Blogging is a strange and wonderful thing. Over the years, I recognize many of the same names commenting on posts or sending me emails with questions or concerns. All from people I don’t know. Yet, I feel like I know them. I feel connected to my readers, like we are all friends.
It’s the same way when I read some of my favorite bloggers. I feel like I know them, yet I’ve never actually looked at any of them eyeball to eyeball.
Whether we’ve met in person or not, I feel connected to you. And sometimes, I just want to chat. I don’t want to write a formal post explaining why turmeric is good for you or talk about a recipe. I just want to chat to you like I’d chat with my friends.
I had an urge to talk to you about regular things. Life stuff. So here’s my first coffee talk. If you like it, let me know and I’ll pop on here now and then with an informal chatty post. If it’s crickets around here, I’ll take the hint and call up my college BFF when I want to chat. 😉
Post-Vacation Week
I shared in my newsletter that Tim and I were able to go to the Dominican Republic last week with some friends for an adults-only vacation. Yes, I missed the kids, but WOW. It was fantastic to have four lovely days of beach time with no little people to watch. I read a whole book from cover to cover! Coming home to freezing cold weather and spring time snow was miserable.
I wore this Stitch Fix dress I got in my last Fix as a cover up and the bright bag is from Stitch Fix, also. I’ve been slacking on sharing my latest Fix and I’m not sure why because it was a great one. Please let me know if you really miss my fashion shares, but lately I’ve lost my mojo for those posts.
Mourning Nap Time
That’s mourning nap time, not morning nap time. As in, Luke is done. D-O-N-E with naps. He’s napped once in the last 10 days and that night he was so hard to get to go to sleep. He will doze if we’re in the car in the afternoon, but other than that, he made the transition to no naps pretty easily.
My transition is a little harder. I have to somehow figure out how to get those two hours of work time into my schedule some place else. Fun times.
I shared this picture on the Happy Healthy Mama Facebook page last night. He sleeps with this many stuffed animals every single night. If we don’t put them all on his bed, he’ll be up in the middle of the night saying, “I don’t have enough friends!”
Holding on to the “Little” in my “Little Girl”
Lately I get this feeling when I look at Meghan. She’s only 7 1/2, so I know she’s still got plenty of time in her little girl years, but I can feel them slipping away. She’s starting to act less like a little girl and more like a, well, teenager?
She’s rolling her eyes at me when I ask her to do things, being extremely dramatic about events that seem insignificant to me, and just acting plain sassy. Her behavior lately is totally out of character for her and I’m hoping it’s just a passing phase. I was actually so worried about it I emailed her teacher to see if she’d noticed anything different in her behavior at school. “Meghan is a teacher’s dream” is what it said on her report card, and her teacher responded to the email that she hadn’t had “one single issue with Meghan all year.”
Well.
I guess she saves all her sass for me. Can any moms of girls relate to this? It feels so personal that she’s well-behaved at school and then becomes Miss Difficult at home.
The Sibling Mismatch
Meghan and Luke’s Fashion Show, shared on my Instagram account.
Luke adores Meghan and wants to play with her, impress her, and keep up with her. Meghan doesn’t reciprocate the feelings. To be fair, Luke can be a little stinker. But Meghan gets so angry and fed up with him lately. I asked you all on Facebook a while ago if you had any advice about how to get siblings feeling more love toward each other, and you all recommended Siblings without Rivalry. I finally picked up a copy this week. Now to actually read it and not let it sit on my nightstand for months. 
If anyone has any great advice about fostering a good sibling relationship, I’d love to hear it.
One more thing. Instead of Friday, I’ll be updating you on how the Move More Challenge is going on Sunday (since that’s the day I announced the challenge). I hope you are all getting more active this month!
Have a great weekend, friends! I loved this chat. 🙂
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Hey Maryea! Such a great idea to have a prime spot to open up to people you feel in sync with. Being a stay at home parent doesn’t allow me to have much phone or personal time to nurture my friendships. I’m not even sure I’ll be able to even finish this comment. Haha I feel like I text and email my friendships anymore, and some I have flat out lost due to lack of eye to eye conversation. Kids change everything!
Being able to open up or talk to a community of people you have developed a certain bond with screams productive thought and insight to me. A great way to build friendships that can be fed and nurtured by being able to share and open up to each other and it still becomes a personal experience.
I have been lucky to have met you and spent time with you. Not only is your kindness, thoughtful, and caring nature immediately felt in person, you display it so well through your blog that It’s no surprise you have faithful fans.
And I’m pretty sure we are raising the exact same children!! My Luke adores, follows, and imitates my Emma every chance he gets.
I think I have shared with you that Emma went through an exact experience with sass and attitude and displayed some funky behavior that concerned me. But yet, perfect student at school. She would have meltdowns over random things, lash out at Luke, etc. Not sure if this may help, but It took a few long calm talks digging into her and then finally it has passed. I sat on her bed with her and cried and told her it makes me sad that she isnt my sweet Emma and I just asked her what’s wrong and told her how it was making me feel. Not to make Emma feel guilty, but I think it’s important even as parents and adults to openly express our emotions in front of our children. It’s natural, it’s healthy, and it’s just part of life. They need to know we are human and we are effected by things they do. i wasn’t sure what to expect, But, she apologized to me and hugged me and just told me she loved me. It sounds simple and I got no answers about what her problem was. But, to me, that was my answer. I know Emma and the loving sweet I know, did exactly what she normally would if she saw someone upset, she comforted me. So my true, real Emma was still here and I knew nothing was really wrong, so I allowed for more time to see if it passes, and it did! Surely, Meghan may be experiencing a similar “change” at this age? And it too will pass.
Regarding sibling rivalry, Luke is Emma’s shadow, Which has caused for some real adorable Moments between them and some awful-pulling them apart – moments. It seems for me, they always want the exact same thing at the exact same time that gets in the way! Or Emma is tired of Luke being in her personal space so much. Ironically, I don’t usually break them apart or even get involved unless I think someone will get hurt. For me, they will argue and fight and I listen in while in the kitchen. I let them work it out on their own and about 95 percent of the time, they do. The yelling turns into laughing, the hitting turns into a pretend sword fight or even dancing, etc. They always works it out on their own at my house . This has enabled them to set boundaries with each other. Not me to do it for them. Now Luke knows what gets under her skin bc he sees her react, not me! They have developed a relationship that they’re learning from each other, in all aspects. They are figuring out What’s nice, when to apologize, when to forgive, what hurts, to share, privacy, personal space, when to stop, when it’s Ok, etc.
Not sure if this helps, but it does work for me at my house with my kids!
I cannot believe Luke has allowed me to even write this much this morning. That’s prob why it’s so long; I had an opportunity to actually share ?
Thank you for your sweet words, Sarah! You are such a good mom and your insights are so helpful. I’m glad Luke let you leave a long comment, too! 🙂
Since we’re chatting, I’m going to ask a question I’ve had for a long time. I feel like I’ve been reading your blog too long to ask, but here goes….how do you pronounce your name?
I loved this post, so I say keep them coming. I’d also like to see your latest Stitch Fix(es)!
It’s pronounced like Mariah Carey. 🙂 Thanks for your feedback!
Hi Maryea,
I enjoyed your first coffee chat!
Although we never met, I love and resonate with everything you write and I wish we would live closer as I think we could be very good friends :).
Please bring back the fashion posts. I live in Canada and so far I did not find similar services like the ones you mention, but I am sure at some point I will.
I read the book you mentioned as I, too, was looking for ways to help my 2 young children become best friends and not enemies. I loved the book and I have a post with my thoughts on it coming up.
Thank you for every post and recipe you share with us!
XO
I’m excited to see your review on the book! Thanks for your comment, Alina. 🙂
I’m definitely down with reading the coffee talk posts! Sometimes those are my favorite posts because it lets me in on the lives of my favorite bloggers and to remind myself that people are so much more than their recipes on their blogs.
How awesome that you were able to have a beach vacation sans kids. I remember you did this before and I praised you for going. 🙂 It’s something I hope my husband and I will be able to do when we have kids. It seems really good for your own sanity and for a marriage.
Oh man, my cousins daughter, Emily had that same sass when she was 8 years old. She’s 11 now and still pretty sassy but to me it was just hilarious. Hopefully she’ll grow out of it. Good luck!
Vacations without kids is something we’ve prioritized for our marriage. It is SO important to have that time for each other. Someday, the kids are going to be out of the house, and we have to still like each other at that point. 😉
I love naps, I understand mourning them being done. Maybe he will agree to a quiet time. We still do those with our bigs on the weekends…
And I think the fact that she behaves at school and feels like she can try things out at home is a good sign that she trusts you and that you feel safe to her. Take it as a compliment momma (although this momma of a 10.5 year old wants to scream at the incessant eye rolling and sass…) ?
I have always enjoyed your voice. Keep it up!
Thanks so much, Cary.
I’ve tried quiet time, but not with much luck. Lots of running up and down the stairs to get him back in his room, though, so I guess it does give me some extra exercise. 😉
Love the chatty post! It’s great to be able to connect with like-minded people. I don’t have that in my real life. 🙁
My 3 1/2 year old son is leaning towards giving up his naps, at least on the weekends. He sleeps for 2 hours at daycare each day (and then can’t get to sleep at night!) and then lately no naps on the weekend. So hard to get anything done. Also, he too, needs all his stuffed animals in bed with him. No room for him!
Glad you had a nice, relaxing vacation. I absolutely love that coverup!
Thanks, Michele. I agree…it’s nice to find like-minded people to connect with.
I gave up trying to institute “quiet time” when my son’s naps ended, but maybe it’ll work for you! It was amazing the amount I could get done during nap time, and now those things cut into husband time in the evenings, or just don’t get done. Mourn away. My daughter is 16 months and I try really hard to not think about the fact that she won’t be little and sweet forever!
I haven’t had good luck trying to get him to do quiet time. 🙁
I personally love this post! As you said, when we read a blog we “feel” like we know the person and posts like this make me feel that even more. I think for many of us silent Blog browsers- it is so nice to read about the “little” things as most of us are struggling with these things just like you! I can completely relate to the sibling fighting and the 7-8 year old sass!
By the way, I love that you are doing monthly challenges. My (old!) blog, Deconstruct The Yuck, was about doing a different 30-day challenge each month, for an entire year. Although it was a lot of work, I learned an incredible amount that year- about others, the world and most importantly, myself.
Keep up the great work! ?
Thanks so much for your kind words, Meagan. I really appreciate you taking the time to comment. 🙂
I have two daughters, college age now. They went through little phases like that and they still do once in awhile. They’re learning about who they are and experimenting with different behavior techniques. Maybe they’ve seen friends behave that way and they want to see how you’ll react. They’re also figuring out who they are and they want their own identity, so they act out against their brother/sister as their way of saying, “I’m me and this is who I am but I don’t know who that is yet so just go with it!” I recommend “For Parents Only: Getting Inside the Head of Your Kid,” by Shaunti Feldhahn and Lisa A. Rice. My girls and I have a wonderful relationship with each other and I think it’s because we talk a lot and I listen a lot, guide them and let them make mistakes. I’ll bet Meghan has reached a new developmental level, a deeper way of thinking than in the past. It’s a blessing to be able to watch them take those steps, and sometimes really hard too. You’re doing great – just keep being you!
Your words make so much sense! Thanks for the book recommendation; I’ll check it out.
Isn’t it incredible that the Internet connects so many people across crazy distances…?!? But then again, it’s totally natural, because we connect through our passions, healthy living. If you follow blogs longer it really feels like meeting up with friends!
So the naps are over! Wow! I hope you figure out your schedule situation soon!
Have a great weekend!
Thanks, Kate–you, too!
Love chit chat. Add it any time you want. If we lived closer (I’m in Indianapolis) I would love to be eyeball to eyeball friends with you. 🙂 Tidbits on me: I actually grew up in Ohio near Marietta, along the Ohio river. I have two older (19 & 17) teenage daughters and my younger daughter totally has the eye roll thing down. 🙂 Funny hat Meghan is currently doing it too,. I think it is just a new trend. also can relate to all the stuffed animal’s in Luke’s bed. Ha! They are so cute!!!
Glad you and your husband were able to get away. That is so important…not to mention refreshing.
Have a wonderful weekend!!
Thanks, Kathy! You, too!