchase a spot in the raffle that will take place on Sunday, September 30, 2012:

1 Entry: $5.00

3 Entries: $10.00

5 Entries: $20.00

THE DONATE BUTTON IS AT THE END OF THIS POST

I want to thank all of the authors who are donating books to help this family out.  My heart is just absolutely crushed for them, and your generosity means the world to me and will to them as well.

You can see sweet Elliot’s memorial facebook page here https://www.facebook.com/ElloitLandon

Comparing.

I don’t think I compared myself too much to others before, because their life wasn’t publicly put into my face – daily. There are so many beautiful benefits to the internet, and keeping in touch and being able to follow along with your friends and family is top of the list. One of the downfalls is feeling as though you aren’t good enough in the things you do, because Sally over here is doing it SO. MUCH. BETTER.  Well, newsflash….she’s not – she’s doing it her way, and your way is perfect for YOU.

We’re all traveling a journey of our own. I love that I can pick and choose aspects of my friends’ and families’ lives that would make mine a bit easier and implement them into mine, but I also love that the things I’m not a fan of I don’t have to acknowledge. When they are doing things that I sit back and think….how the heck do they do it?! I have to remember that it’s their journey. We’re all traveling on these curvy, straight, bumpy, rocky, and glorious roads, and when you’re on one road I might be on another – that’s the point….it’s OUR own journeys.

So comparing?  It’s a sucky, sucky, PRIDEFUL thing to do – and we as humans just can’t help it.

I’m trucking down a new road on my journey – I imagine it to be a little bit of bumpy, rocky and in the home stretch I hope to find it glorious.

I’m writing my first book.

I’ve got this bucket list that I’ve got to get to working on, and writing a novel is on that thing.  I’m excited.  I’m nervous.  I’m scared.  I’m thankful.  I’m so thankful, because there’s this REALLY amazing community of indie authors and readers that have been helping me and supporting so much.

I’m surrounded by some of the MOST amazing, successful authors like – E L James, S C Stephens,  Abbi Glines, Colleen Hoover, Tarryn Fisher, Tammara Webber – the list can go on and on and on.  I’ve watched them traveling on their own roads, and their own journeys and I admire them and respect them ALL – even the ones I didn’t list.  Their books and their friendships have all have had a VERY profound effect on me.  A lot of their books I still think about months after I’ve read them….. before I started reading Indie authors that didn’t really happen very often for me.

It’s hard to start on a book writing journey when you have so much amazing talent so close to home.  You can’t help but start to, well, PANIC, that your book isn’t going to be nearly as good as theirs, or as successful.  Those were the first thoughts I had when I made my author facebook page four days ago.  Right when I announced it was made I started to panic….and then the # of likes kept rising and rising and it all became more and more real.

I remembered in my public speaking class what my teacher told us  – it’s all about perspective.  You can take your nervousness and turn it into excitement.  After she said that, and my heart fluttered back to Andy Andrews book the Noticer, I realized she’s so dang right.  Life is all about a little perspective, and I am realizing VERY early on that all of this nerve wrenching, scared to death fear that has been going through me just needs a little perspective.

I don’t really need to be scared, because this is MY journey.  If I allow my nerves and fears and comparisons to overtake me, then I will push my dream away from me, and I definitely don’t want that.  It’s all about perspective and I’ll just be allowing the intoxication of it all seep into me and MAKE this a glorious journey….. because it’s MY journey.

I posted a preview of my book on my new {AUTHOR FACEBOOK PAGE}, but I’ll post it here as well.  When my facebook page gets to 300 likes (not very far away) I’ll be posting the prologue to my new novel…..and VERY shortly after I’ll be doing a cover/title reveal as well.  This is happening, and I am so grateful to everyone who is supporting me and pushing me towards my dreams.

HERE’S THE PREVIEW…..ENJOY!

We were fifteen when Dawson first called me Bay.

He grabbed my hand as we ran through my back property out to the lake. The type of swimmin’ we’d do never required any clothing; I loved my private property for that reason. That day I could hear all of the crickets chirping and there was a light breeze givin’ me the chills. Dawson held me in his arms and whispered in my ear, “Bay, I know that Liam was the first boy to ask you to marry him, but I promise you right now that I’ll be the last. I swear to God”. The tiny little bumps erupting over my skin had nothing to do with that light breeze and everything to do with Dawson James.

“You’re so beautiful, Lyla Bayou, that I can’t help but feel exactly as I do when I’m sittin’ on the dock of the bay.” He started singing the song; I always melted at the sound of his voice. “So, from here on out, you’re my Bay.”

After that moment, the only time he called me Lyla was when he was angry or hurt. I sure as hell didn’t like to piss that boy off and hurting him was the same as hurting me. I quickly grew to dislike the sound of my name escaping his perfect lips.

 

My heart started pounding, and I thought to myself…. what am I doing????

I woke up yesterday and knew something wasn’t the way it’s supposed to be.  I’m happy, I’ve got my goals in place, and even though life for me is not a mirror of perfection, it’s my life.  The mistakes I make are mine, and they’re mine to learn from and grow from.  I try so hard to learn from my mistakes and not get in ruts that continue on and on and on.

I’m struggling lately.  I’m struggling with homeschooling.  I am scared that I am making one of the biggest mistakes by homeschooling Jayden.  I also am scared that I’m making the biggest mistake in sending Ella to school.  See the dysfunction going on in my head??  It’s one of those damned if you do, damned if don’t things.  The bottom line is parenting is hard.  Like holy freaking crap HARD!  Well, scratch that…. being a GOOD parent is hard.  The majority of parents out there are good parents, and while they might have totally different views than I do, there main purpose is to do the right thing by their child, and that’s what makes a good parent.

I’m trying really hard to just figure out what my heart is telling me.

The scariest part of all of this:  it’s only going to get harder and harder as the years come!

We’re waiting to hear on this house. This house is THE house for us… the perfect, beautiful backyard with a porch that puts warm fuzzies all over my body! There’s planter boxes for gardens, a peach tree…. and basically I have all of my hopes and dreams into this place.

The waiting game is KILLING ME!!!!!! I just want a phone call that says…. yup, it’s YOU and YOU and your family will get to have the summer BBQs while watching your kids play in the back…. you’ll finally be able to cook in a kitchen that you aren’t suffocated in.

With every day of waiting that I have to go through, my heart is freaking aching.

I know that everything that is meant to be will be…. I live by this, and try not to get too let down on certain things. It’s just that I got my hopes so high, and my heart so set that the let down will be crushing. I really want the fun summer out back, with our lemonades, treasure hunts, gardening, and peach picking. I’ve used the Secret to the best of my capability, and am scared that any doubt I’ve put into my head has hurt our chances.

If you’re reading this, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE say a quick prayer that we DO get this house!!

I don’t know if life gets much more peaceful than this right here. Oh, my Ella. My first daughter, and the girl that holds my heart in a way no other girl could EVER hold it. I love her so dang much.

She’s such a diva…. she’s so into girly things, yet needs her pixie dust to get through life. My bathroom is literally covered in glitter right now, because she needed not only her mascara today, but her pixie dust. She’s so grown up for a 4 year old, yet so adorably young in her little heart.

My goodness I was blessed more than I realized the day I found out I was pregnant with her…. I love her so dang much.

My house is quiet.  The only sounds are the Adele pandora station – and that’s it.  I sucked as a mom today.  There was a lot of TV watching, a lot of… give me a minute, give me a minute, give me a minute.

With this quietness, I kinda want to rewind.  I want to sit on the floor and forget about everything I’ve put off for days while I’ve been going through my miscarriage, and put one more day off…. one more day to just give them 110% of me.

I don’t like mommy guilt.

I don’t like mommy guilt one dang bit!

I need to be better about time allocation, and making sure that before anything… my kids feel like they have their mama’s attention whenever they need it.  I read a quote on Pinterest the other day that I can’t stop thinking about.  A quote that is so dang true, and I needed the reminder…. isn’t it funny how Pinterest can do that for you?

Right?! There are so many times I read some sort of parenting quote on Facebook and I just cringe inside, because I think…..crap, I so suck. BUT I don’t – I need to remind myself that it’s hard to be at home with your children 100% of the time. There are times that you have to step aside and take care of the things that you have to take care of. I think my struggles lately have come from the fact that every time I DO try to sit down and get some work done, my girls are in my face not letting me….. they don’t like to play. I DON’T GET IT! Ella wants to constantly be doing things I’m doing and she has this world of amazing toys, and she doesn’t want to touch them. So then I feel guilty, and then I start to question myself as a parent when I’m like….. MOVIE TIME!!!!! I need to get the heck over it, because I watched a hell of a lot of TV, and guess what…. I’m okay. These kids aren’t constantly in front of a TV, but when you are home 100% of the time, it’s OKAY to stick a movie on and get some dang work done!

Okay…. so, here’s my deal right now. My blog has been an issue for me.

I got REALLY, and I mean REALLY caught up in the blogging for others. I of course wanted readers, and cared what people thought, and was careful about what I blogged about…. and then I just stopped. I stopped blogging. That’s not okay with me, because blogging is therapeutic to me.

So – I’ve sortof gotten to that point where I NEED to blog again…. I need to pour my heart out and let it be for me. If my blog post inspires you, GREAT – that makes me happy, but if it only inspires me, or soothes me… that’s okay. That’s what this blog is for. For me.

SO – expect more regular postings, because I have blog guilt lately too – I feel like Aliyah’s entire life has passed by and I haven’t blogged hardly a single thing.

I’ve had this desire in me to write lately. My family has always said I should write a book, but I struggle with this…. I can’t imagine myself writing a fictional novel. I LOVE reading my fictional books, and live to read all of my indie author’s books {I actually don’t read anything else anymore}, but that’s not me. I imagine myself writing an inspirational book – a book to inspire people to push themselves to try a little harder and boost their quality of life, because it’s in them. I have the words… I know they’re there. But I’M just not there yet. So, in the meantime, I’ll put it all here. Maybe become obsessed with slam poetry and start going to live slam poetry readings, because goodness it’s amazing stuff.

I might have just gone through a really hard tragedy, but I feel so dang blessed right now. I have a smile on my face, and a really full heart.

I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to understand why we continue to be given the same challenge in life over and over again.

A challenge that I hate to go through,

A challenge I detest

We’re going through our 3rd miscarriage.

This baby wasn’t planned.

I was furious when I found out.

But then things changed – and I started to dream, and to love, and to hope.

But then I was left empty, I was left hopeless and my dreams were shattered.

I hate the pity,

I hate the difference towards me,

I hate how people think it’s better off avoiding me,

because they don’t know what to say to me.

Why can’t people just treat me normal?

I’m still me – just tainted with what some might see as some disease.

I saw the heartbeat up on the screen.  The amount of love that welled up in me was not what I had expected.

See, a baby with a toddler just seemed overwhelming, but I realized that my heart was sure enough growing.

I loved the pitter patter, and started to dream and then I got the news….

you left me

you left me empty,

you left me missing,

you left me dreamless,

you left me

So here I sit realizing that dreams change, plans dissolve, but life surely must go on.

I’ve found myself missing the three babies God took from me,

I’ve found my reasons to smile in the three babies God entrusted with me.

There’s nothing easy about losing a baby,

There is however an amazing amount of strength that you discover.

So, yes, you left me –

you left me empty, yet full of love.

you left me dreamless, yet full of hope.

you left me missing, and this, my baby, will always remain.

I will miss you forever and love you the same.

I want to give a special thank you to {Colleen Hoover}, the author of Slammed & Point of Retreat – thank you for inspiring me to SLAM my feelings out.