Life's Changed: Reasons to be Cheerful

Hey friends, I hope you're well? It's been a long time since we caught up as life is changing for me and I just don't find the time or the enthusiasm to sit down and blog in the way I used to. I supposed it is to be expected. I wrote my first blog post in May 2008 and it is now April 2022, fourteen years later. That's a long time to keep a hobby going.

In truth, my hobby turned into a job. One that was convenient and allowed me to be available for my family and to do lots of volunteering, whilst earning some money. But I never loved it. Being self-employed and blogging has never given me the satisfaction of previous jobs, where I felt needed and fully immersed. 

I'm so glad to say that I'm back in a job like that, well more correctly, God has revealed to me it is a ministry rather than a job, as it is His work I am doing and His will I'm following. Back in January, I was appointed as the Project Manager for the Bexhill and Battle foodbanks and as the first paid member of staff for Churches Together in Bexhill I knew it would hold some challenges but since I started on March 1st I have fallen in love with my role, with my team, with my clients, with all the possibilities for a better future service, for serving Jesus in a way that is really needed.

I'm away at Spring Harvest at the moment, the Christian conference that I have gone to most every since (excepting Covid) since around 2005. This has been the best time for me, as God has revealed so much about the future and how I should manage and take forward the foodbanks. I now have a guiding bible verse and ideas for the future. Where I saw blockers before, I now see opportunities in His perfect timing. 

30 Great Things to do on a Bloggy Break

I am supposed to have been on a bloggy break from 21st October to the beginning of December but if we are honest I did not do that well. I keep sneaking onto the PC and posting but the good news is that I have not been pressuring myself and I have not been feeling like I have to come onto the laptop. Isn't it funny that when you take the pressure away you want to do it?

There have been a whole load of days where I have not even turned the laptop on and instead I have done the following things ........

1. Take the kids to the cinema to see Alpha and Omega, a nice little film in case you wondered.  A wolf version of Romeo and Juliet!
2. Go to Church and sing my heart out.
3. Organise a PTA quiz night for school (and make lots of money!).
4. Cuddle my girls on the sofa covered in blankets all warm and snug.
5. Go swimming with JJ and have lots of laugh out loud moments.  He sure knows how to take the mick that boy!
6. Watch cheesy movies on TV like Ghostbusters and Sister Act.
7. Write blog posts, without feeling obligated to do so!
8. Go out with a number of different girl friends for drinks, chats and food.
9. Read the bible and lots of literature from my eating disorders group.
10. Have early nights.
11. Play ball with the girls and help to teach them to throw and catch - important skills don't you know?
12. Walk the dog.
13. Go to the gym.
14. Play board and card games with the kids.  JJ is real good at Uno.
15. Organise a shoe box collection at school and make lots of boxes with the kids.
16. Talk to my husband.
17. Visit my parents.
18. Re-visit my old Church and catch up with good friends.
19. Attend a Baptism.
20. Have a date night with my husband
21. Put cheesy music on the TV and dance with the kids.
22. Cook a really nice meal.
23. Make Christmas decorations
24. Go to the library
25. Enjoy an al fresco ice cream!
26. Go tot he children's farm and have a great time as a family
27. Clean the house top to bottom
28. Apply for a new job
29. Mow the lawn
30. and lastly the one I am most excited about, volunteer at the local YMCA day centre and get to meet a ton of super people who need someone to chat to or a helping hand.



Miss E being confident for the first time to hold an animal



Brother & sister working together for once!

Fun at the park...

I have learnt from the last six weeks that balance and perspective are extremely important when it comes to blogging and I will continue to have complete days or even weeks away from the blog when I want to, as really it won't fall apart without me!

So what have you been up to lately?

Reasons to be Cheerful - The Upside Down Edition

<center> <a href="http://mdplife.blogspot.com/search/label/reasons%20to%20be%20cheerful"><img width="150" alt="Reasons to be Cheerful at Mummy from the Heart" src="http://i902.photobucket.com/albums/ac230/RebaMc/reasonstobecheerfulv2-1.jpg" height="150" /></a></center>  

Any of you that have joined in with this linky for any amount of time will know that there comes the weeks when you think 'blah, I can't be bothered!  Nothing much is going on in my life, what have I got to be cheerful about?'  and for you there is a choice to be made. Do you post anyway and work your way through that unhappiness, lethargy or whatever it is that is causing you to feel that way or do you say 'OK, I'll give it a miss this week?'.

Well I do not get that choice.  I am the host of #R2BC and as such I need to post otherwise there will be nowhere for you all to link up.

So today is the upside down edition, I'll do the Pollyanna thing and post about the stuff that is making me feel a bit gloomy and overwhelmed at the moment and then turn it around and remind myself that actually I am blessed I am just not seeing the wood for the trees!

1. I have one good day dieting and then it goes to pot again.  I bore myself with how bad I am at sorting out my weight right now but I suppose the flip side has to be that I am so lucky to have enough food to eat.  It is hard not to think that and then take a stick to beat myself about the poverty in the world and my gluttony.  I pray one day I'll be able to do something about this.
2. I feel like I have a million and one product reviews to write up.  In reality there is probably more like ten but when you have busy head syndrome that feels like ten too many.  The flip side has to be all the great products we have received and some superb toys I have stashed away now for a rainy day.
3. Last night I dreamt about a quiz I am organising for the PTA at school.  In my dream it was the quiz night and I had done nada.  Once I stop procrastinating it will be sorted in next to no-time, at least the dream has given me a kick up the bum to sort it out.
4. Everything is in flux at work at the moment, big changes are impending and who knows what they will lead to for me. As was commented to me yesterday in my appraisal I do not like to be out of control and that is so true, so all this uncertainty is not good for me but again a flip side being that God has my best interests at heart and if I just trust then the best is yet to come...

So there we go, I turned the bad stuff round and it is a good exercise, your mind believes what you feed into it.  So for the nest few days I must feed positive thoughts and stop procrastinating.  I have 2 days off work now and the kids are at school - gym and crap sorting here I come.

I'll leave you with a couple of pictures from my weekend away to Clacton with dh and the kids, this is probably the reason to be cheerful that I should have been posting about, a weekend away with no computer and lots of time together as a family.  It was great!

So I expect you know the protocol by now, write a cherry post, link it up and go and visit some other blogs on the linky. In fact go and visit all the other blogs on the linky, it is always fab to find some new reading material. Leave me some comment love and I'll come and do the same for you. Check out here if you are new to #R2BC and want to read the full low down.

Thanks for joining in, great to see new people cropping up each week and lovely to have some men on board too now.

Mich x

The pink palace is taking shape....

Sorry to have been MIA but dh and I have been busy creating a pink palace for the girls. I had visions of getting their complete bedroom done in just a couple of days....... I now know different!

I am pleased to say that all that remains now is a new curtain rail to go up, a shelf to go up and dh and I need to construct one bed. I also might go out and buy a couple of bedside drawers for the girls. Once it is all done I will post pics.

They are going to go into big beds and be big girls! This will be hard week for the first transition week or two but needs to be done. Like everything else with kids it all comes together in time.

I am sat in waiting for John Lewis to deliver a mattress and then tonight I am off down to Mum and Dad's to stay for a couple of days and to bring my big boy home. I have really missed him this week whilst he has been at Nanny's. I know he has had a fab time and he tells me he has missed my Mummy cuddles, bless him.

It is my birthday on Saturday, a whole 36 years old - how time flies. So hopefully dh and I will spend a nice night together on Sunday night once we have got the girls room all finished.

Bluurrggghhh!

I feel yuck, have just done an hours ironing, my period has arrived today and boy am I in pain and I have eaten like a pig today. Not proud of myself at all but also wise enough to know that beating myself up will do no good.

Off to take some mefanamic acid to ease my periods, have a cuppa, put the ironing away and then maybe an hours TV to wind down, but really I suppose I know I should just go to bed. I am so tired. I have had 2 very busy days decorating the girls room and scrubbing carpets. By this time next week the girls should have a lovely new pink palace and be sleeping in big beds! ahhh, then the fun starts.

Been a miserable old cow today!

...........and I do not even know why. Maybe I just woke up wrong. From very early in the morning I felt anxious and apprehensive and unable to make a simple decision. I know I was more grumpy/ short with the kids than I should have been, they did not deserve it - sorry JJ, M and E.

It was one of those days when I just wanted to have been left alone. I needed some me time and with no school, no dh and no babysitters I had the kids all day on my own - it can get very lonely with no adult company.

When I think back the kids all behaved pretty well and they did some fun stuff but I just did not really like my day at all. I started to feel better when we got home at 4.30pm and I actually just sat down and vegged for 1/2 hour whilst they all enjoyed the nice weather playing in the garden.

I really do not know why I was a grumpy cow, I hope it was a one off. I felt really overloaded for some reason and it was not entirely rational. It was how I started to feel last year when I was bogged down and depressed. It could just have been the thought of the busy weekend ahead and the stress of doing the money for the school fete and then packing for holiday - tomorrow will be a manic day but I can only do what I can do and I must relax and let it go.

Let go and let God, that is one of the ED meeting mantras - so true.

Going to put the ironing away now and treat myself to an early night.

Tired Friday, end of week 7

Just a quick post, feeling very tired and I ought to stop sitting at the PC. Been a busy day with the kids - just playing and sorting stuff. We are off to Butlins on Monday and I am getting very excited now - 5 adults and 3 kids - yay they are outnumbered at last! Dh and I will actually get some together alone - how lovely, some cuddles!

ED meeting was good last night, we covered step one, so that was just needed for me. I realise I must learn to surrender and stop being focused on the weight loss and realise that once I accept I need to stop eating compulsively and turn it over to God, the rest follows. I will keep working at it. Taking my literature with me next week.

Weighed yesterday morning, the scales were saying 15st 11lb, so I am now about 2 stone lighter than before I feel PG with the girls. That is wonderful but I have to remember to focus on abstinence to keep it going. Will try and post properly over the weekend, but if life gets in the way, then I will see you in about a week - have a good one!

Emotionally exhausted

What a day! and it is not over yet...............still the bath and bedtime routine to get through. I do hope that blonde daughter behaves tonight and goes off to sleep nicely rather than screaming the house down and making herself sick like she did last night.

Who knows why today has felt so bad? Work was fine, I got lots done and then I had a nice relax and watched an hour orfTV and even got a few PTA bits/ ebays listings done. That is when it started to go belly up as I had not left myself enough time to get the girls ready to collect JJ from school and the pushchair broke. I got in such a paddy - it is funny now I have a quiet few minutes and think about it (kids currently in the garden causing havoc - I love this weather!). I threw a spanner at the floor in anger. I really needed anger management at that point. I then proceeded to eat a packet of crsips and a chocolate mini roll - as if that would help me, but my warped mind said that yet again food was the answer.

I had all these jobs in my mind that I wanted to get done today and hardly any of them have been achieved and this makes me feel down but I know that I plan for too much and thus set myself up to fail. Perhaps I will get something done once the kids are in bed or maybe I should just stop myself and remember that I am supposed to value myself for who I am and not what I do.

Need to be more like Mary

At home group last night we discussed the story of mary and Martha and talked about which of the characters we could relate to. Well, anyone who knows me will know I am a Martha: not only will I be running around trying to make sure everything is ready I will also be getting cross with others who are not doing as much as I am. We are a womens home group and all but one of us related to Martha, it does seem to be a trend amongst women.

But..............I would like to stop and take more time to be still and to listen to God and learn to hear what he is saying to me. I have got very good over the last year at doing my daily bible readings and I will be due to finish at the end of April but as always this is a journey and there is still a long way to go. So the next task to tackle is to pray more and just take quiet time with God, that washing will still be there when we have finished and I might even feel more psoitive about it after soem time out with God.