Tag: snow days

Fat Fridays: Mental Health Check In

Happy Friday everyone. 

It’s 8:45am and I’ve already had a busy morning. Made homemade muffins for the kids for breakfast. I’ve got a big batch of yeast bread started, sitting in a bowl on the mantel to rise. Walked around picking up all the winter clothing that was left on the floor yesterday after we had a small batch of snow (only happens a couple times a year for us). Lit all the candles in the house in an attempt to chase off the gloom from this cold gray morning. I’ve cleaned up several messes from my son’s puppy that we are babysitting during the day while he’s at work. And also let my cats in and out the door about 5,000 times. 

And I’ve been trying really hard to not be snappy at my kids. This is their second snow day home and in my current mood, I’ve found it challenging to have to deal with arguments, fussing, and just a bunch of energetic kids bouncing around the house. (Stop throwing playing cards at my candles, No, we are NOT playing basketball in the house, yes, we ARE going to clean your room, No, we are NOT going to do a science experiment that involves setting paper on fire.) 

I am struggling a lot with depression and irritability. I’ve been working on getting back to healthy eating, cutting out sugar and processed foods again, and my body is in shock and not happy as it is deprived of all it’s junk again. I know I’m making progress, I’m starting to crave healthy food again and I haven’t had a hard time staying away from the bad suff, but it always puts me in a bad mood when I come off sugar and junk. I have a feeling a lot of that is just physical things happening in my body. 

I’m coming off the High of the Holidays and feeling a predictable blah-ness from resuming normal life again. 

The last two years have been pretty traumatic and so I find myself facing this new year with a lot of hesitancy. What craziness is going to happen this year? 

We’ve got an upcoming court date for our foster daughter and I’m having to face a lot of inner-demons as I resolve to make my voice heard instead of staying quiet. 

I imagine everyone has a list of reasons for why their mental health is not doing so great right now. 

What am I doing about it? 

Well, I’ve been really focused on keeping my home in a constant state of tidiness and order and coziness. It is calming to me to sit in a clean room with candles lit and some pretty things to look at. I tend to be very comfortable with clutter and chaos, but lately I’ve been going the opposite direction and needing everything orderly and in its place. 

I’ve gotten back into daily Bible reading. I have a 12 month Read the BIble in Year. Each day has a date and a passage from the Old Testament, the New Testament, a Psalm and a Proverb. I have decided to start in the month of December and work my way backwards, cause that just feels more doable for me. I am finding this reading time to be a time of calm and peace. 

I am working hard on getting our whole family eating healthy again, and one of the things I’m focusing on is baking our own whole-grain bread again. I used to do this a lot, years ago, and then stopped. I find that I need to bake about every two days in order to keep up with the kids. There is something very soothing about making bread. It makes me feel grounded and connected to the earth. Weird? I don’t know. I just know that I am enjoying it and find it soothing. 

The last thing is I am trying to keep life as simple as possible. I’ve had to hit pause on keeping up with community events and concerns, what’s happening in our country, and just focus in on my home. 

And even doing all that, it’s still been a struggle. But, I’m hopeful. My body is going to adjust to the healthier diet again, we’ll get past our court date, spring will come again. Life keeps moving. We just have to take it one day at a time. 

My Not-so-Picturesque Day in Pictures

I’ve decided to do a Picture Diary of my day today. With some commentary.

Enjoy.

sleeping Noah

So, the two year old climbed in my bed in the middle of the night. This picture about sums up how that feels.

Then at 5:30 am the phone rang. It was the school calling to tell us there was a 2 hr delay because it had snowed. Woohoo! We could sleep in! Except the phone call woke my husband, who decided to just get up. And then his moving around woke up this little guy. So, I got to get up almost an hour earlier than normal on our 2 hr delay day.

nomisnowO

Of course, since there was snow on the ground, the kids’ 6th sense woke them up, and by 6:30 am I could hear little voices exclaiming about snow. (On a school day we get up at 7 am). By the time it was light outside, the kids were ready to go frolic in the snow. I took my obligatory snow pictures. I have ten years worth of snow pictures from this very angle. (Happens to be the inside of my doorway, I’m not going out in the snow.)

Of course, in order to go out in the snow, the kids needed to get their winter gear out of our hall closet.

closetmess

You will note that they left at least one coat hanging in the closet. (No, they didn’t put the hole in the back of the closet, that was already there.)

So, we had plenty of time to play in the snow, drink some hot cocoa, get ready for school. My morning was all planned. I would drop off the elementary kids, then the middle school kids, then I would have just enough time to get to the dentist with my 8 year old and the two little boys, where the 8 year old was getting a crown on her tooth.

Ten minutes before it was time to leave, I sent one of my boys out to the van with the keys to start it warming up. They returned and told me that the van would not start. Oh no. I double checked, and yep, the battery was dead. Now what? My husband was working out of town and while our driveway was full of vehicles, they either didn’t work, or I didn’t have the keys to them. I called my husband. He told me to get his new work truck and jumpstart the van. This involved me having to brush off a bunch of snow, figure out how to start it and drive this humongous stick-shift truck through my yard so it would be close enough to the van to jumpstart. (I haven’t driven stick shift in 14 years.)

jumpstart

But as you can see, I did it.

Which made me feel like this:

workerwoman

The elementary kids were tardy, the middle-schoolers had to run to not be late, but we made it to the dentist on time. Yay.

Then I got home and had to deal with this.

dirtydishes.jpeg

Because the night before, my old dishwasher fell out of it’s opening one time too many. My husband had brought home a new dishwasher and it was sitting in my dining room.

dishwasher.jpeg

And I somehow thought that he would be able to install it for me last night. But, alas, he didn’t have the proper tools with him, so it didn’t happen, and I didn’t wash the dishes yesterday. Sigh.

The rest of the day was spent baking..

muffins

These amazing muffins were enjoyed by most, but some sacrilegious child ate only the sugar top and the blueberries, leaving the rest in a giant pile of crumbs.

I also made stew.

stew

Which one child completely abstained from, and two more children filled their bowl of stew with crackers, but somehow decided they weren’t actually hungry enough to eat it, when all was said and done.

I also made a run to Walmart before supper, where I forgot to buy my dentist-going daughter the award I had promised her for enduring dental treatment. Which meant I had to go out again after supper.

Then, while relaxing with the kids before bedtime, watching some Studio C on Youtube, my alarm went off.

Which was a good thing, because I had completely forgotten that I had an older daughter at work who was counting on me to pick her up. I could not live without all the alarms I have set on my phone.

And so, after bringing her home, I ran around getting all the little kids settled into bed. And now, my day is finally done. For the most part. Just a couple little chores here and there to do on my way to bed.