What's on the brain today

That would be jobs, vacation and diet. Probably the same things everyone thinks about in the new year, right? I have a few friends in need of new employment this year so I've been surfing my company's website in hopes to refer, and I also like to look to see if anything piques my interest. I do have the perfect job in that it is very flexible when/where I work and the work can be done from the comforts of my home office. I also like working with the boys, most of the time there is no hormonal drama added on. However with recent re-orgs and whatever corporate strategies, my small team of 5 is going to reach burnout fast. And when that happens people are known to fly the coop to greener pastures. I waffle daily on having the perfect job that allows me the hours/flexibility to be at home and a decent amount of vacation time, or pursuing what I assume would be my "dream job" in nursing without the schedule flexibility, good pay, and starting out from scratch on vacations.

What to do? I know quite a few people go back to college later in life once their children are grown to pursue their dreams, maybe this will be the case? MAYBE my husband's company will realize how detrimental he is and offer him a 200% raise and then I wouldn't really care so much about my income?! I know...but it's good to dream right? And with my job I still have time to spend with my daughter and do my crafting and all that good time kind of negates all the job stressors I may have anyway.

Now vacation...if I could afford it I would be on a plane, but this year is just the usual winter blues and dreaming of sunshine and it's also been 2 years since I've been to Disney World and so I've got Disney Fever (which is almost as cool as Disco Fever, but not as bad as Hay Fever). I have an aunt and uncle going soon and so that's got me surfing websites and seeing all that I want to do the next time we go (which will hopefully be next spring!) Good thing for me Troy is game to go. His first time there was with my parents 2 years ago where he realized it is fun for adults too. I have another friend going to Hawaii next week to just relax on a chair on the beach and that sounds pretty good to me too! And so I will just live vicariously through others this year and dream.

Lastly, diet. Egads, why is all that eating right and motivation to exercise so hard for 99% of us, and easy to others? I watch The Biggest Loser, I watch that Dr. Oz on Oprah, and think gosh, so many good ideas, let's get out there and do that! But it's cold outside, and I don't know what TO eat only what not to eat, and gym memberships are so expensive, and I don't have time, and excuses excuses excuses. So I figure I need to start small and keep adding on little things to get to the big picture. For Troy and I our first step was getting whole wheat into our diets in the form of bread, pasta, rice, taco shells, whatever, no more white bread/rice/etc. Then the convenience of the Schwann's man brought awesome frozen fruits and veggies to our door. So that's where we're at, baby steps here. If you have any great recipes that are healthy to share, please email them to me!

LUCY: I can't blog and not talk about her. I last wrote about her nightly crying attacks. I think I figured that out by just tuckering her out. We've gone back to nightly baths, or actually just playing in the water, and then down to the playroom until she starts climbing on me and laying her head down. Troy also got her her first toothbrush and toothpaste. I have to get a picture of that, but we did catch the first time on video. So every night we brush our teeth and gums and she holds the brush and knows what it needs to do so that is good. And we're still trying to teach her hand gestures like waving bye bye and blowing kisses. As well as I sign to her. She does stare intently at me, I'm not sure if that means one day she'll be signing "all done" or "mama" back to me or not? "Dada" still rules her vocabulary. And we're talking about her first bday party already (I know it's 3 months away). We do have a date/time and I got an idea today of doing a desserts open house. We could do a build-your-own sundae bar and I was going to bake/decorate cupcakes, so that sounds like a good idea to me, especially since it will be in the afternoon between most lunch/dinner times. So that's all that is for Lucy now. We go for her 9-month checkup tomorrow. I'm guessing she's 20lbs. even. We shall see!