Free Range Family

As most of you know, I struggle with Generalized Anxiety Disorder, perfectionism and OCD. I was diagnosed with GAD as a child, with OCD as a new mother. I feel like I have also been a perfectionist most of my life, I have memories of being in middle school and obssessing over having the perfect handwriting. At twelve, I checked out several handwriting books and read them from cover to cover. From there, I developed my handwriting to what it is today. The funny thing about my handwriting is, I am always getting compliments about it now. People are always telling me about how nice it looks and I smile back at them, thinking quietly to myself, "If only they knew how long it took to get that way." Lots of people who know me don't know how controlled I am, how much control I have over myself. I am like one of those cars on ride with tracks, I am so set in my ways I don't think I could stop it if I wanted. A lot of it is from my Buddhist training, being mindful of everythi...

Happy Friday everyone! I hope everyone has a great weekend! Do you like the new look of the blog???? I figured that I would change the background to be more... srpingy lol, since it is March now. Personally, I think the flowers are sooooooo pretty! I love the new look! :) Its been a few weeks since I have been able to join in with the FQF blog hop. Oh how I have missed it! Without further ado, here is this week's Five Question Friday! Does your family coordinate clothing for church on holidays like Easter? I coordinate my family on holidays and for pictures, but only to a point. I usually give the boys a color group (red, green, white or yellow, blue, green, purple) and they can wear anything in those colors. I usually will have them coordinate jeans though. I like us to either all wear jeans or all wear something different. And I like to wear a dress or skirt if Anna does. Now that I have typed it all out, it sounds a little OCD lol. :P But I like for us ...

We all want to be perfect, don't we? I think that everyone does, even if they don't always admit it. Even just maybe being "good enough." I wrote about being perfect in terms of beauty earlier this month. Oftentimes, I struggle with being good enough myself. Good enough as a person, good enough as a daughter, good enough as a sister, good enough as a friend, as a practicing Buddhist, as an adult, as a wife, as a parent, the list goes on and on. Most nights, I lie in bed awake for hours after everyone else has fallen asleep, thinking of all the things I should have done and all the things I still need to do. I lay there in bed, literally frozen there, thinking about everything. I do not enjoy it one bit, I wish I could sleep but I just cannot.  It is very stressful for me, I have not admitted this to a lot of people. As most of you know, I did have generalized anxiety disorder and obsessive complusive disorder, which means that even though I have gone thr...

How was everyone's Valentine's Day yesterday? Ours went great! Alan's little party had a very nice turnout, we all had a blast together! I will be sure to post about that sometime next week. I do not think that any of us took a single photo though lol, how silly are we! Lon surprised me with a dinner date to Applebee's KID FREE and then we went shopping for a movie (the new Judge Dredd, AWESOME), which was all awesome. I also got chocolates, yum! I am really picky about chocolates lol and he made a point to get me the PERFECT box of chocolates for me. Oh how I love him so much. He is just so perfect for me! Thanks baby! I am so very excited because Aunt Natalie and Uncle Jake are coming to town today! Yay! We have quite a bit we want to do with them here, I am just not sure what the exact plans are yet. But Alan has been asking for Aunt Natalie since he woke up lol. They are buds since he was born. :) We just cannot wait to see them! Have a safe trip here guys, ...

I am pretty excited for this weekend. We should hopefully get a call from our new landlord, sign the lease to the new place, and start moving in tomorrow or Sunday!! Yay, so very excited!! Saturday is also Maddie's baby shower at my aunt's house. I am excited for this too. I made her little boy (they are going to name him James, so sweet) several cupcake onesies to go with the diaper cake my mother had made for her. And Anna has a onesie to wear that goes with the theme of the party! Winnie the Pooh! It should be a lot of fun for everyone. As for today, there's not too much going on here. Just packing the last of the stuff we do not need on a daily basis and some more cleaning. But tonight we might go over to my parent's to see everyone off. My father, April and Kalvin are going to visit Natalie in Missoula. They are going to her homecoming football game with her. Oh so fun! I want to do that with the kids one year! We always wear maroon that day but it would be so co...

I hope everyone has a great day today! I have one of my Kindergarten art classes this morning and then I work at the daycare from 3 to 8 tonight. Nothing too exciting, but its a nice day out again so hopefully we can go outside in our free time! For now, here's Meet me on Monday!! What is your favorite yogurt flavor?  Like regular yogurt or frozen yogurt? Cos both of them are pretty plain lol. :) For regular yogurt, I like just about any yogurt with fruit chunks in it, but strawberry yogurt is my favorite. I'm not really into the whole flavoured yogurt thing, I like my yogurt vanilla with fruit chunks in it lol. Via For frozen yogurt, I like chocolate frozen yogurt. I know lol, pretty lame!! Via Ankle or knee socks? and on the same theme, white socks or coloured?? No socks if I can! I prefer to be barefoot all the time! But if I have to wear socks, its whatever I can find to wear lol. I'll wear long and ankle socks, but only knee socks if I ...

Happy Monday everyone! As of today, it has been a year since I stopped nursing Alan. Unfortunately, someone has forgotten to inform my body and wardrobe of this, as I still seem to wear nursing bras! :D Lol one of these days I'll be able to throw them out, but right now I would have almost no bras. So they will have to work for the time being. I started my Summer Art Classes today with my first Kindergarten class at 10. I had two sisters and a little boy in the class, and boy were they a talkative bunch! :) We were only able to get through two projects lol, The Summer Self Portrait and The Graphic Design Summer Project. But both turned out great! All the kids did so well! I was one proud teacher. Please enjoy today's Meet me on Monday! Its short, but sweet today. :) What is was the last piece of candy that you ate? A Green Apple Jolly Rancher that Korbin (Alan's BFF) didn't want to eat at daycare. Don't worry, he hadn't opened it lol!  Do you "r...

One year ago today, I was diagnosed with Postpartum Anxiety Disorder and mild Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. It was my mother-in-law who was the one that convinced me to get help and better myself. I had never really dealt with a mental disorder before (except for mild Post Traumatic Stress Disorder from an abusive relationship in highschool) and thus was in the dark about seeking help. I was scared to tell my parents and my doctor, because of fear of the unknown. My family hasn't seen a lot of mental disorders in our life, so I didn't feel like they would know how to deal with it. I was having a hard time dealing with it myself. But there was no denying it. (For those of you that don't know) Postpartum Anxiety Disorder- A disorder characterized by constant, uncontrollable, moderate to severe anxiety and depression in a woman after she has given birth. Can happen soon after delivery or up to a year after. Similar to Postpartum Depression except that the woman experiences...