11-1-11

Today marks the beginning of November. I love, I celebrate, I give thanks, I cry and I cook – a lot – in November.

My birthday is this month, I’ll be – well, never mind how old I’ll be - but none the less, my birthday is part of almost every thing listed above, all except cooking. I don’t cook on my birthday. I eat out or someone in my beautiful family cooks for me. Last year was a big birthday for me and it actually sent me into kind of an OCD tail spin so I’m trying hard to look forward to this birthday and rejoice in the coming of a new year. I’m trying hard to not focus on the increasing age, the wrinkles, the increasing age and the increasing age. I never thought it would be something that ever bothered me but like many things, age has a funny way of changing things you “never thought” would happen. This year I’m looking forward to a quiet dinner with friends and family for a joint celebration of my birthday and that of my Papa.

Papa’s birthday is the 11^th, Veterans day. For as long as I can remember we celebrated our family birthday parties together. Sadly, he died 5 years ago. This year, more than those since his passing I think I’m a bit more sentimental because its 11-11-11, such a cool date for a birthday, and Papa would be 76 years old. I rarely remember the day of his death, it’s not a day I want to remember. His birthday, a celebration of his life is different, I always remember. I always get a little sad and inevitably, cry just a bit on his birthday.

That’s just the beginning of the month. The boys have another Scout camp out, I am teaching my first couples massage class (more on that later), plus Bunco and Thanksgiving. Oh, getting ready for December too, another extremely busy month for us. This year as I’ve done some years in the past, I’m planning on a mostly homemade Christmas. Meaning, the kids and I, over the next month or so, will be making most if not all the gifts for our friends and family. I love the pace of the coming months but I also remember collapsing into bed somewhere in January, weary, exhausted and wondering where in the heck the last two months vanished to.

Somehow, in all of this, I’m contemplating setting another goal for a new project for myself. This month is National Blog Posting Month. It’s a project that started years ago to help young blogs (as in age of the blog, not the blogger) stretch their writing skills. It’s since grown into a monthly project each with its own theme. November however, is the original month; there is no theme, its blogging for blogging sake. The goal is to blog every day for the entire month. Blogher who hosts NaBloPoMo (stupid acronym I know, I didn’t make it up) gives all the joint bloggers tons of press – blogsphere press – and can really help your blog reach more people. They also give away prizes, show daily featured blogs and a whole other mess of great things. I’m considering it. I have to decide by the 5^th, it’s the last day to sign up. I’m not really trying to gain big press for my little blog, but I do like reaching and connecting with other bloggers plus, I’ve kind of slacked off on posting lately (not like I’m busy or anything, just slacking) so this would force me to get back into the routine of a daily post. Given that my New Years resolution was to start this blog and the year is quickly coming to an end, this is my chance to participate in a group blogging experience.

My only hesitation is finding the time each day to post and to post something worth reading. I’ve gone back and read some of my first posts and while I love having them cataloged, they really aren’t stellar reading material. It reminds me of flounder from Little Mermaid when he’s mocking the Seagull to King Triton “It’s all, this is this, and that is that….” Bla!  So, I have to decide if I’m willing to commit the emotional and mental energy to a daily, worth while post. Of course, I’d still throw in a recipe or two every week, that won’t change.

Hum, don’t know, stay tuned I guess. Either I’ll be talking a lot this month, or nothing will change and I’ll continue to share snippets of my life here and there as I can.