Saturday, June 25, 2011

Older and Wiser

(Notice anything different about Christian??)


Yesterday we celebrated Christian with an Indiana Jones party with a few of his friends.

I've been a mom for 6 years now. Motherhood has literally given me gray hair, but I'm also so much wiser than I was just five years ago when I did Christian's first b-day party. At his first birthday party I tried to dye white icing red with regular food coloring. Ever tried that? Nonsense I tell you! I didn't have a clue. Anyway...

You see, yesterday we partied. Today we cleaned.

Did you read that???
I didn't clean before the party.
I cleaned after the party.

We straightened up things before the party and as all the mommies dropped off their kids, my house looked clean. Today I broke out the clorox wipes, the vacuum, the swiffer, the windex, etc. And yes, I'm totally tooting my own horn because I'm so proud of myself (this is a big deal for me) that I didn't waste all my time and energy cleaning in vain yesterday. I recently read the book The Reluctant Entertainer and one thing she wrote stuck with me: "Excellence is working toward an attainable goal that benefits everyone, while perfection comes from a place of great need - usually the need to avoid criticism and gain praise and approval from others." Holy cow I needed to hear that!!! Anybody else need to be set free from the curse of perfectionism?? Now granted...my kids have pretty much broken me and my house of anything close to perfect but I still would get stressed out about trying to make things perfect even if I could never attain it. So yesterday was a small victory for me :) And we all had a good time despite the fact that the kitchen floor was pretty gross!


1 comment:

Sarah Joy said...

I love that book and that very thought! I needed it when I read it and STILL need to be reminded of that. Sandy is awesome and has changed many ways that I think when it comes to entertaining and running our home.