ObSeSsEd

When I was in the fifth grade my family started skiing. We would spend Friday nights as a family at Powder Mountain, me in my pink and purple ski outfit and Aubrie in her red and blue suit. Why I got the girly colors and my sister got stuck with the " boy" suit is beyond me, but you better believe that Aubrie brings it up whenever the "favorite daughter" topic arises. Hahaha.....and one time skiing she totally wrecked and a guy from the chair lift yelled, "You okay little fella?" This story can still get us to the verge of peeing our pants from laughter, but ANYWAY(I digress)....the point is, I have been skiing for awhile. Did I always love it? Nooooooo. When I was little I was always cold and slightly....bored, but I went because my family did. Then in Jr. High and High School, it became a social thing: "Wanna go skiing with a bunch of us?" "Okay....something to do." (I should mention here that way back in the day, a day lift ticket was like $13-crazy!)

Then came college, marriage and babies and well.....the skiing stopped. Did I miss it? Not so much. Then in 2009, I all of a sudden decided that Easton HAD to learn to ski. I was determined to teach him. So while Paul was in Florida for work, I loaded up my five year old and my mom and headed up to the mountains. I posted about that trip here.
Since then we have gone several times and I can't describe how much I love it. I love it way more than I ever did as a kid and here is the kicker: I'm way better at it than I ever was in High School. True Story. Shocking, I know....but I am. This winter I started skiing black diamond runs and I have NEVER done those before. (I'm kind of tooting my own horn here....but honestly, I rarely have a horn to toot....so toot!toot!;) I am not an athletically inclined person(at all!)-but for some reason, I can ski and I can't. get. enough! I have a perma-grin the entire time. I get to the bottom of a run and say, "Again!" Paul doesn't even know who I am up there. Several times this year while I have been skiing I have thought about how thankful I am that my parents gave me that oppurtunity. I didn't love it while I was younger and I didn't have the mental capability to understand what that took, financially to get us all out there, but I am SO glad they did it! Now being in my mid-thirties(holy crap!) I have something that I love to do,something that makes me feel amazing and that I can do with my husband and my kids. We went Friday and I am already dying to get back out there. (I should mention here that a day lift ticket is now $60. We ski....but that is about all we are doing...ha..) I am truly obsessed.
I'm such an "indoor" girl and yet the older I get the more I find myself doing "outdoorsy" things. Maybe this is what comes of being a stay-at-home mom; you are inside and cooped up for so long that before you know it a vacation is floating a river and Friday night date night is spent playing in the snowy mountains. I'll take it. ;)

So do my kids love it? Kind of. Sorta. Easton will most likely ditch the skis for the snowboard his dad favors. I think the whole thing is a stretch for Allie....but we will keep at it because one day when she is busy being a mom, wife and all that jazz, she just might find herself flying down a snow-capped mountain with a mile-wide smile,thinking, "Wahoooooo!! I'm ALIVE!!" :)

Cool enough for School

One thing that I have felt really bad about is the fact that I haven't been able to go and help with Easton's class/teacher. When Allie was in Kindergarten and first grade I was the mom that went in weekly to help out. Easton was just that mellow....that I could give him a piece of paper and pencil and he was content for at least an hour while I graded papers or helped kids learn their sight words. Olivia, on the other hand, would NEVER. I tried to take her and help in Allie's class one time.....and one time only.
Today however, with it being Valentine's Day and all, I volunteered to go and help with the party......two-year-old in tow. Amazingly, she did great-as long as she got to go around doing the activities that all the kids were doing. haha..
I got there while the kids were still on break so that I could set up and be ready when they came in. I was a little nervous to see how Easton would react with me in his classroom. Allie was always so happy to have me there, but I have learned that Easton is very different about things like this. I constantly embarrass him-unknowingly. He doesn't like a lot of attention or the spotlight and any fussing is not tolerated-at all. So when he came in I braced myself for the major dis and un-acknowledgement of my presence. I waved casually-leaving it open for him to decide how to respond. He came over and said, "Hi Mom!" and then he wrapped his arms around my waist and hugged me. I'm pretty sure my mouth fell open as I thought to myself, "Easy......don't scare him away!" (haha...)
Before he came back from break though, I had walked around reading all the things on the walls of his classroom. I found his gold medal mile necklace loaded down with feet for every time he completed a mile. I noticed that all the feet were either green,white or black. Allie's had to always be in pink, red and purple. :) I saw his name for passing off sight words, math facts and then.....I saw his desk. My kid's school desks are absolutely fascinating to me. It's like peeking into their little world that I know everything,and yet nothing, about. His desk was neat and tidy, the exact opposite of his sister's and inside I could see a mechanical pencil, Burt's Beeswax lip balm(just like his Dad), a library book on the Tyrannosaurus Rex peeking out, his name laminated and taped to his desk, reaffirming just how much I have always loved his name. ;) The whole thing just made me smile. His Valentine's for classmates sat on top of his desk in a Wal-mart sack. Again, nothing fancy or fussy for this boy, the antithesis to his sister's request:a Valentine box that looks like an iPod from an old pizza box...????
I got to see how he interacted with the other kids and he isn't as short as I thought he was-in fact, I would say he was very much the average. I got to put faces to names that I have heard about for months now and his description of some of them were spot on. I immediately spotted the one "that sniffs up her snot and talks too loud" right away. Poor thing.....must be allergies. ;)
I also met the one and only girl that he has EVER mentioned. The ONLY girl he wanted to give a Valentine to. Blond,blue-eyed,hair-as-short-as-a-boy,cowboy boots and the first one to march up to me and ask if I was Easton's mom. After five minutes of having her sit at my table-I got it. Bubbly, fun, sweet and laughed at everything. Audrey Hepburn wasn't kidding, happy girls really are the prettiest girls. ;)
During his other activities, he would smile and wave at me, wind his way back over to me from time to time and took his sister around to each activity(where she won the chopsticks and conversation hearts game.....two year old vs. first graders....won.....just saying....;)
He wanted to ride the bus home-not with me-and he was worried that I would have my feelings hurt. They weren't hurt.....I was just glad I had passed the "cool enough to come to school at all" test. haha....
However, I couldn't get out of that school fast enough. Our teachers are NOT paid enough-period. The whole place has a smell that I can't really describe. It's reminiscent of stale lunch,dirty hair and glue. The kids, while sweet, after an hour had managed to get on every single nerve of mine. "Easton's mom? Easton's mom? Easton's mom? I need tape. I need tape. I need tape. I need a marker. I need a marker. I need....Easton's mom? I need tape and a black marker. Easton's mom?...."
If I had to teach first grade I would be a drunk. Better to hit the bottle than the kids, right? ;)

Keep Your Blinders On

When I was growing up, my dad used to say: "Keep your blinders on." When he said this, I always knew what he meant. He was referring to racehorses and how before a race, small plastic or leather cups are placed to the sides of the horses eyes to keep it focused on what is in front of him, encouraging him to pay attention to the race rather than other distractions, such as the crowds or other horses.(Thank you Wikipedia) These blinders would force the horse to only stare down his own path. My father used this analogy when talking about our own lives; to not become distracted with what other people are doing, but to remember our own path and to stay focused and steady on our own course. It's easy to become distracted when looking at what others have, what they are doing, etc.. and before long you have lost sight of your own path and more importantly, your own life.

I have a few things in my life that have caused me to take my blinders off.....so to speak, and I feel like the focus on my own path has become lost-a little. If there is one thing I have always been good(no, great) at-it's being completely happy and content with my own station in life. My mom can attest to this. I have always been excited about where I "am" but lately I have lost some of that. I get off Pinterest and feel like in order to be happy I need a new house,new wardrobe,better hair, and home-made play dough(ha!).

Last week after parent teacher conferences I came home and checked my face book and read things like, "My child is the smartest kid in the school!" "The teacher can't believe that she is reading quantum Physics analysis in Kindergarten!" "My child is a FREAKING genius!" "They are moving my first grader to eighth grade....she needs the challenge!"

Okay, okay....I am exaggerating-a little, but that is how it sounded to me. It made me feel bad about my own parent/teacher conferences where I was told for both of my children, "They are doing just fine. Right where we want them to be." Not below-not above. Just right where they want them to be and guess what?.... I was good with that!(actually elated-because they said they are nice kids too-and nice matters) until I got home and read that my FB peers are actually the parents of literal Einsteins. Pin a rose, people....Pin. a. rose. (See? It brings out the ugly in me.)

Don't even get me started on how a charter school is coming to our area and that it is ALL the mom's around me are talking about. There is this air of, "What WE are doing is better than what YOU are doing." It's exhausting...really, just exhausting.

Then there are the few(because some I really enjoy) mommy blogs that every time I read their latest post I swear(no, really...swearing is involved)that I will never go back and yet.......time after time I get pulled in like a rat to the pied piper. I leave those blogs feeling like a crappy mom. They paint this picture that motherhood is non-stop prancing through rainbows and Lilly covered fields and yes, at times that is what it feels like, but there are times that it's......boring, to be honest. (GASP! Did she just say??.....Oh no she didn't! Oh...yes,yes, I did.)

Let's get real, shall we?Sometimes my husband annoys me, my kids smell like outside,a load of laundry has sat held hostage in the dryer for three days, and I have $35 in my checking account to last two more days. Put that in your pipe and smoke it, little Miss June Cleaver! (Small Tangent....)

Anyway, the point of all of this is, I have to put my blinders back on. I have to re-focus on my own path and put all of my energy and attention towards it. Thank you for the advice, Dad-I'll take it. After all......what is down my own lane is pretty dang awesome and they will reap the benefits from my undivided attention and happiness. Even if they do smell like "outside" from time to time. ;)

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