It's me. It's Monday.

1. Have I mentioned that I like purple? I'm getting a little obsessive about. It's like I can't buy anything unless it's purple. Friday I went and got my hair cut. And dyed.


It's purple. It makes me happy. I also had to go buy some purple eyeshadow. Somebody stop me, please! It's obnoxious!

2. Some friends of ours had a baby on Friday. The labor went really fast and they ended up not making it to the hospital in time. She was born in the car!* And I'm REALLY happy that mom, dad and baby are all safe and sound after that wild ride! Also, I'm a big fan of holding babies.


Doesn't it look like I'm about to just slurp her right up? Yum!

3. I've been going to therapy for over two years. And can I just say that I love it? Cuz I do. I love it. I go every other Monday. And so every other Monday I just might include a shout out to my therapist for Thank God It's Monday. I'm a wholer and healthier person because of therapy.

4. It may sound cheesy, but I am thankful for drugs. Not the illegal kind, the OTC kind. Ibuprofen, more specifically. I woke up with a headache this morning, but a little Advil knocked it right out. Also, I'm thankful for Zantac almost every single day. Gah! Stupid stressful life! I mean, uh, yay for this life that is wonderful and filled with things for which to be thankful!

5. Suicide soup! My friend J and I went to Au Bon Pain and I couldn't decide which kind of soup I wanted. So I got all three. Mac and cheese on the bottom, broccoli and cheddar in the middle, and italian wedding on top. It was super yum. I may get it again tomorrow.

*Luckily, the father's cousin, who happens to be a doula, was with them in the car and helped deliver the baby. Did you hear that? A DOULA! Holy crap, I might have to rethink this whole doula thing.

Thankful that I can pretend it's still Monday

Okay. Monday. Time to be thankful. For happy things.

Here go:

1. My tomato plants. Remember my tomato plants?

Here they are when I first planted them in their current container.



And here they are now!
I know it's really late in the season and I might not get any tomatoes from them and if I do, they'll prolly be gross, but I'm really proud that I grew these from seeds.

Also, I have a flower.

No tomatoes yet (or maybe ever), but I'm really happy about this flower.

2. Paint - the painting has not gone as well as I had hoped. We got some tinted primer, but it was really thin and it looked terrible the first time I primed.


But since I am trying to be happy about things, I'll say that I am thankful for second coats.

There. That's a little better.

3. Modern obstetrics - My bro and s-i-l are having a baby in February. I'm super grateful that there are doctors and nurses and midwives who can take care of pregnant ladies and their babies. And I'm glad to know that 'Lil Baby Tiny is doing great. See you in 20 weeks, 'Lil Baby Tiny!

4. The internet. It's strange, I know. But the internet can do some great things. Like help my friend's family find homes for dogs after an unexpected death. That's way cool.

5. Warm days - I know last week I said I was thankful for fall! What gives?! I like the fall weather, but I'm happy to be eased into it by having a few more warm, open-toed shoes days before the cold death of winter.

Thank God It's Monday - again!

Mondays ever get you down? Man, they do me. I start feeling it sometime Sunday afternoon, this vague sense of uneasiness about the coming week, and I wonder why Monday mornings seem more frequent than Friday afternoons.

Anyway, to help beat the Monday blues, it's time for another Thank God It's Monday, where I spend some time thinking about things that made me happy in the past week.

1. Summer Plum - I love purple. I own lots of purple things. My brush is purple, my comb is purple, so is my toothbrush, my hairdryer, my razor, my loofah, my current toenail polish. Love. It. Soon, my bedroom will be purple, too! Can't. Wait.

2. Fall color - the leaves are starting to change here in Philly. Growing up in Dallas, I never understood the fascination with fall foliage. 'Cause, you know, leaves are green and then they turn brown and then they fall off. Big deal. Oh, but it's different here. Beautiful shades of red and yellow and orange! So great! And it has started.

3. Pumpkin orange - Last May, Jeff and I went to the Penn Move Out Sale and I got a pumpkin orange corduroy jacket for $5. The cooler weather has given me a few chances to wear it and I love it. (If you ever see me wearing it, I'll probably tell you again that I got it for $5.)

4. Ambiance - I spent Thursday evening with my friend Julie. It was cool evening and we sat on her converted from porch and drank hot tea and talked. There was music in the background and the lights were dimmed. (Had I been with Jeff instead, it would have been romantic.) Just a lovely, relaxing time.

5. Late nights - I hope that someday Jeff and I have children. In the meantime, though, I sure am enjoying our no kids life. After leaving Julie's on Thursday, I met up with Jeff at another friend's house and played games for a few hours and came home after midnight. I don't know why, but it makes me feel young to be out and about in the middle of the night. (Don't ask me how I felt the next day.)

What about you? What good things happened to you this week?

Thank God It's Monday

Have you ever heard of Not Me Monday? If you read MckMama's blog, you probably have.

The premise behind Not Me Monday is to share all (some) of the embarrassing things you did in the past week, but you say it in such a way that sounds like you didn't actually do that because you are too classy and together and you would never wear your bathing suit bottoms as underwear because there was no clean laundry, thankyouverymuch.

And Not Me Monday is sometimes replaced by Not My Child Monday, where you talk about the things that your child most definitely did not do, like play with a toad for three hours, even though it died after two.

The thing about Not Me Monday, though, is that it's for people who live crazy, hectic lives, lives filled with children who make things crazy and hectic.

I am not one of those people. For me, Not Me Monday, would be boring and repetitive. Basically every week I would say, "I certainly did not sleep with my makeup on again. I take better care of my skin than that" and "I did not go 48 hours without a shower just because showering seemed like too much effort, and besides, it's Saturday, who am I going to see at Target?" and "I did not eat cereal for dinner again because there was no food in the house because I didn't go shopping because I had cereal in the house and I could just eat that instead of real food."

Of course, I could do Not My Dog Monday instead. But those would all sound the same too: "My dog did not try to help us clean up the back yard by eating her own poop" and "my dog did not try to bite Jeff because he thought Jeff was going to take away his toy" and "my dog does not leave so much dog hair lying around the house that it forms tumbleweeds, and if he did, I certainly would not let said tumbleweeds sit around for two weeks."

And all those things I didn't do, it wasn't because my life is crazy busy taking care of 14 children. It was just because. That's all. I got up, and got dressed and went to work and came home and ate cereal and watched TV and went to bed and didn't go shopping, didn't clean up the tumbleweeds, didn't take off my makeup (except tonight I did), etc.

So anyway, all of that to say, I think I came up with my own "Monday" idea.

TGIM - Thank God It's Monday - Because who would do that? I mean, Monday's are so... Munday.

Here's why:
1. I need a day devoted to thinking about good things, and not bad things and
2. TGIM helps me realize that how often good things come my way and
3. Mondays are just a part of the process. Mondays come and go, and good things are scattered along my life throughout.

Thank God.

So, welcome to the first ever Thank God It's Monday. Here are some things from this past week that I am thankful for.

1. I took pictures of flowers that look like this:

2. I sat in the cool grass and the warm sun (with my wonderful husband):

3. Autumn got tired (she went swimming!):

4. I sat by a waterfall (and smiled a fake smile):

5. I got eaten by some topiary:

6. When Jeff and I were talking about marriage and how it had changed us and if there was anything we lost that we'd like to get back, he quoted Blue Like Jazz and said, "...marriage is worth the trade. You lose all your freedom but you get this friend. This incredible friend."

I'm most thankful for that last one.