It's Thursday already?! Why do I never realize it's Thursday until 8 o'clock at night? Linking up late with Danielle over at Sparkles and Lattes for Confessional Thursday.

I confess that...

...I had the opportunity to cut back my hours and I enjoyed only working 4 days a week for about 6 months. Now I am slammed at work and back to working full-time and I am not loving it.

...I always thought a "work-life balance" was a myth. Now I realize I had that these last glorious months. Like so much in life, we never fully appreciate something until it's gone.

...transitioning from nerd bad-ass programmer to mom isn't easy. Exercise is the only way I can manage it and keep my sanity.

...I feel like I barely see my kids during the week, and what I mostly get is the evening rush of dinner, bath, bed. I've got to carve out at least a few minutes of play time each night.

...we have a fairly flexible schedule at my work which means I've let myself get in the habit of not getting to work until 9am. I am having a hell of a time trying to move it earlier so I don't have to stay as late or work through lunch. I am just not a morning person

...there aren't enough hours in the day to do everything I want to do. Working full-time really emphasizes that fact.

...even though I'm tired and bitching about work, I couldn't imagine being a stay-at-home mom. I love my kids but holy crap do they talk a lot. Just be quiet for 5 minutes!!!

...Brian helps out so much with the kids and cooking, and it is still hard being a working mom. I don't know how single parents or parent's with deadbeat partners do it. Seriously you guys are amazing.

...last month was 10 years since I graduated college. That is really weird to say. I have over 10 years of experience in my field now?! I'm not going to let that make me feel old. That can wait until it's been like 30 years.

...I'm taking a mini-vacation to see my dear friend Sara in Phoenix for a couple days next week. So excited for this much needed break!

Birthday boy enjoying his new Dora book

My youngest son Oscar turned 3 years old on December 22nd. You can just ignore the fact that I'm a month late on this post, totally planned out, just to keep you on your toes. Late or not, I love writing birthday posts and looking back on the past year and how much he's grown. And how many awesome moments we had with him.

This year brought us a lot of music...

February 9th, 2016

April 7th, 2016

And even more music than this, but he's naked in all the other videos I took. He's definitely a little nudist. Well he likes clothes for fun at least. There was definitely lots of dress up:

March 3rd, 2016

May 21st, 2016

August 21, 2016

And some yoga:

July 22nd, 2016

August 26th, 2016

And some awesome naps:

July 9th, 2016

August 23rd, 2016

October 7th, 2016

His favorite things are cars and books. No surprise there considering that's what he's been surrounded with since birth. He pretty much skipped playing with most toddler toys and went straight to all of Sebastian's. Big brother's toys are just way cooler. Who could blame him? 

He may have inherited my OCD...

He likes TV of course, but lately it's been mostly requests for more educational shows at least, like Super Why and Leap Frog. Can't complain about that.

Comfortable way to watch TV

Oscar is very bright, funny, and athletic. He is talking up a storm. No word is too hard for him to try repeating. And he's counting really well thanks to many games of hide and seek. We just started him in gymnastics and he is loving it, as expected, since he's quite the little monkey. He's already running fast enough that we catch Sebastian cheating sometimes if they're racing each other. He's very strong-willed and throws plenty of fits still. But more often than not, he's a very happy kid.

December 29th, 2016

Snow Day! January 11th, 2017

It's so weird to have my baby not be a baby anymore. He's quickly turning into a little boy, with the toddler year's a blur behind us already. I'm doing my best to appreciate each stage of these early years. But no matter how many moments I stop and cherish, they just don't pass any slower. Regardless of the speed, I am enjoying watching him grow into the wonderful little human he is becoming.

Today, January 24th, 2017

"Why are people setting off fireworks? It's not the 14th of July," Sebastian asked me last night.
I couldn't hide my chuckle at that. "The 14th? Try that one again buddy."
"The 4th, the 4th, I mean!"
"People like to celebrate on New Year's."
"Why?"
"It's just a way to measure another revolution around the sun, another year has passed. It reminds us to take time to appreciate the moment. And to evaluate everything we did the past year, and make goals for the coming year, " I replied...or something that probably didn't sound quite that organized, but was the gist of our discussion.

This, of course, got me thinking of taking my own moment of appreciation. Today always marks a unique point in time for me. I often wonder if having my birthday on New Year's Day is what makes it seem that way. I'm betting most people have a moment like this on their birthday's as well as New Year's, so I guess I'm just combining my New Year's and birthday moments. It usually results in lots of deep breathing and heavy sighs. Another year is over already. I'm another year older. 32 today. How weird that sounds. Am I the only who still feels like a teenager? Back when being over 30 was "really old"? Now I don't think of old as starting at a specific age, but more of a way some people feel about themselves. But it still seems like I'm young and have all the time in the world. Maybe that's because I'm trying to remain at peace with my age.

You know what I mean... "to age gracefully". I don't want to be that 30-something person who lies about her age and spends all my time and money on covering up the fact that I'm not 16 anymore. Of course it feels weird to see new wrinkles showing up on my face, old ones getting deeper, the white hairs spreading like wildfire on my head. But my thoughts on aging are less worries of the physical, and more of the philosophical. I feel the worry of, am I doing all I should be doing with my life? Am I making the best use of my time on this planet? Am I making the largest, most positive impact I could be making? Those are the questions that nag at me. Not if I should start using anti-aging cream. Fuck that pile of bullshit. Concentrate on your life, not your wrinkles.

So while I have been wrestling with all those thoughts as my birthday approached this year, another moment worthy of appreciation caught my attention. Today marks my 5th anniversary of this blog. Which started with a short, honest post about my purpose and intention, which you can read in less than a minute here.

Interestingly enough, my intentions have not changed much in the last 5 years. I have many writing goals, but probably not the typical blogging goals. I try not to care about the numbers (followers, page views, likes, etc.). I get it, if you're trying to use your blog as a source of income, then the numbers are important. But thankfully, I'm not. I'm just trying to make myself write, you know, somewhere people might read it. I don't really care how many people read it. Well that's probably inaccurate. Of course I want many people to read it, and if they enjoy it, stick around. But I don't want to attract people to my blog because of products, free giveaways, a fake service, or false promise of being able to help you drastically change your life. I want people to come here simply because they enjoy reading what I write. Period. So it is with that in mind, that I share with you my blogging goals for the year:

2017 Blogging Goals

• Get published on more sites, big and small.
• Connect with more of my readers.
• Write posts about once a week.
• Stay ad-free.

This is starting to sound like a resolution post. Oddly enough, I've never been a fan of New Year's resolutions. Maybe because most people don't stick with them. I set goals for myself whenever I think of it, definitely more than once a year. And I rarely share them with anyone, because I don't need anyone's judgements if I fail. I want goals to be a way to keep me motivated, but not stressed out and disappointed if I don't achieve them. Being an overachiever for most of my life meant I spent a lot of timing feeling bad about myself, especially if I failed to achieve a goal. But for many years now, one of my biggest goals has been to STOP feeling bad about myself. As is even obvious in my first post. But now, finally, I feel confident enough in myself to share just a few of my more personal goals with you, without worrying about your judgement or the fear of failure.

2017 Life Goals

• Less depressed episodes (days where I hide from the world)
• More patience (especially as a parent)
• Mindfulness- conscious and intentional decisions in all areas of life

I also have many small goals like spend more time outdoors, keep working on pain-free running, more yoga, more traveling, etc. etc. But these bigger goals are the real challenge, what requires more of my concentration. The things I have a higher chance of failing at, but also the ones really worth achieving. Like all important things in life, they won't be easy.

So here's to 2017! Don't be afraid to set some challenging life goals for yourself this year. Have you already set some? Share them in the comments!