by Sarah | Jul 15, 2021 | All About Denver, All About Erik, All About Family, All About Kennedy, All About Me, All About Molly, All of Us, Disney, Redefining Perfect
Let’s face it…we all have expectations of Disney.
I mean, it’s supposed to be THE vacation.
The happiest place on earth…
Mickey, and Minnie, and Buzz, and Pooh Bear, and family, and love, and magic.
Everything rolled into one.
Amazing.
Joyous.
It’s supposed to be this:
But, let’s face it…reality, I mean…
It’s usually more like this:
All the time.
Siblings will be siblings.
Arguments will happen.
You roll with it.
(Seriously, there was much laughter after this moment).
by Sarah | Jul 13, 2021 | All About Denver, All About Erik, All About Family, All About Kennedy, All About Me, All About Molly, All of Us, Blogging Life, Redefining Perfect, Top Ten Tuesday
Five months until Graduation! Hard to believe that in 5 months time I’ll be free from all of this schoolwork, tests, stress. It’s been a super difficult year and a half. 2021 has been exceptionally hard with me working full time as well as school full time – at least until I resolved that issue last month it was.
Now I’m dreaming of what I will do when I only have to work 3 days a week. When I can have freedom from studying, and an actually decent combined income for once in our 19 years of marriage. 6 months until I achieve my second Oola dream in life and find a new level of…well, oola. 🙂
So what do I want to do when I graduate? Oh, there’s plenty.
- Take a real, honest to goodness, 2 week vacation at Disney/Universal. I want to not be cramped by only so any hours/days that we need to cram every little thing into. I want to chill by the pool, spend some hours at the park, and maybe chill in the room with the family. A trip where we don’t have to plan every minute because we have ALL the minutes.
- Get another decent camera and start photography again. I miss my camera. It’s still here, but it’s ancient…and with all the wildlife I need some better lenses too. Maybe get hubby or one of my kids involved in it, too.
- Crochet/knit all the things. While I AM still crocheting while in school with supplies I had around…I have lots of projects saved that I want to work on.
- Get my Etsy business back up and running again. I miss the hell out of crafting. I miss making my jewelry and have some more things I want to try doing jewelry-wise. I can’t wait for the freedom to explore more projects.
- WRITE. More than my crafts, I miss making words. I miss my fun worlds and characters and hearing them chatter at me in my brain. Right now so much of my brain is vitals and anatomy and pharmacology…I want to revisit Dominion Falls, The Tribe, The Exceptionals, maybe even Lake Point again…and I want to find NEW worlds to create and explore.
- Beach time. I moved to Florida for the proximity to the gosh darn beaches…and I have not gone NEARLY enough. I am a water baby and want all the beaches.
- Travel. I want to see more of Florida, ALL of Florida. I want to pack up my kids and drive wherever. I also moved to Florida for freedom and getting-out…but school and covid and urgh…but my kids are going to virtual school next year and I’ll be working/schooling less. It’s time for us to get on the road.
- Go back to school. Weird, right? But I want my BSN. Employers want me to have that BSN. So I want to keep on going on. Not right away, but I want to start before 2022 is over.
- Tackle my bucket list(s). Next week I’m going to revisit and revamp. I’ve done a LOT more of my 50X50 list than I’ve actually managed to get around to marking as done, and some of the things need to be switched around. I also have a Florida bucket list and a Disney bucket list. I want to get back to checking things off. For a while I was doing 2-3/year on the 50X50, but the past 2 years they’ve been neglected due to moving, work-stress, school, and covid. I have a LOT to catch up on. Only 5 years until I’m 50…
- Get a personal trainer. I need someone to kick my butt to work it out…because while I plan on some plastic surgery eventually (a few tweaks I wanna make), I also want to get healthy again. I want to feel strong again…and I got that best when I was working out regularly and eating better.
What do you think I should do? I have other things…but they’re more practical/boring – like paying off credit cards and getting a new car. These were just about chilling out and being happy again. What do you think?
by Sarah | Apr 7, 2020 | All About Denver, All About Erik, All About Family, All About Home, All About Kennedy, All About Me, All About Molly, All of Us, Blogging Life, Redefining Perfect
I honestly had no idea what day it was today.
Had a minor panic attack thinking I had to work tomorrow (I don’t), and that we were already on Wednesday and I’d done nothing. NOTHING.
I have finals in less than two weeks.
My adult child is living under our roof again (temporarily).
I haven’t been to Disney since February (and I’m officially going to miss my first ever Flower and Garden Festival that I’ve been so excited to see)
I work in health care…and my floor is the Covid floor.
Hubby’s job has been declared an “essential business”, but if they don’t make sales, then they may not stay open.
The girls are both succeeding, and failing, at the homeschool thing…it’s a total yo-yo day to day.
I have 2 kids in the “danger zone” due to their Cystic Fibrosis (atypical though their cases may be) – and I work on THE floor.
I can’t do normal grocery shopping because everyone else is panic shopping.
But it’s okay. We’re all okay.
Right now we are making it by just fine.
We’re all healthy.
My family back in Indiana is still healthy. My family in Buffalo is still healthy.
My eldest is reading a book (WHAT?).
Birthday gifts for our apocalypse birthday girls have been purchased.
I’m baking bread (this is a pre-apocalypse thing I haven’t done since Indiana), and desserts, and making soups.
I’m crafting. I’m writing.
We have food. We have water. We are safe.
The weather is beautiful.
We are okay.
We are in a weird wonderland where we are all mad here.
But we are okay.
The world is changing, I hope for the better. I hope when this is all done we see what can and should be done.
Right now we’re still working through the trauma, and we have been traumatized, all of us…but I hope we do better after this.
I hope we see the companies that did right by their people, and those that did wrong. That we see what we could be, trauma aside, what a world we can live in.
Until then, I hope we are all okay.
A little mad in wonderland….
But Okay.
How are you holding up out there? How are you coping? Have you tried something new? Or are you just trying to hold it together? Either way it’s fine, you take care of you. Please.
by Sarah | Oct 8, 2019 | All About Family, All About Kennedy, All About Me, All About Molly, All of Us, Blogging Life, Pour Your Heart Out, Redefining Perfect
Raising kids today is hard.
Not saying that raising us was any easier. Every generation had their own woes, I suppose…but I am digressing.
Raising kids today is hard.
They have so much to deal with that we didn’t. I mean, sure they’ve got opportunities and things that we never did, but they have a lot to deal with…including a big scary world that isn’t as understanding of all of the changes in the world and people around us.
You see it everywhere these days. Not to get political, but the climate is HOSTILE. I can get panic attacks just going on Facebook some days.
My biggest thing in raising my kids is I want to be their safe place to land.
I want them to be happy.
If they want to tell me they decided they don’t want to go to college, okay fine. Or they do want to go to college. Great.
My big thing has always been – I want them happy. They can chase that dream wherever they want to let it take them.
I’ve expressed this to them over and over.
But as they get older the situations get more complex.
More grown up.
Less, “Okay, if you don’t like Clawdeen any longer, that’s fine. She’s still my favorite character.”
More, “I don’t care what your sexual orientation or gender, I will love and support you.”
It’s been a weird switch for me, as my ‘talk’ was a very uncomfortable and embarrassing affair. I don’t want to repeat that with my kids.
So, when one of them came to me and said, “Hey mom, Kendra* said she’s pansexual. She’s kind of afraid to tell her parents.” I didn’t even have to school my reaction, but I did have to ask, “Do you know what that means?”
Which led to a big discussion over Pan/Trans/Bi/etc. A discussion that I didn’t mind having, and had actually very recently had at work because we had a non-binary patient and the nurse “didn’t get it.”
My girls and I had a long talk that day, very casual and comfortable about all of the terms, what they meant, what they comfortably understood. I had to tell my girls that I totally understood why Kendra didn’t want to tell her parents yet – I knew them and I knew it would be a struggle for them to understand and accept. That she could let her know she was always welcome at our home, and that I knew who in her family would also be accepting in the worst case scenario.
Out of all of it I hope that they understood that I truly only want them to be happy, comfortable, and safe.
I hope that they know I will always be a safe place to land. That I never want them to have to feel the need to keep anything like that from me.
We’re working on having an open, comfortable communication on the subject. They’re still teenagers, they still have their pushback…but in the end, as long as they know we’re good no matter what the challenge, then I feel better.
Raising kids is hard.
Raising smart, intelligent, kind adults is the right thing to do. That’s my goal here. To see them happy, and comfortable in this ever changing world.
*Name changed to protect the child, who has still not come out to her parents. It’s a big step and I wish her the best.
by Sarah | Jul 9, 2019 | All About Denver, All About Kennedy, All About Molly, All of Us, Blogging Life, Redefining Perfect, The Teenager
You know that sequels are always a crap-shoot.
They’re either really good…or really BAD.
With Denver – it was rough.
I mean, at one point we talked about shipping him off to live with his grandparents rough.
It’s made me terrified of this stage with the girls.
Legit.
Especially with all the horror stories of how girls are SO. MUCH. WORSE.
Except…
So far (knocking on every bit of wood here)…they haven’t been.
Despite puberty, moving struggles, teenage friendship drama, technology zombies, and a few bumps along the way…right now these two are the sweetest kids ever. They hug us and tell us they love us and they TALK to us.
Like, legit talk to us.
About everything.
Through the rough struggles with Denver we learned a lot. About how to approach them, how to have conversations about difficult topics, and how to discipline.
With these monsters we talk about everything.
Sex. Internet. Sexual preference. Bullying. Mental health. Religion.
It’s a whole new dynamic I never expected this time around. It’s happy, comfortable, full of laughter and honesty.
Don’t get me wrong…I know without a doubt this could all turn on a dime. I mean, they are teenagers, after all. Puberty could hit the little one harder than the bigger one. There could be an argument that could trigger a landslide.
But I am working to make sure that isn’t the case.
We’re finally on the rights with Denver and enjoying a pretty good relationship with him, but it took a long road and a lot of Disney to get us there.
I’m doing everything I can to make sure if there’s bumps, we handle them…so that we don’t end up having to navigate around a sinkhole.
by Sarah | Jun 20, 2019 | All About Denver, All About Erik, All About Family, All About Kennedy, All About Me, All About Molly, All of Us, Blogging Life, Disney, Disney Mom, Florida Dreaming, Make-A-Wish, Redefining Perfect, Universal, Universal Studios Mom
Our road to Disney and Universal was not paved with flowers and sunshine. That goes without saying. I could go into logistics about Make A Wish’s former CF rules, refusals, and hope coming our way again, but that’s another story for another blog post. Suffice it to say, it was a bumpy, long road…until it wasn’t.
When the time came for us to approach the kids and say they were getting wishes, and to ask what they wanted, both of them thought pretty hard. I, myself, hoped for Disney, but didn’t push either of them in that direction. I did mention to the obsessed-with-Harry-Potter Kennedy that there was this magical place called Diagon Alley at Universal Studios, but we discussed other options. Things like trips in an RV, remodeling the bedroom were discussed among others.
When the day came, the wonderful Wish Granters asked the kids what they wanted.
Kennedy said, “I want to see Harry Potter World!” (It was only then that I learned when you wish for one FL theme park, you get both) I was not upset by this declaration.
From that moment everything flew by in an instant. Before any of us knew it, we were in the limo and on the plane for Florida.
Months of planning, talking, anticipation all came down to that one moment…
You know the one…
The one where we stepped through the brick passage and onto Diagon Alley.
Every moment after when Kennedy’s face looking like this —->>
Excitement. Spotting everything left and right, pointing out everything.
When Ollivander selected her and her sister (believing them twins, methinks) to get their own matching wands.
When she saw, and felt, the dragon breathe fire down on us.
When she sat in the sidecar (look how tiny, my goodness).
Every moment in Diagon Alley that day was so much magic we could have gone home right then and never complained a moment that it wasn’t worth it.
To see K become completely immersed into the world we both loved so much.
Every single second was one I wanted to bottle and hold onto.
That was the moment I knew magic was real.
And the look on her face made every struggle that led us up to and through the brick passage way was worth it.
So damn worth it.
Let’s face it…we all have expectations of Disney.
