Pinot, Bretzels, and Cathedrals

Gone are the days of me thinking that the start of the year was the opportunity for fresh beginnings and habits.  The same can be said of resolutions- resolutions in itself has become very untrendy, and a hashtag line by how not to approach the New Year.  Given that I am really not prepared to give up my Chablis/Chardonnay/Champagne/Bordeaux wine, and neither am I actually going to run any form of even a ¼ marathon, I am going to remain positive that I have not broken any resolutions.  Neither am I going to deceive myself into thinking that I am going to become a health nut, content to eat chai seeds and tofu.

Don’t for a moment think that I passed away my New Years Day (while sipping on copious amounts of Champagne) not thinking about how to make a change in 2016.  Once again I promised myself to be more active in my girls play times (often, if they are left to play alone, they get on with it, and why should I mess up their apple cart?), and while this has almost un-achievable 100% expectations, they are unlikely to ever let me forget about them.

However, in line with this, one thing I am going to try this year, is to take photos of all of us, and our social gatherings.  When we were going through Mom’s photos in June, we realised that almost 90% of her photos taken over the years were just of the children, and there were very few of us with her.  While I know in my heart that she was always with us, it is sad that we don’t have any photo reminders.  So this year, I am going to make sure that we have more photos taken with the girls-not just OF them, but WITH them, and the bigger challenge will be that a ‘selfie’ doesn’t count….  Also, I would like to see more photos of us as adults- when we are gone, I would still like my children to remember those people who shared to shape their lives.

More importantly this year, I am going to do my best to not sweat the small stuff.  This may seem complacent, because already I suspect it may be a ‘way-out’ of certain necessary activities (like finding a new English speaking gynae), but that’s what I am going to try this year.

For example, today is the first proper working day of 2016, and my morning thoughts ran along these lines:

1. I’ve lost our post box keys.  And I have searched high and low for them.  Already I’m stressing because of the language barrier that will see me feeling very unsure and insecure of myself, but also, on the key ring for these post-box keys, is a little metal ‘dog-tag’ with my name on it, which was punched out for me by my brother when he was 14 years old, and this key ring has been with me for 23 years.  I just need to let it go.
2. I have ALSO lost a winter woollen hat.  It’s grey, and beautifully soft, and I have only had it for 7 months- roughly the time that has passed since I nicked it from Mom’s cupboards in June.  I’ve only worn the hat for less than a month, and it too has disappeared from my house- most likely dropped out of my hands while carrying various pieces of superfluous kiddie winter gear when we had uncharacteristically warm December weather.  These lost items have really baffled me, and I want to lament their demise, but like I said, I cant afford to sweat the small stuff.
3. On top of these lost items, is the great big box sitting on my kitchen counters that was delivered 6 days late from Amazon.  It contains rather expensive wooden train set pieces (and its expensive only because I used my SA credit card to pay for them just at about the time the exchange rate plummeted).  It was supposed to be a gift for my nephew, whose birthday was last November, and bad Aunty that I am, just figured we could courier gifts back via our esteemed visitor.  I feel like the BIGGEST loser that I never ordered the gift in time for Christmas post rush, and now the poor guy is still without his birthday present. (Granted, there was pretty much no space in Dads bag, and it might have had to travel in his hand luggage, along with the Christmas fruit cake, Greek coffee pot, and one or two other tourist items.) But still, the shame…

4.  Something fun to deal with this month is Beth’s bi-weekly extra French class.  Oh, so much of yay.  I just love hanging around schools in the impending darkness, waiting.  In this case, its going to be a pain, because of the girls combined timing.  On both Monday and Tuesday, I will have to wait for either one, or the other, for 45 minutes, outside, in the cold.

But, I’m not going to sweat the small stuff… oh dear.  Already the thought of it depresses me.

With that in mind, let me tuck into my lunch of macaroni, Black Forest Ham, and tomato sauce, without even so much of a whisper of any type of seed.  Just full-on carbs.  (granted, I’m not having a glass of wine.)

So, in signing off, let me ask:  please tell me that you’ve crashed through some of your own carefully laid out plans!

Au revoir, auf wiedersein, ciao,

And lots of love,

Xxx