These Days...

Hey Humble Readers... (if there are still any of you out there who haven't given me up for dead)

I'm here.  I'm alive.  And I thought I'd give you a peek into where I'm at these days.

These days...

I'm in awe of a beautiful little girl who amazes me just by being.  Ginny is officially mobile, rolling and army-crawling everywhere and getting into everything.  Her growth seems to have slowed down (finally!) now that she's burning calories galore.  It's hard to believe it's been almost 7 months since I first saw those big blue eyes and tht mop of dark hair (which isn't so dark any more... somedays it's more red and blonde than brown). 

These days...

I'm reading a lot more than I have in the last few years.  It feels good to get lost in a book for a time.  And now that Ginny is napping during the day (thank you solid food!) I get a bit of time each day and my reading muscles are getting a work out.  Now I just need to work on not reading until the wee hours of the morning so that I'm not a slug during the day.

These days...

I'm watching less tv.  Many of you may recall that I am a tv junkie.  I have been since I was a kid.  Now, due to our welcome-to-parenthood financial wake up call, there is much less to watch as we have cut our cable back to the bare minimum.  We've also changed service providers, so I don't know what channels have what on any more.  Another reason to just turn the idiot box off. 

These days...

I'm spending an inordinate amount of time trying to reconstruct and reorganize my computer.  I was hit with a doozy of a virus last month that resulted in the hard drive of my trusty little netbook being entirely wiped.  Thankfully, all the pics from the last few years are still on the memory cards, cds, and flash drives, but it's taking some time just to get the most recent things reloaded and organized.  Once I have them all back, I'm going to transfer them to an online photo storage site so that I don't have to go through this again.  And I won't even mention trying to find all my bookmarked websites.  *sigh*

These days...

I spend a lot of time trying to figure out how to stretch a buck.  Diaper service is gone (*sob*), as is the cable, eating out, and just random trips to the store for whatever I feel like having for lunch.  Our cell phones are next on the chopping block, but we are stuck with them until our contracts expire.  Beloved will keep his in a very scaled back form... likely pay-as-you-go.  I'm trying to find good sources for Canadian coupons, and good cheap recipes.  I still have my mat leave benefits until October, but we are working on getting our budget in line with what Beloved makes now, and using my mat-money to try to lower our monthly debt payments.  It's no joke, it's going to be tight, but we will make it.  It's more of an mental/emotional adjustment than anything right now. 

These days...

I have stopped tracking my cycles, put my FF account on hold, and am trying hard not to think about the fact that we have had to put trying for Halfling 2.0 on the back burner.  Our condo is just too small to add another person, and given the upside-down nature of both our mortgage and our car loan, we don't have the option of selling and moving up.  This has been the hardest part of the last month, coming to terms with the notion that while our family isn't yet complete, and I feel my eggs expiring every day, we have to wait.  I know that a baby doesn't take up much space, but just thinking about a baby and a toddler in this small place is frightening.

These days....

I spend a fair bit (too much!) time navel gazing.  Pondering who I am now, and what I'm doing.  It's nothing new, but all my adult life I have defined myself largely by my work.  I know that working retail doesn't seem like a huge contribution to society, but I enjoyed my work (most of the time) and my customers.  I took pride in helping people find what they were looking for and discover something new.  I know that I have a new and better job now... but still...  Honestly, I think I just need to fill my time better, so I can't get so self-centered.

These days...

I'm searching for my mojo.  I lost it somewhere this past winter and I want it back.  My bloggity mojo, my confident mojo, my cooking mojo (I've ruined far too many dishes lately), and by gum, my sexual mojo.  (Sorry, TMI) 

That's life in the hobbit-hole. 

I'm not making any promises (because I would hate to let you all down AGAIN), but I'm hoping to be back here again soon... with pics, with recipes, and with ramblings.