The Perfectionst vs. The Birthday Girl

Fall is my favorite time of the year.  My family indulges my swooning over the trees changing colors, cool temperatures, pumpkins and all things orange.  As favorited as fall is in my world, it's also the busiest time of the year preparing for back to school and homeschool co-op classes.  Once we get in the swing of things and nail our routine down, the roar of preparation subsides and life settles into rhythm.  So, you know, birthdays are nice and everything ... but really, who has time to take the weekend before school starts to celebrate a birthday?  Not me, no way.  Impossible.  Can't be done.

Fortunately, LtDan has no such perfectionist compunction to let putting ducks in rows take precedence over celebrating a birthday, and he planned a surprise weekend getaway that he knew would be a welcome respite once I got over my notions about how things "must" be done.

We went to the Omni Mandalay Hotel in Las Colinas, less than an hour away, and our old stomping grounds from newly married years.  Las Colinas is a business and residential development complete with hotels, townhomes, restaurants and businesses.  It's quite convenient to DFW airport, and is about in the middle between Dallas and Fort Worth.   The Omni Mandalay sits beside Lake Carolyn, a small lake that runs into the canals of Las Colinas.  

  

We made ourselves at home and enjoyed the gorgeous artwork throughout the hotel before we convened with wine overlooking the lawn and Lake Carolyn.  I fell in love with these two gorgeous fall-ish prints in one of the conference rooms.  

The corner rooms of the Omni are special ... they have a curved wall and a huge rounded window with a balcony, and the floorplan feels more like a small apartment than a hotel room.  Simply gorgeous!  Standing on the rounded balcony feels like being the queen, and the views are stunning, both day and night.

Our view was toward Williams Square, home of the Mustangs at Las Colinas.  These are giant sculptures, sitting at the base of huge buildings - if you ever want to feel small, this is where you should go.  You can just make out the mustangs in my picture from the balcony (sorry, blurry phone pics), but click }here{ for a better idea of how magnificent these sculptures are.  

 We opted for a leisurely breakfast in the room - my favorite, and my favorite breakfast entre, smoked salmon.  There may or may not have been sharing.

We took a stroll along the canal, remembering distinctive shops that were there back in the day, but sadly the shops we remember are no longer there.  I teased LtDan that he'd planned this, since we were supposed to shop for my birthday gift on the canal.  The architecture has a Spanish flair and the landscaping is beautiful.  Even though there are 'no fishing' signs posted, we passed three fisherman who proudly showed us a catch of six huge catfish.  If I were a fish, I would want to swim here.

Back at the hotel, we scoped out where we wanted to spend the evening, and the courtyard patio did not disappoint. While Friday night had been fairly quiet, the hotel filled up on Saturday with New York Giants VIPs and their families, which was kind of fun. 

On the way home, we stopped at Nebraska Furniture Mart, and I picked out my birthday gift, which was a much bigger deal than I was expecting.  My dream of having a comfy place to stretch out and take naps on the porch is about to come true ... happy birthday to me!

If you've never been to Nebraska Furniture Mart ... well ... you must go.  Quickly.  Go there.  Think Ikea, except bigger.  And they have everything.  Furniture for the house, inside and out, kitchen appliances, decor, rugs ... and I'm not sure what else because we didn't even go upstairs ... !

 
 

Coffee understands :o)  

I was expecting to have the whole weekend to wrap up loose ends before starting school, but instead spent it in the lovely real-life suspension that is staying in a hotel.  Although I'd convinced myself that the weekend was necessary to prepare for school, I sensed that everything would be fine if I just relaxed.  Sure enough, LtDan and I had a marvelous weekend, it was a great first week of school, everything was more than fine, and the kids were happy to be back in class.  Here's one great gift of getting older:  you learn you can trust yourself.  Even if all the ducks aren't in an absolutely  p e r f e c t  row, it's probably quite good enough, and the perfectionist should take her birthday off.  Birthday Girl for the win :o)

The Pomodroido : My New Favorite Phone App

I've written about how taking breaks is the best thing since sliced bread - as though I have this productivity booster down pat - but the truth is, I need all the help I can get when it comes to time  management.  My default mode is to work until you can't stand up anymore, then keep going until you finish the project, the kitchen is clean, and you've done two loads of laundry.

So I want to show you a nifty little phone app I heard about this week from someone way smarter than me.  I'm sharing this with you not because I'm gaining anything from it, but because it rocked my world this week.  It's called the Pomodroido.  In case you're not familiar, let me give you a little background about the Pomodoro Technique first.  It's both a technique and a book, written by Francesco Cirillo.  Remember those cute little kitchen timers that look like tomatoes?  When Cirillo developed the Pomodoro Technique, he used a tomato timer, hence the name (Pomodoro means "tomato" in Italian).  The gist is that you alternate work and break cycles, maintaining absolute integrity on both your work and break periods.  One work period plus one break period equals one Pomodoro.  Work when you're supposed to work, break when you're supposed to break, and when executed properly, the technique is a huge productivity and focus booster.  You can click }here{ for more inspiration at the Pomodoro website.

Have I tried this?  Yes.  Does it work?  Yes.  Can I use help, though?  Absolutely.

What in life can't be improved with a nifty phone app?  The Pomodoro Technique is no exception.  Let me tell you a little bit about Pomodroido, and maybe you'll find it helps you with time management and productivity, too.

Essentially, Pomodroido is a timer app.  Being set up expressly for the Pomodoro Technique, it sets you up for a 25 minute work period, counts down how much time is left during the period, sounds the alarm when it's over and asks if you're ready to take a break.  If you're ready for a break, you swipe the phone, the timer sets for a 5 minute break period, and the alarm sounds when the break is over.  If you choose not to take the break and opt to continue working, the timer sets to another 25 minute work period, but your next break will be longer.

The work segments default to 25 minutes and the break periods to 5 minutes, but the times are customizable.  You can also customize the alarm tone, as well as opt (or not) to hear a ticking timer during the work sessions.  That would probably drive some people crazy, but for me, it works like a rebounder for my wandering brain.  When my brain starts to wander and hears the ticking timer, it hustles back to the task at hand (most of the time :o).

In addition to timing your work/break periods, Pomodroido also keeps track of how many Pomodoros you've accomplished in a day and in a week.  If keeping score motivates you, this is a big win.  Kind of like a step counter for work periods.

Using the Pomodroido app helps me stay focused and gives me a greater sense of urgency for completing tasks in a timely manner.  I don't know about you, but I can stretch a task or project into an unseemly length and think I've worked the entire time on the same task, when in reality my work period has been  riddled with  in unsanctioned "breaks" - often they're breaks to do multiple work tasks in other areas, but they lessen my focus and concentration, and of course that's counter productive.   Using the Pomodroido app also helps me keep my perfectionist tendencies in check - do I really need to spend another 25 minutes working on this project, or is it good enough right now?

I'm not a big gadget girl, but this app helped me stay focused and productive this week in a crazy busy week.  If you check out the Pomodroido app (click }here{ to see it at the Google store - it's free), let me know what you think, or if you have another time management app that you love, fill me in!

The Magical Powers of Decluttered and Tidy

I mentioned starting the book The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up?

I told you I'd let you know when the magic happened?

It happened.

Back to school is my get-it-back-together season.  The new year is all about resolutions, I don't do a big spring clean, but if it's September, you can bet I'm looking to get all my ducks in a row.  I kept hearing about the book The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up : The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing and that it's - well, life-changing, so I started reading it on the way home from vacation, knowing I had three weeks to get everything in order before we start school again and that I needed some serious inspiration.

Serious inspiration indeed.  I haven't even finished reading The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up and it's propelled massive action : two teenager's rooms tidied up in two and a half days and all ready for a new school year ... it IS magic!  I can't give you a full book report since I haven't completed reading it, but I'm here to tell you that the basic premise of decluttering first and then tidying up absolutely  w o r k s.  You release the junk first, pulling everything out and using the "does this bring me joy" technique for shedding stuff.  This rather forces you to finish the project in one grand effort.  Yes - ALL AT ONCE.  In its purest form, the KonMari method would have you sorting through all your belongings at once, not just one room at a time, but I had to be realistic about what areas were priority and what we would be able to accomplish with the time available.  What I can tell you is that ridding a room of its junk from floor to ceiling and then tidying it up gives you space to put it all back together in its best form.

We made some effort toward updating these two rooms several months ago, but we lost steam and the clutter exploded, precisely because we tried to decorate and make it pretty before decluttering.   Unfortunately, the Golden Rule prohibits me from showing before pictures, but trust me when I say the results of our decluttering and tidying up work are dramatic.  After I promised myself I would not question any decisions my kids made to throw out or give away, we started with Abbie's room and she was ruthless about letting things go; I was so proud of her.   We got her room done in about four hours - not because there wasn't much stuff, but because she was decisive and fast (and I kept my promise).  When we started, the floor of her closet was completely covered with stuff, and the hanging rod was packed with clothes going all the way back to when we shopped at Justice - it was definitely time to clear out :o) 

Aaron and I tackled his room the next day.  Since he's the youngest of four kids, his room was a little more challenging.  He was the last one to play with all the toys, and they migrated to his room over time.  All of them.  The Fisher Price Castle, the Legos, blocks custom made by Granddaddy, Woody from Toy Story - they were all crammed into his closet along with 50 years of National Geographic Magazine (not kidding).  It's a testament to Aaron's great patience that he never complained about having outgrown his room.  All in all, it took about six hours to finish the magic, and that spread over the course of two days (because you do not interfere with Bunco night). 

After pulling out six (yes - SIX) giant trash bags of things to take to Good Will, and two giant trash bags of things to throw away, we have two rooms filled with things that only bring joy and they feel absolutely spacious.  We have curtains and a few decor items on the way, but I keep wandering in there to admire the decluttered tidy - it makes me so happy!  Not to mention it's completely within reason to expect that these rooms could be cleaned in five minutes or less.  My challenge to the kids is to never let their eyes see their "new" rooms messy, and they're up for it; they like the tidy, too.

As for me, I'm looking forward to the next decluttering project, and I'm pretty sure finishing The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up will help me conquer some significant clutter.  I keep things.  For sentimental reasons, I keep things I will never use.  For sentimental reasons, I keep things I don't even like.  For sentimental reasons, I keep things other people give me just because they can't throw things away.  But from here on out, I'll declutter before I try to clean up, and the keep it or not test is joy.  This is no illusion here, there's no junk lurking under the bed or in the closet - this is REAL decluttered and tidy magic.   

What I Read on My Summer Vacation

We'll start school mid-September, in case you're wondering.

We're actually just finishing last year's schoolwork, thanks for asking.

We made it through Algebra II - yahoo!!

One of my students is completely DONE with school work and earned a nice little break, one of my students is wrapping up a few loose ends, and I'm gearing up for the new school year with a 10th and an 11th grader.  That's completely unreal.  Our eldest is working this semester and applying for EMT school, and our second son is working and loving his college classes.  It was such a blast to have him come home from his first day of classes to say, "I LOVE my classes!"  YAY.  

So it's time to start school.  You can read about how I feel about that }here{.  I haven't had a prophetic dream about starting school this year because my head and my heart are still full to bursting with vacation.  I suppose that's when you know you did it right.

We scheduled summer vacation for the last possible week, just before college classes began here.  It was fun to look forward to sunshine on warm Gulf waters all summer, and it helped that so many of my friends went to the beach in Alabama so I could enjoy their vacations vicariously on Facebook.  I'm a big believer in vicarious vacations.  Take me!  Take me!!

I had all of our clothes packed two days before we left.  Six people, eight days - do the math, this is no small thing!  We came home to a clean house with all but a few items of clothing clean.  This was our most efficient vacation prep ever, and Past Me gets a big gold star for all the effort it took to make coming home a pleasure.  This is something I've been working on for YEARS, and I can say it's totally worth all the work up front.  Of course I can say that, now that I'm home reaping the benefit.

I love to anticipate vacation and all its fun, and I also really look forward to all the idle time to fill with reading.  I choose at least two books to read on vacation, something light and something thought provoking.  I think about it all summer.  That's kind of geeky, but I know my fellow book lovers will understand.  Time in the car, time on the balcony, time on the beach - a book lover's dream!  My favorite reading vacation was the one where we went to the beach in early May, and it was chilly enough to sit on the balcony wrapped in a blanket and read all afternoon.   

Before I started reading my vacation books this year, I had to finish The Geography of You and Me, because I have book rules.   I chose this book from the Modern Mrs. Darcy Summer Reading Guide.  Click }here{ to check it out ... so many great books!  The Geography of You and Me is a sweet book about first love and does a delicious job of describing the ups and downs of being young, in love, star crossed, and at the mercy of life events.  It's Young Adult fiction, but well written.  

For thought provoking reading, I chose Brene Brown's Men, Women and Worthiness : The Experience of Shame and the Power of Being Enough. Actually, this one is a listen through Audible.com - if you aren't a member, your first listen is free!  This is a 2 hour program and every minute is packed with wisdom.  I've heard about Brene Brown for some time and was curious about what she had to say, and honestly, I wondered if any of it applied to me.  The answer was yes, very definitely, everything she said applied to me.  She begins with explaining the difference between shame and guilt: shame is about you - shame for who you are; guilt is about behavior - guilt for something you did.   Guilt can be helpful in changing your behavior, shame has no constructive purpose.  The difference is subtle, but consider it and you'll realize the implications are vast.  Listening helped me understand some things about myself that I've been trying to puzzle out for years.  Understanding the difference between guilt and shame can have a tremendous impact on how you parent, and how you approach all relationships, really.  I also appreciated the insightful discussion about what men and women experience shame about - quite the difference there, as you might expect.  I haven't finished contemplating this wisdom, and I look forward to reading more from Brene Brown.

Next up was book 1 in the Survivalist Series, Going Home, by A. American.  I didn't plan to read this one, but my brother-in-law had just read it and strongly recommended it.  Going Home begins with an "event" that shuts down everything electrical.  Everything.  No electricity, no cars, and everything goes dark.  It's not completely clear what's happened, and it seems that a sun flare may have had something to do with it, but there's also evolving suspicion that the government may have played a role.  The story follows Morgan Carter, who is 250 miles from his home in Florida when everything shuts down.  His road home is a long and dangerous journey and will have you thinking about planting a garden, digging a well and getting some chickens.  And if you're on a road trip, it will have you thinking about the miles from home not in hours but how long will it take us to walk it?

Finally, I started The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, by Marie Kondo, on the drive home, since I'd heard that when you read it, you'll immediately want to change your life and tidy up, and I wanted to apply the energy to home and not a vacation condo.  I haven't finished the book yet, but Kondo's premise is that you start not with tidying up, but with cleaning out - in one fell swoop.  As in pull everything out, sort through and throw things away that don't bring you joy, and then find a place for everything that made the cut.  It makes complete sense and the idea appeals to me tremendously.  I'm not sure I can employ the big clean out in one fell swoop in a household of six people who aren't really motivated to clear out their junk, but there are rooms in our house that desperately need magic, and this book just may be exactly what we need.  I'll let you know when it happens.

September is sneaking up on us.  There's a faint tint of yellow in the color of the leaves.  As much as I loved summer and the beach, I'm ready for all things fall - it's my favorite time of the year, I may have mentioned that once.  Same as I enjoyed the beach vacations of my Facebook friends, now I'm enjoying everyone's back to school pictures.  Just let me get one more peek of the beach before I sharpen the pencils.  

thanks to my sister-in-law for her gorgeous beach pictures!

Mercy Hunting : Vacation Style

We've been on vacation.  Beloved, wonderful vacation.  Beloved, wonderful, takes a lot of work to get to, we've been counting down for 364 days vacation.  God's mercies are new every morning, but surely on vacation they're doubled and maybe even tripled.

We've done this vacation with little ones.  We've done this vacation with tweens and teens.  Now, we're doing this vacation with a passel of kids and their cousin who are old enough, really, to execute this vacation on their own.  Funny thought, that.  Not, of course, that I refrain from reminding them to put on sun screen, don't swim out too far, or to be careful crossing the street.  It's really hard to turn down the Mom machine.

I've shared ideas about how to have a successful family vacation }here{, and one of those ideas is to keep a (loose) daily schedule.  We've vacationed in Gulf Shores/Orange Beach, Alabama, for years, and I realized about half way through the week that maybe it's time to adjust my expectations on the kids.  They're teenagers and twenty-somethings now - no one is bounding out of bed at the crack of dawn ready to play in the surf.  Reality is that they're staying up really late and sleeping late and doing the beach somewhere in between.  It's their vacation too :o)

We took a risk and opted to stay in a different condo this year to make sleeping arrangements a little more convenient.  I love love loved our old condo, but the new one had a bed for everyone and it's hard to argue against that.  The new condo had a beachy decor motif, an absolute must as far as I'm concerned.  The colors were on the sophisticated side of happy and definitely on my favorite color palate.  The master bedroom was the most dreamy color of blue with white furniture.  

Part of our crew made a massively successful fishing expedition with Summer Hunter Charters (click }here{ to go to their website), wherein the they left a bag of fish with the deckhand, brought three bags of fish to the restaurant to be cooked (we love Mikee's!), and we still took four boxes of leftovers back to the condo!  The fishermen fished and the rest of us enjoyed the beach and did our best to dodge the jelly fish.  (Thanks to Sam for the fishing trip pics!)

My sister-in-law and I spent a lovely morning shopping, all the way from Orange Beach to Loxley and back.  It's so much fun to imagine decorating a beach house or condo in all beach theme decor.  And we couldn't resist a stop in at the Burris Farm Market, too!

We also found the two beach houses that were featured this season on HGTV's Beach Flip (click }here{ for a link to the show).  We just drove by, we didn't knock on the door, but it was tempting!

Our Mercy Hunting nets are full.  We had a fantastic time sitting on the beach, playing in the waves (except for those pesky jellyfish - oh, the pain!) visiting our favorite restaurants (Lamberts, Home of Throwed Rolls, you MUST eat there!), drinking coffee on the balcony, listening to the loudest thunder we've ever heard in our lives, grilling by the pool, squeezing in multiple naps, reading, and just sitting blissed out on the sand.

The countdown clock resets ... 364 days to go!  

If you're interested in visiting Gulf Shores or Orange Beach, Alabama,  

Brett Robinson Vacation Rentals is a great resource.  Check their website }here{ for property listings.

I'm not affiliated with Brett Robinson, and haven't been compensated for mentioning their name here; 

we've used their services with great results for many years and I do recommend them.

If you visit our favorite vacation destination, share the joy - let me know!