Happy {Belated} New Year

Live a balanced life - learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work everyday some. --Robert Fulghum


We're only three days in to the New Year and apparently this is going to be a year to learn how to balance. Balance being a single mom to a toddler, who is sleeping downstairs right now with a 101.3 degree fever. Balance being a homeowner, with too many things on the to do list and not enough motivation or money. Balance being a full time nurse, trying to figure out how to provide the best care for my teeny tiny preemie patients and advance my career. Balance being a daughter, a sister, a friend...all while finding a little time and energy for me. (Oh, and in the spirit of New Year's traditions manage to lose the baby weight that's been hanging around for over two years now.) In the end, I guess that's what this new "hobby" of mine is all about; it is something for me.

The idea came about late last summer when I met a long lost kindred spirit named Holly. In our e-mail exchanges back and forth we realized that we have good stories to tell, good thoughts to share...and not just with our children. Holly beat me to the blog thing (check it out HERE) and since then has given me gentle nudges to get mine up and running. And so an online blogging class made it onto my Christmas list. (Thank you Grammy and Libby!) Now here I am, with my very own blog, about 4 lessons into my "class", and fingers itching to tell a story. Any story.

Except my mind is blank.

Maybe blank isn't the best work. Exhuasted and numb might be better. It was a long, very sad weekend at work. The holidays always seem to be gloomy in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. Add to that the conflict a mother feels leaving her own precious and sick little one (even if it is in the hands of my beyond capable mother) to go take care of someone else's sick baby and I couldn't help but feel a little gloomy. A little guilty. And all the more thankful when I made it home (after a short trip to the Pediatric ICU to say goodbye to a patient who holds a very special place in my heart before he began his journey to Heaven today) to gather her up in my arms and hold her feverish but otherwise healthy and alive body against my own.

So yeah, I am starting out the New Year exhausted, overworked, and off balance, and Libby is starting it out sick, but that's okay. I am remembering to be grateful. Grateful I have a job I love, despite the sad moments, that allows me to provide for myself and my child. Grateful I have a healthy child to spend my days (and long, feverish nights) with. Grateful that I have a need to balance motherhood and work and family and everything else life throws at us. And tonight, grateful that I have a new hobby and a place to share my thoughts and stories from our sweet little life. Oh and pictures!

Keeping with my Title theme, I figured I'd share with you my New Year's Resolutions. Plus, writing it down means I can come back to it and see how I'm doing. I predict I don't manage to keep any of them, but you never know!

1. Complete my Project 365: take at least one picture every day this year
2. No sugary sweet snacks before 12 noon or after 9 pm (a challenge for someone who gets home from work at midnight)
3. Make myself healthier and lose a few pounds
4. Create a blog I am proud of AND keep updated