Small Success: Work, Walking, Wunderlist, and Working out, with a Dose of {Blogging} Discernment

It's Thursday and I'm jumping on the Small Success wagon over at CatholicMom.com. Doesn't matter how big or small your accomplishments are, they all matter. Come on over and join the fun!!

My small successes this week are pretty darn small in my opinion. But here's goes nothing.

1. In anticipation of my upcoming resignation from my job, I have started moving files from my computer to our intranet. I had to call someone to find out how to move files within an intranet page, but once I got that figured out I was able to move things and then also add things. This is giving me a chance to clean up some too. Still a lot of clean up to do in the next two months.

2. I have been wearing a Fitbit for a while now and recently joined a challenge through my place of employment. There are prizes involved too!! I've been doing really well, getting at least 10,000 steps most days. This week has been especially good with step counts close to 13,000 on Sunday, over 11,000 Monday, and over 14,000 on Wednesday. Walking for the win!!

3. I started using the app Wunderlist to keep track of my to-do list. I have several similar apps on my iPod Touch, but this is the first one I have kept up with for more than a few days. Hoping to keep it up!!

4. I'm starting a workout challenge next week. Ack!! I sent in my measurements and pictures this week. That's the first step. Let's hope I can follow through with the next step!

5. Finally, I'm still discerning creating a new blog. The name of it has been a very long discernment process. Something finally hit me this evening on the drive home from work. Need to spend some time mulling it over, but I kind of like it. And actually, part of this discernment was whether to keep this blog going at the same time or not. I think I'll keep both because I'm seeing these two blogs being quite different from each other. Maybe there will be a bit of overlap, but for the most part they will have different focuses. We'll see where my continued discernment leads me. I'm not planning on diving in until after I'm home full-time, anyway.

That's about it for this week. Not a bad week thus far. How has your week been?? Come on over to Small Success Thursday at Catholic Mom and join the conversation there (you don't need a blog to participate, just leave a comment there).

7 Reasons for My Blogging Absence, aka Small Success Thursday

I think one of the best ways to come back from an unintentional blog break is with a list of small successes. Start on a positive note, right? So here we go.

1. Gardening: We have quite the garden going his year. We had spinach in April and May, a bit of lettuce in early June but the rabbits got most of that, and we ended up with quite a few sugar snap peas that we are eating now. Hubby has planted our tomatoes where the spinach was, added the zucchini in next to the dying lettuce, and planted a section of string beans. I'm starting to see a few tiny green tomatoes out there and the other plants are all getting huge. I should have taken a picture today, but didn't. Sorry. Just take my word for it, the leaves on those zucchini plants are ginormous! 

2. Adoration: I officially have an adoration hour again. Every Monday night I get to spend an hour with Jesus in the Eucharist. Love it!

3. Sorting and Organizing Kids' Clothes: Plastic bins have been sorted, winter clothes put away, bins of clothes 9 month size and smaller are all in the basement, and all other bins are in one of two closets. Summer clothes in the right sizes are in the appropriate children's dresser drawers. Doing all this is very time consuming! But oh so glad to have it done!

The guest room closet, clothes from 24 months up to 5T

4. YMCA: We joined the Y in our little city. And then I started working out. I've only just started, met with a wellness coach last week and have been to work out on my own twice this week. Goal is 3 times a week, in the evenings after the kids are all in bed. Seriously cuts into my writing time, but it must be done.

5. Swim Lessons: Now that we have joined the Y, we registered the twins for swimming lessons. The next small success will be getting them into the water. No, scratch that. If we get them in the water that will be a BIG success.

6. Catholic Sistas blog series: I'm working on two series of posts for Catholic Sistas right now. One is mostly me coordinating the volunteers who are writing each post (and I have one to do as well) and one that I am doing entirely on my own. I like doing big series like these and I always think that it'll be easy. But they always turn out more time consuming than I expected. Regardless, I still like doing them. The first is our "You Did it to Me" series on the Spiritual and Corporal Works of Mercy and the second is a series of interviews in honor of the Year of Consecrated Life (next post is scheduled for tomorrow). Go check them out, share them with others, and leave comments for our fabulous writers!

7. Work: I submitted my annual column to my new editor for our professional journal; I finally got moving again on a project that is massive and will takes years to complete but is always nagging at me; and I had my last big event to be in charge of for the faculty committee I've been chairing this year, which means my chairmanship will end on June 30 with all the boxes checked and someone else gets to take over. Very excited about that. And then I went and volunteered for something else. 

Lastly, I've been missing my blog. I keep thinking about things I want to write, but with everything I have going on right now, including a biggish project with Catholic Sistas, I have been trying to resign myself to the fact that writing here is going to be a very occasional thing. At least for the near future. For those who have been hanging with me for a while, keep checking back. I'm still here, even if just occasionally.

Linking this post up with Small Success Thursday at CatholicMom.com. Come share in the fun!!

Snow Small Successes

It's been a whole lot of snow this week. The university I work for was closed Monday and Tuesday, open Wednesday (though they probably shouldn't have been) and Wednesday night they cancelled classes and called a "Plan B" for essential employees for Thursday and Friday. My kids' daycare has been closed all week so far and I expect them to be closed Friday as well. So I've been home all week. And the roads are terrible, so Hubby has been home too.

So far, I believe we've had 12 inches of snow. Ten of which all came on Monday, starting around 2 am and not ending until around dinner time or so. That's a lot of snow for one day. Heck, that's a lot of snow for Kentucky! Then we got two more inches between Tuesday night and Wednesday morning plus it snowed off and on (light snow showers) during the day Wednesday.

Now, I'm not one who gets cabin fever much at all. Maybe it's because I'm often away from home, so when I get a chance to spend a few days at home, I don't mind it. But it's been so cold and all this snow has made it hard, no, impossible to get out that I think I may be starting to feel the effects of a tad bit of cabin fever. Hopefully I'll get a chance to get out soon. Probably not today, hopefully by Friday.

How, you are probably asking yourself, does this have anything to do with my week's small successes? Well, I'm making it work. Here we go.

#1
Saturday it snowed quite a lot in the morning. We were planning on family coming in from about an hour away for dinner that night and I really started wondering if we should cancel. I hate the idea of people putting in a long drive and then getting stuck somewhere. But we waited it out and I kept checking my messages for a cancellation on their part. Right about 3pm, the snow started to lighten up and the sun came out enough to melt things. It was actually quite impressive. By the time out guests arrived you wouldn't have known it had snowed much more than just a dusting. Anyway, the whole point here though was that I did some nice cleaning around the house for once. The nice thing was that Hubby occupied the children for an hour or so while I made beds and vacuumed our entire upstairs (two tasks that were long overdue). But it felt great to have those things done!

#2

Tuesday's mound of shoveled snow,
almost as tall as me.

After our big snow fall on Monday, I got out on Tuesday and helped Hubby shovel the driveway. I haven't done anything physical in a very long time. It felt good, actually, to put in some physical labor. We didn't clear off our entire driveway, but we got enough to get the cars out of the garage (eventually).

#3
Also on Tuesday, we helped a neighbor from up the street get his car moving. He had gotten stuck in the snow in front of our next door neighbor's house. So Hubby and I and the next door neighbor all helped push him out (after a lot of back and forth) and got him moving up the hill. He then got stuck at the top of the hill trying to turn the corner. Hubby and I walked up the hill to try again, but didn't have as much luck that time. Eventually some other neighbors came out and someone else got in the driver's seat and got the car moving. Lesson of the day: Don't leave the house!

What are your week's small successes? Come join the fun at CatholicMom.com.

Small Successes Again!

I don't know how Thursday always comes up so quickly each week. One minute I'm thinking it's the slowest week ever {It's Tuesday? Darn, I thought tomorrow was Friday.} and the next thing I know it's Thursday and it's time for Small Successes at Catholic Mom.

So here we go ...

#1
I unpacked a box that has been sitting under the desk in our kitchen since we moved into the house in August 2013. I can push the chair in now! I tell you what, I am the queen of clutter. I'm trying to decrease it, but it is so hard. I was in pillage mood Wednesday night, though. One box done, 397827303 more to go.

#2
I mopped the floor in my kitchen, specifically under the kitchen table. Sweeping and/or vacuuming are normal activities and Hubby usually handles steam cleaning the horrible, awful tile in the kitchen, but it had gotten really bad and I had had enough. I still don't know how the steam cleaner works, but I still have my old spray mop with some cleaning liquid still in it. So I grabbed that for a quick once over. It's not perfect, but at least it looks better.

#3
I don't know how it happened but my writing list for February is kind of long. I also have a trip coming up for work at the end of the month, so not only is it a short month to begin with but my trip makes it even shorter (unless I bring the laptop with me, which I am trying NOT to do). And then, driving to work one morning this week I was thinking about how I've always wanted to write fiction but I'm my own worst enemy when it comes to ideas. I told myself I needed to stop thinking about it so much and let the Holy Spirit guide me. Two seconds later I was hit on the head with an idea that I know I could not have come up with on my own! I was actually seeing scenes play out in my head and I got chocked up, even. That's all I need is more writing on my to-do list. I managed to write out a 1400 word synopsis and brief character descriptions within a few hours, but now I'm letting it percolate.

So, where is the success here? Despite adding to my writing list (long-term anyway, not just February), I did manage to finish two items from the list. You can see one HERE. I have one week to finish up the rest of the list! And a related success (at least in my mind), I managed to listen to the Holy Spirit and not myself. Amen!

Join the small success fun at Catholic Mom today!

The Week's Successes: Shoes, Cleaning, Prayer

Happy Thursday! The great part of "Small Success Thursday" is that it's almost the end of the week, but not yet THE end of the week. So you're still in the drudges, trying to make it to the weekend, but it is just out of grasp. What a great time to think about the things we have accomplished so far. Even if they are minuscule. Doesn't matter how big or how small, a success is a success.

There's your pep talk for the week. You're welcome.

#1

For weeks I've been saying that we need to get new shoes for the boys. All three of them! This past Saturday we finally did just that (after a stop to get haircuts for all four boys, which was the first haircut for Silas). Even with both Hubby and I there, three small boys in a shoe store is quite the challenge. Especially with a new walker who wanted nothing else but to play on the stairs and ramp that led down to the children's section of the store. But in the end, all three boys got shoes. 

Silas was not sure what to think at first. Hubby described his attempts to walk in shoes for the first time as like a cat with duct tape on its paws.

#2

I did some vacuuming. That's it. Success enough for me!

#3

After weeks of thinking about it (or maybe the Holy Spirit was just bugging me about it) I finally went to church one night and spent an hour with Jesus in the Adoration Chapel. I need to make this a weekly thing, but for now it was nice to just get there and remember what it is like to spend a peaceful hour before the Blessed Sacrament. It also gave me a chance to do Evening Prayer without any interruptions. I do plan on getting on the schedule permanently, but since I'm going out of town in a few short weeks, I figure I'll wait till after that to make it a permanent commitment.

What are your small successes this week? Join the fun at CatholicMom.com.

Small Success Thursday: Interviews and Blogging

Another week has gone by and I'm struggling to figure out where my successes are (which is also why I'm doing this so late in the day, too). I'm reminded each week when I do this that because I struggle is exactly the reason I need to do this. So here we go.

#1

I wrote a blog post for Catholic Sistas last Friday. I wasn't sure I was going to get that one off the ground, but it is an introduction to a series of posts I'll be doing over the next year. It is in honor of the Year of Consecrated Life that Pope Francis declared. I'll be interviewing (hopefully) people in consecrated/religious life and sharing those on the blog from now until next January. Hopefully we can also do something on February 2, 2016 for the World Day of Consecrated Life, but I haven't thought that far ahead yet. Anyway, if you want to see my first post it is here: Pope Francis Declares a Year of Consecrated Life. You'll be able to see the interviews on Catholic Sistas as well, just check in on the 3rd Friday of each month, or better yet, subscribe to the CS feed! We'll have a category in the pull down menus at the top for "Year of Consecrated Life" that will get you to all the posts as well.

I'm very excited about this, I have two interviews in hand, one other that I'm expecting to come back to me soon, and the possibility of at least one more plus a few lead for others. I don't know of any other big efforts this year for this Year of Consecrated Life, so I'm excited to be doing this one at CS.

#2

For my novice year as a Benedictine Oblate I have monthly lessons to read and reflection questions to answer. I don't have to submit answers to the Oblate director, but I feel like I should so he knows that I am actually reading them. I had fallen behind, hadn't submitted anything, but had scratched a few notes in the margins next to the questions. I finally went back and reread the five months of lessons and typed up some replies to the reflection questions. Just yesterday I finally sent him my answers/reflections to the first 3 lessons. Only 2 more to go! (Although, I'm expecting to find Lesson #6 in the mail any day now.)

#3

I completed a "featured bloggers" interview for Catholic Sistas. That sounds weird, since I write for CS, but I'm also a blogger on my own (obviously) and when our fearless CS leader said she wanted to do a series of posts with different Catholic bloggers (including any of us) I decided I should. So I managed to fill out the interview and submit it yesterday. It was kind of nice to do because it actually got me thinking more about my blog and what I do (and don't do) here. Plus I've been considering some changes so it offered my the opportunity to do some reflecting on the whole purpose and future direction of my teeny tiny corner of the blogosphere.

Speaking of interviews, I also participated in the "Working Mother" interviews that Erin McCole-Cupp conducted as a promotion for her novella Working Mother. My interview went up today, so go check it out HERE.

For more Small Success Thursday posts, go check out CatholicMom.com. It's always a fun time!

Small Success Thursday: Blogging, Feedly, Cataloging

The weeks keep zooming by! I keep promising myself that I will blog more, even just one post a week (that is, one in addition to this one) and then all of the sudden it is Thursday again. How does that keep happening? In all my 30-something years ... oh wait. Nope, that's not right. I'm 40 now.

So maybe it's just an age thing. Remember those days when you thought you'd never be a teenager or an adult or ... you get the idea. Now it just all speeds by. But in the midst of this whirlwind we call life, I still manage to get a few things done here and there. This week it was:

#1
I got my Friday article (as in tomorrow) for Catholic Sistas completed, finished, and scheduled on Sunday evening. That never happens! Not only that, but I may soon be done with my February article too.

#2
For a brief time on Tuesday afternoon my Feedly account was empty. Yep, I caught up on all my blog reading. What the what?!?!

Seriously, it's like the twilight zone over here.

#3
At work I have a goal of cataloging 40 scores a month. Thing is, I have so many that need to be done that I really need to be doing more than 40. Much more! So 40 is still the goal, but in reality I'm hoping to be a lot more. As of now, I've exceeded my January goal. 58 scores so far! I have to focus on doing staff evaluations now, but hoping to get that number even higher before the end of the month. So far so good, though!

Check out more Small Successes today at CatholicMom.com.

Small Success Thursday, No. 16

#1
I unpacked one box sitting in my basement.

Part of my effort to get better organized this year. It was mostly candles of all shapes and sizes and other things that produce scents. I never use any of that stuff, ever. And now with a kid with asthma, I have a good excuse to get rid of it all. I already have several friends wanting to take some off my hands. Yay!

#2
I've gotten a ton of laundry done this week. And all folded too. Most put away, but not all.

#3
I wrote thank you notes from Christmas. Quite an accomplishment since I was pretty slack about doing so since Silas was born. Three kids and working full time finally pushed me into a place where sending any sort of birthday cards or thank you notes just didn't happen. Hopefully I'm now coming out of that place and will be better about this in the future. Hopefully!

No success is to small. Join in on the fun over at CatholicMom.com!!

Small Success Thursday, No. 15

#1
Okay, so this wasn't this week, but it was just last week. And since I didn't do a small success post last week I'm taking the liberty to share more than two weeks worth of success. Since moving into our house a year and a half ago our front hall closet has been a mishmash of stuff. The coats are hung nicely, but everything else was thrown onto the shelf above: summer hats, winter hats, ball caps, scarfs, gloves, and even baby carriers. So I finally organized it all in neat baskets so that we can keep them organized. There are even names on each basket!

So clean looking!

#2
Speaking of organizing, I organized my desk at work. AND cleaned it, too! I wish I had a picture of the clean space. Actually a before and after picture would have been nice, but I didn't think of it at the time. Oh my goodness, the stuff I threw away!! Tons of old papers that had no meaning any longer. Lots and lots and lots of old meeting notes, conference notes, hand outs for programs, workshops, software we no longer use. My desk was so bad that I had asked for an additional new desk organizer a couple months ago and it had arrived and then sat on my desk, on top of stacks of stuff, still in the box, for about two months. Ah, the irony! I've cleaned my desk here and there over the years, but not to this extent. It looks amazing, and yet I don't feel done yet. As we approach Christmas and we get less productive in the office, I want to tackle more of my filing cabinets and the carts sitting around my desk. I'm so motivated now!!

#3
Invitations to our almost one year old's first birthday went out Wednesday. I'm so on top of things! And they are the cutest invitations too. I love them and can't wait for our family members to see them.

What are your small successes this week? Come on over to CatholicMom.com to share in the small success fun!

Small Success Thursday, No. 14

It seems all my blogging these days is the weekly Small Success posts. Better than nothing, though, right? And if I'm only going to have time to do one post a week, it might as well be something positive. So let's get to it: my small successes on the week of my 40th birthday:

#1
We had pictures done on Saturday. I had to schedule an afternoon time slot and was very nervous about doing afternoons with three young kids, I usually prefer morning pictures with the kids. So I picked a time and prayed for the best. I managed to get the baby down for a nap at just the right time, Hubby fed the boys lunch a bit early and then gave them each baths. During their baths I woke up the baby, fed him lunch, and then got his clothes changed. By that time Hubby had changed closed and we had 20 minutes before I wanted us all in the car. Just enough time for me to get ready. Mom is always last, right? But we got in the car just a little late and got to the location right on time. It was perfect. I could not have possibly planned it better. And for the most part the kids were good. Silas didn't want to be anywhere but in my arms, but we still managed to get some good pictures. Can't wait to share them.

#2
I've mentioned in the past that nursing has not been super fun for me. I keep doing it because I know it's good for Silas. But I don't enjoy it. Pumping at work each day is also a chore. Lately my daily yield has gone down considerably. Finally, this week, I decided that it was no longer worth it. There was such freedom in making that decision!

We started him on some whole milk on Tuesday evening and he took to it right away. Wednesday I didn't even bother taking the pump to work with me. He had the last two ounces of pumped milk on Wednesday (he had had the last bag of frozen breast milk on Tuesday) and we haven't looked back. I'm still nursing him in the morning and at night, but I plan on dropping the morning session when he hits his first birthday (1 more month!!). I'll keep the night time session for now; if we don't lose it before the end of February, we'll probably drop it then since I'll be out of town for a work conference at that time. But until then, we're now down to two nursing sessions a day and, after 8+ months, I'm no longer pumping! Woohoo!!

#3
Speaking of no longer pumping, I put the pump and all the supplies away today. I had two plastic containers that I had used in the freezer to keep all the frozen milk together. I used those to organize all the various pumping supplies (bottles, bags for freezing milk, and a bunch of other stuff) and nursing stuff I had (all the syringes for supplementing, lanolin, etc.). I also put away the nebulizer machine that's been sitting out for a while and organized all the various parts and extra equipment into one of the plastic containers as well. I put all of these things above the cabinets in my laundry room and used my nifty label maker to label everything. Wow! It looks so much better! There used to be plastic bags of stuff up there, no labels, falling on top of each other. It's so neat and tidy now. I really can be organized when I want to!

Those are my successes this week. How about you? Come join in the fun at CatholicMom.com.

Small Success Thursday, No. 13

If this could be a post about failures, I think it would be much longer than three items. Maybe that's why we only do three? No, I'm sure that's not it! ::winkwink:: It's hard sometimes to see the little successes we all really do have in our lives, because the things we don't do often stick in our minds longer. Regardless, there are plenty of things we can count as successes. So here's my attempt this week:

#1
I spent some time on Saturday doing some vacuuming. Sadly, this is very much a neglected task in my house. My biggest concern was corners, cobwebs, and ceilings. Our main floor looks infinitely better now.

#2

The Vocations Crucifix on our mantle

We have been wanting to start a Vocations Crucifix program at my parish for some time. We used to have one a couple years ago but it didn't get a lot of volunteers and eventually fizzled out. So, I'm on the committee now and we are working on getting this going again. The time when we wanted to get it started suddenly sneaked up on us and I've spent the last couple of weeks putting together a pamphlet, getting the volunteers on the schedule, and working out the logistics. We're still working out some logistics, but this week is the first official week of the program! Of course, the crucifix is at my house, so it was a very soft start to the program, i.e., no one else besides myself and the rest of the committee is even aware of it. Ha! But that's okay, the good news is we started. And, my family has actually been praying each night with the diocesan Vocations Prayer. Definitely a success.

#3
We started composting this week and on Wednesday morning I actually remembered to throw Hubby's coffee grounds in the bowl we keep inside. Sort of insignificant, but I was proud of myself for remembering without him having to remind me.

What are your small successes this week? Come visit Small Success Thursday at CatholicMom.com to share in everyone's weekly successes and to share your own.

Small Success Thursday, No. 12

#1
I cleaned out my email inbox! I had been neglecting it for way too long. I logged in one night recently and saw the number of messages sitting in my inbox and was aghast at how big it had gotten. I proceeded to spend the rest of the evening whittling it down from 1100+ messages to around 200+. I'm on Gmail which now also divides your email into three default tabs. The other two tabs had gotten a little too large as well, so I worked on them, too. It's amazing how light I feel after getting rid of a bunch of virtual junk.

#2
At work I completed the final piece of a project that's been hanging over my head since August. Actually, it was longer ago than that, but August was when I recruited a bunch of people to help me sort through the mess. They did a great job and I just needed to finish the job. I finally did it. I'm such a procrastinator!

#3
Tuesdays are really hard days. Hubby has Adoration at 6 AM those mornings and usually goes right to work after. Which means I am on my own to get myself and the three kids ready and out the door, drop them at daycare, and get myself to work on time. Not an easy task! This time change in the fall helps so much. I always feel so much better at this time of year. Then there was Election Day this week. So, Hubby decided to come home after his Adoration Hour, have breakfast with us, and then we'd all go to our polling place to vote (a fire station!! My boys wanted so bad to climb into the fire trucks parked right next to where we were voting). I'm counting it as a small success that I actually managed to get up at 6:15 AM, feed the baby, get the boys dressed, and set them up in front of the TV while I showered all in a timely manner. When Hubby got home at 7:15, I was in the shower, all three boys were dressed, and the baby was back down for a nap. That is pretty impressive!

What are your small successes this week? Come join in the fun at Small Success Thursday on CatholicMom.com.

Small Success Thursday, No. 11

#1
I finally folded all the clean clothes that were piling up on my dining room table. That always feels good. [We won't mention the clothes that are sitting in the drier right now. Shhhhhh.]

#2
I've managed to read four of the eight faculty files for promotion and/or contract renewal that I am required to read. That's 50% which is great!

#3
Not sure I want to call this a success just yet, but it is something I did this week. So ... I started a new blog. Crazy, right? I can barely keep up with this one. So why did I do this? I wanted a new space to write in, a space that wasn't just about family and my day, and pictures of the kids, and so forth. I haven't even decided if I am going to share it with anyone yet. But, it's been on my mind for a while to do this and I finally took the plunge. Guess that can be considered a small success.

What were your small successes this week? Share here in the comments or go visit Small Success Thursday at CatholicMom.com to read other small success posts and comment there.

Small Success Thursday No. 10

I had this post on my mind since the weekend because I finally felt like I had something to say. And then Thursday completely snuck up on me! But that's okay because the day is only half over. I'm a "glass is half full" kind of girl (for the most part). So let's get to it:

#1

I went shopping! That's a success because it has become incredibly hard to get out of the house without any children in tow. And we all know shopping with children is tow is rather useless. I have needed new clothes for the longest time. But between my pregnancies and nursing Silas and the ups and downs of weight gain and loss and gain again, I was feeling defeated. And I have a really hard time finding clothes and have never particularly enjoyed shopping. But finally, I managed to get out and get some shopping done. I replaced three pairs of shoes that all had holes in them plus bought a fourth pair to help change things up a bit. On another night I went out and bought several tops, a new pair of pants (to replace ones that also had holes in them), and even two skirts. That's right people: SKIRTS! My husband, I think, was particularly shocked to see me in a skirt. I also bought some leggings, my first pair, yes, I am seriously and always way behind the fashion trends, and I bought some sweater tights. The sweater tights are my new favorite thing.

#2
Because of my shopping trip, I did a little closet weeding. It's a work in progress, but I made some good progress. I have a throw away pile and a donate pile and I'm finally getting rid of clothes that have been in my life for far too long. There is still a lot to do, but just the fact that I finally started this is such an improvement!

#3
It's only October but I ordered new Christmas cards for this year. Never have I been so on top of things. I think this will be the first year that all my cards are religious cards. I finally got through all the generic "Happy Holidays" cards that were in my stash. I only had about 12 or so cards left over from last year, all with Mary and the baby Jesus on them, and I added to them with more religious based cards. I can't wait to get started on my Christmas card routine! It'd be great to finish it up before Advent starts, but I'm not holding out hope.

Bonus
Not really a success I had much control over, but as of late the milk I pump for Silas has dwindled down to around 5 ounces a day. I'm ready to be done, so when I finished off a bottle of fenugreek a few weeks ago, I didn't replace it. Things were already heading south anyway and he's starting to drink water and eats plenty of foods, so I'm not worried about his nutrition. Still, I do still hope to get all the way to his first birthday (just two more months!!). And then yesterday, Wednesday, I pumped 5 ounces when I went to pump at noon. I just sat in the little supply closet lactation room staring at it in disbelief. But then I told myself that it probably meant I'd get nothing went I went back at 4 PM, which happened last Friday, although with much less success at my first pumping session. But I was wrong. I did another 3 ounces at 4 and came home with a whopping 8 ounces! I was shocked!

Check out more Small Success fun over at CatholicMom.com.

Small Success Thursday, No. 9

Eight weeks! That's how long it has been since I last participated in Small Success Thursday. That's entirely too long to go without acknowledging my small successes in my every day life. Often it's because I get caught up in all the things that I don't get done or the failures all around me that I can't even recognize the small things that I have done well.

And that is what Small Success Thursdays are all about at CatholicMom.com. It's the small things!! Let's take a brief moment to celebrate those.

#1
I managed to have all lunches made, breastmilk bottles poured, water bottle filled, and all daycare bags ready to go on Sunday night this week. I can't remember that last time I was that prepared for a Monday morning. And then we made it out of the house right at 8 AM as planned. The best part, was that I didn't have to do any yelling to get us out by 8. Still lots of constant reminders and pushing everyone to keep moving, but not yelling. This one might count as two successes!

#2
I managed to clean off a portion of my desk at work. I hate how cluttered and overgrown my desk is. And it's a big desk too. The desk is in a square shape with three of the four sides being desk space the the fourth is open. On the open side I actually have a library book truck full of stuff too. So I end up with a little walkway between the book truck and the third side of the desk for me to escape from. Monday I finally tackled a large box that was sitting on my desk and finished all the things in it by Tuesday and the box was able to be moved. It opened up the space enough for me to see a few other things sitting in that same area that were relatively easy to get done. And tada! I could see my desk again!!

The best part about cleaning off a section and getting some things accomplished, is that it gets me motivated to tackle a bunch of other things. I'm starting to put some dents in a few other piles of stuff and shelves of materials sitting around my office, not just on my desk. It's amazing!

#3
I have been doing so much better including some form of daily prayer in my day each day. This has always been a struggle for me. Lately, I have been using the Honor Your Inner Monk app and it's been great. The app keeps track of how many times you do the morning and afternoon prayers and at the end of the month gives you an "assessment." It keeps giving me the "wha-wha-whaaa" sound and a message that "You can do better." That may not sound good, but I've been doing the morning prayer practically every day and despite what the app tells me, I'm pleased with that. I have a harder time getting to afternoon prayer. I'll work on that later. #innermonk

Normally I would link up to the Small Success Thursday post at Catholic Sistas. But it has not yet been published (or maybe there isn't one this week?). I'll link it up later if it pops up, but wanted to go ahead and post mine. Happy Thursday!

Small Success Thursday, No. 8

#1
We have our garden boxes done and in place. Admittedly, I had very little to do with this. Unless you count keeping the children out of the way while Hubby worked on the boxes. Which really, that can be quite the task! Especially with a baby. Try keeping two toddlers inside the house while Daddy is outside sawing or painting or doing other things with power tools. So, okay, this is definitely a success for me! I shared a couple pictures of the early stages of the garden boxes in THIS POST. Here's the rest of the pictures:

Painting the concrete board

Finally in place, dirt sitting by ready to go in.
I did help with placement, which took many tries.
And those boxes are much heavier than they look!!

Dirt in and seeds planted. I wasn't home for this part,
Hubby and the boys did all this together. Silas and I went shopping.

The success here is that this is finally all done and 99.8% of the credit goes to Hubby. Can't wait to see what we get out of this!

#2
As of this week I have now been back to work for three months. This also means that I have been successfully pumping for three months! With as much of a struggle as breastfeeding was in the beginning and how much I was not enjoying it, I really, truly thought that we wouldn't continue once I returned to work. But we did. Twice a day every day I leave my office (or I leave a meeting early or interrupt a conversation with a coworker or student or stop doing something right in the middle or ... something), and I walk to a different building to pump milk. And I've been doing that twice a day, every day for three full months now. I never thought I'd last this long. And Baby Silas is doing great!! Isn't he cute?

Almost 6 months old!!

#3
I took a walk on Monday! I finally did what I have been saying I want to do. Monday after dinner and some play time, Hubby took the twins up to do baths and I stuck Silas into the ring sling and we went for a walk. I think I managed to walk about 30-35 minutes. It felt great and Silas got a little snooze in as well. I had a little baseball cap for him that he looked sooooooooooo cute in. Oh my goodness, this boy! I got back home just after the boys had had their evening snack and read some books and Hubby was getting ready to get them upstairs to bed.So far, that's only one day this week, but it's a 100% improvement over last week and the week before that and the week before that and ... well, you get the idea.

Bonus #4
I have finally completed my application to start the process of becoming a Benedictine Oblate through the St. Meinrad Archabbey in Indiana. I've have been praying about this for several months now and have had the application sitting on my desk since March. I finally got it filled out and am handing it over today to be mailed off with several others. Thus starts a new journey! I haven't mentioned this previously and I don't know how much I'll share about it on the blog (at least initially). Eventually I may share a few things, but we'll see how things go. The process to become an Oblate takes at least a year, possibly longer if you're juggling a young family at the same time. Prayers appreciated!

What are your small successes this week? We're all sharing over at CatholicMom.com.

Small Success Thursday, No. 7

Wow, April 10 was the last time I did a "Small Success" post. Time is totally getting away from me these days! My days are full, seem chaotic, and the failures often loom large. There are so many failures or things forgotten. It's precisely for that reason that I need to try and take some time every now and then to recognize the things that have been successes, however small. And believe me, my successes are teeny tiny these days!

So here we go:

#1
I shaved my legs. [Small successes, right?] Seriously, this hasn't been done in a long time. I was pregnant, we moved, the shower in our bathroom is small, winter happened (and who really needs to shave in winter, #amiright?), and then we planned a trip to the zoo and it's gotten hot. So yeah, I finally broke down and used the tub in the other bathroom. It felt so good!!

#2
A small success at work: I finally cataloged a music score that had been sitting on a shelf by my desk for *coughcough* almost 4 years *coughcough*. Don't know why I left this particular one for so long. Just one of those things that gets forgotten. But it felt great to get it done and pass it on and see an empty space on a shelf. An empty space that I expect will get filled up pretty quickly again.

#3
Last night I turned the TV off at 8:00 PM. This is a big deal. I often feed the baby around 7 PM and turn on the TV to watch Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy. Once the TV is on, it tends to stay on, which means I don't get a whole lot done the rest of the evening. Last night I turned it off once Jeopardy ended [have you been watching it, I've been cheering on the champion now for weeks, love it!]. The boys went to bed a little after 8 PM and I was able to get the dishes finished, clean off the kitchen table, vacuum under it, get Silas' bottles ready for the next day, switch the laundry to the drier, and feed the baby one last time and get him to bed, all by 10:30 PM. I then was able to sit back and read from A Well-Built Faith and write up a short blog post on chapter 1. It felt great to get all that stuff done early in the evening and then have some time to myself rather than what I've been doing, which is the reverse and is very stressful.

Those are mine for this week. How about you? Join in on the fun over at CatholicMom.com.

Small Success Thursday, No. 6

 #1
Work Success: I finished a quarterly report on Monday. You'd think this would be an easy thing to do when you consider that I keep a consistent format to these reports and I had all the info I needed by last Thursday. But I ended up not working on it on Thursday, then I was off on Friday. I figured it'd be no problem to get it done on Monday. But then I had meetings all Monday morning followed by a weird monitor display problem with my computer which we fixed just in time for me to then go pump milk. After that it was lunch, check email, then another meeting, and then it was time to go pump again. So then it was 3:30 PM and I still hadn't started the report. It was due by the end of the day and I sent it to her at 4:55 PM. Just under the wire.

#2
Today is exactly one month since I went back to work after maternity leave. And I'm still breastfeeding!! I didn't think I'd be able to last, but here we are, still going strong. Even though I don't find the actual breastfeeding part all that enjoyable, I have learned to appreciate it more than the pumping part. I could totally do without having to lock myself into a storage closet lactation room twice a day and hook myself up to an electric motor. But it is making it possible for Silas to continue having my milk 100% of the time. The pros definitely out weigh the cons.

#3
I went to the grocery store!! On my own! Yes, it was 10 o'clock at night, but I managed to get there. And now I have lunches to bring with me to work each day and don't have to go to the Student Center or a local restaurant. This week was getting expensive (we were out of town last weekend, so we've been improvising all week). It was so nice though to go without any kids. I even got to use one of the little carts that don't have space for kids. So great!

What are your small successes?? Share them here or over at CatholicMom.com as part of the Small Success Thursday fun.

Small Success Thursday, No. 5

#1
I'm actually writing this post. I almost didn't.

#2
I cleaned our kitchen floor last night. It had been getting the short end of the stick for a little too long. It doesn't help that I hate the bright white tile floor we have and that I have two two year old toddlers who don't know how to keep food on the table. The ants are started finding their way in again (had that problem last year too). So I swept, vacuumed, and mopped. This morning? No ants. Success!!

#3
I managed to get myself together enough to think about Easter this year. I totally slacked on a few Christmas things this past year (though the whole having a baby thing probably gives me a good excuse) and missed some birthdays and such in the new year. But I'm on the ball now!! I got some Easter gifts for a few precious people in our lives and even ordered some birthday gifts for the boys for the end of May. We won't talk about the fact that I still have a few thank you notes to write and I just last night flipped over my birthday calendar to April and realized that birthday season is going into full force this month.

Bonus #4
I rearranged part of our basement space to create a small space for myself. I set up our card table in a corner and bought a three-drawer, plastic storage unit to put next to it. I moved all my cards, card filing boxes, envelope boxes, and all the gift wrap stuff to that area. I still need to do a bit more organizing, but not I have a spot to wrap gifts and write out cards (and maybe letters??). And I could use it for other things as well. It's in a storage space in the basement, but that's okay with me. I was very pleased with my little set up.

What are your small successes this week? I'm linking this post up with Small Success Thursday at CatholicMom.com.

Small Success Thursday, No. 4

#1
My first week back at work was last week. Before I even started the week I cancelled my Monday morning meeting. So, I had no meetings first thing in the morning on any day last week. I needed that for my first week back, less stress while I tried to figure out how everything was going to work in the mornings. But I couldn't continue cancelling meetings. So this Monday I had to get moving even earlier than I had last week. But I made it to work just in time for my 9 AM meeting.

#2
Then Tuesday rolled around. No meetings, but Hubby and I decided that I would try doing the whole morning routine on my own. Hubby has an adoration hour at 6 AM on Tuesdays. Since my maternity leave he has been coming home afterwards. But this Tuesday he went straight to work when he left church. I'm please to report, that we actually managed to leave the house by 8:15 AM. It was hard, though. I had to get up at 5:30 AM and I had to be on top of my game to get the baby fed, get myself ready, get breakfast on the table, get the boys up, changed, and dressed, and get everything (lunches, day care bags, breast pump, purse, work bag) and everyone in the car. To be able to leave by 8:15 AM was quite the achievement!

#3
This Lent I am trying to remember to do Morning Prayer (Lauds) from the Liturgy of the Hours each morning. So far I've only missed two mornings. For someone who is really terrible about keeping a regular prayer time, this is a big improvement.

What are your small successes this week?

Check out the Small Success Thursday post at CatholicMom.com.