Time Flies, 2nd Sleep, and 30 Day Challenge

Wow! Labor Day Weekend is upon us already! It was 17 years ago, this weekend that we made the move from Virginia to Oklahoma. It is good to occasionally stop, look back and remember what all God did to enable us and my entire family (my parents, youngest sister, middle sister and her family) to make the monumental move in one 4 month period. My children were 6, 4, and 3 months old and now they are 23 (and married), 21, and 17; time sure does fly. Of course, it doesn’t seem like it at the time, when you have no time to yourself and have 3 kids calling Mom, Mom, Mom, Moooooommmmm, all the time but sitting on this side, I can definitely attest that it really does go by fast.

Brian and Lauren are going on vacation and Sean will house and dog sit for them while they are gone. This is a double whammy for me because I won’t get to see Brian and Lauren while they are gone and my sweet Sean will not be home each night, brightening our home with his sweetness and thus making me FEEL how old my kids are, how much time has flown by, and that he too will be married before I know it, which will be a happy and sad time for me. Happy that he will have found his love but sad that our home will no longer be blessed with his presence on a daily basis.

Holiday Grand Plan starts next week. I’m looking over the website and seeing what I will be doing next week. I know it sounds early to be thinking about Christmas, especially with it being so hot here this week but my sister, my mom, and I like to have all of our shopping DONE by Thanksgiving so that we can thoroughly enjoy our favorite time of the year! Consequently we start shopping sometime within the next 2 months.

One part of the Holiday Grand Plan is cleaning and decluttering the house. Tiffany and I did NOT get our goal accomplished during her month of vacation from school – namely, getting the library and craft/game room clean, although we DID get started in each, we will have to get that remedied very soon! I’m looking forward to gradually getting everything in order so that the holidays are nice, neat, and fun (couldn’t think of an “n” word that meant fun ;) ).

I think I have mentioned before that I, generally speaking, get up when Mike gets up and go to bed when he goes to bed. Left to my own devices I would push myself and stay up until I couldn’t keep my eyes open any longer and then stay in bed the next morning until I felt it was ridiculous to roll over and sleep any more. You see, I don’t like to go to bed and I don’t like to get out of bed either. The problem is that each night I would end up going to bed a little bit later and sleeping in a little bit later the next morning than the morning before, until I would probably end up sleeping most of the day and being awake most of the night. So, I have an external control that helps me stay on track and NOT end up getting my days and nights mixed up.

Sleep ~ LifeOfJoy.meWell, I thought this was odd and that I was just weird but this week I read an article that supported me/proved what I have said about myself. It states that without external cues we would run on a 25.4 hour day! They even said, “In extreme cases, an individual can cycle completely around the clock.” Ha! I knew it! I guess I’d be an extreme case without my love! ;)

I read this other article about alternative sleep cycles, in which most incorporate some naps throughout the day and sleep fewer hours at one time over night. Naps don’t work very well for me, especially short ones. If it isn’t an hour long nap, I don’t feel like it accomplished anything and if I nap for an hour, I feel very groggy when I awake.

These two articles reminded me of one I read several months ago, it might have been this one, about “two sleeps” or “second sleep”. This was the practice, in previous centuries, where people would go to bed when it got dark outside, or shortly thereafter, and sleep for several hours. When they awoke in the middle of the night, they were not bothered by this, as it was a time they would read a book, pray/meditate, or some such other activity for several hours and then go back to bed and sleep for another several hours but not generally sleeping more than 8 hours even though it was spread over a 10-12 hour period. If I ever struggle again, tossing and turning in the middle of the night, I hope I remember this article and go ahead and get up and enjoy some quiet time rather than getting frustrated that I can’t sleep, until I am tired again. ;)

In the month of September I will be participating in the 30 Day Pray for Your Spouse Challenge, which can be found on facebook. I also signed up for The Dating Divas’ 7 Days of Love Program for free by signing up for their newsletter, which I thought I’d already signed up for, but oh well! ;) They have a cute little printable 7 day journal you can print out to go along with it. If you print sign up and print out this journal, don’t cut it like they say to. Instead, fold the pages so that the printing is on the outside. Then insert the loose ends of the pages (fold side out) into the fold of the cover page, and then staple. This makes the pages sturdier and no blanks backs. :)

Well, I’ll go for now. Until next time, God bless,

 Michele ºÜº

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