The Rantings of a Tortured Mind

Valerie Rayne Rants

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My 2013 Blogging-Type Goals


Blogging Goals 2013

Blogging Goals 2013

I’m not sure how much I’ve actually told you about this challenge that I’m doing – and at the moment, I’m the only one doing it but that’s okay, I’ll make it work. So tonight, not only am I going to tell you more about the challenge, but I’m also going to use TODAY’S INSPIRATION to write my own post. I’ve been semi-working on this list for month’s, but have been being an incredibly annoying perfectionist about it, so today, I’m throwing that out…

I’m not going to go into great detail about The Blog Everyday Challenge, because I’ve written about it pretty much everywhere you could imagine and because it’s title is pretty self-explanatory. You blog, every single day, for however long you want to set your goal to blog for is – could be days, weeks, months and even years. Our mission is to support you on that journey!

By joining our official group on Lifestyle Bloggers Anonymous, you’ll get support and encouragement to keep you blogging everyday and you’ll also get to meet up with some great adult bloggers. But even if you’re not an adult blogger and still want to join in, we’ve got you covered.

There are even brand new products in the Blog-A-Holic Designs shop so that you can motivate yourself to keep blogging when the going gets tough and even products that you can customize to promote your blog (and the fact that you’re doing this challenge). I’ve been posting about that everywhere too, so I’m not going to say anymore about that…

So, that brings me to my very first goal. I really want to blog every single day for an entire year. So, my plan is to blog daily right here on The Rantings, and while I can’t guarantee what the ratio of adult posts to non-adult posts will be, I’m hoping that it will generally stick around even.

Some of my many other blogging-related/online/technology-type goals this year include:

  • Finish and post the second installment of 100+ Sexual Bucket List Ideas
  • Finish and post piece on different ways to communicate about using your sexual bucket list with your partner
  • Begin commenting on my reader’s blogs more often (because I always mean to and then always cower shamelessly in the internet corner)
  • Post at least 3 times a week to the Lifestyle Bloggers Anonymous blog
  • Post to The Blog Everyday Challenge group(s) every single day, come rain or shine, sickness or health!
  • Post a video to Lifestyle Bloggers Anonymous at least twice a week
  • Actually go through all my FetLife groups, ideally on a daily basis, but even once a week will be better than what I’m doing right now…
  • Post to Updates from the Head Blog-A-Holic at least twice a week
  • Add new products to Blog-A-Holic Designs at least once a week, which includes promoting said products on Tumblr blog
  • Actually start going through my drafts (on all the blogs…) and start finishing and publishing the pieces
  • Learn how to create an application for devices – just because I want to!
  • Step up my social networking game… This one requires quite a bit, but a couple of things that I vow to absolutely do this year:
    • Post every day to my personal Facebook page. It already streams my blog posts there and it shows stuff from the Lifestyle Bloggers Anonymous Tumblr blog twice a day, but I’d really like to start putting my own posts up there. Ideally, I’d use Facebook notes to kind of do a daily update about all the stuff I got done online that day… Here’s hoping!
    • Post every day to Twitter, at least once a day, because I’m really bad for forgetting all about Twitter
    • Start posting and using my YouTube accounts, both my personal and Lifestyle Bloggers Anonymous one. One day, the LBA one will include uploaded videos, but at this point, I just don’t have time to focus on it. It’s something that is in the very early planning phases…
  • Figure out the one and only system that I’m going to use to curate content (ie. Digg, Delicious, Diigo, Bit.ly), because right now I seem to use a whole bunch of different things and it’s just not working out to my advantage at all…

I know that more will come to me the more I think about it, but I think this is looking like a pretty hefty list already. I guess another goal we can add to this, is to upgrade Lifestyle Bloggers Anonymous. I had planned to do this before the New Year, but life kept getting in the way of that goal, so I don’t want to make any promises… But I really want to allow people video uploading and a video chat room (personally, I really want the chatroom, my members apparently want the video uploading).

So now, what are your blogging goals for 2013? Do you typically set goals for your blog, or is this your first time? 


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What I Did… It Feels Like Nothing…


I’ve been hard at work online these last couple of days and I’ve felt inspired and creative and today, I just feel boggled down and overwhelmed. I’m sitting here, as I have been for the last hour and a half, continually starting things, getting halfway into it and then giving up. Then, spending the next few minutes beating myself up for giving up and then jumping in to something else to half start it…

I decided, kind of last minute like (which shows you the problem in the first place), to start a new and in my opinion, very cool new group on Lifestyle Bloggers Anonymous. I’ve done this before, in the form of NaBloPoMo, but didn’t feel like trying that again – so I started The Blog Everyday Challenge. Starting January 1, 2013, it is my mission to blog everyday for as long as I can. Ideally, I’d like to do it for an entire year!

So, of course, right then and there, I should’ve known I bit off more than I could chew, but… I guess, I never learn. So, a Facebook page was created for this group and a Google+ community and then… and then… I jumped over to my Zazzle shop and decided to start creating products for my store (which hasn’t undergone the big re-design that I have been planning forever and a day – which is why you’ve barely heard about it…), which resulted in the insanity that is about to ensue…

First, I decided I needed to create a new Tumblr account, because I was having such a hard time with the whole concept of having the two blogs under the same account. I was constantly posting stuff not intended for one on the other. But then I realized, I needed a new email address. I had stopped using so many of my old ones, to the point where I couldn’t even get into it anymore, so I’ve just been using the one. Mixing the personal life emails with the Lifestyle Bloggers Anonymous emails (mostly ones coming from stuff I’m doing and not anybody in the outside world…) and now the Blog-A-Holic Designs emails was becoming too much, so a new email was made.

It’s just been a slew of getting tons accomplished and getting absolutely nothing accomplished. Let’s take a look at what I’ve done in the last few days:

And doing all this stuff (which I’m sure I missed a few things, I just can’t think of them right now), has just made my to-do list even longer and even harder to accomplish. Thinking about all the things I still have left to do and all the plans that I still have in the works and I just feel like sitting back, kicking up my feet and saying, “Phew!”. Like, I just want to catch my breath for a second.

On one hand, I love this total and absolute addiction to this kind of stuff. I love this whole creating thing and I love when I get hit with these really inspired and motivated bursts online. When it seems like it’s all coming easily and it’s flowing from me with ease. But I also hate it, because I feel like I’m just setting myself up for failure.

Which I’ve been feeling like a lot lately. Like every single move I make is a move towards absolute and epic failure and I feel it weighing heavily on me. I’m sick of not completing things, of starting things without ever finishing them, of giving up entirely. I’m sick of being that person.

So tonight, I’m sitting here trying to get started on something I hope to finish and I feel like I’m stumped and hitting a brick wall. I feel frustrated and overwhelmed and just generally harumphed…


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No Closer to Getting It Done…


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I have been absolutely consumed by the Lifestyle Bloggers Anonymous re-design these last few days, whenever I haven’t been trying to get up the motivation to do the cleaning…

Unfortunately, it’s not as much in the re-design as it is in the planning of the re-design at this point. First, I tried out TeamLab for working on my planning of this massive undertaking. There are things that I definitely appreciate about this app, but I just couldn’t get into the look or feel of it. I also hated that it’s just lil-old-me working on this project and this app has a huge section for community engagement, so that a company can stay connected with their employees. One day, my friend, one day…

So, I went on a day long hunt that has resulted in a more than one day experimentation with all these different apps. I went through the Chrome Web Store, which I try to do as little as possible, because this place is seriously addicting. People just go out and create these wicked things for you to use, like this really awesome tracker-thingy that I just installed, that literally lets me track everything. My food eaten, my sleep, my pain and my freaking period!! There’s even more awesome features, but I’ve only really tried out the tracking, and it’s only been for two days!

Anyways, back to the point…

Then I tried working with Teambox, but found it was a lot like TeamLab, so I moved on. There are tons of great project management apps out there and if you’re a business or a really big blog, then a lot of them are really great. But for just me – I don’t even know how to describe myself in this situation – I mainly just need a place to post all my great ideas (I say that with the utmost seriousness…) and keep track of what I’m doing. But I also desperately want to get fancy about it and be all professional and organized and treat it like my business baby.

Tonight, I’m experimenting with Podio. I haven’t gotten an iota of a step into actually planning anything to do with the site re-design, but instead have gotten lost in the fascination brought on by browsing the app market and then finding out that I can modify these apps and make them exactly what I need for what I’m doing.

Point of the story:
I’m overjoyed, but no closer to getting done what I need to get done…


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Trying to Figure It Out


I can’t stop talking about how much I need to get things back on track around here. I did so good for the first two or three weeks here and now, everything is completely slacking… And I’ve got plans like crazy. Now it’s just a matter of putting all those plans into action, which seems to be the absolute hardest thing in the world for me…

First, I need to start waking up at a regular time again. I went from waking up everyday at 7:30 to now, where I’m waking up whenever the heck I feel like it before 11:30. I just barely let myself become conscious enough to get Kaeidyn and Kenzie out the door before falling back asleep while Keirnan and Carter watch TV. And while it is truly blissful to have that extra time to sleep, it makes me lazy for the rest of the day.

Then, I need to start making the kids lunches again. After them not making their lunches properly for the past few weeks and after the messes I’ve experienced because of allowing them to make their own lunches, this needs to happen immediately! I just cannot for the life of me figure out what the best way and time to do this is. Do I want to do it the night before school or do I want to do it in the morning before school? Would I prefer to get down to making all weeks lunches once a week or does making them daily work for me? I also need to start discovering more healthy snack choices for school because I’m not liking what we’re choosing lately.

I also need to get some paper organizing going on around here. We got a file cabinet and files, but it’s in a awkward spot. Accessing it comfortable typically involves moving furniture around and the file cabinet part of it is so low that it almost never occurs to me to look at it. Kaeidyn ended up missing a birthday party because I put the invitation in her file folder and forgot that it was there entirely. I’m just unsure how to best do it. I’ve got tons of ideas floating around in my head. I saw one thing on Pinterest today that I thought was rather cool, having a whole bunch of little one inch binders for everything from finances to household management tasks like cleaning and scheduling and electronics manuals. But I feel like I’ll put the binders up and have them all fancified and then never do anything with them.

I’ve been trying to do all of that type of stuff on the computer with documents and spreadsheets, but it’s just not being out there enough for me to keep up with it. I need something that is bam, in my face. I need something that demands my attention and sticks out like a sore thumb. We’ve decided we desperately need a printer and a place to put all this important stuff. Now it’s just a matter of making sure money goes towards the printer and deciding what’s going to work best for all of us.

I gotta get back into a cleaning routine. I was doing so good doing dishes all day long and laundry all day long and sweeping and mopping on a regular basis. But when I came down with my cold (which can you believe, I’m still not over…), it all just started to slide. Sliding to the point where I haven’t done any of today’s dishes, the floor only got swept and mopped because The Boyfriend was restless while I was playing video games. Which is another thing I’ve just been doing way too much of. Video games on the TV, games on the computer, just too much…

I just want to get my life on some sort of organized type of track. And I want everyone to be on board with it. I just need to figure out how…


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Wasting My Life Cleaning…


Today is not being a good day. It started out better than I had expected, but it just seems to be slowly going downhill. I’ve had a cold for the past couple of days that has been a real bitch to everything. I’ve been way lazier than I’d like, my head has felt swollen for days on end now and I have tissue burn so bad that I feel like my top lip is on fire. But this morning, I woke up and the stuffy nose was barely noticeable and I had officially moved on to the really intense coughing that signals that this cold is almost over. I was relieved.

And when I woke up at a better hour today than I had expected, seeing as I’ve slept in way too late the past 2 days because of this cold, I was excited to see that I was up and awake and moving around before 10. We had let the cleaning slide for the days that I was sick, so there was quite a bit of that to be done and I’m not even close to done that and it’s starting to make me grumpy.

This house is too big. It took me three hours to collect the laundry from upstairs and clean the upstairs bathroom, then to wash 2 loads of dishes and wipe down all counters/surfaces in the kitchen, take down a load of laundry and start it, and then sweep and mop the living room floor while The Boyfriend cleaned all surfaces and laundry out of the living room. Three freaking hours!!

Now that would signal to you that it was really messy in here, but in fact, it really wasn’t. Laundry was the only real mess anywhere, that and the floor desperately needed to be mopped. Other than that, there really wasn’t all that much to do. On a good day, that would’ve taken The Boyfriend and I about half an hour to an hour to do, not three!! I feel like I’ve wasted an entire day…

I am just not made for this world of domestics and cleaning. It makes me more upset than it does happy. The only chore I enjoy doing at all is the dishes and I believe there’s a few different reasons for that. First one is, it’s the only one I can do and stay completely immobile. Ever the lazy house cleaner, I prefer my chores to reflect that. I don’t have to move, I don’t get breathless, I sweat only because I’m using all my elbow grease and I don’t hurt any part of my body other than my feet. Another reason is because it’s the only chore that gives me the freedom to think about things other than chores. My mind is free to wander away from the chore at hand onto other things as I stare out my window and sing ditties in my head. It’s also the only chore that none of the kids can easily get in my way with.

Yes, Carter tends to come over and stick his hands in the water a lot. And if I’m doing them when the older kids are home, they’re normally standing somewhere behind me talking or asking for something. But I’m in my impenetrable zone. They can’t walk through the pile of mess I’ve just made, they can’t insist on grabbing the broom and taking over, they can’t keep me chasing after them to get that piece of whatever away from me. They can be there, but not in my way.

I just hate cleaning and I hate how it seems so much harder than it should. I wish I could either a) be a domestic diva or b) hire someone to be it for me…


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Yesterday Was a Fluke


Well, after the positive and productive day that I had yesterday, today has been less than that. I woke up this morning feeling dreadfully tired and the kids’ offered to walk themselves to school. I let them do that and they did a great job. No phone calls from the school and I saw Kenzie today when I dropped Keirnan off, having a great time with all his new school friends. But I felt like crap!

Then, it’s freaking freezing cold out. It’s 12 degrees but it feels much colder with all the wicked wind we’re having. It’s making me most grumpy of all. My hands hurt from the cold, my body feels like it’s constantly on shiver mode and it’s making me dread my walk to and from the school. I’m not looking forward to winter this year.

I need to kick The Boyfriend’s ass into gear about a few things around the house here and that’s making me more upset than usual. I just keep thinking back to the beginning of our relationship with his comments about “I’ve got a budget” and “I’ll take care of you“, to what we’re at now and I feel like I’m the force behind The boyfriend’s becoming crappy with their money, their goals, their everything! It took Alfie 4 years, but that guy’s starting to get his life on track now that he doesn’t have me and all my kids really in his life. The Boyfriend, doing all great and wonderful and then the kids and I come into his life and it seems like none of that was ever real.

We were supposed to go weeks ago to change my bank account to a joint account and shut down his account. It’s costing us a lot of money in fees running both accounts, and his are always WAY higher than mine, it’s hard for us to pay bills when I pay all of them online and his money isn’t directly coursing through there. But something always gets in the way of our perfect little plans. He was supposed to call the utilities and put my name on them so that I could talk to them, but he hasn’t. So when Telus called today and I tried telling them that we’ll be paying them off on Friday, they basically said that he’d have to call and tell them that. Which is just that much harder when unless someone is leaning on his shoulder reminding him, he can’t remember that stuff during his work day…

I’m stressing, if you can’t tell. I don’t know why I’m stressing, I just am. Today feels like a day full of pressure and I feel like again, all the weight is directly on my shoulders. Like if I make one tiny mistake the whole world will crash down around me. I don’t know why I do this to myself all the time. It’s like I can’t let myself just be happy or satisfied. I’m determined, apparently, to keep myself in the negatives and the horrible destruction and the bad ju-ju…


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Monday Ramblings


The lazy weekend was absolutely and exactly what I needed, apparently. This morning, I had no problems at all waking up even though I had woken up with The Boyfriend for a little bit before he went to work only 45 minutes earlier. I felt energized enough to walk all the way to the store after walking the kids to school to get myself a morning coffee. My mind feels alert and awake and all the cleaning that I didn’t do over the weekend is well on it’s way to being done and it’s only 10:30 in the morning!!

I’m so glad that today has been the way that it has been today. I went to bed last night fretting about all the things I neglected over the weekend and worrying about what would happen if I didn’t have the energy for any of it today and how I was going to force myself through it. As the great sex finished and the cuddling after had ended, as we rolled our separate ways, I stated, “Tomorrow, I am going to be energetic!” and for the first time in my life, I think I went to be on a positive thought instead of a negative one.

I wouldn’t say I slept any better or worse than I usually do after a good session of sex. I will definitely say that sleep comes much easier and feels much deeper, even if it’s a shorter sleep, after a good romping. Your body and mind is exhausted once you’re done, so you just give into the sleep better. Normally, I lay there wide awake for another hour at the very least, tossing and turning and thinking. But after sex, once we get comfy, I’m out in seconds. I don’t even notice I’m falling asleep, where usually I have to keep telling myself, “Keep your eyes closed, it’ll happen…”

I feel so good about life in general today. I stayed up late last night looking more into going back to school. I’ve discovered where I need to start, so that’s a really great thing. That’s normally my biggest problem with any goal that I’m trying to achieve. I have a hard time breaking down the steps into the baby ones and instead look at the bigger picture of things. I tend to do a lot of future planning and very little right-now planning. Half the time, I don’t even realize there should be steps to get to the bigger goal.

I’m also really loving these walks to the school 5 days a week. Normally by Thursday (or at least, this was the case last week, we’ll have to wait and see for this one), I absolutely despise the walking. But apparently a lazy weekend easily solves this issue. I’m loving getting the fresh air first thing in the morning and then throughout the day, I’m taking a lot of joy in seeing all the trees and bushes along our walk changing color with the season (even if it makes me dread the coming season). Fall has always been one of my favorite times of year. Everything looks so vibrant even though it’s dying. It’s an irony that always leaves me looking like a quizzical avatar. I have fun with the kids when we’re walking too, which is so rare these days that it’s incredibly welcome.

I’m feeling good about the cleaning too. Even though we let it slide a lot more than we should’ve this weekend, it’s not taking me long to get it done today. And my motivation with the cleaning is through the roof. While my sink was full of dishes almost all weekend, in 20 minutes I got that under control this morning. And the floor got swept over the weekend and will again today. Now, I just need to kick my ass to get the laundry under control. I’m doing a great job at getting rid of clothes that no longer fit now, but the ones I’m keeping still aren’t making it to a drawer. Something to work on!

Well, here’s to optimistic and totally productive Monday! Let’s just hope this continues for awhile. I like this a lot better than previous days emotions…


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Noisy


This morning was one of the best, when all the kids woke up early this morning and I was not in anyway wanting to get out of the bed. The Boyfriend, who hasn’t done this in awhile, got up with them and kept them quiet so that I could sleep in. It was definitely nice and very much appreciated, even though I still feel absolutely exhausted.

I’ve been awake for about two hours now and I feel like I’ve already had a very long day. First, I turn on music and jump on Facebook and I just have so much different varying opinions on there that I leave Facebook feeling incredibly confused. I mean, we’ve got pictures with the galaxy and one little spec on it, “You are here. So don’t worry so much” kind of thing and then we’ve got another picture two seconds later, saying something about how Armageddon is coming and we need to be worried and that’s just blaring. It’s about everything on there too, not just the end of the world kind of stuff. Relationships, politics, religion, cultures. And it’s so much freaking noise.

Then, I jump over to Twitter and see all these people who are my idols (in an online sense) and I start clicking links and begin thinking that everything about my online stuff needs to change, and that just makes me angry. It’s like losing weight for me. I know what it’s going to take to get there, but I can’t bring myself to do it. It makes me wonder how serious I am about it and then I spend so much of my day stressing out about it.

Man, am I ever rambling today… I just have a lot of stuff on my mind. And I still have to get the oomph up to clean today… Blargh!!


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She’s a Maniac, Maniac


Tonight’s project: The kids are making me file folders for their school stuff. Each of them gets a file to color and all their paperwork for the school year will go into it. Carter’s making one too, even though he’s not going to school, but I imagine him and I will get creative and figure something out to put in it. It’s kind of the first craft that they’re doing with me. Normally, they do it at Mom’s house and it stays there. Brilliant idea I might say!

Today was supposed to be a day full of cleaning for me but I didn’t do nearly as much as I had hoped because the kids were completely out of control today. They’re so excited about going back to school and the birthdays that are upcoming, that it’s utter chaos around here. No one’s listening, they’re all being incredibly loud and argumentative and the boys’ are constantly having power trips and play housing too roughly. If someone’s not crying, they’re screaming and if they’re not screaming, they’re making one of a million other sounds that make the inside of your brain tingle.

I did get some cleaning done and even made the kids do more cleaning today than they’ve had to in awhile. Luckily, it wasn’t nearly as much of a fight as it normally is. The only one of the kids that I trust at all to do dishes and not make an epic mess and actually get the dishes cleaned to at least 75% of my standard, above and beyond The Boyfriend, is Kaeidyn. I’m pretty particular about the cleanliness of my dishes and often find flaws in other people’s cleanliness standard (including those who say they have a standard), and she’s the only one that makes the grade, so far. But, she started losing interest in doing the dishes and didn’t like that it was always her chore. Then Kenzie started asking to do the dishes and almost like magic, she decided she wanted to do the dishes today.

And Kenzie, who is normally the biggest pain in the butt to really get cleaning, got in trouble for doing something and was sentenced to cleaning the downstairs bathroom floor. We had just recently gotten a Swiffer Sweeper Vac, so the kids were all wanting to try it. Needless to say, there was no fighting about cleaning the bathroom floor. And because the Swiffer doesn’t do as great of a job as I’d like it to, I made him sweep it with the broom first. Now though, I have to charge the Swiffer, so can’t finish the big clean I was planning for anyways…

Not that a big majority hasn’t already or isn’t getting done today. After the kids are done their project, their going to bed and then The Boyfriend and I will spend sometime cleaning up whatever’s left. Again luckily, he doesn’t have to work tomorrow, so keeping him up late isn’t a huge deal. Hopefully that means that after the stressful day that I’ve had today and after the sweaty cleaning of the night, we’ll get to spend some adult alone time together, which will be wonderful.

But for now, I’m going to sit back and eat some ice cream, maybe color a folder of my own and then commence the night-time cleaning marathon. Goodnight!


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Lots of School Stuff


I don’t remember if I said this last year or not, but I freaking hate back-to-school. On the one hand, I’m incredibly excited about it. I’ll only have 1 kid at home all day, every day. I’ll get time alone and I have so many plans for that time that I get alone now. On the other hand, it’s just a huge deal of stress.

We went school supply shopping today… Almost $300 later and no new school outfits for anyone this year. Maybe next payday they’ll get a new outfit, but right now, it’s just not going to happen. And the worst part, we didn’t find everything that we needed. They were either sold out or we just got fed up looking. It was so confusing and you don’t want to buy the wrong thing or the more expensive thing or the thing that’s never going to get used or any other number of variables, plus the kids are all up in your calculating business, so you’re distracted and adding and reading and it’s a lot on the brain all at once…

I hate back-to-school!

In other school-related news, though this part is less hated, we went for Keirnan’s kindergarten orientation and speech therapy assessment today. He’ll be going to school with The Boyfriend’s cousins kid, so that’s really really exciting. It’ll be the first year that we’ll actually kind of know someone that the kids are going to school with and while we don’t know them very well as of yet, this could be the year that changes that all. Who knows!

Keirnan did great with meeting his teacher and his speech assessment went good, though there were quite a few problems. It’s amazing how many of those things you don’t notice unless you’re having them pointed out to you. I remember with Kaeidyn, when she started speech therapy in kindergarten, they had noticed that she was saying her “sh” sounds wrong and I never had. With Keirnan, it turns out he’s saying a lot more sounds as other sounds than I had originally thought. It’s not all bad and I’m sure working with a therapist is going to help in ways that I simply couldn’t.

I’m pretty excited for the kids to be back in school, to tell you the honest truth. I’m excited to sit and do homework with them, since we neglected it so much in previous years. I’m excited to get involved at school, even if it’s just a little bit and more socially than anything else. I’m excited to walk them to school everyday, especially being that there are beautiful yards, cars and field/play areas surrounding us. I’m so excited to walk them to school everyday that I even went and bought new shoes specifically for it.

I think what I’m most excited about though, is finally beginning to establish some sort of routine. I’m looking forward to getting up at the same time of day everyday and I’m looking forward to thinking more about school lunches and I can’t wait for my alone time, where I plan to spend my time keeping my house clean and working towards a 45 pound lighter me. I’m just really looking forward to the end of this year (this horrible, crappy and absolutely wasted year…) and the beginning of the next one, which I’m hoping will be better, a lot better!

I still hate back-to-school though… *smiles*