It's a New Day

I was just reading Ali Edwards' blog {she's my favorite scrapbooker} and this week she is leading a project on documenting your everyday life called A Week in the Life. I did this last year and now it's one of my favorite albums to look back on. I journaled every day about just the ordinary details of life: chores around the house, my routine with Maddie, places we went, people we saw, funny things she said, crafty projects I was working on, etc. There were lots of pictures to document everything: from a special date with Nana to October decorations on our doorstep to a pile of dirty dishes in the sink. {Hey, it's reality!} Back then I thought, "Oh, we do the same things every day. How ordinary." But you know what...big changes can happen in a year! Now we have James and our daily life has a much different flow! I really want to do this project again and capture this time in our lives because hopefully by next year James' medical needs will have greatly diminished and what now seems so ordinary and routine will someday seem extra-ordinary! But this is not the week for this project...Keith is having a much deserved Guy's Weekend here at the house. Three of his college buddies are flying in today from Ohio and Alabama for a little vacation, so the kids and I are shipping out to my parents' house {um, good thing we have a new car with a BIG trunk...we're gonna need it for the billion things I need to take with me!} I'm so excited for Keith, though--he definitely needs a break and time to just relax and laugh and have fun!

Hopefully the guys will take some photos to document their time together, but I'm guessing it will be somewhat like this: fire up the brand-new BBQ grill he bought last night {yay! Can't wait for this!! We've been without one for a year or two}, eat {our kitchen is now stocked with just the essentials: Oregon beer, Diet Coke, kettle chips, steaks & brauts}, perhaps go on some kind of outing, come home, play cards/board games, drink, watch movies {we literally have about 1000 movies on our XBox Media Center system now}. Repeat. {Sounds good to me!} :-)

And now I leave you with my new favorite quote, which applies to everyone, but especially anyone in the trenches of parenthood:

Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities no doubt crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day; begin it well and serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense.
--Emerson