For last year’s words belong to last year’s language. And next year’s words await another voice. And to make an end is to make a beginning. -T.S. Eliot

I was recently in a discussion with a friend about a group of women she admires. She shared with me how they all have full-time jobs outside their homes. They play on their own sports teams. They run marathons. They put on the school auctions, run various school committees, attend all of their children’s sporting events, and while I don’t know most of these women my friend was referring to, the one I do know is always cheery. I took a deep breath and asked my friend, “How? How do they do it?”

I can’t even seem to take a walk to clear my mind let alone play on a sports team.

I shared earlier in January my word for the year – courage. Well, I also like to give myself a little mantra to keep myself focused throughout the year. A few weeks ago, I pulled out my typed up goals from last year – 4 single-spaced pages – and was reminded of last year’s mantra: A goal without a plan is just a dream. I certainly had a plan – 4-pages worth – a bit over the top but, I must say, I was able to check off quite a few of my goals. I loved that feeling.

After reviewing the goals from 2011, I pulled up a fresh clean page, titled it 2012 Goals and typed my word and my mantra at the top. After that I went through and typed up 3 specific goals in all of the areas of importance in my life: Writing, Photography, Marriage, Kids, Financial, House, Health, Etc., Etc.. Instead of four pages, I ended up with two. Sometimes I found it difficult to choose only three specific things but I forced myself to choose. What can I really do with the finite time I have available in any given day, week, month, year? And what do I deeply want to get done in that time? What is the most important to me? I find that with each passing year, I am better able to judge. Instead of saying I’m going to give the entire house a face lift this year, I now know that if I can get a cushion made for my bench, replace the weather stripping on my deck doors, and get the broken garage windows fixed from errant lacrosse balls, then I will consider that a success. My three goals for my house will have been met. But, my house is not the priority it once was.

Before we leave this first month of 2012, I thought I’d share my made-up mantra for 2012.

Be present, trust the process – your own process, and keep moving forward.

And that’s the key really. Knowing what we can each do…individually. We are all given the same amount of time. How we end up using it is up to each one of us. We have to trust our own process. Our own way of doing things. And, keep moving forward.

My first grader likes to tell me as soon as I pick him up from school, how many recesses he had. “Well, we had a lunch recess and in the morning my teacher gave us a brain break and then, we got extra recess before it was time to go home.”

One of the beauties of working from home is that when I go outside, I can hear the kids out at recess. I always smile when I think that perhaps one of the voices in that chatter coming over the trees is my little guy.

I don’t know why I didn’t think of it on my own, but yesterday, I gave myself a brain break. Just a quick ten minutes outside. A walk down the trail to the bridge to watch the water fall and back again. I could hear the sounds of children playing from the school and I hoped that one of those happy voices was my little buddy. The ten minutes of fresh air felt so good.

I won’t be playing on any sports teams or running any marathons anytime soon but right now, in my life, I can take a ten minute walk each morning to clear my mind. That’s how I’m choosing to spend ten minutes of my day. That’s my own process. I can’t agonize over the way other people choose to spend their time – which can certainly seem at times much more efficient than my methods – but, I have to trust myself. I have to trust my own priorities and my own way of doing things because really, what else can one do?

Does anybody have a mantra they are posting on the fridge for the year? Would love to know…..if you want to share.

Thank you for choosing to spend a little bit of your time here. I’m off to take my brain break. xoxo

P.S. Hope you enjoyed the photos from our one snow day…..

What I’m Loving Right Now:
Justin’s Chocolate Almond Butter on toasted whole grain bread. Like Nutella…only, better.

Coming Next:
I have a backlog of recipes that I’m dying to share with you. You can expect one involving chocolate later this week and one for a comforting pot of soup the week after. Cheers, my friends!

You had been told that this would happen. This ever-increasing independence. The wings starting to flap. You’d read about it in books. You’d been told, many, many times by all the people who came before you but still, for you, you weren’t quite ready.

No, you’re still back in preschool when she’d cry and call out for you as you turned to leave and you’d have to practically run to the car so she couldn’t see that you were crying too. Or in the first grade when you were the only mother still walking your daughter to her classroom everyday because she didn’t want to leave you. Or, in the third grade, when you skipped out of town for a romantic weekend with the Rooster, and your daughter, back at home, laid photos of you across her bed every night and cried because she missed you so.

And now, when you are with her, her thoughts are a million miles away. She may be looking at you but she’s not really seeing you. No, she’s thinking about what he said or she said. Who’s status update is coming in next on which device. What she’s doing Saturday night.

And you get it. You really do. Because, you were once that 14-year-old girl too. And what she’s doing and experiencing right now is fun. It’s exciting. It’s all the things she should be doing. You remember.

And yet, for the Mom at home, it can be stressful. This increasing independence. This letting go of control. And, it can also be a little wistful because if you are perfectly honest with yourself…it’s not the late hours, the constant texting, or the teenage drama that are the sole source of your angst, no, it’s that you miss her. Miss spending time with her. Real time. When her mind isn’t far, far away. And, you miss her, wanting to spend time with you, too.

You find yourself seeking advice from a very, wise woman, one who knows your own 14-year-old self better than most anyone. You tell her the “I miss her”, the “it’s stressful,” the “she’s never here,” and this wise women agrees with you, “Yes, it’s hard.” Then, she looks deeply into your eyes, a little smile on her lips, and she tells you what she’s always told you about the teenage years, “Just get ‘em through it.”

This wise woman, not being one for pity parties, snaps you right out of yours because, really, she’s right. What else is there to be done than to just “get ‘em through it.”

You find yourself taking a deep breath, knowing that she’s right, and hoping you can do as good of job as she did.

To soothe yourself, you turn to cooking. Your daughter’s thoughts may be far away, and she may want to do anything besides stay home on a Friday night, but she still has to eat. And one of the things you love best about her is that she’ll eat whatever you cook, and thank you, genuinely, when she’s done.

Before a month ago, you’d never actually made homemade meatballs. No. And now, here you are, reaching for that Turkey Bacon Meatballs recipe for a second time.

You set your wedding ring to the side, and dive into the bowl of meat and egg and breadcrumbs, mixing it all together. With your still messy hands, you form the mixture into golf balls and place each one on a cookie sheet.

While you work, you think about your hands in the mess. About how not using your hands would make the process twice as long. About how very tactile it is to make meatballs.

When your daughter was little she loved to feel different kinds of fabric. She was a magnet for sensory tables. The play dough station. Finger painting. And even now, she would be right at home in a country full of people that eat with their fingers.

Your tall, beautiful daughter breezes through the kitchen, moments before you call everyone to the table, and asks, “What are we having for dinner?”

“Those turkey and bacon meatballs with spaghetti.”

“Yum! I love those.”

She grabs herself a bowl and dishes up.

She stays at the table long enough to eat her dinner and share a few snippets of her day and then, she’s off.

And you know it’s brief. This small bit of her undivided attention. But you’ll take it.

Knowing that she still needs you for something, even if it’s meatballs, is somehow comforting.

Would love to know how you comfort yourself, or how you imagine you would comfort yourself, as your kids, or kids you are close to, grow more independent in preparation for leaving the nest. Those of you who have already been through the whole process, any thoughts? You know, just in case I rejoin the pity-party.

Thank you to my friend, Sandy Coughlin, who writes the wonderful blog, The Reluctant Entertainer, for letting me share her scrumptious Turkey Bacon Meatballs recipe, here, with all of you!!

La Pomme Elsewhere:
The kind folks up at Calgary’s Child Magazine included my article, Cabin Fever Busters – 6 Creative and Entertaining Days Sure to be a Hit with Kids of All ages, in their Jan/Feb 2012 issue, on page 35…should that interest you.

We gain strength, and courage, and confidence by each experience in which we really stop to look fear in the face…we must do that which we think we cannot. -Eleanor Roosevelt

I always like fresh starts. New beginnings. The start of a new year. A brand new calendar without a single commitment written down in it…yet.

Last year, I wrote out an entire Word document of goals – four single-spaced pages – it was too much. Unattainable. This year I’m keeping it simple. Instead of starting with a list of goals, I’m taking a cue from one of my favorite writer/photographers, Susannah Conway, and just starting with a word.

COURAGE

Every time I write something and send it out publicly for people to read…I put a little bit of myself out there and that makes me vulnerable. Vulnerable to both approval and criticism. Like and dislike. Understanding and dismissal.

Every time I take a photograph and put it out there for people to look at…a little bit of me is in that photograph and once again, that makes me vulnerable.

That vulnerability can be downright scary.

There are many days when I doubt my abilities and think, “Why am I doing this? Who wants to read this? Who wants to look at this? Who cares what I have to say, or show, or cook?“

And yet, I continue on. Because it’s important to me.

Being a parent can also be downright scary as well. Never sure if I am doing all I can to ensure my kids grow-up to be competent and caring passengers on our little planet. Never sure if I am finding the right balance between independence and boundaries for them. Trying to stay true to what I believe is right as a parent despite feeling as if my children and the entire advertising/marketing/social media world are fighting against me.

But I continue to remain steadfast in my role as parent. Hoping my kids won’t sense my insecurities. My fears.

My 6-year-old still does not know how to swim. He’s scared. He mentally breaks down when he stands on the stairs in the pool, hands above his head like a rocket, and he has to push off, face down in the water.

He has to learn how to swim. We spend our summers at the Pacific Ocean. It could save his life.

Group lessons weren’t working. His peers were moved up at the end of each session and my 6-year-old was still bobbing.  I had visions of him at 10, still bobbing, with a class of 3-year-olds. In December, I signed him up for private lessons.

The first few lessons, he bobbed. He learned to swim on his back across the pool by himself. He jumped in.

At lesson three, his teacher told him she was going to teach him the most important move in swimming. “The one that can save your life…how to start out swimming on your stomach and flip to your back…to conserve energy. “

I watched him, there on the stairs, shifting quickly from one foot to another, goggles in place, hands above his head. Clearly scared. His teacher held his hands and guided him through the move the first few times, but once it was time for him to do it on his own, he barely got in the water when he clawed his way up to find her arm, the side of the pool, anything he could grab onto.

On the way to the fourth lessons, he cried. He didn’t want to go. He told me he was scared. I went over all the reasons why he had to learn how to swim and told him that sometimes in life, we have to do things that are important, even if they are scary.

He started out the lesson swimming across the pool on his back, but soon, it was time to work on the flip. As he stood on the stairs, I could hear him tell his teacher he was scared. She was patient. Finally, he pushed off into the water but then, grabbed her arm right away.  She put him back on the stairs.

He pushed off again and this time he started the turn but grabbed her arm halfway through.

They were out in the middle of the pool.

She gave him a little push back toward the stairs and off he went, face down in the water. After a few kicks, he flipped over on his back and continued kicking until his head gently bumped the side of the pool.

I cried.

His teacher looked up at me with amazement and excitement.  She hugged my little guy and told him she was so proud of him.

My guy looked up in my direction with a poker face, goggles still on, and simply gave me a thumbs-up.

He continued to do the flip four more times in that same direction.

Afterwards, I hugged him tightly and told him that what he had done was the true definition of courage. Doing something that is important even though you are scared.

Whether you are someone trying to develop a skill or a talent, whether you are a parent, or whether you are a child learning to swim, there are times it can all be a bit scary to try to do those things well. To put yourself out there. To set yourself up for possible failure or criticism.

My hope for myself this year is that I continue to have the courage to put my writing, my photography and my parenting out there because it’s important to me….because I love to write….because I want to learn to be a better photographer…because I love my children…even though there are times when I’m scared.

If you were to pick a word…a single word that you could tape up on the fridge to guide you through 2012… what would your word be? If you want to share it down in the comments I would love to know, but I also understand if you want to keep your word private. Really I do…

Hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season! All the best wishes to you in 2012….. I am so fortunate to have you in my life. xo carrie