Vida. Risa. Amor.

It seems I'm back in the "project-mode" of life again. Since it was literally pouring buckets of rain all last week I took the opportunity to start part one of the "Palacios-Kids-Trading-Spaces" project. Our home has 4 bedrooms and the only one by itself downstairs happens to be Josie's bedroom. We have slowly come to the realization that for a dozen different safety reasons, and the rare and probably unlikely chance she might figure out how to sneak out someday, we'd rather have our teenage-almost-high-schooler-daughter upstairs! Another reason is that teenage boys are now the new crowd of "friends" these days and a "hang-out" room wouldn't be such a bad idea in a hope to draw kids over to our part of the neighborhood once in a while. The end set up will be that the girls will share a room, the boys will share a room, and the downstairs room will become an "everybody room"...(that design plan is still a mystery at this point).

Painting is fun for me, so the best way to start was to repaint the boys bedroom. The color of Aydan's choice was an-in-your-face-red; (not a one coat kind of job red either). Paint is really not cheap these days but we lucked out in that our color of choice was free paint my sister wasn't going to be using. Once the painting was completed in every sitting / squatting / standing / reaching position known to man, about 4 big pieces of furniture had to be switched. I know I'm not strong, but I do have determination. Your back will thank you later if you take the drawers out first, THEN move the dressers. Mattresses are not light to lift out of a form fitting top bunk bed either by the way. The squeaky bed Lanie had been sleeping on was a 90's IKEA loft bed that is "shockingly" no longer sold in their stores anymore. The 4 inch hexagon screw key thing they give you for the 150 screws just doesn't quite cut it....in fact, I don't even think there's a good name for that loser, failure of a tool. It's awesome when you keep dropping the thing on the floor when you're standing on a ladder and you can't find it. Halfway through the process, I remembered about a drill bit I could have used instead. Some of the screws have had to be replaced as they have been bent quite literally in half or stripped from the drill or pounded on by a hammer in desperation from the several times we've assembled and disassembled it. This bed and I have had these frustrating issues over the years and I told it that the next time we took it apart, that it was the very last time it would be a bed in the Palacios house. It is now waiting in the garage for our next garage sale. Adios cama feya...que te via bien. The boys bunk beds are newer and are also from IKEA, but luckily my sidekick helper Lanie and I had it taken apart and put back together within an hour or so...(minus a few swear words here and there...I really took the time to let all the uncooperative screws and my failure of a drill know what I thought about them...there was even a lengthy "speech" on my opinion that all the people who design IKEA bunk beds need to be fired). My Lanie loves me anyway.

I have a strong need for all my furniture in each of the bedrooms to coordinate, so after a few cans of black spray paint I was proud to match Aydan's desk and shelves to the color scheme. Swapping the stuff in closets probably should have been saved for another rainy day but since I like to see the whole finished project I pressed on...I just had to get that vacuum out to suck up all the dust build up...the treasures you find! Vacuuming is my favorite thing next to organizing...next to suntanning...next to Diet Chery Coke...
I just love to vacuum. My family knows.

My boys are pretty easy to please and they are super excited about their "new" room. I learned that I probably should have waited for my man's help on the furniture but since he was working another 60 hour week and because of the fact that we know we don't get along when we move furniture together, I just decided to go for it. When I get it in my head I want to do something, I usually don't like to wait, and waiting for help is even harder. I also don't think I'd recommend attempting a project of this size again when all the kids are home. Living off of frozen pizza, ramen noodles, and macaroni and cheese can really only fuel you so far in life. Next week I'll work on the girls room and I already know they have a list of opinions on paint colors, bed spreads, curtains, and furniture arrangements....(wonder who they got that from!)

I had a really good race day today. There is nothing like the feeling of the satisfaction you get from meeting a goal you set for yourself. I knew after Halloween trying to pull off another 26.2 miles and trying to find time to train was going to be close to impossible during the holidays, so I set out for doing 13.1 instead. I'll admit I had a few dull training days here and there, and many of my runs longer than 6 miles a little boredom started to set in, but in the end it was all worth the effort. "The pain is temporary, the pride is forever"...in other words, I basically kept telling myself to suck it up, my acheing toes could rest tommorrow! It would have been great to have had a buddy to run with as I did in the Chicago Marathon in 08 with my good friend Nicole, (who has known me since age 10)....but the farther along I got into the training I knew I had to see if I could do this for myself. Thirteen is a special number for me this year as it's the same amount of years I've been a mother and have been married. If someone would have asked me 13 years ago how I would imagine myself to be like today, I don't think I would have guessed I'd be attempting half or even full marathons! I saved a few thoughts to think of each mile...mile 1: my first year of everything, becoming a Mom, getting married, starting a home. Mile 3: I thought of when Lanie was born and the fun it was to dress up my two girls. Mile 7: Aydan and the new joy of having a baby boy. Mile 9 during the race was very difficult! It was mostly up a huge hill and I thought of when we welcomed Rylan to the family....(wonder if the hill was significant there). I didn't forget the requested boxing moves and booty shakes for miles 9 through 13, although my booty can basically shake all on it's own these days. I was too chicken to bust out a kung-fu panda move, but I did consider it after a marine man was shouting "COME ON!" at everyone or himself...still not sure...but it worked since I pushed myself to finish strong. My 2 hour 17 minute finish time was a better time than the goal I set for myself...in fact it was exactly 13 minutes less! It was such a relief to find my family at the finish line among the thousands of people and to have them all support me in that moment. I haven't thought about what the next goal or challenge for running will be for me, but I'm thinking to keep it under 13 miles for a while. I still have all my toenails this time, and they sure need a break from kicking assphault!

I have four kids and it's funny how I tend to get more overwhelmed with issues with my 1st and 4th....my oldest and youngest. But I have 2 middle kids, Aydan age 7 and Lanie at age 10, that are just as amazing. Lanie makes me laugh every single day. I'm not very good at describing her humor, but she is absolutely hilarious. She could literally win an award for it I think. I had her washing the dinner dishes last night and she seemed to want to drain the whole salt river, so I took over while she dried. When she get's in her "coconine voice"....(it's a mix of what Mrs. Kowalski from Monster's Inc. sounds like....and for a lack of better description...a special needs kid). She likes to repeat things over and over and anything I tell her to do, she's like, "nope, sorry, Mom....uh-uh....no way...can't do it..."...it can just go on and on. She ended it last night by making herself laugh super hard by shouting...."I'm goin to a western town....hoooo-eeey!!" And it's not just her voice that's hilarious, it's her face. I need to get it on video soon. She's my best companion for a romantic comedy movie and loves to keep me thinking hard about how to answer questions like, "How do we know that God is really real?" She's so beautiful and I love how she can joke about her eye-brows....her doctor even told her they're "fancy"...I miss the days of braiding her hair in matching barrettes and bows, but I know she'll be giving me tips on how to style my own hair soon.

My second middle man, is my first-born boy Aydan who just turned 7 this week. He just started learning football with his buddies and since his team was "the Cardinal's", and because we've recently become a fan of the AZ Cardinal's out here, that was the theme of his party. (I love easy themes!) We rented a jumpy thing for his party, bought hot-dogs and 30 Cardinal's cupcakes from Sams, had a football pinata, blasted up the music, and that was enough to make a super fun party for 1st graders. I "forgot" to plan games and that was Aydan's only complaint, so I'll have to do better next time I guess...(hello! they wouldn't even listen to me to keep on the grass during the pinata smacking!!) They were also easily entertained by pounding on the teenagers hanging around too. He has some super sweet moments too: like the other night he wanted to watch The Biggest Loser with me and he got really upset for the Mom who fell on her nose during the challenge. He has such a sweet heart and I love when he hugs my legs when I'm doing the dishes, and looks up and says, "I just love you Mom." He would play Indiana Jones Legos Wii all day if I let him, but 1st grade demands a lot of reading practicing so we've gotten to spend a lot of one on one time doing that. He loves to joke, poke, and laugh and he loves to draw it out from me too. I'm challenged each day to try and be the best kind of Mommy I can be for each of them....and laughter is my favorite kind of reminder.

I like New Years. There's always the hope that there's somehow a way to be able to make the new one better than the last one. I've been stuck in some kind of funk for the past few months and though I'm almost getting my thoughts organized on it all, I can kind of feel like I'm coming out of it....I can't describe it any other way. We watched a lot of movies over Christmas break and I grabbed a little quote from one of them, (of course I cannot remember which one)...

"Focus on who you are being, not on who you want to be"...

I'm not going to sugar coat it: I've had a lot of meltdowns. The shut-myself-in-my closet kind of sobfests. Feelings of insignificance, loneliness, boredom, frustration, and fatigue seemed to have just bombarded me. I'm hoping it was just a bad case of the "winter-blues". When I didn't know now how to answer the question: "What do I like to do for fun?" I got a little freaked out. So I'm kind of just deciding that it doesn't really matter if I can answer that...I actually like to do a lot of different things.

I know I tend to overanalyze things, so it's probably been a good thing that I've kept busy "organizing" Christmas, New Years, 2 birthday's, presents, cakes, new toys, and decorations....because I really like celebrations and making things feel "festive".

I'm running a half marathon in 6 days....which has turned out to be a darn good thing because I've probably needed the extra dose of endorphins. I'm totally ready. Last year I might have felt I was "spread out too thin"....this year I hope to just be content no matter what the circumstances are.

I also hope that when I blog I don't have to hit the delete button every two seconds.

In an attempt to sum up 2009, I'm making it as a rhyme...
not sure if it's going to work, but I used to do it all the time.

In January we drove to Flagstaff to find snow and let the kids play,
shoveled up some snow and brought some back for Aydan's birthday.
Chemo turned 39 and shared a cake with Aydan turning 6,
a soccer tournament in Tucson, was good for a lot of "kicks".

February brought girlscout cookies, and going to more soccer games,
I made the kids pose for pictures, so I could update all my frames.

We took the kids to parks in March and watched movies once in a while,
Birthdays, Disneyland, and cousins moving nearby made us all smile.
Josie invited 26 people to her unicorn-guitar-hero-jump-jump-13th-bash,
Lanie's 10th was cupcake decorating, pinata-breaking, treasure-hunting dash.

....to be continued soon...