5 Favorites Link-up #1

Yesss!  Another fun link-up upon which I shall piggyback!  This one is hosted by the adorable Moxie Wife.  5 of my favorites?!

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My earrings.

Sarah Mae posted a few  MANY months back (I just tried to search her archives and can’t find her post) about keeping motivated to manage housework. She suggests that if we get fully dressed for our day, we are more likely to do the work needed.  I am blessed beyond my deserving to be able to stay at home with our children.  That should be enough to motivate me to get the housework done.  But when that’s not enough, wearing these beautiful earrings makes me feel Fancy Nancy and I do the dishes with extra sparkle in my smile– wait. I don’t smile when I do dishes… What’s that? I still have a sparkle? No, I’d wager that’s part of a pretzel stick stuck in my teeth.

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Mumford & Sons.

[youtube=http://youtu.be/rGKfrgqWcv0] <I promise, I don’t like listening to Live Music, except for this.
I am half sick of music. Being an artsy fartsy, I could never have predicted my future self would say that sentence as I sat through my 4 hour drawing studio 4 days a week + outside studio work, scratching out charcoal masterpieces, ears crammed with plugs, resonating the albums of Coldplay, Snow Patrol, Dave Matthews Band… (yyyyyeah. I’m one of those…)
But it’s all so shallow!  “feel the feelings!” “be sad/angry over the beautiful girl” “get all the quick money!” “get all the best stuff!” “Pop all the bottles!” “Party all the parties!” “Pop all the tags!”

A good beat is fun, don’t get me wrong, trust me.  I love dancing like an idiot in front of my 2 & 3.5 year old along to Katy Perry’s Firework and fist pumping to the BOOM, BOOM, BOOM part. But after a while, listening to the empty lyrics, I’m like, baby just play me a beat on one of those boxy type drum things I danced to when I wasted tuition on took a contemporary dance class my freshman year.

Mumford & Sons makes my soul sing out rainbows.  I want to dance barefoot- either in the rain, or in a dry field with tall lemon grass, free of ticks and snakes and sneeze-inducing organisms, but filled with purple lavender and blue butterflies. –with tears of wonderment at the human race.  I’d need a long skirt and some really good shaving cream because I’d need to have excellently shaved armpits because my hands would be in the air, palms facing the clouds.

“HOO WHEE, BOY, THAT WAS SOME MIGHTY FINE A’PICKIN AND A’SINGIN’!” -O Brother, Where Art Thou?

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This floral print:

I KNOW!  Go ahead, call me your 70 year old grandma! I’m so happy that it’s in fashion right now.  …although I own nothing with this print at all, if I could design a room in our house just for me, it would be loaded with polkadots and shabby chic cabbage roses.  Pinks and blues.  MMM!

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San Pellegrino. 

I have an attachment to Coca-Cola. I don’t know if I should call it an addiction, because it’s not like I have to have it. We don’t keep the house stocked with it.  But there are some days when I want one and I WANT IT NOW.  I know it’s bad for me. It’s the one kind of food  that I am fully aware of the absolute trash it is, yet continue to consume, with pleasure.  Ahh there, I said it.  For some people, they’ll “go off” pop for a few weeks and then have one after a time of abstinence and say, “ew! I can’t believe I actually liked this!” That’s not me. I take a swig after a few weeks of no Coke and go, “aaaaaaaaaaaaaat laaaaaaaaast, my lOOOooove has come alooooong…”

Well, I gave up Coke for Lent.  I’ve failed technically once (the other time, I had a coke on a Sunday, but let’s be honest, that’s still kind of cheating), and like Jacques says, “I am ashamed.”

However, in its stead, I’ve discovered a new favorite: San Pellegrino spaaaahhhhrkling watah, dahling. It has a nice bite. I’d rate this second to Coke, and umm, not quite as high fructose-y.

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The cry of my almost 6 month old,  believe it or not, and the embrace of my children. Little did I know, during the time I was in ignorance about the gift that are children, that an infant’s cry, to his mother, is way more than just a “WAAAHHHHH”. Mothers who are in tune with their children understand differences in each cry.  I don’t need Collin to be able to talk, and I love that.
As I was bidding goodnight to my eldest this evening, I found myself slightly aggravated that he wouldn’t let go of my neck after I’d hugged him goodnight. But suddenly my mind whiplashed to the future and I envisioned a large, 20 year old man who might barely give me a one-armed shoulder hug.  I snapped to the present and held on to my little boy, inhaled his hair and his innocence, taking his littleness in, more fully aware of his scrawny chicken arms as they clung to me. My boy. I’ll love you for always.  I rush too quickly through these days.