Donuts

Donuts are my failing. 

It's Friday! I think we should have donuts to celebrate!... It's Monday! I should have a donut as a pick-me-up!.. It's the weekend: donuts! 

Also, donuts or doughnuts?  

They're good. And I love the picture of the one above- it's Dynamo Donuts {they DO have great ones, but this particular flavor wasn't my favorite- I've heard great things about their maple bacon}. 

If you're in SF, try Bob's Donuts on Polk. Doesn't look like much, but they cost $1 flat, they take Square (good for the unprepared who never keep cash on hand!), and I'm hoping they never renovate and become a welcoming, pretty place to visit with a fancy website, because they may double in price.  

I used to talk about donuts a lot on twitter, but then I started getting a bunch of spam weight-loss followers so I reigned it in. 

To be perfectly honest, I suggested I do a donut tasting around the city "for blog research" but Brian called my bluff. Maybe he didn't want to spend his Saturdays in the car driving me around the city with our children while we {I} went and ate 10x my weight in warm, glazed donut calories. I don't know why... ;)

I eat a ton of veggies {remember the leeks I was just referencing the other day? Who eats and LOVES leeks, really?}. They cancel each other out. I like vegetables, and I like being healthy, and I can't quite explain why I'm sitting here, confessing my love for donuts today...

...then again- hey- it's Friday!! So why not? ;)

Ps. Pinterest is totally with me on the donut thing:

So maybe we're all in this together.

{Image one // Image two}

Embrace Imperfection

When I think of childhood, I think of a clean home, a table set and dinner made every night at 5:30pm, a backyard that was incredible for playing for hours, homemade cookies in my lunch bag, and bedtime stories with my mom, who also managed to be beautiful every day. My image of my mom is as super-woman. 

When I say to my mom that she always had the house clean, she remembers differently. When I mention her I wish I could make every-night-healthy dinners like she did, she reminds me of the ones that were hardly healthy. When I tell her our home was the best, she recalls that our home was under construction for a number of years.  

We are too hard on ourselves. I think most mothers are. I have this saying for my husband that "it's either I look good or the house looks good," but I so desperately want to have both be true when he comes home from work... my own expectations, not his for me. 

As a stay-at-home mom, I feel the need to have my children fed, clean, educated at some point each day, getting outside, playing with me and independently, happy always, learning to be perfect little citizens of the world. I expect my closets to be clean and my home to be tidied. I expect to look nice and presentable at all hours of my days.

Expectations are just as high for those friends of mine who are working moms. They want to have their work shine in the workplace, and then get home and have home-cooked meals and clean homes, while managing to also get quality time with their babies. It's the same, though different.

I got sick this weekend. I couldn't fulfill any of the things I'm accustomed to accomplishing on a weekend. I couldn't catch up on my laundry, or cook, or get to the store for essentials, and I definitely couldn't manage to look anything but exhausted. I had felt like I was in a groove of capability through the week, and it came to a standstill. I was stuck in the bed, sleeping while my husband took care of everything. It felt awful and wonderful all at once. 

I read a book. I didn't "do" anything else. I thought a lot and rested a lot. I wanted to write about a million posts about who-knows-what while I was thinking, but I didn't write either. I just rested.  

Sometimes I think we are given seemingly imperfect circumstances- like sickness on a weekend- to let us recognize that we cannot do everything and we can be okay with that. Mothers work our hardest but we need to be okay with being still. With resting. With introspection and quiet prayer. It can be more important even than having perfect homes and perfect work and perfect children.

I'm starting this week far from perfect. Physically and at home. I actually start every week far from perfect, but it generally isn't quite so glaring. ;) Today I'm going to take it easy and read a lot of books to my children. My meals will not be fancy, my home is epic messy, and I'll probably take a nap. I will continue striving to do my best as a mother, and I will continue to be imperfect.

I'm okay with it. I welcome it.

xo,

Kate

Thinking about:

Last week I got totally emotional and had a crazy-mom moment... I'm talking tears folks. School is coming. 

Here's the most embarrassing thing to admit: I got teary thinking of Sophie going to school next fall. No, not this fall. Next. I never have thought myself to be a teary type, but hey, things change. Kids change things. Kids growing up too fast change things. Ahhh. 

I think the realization is just that once they go to school, they're literally gone five mornings a week. I won't be able to go in reverse and say "oh, let's do that time again!" Mornings are the best time for little dates at coffee shops, for walks and bus rides to parks and grocery stores, for staying in pj's until noon on Mondays... we're living the good life here.

I'm going to go ahead and appreciate the fact that getting into pre-school in San Francisco takes so much work and $$$ and about two years of advance application, so I didn't get my act together... and I'm going to soak in every moment of mornings together. 

All sentiment aside: I LOVE the back-to-school vibe... all the school supplies really are serious fun, and they've only gotten better since I was in kindergarten, obviously.  

Here's where you get the cute things above:

supply: notebook || colored pencils || desktop accessories

wear: sweater || oxfords || skirt

carry: backpack || water bottle || lunch box

Hello Reality!

Last night I went to bed at 12:30am. Really? Yes. I was strangely wide awake, and setting myself up for a solid, drowsy morning of entertaining children. I was so sleepy this morning that I left the house for a little trip to the library without drinking my coffee. Whaaat? It's okay. I treated myself to a cup because I made it through the first day back from vacation. Wait, so you mean I have to make breakfast, lunch, AND dinner?

The day after vacation is always SUCH a doozy. I mean, reality is great and all, but vacation-- ahhh vacation. The total dismissal of all things responsible is entirely too ideal... I shouldn't say all things responsible. Obviously I had to make sure my children didn't hurt themselves or get lost on our trip, but I had my partner in crime by my side to tag-team the whole thing.  

We went to Tahoe. Tahoe is insanely gorgeous and I tried so hard to get a picture of the vast, mountainous beauty as we drove down toward the water, but all I got were 15 blurred photos that needed to be deleted. There's no photo that will quite capture the blueness against the sharp green inclines with gorgeously textured grey rocks... you'll just have to go there yourself one of these summers. I did, however, manage to take 500 photos of other things in four days, and I'll go through and share like any good blogger should, but not today. Today I will ramble and then I will nap. Two of my favorite pastimes. ;)

I'm curious if it's a pretty normal thing for people to hear "wow, you have your hands full," and "are they your kids or are you the babysitter/nanny?" or if it's just me. I think almost every time I go out, I hear one or the other sentence. I never know if I should be flattered that the big world thinks I am a nanny with my hands full and think it means "wow, she's handling things well," or (more likely) if it simply means I am making the management & mothering of my two children look far more difficult than it should. If it's the latter, I'm going to go ahead and blame the bulky wagon we take everywhere, and its terrible turning radius. It's incredibly photogenic and totally essential, but those wheels and weight are not made for the hills of this city.  

Today when we went out, Sophie decided to touch a plant that made her hands sting and she walked all the way home with her hands clapped together, moaning that her hands were so pokey! Why would someone plant a crazy poison plant like that is beyond me, especially because it wasn't particularly pretty, but the guy who handed my coffee over was totally right with the whole "hands full" line he gave me. We got home and I sat in a chair on top of Maggie's toes, and then went to put a toy away and rammed my shoulder into a shelf, so we're quite the scene today.

I'm feeling all of this means that we have come home from vacation a week too early. Tahhooooeeee, we miss youuuu!

Where's the cookie butter when you really need it?  Therapy in a jar, that's what I call it. 

Goals, Approval, + Love

I haven't written a lot this week, but I've been thinking a lot. And sometimes that's a better place to be. 

I've been thinking about goals and motivation and what in us creates these expectations for ourselves.

There are so many goals I've developed through life. There are goals to get married, have babies, live in San Francisco- I've done these things earlier than expected. There are goals I had at 22 to visit all the states before 30, work as a creative in marketing or styling, learn to sail, learn Spanish, sing with a band.. the things that never came to be (for the better!). We create personal goals to eat healthier, work out more, and maybe they'll be met sometimes, sometimes not. Goals are good.

But goals can also be unhealthy.  

There's a verse that says "what good is it for someone to gain the whole world, but forfeit their soul?"  (mark 8:36)

Since I read this essay last week, I've been wondering the same thing. When is what I'm doing enough? And what is the motivation behind each goal of mine? What really matters? 

Here's my example: I'm working out these days. It's healthy at this point; I've gone to Pilates multiple times a week and on most off days, I take a three-mile run. When I run I think to myself about how I can just push a little harder, and get a liiittttle more fit. It's good and it's bad. I do want to be healthy, but what is my motivation? Just to be healthy? That's great if it is, but I know I want the acknowledgement that I'm in shape, and I want people to be proud of how I work. WHY does it matter? It doesn't. Really though, it doesn't. So I can reach a certain point where I'm an accomplished health and workout machine, and gain the "whole world," but to what end? My runs this week have been more healthy and more enjoyable, because I've been spending the time in thought and quiet prayer, rather than "ooh, it'll seem I never ate those bagels because I ran so far."

When I think of what I want my girls to see in me- do I want them to see a go-getter? A goal-oriented mother who can accomplish what she sets her mind to do? A healthy woman? Yes, I do. But is that the most important thing for them to know about life? No. 

The things I want my girls to know?

I want them to know first and foremost that they are loved by God who created them. I want them to know that they are loved by their mom and dad. That they are enough the way they are. That the expectations of people are unrealistic and that they don't have to be everything to everyone. People may or may not be impressed, no matter how hard we try. Working hard is important, but working hard to maintain relationships- to forgive, to laugh, to cry with others through good and bad times- is equally important. That people will let them down, that good health is not a given, no matter how nutritious we are, that circumstances will come that are not peaches and posies, but they will become stronger for them. I want them to love people and adore their Maker. I want them to be humble and confident. I want them to feel, I want them to experience. I want them to be gentle. 

I don't want them to spend their moments searching for approval from others... because it may never come. 

I want my children to spend their days thinking of how they can make OTHERS feel confident and beloved. Show others that they are valued and loved as well.

I know what I want for them... now I need to spend MY days showing them... and believing with all my heart that I am enough, not concerning myself with seeking approval from people, and loving others without restraint.

The trickiest part about teaching is learning it myself first. ;)

xoxo.  

Pilates HURTS.

If you're reading this in the morning, sipping a hot cup of coffee and catching up on a few posts from the weekend, I envy you.   

It's Sunday evening and I'm about to go to bed after a beautiful weekend. I'm going to sleep and then I'm going to wake at a ridiculous (for me) hour of 6am to go to torture myself in a Pilates class.  

Pilates is my new thing, maybe you've heard. If you're my friend in real life, there's practically no way you haven't heard. I'm that friend that decides to make (relatively) healthy choices for a full week, and I must tell the world. The "relatively" comes into play today when I was offered Swedish pancakes, Thai food and donuts and didn't refuse anything.  The healthy is based on otherwise quality food decisions the remaining days of last week, two Pilates classes, and a 3-mile run. 

Back to Pilates. I went for the first and second time ever last week. I go in there and the people are so friendly, that lighting so soft and music so beautiful. Even the hardwood floor is perfect. I sit on my mat and begin stretching... oh, you want my legs to be at "tabletop?" No big deal, I've got this. I chase an almost-two-year old, so this is no sweat. Arms over the head? No worries, I lift babies all the time...

..then suddenly it's "one leg tabletop, the other extended flex one, point the other, hips down- (or up?), back curved, elbows in, head straight all at once, now hold it, now pulse five... four... three..." what am I doing here again? It's 6:45 and I could be in warm, fluffy white blankets with that cup of coffee in my perfect orange mug, straight chillin' and I am WHERE? Moving my muscles to insane positions and thinking harder than anyone really should have to think at 6:45am... and I can't be the girl who collapses on my mat because then what will these people I will never see again in my life think of me? I must survive, I must get through this. 

So I do this now. I'm a Pilates girl. And at 11pm on Sunday night- eve of another class- I am thinking about WHY I signed myself to a month of this torture. And I think to myself that probably no one else in the class seems to be having trouble because they've never had children. Gone went that that theory when I realized the instructor with the perfect abs has a 1-year-old. Ahh, excuses be gone. 

Thus far, I've lived to tell about it. I mean, yes it's torture but it's such a tiny percentage of my week.  The instructor says "and you.are.done!" in her perfect, morning peaceful voice, and I say "I've made it. I've really made it" in my head.

THIS is what keeps me going back: I leave my Pilates class and walk into the quiet streets enveloped in peaceful San Francisco morning fog, feeling calmer. Feeling proud of my accomplishment, and excited to tell my husband the crazy moves they tried on us this time... walk home to the chaos... having twisted and stretched and strengthened every bit of my core in a safe setting, and it actually feels good. I feel ready for anything if I conquered that crazy mountain.  

I love how we get to start each week fresh. I love that this week I'm starting with a kind of torturous discipline. Sometimes I think that as a mom, what I need is that extra 30 or 45 minutes of sleep, even if it's followed by abrupt & charming & noisy chaos.

In reality, I am far more rested when I've begun my week with discipline... even if it's the kind that hurts (I mean that quite literally... I mean, I had no idea these muscles could even BE sore).