Pages

Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Jet Setting

I don't travel a lot.  That is something that I dislike about my life.  I really want to have the money and time to travel more but that's not going to happen any time soon.  Most of the traveling I do is to go home for one reason or another (holidays, birthdays, etc...)  I see my friends taking trips all the time and really wonder how they do it but then they don't have to work around crazy work schedules like we do.  Chris and I have a list of places we would like to go and trips we would like to take but those are just daydreaming for us right now.

However, it seems like I have been traveling a lot (well at least for me) recently.  My mom got me a ticket to join my brother at the House that Jerry built in Dallas to watch Alabama and Michigan battle it out in the season opener Cowboys Classic.  So I loaded up Jackson and headed North with Clay, Jenny, and Blake to see the game.  Jenny stayed at the hotel with the boys while we headed to the stadium.  We had standing room only tickets so we couldn't see the field and had to stake out a place to stand so we could watch the game on the massive jumbo tron.  It was a long, tiring night that wasn't helped by having to wait over 2 hours for a taxi after the game but I'm glad I made the trip to see my boys play (and win!). I enjoyed getting out of Austin for a bit even if it was just over 24 hours. And it was nice to see a side of Dallas I haven't seen before.

Last weekend I had to head to Alabama, Birmingham to be exact, for a JCAA board meeting.  I was given the option of skipping the meeting and being updated after the fact but I really felt it was important to be there since I had committed to this role on the board for the next 2 years.  This trip was significant because it was the first time I had been away from Jackson over night.  I almost didn't know how to handle myself not having a stroller and diaper bag in tow and I have now decided that I will never again be able to sleep without the constant static from the baby monitor.  It was only 36 hours but I was ready to see my little man (who was sound asleep in the car) when I got home.

In 3 weeks, I will be heading back to Alabama.  This time to Mobile and then Marion for the formal board meeting.  I will be traveling alone again and will have 3 days of baby free time. I'm kind of excited about this. I get to see my family which I didn't get to do when I was in Alabama the last time. Plus I'm going to see my niece and nephew march with their high school band.  I just hope Jackson and I can both handle that much time away from each other.  There was some crankiness on his part when I was gone the last time so I am worried Chris is going to have his hands full.  Plus I praying my house won't be destroyed when I come home.  Chris isn't really good about picking up after himself or the boys so I am sure I will have a lot of cleaning to do when I get home.

Thursday, September 6, 2012

Living in a Pinterest World

I am on Twitter.  I blog. I have a Facebook page.  I live in a world of social media.  So it isn't surprising that I spend my share of time on Pinterest.  I'm not on it every day but I hop on at least once a week and pin ideas for recipes, cleaning tips, activities to do with Jackson, and anything else that tickles my fancy.  Chris just laughs at me when I start a sentence with, "I saw something on Pinterest the other day..."  However, he has been surprised at how well some of the ideas I have come up with from pins I have seen have worked.  There was cleaning the microwave by heating a bowl of vinegar in there.  There were the table decorations for Jackson's birthday party.  Now I am toying around with an idea on how to tackle Christmas presents for the boys and not kill our budget in the process.

However, Pinterest has made me realize just how uncrafty I really am.  I see all these neat things on there that I would love to do and all I can think is that the person who made that has a lot of time on their hands.  Maybe it's not that I am not crafty.  Maybe it's just more that I am a working mom who is exhausted by the time I get home every night and my weekends are spent juggling kids and my husband's crazy work schedule while trying to maintain some sort of decent household.  I'm not saying that I can't do it all.  I'm just saying that it would be difficult.  But still I continue to pin things with the thought that maybe one day I will be able to use all that Dawn dish soap I bought at the case lot sale 4 years ago to mix with vinegar to make the perfect bathtub cleaner. Who knows...I might even venture into making my own laundry detergent one day.  Am I hippie enough for that?