Try, try again

     My last post (less than a year ago!) bemoaned how busy life had become.  It's interesting that tonight has held many of those same thoughts.  I am giving myself a free pass for not having done much about it yet.  In the last 12 months, we've had a new baby, four hospitalizations in our immediate family, another emergency room visit, a move to a new house and my dad had a heart transplant.  That would make anyone's head spin, right?
     Now that the baby is almost one (how did THAT happen??) and my dad is doing so very well and we are moved (not so much moved in, but moved), I am starting to feel like my feet are on the ground again.  Look at that big boy over there.  Soon he will turn seven.  It is speeding by at a dizzying rate.  I have spent seven years trying to find my parenting footing, then being uprooted over and over and over by new additions to the family.  It's time to stop.  Focus.  Enjoy this time.  I am not so naive as to believe that I will "love every minute."  Having 4 young kids is hard.  I some part of every day exhausted, frustrated and feeling stretched way too far.  On the other hand, I would not for any possible thing in the world change this amazing family, these amazing kids.  I look at them, so eager to be with Mommy, so anxious to share their lives, their play, their thoughts with me.  I know that soon enough that will all change and I am determined not to let as many of the carpe diem moments slip by.  I hope to post here more regularly and hope even more to be able to document some change.  I plan to make one small change a week for... some number of weeks and see where it leads us.  I am hoping for more purposeful time with my children.  I am hoping to slow down and enjoy.  I am hoping to give them memories of a Mommy who was present and relaxed rather than distracted and busy.
     For now my one small change will be to take some quiet time each morning to focus on what is important and how I want the day to go.  Ok.  Let's go.