Making mornings a little less dreaded.

In my best Yosemite Sam voice: "I hates mornings."

If you've been around here for a while or know me personally even a little, this is not news. Mornings and me, we go way back. We've never had a great relationship. I envy people whose bodies naturally come alive before, say, 6 a.m. My body prefers something a little later.

Over the years I have tried - and failed - to train my body (and brain) to wake up earlier. Sometimes I want to get my day started at the crack of dawn. I've got stuff to do. And I have kids to wake up and get ready for school. If I oversleep, everyone does. But no matter what time I go to bed at night, no matter what time my alarm goes off in the morning, my whole being resists rolling out of bed.

Alas, I keep trying.

I do love coffee, but I have never developed the morning coffee habit. I even set my Keurig to turn on at 6 a.m. so it's ready to go when I hit the kitchen. But most mornings I'm just not ready for that slap in the face of caffeine first thing. Sometimes I'll brew a cup just for the smell, though, and warm it up to drink after I get the kids to the bus stop. This doesn't solve my getting-out-of-bed dilemma, though.

I have tried exercise first thing in the morning. (Stop laughing.) (Oh, and ... FAIL.)

I have tried putting the alarm clock across the room so I have to get out of bed to turn it off. This just makes me mad. Not a great way to start the day.

I have tried heading straight to the shower. This is still a contender, but doesn't work when I've already hit the snooze button six times.

I've tried a wind-up alarm clock. You know the kind - you get one shot, no snooze button. So that the urgency of knowing I had somewhere to be would force me to get up as soon as that alarm went off.

Right.

I have tried dedicating my mornings to God. Fifteen minutes of prayer and devotion before the rest of the house wakes up. But even a daily date with my Lord and Savior has not been enough to coax me out from under the covers.

It's ok. I love Him just as much at 9 a.m. as I do at 5:30.

I've tried stretching like a cat. Wake up every limb, get up on all fours and stretch out my back (which would benefit me as the day goes on). But no. Stupid cats! They sleep all day anyway.

Why is this so hard?! I actually love to watch the sun rise. When we travel I like to leave early and then see the rest of the world coming alive around us after we've been on the road a while. It's just that first hour or so, the shaking the sleepiness from my brain and getting the gears turning that I struggle with. I have been this way all my life. One of my children is exactly like me in that respect. I feel for him. I try to wake him gently in the mornings and give him plenty of time. He growls at me. I never (ok, rarely) just flip the light on like my brothers used to do to me. That's as bad as having to get out of bed to turn off the alarm clock. We're talking The Incredible Hulk kind of bad.

Mom, I am so sorry.

I'm trying a new approach. This week I've been using the alarm feature on my cell phone. I set it to wake me with a song I like, it fades in and slowly increases volume. I tap the screen for a 5-minute snooze. When I'm ready to really wake up I just let the song play, then I can turn off the alarm, check my e-mail, on-line news sources, say hello to my peeps on Facebook, or whatever.

So far I'm totally diggin' it. Which is interesting because I despise having the TV on in the morning, yet here I am using an electronic device to help me wake up. Maybe I don't mind the phone so much because it isn't blaring commercials at me and I can pick and choose what I see. And the kids don't come out of their bedrooms and stare at it like zombies.

This is my current favorite:



Yes, I wake up to Jason Aldean every morning. Or at least his voice. Don't judge.

This is much more pleasant than that cranky ol' alarm clock buzzing at me. And a pleasant wake-up means a happy mama. And everybody appreciates a happy mama.

I'll keep you posted.

Swapping out a light fixture.

I did it! I hung a light fixture. All by myself. And it works!

This is a big thing for me. I have this fear of anything having to do with electricity. I like being able to hit the switch and have the lights come on, but I don't really want to have anything to do with what happens within the walls to make it work.

Alas, my go-to guy (Steve) isn't around and the last thing I want to ask him to do when he finally gets some time at home is to hang a light fixture. (Although I did find out it's pretty uncomplicated, it just helps to have another set of hands to assist. Which I didn't.)

I've been on the lookout for lighting fixtures for ... ever. Our house is full of builder-grade brassy, cheap-looking fixtures and I'm tired of looking at them. But rather than spending hundreds of dollars for a bunch of new fixtures, I have kept my eyes open for fun, funky, used (or clearance priced) fixtures with character.

A few months back I bought this one at the Habitat ReStore:

I wasn't sure where it would end up, but I knew it would look better than any of the lights we had in the house. I purchased it with the idea that I would spray paint it, and once I decided where it would go I chose Rust-Oleum's Metallic Oil Rubbed Bronze.

$15! Not bad. Maybe not as great as a garage sale price, but certainly better than new. 

And yes, the glass really was that dirty.

Here is what I was replacing:

Looks safe, no?

And classy.

I don't even remember how long that "temporary" fixture has been hanging there. It's one of those things that we got used to, and it started blending into the background.

Well, NO MORE!

I luuuuurve this new light.

And though I can't say I am totally over my fear of working near electricity, I can at least tell you I will attempt a similar project again, with a little less trepidation.

Neat detail, huh? It has almost a Moroccan feel. I likey.

The glass cleaned up fine (but even if it hadn't I wouldn't care - I'd put the light up without it), the paint looks good (though I do have a couple touchups to do), and best of all the light actually worked when I turned it on.

I do have a couple of adjustments to make. The screws that came with the crossbar that attaches to the box in the ceiling weren't long enough, so I had to dig through my toolbox to find some replacements. They'll work for now, but if you look closely - in person, maybe not on the pics - you can see the canopy isn't quite flush with the ceiling. Definitely gotta' fix that. But overall, I think I did pretty good!

So now I can add something to my list of possible projects I can do myself. Win!

Back in the game.

Ha-lle-lu-jah!

I picked up my new laptop this afternoon and I am way more excited than a person should be about any one technological device.

The fact is, I rely heavily on my computer for a lot of things from budgeting and on-line banking to storing and retrieving all kinds of digital information to keeping me company (and sane) through streaming music and social networks during the day when the kids are at school. I use the Internet to look up recipes, garner inspiration from music videos, look up Bible passages while I read my daily devotions. I post here and read a handful of other blogs each day. I check my son's grades and homework schedule on-line. Steve and I keep in contact throughout the day via e-mail and text.

And for nearly three weeks I haven't had any of that.

Wait. I could send and receive texts, and could at least check e-mail on my cell phone, but service at our house is spotty at best and I could never be sure whether my e-mail responses actually made it out to cyberspace, much less to the intended recipient. My apologies to anyone who expected a reply from me over the past couple weeks but never got one.

I'm still figuring it all out - starting from scratch adding all my "old" stuff onto this new computer and tweaking all the settings to my preferences. I had my old laptop for almost three years and it's amazing how technology has advanced so much in that amount of time. I'm excited about exploring it in more detail when I don't have kids hanging over my shoulders asking if they can check out the webcam.

Several times these past few weeks I really missed the opportunity to sit down at the keyboard and share my thoughts with the world. I'm so glad to be connected and able to do that again. Boy, do I have lots of catching up to do.

Technical difficulties.

Argh.

My computer has been out of commission for ... well, since the last day I posted here on the blog.

Today I finally decided she is too old to put any more money into, so I asked my computer guru to recover my files (which thankfully he was able to do) and quote me a price on a new laptop.

Blah.

I did not want to buy a new computer right now, but it has become one of those conveniences of life that I would just rather not live without. Like a microwave. Or a dishwasher. Do we need them? Not necessarily. But they're sure handy to have around.

So hopefully sometime in the next week I will have a new setup. Until then, I'll take advantage of the lack of distraction and finish up a few things I've been working on around the house. I've been getting a lot more reading done lately, too, which is always a good thing.

By way of update for my regular readers, I should mention that my grandma is hanging in there with us. She's weak, becoming more confused as time goes by, and this week started seeing people who weren't really there - or at least we couldn't see them. But for several days she was doing well enough that my parents and aunt and uncle felt comfortable going back to Florida, so for now I'm back to being the primary contact for her.

According to the weather man we have a heckuva storm coming our way in the next few hours. School has already been called off for the kids for tomorrow, and I will welcome the chance to sleep late in the morning.

I see hot cocoa and homemade cookies in our future.

Here's hoping I'm back in business and posting regularly again soon.

Frustration #142 of living The Pipe Life.

It is sometimes difficult to be the one at home, wondering what's happening in the world of the worker and knowing that whatever is happening, good or bad, there isn't a darn thing you can do about it.

Every time I call Steve in the evening and hear lots of noise in the background I imagine him with his work buddies at a sports bar with big-screen TV's and hot wings and beer. Lots of beer.

If I chat with him during his lunch break and he seems a little off, I wonder if he's having a bad day and doesn't want to say anything in front of his coworkers. And what could I say anyway? "I love you. Have a good afternoon." Good lot of help that is.

And then there is the fact that I am just not there at the end of the day to give him a hug and a kiss and help him unwind. Nor is he here for me.

We muddle through it, work around it. It is what it is.

Life at home is settling into a pretty good groove for me and the kids. At least it seemed that way until Steve got cranked up about something at work this week and it just about sent me into a tailspin. The fact that I couldn't be there to read his body language and show him I supported him was tough. That's important to me - I need to be able to look at his face and know that he hears me telling him everything will be fine. Whether he believes it is irrelevant; I just need to know he heard me say it.

For now, phone calls suffice. Technology is grand and I love to be able to send him texts and chat with him on-line, but talking and laughing with Steve over the phone is so much more personal - about as personal as two people can get while hundreds of miles apart.

This week I am reminded of our song, the first song Steve and I danced to at our wedding: "Faithfully" by Journey. The words of that ballad rang true for us then, and they still do.

Highway run; into the midnight sun
Wheels go round and round; you're on my mind
Restless hearts sleep alone tonight
Sending all my love along the wire
They say that the road ain't no place to start a family
Right down the line it's been you and me
And lovin' a music man ain't always what it's supposed to be
Oh girl, you stand by me
I'm forever yours, faithfully