I want to do it all.

It's been a while since my last post. There are a few reasons for that. One is that there are some external stressors in my life that I tend to over-react to. Or, maybe appropriately react, but either way, I go off the deep end from time to time. Really, these stressors don't directly affect my life much, other than on an emotional level, so I am working my way through dealing with it. (vague much?)

Another reason for the lack of posting is I've been caught up in routine. Well, sort-of. From the outside, my life may seem far from routine. But it happens just the same. 

Oh, and then there's the fact that April happened. April is birthday month for both the Mr and I. That could mean awesome-fun-celebration month, or, as is usually the case with us, Broke Month. Along with having the car registrations and state inspections for 2 cars, April is tax time. As a self-employed mom who is married to a regular-job guy filing joint taxes, the whole "return" concept gets a bit dicey. We did get a return this year, but a slim one. April also happens to be when my business liability insurance comes due. Somehow, the bill was missed and I discovered I'd been without insurance for a week and a half. Oops. Oh, and there's the spring tire change that has to happen. (cha-ching) So, see why I haven't been posting. This financial crap is boring. With all those expenses for April, we decided to put our intense saving for Euro-trip 2012 on hold. It's just one month, and we intend to catch-up in the next 3.

Today, I am taking a sick day, as I caught some odd tummy bug over the weekend. It was pretty epic, actually, as I drank a little wine at a baby shower and got ill all over the front yard at my friend's house. It looked like I was an extreme lush, but as it turns out, I've got a nasty bug, cause it's still with me today. (OK guys, you can call off the intervention! It's a tummy bug!) 

This sick day is allowing me some time I wouldn't have otherwise taken to assess my life & day to day routines. It seems I'm once again over-extended. I'm currently serving on 2 boards of directors, working as a massage therapist, teaching a Yoga class, being a mom, newly taking Aikido classes, aspiring to mountain bike all summer (I mean, I just got a new bike seat), taking road trips all over New England (Burlington, Portland, Boston), Planning more road trips (Montreal, anyone?), Planting a garden, becoming a runner, I could go on...

What's being neglected? My house, obviously. This place is pretty trashed with kids' toys and paperwork and laundry. My husband, likely. He's not a complainer, so I have to be more aware of these things. My health- usually I get sick when I'm overextended, so I should listen to that. 

Here's the rub: I genuinely WANT to do all the things I'm doing, plus more. I want to go rock climbing more this summer. I want to paddle the rivers and lakes around here. I want to make some great Yoga videos to share all over the internets. I want to re-design my web page. That thing hasn't gotten any love in a very long time. 

I suppose I'm lucky, or blessed, or smart. I'm just plain glad that I really do enjoy my life and all the things I'm doing. It's just got to be about priorities for me right now. I'm not big on list-making but this may be just the occasion for it. It's great to want to do many things, but it could be time for me to plant my feet on the ground and prioritize, deciding what gets left in the dust, or, better yet, manage my time so I can do ALL things. 

Where's The Snow?

Just a quick note to whine about the weather. I'm not one to complain too much about weather where I live, as I know the climate in northern New England is fickle. I am, however, losing my resolve. By this time last year, I'd done a ton of nordic skiing and I was kicking my own butt learning how to skate ski. Although we've had a couple of storms, none of the snow stuck around for very long. Looking at the 10 day forecast is pretty grim as well. Looks like about one new inch of snow is likely. Not enough to do much of anything on.
Although this lack of snow is affecting morale for us skiers (especially those of us relying on natural snowfall versus the machine made stuff on the slopes), it's really not good for the economy. The local economy here relies heavily on winter recreation: skiing, snowboarding, snowmobiles, dogsled tours, etc. The folks that really make their bread and butter off the snow are just itching for the next big dumping of fluffy white stuff to sell to the tourists. Although I complain about the lack of wintery weather, at least I don't rely on it to keep my family fed.
All we can do is grin and bear it, and go for a hike instead.

Busier than we ought to be.

OK, so I've been MIA for a while.
I'm still trying to find some balance between my work life and my volunteer life. This ski club I volunteer for is great and fun and has some real historical significance, and I feel like I ought to give it more energy than I have been. Of course, it's all volunteer run, and although I get some great ideas, I keep having to remind myself I'm just a volunteer. So I need to lay off. Or not. I am having fun learning new things, like how to write a grant, and I'm loving the trail work and the times we get to get outside.

Now, if I could spend more time outside and less time squinting my eyes in front of grant-y terms and what not...

I did get to spend some time with Lils and the neighbor kid jumping in leaves last weekend. That stuff brings me back to the best times of my childhood.

To make an eventful week even more so, our hot tub busted last Thursday. In the midst of my stressing out about something that was probably unimportant, I decided to take a few minutes in the tub to relax. then the jets stopped and this happened:

Yeah, that's the contents of my tub draining out onto my yard. It was on warranty and the hot tub company sent a very adorable redhead man to repair it for us. Although the broken tub totally harshed my mellow, I am well aware that this is not a real-life problem, so if you were pitying me, you should stop now.

So what's on tap for the weekend? It's Veteran's day so Mr. has Friday off. We're going to tackle the shower project this weekend. A while back, we totally re-did a bathroom and installed a shower that we chose mainly because it was inexpensive and looked cool. Like a portal or something. the shower turned out to be a total piece of crap and the floor cracked in several places. It wasn't how it was installed. It's that the base was a not-so-dense foam covered in a thin plastic coating and never made to last. We got a pile of tile and a new floor and glass doors and are tackling the demo of the old shower tomorrow. Hopefully, we'll have it done by Monday. 

The Before Picture

Of course, We've got a pile of other stuff going on this weekend, so we'll see how the project goes. 

I'll post more often, as we're getting psyched and planning our Europe trip and this shower project ought to have some progress to report soon. 

I shaved my legs for this?

On a recommendation, we went to the Notchland Inn in Hart's Location NH for dinner last night. I'm sure the person who recommended the place had a good experience there. I however, did not.
I have a hard time dining out. We live in a rural area. Being veg, I don't set very high expectations. Sometimes, I even eat before going out.

This time, I was expecting better. When we called for reservations, the owner of the inn asked my husband some very specific dietary questions. It sounded like they knew how to make a vegetarian meal.
When we arrived, we were told the vegetarian meal was a delicata squash stuffed with quinoa, etc. It seemed promising.
First we got some bland bread, followed by some mushroom soup. The soup was good, but there was not nearly enough of it. Then came the meal. Bland, and worse than that, not cooked properly. Quinoa is not supposed to be as crunchy as this was. I figured they'd ask about it when they saw the entree uneaten on the plate. Nope. They came, took the plate, and that was that. No "how was the meal?" or anything like that. The salad and dessert were barely worth mentioning. I ate the tiny salad, but the dessert was a disappointment.
I suppose I could have said something, but I have this defect when it comes to food. If I'm paying money for it, and it's unacceptable, I cry. It's embarrassing. I literally cry. So, rather than point out the inadequacy of the meal and start bawling in front of a dining room full of people, I kept my mouth shut until we got in the car. Yeah. I cried to my husband over undercooked quinoa. Well, I think it was over the money spent on the undercooked quinoa, and that this was not the first time a "fine dining"establishment royally screwed up vegetarian food for me. And I was hungry. And we had a sitter. And it was date night.

Some highlights from the evening:

It was dark and rainy, and we had a hard time figuring out what this was when we drove up. It turns out, they did a bride and groom pumpkin people display as part of a local business competition.
It was downright creepy.

At least the wine was good.

This Saint Bernard came over to see us during dinner. He made himself comfy by my side.

 Oh, did I mention? The meal cost well over $100. 

When we got home, I made myself a sandwich.