The Art of Living

Well, it is the last day of April as I sit and write this.

Funny how the end of the month is very much like the beginning of the month.  My oldest son is sick again, and I’m sick again.

I’m trying to get a jump on my April recap and May goals

Need a reminder of my April goals?  Go read them at “Alright, Do it Right April” on my list blog.  Go ahead, I’ll wait….

Now, how did I do?

1.  I have started a Sacred Space or Altar for myself.  Its growing and changing a little at a time.  It is a collection of small things that I like, and each thing has meaning as well.   I’ll probably blog about it some time this month.

   I have tried meditating in front of it, but that didn’t go so well for me, as my children and husband always interrupt me.

   Of course, if I can’t even go #2 in the bathroom by myself, meditation didn’t stand a chance.

2. I’ve still not journaled, or even blogged (since my blogs are very much like a personal journal), like I wanted to.  The intention is there.  I even have two journals and some pens as part of my Sacred Space.
3.   No cleansing or purging has happened.  Again, good intentions, but I would take a look at whatever space I wanted to start on, and get cold feet.  Too much work.  I hate having to part with any of my stuff.  We have a whole house and I should not always be the one giving up my things.  But that is a rant for another time.
4.   The mindfulness is about 50/50.  I have been slightly more aware of my moods, what was triggering them.  But I’ve not been able to turn my moods around.  When I went dark this month I stayed dark.

Now, wanna see what I’m up to in May.  Check out my May goals on my List Blog.

From the “There is a little witch in all of us” Facebook page.

If you have read this blog before then you know I am on a quest to find myself.

Or, rather, I am on a quest to find a quest to find myself.

See, my soul wants to be shaken up.  I need a big change.  I need something that will rock the boat.

BUT….

I can’t afford (literally and figuratively) to rock the boat, because I’m not alone in it.

I work a full time job.  My husband only works part time.  We have a mortgage and 2 small kids to care for and feed.

My job has become a nightmare, and my relationship with my husband has become…questionable.  Except he refuses to acknowledge it.  I feel myself slipping away from him, and he doesn’t seem to think anything is wrong.

What I want to do is take some time off.  Some time away.  Some time apart.

I want to be isolated in a cottage in the countryside.  I want to be free to make and to create and to sit still and meditate for hours on end if I want to.

I need to be able to turn inwards.

But I can’t.

I spend 40+ hours a week at a job that I have come to LOATHE in the past year.  I mean, work is never fun.  I used to like my job a little more (despite how much I complained about it) because I always liked the people I worked with.

That isn’t true any more.  The  job has changed so much in the past 10 years its like I’m not even working at the same place anymore.  Even more so that we have the new manager.  If he can still be called new after 10 years.

Meanwhile, by the time I get home from work I’m mentally and physically drained.  I want to be creative, but I can’t.  I want to spend time with my sons, without being the mean mommy, but I can barely do that.  I just want to fall into bed and sleep and forget that I exist.

I love my sons deeply and dearly, but I need to be alone. (The job I work at has me surrounded by literally hundreds of strangers a day as well)

Then when the boys are finally both asleep and I can have some time to myself, my husband thinks that time, and my body, should belong to him.

I want to run away.

I can’t take time off though.  I can’t quit my job and search for a creative outlet.  Because if I don’t go to work every day then my husband can’t afford to pay the mortgage and feed the kids.  My family would be homeless and hungry.

I am a mother.  I will always sacrifice myself for my kids.

But after some recent very vivid nightmares (read about one here) I wonder at what cost.

I’m doing it again.

I’m making another blog.

Because I refuse to give up on the idea that I can spend my time doing something I really enjoy, and earn money from it.

It is a niche I tried in the past, but I’m approaching it from a different angle this time.

It is a craft blog.

In the past I launched a craft blog, but never had time to make crafts to share on it.  So nothing came of it.

This time I am going to have several crafts DONE before I even launch the blog.

Right now I have a whole page of possible crafts listed.  If I only posted one craft a week I have enough crafts to do 7 months of blog.

Of course I don’t have all the stuff to do every craft right now, but they are mostly inexpensive.

Are they all my own original ideas?

Nope.  They are DIYs inspired by Pinterest, Tumblr, youtube, etc.

I’ll do a craft.  Share the process and products.  Share my finished product.  Share what it was inspired by.

Meanwhile I need to think of other “filler” stuff.

I mean, I would like to post a minimum of 3 times a week.  One DIY project a week and….what else?  Crafty book and product reviews would be good, but I can’t afford to review one product or book a week cause I can’t afford to BUY something every single week.  Probably not even every single month.

Unless, of course, this thing actually DOES start earning some income.  Since crafting is my hobby, if it even made enough to pay for just the supplies to do more stuff.

Anyway, what I need to know is:

WHAT WOULD YOU LIKE TO SEE ON A CRAFT THEMED BLOG?

Please, leave me some comments below on what you would like to see in a craft themed blog.  Really, any suggestion will be considered so don’t be shy!

This poster is available at Amazon.com.

Today should have been a good day, because I didn’t have to work.  And I didn’t have a crap-load of housework to do.  I could just chill.

But it wasn’t a very good day at all.  That seems to be the case with Tuesday.  Tuesday is always the worst day of my week.  Every freaking week!

Being home, and in a good mood to start, I dressed up for my husband for when he got home from work.  I was wearing an outfit he likes, and even wore a lipstick color he bought me, not because I like it but because he did.

I put effort into looking nice for him and he completely ignored me.

Yep, didn’t even bat an eye in my direction.  Just went on about his day as if I were not there and were still at work instead of home happy to see him.

Except I wasn’t happy to see him after that.

When it became clear that he wasn’t going to pay a single bit of attention to me I changed into something more comfortable and washed the silly makeup off my face, then made lunch for me and the boy.

Sometimes I am jealous of single people, who can look for someone to love them.  I’m in this loveless marriage, and it is very, very lonely sometimes. (Ah, who am I kidding.  It is very lonely all of the time.)

After lunch I took the baby outside to play.  He ran around a while then wanted to play with his bubbles.  He spilled all his bubbles, and sat down in the mess.  It was kind of cute.

He played with his little basketball hoop, went down the slide once, and spent most of his time running circles up and down the back porch.

Up the ramp we build for our old man dog.  Down the steps on the other side.  Circled around.  Up the ramp.  Down the steps.  Circle around.

Of course, as is bound to happen with a 2 year old playing on steps, he fell down!

He hopped back up, didn’t even cry, but it scared the bejeesus out of me.

He just handed me the bubble wand he was still carrying, and went on his way.

Old man dog went to the vet, and I put the baby down for a nap.  Instead of relaxing I cleaned the kitchen which was a mess.

Hubby got back, and the older boy got home from school about the same time.  They started playing minecraft.

I tried to take a relaxing bath, but could hear the hubby scolding the boys every few minutes, for no reason other than they were acting their ages, and he was getting annoyed because he was trying to play a video game.

So I got out.

The rest of my night has continued in a similar manner, and I’m ready for bed.  But I have to wait for the bread in the oven to finish baking first.

Meanwhile, I’ve made my goals for March (See Marching Forward with March Goals).  Go check it out.

Every month I have been setting a handful of goals for myself for the month.  I share these on Listing Lists.

Things I’m Working On In February, is where I shared my February goals.  Take a moment to go read over my goals.  I’ll wait.

Now, here is how well I fared on them:

1.  I did cook some this month.  I did not make any Candied Orange Peels.  I did bake more bread.  I made cupcakes from scratch, that didn’t turn out so well.  And I make chocolate chip cookies that were EXCELLENT.  (and they are also gone.  lol)
2. I did not start my new blog.  I can’t settle on a name for it.  The name I really wanted (Simple Happy Home).  I’m also playing with the idea of buying some hosting and trying a wordpress blog to see if the earning potential is any higher.
3.   I didn’t do any more cleaning of my desk drawers.  In fact, the top of my desk is a hot mess, an avalanche just waiting to happen.On the bright side, none of the drawers I already cleaned have gotten any new junk thrown in them, so they are still clean.
4. Likewise I didn’t touch my bookshelves at all.  And the mess is overflowing off of my book  shelf onto the tiny shelf in front of it that we put our library books (and dvds) on to keep them separate from the rest of our books.
5.   I also did not get anything listed in my etsy shop.Every time I would think about sitting down to make something, those horrible little critics in my head started their “nobody is going to buy this” chatter.  So I never did make anything to list.

So, there you go, what happened with my “To Do”  list for February.

I’m a little sad that I only accomplished 1 out of 5 goals this past month.

Keep your eyes peeled for a list of goals for March on Listing Lists

(image used from morguefile.com.)

Has your whole life become a series of wants and wishes?

Image used from morguefile.com

When I was a child we used to say that if you made a wish and blew on a dandelion puff that the wish would come true if you could blow all of the seeds off with one breath.

Also, any unique old bottles found had the sweet promise of the possibility of a genie inside.

Wish. Want.  Dream.

All of my life I have been chasing wishes.

People often say that if you want it hard enough and work hard enough that you can make your own dreams come true.  I tend to disagree.

But maybe that is just because I’m a failure at life.

Other people give rousing speeches about how they started at the bottom.  Now they are famous actors, actresses, sports stars with multiples mansions and holiday homes in Europe.

I started at the bottom and have barely pulled myself halfway out of the hole that life plopped me into.

*sigh*

Can you tell I’m not in a place of light and sunshine tonight?

There are so many physical things I want.  So many things, less physical, that I wish were different in my life.

And what those two things have in common is that they will never become mine.  Those wants and those wishes are just the daydreams of a poor child who still blows on dandelion puffs and rubs bottles.

Life is what you make of it, people say.

Well, you can hand someone a pile of poo and tell them to make a chocolate pie with it, and the result might look like chocolate, but if you smell it or taste it you know exactly what you get.

Or, as my granny used to tell me, “Wish in one hand and spit in the other, see which one gets full first.”

Alice In Wonderland Art Poster Available on Amazon

Today I was thinking about how so many children today seem to have lost their sense of wonder.

The thought came to me as I was reading Go Set a Watchman today.  In a flashback in the novel a young Scout is afraid she is pregnant.

At her age in this novel children today would have no fear that a tongue kiss would make them pregnant, because they would know all about how babies are created.

But that is not the only place where wonderment is missing.

I will show my son things I find in nature.  I have shown him a feather, an interesting rock, the shell of a cicada left behind when it molted.  To me, at his age (he is six) those were amazing treasures.

He did briefly collect red leaves in a box, but even grew out of that.

His wonder is in the screen.  Right now he is obsessed with Minecraft.

Last night his dad had the TV and he couldn’t play.  He was wandering around huffy and puffy.  I asked him what was wrong he said, “I don’t know anything to do!”

“Boy!” I told him, “You have a whole room full of toys back there, don’t tell me you don’t have anything to do.”

Which is not to say that I didn’t say the same thing when I was his age.  I was bored plenty. But I didn’t have cable tv.  I didn’t have video games.  I didn’t have cartoons at my fingertips, or a whole room of gizmos and gadgets.  I had a few toys, a few books, and the whole wide world outside.

As an adult I want to go back to childhood.

I look at the world through a glass darkly.  I want to be able to look at it through the looking glass again instead.

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Image in this post is a poster from amazon.com.  Click it if you think you’d like to purchase it!