Thursday, February 08, 2007

Today ...

First of all, if you haven't read my friend Mel's blog, you should. As a matter of fact, if you had to pick between her blog and my blog, you should definitely without a doubt pick hers!
Which would be had as she actually keeps two blogs, but really they are both good and you should be reading both of them!

Now with that said, the other day I read this and thought that has been me lately.
Anyway, I'm sort of trapped at home during the day. And while I could look at it as being "safe in my cozy home" and all that, sometimes, like on a Friday afternoon, it feels like prison. I just want the doors to open so I can run to freedom without looking back.

The next best thing is to have a snack.

That has been me a lot lately! A whole lot lately actually. More than I care to admit, but yet, the scale is steadily climbing upward and I don't necessarily appreciate it. I do blame a lot of it on this thing called stress eating (which I do not believe I have struggles with prior to recently but since I didn't know it even existed until recently, I could be wrong!)
Anyway, I also read a bit more from Mel:

I have noticed that if I clean instead of having a snack, the uncluttered floors and shining kitchen counters soothe me more than a sugar-free pudding. At least the satisfaction lasts longer.
And today, I had about an hour to spare. I was waiting for my aunt to come pick up my two daughters and my son was sleeping. And so I plopped down at the computer and promptly whipped out a bag of tortilla chips. Mostly because I thought well, I only have an hour and all the things I need to do require more time so I'll just sit and do a whole lot of nothing! And so I did this for about five minutes when I decided to STOP. Just like that. I put away the chips, walked away from the computer and then did the dishes, cleaned the table off, swept the floor, put some other things away, cuddle with babyboy when he woke up, vaccuumed the floor, doled out snacks, put some things in the car so when it was time for me to leave, I'd only need to gather up the son and myself and go, and then the doorbell rang and my aunt was here.

And I thought, holy cow! I did a lot in an hour, and my house looked much much better all picked up like that. And it was better than sitting on the computer and eating chips.

And my motivation didn't end there ... oh no, then babyboy and I went to the new house and opened up quite a few boxes. And we put away almost all the things we opened up. Wonderful! The grand plan is to completely move into the house next weekend. So I am trying to pack up what's left here while unpacking things there so it's kind of put in place when we do move.

So thanks Mel, for the advice and the tip. My children and husband thank you as well ;-)

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hey I never got my "prize" hope our move goes smoooooth

Anonymous said...

our= YOUR

MissKris said...

I had a few uninterrupted moments this morning so thought I'd do some catch-up on blogs, which means a stop by HERE!! Congrats on the house and I hope all the moving goes smoothly. After living here in our house almost 25 years now, I'd DREAD having to move again! I have boxes in the nether regions of the basement that haven't seen the light of day since we moved in, haha! Oh, honey...I SO sympathize and understand how you're feeling. I went thru so many years feeling the same way when I was home with the kids. It gets to be pretty overwhelming at times, and we SAHM's have a tendency to become isolated, which is the devil's playground, so to speak...he can come in and bring so much discouragement! One of the young moms at the church I attend started a Mom's Group of the SAHM's and I believe they meet once a month at someone's home...kind of a potluck situation, then the moms just schmooze and the kids go crazy, haha! Do you have something like that where you can meet with other moms? Or even start one yourself?! There was also one when I was a young mom and I enjoyed it alot...everyone gets to talking and you realize you're not the only one feeling these emotions and sense of isolation. There are a lot of message boards, etc., on the internet as well...Club Mom has a lot, as does iVillage for a couple of suggestions. In the meantime, I'll keep you in my prayers. (((HUG)))

Smoov said...

Brandie, isn't it great how much you can squeeze into an hour? I get most of my cleaning done in those weird little bits of time between other things. This morning I had 20 mins before I had to leave the house. Instead of checking email, which I can easily do at my office, I did the kitchen floor and loaded the dishes into the dishwasher. Last night when we got home from the airport, as dinner was cooking and the kids were playing, I did a load of vacation laundry and managed to unpack one small bag. The key is to keep moving! Once you are in the habit of filling your time this way, the times you do relax will feel well-deserved and you won't have any nagging guilt about sitting on your ass!

Also, on the weight-gain things, you can easily fit in some exercise in 20 minutes. If your kids are content with an activity, grab some hand weights and do some curls. Or do some push ups or crunches. Or some stretching. You don't need to go to a gym to exercise!