Daybook

http://thesimplewomansdaybook.blogspot.com/

FOR TODAY: July 25, 2012

Outside my window... Powder blue sky, a few lonely clouds, green grass, oak trees, manicured lawns and big brick houses.  It's still hot although it's 7pm.  I'm nestled in my comfy neighborhood back in Texas after a week in Florida. 

I am thinking...about so many things...the kids..the bills...my schedule...  I'm thinking about Brent at boot camp and wondering how he is handling all the challenges in his training.  We heard from him about a week ago, and he sounded good. He said he is learning a ton.  The Colorado theater shooting happened while we were on vacation, and I've been thinking about that a lot too.  The shooter...the victims...guns...going out in public etc..

I am thankful...Sierra made it safely on her first solo drive to Lubbock.  She and I are so different with highway driving.  I learned how to drive in Washington DC and have always been a confident driver.  She is scared of driving on the highways and has never made the trip by herself.  She looked up an alternate route that kept her on major highways without a lot of interchanges.  She went back to school early to get a job before rush starts and found a job waiting table right away! 
     I'm thankful Zoe and Sierra are getting along better now and have come a long way in developing their sisterly relationship.  I've always wanted to have a sister.  They are lucky to have each other.  They are seven years apart, so it's been kind of rough sometimes with both of them in different stages most of the time.  I think this summer they both realized what it's like to be in the other one's shoes and are starting to understand how lucky they are to have sisters even though there is a big age gap.
     I'm thankful for getting to spend today with Thomas (since Sierra left for college and Zoe is sleeping over at Joe's mom's).  He is such a good sport when I want to drag him around for girl stuff like getting my nails done today and registering Zoe for dance classes.  We had some lunch and went to the pool.  He said, "hey mommy - win/win - you can swim laps and I can go down the waterslides!"  He joined me in the lap lane for a while and then we played in the family swim area too.  He is working on going all the way across the pool and today asked if I thought he might be able to become an Olympic swimmer one day.  I told him he can be anything he wants. It just takes work and practice.  He seems turned onto the idea of exercising today.  That's awesome. 
     I'm thankful for Joe.  He is my rock, my soft place to land, and my person.  He is the strong husband and father in the family.  He takes care of all of us. He works really hard to support us and the lifestyle we have.  He loves me just they way I am and supports me in whatever I want to do.

I am learning... to develop my blogging habit.  I've been working on it off and on over the years and now that I'm home full time again, it's fun to get back to writing down some of the many thoughts that run through my complicated mind.  It gives me a way to structure my thinking and to share my thoughts with my friends. 
     I'm still learning guitar.  I downloaded the Ultimate Guitar app on my iPhone and I love looking up songs that I hear to play.  I'm getting better, but I still have a long way to go.  I would still love to get better on my electric guitar, just need to carve out more time to practice.
     I'm also learning Trigonometry.  I need to write a blog about my love affair with math to explain my history, but suffice it to say I didn't know I liked math or was good at it until I became a teacher.  I want to go back and keep taking classes as time allows.  I've downloaded the Trignometry class from Khan Academy on my iPhone too, and I watch the online lessons and do the practice problems.

In the kitchen...grass fed beef is thawing.  Thomas wants Hamburger Helper Stroganoff tonight (yuck!), so I will probably stir fry some veggies with the meat separately and then make the stroganoff with the rest of it. 

I am wearing... my bikini (we just got home from the pool), black nike shorts, and a lime green tank top that says LIVE LOVE SURF Pensacola <3

I am creating... this blog!  Working on writing about my life and my thoughts without fear of who reads it. 

I am going... to PT tomorrow.  Still having lots of back pain, working on core stabilization and spinal strengthening. 

I am reading...can you believe I'm still on Hunger Games? I think I started it months ago. I'm almost at the end, but I hate reading fiction!  HAHA.  I like to read, but I gravitate to non-fiction.  I have to work on my fictional reading habit just like I have to work on my writing habit.  I'm so much more of a math and science person.  I read a ton of news articles and non-fictional stuff every day, but I admit reading fiction is like pulling teeth.  I saw Hunger Games, and I liked it and heard the books are better, so I'm trying.  I'm toward the end where Katniss and Peeta are still in the cave. She has the extra supplies and his leg is healing, but they are still there.  I've seen the movie, so I don't really care to finish the book, but I heard the book is different, so I do still want to finish it sometime.

I am wondering... how to handle a situation with my mom.  We've had a long history together, and although I know she loves me, I am not able to have a relationship with her.  We haven't spoken since Thanksgiving. She came here and got really upset and changed her ticket and left early then blamed everything on me.  It's very complicated. I hate that we don't have a relationship but I don't know how to fix it.

I am hoping... to lose about ten pounds.  I will write a separate post about diet and my allergies.

I am pondering... what makes some people so into facebook and others not.  The other day, Joe and I were talking about facebook like we often do.  I'm a big fan and am an active user.  I have lived in many places and experienced many things, and I know people all over the world whom I communicate with via facebook.  I've always been an extrovert, so it makes sense that I love social media.  I connect with people in real life too, but seriously I have many friends who live in facebook land, and without facebook I wouldn't be able to keep in touch, see pictures of their kids, or hear about their lives.  I frequently tell Joe about things I post and ask him if he has seen them.  His usual answer is no.  If something's important, I'll ask him to go and look at it and tell me what he thinks about it.  Since I've been blogging again recently, I decided to also create a facebook 'fan' page for my blog...not so much to amass fans (although that would be great) but to have one place for all my blog posts instead of having them mixed throughout my timeline obscured by other posts about what I'm doing or what I'm listening to or links to other interesting sites or pictures I've posted.  When you create a page, you invite people to 'like' it so they will get your posts in their news feeds.  I invited all my facebook friends to like my page, and I noticed my husband, my most important person in the world didn't like it yet, so I asked him if he got the invitation or if he had read any of my recent posts.  His response was, "I never think to check facebook."  I was speechless.  The words echoed in my head again as I struggled to understand them.  We don't live on the same planet.  I have to try NOT to check facebook too much.  How can people never think to check facebook?  My first impulse is to explain it by saying he has both his parents and had his needs met as a child, so that must be why he doesn't reach out to others as much as I do.  (I didn't have both parents, I didn't have my needs met as a child, and I've always reached out to friends for connection and validation to compensate).  I've always been a "friends" person.  These days many of my friends live in the computer, so I'm always thinking about connecting and learning things and sharing ideas and expressing myself.  If you're reading this, you are probably like me. You're online on facebook or have arrived at my blog through twitter or the daybook or what have you.  I truly ponder what makes people so different on a basic level like that.  Why is it so easy for Joe to never think of facebook?  His answer is that he is too busy in the real world to care about the virtual world.  He reached over, poked my leg, and said, "I like you Susanne and I like Susanne's World.  I just like Susanne's real world."  That meant a lot.  It's real, and it counted way more than getting 100 likes on facebook.  I'm sure there is a happy medium between never checking facebook and checking it all the time.

I am hearing... Alaine, "Sacrifice"  I still remember the first time I heard this song, on the way down the mountain on our last day in St. John, USVI in 2007.  I thought it was Madonna!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Ll1VxrFARU

A favorite quote for today..."Be yourself. The world worships the original."  Ingrid Bergman

One of my favorite things... got a mani/pedi today!  Thomas was happy to come along with me because the ladies let him sit in a massage chair. He loved it!

A few plans for the rest of the week: PT and allergy shots tomorrow, allergy shots for Thomas on Friday, a little shopping to get the kids ready for soccer camp next week. Grocery shopping at Sprouts!

A peek into my day

My kind of heroine

I am the proud mom of two daughters. One is out of the nest and in college, and the other is a tweenager.  I've been both a working mom and a stay home mom, so I have lived on both sides of the fence.  Raising girls in today's world is a challenging and fulfilling craft.  I learn something new all the time from my experiences with my daughters and want the best for them in their adult lives.  I want them to feel loved and nurtured, yet I also want them to know what challenge and struggle feel like so they can know the sense of pride and accomplishment that comes with facing adversity and rising up out of figurative ashes.  When it's their turn to be mothers, I want them to have happy memories of their childhoods and a strong sense of themselves so they can shine as individuals as well as give their utmost love and devotion to their families.  There is no "handbook" for raising daughters, but I love this list of rules for mothers with daughters:  It actually brought tears to my eyes as I read it.

http://diapersdaisies.blogspot.com/2012/01/rules-for-mothers-of-daughters.html

Today, I braided my ponytail since it's in style, and I couldn't help but think of Katniss, the heroine from the latest movie and book craze, the Hunger Games.  Her character is introduced as a hunter in the woods in a post apocolyptic world.  She is from a coal mining district, wears modest clothing, and sports braids in many scenes throughout the movie.  To me the braids make her seem stronger, perhaps it's the idea of weaving three sections of hair together to make a stronger mane.  Three is the magic number, the holy trinity, faith hope and charity, tripods stand strong, tricycles are sturdy.  I braided my hair and thought of the qualities of a strong woman.  In today's society where technology is ubiquitous, girls have so many heroines in the media.  When I was a little girl, we only had one tv in the house, and classic princess stories and Barbies were my main female role models.  I've seen heroines change over the years and have been happy to see the emergence of strong, confident, smart female roles. 

Katniss from the Hunger Games is the most contemporary heroine I admire.  She volunteers to take her little sister's place in a fight to the death even though she is scared for her own life.  She is smart, humble, and true to herself.  She doesn't get involved with the initial bloodbath.  She takes her mentor's advice and finds high ground and seeks water. She uses her intelligence to outwit her competitors and plays to her strength, which is shooting with a bow and arrow.  Ironically, it's her willingness to risk the ultimate sacrifice and stand up to the rules of the game that changes the ending of the story.  She shows solidarity with the final competitor and saves his life.   She is strong and beautiful and smart, trifecta!

Hermione Granger is my next favorite heroine.  She is also one smart cookie.  Her character in the Harry Potter series is frequently studying and always knows the answers, both in class and to help solve whatever problem they find themselves facing.  She shows that education pays off and that knowledge is power.  She also shows that young ladies can be intelligent and beautiful and that it is possible for a boy and a girl to have a quality friendship.  She is daring and confident and keeps her cool in the most precarious situations. 

Disney started branching away from the stereotypical princess-waiting-for-a-prince theme first with Pocahontas and then with Mulan.  Both heroines struggle with family honor and loyalty. Both heroines risk their lives to be true to themselves.  Both heroines trust their intuition even when it's a different path than what is expected of them.  The Disney version of Pocahontas wasn't historically correct, but it adopted the story of saving her man's life (John Smith in the movie, John Rolfe in history).  Her father was the chief and John was captured and was going to be killed, so she put herself in between John.  She was one of the original activists, and I'm proud to note that my great grandmother was a geneologist and traced our family tree, finding that we are descendents of her only son Thomas Rolfe.  She shows us that we should take a stand for what we know is right.  She also shows us a deep connection with nature.  Mulan doesn't want her father to go off to war, so she pretends she is a boy and becomes a soldier to bring honor to her family.  She shows how to be respectful and loyal to your family.  She shows how to be brave, take risks, and to face her fears.  She shows how sometimes, it's important to put the welfare of others above that of your own.

Cut to some of my least favorites, Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty.  Cinderella goes from an unhappy, overworked, girl of little means to a lavish lifestyle as a princess.  Why? Is it because she went to school and worked hard to earn all of her possessions?  Was it because she made goals and took steps to reach them? No, it was because she snuck out, went to a ball, and caught the eye of Prince Charming.  He fits the lost shoe on her foot and presto, he wisks her off her feet into happily ever after land.  Sleeping Beauty and Snow White are pretty much the same story, minus the ball and the glass slipper.  They are both put under spells by evil characters and lay in repose for eternity until kissed by Prince Charming.  The magic kiss brings her back to consciousness and they ride off into the sunset to live happily ever after.  However, no kiss, no man, no happily ever after.  They are basically dead without a man.  What kind of lesson does that teach our daughters?

Speaking of dead without a man, Bella Swan from the Twilight series.  She is the most do-nothing heroine I have ever met.  She seriously does nothing other than fantasize and hallucinate about Edward and stare out the window in a deep depression when he leaves her.  Her whole life is wrapped up in a dead, cold vampire.  Very much alive Jacob is her best friend and is the opposite of Edward. He is in her life day to day. Edward leaves her broken hearted.  He's a werewolf, and naturally there is a rivalry between the boys for Bella's affections.  She is too lost in Edward to see the value of what is right in front of her, and she eschews Jacob in pursuit of becoming a vampire wife and mom.  She zones out at school and in life and in the end, she gives up her life for a male character.  Her life is worth nothing without a boy. That's not the lesson I want to teach my girls. 

Don't let life happen to you

Grab the buffalo by the horns

Ride the crest of the wave

books

I'm still trying to finish Harry Potter 7. I got it when it was first released and it didn't catch my interest like the other 6. I trudged my way through it until I was 2/3 of the way done and it was finally getting good. Then I left it at the gym...big mistake...because nobody turned it in. Somebody picked it up and took it home. Great. So, now I checked out the audio CDs from the library and am trying to finish it that way, although it takes so long to listen to the narrator read it, not sure if I am going to get through it that way. I just want to know if/how Harry dies...

I've also joined a book club in the neighborhood to help me build my pleasure reading habit. The first book we read, The Memory or Running, was ok. The Hour I First Believed was about Columbine. Good book. Then we read Good Christian Bitches, not so good. Now we are on Driftwood summer. Haven't started it yet..

In the meantime, I have started on the Twilight Series. Saw the movie and hated it. Everybody says the book is better, so I made it through #1, and yes I agree, the book was better than the movie. So, now I am on New Moon (#2) So far so good.