Caught in the headlights

We are well into the new year already! Both 2011 and the Chinese Year of the Rabbit. It's my year this year. Jen the bunny. Turning a multiple of 12.

I feel a bit like a rabbit, lately. Caught in the headlights. Frozen in fear, trepidation, anxiety, worry, stress. You've heard me go on about it before. My life is still in limbo. My father's illness. Work (or impending lack of work) stress. Raising three boisterous children. Every day I think about blog posts to write, things I want to share or get off my chest. And the words, they appear in my mind and then flutter away before I can do anything with them. It makes me sad - I love to write and create - but I just haven't been in the write headspace for it.

Things are gonna change, though. I've found a new iPhone app called "blogpress". Allows me to write and save drafts locally and online. I could just use the regular blogger interface but this one seems a lot more user friendly, plus the font size is much kinder to my deteriorating eyesight (which is not really that bad, thank you very much). The main advantage is that I can now write anywhere, anytime because I carry my iPhone with me everywhere. So if a thought occurs to me while I'm in a lift or on the loo (is that too gross?) I can write it down straight away. A big bonus, in my books.

So expect more posts from me in the near future. There's been a lot going on and I want to write about it!

March success

Well that was a busy month. I missed a couple of days but otherwise managed to write something every day. And it didn't become a chore either! I think I might have my blogging mojo back. I hope so!

Times in the Burn household are only going to become busier as the year goes on, I suspect. The boys will get more and more into their schooling and school work. We'll start getting term-long projects (argh! Curse them!) and more homework (perhaps). Elora will progress through her "troublesome threes" (as opposed to the so-called "terrible twos" which never happened)... It has already begun.

The biggest change around here will be in the second half of the year when Dan begins his PhD. He has finally started the ball rolling, happy to at last be fulfilling a lifelong ambition (to become Dr Dan) but nervous about the stress and workload, understandably. I don't know many people who embark on a four-five year higher degree with a full time job (even if it's related somewhat) and three young kids at home. We will all have to pull our socks up.

See you in April!

Productivity... tomorrow

For the second night in a row I have fallen asleep on the floor of Elora's room whilst putting her to bed.

I'm not sure if I've mentioned this before but for three years she cried, screamed and yelled when I put her to bed at night. There were probably a handful of occasions when she didn't. And I was SICK of listening to her crying, even if it was only for a couple of minutes. It was the persistence that bugged me and I would be annoyed for the rest of the evening.

So upon her third birthday I changed tactic. Now I sit in with her, leaning against her bed or lying on the floor until she falls asleep. Makes for interesting Monday nights when I am alone with the kids. But it has worked. No more screaming girl every night. She even says to me now, "I want you to sit with me tonight. I will cry if you go."

But the downside of it all is that if I am the slightest bit tired, which I have been lately, fighting a bug that's trying to take hold, and if Elora takes a little while to be still then as soon as I stop and relax, even uncomfortable on the floor, I fall asleep. Tonight I may possibly have fallen asleep before the girl did. And didn't wake up until after 11pm, way past my bed time, with a sore neck and aching hips. I got up, went downstairs and said goodnight to Dan and crawled back into bed. And now I'm blogging about it.

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So because of all my sleeping I missed a day of my one-post-per-month thing. Oh well, one day out of 18 ain't bad and I certainly have no intention of stopping now.

In one week's time we will have a full house - ten heads under this roof as Dan's cousin and her family are coming to stay. The house needs a good scrub before they get here! Dan's sister will be Mrs M this time next week. Tomorrow is going to be my day of cleaning. Actually, it was meant to be my weekend of cleaning but I made brownies instead this afternoon, and napped and shopped (for Dante's suit - it ended up being cheaper to buy than hire!)

Hence "productivity tomorrow". Watch me!

Ten days, so far so good

You may have noticed that I've been making a bit more of an effort to write this month. Every day so far, to be precise. And here I am today, day eleven, and I'm reduced to writing about my writing. Ack! Can I have really run out of ideas so quickly?

In truth I have not. I have simply run out of time this evening.

I will be back on track tomorrow!

Template change

Hmm. I've changed the blog template after years of the same old one. Just one of the standard choices but I was so annoyed at how the main text window would not stretch if your screen was bigger than the minimum. I hate wasted screen space!

I know it's boring. There are some lovely fancy templates out there but I can't be bothered editing them! What do you think?

One more

Oh yeah. One more resolution to add to the list:

BLOG MORE!

I'm sorry that I've been neglecting this poor old online journal of late, and you, my readers, as well. I am determined that I will be a much more diligent writer in the new year. The writing is good for my brain, helps me to remember my days, motivates me to do more with my life. I like the writing.

So, I will be posting on a regular basis - weekly, definitely, and more if I'm organised enough :) Not sure what time I will set aside for it, but the point is that there WILL be a set time for me to write.

Just letting you know!

500th post!

I've had a bit of a blog break - so much for NaBloPoMo!

I've been busy - work, craft, kids. Well, it seems just the usual life stuff, really. My trip to TI was wonderful. Warm (actually, hot and humid), relaxing (except that Elora wouldn't sleep much) and family-filled. But it was good to get home, too.

Now Christmas is less than a month away and things are starting to get quite busy - the social calendar is filling up quickly.

And I just realised that this is my 500th post! It's been almost four years since I started this blog - about 125 posts/year. That's an average of two posts/week. Not a bad, I reckon.

Lots of the craft blogs have giveaways for big events like this. I might do the same. I'm not sure exactly what yet. Perhaps some wool (I have a skein of Koigu KPPPM that I can part with), some fabric (some fat quarters) and something else yet to be determined.

Leave a comment on this post and I'll pick a winner in a few days.

Word cloud

Just found this cute online application. It takes a bunch of text (or your blog feed) and turns it into a nifty word cloud (with the more frequent words being bigger).

"Incredible heart" by Jen

I used this post for my words. Click on the image for more clarity.

September: over

Two nights in a row of falling asleep before 9pm have meant that I've missed two days in this Month of Blogging... but I don't mind. It's been fantastic writing every day and reminded me of my childhood ambition to be an author (which earned a "Good choice, Mama" from Dante this morning when we were discussing what we want to be when we grow up... which somehow led to a discussion about reincarnation. But I digress. )

Thanks for hanging around and listening to me blathering on this month. It's been fun. I'm going to try and continue the more frequent posting. I think it's good to keep at it.