Scattered

Here we are at another transitional period (Nathan's craziest, busiest semester FINALLY wrapping up and the end of Zoe's school year) and I'm once again finding myself totally scatterbrained.  My head is a big jumble of halfway completed to-do lists and "don't forget to.." work stuff and I can't seem to finish anything I start, including thoughts.  It's okay, because I know this just tends to happen to me in times like these (am I the only one??) but also because I know I'm spending a lot of mental and a medium (so far) amount of physical energy on my running.  Also, I've been rediscovering my (love? not yet..) appreciation for cooking.  To be fair, I haven't actually cooked a ton yet, but my "Food" board on Pinterest is growing and finally has things other than gooey, chocolaty desserts on it.  No, no really.... you think you know me but I do go through phases where pushing "start" on the microwave isn't the most effort I put into dinner.  I'm happy about that, so I'm accepting (I was going to say "embracing", but that is just not true) the resulting foggy brain.  I have to give myself little pep talks all day to stay calm about it because normally, I really like to finish what I start and I tend to feel anxious if I have to leave a project or chore half done.

Here is a list of the things I've left on my plate (not abandoned) to be completed at a later date:

-Buy the bottom half of a swimsuit.  I finally went to the store today to commit to buying a more expensive but more forgiving (notice I didn't say "flattering".  I gave up on that even before having kids) bathing suit in hopes that I won't want to crawl under a rock while wearing it this summer.  I found a top and begrudgingly handed over my credit card to pay for it, but I just could not accept the fact that in order to get the bottom half, I'd have to lay down another $60.  I'd rather wear a pair of underwear, honestly.  So, I'll head off to Target sometime soon to fork over less money to buy something I'll totally hate wearing.  I really have been working on seeing the bright side to stuff more these days, but there's just no use trying in the "wearing a bathing suit" department.  Sorry.

-Learn to use all the cool features on our new camera.  Our camera broke last week and I was forced to go buy a new one (1: Why do all expensive technology related items have to break every couple of years?  2: Why do they all have to break within a month of each other?).  It's a "point and shoot" so I can get by with using the same basic features as our last camera, but this one has more manual options and I really want to learn to use it in a more versatile way.  With the purchase of the camera I got 2 coupons for free classes at the store and I can't wait to cash them in but.......when??

-Get a cheap pair of binoculars for Zoe.  Last week, I got The Young Birder's Guide for Zoe because she's been asking for weeks for a bird watcher's book.  She wants to be a bird watcher when she grows up and wants to get started right away.  She's also shown a lot of interest in actually looking for birds so I felt it was a good little investment.  Could be a great new hobby and I'm excited to get into that world with her.  We have dipped our toes in, but we need a pair of binoculars because we haven't been able to get close enough to many birds without scaring them away. 

-Make a princess bed for Zoe.  A few weeks ago, I stumbled across this tutorial for a DIY princess canopy and I tucked it away in my head.  A week or so later, Zoe coincidentally asked for one.  She and I (eventually) went to the craft store to get a couple of supplies.  The supplies are now sitting in the closet waiting to be thrown together.

-Make some tin can wind chimes.  I also stumbled upon this a couple of weeks ago and wanted to give it a try.  Looks so simple and we can make them out of things we already have.  I told Zoe about it and since we didn't have any cans in our recycling bin for some reason, she and I went dumpster diving and geared up to make them.  We ran out of time that day and the cans were set aside.  After a few days, I started prepping the cans (taking the labels off and putting masking tape over the sharp edges) and got about 3 done before getting interrupted, leaving the other 3 to finish "soon".  4 days later and I finally moved them from the kitchen counter to a bag in the craft closet.

-Come up with a plan for our next Art/Young Scientists Group.  The project is a toy hovercraft but this version doesn't work on water and we want to let the kids decorate them so I'm trying to figure out how to do that.  I fiddled around with it today and haven't had luck but I think I know what the solution is.  If the idea in my head doesn't work though, we might be screwed.

-Organize the toys.  I don't mind our house being overrun with toys, but  I like them to be in some sort of order.  Doesn't have to be perfect but I want everything to be easily accessible and our living room is officially a jumbled mess.  The play kitchen is a mountain of junk and the kids can't really play with it for fear of a toy avalanche.

I could honestly go on but you get the idea.  Please send calming vibes my way so I can continue to feel positive about my running and cooking.  I'm reminding myself that I can't be everything all at once and I'm finally taking some "me" time and doing things that make me feel good about myself.  That's allowed isn't it?