I'll confess that I saw a sneak peek of this week's prompt and all week I've avoided thinking about it because it causes anxiety. I'm not at a point in my life/mental health journey that I let myself think long term. But, I'm going to try to relax and just write...after all, that's the night before my 53rd birthday. Who knows what that time will bring?

This week's prompt:
Write a diary entry, dated 10 years in the future.

Well, happy birthday eve to me. There were times that you never thought you'd get here, but you did. The boys are all grown up and doing great. You have a daughter-in-law and grandkids are on the horizon. Do you remember being in high school, thinking you'd never have kids? It's funny now, but it wasn't at the time. You were already so damaged.

Here you are though. You've come through everything that the universe could throw at you and you have a thriving editing and writing career. You get to work with the best indie authors that there are and you're receiving fan emails asking when your next book will come out. Ten years ago, you were just getting started, afraid that you'd never finish that novel, but you did. You did and people loved it. Now, you have an entire series of young adult novels as well as your children's stories. You chose not to choose and it was the right decision. People doubted you. People said you couldn't do it and you did it anyway. You. Nobody else. I'm proud of you.

You've moved to a home that you love, in an area that you love, and you're surrounded by people who love and celebrate you. Life is good and that's because of you. You turned your life into what you wanted it to be and that, girl, is awesome.






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This past Saturday was a long one. Roger and I were up at 5am so that we could join his high school steel drum band at a festival for the day. The festival was pretty awesome and I'll share a link to the mass band performance at the end of this post, but that isn't what I want to talk about...I'm going to sit here and I'm just going to write about being a mom.

For the longest time, mom has been my primary title. It's been my world and my life. Those two boys have been my world and my life. It's only been in the past little while that I've started thinking about what I'm going to do when they're gone and living their own lives. I still don't really know but I am thinking about it.

On Saturday, I had expectations. I expected that this was an event that Roger and I were doing together. Except, the event really wasn't what either of us had figured it was. So, instead of spending the day with me, he spent it with his band and with his friends. He did pretty much everything with them. He sat with them. He had lunch with them. Since this wasn't my usual group of band kids, I wasn't invited to join them. I ate lunch alone. I sat in the bleachers alone. I watched them laughing and inside, a part of me hurt. I was happy he was having a great time, but it still hurt that I was on the outside looking in.

Still, there were those moments where he was completely my boy...he ran over to me to make sure it was okay that he spent $5 of the money we'd set aside for his band trip. During the concert, he was sitting on the opposite side of the gym from me and I realized that we were sitting in the exact same position. He'd make faces at me from across the room and I couldn't help but smile.

What's the point of all this you ask? Just that Sunday, after his dad had picked him up, I was sitting there thinking about the weekend and I realized something. The very fact that he was confident and comfortable enough to not need me on Saturday meant that I had done my job. He may not know how to sew a button back on but he's learned the skills that will help him become the man that he wants to be and the fact that he'll still make goofy faces at me from across the room means that no matter how old he gets, he won't forget he's my kid. With that realization, I was filled with peace and that, my friends, is a very good thing indeed.

If you'd like to check out the mass band performance, check out this video!


If you'd like to hear the HHS Steel performance, head on over to my YouTube channel where it's almost all kids, all the time.



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It's not very often that I come here and just write these days. I guess I get caught up in my days and making sure that I hit the themed posts that I don't jut write to write. I want to change that. It's my "secret" dream to one day come here and find that people have found my specialty posts that I've created and started linking to them like I link to so many others. I see other blogs like 5minutesformom.com or orgjunkie.com and how well loved they are and how many comments they receive and I'm envious. I want that for this blog.

I want more than that though. I want to be up in front of crowds speaking and teaching things. I want to combine my love of organizing with my love of helping others and turn it into a career. I want to teach people how getting rid of the clutter in their lives with help to relieve the clutter in their minds. I want this blog to be the place people come when they need a tip on organizing or living a greener lifestyle. I want people to come here and laugh with me and cry with me and to feel as if they've found a new best friend.

I want a lot and while I may not know how to get to the end result, I know that the first step must begin with me. I know that before I can change the world, I have to change me. I know that before I can go out and organize a single room or home, I have to organize my own. I know that if I want to do what others are doing, I have to find out how they're doing it. I need to learn. I need to grow. Enough making excuses as to why I haven't done something but it's time to find joy in the fact that I *am* doing things. There will be changes to this blog. I have things I want to add to it, specifically a Saturday post idea. Will it take off? Who knows..but it's a step that I need to take for me and hopefully others can learn and grow from it as well.

As for right now, I'm going to enjoy what remains of my delicious Paula Deen candle and perhaps sort some more Christmas items while I wait for the plumber to arrive. Hopefully by the end of the day, my toilet will no longer be leaking and my shower walls will no longer be flapping.

I apologize for vanishing off the face of the earth again. Life here is just plain insane. I'm moving back to Michigan in 4 short days and I'm not even close to being ready. Thank god for those people who have volunteered to come out to help me load the truck and the fact that Justin is coming in on Saturday to help me finish packing. My back has been bothering me and that is not good when trying to pack!

Other than that, let's see..I graduated! Woohoo! I now have an expensive piece of paper that says I'm smart. Heh! I'm doing some online work for kgb.com. It doesn't pay much so I'm going to be looking for something else I can do from home. I have my boys all summer so there's just no way to work out of the house. Any suggestions would be fabulous! I can almost guarantee that I'm going to take some more paid postings for this blog, but I promise they won't be lame ones! Only the best for my readers..lol! I did monetize this blog with google adsense, so you'll be seeing those in the lower right on the side column.

That's been most of my life for the past few weeks. The only other major thing is that my wedding is permanently postponed. Things in that area are a little bit rocky. We love each other but actually getting us in the same place just isn't going so well. I have faith that we'll figure it out, but right now, I'm putting all major plans on hold.

Ok, I need to finish my lunch! I have a kgb_ shift coming up in about 30 minutes. Gots to make some more pennies for the coffer, ya know! I will be back, I promise. It just might not be for a couple of weeks while I get settled into the new place. I love you guys..really and truly, I do!