Get Dressed!

New Year's resolutions. We make them every year. They usually consist of things like saving money, losing weight, exercise, and cleaning out the garage. Well, I have 2 this year.

1. No murmuring.

2. Get dressed at least 4 days a week. (not including Sunday-because you just can't go to church in your pajamas)

The murmuring isn't going too great. But I am trying. It kind of goes a long with being nicer to my husband. That was going really well until last night when he wouldn't turn off the TV and I was trying to sleep. O well. Today is going much better.

But really it's all about getting dressed. I don't have a real job. I don't have to look stylish to play with Baby Kelly or fold laundry or wash dishes. And because of that, it's really easy to fall into the "sweats" rut or even the "These aren't pajamas; they are lounge wear." rut.

So I decided that I would force (and I mean force) myself to get dressed almost every day.

This was Monday. The first day.

Tuesday.

Wednesday. Kelly came to visit. I loved Roko and Ollie all day. And I looked stylish the whole day.

Thursday. You can see the novelty is starting to wear off.

By Friday it was all getting old. And it was a lot colder. I really need a lime green sweater.

You may be wondering why there are no bags pictured with these stylish outfits. I have lots of cute, stylish handbags, but this is what Rich gave me for Christmas so it just has to go with everything.

There's another reason I wanted to post pictures of outfits. On Pinterest (You know what Pinterest is don't you? If not check it out here.) they have a whole category devoted to fashion and it's loaded with really cute skinny outfits. If you want to see Plus Size fashions you have to "search" for them. Well I just think that's completely wrong. Why can't the Plus Size outfits mix in with the skinny ones? Are Plus Size outfits not considered fashion? Anyway, I just wanted to show that round girls wear clothes too.

Please note that all the jewelry shown was made by my very sweet and talented daughter, Kelly. And both scarves were crocheted by... me.

So for a whole 5 days I got dressed. And I kinda liked it. But it involved a lot of ironing and created a huge pile of laundry.

This week? I don't even remember Monday. Yesterday I wore sweats because I walked in the morning and then never got a chance to change. Today I have on an old ratty peasant skirt and a t-shirt. Maybe tomorrow it'll go better.

Don't ya LOVE New Year's resolutions?

Miscellaneous Stuff

On Sundays I doodle on little scraps of paper. Sometimes I will post them on facebook. But most often they just sit around until I throw them away.

I came across a few that I decided to color and finish and share, along with what was going on in my head while I was drawing.

ONE JUMP AHEAD OF THE BREAD LINE

Harry played Aladdin in his school's muscial. I was really proud of him. Lots of kids came to see him and he was so sweet to take pictures with each. While thinking of him one Sunday, I doodled an Aladdin.

IF WISHES WERE VWs WE'D ALL DRIVE

I'd like to be able to draw cars and rockets, but I really can't. The cars always look like this one:

And the rockets almost always look like this one:

A HOPE FOR SUMMER

We had a really wet spring this year and it seemed as though Summer would never get here. We'd have a couple warm days and then it would pour. And the snails! They were every where. Waiting for warmer days and dead snails led to these Sunday doodles.

THE THICK AND THE THIN OF IT

One Sunday I was thinking about my continual battle with weight. I am round. I've tried to be skinny and managed it for a few weeks here and there during my life. But I always return to my plump self. Why is that? And then it hit me. It's about carrots and Fudgecicles. Which one would you choose?

OLLIEBOT

Kelly had her second baby last month. His name is Oliver. We call him Ollie. And sometimes Olliebot. I made him a cute romper to be blessed in and embroidered robots on it. Although two of the robots came from Stampin Up, I drew one and his little dog too.

CANNON BALL SPLASHES

And then summer was here with hot days filled with swimming and cannon balls. We've had some great parties so far. We've swum into the dark of night while the Tiki Torches blazed. There have been under water voyages and jungle cruises. And Andrew can do an AMAZING cannon ball!

THE BLACK CLOUD

If you read my previous post, you know that my life is not going the way I'd like. I'm mad at God, the Church, BYU, all the perfect people in sacrament meeting, and I have no intention of coming out from under my black cloud any time soon.

SO THERE!

Breakdown

I had a bit of a breakdown on Saturday morning. You know...the crying hysterically, yelling, crying, and more crying. So, I put my pajamas back on. I put myself back to bed. I covered my head. I did not get back up until Sunday. I'm better now. It took 3 days before I could talk to anyone. I still don't feel quite myself.

I felt it coming on all week. Our family had been moving furniture between houses and storage. I'd cleaned out closets. So I think I was kind of tired. My husband yelled at me for bothering him during work hours (which are all the hours), so I did a lot of things myself that I would have ordinarily had his help with. Then my daughter yelled at me for something that I thought I was being helpful with. And that was IT! The camel's back was broken. The cup had overflowed. The last straw had fallen. My world came crashing down around me.

Really when I write it down, it doesn't sound so serious, but ... I felt like all of a sudden I had no control of my life. I felt trapped and stomped on and completely unloved. I really wanted to run away. I settled for the guest room.

Everyone stayed away. Rich popped his head in a couple times to make sure I was breathing. Later, I found out Sabrina had been here but she didn't come in. When I wasn't sleeping, I cried, so I tried to stay asleep.

When I finally emerged, everyone walked around on eggshells. Rich did dishes (shock). Harry sat by me and hugged me. Sandi left me a present (a new purse). David and Kelly kept calling, but I just couldn't talk to anyone. Finally, yesterday I went out to lunch with the daughter who had yelled at me, but we didn't talk about what had happened.

You're probably wondering why I would put this in my blog. I want to remind everyone of how fragile the human spirit can be. Even the strongest person has a breaking point. And you can't know when or where a person might break or what occurrence, large or small might cause it. Be kind. Be caring. Be gentle. And if necessary, be quiet.

I don't regret my breakdown. I think it was good for my family to walk around on eggshells for a few days. I needed them to remember that I am a person with feelings. I also probably needed the rest.