Lazy W Marie

Carpeing all the diems in semi-rural Oklahoma...xoxo

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Archives for September 6, 2015

two decades

Today she turns twenty. My doe eyed baby girl, the artist and music connoisseur, the horse lover, the speaker of hard things, the innocent who has learned to heal herself and gather her own magic. An unbelievable pair of decades has passed since I first held her, though I had seen her face before that in my dreams.

joc studio newborn pic

joc age 4 christmas

joc

She has grown from a tiny, grasping little girl who hated to be separated from me into a confident young woman ready and excited to explore the world in ever widening adventures.

I miss holding her in my lap! xoxo
I sure miss holding her in my lap! xoxo

Last year at this time we had just begun our reunion. A deep, much needed healing started just as she turned nineteen, and the months that followed brought one surprise after another, plus such an outpouring of love and grace. I wrote for her 19 wishes for that birthday, and looking back I am amazed to see how many of those wishes, prayers really, have already been answered and started to come to fruition. Her life is showing the fruits of faith and love in beautiful, mysterious ways. For this we are so thankful.

This past year she has learned a lot about herself, I think, and about work and life and money, stuff both practical and eternal. She has learned more about people, human nature, romance, and lasting family bonds. She struck out and spent some time working in the mountains, her own special version of paradise, and I was so lucky to go visit her there for five amazing, unforgettable days. Seeing her eyes light up and watching her leap and bound through the ancient boulders and wild sage… It made my heart deeply, wildly happy.

On Trail Ridge Road, June 2015.
On Trail Ridge Road, June 2015.

joc hikejoc justin on old man peak

joc horse colorado

That collection of moments with her in the mountains held the dual charm of bonding us more tightly and helping me let go a little bit, for her sake. I’ll write more soon about what things I have learned as a mother over the course of this year of explosive growth. But today is her day.

This year, Jocelyn, I continue to pray those same nineteen wishes over your life, plus one very special unspoken hope. I expect to see things unfold for you more and more. God is moving on your behalf in so many ways, seen and unseen, and life is full of surprises. We are so proud of you, of your heart, of what you have faced and what you have accomplished. So happy for your strong internal compass and instincts. So thankful for your love.

Life is beautiful, just like you are, and this is only the beginning.

Happy Birthday, Sweet Pea
XOXOXOXO

 

prepare: nighttime routines

Hey, happy Labor Day, happy Monday! How are you doing?

My days of the week and hours of those days are all a bit off right now. We have been partying and celebrating life’s various milestones like crazy people, happy crazy people, and of course a ton of work comes along with all this much joy. So Handsome and I are EX-HAUS-TED. In the best possible ways.

Handsome turns 40!
Handsome turns 40!
Kate & Dillon say their vows with friends and family to witness...xoxo
Kate & Dillon say their vows with friends and family to witness…xoxo
Our beautiful girl visits Oklahoma and, quite against my wishes, turns 20 and leaves again, haha. ; )
Our beautiful girl visits Oklahoma and, quite against my wishes, turns 20 and leaves again, haha. ; )

Tomorrow we will more or less go back to normal work routines, so tonight I will spend a few minutes preparing for that. You know, just twenty or thirty minutes rounding things up and setting them in order so that bright and early tomorrow morning we can hit the ground running. Literally, in my case. : )

This happens to be great timing to reflect on how I prepare for the coming new week, because my local wordish friends at Oklahoma Women Bloggers are asking exactly that question. Click here for a link up of everyone’s answers.

Our evening routine is pretty simple, and Handsome and I have fallen into a gentle cooperation that wraps it all up in less than half an hour. These little rituals set us up for a smooth and stimulating sunrise.

  • Dishes rinsed and in the dish washer, kitchen clean, wiped down, sink scrubbed and dried, kitchen floor swept. I call this whole process “zipping” as in, “Oh I’ll just zip this up, only take a minute.”
  • Trash from the kitchen and two main bathrooms bagged up and taken outside. Smells are a big deal to me. This is why during this half hour nighttime work I usually burn a fragrant candle. I love waking up and entering a nice-smelling downstairs.
  • Dirty laundry collected from around the house (there’s never much when it’s just us two), sometimes a full load started at night so it can then dry in the early morning hours when electricity is cheap.
  • Downstairs basically tidied up. Not clean, just neat looking, throw pillows not crazy looking, so that the first thing we see at 6 a.m. tomorrow is not chaos but a peaceful, welcoming living room flooded with sunlight.
  • Pacino tucked into bed, which at this time of year means his large cage is rolled indoors.
  • Geese and chickens shepherded into their coop and yard. Speaking of shepherding, Klaus is getting really good at helping with this! He bites less and less and is learning how to run in overlapping, opposing curves to funnel the birds where they belong.
  • Coffee machine is filled with exactly 7.2 scoops of dark ground coffee plus a full carafe of cold water, and the automatic brew timer is set. I kinda have to do this in an exact way or I have to start all over. I make sure a mason jar filled with whole coffee beans is stocked with teaspoons and set out a couple of our favorite mugs. Waking up to perfect coffee with a comfortable, attractive spot near the window is pretty luxurious.
  • Before we walk upstairs and toward our end of the house, we say good night to Klaus and kiss him into his crate. I mean, sometimes he sleeps with us, but he is growing by leaps and bounds, so he takes up so much room. So much.
  • Change out of the day’s clothes and make sure I have some running gear ready for the morning.
  • Wash my face, brush my teeth, maybe do a few yoga poses or nighttime stretches. Lamp. Ceiling fan. So much romance.

coffee station

 

Thinking of the particulars of our routine begs the question why? Why do this and that and everything? Well, the simple answer is to make life better. To make it more beautiful and us healthier and more comfortable.

When Handsome and I were first married I read a thick book, cover to cover, that details just about every aspect of modern home keeping. It was both encyclopedic and poetic, but I cannot remember the title now. Anyway, the author used the word “demoralizing” a lot, in reference to everything you want to avoid in your home keeping routines. For example, and I am paraphrasing here but obviously it made a big impression on me: “There is nothing more demoralizing at the end of a long, hard day than crawling into a dirty, rumpled, unkempt bed.” Do you agree? I agree. And I would say the same thing about walking on a dirty floor, trying to enjoy that first cup of morning coffee in a messy, sticky kitchen, or using into a stinky bathroom when you’re just trying to get clean yourself.

Anyway.

These routines are soothing. They are mechanical to me now and totally peaceful, conducive to a deep sleep and a smooth tomorrow. They are small investments of time and energy that yield big, wonderful rewards, especially when I perform them with a conscious sense of gratitude for what they accomplish. Especially when I move just slowly enough to press the details into my skin.

What are your evening routines like? How do you prepare for tomorrow?

“Gratitude can transform common days into thanksgivings,
turn routine jobs into joy,
and change ordinary opportunities into blessings.”
~William Arthur Ward
XOXOXOXO