Refresh {Spin Cycle}

Sometimes I’ll be on my laptop surfing the web and something will crash. The prompt “Refresh your browser” will pop up. And so I click the little circle arrow to refresh the browser and voila! The problem is fixed!

If only refreshing my life was that easy.

Some days, I’m just tired. Tired of getting up in the morning, tired of packing lunches for the girls, tired of laundry, dishes, cooking dinner…just tired.

I look at the moms of my children’s friends, and they just seem so young. Younger than me, an old mom who has yet another birthday coming up next month. I’ll be exactly between 40 and 50. This older mom thing is tiring. I wish I had the energy I had in my 20’s to raise my children today.

Just yesterday, I read another blog post about another woman who had breast cancer scare so she’s so relieved she doesn’t have cancer. She decided not to take life for granted and live life to the fullest, blah, blah, blah…. I’m sorry I’m being so cynical. Every time I read a post like this (and I’ve read far too many) I wish that I could have written it.

I need a refresh button.

This spring, it will be 18 years since I was first diagnosed. I’m tired of counting the years, tired of wondering if the cancer will come back. My mom’s cancer returned after 20 years. Shouldn’t I be grateful for every new day? Of course I am. Do I take life for granted? Of course I do. I yell at my kids, I get irritated at my husband, and I get sick of making yet another meal.

Cancer didn’t make me any different from you.

For last week’s Spin Cycle, Janice chose “refresh” for her word of the year, and it seems like a perfect word for the beginning of a new year. She describes in her writing how weary she feels, and as I was reading her post, I felt weary, too. But then she wrote a wonderful poem to go along with her word, refresh. As I read Janice’s poem, I began to feel refreshed and ready for a New Year.

Unlike this laptop I’m typing on right now, I have more than one refresh button.

When I read inspiring blog posts like yours, (yes, I mean you) I feel refreshed. If you don’t think your blog post is inspiring, to me it is.

Opening the curtains every morning as I sip my cup of coffee is refreshing.

Going outside, even in the middle of this long winter, is refreshing.

Reading my Bible, teaching Sunday school, singing in the choir; refresh.

And of course, kissing my daughters’ sweet cheeks instantly refreshes my spirit.

What refreshes your spirit?

Second Blooming

Bloggers–link your post here! A link to your post will be both here and over at Second Blooming.



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10 Things I Love About Winter

snow cave

Snow. I just love snow. I love the way snowflakes drift down from the sky, covering everything softly, muting the traffic sounds and smothering the ugly brown grass. Snow is just one of the things I love about winter, and so I’m joining in to today’s Tuesday Ten with Lisa and Rabia, two of my co-authors of The Mother of All Meltdowns.

Ten things about winter

10. I love to put on my favorite sweater. I’m not someone who gets cold easily; I always have warm hands. But I love wearing my favorite sweaters in the winter, when it’s cold enough for me to wear sweater all day long. (My husband and I are probably the only couple in the world who don’t fight over the thermostat.)

9. Hot coffee in the mornings is lovely. I drink coffee year round, but it’s so nice on a chilly morning to hold that hot mug in my hands and warm my cold cheeks with its smooth sides. More recently, I’ve been drinking Lisa’s hot Russian Tea, and I swear the Vitamin C in the Tang helped me thwart a cold that my six year old daughter tried to give me.

8. Snow is beautiful. Even people who hate snow admit that snow is pretty.

Snowy Street

7. Taking my daughters sledding is so much fun! There’s nothing like that rush of adrenaline as you’re sledding down a steep hill with other kids sledding down without paying attention to other sledders! Once we’re at the bottom of the hill, I thank God no one got hurt, and then we drag the sled back up to the top to do it all over again.

6. Snow Days are awesome. I know, we regret them at the end of the school year when we’re making them up, but getting that phone call saying, “No school tomorrow due to the weather” is like a little piece of heaven.

5. My birthday is in the winter. Enough said.

4. Christmas and New Year’s Eve, also in winter, also enough said.

3. Snuggling under a blanket and reading a good book feels oh-so-right in winter. It gets dark so early that snuggling under a blanket and watching two movies in a row does not make me feel guilty at all. I also seem to get more blogging done in the winter.

2. Having the freedom to NOT shave my legs in the winter is wonderful

1. I love it when my husband builds a fire in the fireplace. It makes our family room so cozy.

girls by fireplace (2)

There are definitely things I don’t love about winter, but overall it’s one of my favorite seasons (along with Spring, Summer, and Autumn).

Tuesday Ten is hosted by Lisa from The Golden Spoons and Rabia from The Liebers. Visit their blogs for more Tuesday Ten!

Tuesday Ten
signature Be sure to join in the Spin Cycle, a weekly blog hop hosted by Gretchen from Second Blooming and me!