catharsis

ca·thar·sis

 

[kuh-thahr-sis] noun the purging of the emotions or relieving of emotional tensions, especially through certain kinds of art

in case you haven't noticed, i haven't been around much. i think i've been in a very real funk for the last six months. it took some serious jolts to get me out of that funk PMS  whatever you want to call it.

jolt #1: my doctor telling me without sugar-coating it that if i really want another baby, i need to "get healthy". uh, thanks. luckily he also offered some help. two months and 25 lbs. down, i think i'm getting the hang of this exercise thing...and i kinda like it, a lot.

jolt #2: having a "mom's day out" once a week that gave utter freedom one day a week for five hours. what did i do with myself? worked out, grocery shopped, and blew way too much time on pinterest (friend me, we can join the time suck together). needless to say, i had some serious conversations with myself about time management and what i want to be when i grow up.

jolt #3: after listing those very trivial, but self-awakening jolts, this may seem a little trite. but this jolt rocked me to my core. about a month (has it really already been a month?), my mom called me while we were driving home from the temple to tell me that my sister, Lexie, and her husband, Nick, had lost their two month old baby girl. i was in shock and spent the better portion of the three-hour drive in denial and utter helplessness. sometime soon, i'll write about some of the emotions i've been feeling, but this is not that post. needless to say, it's been a month of very personal tender mercies and tears when i'd thought i'd run out of tears.

but these jolts have caused some good things to become very apparent to me. i need to take more pictures/videos of my kids. and share them, of course. i've been better about writing in a journal for the last two months than i ever have been before (thank you DayOne app). and i've realized that taking care of myself in every aspect has to be a very real priority in my life. one aspect that i've been neglecting (seriously, pick any aspect and i'll tell you what i'm missing) is the intellectual stimulation that i seem to require to function.

most of my intellectual stimulation is satisfied with some good reading (twilight is not considered "good" reading in my book, just in case you're wondering). but as i've been pouring my heart and soul into my journal in the last couple months, i've realized that i miss writing well. i read the blog my sister writes, and i realize that though i might use the pregnancy/motherhood excuse for losing all logical brain cells, i think it's simply because i've let my brain (and my vocabulary and my body and my fingernails and on and on) atrophy. so, here is my resolve: i resolve to be a better blogger and write better blog entries at least twice a week. that may not sound like much, but you're lucky i'm pulling away from facebook and pinterest and the google reader and moda bake shop and my silhouette and my eleventy million projects to answer your plea for more of my time and witty banter (i do realize that banter implies you reading, replying, and generally conversing and that will be my expectation from here on out, k?). so there it is. wait for it. i.will.deliver. it might be all lower-cased and somewhat random, but you will get me twice a week.

oh, and because i'm a mom and i know you're really just here to see how gorgeous my kids are today, here's my peace offering. it's not much but it's better than no pictures.

 Teya playing the keyboard (alas, no piano in my home....yet. maybe santa will reward me for my good beahvior this year). 

teya on her way to "school". she hates taking off her "packpack", even when she goes into her classroom. that thing is bigger than she is!

Palmer & Portia on halloween (not the utter lack of hair accessories in portia's hair. this is what happens when daddy does halloween alone). 

Teya & brizzy on halloween. clearly, a lot of love going on here. actually brizzy was very annoyed with teya on our short trip home. teya is just old enough to be annoying but not nearly big enough to play with brizzy. brizzy kept asking me where portia was.