Adulting*
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Secondhand Gift Giving*
I have a thought. Well, I have many thoughts. I unload most of them on all of you. I just went and picked up a Christmas gift for my mom. I can’t post a photo yet because she sneaks on here sometimes (HI MOM!), but as soon as I saw it I knew she’d love it. …but I didn’t get it from a store. I bid on it on a Facebook auction. It’s old and used, but it’s beautiful. I’ve never seen anything like it. I am giving my mom a second hand item for Christmas. Is that weird? In truth, I know my mom won’t care, because she loves…
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I’m a Fake Adult*
I have a small confession to make. I realized something yesterday. I’m a fraud. A fake adult. A pretend grown-up. I did laundry yesterday. This is not exciting. I do laundry all day every day. This time I was washing something new, so I checked the tags. As I was checking the tags, which I do often, you know, as an adult woman doing laundry would do, I realized something: I have absolutely NO idea what the symbols mean. None. Zip. I have been washing laundry for 20 years. Somewhere along the line I realized that you should read the tags before washing things. Check. I do that. …I just…
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Sometimes my anxiety is a jerk.
It’s extremely high today, and I know exactly why: I have friends coming over tomorrow. I often feel like my brain holds two separate entities: the Rational Brain (RB) and my Anxiety Brain (AB). Sometimes they coexist peacefully. Other times my Anxiety Brain tries to stage a coup and completely take over. (She can be mean when she wants to be.) Today was a hard day. It’s felt a little like this: Rational Brain (RB): “It’s going to be so good to see my friend tomorrow. I really need this. Anxiety Brain (AB): “You can’t possibly have friends over!! Your house is a disaster. Have you SEEN your floors?!” RB:…
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Today I had a little reminder to check my privilege.
After seeing a comment and message about some of the options I had on my “no screens activity list”, I wanted to explain something. Well, a couple of things, actually. The options on that list weren’t meant to be me showing off. My kids came up with 90% of what was there. It’s a big list, and we are definitely privileged to have so many options available to us. But here’s the thing: we have so many options for two big reasons. First, I live very frugally. I save, shop sales, thrift shop and watch community sites where people near me are passing things on for a reasonable price. Second,…