Thankfuls

The holiday craze is passed and the kids are back to school today, and I feel a bit dazed. Now to pack up the tree, take down the wreath and un-christmas the house. Whatever fun is in the decorating is reverse in the un decorating, although it does make the house feel less cluttered and decidedly cleaner when all of those holiday nick knacks dissapear and the house goes back to its regular self. But when is the best time to do it?
Usually I do it all myself and everyone gets home and then after a while someone will exclaim... " hey the Christmas tree is gone!".. or it will be little by little, dragging out an already slightly painful ritual. We love Christmas time around here so its a little sad when we have to say goodbye. But we can keep giving and singing throughout the year anyway!

We are super grateful to all the family who sent gifts and fattened the trimmings under the tree this year, it sure felt nice that Santa Clause was alive and well and sending gifts through the mail! I got slippers from Aunt Patty and a pedicure from Aunt Barbara so my feet will be pampered this winter! Aunties Rock!
Jon and I are so thankful to the support we have recieved from family members like Gina and Greg Wegis, Bernice and John Gonzales, Harold Appleton, Patricia Canfield, James Gonzales, Marcelina Gonzales and the whole Bakersfield Clan Gonzales, Behill, Ramos, etc. Kim Peterson, Chris Combs and Gloria Kitner and families, and to so many friends like Jennifer Weisbrich, Erica and Paul Solano, Megan Watt, Kimberly and Sebastian Stinson, Patricia Flora, Matt and Jennifer O'Donnell, Sue Davis and family, Michael Taylor, Michael Ratikan, friends from Elsie Allen, Ukestars, and so many more.
We are so blessed to have such a wonderful and diverse community here in Sebastopol and Sonoma County,( the allergies are the only thing I don't love). The ocean and hills and beautiful views are wonderful but it is the people who make this county a very nice place to live.  We are lucky to have been born here in North America, in Sonoma County and so forth, so we have a chance to show the world what happy cows can do (we are the cows).

Harmonious Moments??

I sit here, at the computer, the baby is finally asleep. She has not been sleeping well lately and it's meant less and less getting done around here because she is a full time job on her own!
SO now I should be warping into superspeed and cleaning the house from top to bottom without making a sound that may wake up said sleeping baby. But I am paralyzed instead and I look from heaping pile of dishes to heaping pile of garbage and recycling to heaping pile of dirty laundry to heaping pile of clean laundry to heaping pile of kids books and papers to be sorted to heaping pile of bills to be paid to heaping pile of dirty diapers to dispose of and I just can't help but cry and wish that I had a magic wand that would make it all just go away!
Ok so now that I've got that out of my system... I do know that we all have these things to do and times to be places and reasons why we must nag our kids to do their homework and clean their rooms and stop fighting and turn off the t.v. and eat their vegetables and go play outside... and it all begins to sound very cliche' when I see it written down. Nevertheless, (love that random word :) it is so true in my house and I think many others, but not all the time. There are these times when I look around and I go, "wow!" I am the luckiest person in the world! I am so blessed with this amazing family!!"

What is the trick to having a happy harmonious home? Is there one, or many? I can't obviously be the one to answer this question because I am the one posing it, but I am happy to ask my friends and family and see what they come up with, as well as observing the times that are going well for me and my family and what events transpired to lead up to the hypothetical "harmonious moment."
I need to do something with this mind that I spent so many years using, and now I am getting brain-numb because I haven't been putting my brain to enough good use. I love being a mommy but I have sadly gotten a case of mommy insanity and I can't remember how to act like a normal person. Am I alone in this, or is the whole world just disposed to being zombies once they become daddies and mommies?
I will get going on the research, the questions being posed are...

"What factors are essential to the harmonious moments in your family?" 

"Will you share some memories of harmonious moments in your family"

"Do you know where to find a magic wand?... seriously."

That is all for now! This is going to be fun, and rewarding because we are looking for the good stuff!
Until next time!