Limbo

I wrote this a week ago (Jan. 20th or so):
So here I sit in limbo. We are living in the little house by the river but we don't own it yet. We are waiting for final approval on our loan and then we'll get a phone call to set up a time to go in and sign the papers. I'm nervous, a little, just because almost everything I see around me makes me so excited but I keep trying to hold myself back because it's not official yet. The river, the eagles, the snow, the land...even the house. My mind keeps running off and making plans and dreaming about the things we can do here.

I've also been having a interesting time balancing my daily life. I'm reading a book that is proving to be very useful to me. It is called Happier at Home by Gretchen Rubin. It is helping me learn how my brain works and how to get what I want from myself. I have realized that if I tell myself that each day is full of busyness and projects and today is really no special than any other day and each day will have it's own busyness and work it helps me do the normal stuff. It helps me get out of panic mode and pay attention to the people around me (and myself).

Most things I panic about are not real panic-worthy things. I set too much importance on getting the dirty floor cleaned or finishing whatever it is I am working on. Especially when there are any slightly bigger things going on like moving, home renos, etc. I still need to pay attention to my kids and it's ok to take a break and walk down to the river and take some photos. It's also better to keep a regular schedule like making dinner and stopping to relax in the evening.

We recently made a family decision along these lines of reasoning. My family reserved a cabin in Cranbrook, BC to spend the Christmas holidays at and we had been invited but hadn't committed. We decided to go instead of spending the four days cleaning this gross house.  Honestly, yes, this house could really have used four days of cleaning but in the end we decided that there was so much work out here that four days really wouldn't make that big of a dent anyway. The entire house is coated with nicotine and grease and the floors are layered with grime and there's a lot of cat urine.  However, the dirt would wait but if we missed out on the time with my family we'd really regret it.
We are so glad we went!

Daniel and I were arguing the other day about whether he should install the dishwasher (his idea) or organize the garage or house (my idea). He phrased something in a way that really helped me to stop and think. He said, "I don't think you are really hearing me right now. By the way you are talking, it makes me wonder if you would like to talk about this later?" I apologized and said no, I would like to talk now. I did keep pressing my point, however and then he was quiet and then left. A little later I went and found him and told him I decided that what I wanted really wasn't that important to me. I had been arguing that the organizing was more important to me than the dishwasher but I wanted to let him know I had realized that it really wasn't. I was just arguing for the sake of trying to prove my case.  If he felt the motivation to do something different then he should do what he was motivated to do. Those are the methods I use on myself to get things done and I should leave him be. There is a lot of shit to do around here and I just wanted to relax a little and go with the flow.

So, I just finished preparing our taxes and now I'm going to go outside and check on my chickens. I also want to see if I can spy on a little bird I saw yesterday diving and fishing in the ice-choked river. I would like to know what it is.