A Letter to My Single Friends at Valentine's Day

So, over the past few weeks I've been thinking a lot about marriage, family, settling down, and all the things that supposedly come with "growing up". I've been reading just about every article and post that pops up on the topic. Its been great. I've enjoyed them. A few have reminded me why I love my husband or why its awesome to have kids. Then I got to thinking, what is it like for my dear single friends who don't live in this world.

I know its true that I too once lived a single life. I slept, ate, and woke whenever I decided. I went out and didn't ask anyone's permission and I didn't have to carry a diaper bag. However, its been easy to forget those days ever existed. This leads me to why I decided to write this letter.

Single Friends,

 I know its hard to wait for someone special. I know your parents want you to "settle down" and have a few grand-babies for them. I know you feel like it will never happen. Cheer up, I have a gift for you! I will give you a very personal, intimate view of what its like to be married and an even more open view of what its like to be a parent.

Its hard! Marriage is hard. It takes hours of work, often with little to no return. You have no privacy, no space, and you have to consult someone else on everything. Yes, its nice to have someone to talk to, but that also means you have to listen. Sometimes you will have to sit there for an hour and listen to someone talk about video games or reasons why today is a bad hair day. You will have double the stress, double the bills, and half the sleeping room. Please don't get me wrong, I love my husband but there were perks to the single life. I beg you to take advantage of them now while you can. And, if the case should be that you never get married, I hope you can see the blessings in it.

The other thing I can say about that is, flirt. Make someone else feel beautiful, special, and worth while. In fact, make many people feel that way. You have the rare opportunity of being able to freely share compliments without risk. I'm not saying go get involved with tons of people, I'm just saying that there is so much fun in the chase. Once your married, your caught and that season of your life is over.

Secondly, parenting is the hardest, lowest paying job you will ever have. Please believe me when I say that I have not slept a whole night or eaten a whole meal in peace for over three years. You wont believe me now, but you don't realize how good you have it on a nightly basis. While I'm here. Sleep. Sleep! Sleep while you can, you will miss it someday.

Children will force you to take a deep look at yourself. You will see depths of fear, anger, and love you have never experienced. The freedoms you have now will be gone and you will have the greatest responsibility you could ever imagine on your shoulders. You will have little help, many questions, and probably more ruined clothes than you think. You will have regular conversations about puke, poop, and all sorts of unpleasant things.

My friends, please don't let me dampen your desire for a spouse and family. I don't say all this to ruin or crush your hopes and dreams. In fact, I hope that if you want those things that you get your Prince Charming or Cinderella. I hope they treat you like gold and realize that they are so very lucky. Look at all you gave up to be with them. I also hope you take a few minutes every day after your married to realize they too gave up a lot for you. You are worth it! So, just because someone is not in your life right now, doesn't mean its a bad thing. Sometimes the very best things take the longest to achieve.

This Valentine's day, I have a few suggestions to make the day less depressing. (Because, frankly, I know it will be.)

One, be another lonely someone's secret valentine. Don't sign it, don't admit to it, just do it. It might be just enough to change someone's whole point of view this year.

Second, grab a friend and go out on Valentine's day anyway. I'm not talking one of the "romantic" hot spots, but to something! Don't stay in and sulk. If you can't go out, do something at home. Just don't sit there on your couch, eating ice-cream and pouting. Your better than that! You are a grown-up. You have a life and friends and so many people who love you.

Third, remember the people who love you. Send your mother a valentine. Call up your best friend, whatever it takes. Put your life in perspective.

Fourth, if you don't make a point to go out or have some kind of fun shindig at home... offer to babysit for one of your friends who is already left the single life. If they have kids, they don't have many chances to be with that special someone anymore. Just place this thought in your mind, someday you will wish that someone does the same thing for you!

As a happily married woman with two kids, I am telling you now that it is OK to be single! Its perfectly fine not to be "settled down" yet. It's not bad that you don't have kids. Stop beating yourself up! You are a beautiful/handsome person and being single doesn't change that.

Beyond that, for every day you envy me there are days I'm so jealous of you! Go, for now is but a season and who knows what the future holds!

Much love,
Me

Resolutions: Complete List

Here is a complete list of the resolutions I haven't covered thus far this month. I do hope they will be helpful as you finish creating yours!

Reading

• Read 2 books on household management/ money
• Read 2 books on marrirage
• Read 2 books for pleasure
• Read 2 book on parenting

Enough said.

Blogging

• Post at least 3 time a week here on Casseruola Dolce Della Vita
• Post at least 2 times a week over at Missionary Manda's Musings
• Post at least once a week at Growing Up Around the Table

Fashion

• Clean out at least 4 articles from my closet that haven't been used in the past 6 months.
• Paint my nails on a weekly basis and my toes on a monthly basis.

For a mother, this really is a bigger task than it seems!

Saving/ Money Management

• Put away a little money for each of my boys a month. I was thinking about 10 each. Something is better than nothing right?!
• Use more coupons!
• Save at least 50 a month.
• Create a workable budget.
• Put a small sum into an emergency fund each month.

So far, I am failing at these goals.

Physical 

•  Take at least 1 exercise class
• Do something active (and purposeful) at least 3 times a week.

Cleaning/ Household Management

•  Clean one thing before bed every night (Again, another failure so far) I also think dishes would be my best bet, and I hate them.
• Create and post family rules
• Give my oldest son a chore list (We actually have this one sort of started!)
• Create and stick to a basic menu and shopping list
• Create and use a household management binder

Service

• Be involved with some form a volunteer service 3 times this year
• Knit at least 10 baby caps for the local hospital to be given at the end of the year.

So, I probably bit off more than I can chew. I think now that I have gotten them all down and in my vision... I can start making it reality.

Educational & Professional Resoultions

Since I haven't kept to my word and posted daily, I have a little bit of catching up to do. So, I've put two closely related goals together. These are not always closely related for everyone, but in my case they are.

Educational

I have little hopes on going back to school this year... so I had to settle for something reasonable. I decided that taking one class or seminar on an area of interest would be more than enough of a goal this year. even this may be asking a bit too much with all the craziness that comes with working and having two wild boys!

Professional

My professional goals are a bit more involved that my educational goals. This is partially because the two can be combined and I can knock them out at the same time. Here is a run down of these goals:

• Do three professional trainings

• Do three activities to be more actively involved at my current school (If you didnt know, I am a Instructional Assistant.)

This is the first time I have included professional goals in my personal resolutions. With the position I have, it isn't common or popular to do more than we have to. However, I am a firm believer in the "bloom where your planted" philosophy.  I can't expect to move up, do more, or feel better about my position if I am not willing to give it 100% or more.

I hope that my sharing my resolutions and goals thus far has inspired you to think outside the traditional box when it comes to New Year's resolutions. There is so much more we can do with this very special time- the start of a brand new year. With a new year we can change our perspective. Reconsider our plans and prepare for an awesome year.

Healthy Eating

source

I think everyone decides to make a change in their eating at the beginning of the new year. We just spent the last two months eating (stuffing our faces more like) with very little exercise if your like me.

So, like the crowd I have a few healthy eating goals myself. I think making the transition slow will be the least painless way to do it. I'm really making these changes for my whole family, not just myself.

• Reduce intake of sugary foods. This is best done by not having it around the house!
•  Reduce intake of fatty foods. Again, less likely to be eaten if we don't have it!
• Drink at least 8 glasses of water a day. This one is more personal, but truly necessary. 

 None of these are really about weight loss. Its more about upping energy, feeling better, and providing my husband and kids with healthy balanced diets. Of course I'm trying to make other healthy changes as well, but these are the goals I'm focusing on. I look forward to making these changes and many more over the next 12 months. I'm sure you will hear about them as they occur. If not from me, the whines from my husband and kids should be evident!


This is where I once again ask for your help. Share you healthy recipes and ideas below. How did you get the new habits to stick? What makes it easier? I welcome links in the comments below.

Romance/Marriage

I think anyone who is married should have at least one romantic goal a year to build their marriage. I personally think there should be several! However, for my new years resolutions this year, I picked two main areas where I have lacked at.

1. I would like to write, say, or do something to build up and encourage my husband on a daily basis.

In the grind of daily life its easy to get in a cycle of nagging, complaining, and even just forgetting to encourage our mates. My goal is to share with my husband how blessed I feel to have him in my life!

2. Make it a point to have a "date" on a monthly basis.

We are finally at the point were our finances are somewhat regulated and our kids are out of infant stage. Its time to rekindle some of those flames that have been dimmed by the pressure of young parenting. We have never really made it a priority to date each other, but I think doing so will increase unity and leave us both in a happier place!

Source

So, do tell what you romantic/ marriage goals are for the year? Perhaps you would like to write a love letter a month? Or maybe spent 10 minutes each evening together? What ever it is, I would love to hear your stories and comments.

Resolutions

I decided it would be appropriate to start this new year and fresh return to blogging with a few resolutions. However, I am an over achiever and I have quite the list! So, to save everyone the time, I will split each category of goals and resolutions out during this whole month. Below is a list of my goal/resolution categories.

Please feel free to inspire me. Tell me what your goals in these areas are. Tell me what areas I missed too! I'd be glad to add a few.

• Romance/ Marriage
• Healthy Eating
• Educational
• Reading
• Blogging
• Fashion
• Money/ Saving
• Physical
• Professional
• Cleaning/ Housekeeping
• Household Management
• Service

As of now I have at least one goal in each of these areas. I feel like I am missing something... I may be thinking about it a bit too much! There is some part of me that wants to be Martha Stewart, Rosie the Riveter, and Wonder Woman, all put together!

Catching Up

There is a tug a war within me over getting "back up on the horse" as they say. It has been something I have been looking forward to for so long, but with time have lost some of that great drive I had. I have no fear that it wont return, its just getting back into my grove. I regularly blog in the evenings when my children are asleep and my day is over. Ive gotten used to falling straight to sleep and have lost hours of time I would otherwise be using here and my other blog. However, I will push past the slight resistance and come back with full force. I am so excited to share news and recent events with you!

As you know I moved in October. It has been a major blessing to be back in our own place once again. My husband found a job and is now happily working with benefits and everything. We have Internet in our own home for the first time since our marriage. That is a very big milestone! Do you know what made us get it? YOU! I just couldn't live without blogging. Both my children had birthdays prior to Christmas. No I have a one year old and three year old keeping me busy! We started potty training Ben and are now on the home stretch. Underwear is cool! My baby, Henry, is still not sleeping through the night. You can imagine our disappointment. Other than that, there is very little on the home front to fill in. Christmas was wonderful. The kids loved it! My husband and I shared our 4th anniversary at the beginning of this month as well.

I do have one other big piece of news I would like to share. I am now a proud writer for another blog and magazine! You can check out my blog, Growing Up Around the Table, here. Growing Up in the Valley is a local, family magazine I was originally doing sales for. I wasnt a very good sales person, but I am a much better writer! I look forward to having my work in their print editions as well!

Be on the look our for posts on here as well as there! You can also check out my devotional blog, Missionary Manda's Musings as well.