Domicile Discussion

Hello!
Since Halloween, I have decided that I would like to buy a house for my little family by Spring 2013.  I don't yet know which neighborhoods as of yet, but I do know that I would like at least three bedrooms, and 1100 square feet.  I'm flexible with floor plans, however, my husband and I are torn between buying a cheaper fixer-upper or to buy a more expensive newer home that needs little in terms of repairs.  We of course want to save money, but we would also like to make the best decision for our future, even if that means no longer renting.
Any thoughts?  We're obviously new to this process and want to avoid the pitfalls that happen to first-time homebuyers, but because we're not in any rush to buy a house, I think we'll be able to find the location and style of house that gives us the biggest bang for our buck sometime in the next six to nine months.  In the meantime, I would welcome any advice and suggestions.  Thanks!

How do you Halloween?

With Halloween a week away, I'm starting to consider what to do about pumpkin carving, what the girls should wear under their costumes to stay warm, and what activities I should pencil into the calendar to make this year fun for the five and three year old.

Pumpkins are, of course, the biggest challenge, but I think that so long as everyone gets to pick their own (with the condition that they can carry it themselves), and we have paints for the girls and pumpkin carving kits for the adults, I think we'll be just fine. Still no ideas yet.

Although the kids have been asking for weeks about Halloween, my husband and I are also getting excited about dressing up and taking the kids around the neighborhood. I hope it doesn't rain (or snow), but even if it does, we can work around that (see below). :-)

I'll of course take millions of pictures, and I'm assuming that everything will go well. I wish everyone a happy and safe Halloween this year! Take care and have fun!

"There is nothing funny about Halloween. This sarcastic festival reflects, rather,

an infernal demand for revenge by children on the adult world." --Jean Baudrillard

Energizing Epiphany, Encouraging Enlightenment

Well I did get my wake-up call.
It took a few weeks, but I now feel like I have a better direction for my life, rather than the mixed jumble of half-plans that I seemed to be struggling with for the past three months or so.  Instead than coming gradually, like I half expected the newly discovered ideas to do, I was hit one evening with several new ideas that materialized over the course of just a few hours.  Perhaps it was because I was distracted long enough to not agonize over the details, that the picture became clear. Or perhaps it was because I was mentally quiet enough to allow the thoughts to wash over me, unrestrained by my constant to-do-list. Either way, I'm grateful for the insights that peeked their way into my brain that allowed for a paradigm shift in perspective and priorities.

So I've decided to accept the following changes in my life:
-My family life will continue as usual, but with greater emphasis on the physical, mental, and spiritual well-being of everyone these next few months.
-Work will also continue for the next two weeks, until I am able to advance to the supervisory and/or managerial positions, at which time our family schedules will be adjusted accordingly and continue throughout 2012.
-I will begin to take non-matriculated classes starting in January, and will begin the process of studying for the October GRE and LSAT exams in April.  Further classes will be taken as needed in September and applications for graduate schools will be completed by Thanksgiving of next year.
-After the start of 2013, greater efforts will be made on the research aspect of my book, and subsequent related chapters will be written.
-Preparations for accommodating grad school will begin in the spring of 2013.
-For now, I will focus on preparing for the changes, and helping the girls to get ready for the next school year, and maximizing our family's edification.

When I need to be reminded of something, the easiest way to do so is through music.  I think most clearly when I have music playing in the background, and more often than not the lyrics to various songs are applied to my life on almost a daily basis. So it comes as no surprise, that on the night when everything I've been worrying about fell into place, I also heard the following song for the first time as well, and I've included the lyrics below:

Keeping Sheep

Lynne Perry Christofferson

I have a little flock of sheep

And they are mine to tend and keep.

And I must guard them everyday,

For little lambs, when left alone, will lose their way.

So many voices say to me,

A sheep-fold is no place to be

Your time spent there is dull and slow

And lambs leave very little room for you to grow.

Well if I ever start to stray

Deceived by thoughts of greener pastures

Remind me Lord that keeping sheep

Will lead to happier ever-afters.

Oh surely there will come a day

when all the lambs have left my side

and I am free to roam about

and go exploring other meadows, green and wide.

Yet something whispers in heart

That when my sheep have left this pen

I’ll long to stroke their little heads

To draw them close to me

And have them young again.

So if I ever start to stray

Deceived by thoughts of greener pastures

Remind me Lord that keeping sheep

Will lead to happier ever-afters.

So while they still are in my care

I pray that I will clearly see

These little lambs within my fold

Are tender gifts the Master Shepherd has given me.

On the off chance that I find the right picture to illustrate this beautiful metaphor, I'll send a framed copy of this song to each of you as well. :-)

I'm encouraged by the direction I'm taking in life, and I love that I have a family who is not only willing to share the ride with me, but also to make the journey so much more enjoyable.  Whatever happens these next two years or so, I'm glad I have them in my corner, and I hope I'll always cherish them in the manner that they deserve.

Delusions of Grandeur

“Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great.”  - Mark Twain


Perhaps it is both a blessing and a curse that I have had the opportunity to be constantly surrounded by people who are uplifting, encouraging, and successful. As a result, I have nurtured a healthy does of ambition, and have been raised to believe that I can achieve anything I set my mind to if I am willing to work hard enough.  The reason why this great blessing is such a curse, because I find myself wanting to do more, much more.  
My parents were able to instill in me the value of education, not solely to make more money, but rather to help as many people as possible while doing what I am are passionate about.  My parents love what they do, and while it was not easy for them to raise a family while pursuing bachelor's and master's degrees, they wouldn't have done it any other way.  They effectively balanced our family life with school, and were successful in doing so. Consequently, I grew up thinking that if my parents can do it, then I can do the same.  Which, not surprisingly, I did.  Deciding to get married and have a family in college may seem like suicide to some, but it was all I knew, so that's how I did it.  I have two beautiful girls, a happy marriage of almost seven years, and a Bachelor's degree in the academic discipline I am most passionate about, History.  So what's the problem?


“Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude.”  - Thomas Jefferson


I don't like bragging about my accomplishments (despite the previous paragraph), but I needed to use it as an example of what my sudo-problem is, and more importantly, what I plan on doing about it.  I want to obtain a joint Masters' Degree in Public Administration and Law in the next five to seven years. This is not necessarily a problem, per say, but it would require many logistical factors to be taken into consideration. Fortunately, I have an incredibly supportive husband who loves me for my ambition, although he puts up with my many delusions of grandeur. He, of course, has his own ambitions of going to Grad school and achieve a Masters in Architecture, also in five to seven years, so we're currently researching universities that have the programs that I want, coupled with the accreditation that he needs. So what's the problem? 
Ambition feeds on itself. I trying to find happiness in my everyday life and be content with what I have currently, but I keep wanting more. More education, more experience, more edification. While I love my life, family, and current situation, I would still like to take my ambitions off of the shelf where I temporarily placed them and conquer my life long to-do-list.  I don't NEED more education, but I WANT more education. I don't NEED to write a book, but I WANT to write a book. I don't NEED to become a virtuoso harpist, but that's what I WANT.   The more I surround myself with great people who have done the impossible, the more I want to do the same.  Juggling between needs and wants, and prioritizing them into "essential", "necessary", and "nice-to-do" categories is what I'm currently working on, but this life is so short that I want to fill it up with as many experiences as I can.  Does this make sense?


“To be happy at home is the ultimate result of all ambition.”  - Samuel Johnson


There is nothing greater I can do in this life than helping my girls reach their potential and to know that they are loved and supported in their ambitions. But how can I do that when I want to lead by example and show then how to dust off ambitions? Where is the balance between doing something for me to teach them how to bring ambitions to fruition, and stepping back from my own selfishness and letting them explore this world at their pace and let them do their own thing?  I'm just worried that I'll always want more. That if I'm not enough without it (the degrees, the prestige, the diverse accomplishments), I'll never be enough with it. At what point will I want to stop learning, growing, progressing? I think never.  That bothers me to a certain degree, because I try to be so careful to enjoy the here and now and not always look to the future. But at the same time, I'm constantly planning for the future so I can prepare for the time when it is right to achieve my desires.  
I think this this is the crux of the matter. I want to stretch mysef, but not at the expense of my family.  But I won't know what my family can handle if I don't attempt to stretch them as well.  The girls can handle more at the age of seven and nine than they can a three and five, which is why I'm considering changing our situation at that point, but not before then. So we're practicing for the time being by having me work nights and weekends, so they get used to the idea of me leaving for work/school, but they know that I'm around during the days. Once they start kindergarten and first grade, our paradigm will shift again. I want to anticipate these changes in our family, and help cultivate them for good (to make the most of them), and if possible, fit my own ambitions into the cracks and free time created by public education.  We'll see.


Thanks for humoring this rant. Hopefully I'll figure out how to balance my ambitions with my life. Perhaps I'll get some sense knocked into me soon. :-) Take care!

If I die before I wake...

For the record, "Baby Blues" has been my favorite comic strip for the past five years or so, (coincidentally enough, that's how old my eldest daughter is...), and not just because I look and act like Wanda and my husband looks and acts like Darryl, but because I find that there is a comic strip for virtually every marital and parental situation that exists. 

For instance, my husband and I were talking one night and the topic of spousal death came up (despite how morbid the topic can be, we were actually having a great conversation).  We decided not only what the funeral arrangements would be, but also how the surviving spouse would deal with widow/widower status. The discussion further led to the topic of remarriage and what type of step-parent we wanted for our girls, which of course led to the topic of what we would do-over in the dating department (should the situation ever present itself).

We came to the conclusion that having a spouse die and the subsequent grieving, singleness, dating, remarriage, and family-blending that follows takes so much effort that we'd much rather be lazy just go through life together knowing that we're better off together than ever apart, and just pray that we never have to experience widow/widower-ness until we're closer to 100 instead of 30 years old.  So here's to hoping for a long life with my husband!

Living in Limbo

Hey Everyone!
For the past three weeks, my family and I have been living in a constant state of "limbo-ness". We know what direction we want our family to take and which activities we want the girls to participate in, however those decisions must be put on hold, while we analyze the difference financially between part-time work and full-time work with childcare.  In essence, I have the opportunity to go back to work, (I'm of course waiting to hear back from various potential employers), but I'm trying to figure out if working full-time is worth the price to pay for someone else raising my kids, or if part-time work is worth the logistical juggling I would have to do everyday to balance four different schedules.  This leaves me in a catch-22 because I cannot start the girls in their activities which would strengthen their development until I start working, but by going to work, I am no longer with them to oversee that development as throughly as I would like.  Of course, if my husband were to suddenly have a ten thousand dollar increase in pay this would be a moot point, but as things stand now, I'm forced to make the best decision for my family based on what I feel would solve the highest number of problems without creating a new set of problems.
My family and I have a financial plan in place that will allow us to do what we need to do, and pay off all our bills on just my husband's salary, however, we'll be able to pay things off faster and still have money left over to play with if I was to work. Which brings me back to my original dilemma.  Work full-time or work part-time?  Obviously this needs more thought and more pieces need to fall into place. But in the meantime I'm learning that true maturity is being able to live with constant ambiguity.
In theory I'll have more of a set schedule by the end of September, but in the meantime, living in limbo has become life.

Tenacious Pines and Stubborn Falls

My family and I spent the weekend enjoying nature this past weekend, and we hiked up Big Cottonwood Canyon to explore the majestic beauty of the mountains in the Wasatch Range.  One of the hikes that we explored was Donut Falls.  The Falls are surrounded by beautiful trees, mountainscapes and grandeur, but that's not what makes them special.   The water, over several hundred years, has cut an almost perfect circle in the middle of a wall of granite, thus the name Donut Falls.
This stubborn water, which collects together as run-off year after year, has eroded away the land enough so that it may run freely from the tops of the mountains to the valley below, unhindered and undeviating from its course.

While my family and I were marveling about the sheer power of the water that  kept flowing through the rock and the beautiful backdrop it created, I was reminded of another seemingly impossible task that nature has somehow overcome and how life has found a way to thrive in another hostile environment.

I'm referring to the Bristlecone Pines in Central Utah, some of the oldest trees in the entire world.

These are ugly, small trees whose roots are gnarled, needles are sharp, and live in the mountainous desert of Central Utah and Nevada.  Despite their appearance, these Bristlecones are among the oldest trees in the world, with an average age of about 1500 years.  These trees endure an environment consisting of harsh, windy winters and scorching summers. Little water, rocky soil, and constant extremes in temperature make it virtually impossible for any other plant life to survive, thus the Bristlecones are left with little competition for the scarce resources. The windblown trees are weathered and beaten by the climate, yet they survive year after year, and generation after generation. They thrive where no other plants can survive.

So my point is that despite our circumstances, and where we are in life, we can always choose how we will respond to life's difficulties.  And how we choose to respond to our challenges is a manifestation of our character.  We can be resilient, despite the challenges. It may take years to build up that resiliency, but we have the tools necessary for weathering life's storms and dead-ends.  We may end up ugly, windblown, and weathered down from exposure, but we know our roots are strong, thus we are able to survive anything. We can overcome any challenge, even if that means cutting through a wall of granite using nothing more than water and gravity.

C.S. Lewis once said, "Miracles do not, in fact, break the laws of nature."  Water cuts a perfect hole in a solid wall of granite. Trees live for thousands of years in an environment that kills off all other vegetation.  Miracles happen everywhere, and it's the majesty of the Earth that never ceases to leave me in awe and be grateful that I can live amidst such beauty and share that grandeur with my children.