Happy New Year...at last! (Week 32) ...by Liimu

Man, I feel like I am finally able to exhale after the holidays. Today is my daughter Amelia's seventh birthday. We started today off with the celebratory donuts that have become a tradition. I didn't realize how much of a tradition until my daughters told me last night that they were VERY excited for the donuts that were coming. I was like, "What donuts?" And they said, "The donuts we get every time it's someone's birthday." Guess it's a tradition now!

Anyhoo, back to the whole Happy New Year thing. Last week, I think I talked about how frustrated I had been with how much illness was ripping through the house. Honestly, I couldn't even come up for air long enough to appreciate the fact that we had made it through the holidays. Yep, I said it. I feel like I hold my breath from October 31 through Jan 1 because of all the temptations to CONSUME - to consume food, to consume alcohol, to consume products in stores. It just feels so great when it's over and it all goes back to normal. I know, I know...some of you out there are saying, maybe you need to get in touch with the spirit of the holidays... And maybe I do, but I'm just being honest here.

So, I managed to make it through with fairly little damage to our finances, or to my whole pregnancy weight gain goal (which is just to keep it to somewhere around my average weight gain from the past three pregnancies), but I couldn't really stop to enjoy it because I was caught in such a whirlwind of everyone getting sick, then better, then sick again. And, in the midst of all that, I had this client who supposedly wanted to renew my contract with them but to do so was involving so much back and forth, so much negotiating, I was barely sleeping from the stress of it all.

Well, that ended yesterday and everyone is healthy and HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! I have just the amount of work I really want, and clients who really value and appreciate my contributions and even a little time to actually prepare for this new baby who's coming (whether we're ready or not) in less than 8 weeks!!!

So, yes, I'm happy. I'm blissfully happy. Happy, happy, happy. Life is back to normal, and for the record, my normal life is nothing short of extraordinary.

Enjoy your Thursday, everyone!