How do you afford your rock and roll lifestyle?

The answer of course is by working. Working enough to make enough to afford all the things you need. 

But working takes time, and time has become a very precious commodity. Especially now, I feel like I just don't have enough time. Ever. It's always a game of "What do I have time for" vs. "What can I put off a bit longer?"

Recently I decided that getting back into shape needed a priority spot. So I'm running every day when I get home from work. This is a good thing, right? I'm doing something for myself, something healthy!

So why do I feel so stressed? 

Baby Girl had been going through a rough patch with the sleeping lately. This means no ones getting much sleep around out house. Even going to bed early (between 10 and 11) and me giving in and taking a nap on Sunday, both me and WorkingMan are exhausted. Which makes for a lot of snippy-ness and general unhappiness.

It's kind of freezing out right now, in the low teens, so the poor dog isn't getting walked, which makes him hyper. With us being as tired as we are, the last thing we need is a hyper 80 lb. dog. There's also something up with the cat's eye, and I need to remember to make a vet appointment for him. That keeps falling off my list. 

A visual representation of my inability to maintain the balance in my life is the general state of our house. There is a giant pile of laundry at the foot of our bed. It is clean laundry. It never gets put away. We basically just live out of two piles, clean laundry at the foot of the bed, dirty laundry on the side of the bed. Baby Girls room is similarly styled. Giant pile of clean baby clothes next to the rocker. Toys perched precariously on top of the bookcase, however i can get them to stay there. Everywhere in our house there are piles, toys, papers that need going through, christmas gifts we still haven't gotten around to putting away...

Dishes in the sink, dishes on the counter top.  The floors need to be moped and vacuumed. The bathroom needs to be cleaned. There are still boxes and boxes of things in the back room that we haven't  unpacked since we moved in, in August.

I've been working on a baby blanket for my Sister in law since I found out she was pregnant. She had the baby almost a month ago. The blanket still isn't done. Every now and then I find the time to sit still and knit a row, but not often. Usually if I'm sitting still it's because either I'm holding baby girl, or I'm asleep.

Both of us are working full time, both of us pitch in around the house. WorkingMan actually does a lot of the house hold stuff, he cooks more than half the nights, cleans like a person possessed and is the only one that can load the dishwasher in a way that gets almost all of the dishes in at one time. 

And yet, the house is still a mess. We are still living at the edge of our budget. We are both tired, stressed and unable to fully enjoy this amazing time in Baby Girls life. 

Maybe its the dark, maybe its the cold. Maybe my attitude and outlook will be better next month. But honestly, this balancing act sucks.

New year, new start

In a very graphic demonstration of the lack of balance in my life, this blog has been horribly neglected. Between work, family and baby, the me part is getting left in the dust. 

Being back at work has been, in a lot of ways, unhealthy for me. I had been doing well loosing the baby-weight while I was at home, but once I headed back into the office I no longer had time to exercise. I sit at work all day. I come home and sit on the floor with the baby. I started to eat for convenience, since I no longer had time to cook healthy meals. My weight started to creep back up.

My wake up about my weight happened at a doctors visit. I am participating in a study about pregnancy. They needed my 6 month postpartum weight. 183.5 lbs. I couldn't believe the number on that scale. 

So in this new year, I have decided that things need to change. I need to carve out a little bit of time each day to make sure I'm doing what I need to do for me. I've installed a food journaling App on my phone, and I'm going to try to ease myself down to eating 1380 calories a day. I'm committed to getting at least a half hour of exercise at least three days a week, more if I have time for it. 

We'll address the other issues, like stress and money, later. For now, this is a step forward. Finally a step forward.