nannies.

we threw a couples baby shower this weekend for our good friends erin and derek who have a little one coming in october.  i was stressed leading up to it, mainly because it was at our house (reminder that we moved in a month ago and we are not as fast at getting situated as other folks, i think...), and i was one of two hosts and the other girl is 36 weeks pregnant.  so, i just wanted everything to go smoothly and be fun for them.  and of course it was...i stress out so needlessly most of the time. 

anyway, leading up to the shower, i kept saying things like "if i can just execute this shower, everything will be perfect and wonderful and life will suddenly be completely without stress".  ha. 

to back up for a minute...we decided a few weeks ago to put emme in a montessori school when she turns a year old.  we had heard from several people that this school was awesome, and it is 1.2 miles away from our new house - amazing!  it is the only full-day, year-round montessori program in austin, so that was additionally appealing since we didn't want ek to be with different providers over the course of the day (i.e. school and after school care or whatever).  we also felt strongly that she needs to be in an environment with some structure and opportunities to learn, because she is SO busy and it's obvious that she wants more than what she's been getting at home.  so, we toured the school and met the director and watched the kids playing and engaging and we loved it. 

on the day of the tour, i had gone in to work and jb stayed home until i came to pick him up for the tour.  the nanny was there with the kids, as usual, and she asked justin what we were doing that day.  of course, he and i are both TERRIBLE liars and we didn't really have a plan of what/when to tell her, so he just said, oh, we're going to tour a day care this morning.  when i got back that afternoon, she asked me when we were planning to put emme in a daycare, and again with me and the inability to lie, i said probably around 1 year. 

this was a problem for a few reasons.  1. the school doesn't have an opening until nov. 1, so we really needed to keep the nanny until then; 2. we hadn't had a chance to discuss with vincent's family and figure out a plan; and 3. once you know your employment is on its way out, where is your incentive to work super hard?  and when it comes to your child, how do you enforce quality care in this scenario? 

so, we were stuck.  the day after we had the joint-family conversation with the nanny about moving on to a new arrangement in november, she asked if she could leave early the following day for some citizenship stuff.  we were skeptical, to say the least, but we accommodated her.  on that day, she put the babies down for naps almost 2 hours before when they should have gone down and just let them cry it out until they fell asleep.  she also spent that time primping for her interview and left the house in a mess.  needless to say, this was not a great start.  vincent's mom and i both had talks with the nanny the following day telling her we weren't ok with the super short notice, even though we knew we would have to be somewhat flexible as she looked for other jobs, and we most definitely were NOT ok with her trying to force the babies to align to her primping schedule. 

anyway...on friday of last week (the day after the conversations), when jb and i got home, we noticed that a chunk had been bitten out of our coffee table - literally, the wood is splintered.  it is obvious that it was emme that did it because of the shape of the bite and the fact that she's a wildebeest and tries to chew on the table all the time.  the level of chew indicates that she had to have been working on it for at least 10 minutes.  that means the nanny either watched her do that and didn't care (scary) or left emme alone in the living room on tile floor, unsupervised, for that long (scarier).  i also checked her browser history on our computer (which is in a room that the babies should never be in) and she had hit 386 web pages.  yowza.  we were obviously frustrated, but hoping to just make it through the next two months and then move on.  i was also hoping to preserve the relationship, as it would have been nice to have her babysit occasionally (if she ever got a car and didn't have to take the bus over 2 hours to be at our house). 

but, that wasn't to be.  on sunday morning, she texted us asking if she could have 9-1 off on monday, clearly ignoring the request for more advance notice.  vincent's family decided they were just done, and, after discussing it, jb and i decided we were over it as well.  beyond the recent frustrations, the logistical issues were becoming too much, so we just had to call and let her go. 

i have mixed feelings about the whole thing.  on the one hand, i do think that she loved emme (although, as her mother, i can say that i don't think it's hard to love my baby - ha).  she is enamored by babies in general, and i think she enjoyed her time with them and thought we were nice enough as well.  on the other hand, though, she definitely pulled a few stunts that i didn't like, and she was generally rather lazy.  there was no "light housekeeping" done - really, we had to ask her/remind her to pick up after herself and the kids.  she had the tv on most days, despite us making it clear that we weren't crazy about that.  lots of little things adding up to make me feel just sort of....meh about her.  i think she was a bit manipulative and took advantage (maybe not consciously, but advantage nonetheless) of it being our first time hiring someone in this capacity, and of the fact that we are relatively laid back etc etc. 

anyway.  the bottom line is that she is done, which is good and bad.  good because i think she had begun to detach from us and the kids in a major way, and i know how quickly emme can get hurt, so it makes me feel safer this way...but bad because we're without a nanny and both in new jobs.  i worked from home yesterday and our friend alison is watching emme with her daughter cameron at our house today.  tomorrow is emergency care through dell, and then thursday we're trialing a girl i found through a neighborhood group. 

we shall see.  but this situation is not the first time i've thought about the particular trials of working moms.  how do you just blindly allow a stranger to care for your most precious person?  ugh.

here is a pic of ek helping me "work" yesterday...

a eulogy for chickens.

as i mentioned in a previous post, our sweet chickens passed away a couple of weeks ago.  this is a brief synopsis of our chicken history. 

about 4 years ago, justin and i were walking the pups in the field by our (old) house.  we ran into a guy with two border collies and got to talking.  he mentioned he and his wife keep 6 chickens in their backyard and described a little bit about how/why they did so.  we were intrigued.  on the walk back, i told justin "we should totally get chickens!".  and so it began. 

justin and our friend chip constructed our first coop and after loads of research and some lolly-gagging, we headed to callahan's general store and procured two fine hens: bixby and octavia.  they were rock island reds and they were hilarious and not very smart (lack of intelligence is a trait in chickens).  our plan was to have them in their coop and in a chicken run justin had built, but that plan soon deteriorated and they mostly just hung out in the yard and went into their coop at night.  bixby laid an egg the first day we got her and then again the day after that.  then neither chicken laid again for almost six weeks, which had me questioning why the heck we thought chickens were such a great idea in the first place.  if they aren't laying, essentially you have pets that don't really love you, aren't trainable, and that poop ALL THE TIME.  but really, they were adorable despite all of that and got increasingly so once we started getting a regular supply of delicious eggs. 

fast forward several months and jb and i went on a weekend trip with my parents.  the chicks had stayed by themselves for much longer periods of time, so we weren't really worried.  well, when we got back, octavia had died.  i was particularly sad, as i thought of octavia as "my" chicken.  and she did the chicken dance when you walked up to her and had a generally sweet disposition.  my reaction to her death should have been a warning that maybe i am not, in fact, cut out to be a farmer...but we decided we should press on.  back to callahan's we went, and we returned with bernadette and bettyrene.  they were regular brown hens and the pecking order in our coop took a little while to establish, but ultimately, the ladies all decided to get along. 

fast forward another year and you'll remember the st. thomas trip during my early second trimester.  we lost bettyrene to our neighbor/housesitter's dog, max.  that was another rough one.  bettyrene channeled octavia's sweet personality and she was justin's little pet. 

and then there were two.  bixby and bernadette were sweet and tough ladies.  they survived a few possum attacks, held their own against ollie and etta when the dogs wanted to play a little too hard, and helped control the pest population in our yard.  when justin would walk outside to feed them, he'd do his little chicken call and you'd see them run from wherever they were.  when they ran, they looked like little old ladies wearing bloomers.  it was my favorite thing to watch.  they would destroy a potted plant faster than you could get it watered.  they loved to roll in dirt and sneak under the fence.  they each took to laying their eggs in the dog house at random points over the year.  they were inquisitive and dumb and reminded me endlessly of weird little dinosaurs.  justin likes to tell the story about how one day he saw bixby standing on one leg and he got all freaked out, thinking she'd been hurt and wondering if there were other injuries and what we might do with a one-legged chicken.  turns out she was just standing on one leg like a weirdo.  we really loved those chickens. 

when we decided to move, we weren't sure what to do with the hens.  we loved them, but a small-ish yard predominated by a pool is not the best environment for destructive chickens that like to free range.  we waffled far too long on the decision and it was time for our tenants to move in, so justin set them up in temporary housing in a shady part of our backyard.  they were in our dog crate with food and water, but we thought the shade from the trees would be enough.  as it turns out, this was a fatal assumption.  it got up to 106 that day, and we think it was just too much for them.  when we went outside around 830 to swim, they had knocked over their water bowl and neither of them were moving. 

we were both rather hysterical in the immediate aftermath, but i have thought of a few things i am grateful for.  i am glad they died together.  i think it would have been really sad to lose one and have the other be lonely for the rest of her days.  i am also glad they lived the life they did.  there aren't a lot of chickens in this world that get to play in open spaces all day with food and water readily provided to them.  i hope that it was easy on them - that they just went peacefully to sleep, dreaming their little chicken dreams. 

9 months.

well, as might be expected based on all the aforementioned mayhem, i am almost two and a half weeks late on posting this.  to compensate, i will post a zillion pics of this little monkey from her 9-month birthday on.  unfortunately, the bunny was sick on the actual day of her 9 month, but we did manage to snap a couple of (kind of pitiful) pics anyway.  

so what can i say about you at 9 months, ek?  this is, as ever, the most fun age yet.  i have never seen a busier little bee – i feel like you are soaking up information and experience faster than a sponge.  you are happy the vast majority of the time and you are a pure delight to hang out with.  you are much more apt to giggle than you used to be and will laugh when someone makes a funny face or tries to munch on your hands or feet.  you also love to be tickled and will usually squeal when someone gets your belly.  you’re jabbering up a storm and have a lot to say about the world.  you say mama, dada, and dog (dah) pretty regularly, and kk also got you to say etta a few times (only in a whisper) while she was taking care of you last week.  you are obsessed with ceiling fans and lights and will not fail to point them out on any and every occasion.  i had you at the grocery store the other day and you would point directly at anyone who looked at you and give a big grin.  you have your four front teeth (the top two were not much fun coming in, but are now helping you bite puffs in half which you love to do).  you crawl everywhere and are really fast.  i like to get on the floor and crawl around with you – that usually results in you crawling towards me at high speeds laughing and doing this excited squeaky inhale thing that is awesome.  you love music and play on your dad’s bongos and get super happy whenever he pulls out his ukele to play for you.  you also dance now.  it involves you pushing a button on something that plays music and then bouncing and looking at us expectantly (who likes to dance alone, right?).  you get really into it, especially when we flap around like the silly parents we are.  probably my favorite thing you’re doing these days is turning the pages of your books.  you grunt and point excitedly at your bookshelf any time we’re near your room, and you can spot one of your books in any room and make your way over to it.  you’ll usually pick it up and look at me expectantly, and occasionally you’ll even carry it over to me as if to say “read this to me now, please”.  when i read to you, you turn each page and it is just too cute.  sometimes you get a little over-zealous with the turning, but most of the time you will wait until i’m done reading each page.  you’re also so much more aware of what’s being read to you; for example, every time we read the very hungry caterpillar, when he turns into a beautiful butterfly on the last page, you make this coo/squeak/sigh sound that expresses your amazement at his transformation (or at the very least it expresses your pleasure at the pretty colors on the page). 

what else?  you recognize people – you crawl towards a picture of me on a low shelf and point at it and say mama, and you point at jb when i ask you where daddy is.  you love your pets even more every day and have gotten much more gentle with petting them.  you’re obsessed with pippa and like to talk to her a LOT, especially while eating breakfast and dinner (although pippa is not yet super keen on you).  you recognize kk’s voice on speaker phone and know who both kk and jj are when we skype.  you are impossible to change and it’s endlessly amusing.  sometimes the boudreaux’s butt paste or sunscreen will occupy you long enough to get a diaper strapped on, but mostly you just grab it and flip over anyway.  you are more entertained by a whisk or a clothespin than by most of your toys.  you love being in the pool and splashing your own face and kicking your legs.  you give hugs and kisses now and are extremely affectionate.  i can’t get enough of that, let me tell you.  you are, mostly, a good napper and a great sleeper (with notable exceptions while you were sick, etc), and for that i thank you in my heart every day.  you’re still an awesome eater and have recently started loving sautéed spinach, greek yogurt, black olives, and watermelon.  everyone that sees you eat is astounded by the amount you can consume. 

your 9 month stats:

weight: 18lbs 4oz (50%)

height: 27inches (25%)

head: 75%

i can honestly say that i was unprepared for how awesome being a parent would be.  you remind me to take a little step back every day and just slow down to enjoy the zeal with which you experience everything.  i love you little pooter. 

the staples and the sickness.

so i definitely owe an emme kay 9 months old post, but the tale of the injury will take precedence.  my original goal was to do everything in chronological order, but that's just not going to happen.  also, i should say that it's likely this post will be quite long, so feel free to skip it or skim it - i just want full documentation for us.  let me begin. 

our nanny had last week and this week off because her family was in town visiting from latvia and she hadn't seen them in two years.  back when she asked to take the time off, i didn't know i'd be changing jobs, so i figured i could take a vacation week and my mom SO graciously offered to take vacation/sick time to care for ek the following week (this one).  i also didn't know we'd be closing on a house at the end of july and everything would be in a shambles, but i digress.  when i got hired at the new company, i asked if i could please start the week of the 15th.  that would give me 2 weeks off to get a grip on my life and cover the week i needed for liga's time off.  well, the company said no they needed me to start the first.  so, i agreed but said the week of the 8th was non-negotiable but i would try to work from home during nap time, etc.

in my magical thinking, i figured the week "off" would be amazing - i would get to spend quality time with ek, lots of swimming and books and walks; i would get stuff done around the house; i would get some work done here and there; and all in all it would be relaxing and fun.  i was also planning to head to louisiana to pick mom up for her stay here on thursday so i could have some extra days there to see friends and family.

so.  i get off my first week of the new job, all fired up about this relaxing and super-fun week emme and i were about to have.  we went for a little swim.

when we got out of the pool, i noticed that she felt warm and she was a little cranky.  i chalked it up to being outside (it is a million degrees here, after all) and being ready for bed.  so i got her inside, fed her dinner, and then put her in the tub.  it was about halfway through the bath when i noticed that her skin was splotchy (from the cold) and she was shivering.  the bath water and temp in the room were not that cold at all, so i got her right out of the tub, wrapped her in a big towel, and brought her to her room.  she nursed voraciously, but i think it was mostly a comfort thing as she just didn't know what was going on.  i took her temp and it was over 102.  awesome news.

this was an unknown quantity for us as emme had never even had a sniffle up to this point.  i will never again take my child's good health for granted.  i talked to mom about it and justin and i discussed, and we opted to just put her to bed and see what happened.  i had made an appointment for saturday morning at the pediatrician, so we were hopeful she would be feeling better by then.  she was very sleepy and went right down.  the laings came over for a little while, but of course i was totally distracted and in there checking on her every 5 minutes.  i also had to call and cancel our swim date with the pyles, which was a huge bummer.  anyway...at around 10 or 1030, emme woke up super sad and sounded like she was in pain.  her fever was up near 103, so i called the triage desk at the hospital (this is all through the pediatrician since i obviously have no idea what to do in situations like this).  they told me to give her acetaminophen and keep her comfortable - cool towels, tepid bath, etc.  so no one got a lot of sleep that night, let me just say.  e would wake up every couple of hours with the most pitiful cry of all time ever.  i had her between us in the bed so i could comfort her immediately.  she mostly wanted to sleep on my body, which was insanely hot and not particularly comfortable, but of course i was worried about her so i didn't mind.

anyway...we make it through the night and get to the doctors office.  her doc wasn't doing saturday hours that day, so we had a male doctor who was nice but whose bedside manner wasn't as great as our doctor.  he looked her over and proclaimed that there wasn't anything wrong with her, but said we needed to rule out a UTI.  so, the catheter was beckoned.  let me just advise you, if you have a baby, a catheter is a device you want to avoid.  emme had just peed (i had the wet diaper to prove it), but they said they may be able to get some out, so they were going to try to cath her anyway.  awesome news.  justin and i had to hold her down (have i mentioned that this child does NOT like to be still?) while the nurse inserted the catheter, only to get not a single drop.  shocking, i know.  after that, they let me nurse her with a bag on her so she could maybe pee and they could get it that way.  45 minutes and no pee in a bag later, they decide it's a great idea to cath her AGAIN.  obviously, this was not more fun the second go-round.  but, at least there was pee this time.  they took her sample, gave us ibuprofen and sent us on our way.

ek's fever peaked at 105 on saturday night and was above 101 until tuesday when it was basically gone.  she refused to be more than inches away from me and basically turned into a goblin for the duration of her illness.  it was rough.  not only did i have to watch my baby be sick and know there was nothing i could do about it, but i couldn't get a single thing done, really, and working was pretty much out of the question.  also, my sweet, loving child was a goblin.  i wondered if she would ever go back to her normal self, seriously.  oh, she also wasn't sleeping more than 2 or 3 hours in a row, so the whole family was feeling pretty energized...ha.

on wednesday, she got a little rash on her belly/chest, so i knew it was roseola (for the record, that's what i thought it was based on my awesome internet and baby 411 research, but i was still worried, of course).  she was also getting back to normal, at least personality-wise.  awesome.

thursday morning, we had her 9 month doctors appt.  i'll write more about that later, but everything checked out and she only had to get one shot, so that was good.  we hopped in the car and headed to lafayette right after.

friday morning, we had plans to go to the drugstore with my grandma, and then meet my mom and some of her friends over their lunch break.  ek took a nap and then was ready to start playing.  she was much more like my baby, even though she didn't sleep a whole lot on thursday night (being in the pack-n- play, she could see me and decided she wanted to mess with my face for several hours between 12:30 and 5.  ruff.).  so, she woke up from her nap and i was sitting in the bed nursing her.  she's a wildebeest, so she was kicking her legs all over while nursing, as usual.  she somehow managed to kick my water glass off the nightstand and it rolled on to a pillow, then on to carpet, then somehow dinged a corner of the bed frame ever so lightly and managed to shatter.  awesome. 

i decided to leave emme on the bed, since broken glass was everywhere and she would have been all up in my business if i'd brought her onto the floor with me.  i've got glass in both hands and i see her making her way to the edge of the bed to come investigate what i'm doing, so i put my left arm up to sort of block her onto the bed while i figure out what to do with the glass in my hands.  well, that just did not stop her because she dove over my arm onto the pile of broken glass on the floor.  immediately, she starts screaming and i focus on not hyperventilating while assessing the damage.  there is blood EVERYWHERE.  i can't tell where/how much she is cut, just that she is.  i pull what seems to be the biggest shard of glass out of her head (this is not a feeling i recommend anyone trying), meanwhile trying to figure out the best course of action.  since i obviously cannot recall phone numbers at this time, i grab my cell phone and call my mom.  she told me later the words i said were "please come home now, i've hurt her".  definitely not the most calm and functional way to handle the situation, but i digress.  i then immediately called 911.  i give them the relevant information but i can barely hear them over emme crying.  i'm holding a cloth over her head and it seems to be helping a lot, but i decide the appropriate action is hanging up on 911 because i can't hear what they're telling me and i want both hands free to handle the baby.  they call back immediately and chastise me for hanging up on them before the ambulance got there, and they also tell me i need to be applying pressure to the wound with a dry cloth instead of a wet one.  so i'm doing that and moments later the ambulance is in the driveway.

i should say that even though it felt like everything was going in slow motion, the time from emme's crash to the ambulance's arrival could not have been more than 5 minutes.  by the time they drove up, she had mostly stopped crying and was smiling and excited to see the big yellow vehicle with all the flashing lights.  that sweet bunny.  we walked outside to meet the paramedics and i was beginning to realize that everything would probably be ok - i was starting to feel the intense relief of how many close calls we'd just had.  anyway, mom pulled up right then and i was able to tell her everything was ok.  we went inside with one of the paramedics, because apparently they have to investigate all accidents in case of child abuse.  the thought of someone hurting their child intentionally appalls me even more after this experience.  as we were coming back up to the front of the house, i see my grandmother in the driveway, sobbing while talking to the other paramedics.  timing is of the essence, y'all.  we got her calmed down, and emme into her carseat and she and i rode in the ambulance to the nearest hospital (though we probably could have driven ourselves, there was no way to know that).  we got checked in and dr. hamilton came to inspect ek's head.  it was only one big cut, about 2 or 2.5 inches, in her hair, about 4 inches above her right eyebrow.  he said he needed x-rays to make sure no shards of glass were in her skull/brain, so i tried to convince myself not to hyperventilate once again.  the x-rays weren't bad except for the not-to-be-understated fact that emme hates being still.  after a few minutes of intense worst-case scenarios playing out in my head, the doctor confirmed that her skull and brain were just fine.  this again brought in to sharp focus how amazingly fortunate we had been in this whole fiasco.

dr. hamilton decided to put staples in emme's head for a few reasons.  first, the staples are less likely to scar than stitches.  second, he wouldn't have to shave any of her hair.  third, they are super quick which is ideal when doing stuff like this to babies.  they put some goo on her head and we had to wait for 45 minutes for it to numb everything up.  during that time she got to walk around the hospital talking to people and pointing at everything and also watch some cartoons (which i never let her do).  the time passed, the doctor came over, strapped her down, cleaned her wound up super quick and bang bang, two staples and we were outta there.  the strapping down was the worst part.

so that's the story.  we go to the doctor this saturday to have staples removed.  emme is healing SO fast and SO well i am amazed.  she shouldn't have a scar, even though the doc said the injury may be a little tender for up to 6 months or so, crazy.  this is the only pic i have of the wound, so you can kind of see it's not the worst thing that could have happened.  i am so happy and grateful that she didn't land on her face or her eye or her sweet little neck and that the glass didn't penetrate her head.  i feel like this was such a close call and we were really fortunate that it went down the way it did. 

dear internet.

hi there.  it has been a while.  if you're friends with me in real life, you may have noticed that i haven't talked to you/returned your calls/remembered your birthday/etc.  i'm sorry.  i owe about 47 posts (or maybe just like 6 but still).  for now, though, i'm just going to blog a quick post about the recent trauma and subsequent sigh of relief that everything is really ok.  someday, when i have 2 minutes in succession to do anything other than collapse, i will post pictures and talk about all of this in greater detail, but for now, here is a list of what's gone on the past few weeks. 

• closed on a house the same day friends got in from out of town for 4 days
• quit job/started new job
• moved items to new house
• cleaned and prepped old house for renters
• hosted family and friends for help moving and unpacking
• turned 30
• emme turned 9 months old
• emme got roseola and had fever of nearly 105 - she was sick for 4 or 5 days and would not be more than 2 inches away from me
• both chickens died in a freak situation
• drove to louisiana with just me and emme to pick up my mom
• first 911 call for me
• emme's first stitches (staples) in her head
• dinner and hanging out with amy, patrick and amelia (awesome) in houston

i'm sure i'm leaving something out.  everything is fine, everything is nuts.  hopefully we're on the downhill slope, but i am not getting too optimistic...at the very least, i hope to be a more responsive and functional friend, even if the frenetic pace keeps up.  wheeee. 

dirty thirty.

well, i am here.  in my 30s.  a new decade bringing with it all sorts of hopes and probably (as you might expect) too many expectations.  i like birthdays, particularly major ones, because they feel like a big, special new years eve all for you.  it's like another opportunity to make resolutions and start afresh. 

as i mentioned, the hesterly brigade was in town last weekend, pre-tuesday-birthday, to help with the unpacking.  they were amazing, as expected.  they showed up on friday around 7:30pm and by 10 we had almost a whole room functional (and lemme tell you, that room was in NO WAY functional before that).  we managed to have a good time as well - swimming and grilling on saturday afternoon and evening.  saturday night there was a little fiesta to celebrate my birthday, complete with presents and cake and singing that i tolerated because we were in our own home.  on the day of my birthday, justin made coffee and breakfast and then i scurried off to my new job where no one really knows me so no one cared that it was my birthday, which was ok.  i had about 700 meetings, then scurried to get ek.  i don't think she knew it was my birthday, but she makes every day so fantastic, it felt like she might.  justin had arranged for mike and kim to babysit for us, so after getting the wee one down, we dressed in adult clothes and headed downtown.  we ended up at flemings, a steakhouse, and it was really delicious.  i have been so overwhelmed with everything that's been going on, it took me a little while to decompress, but it was profoundly lovely to sit at a table with just justin, eating and talking and not thinking (too much) about my to do list. 

which i guess brings me to my to do list.  ha.  i have been thinking a lot about this, and i'm fairly sure this list is not comprehensive or even very detailed, but i wanted to write down some goals for this year and for my 30s in general.  so here we go....

• look like an adult (meaning, flip flops with no make up is acceptable, but not for every day, and certainly not for work).
• take better care of myself - floss, exercise, try not to stress out, use sunscreen and moisturizer.  
• slow down.  
• invest time and energy into quality interactions - this could be phrased as do less, but do it with intention.  
• cook new things.  
• travel to new places.  
• write more letters.  
• give thoughtful gifts.  
• write more, period.  
• complete craft and DIY projects instead of just thinking about them.  
• forgive myself and others more easily.  
• take classes (french, maybe?)

i'll keep working on this....