So I’m sitting here on my couch, thinking about New Year’s resolutions. And I can’t decide what I think.

The truth is, I haven’t done them for the past 18 years because I’ve always created a year list…which always started and ended in May, and so around Jan 1, I was always just in the middle of that, and well, blah blah longreallyboringstoryshort, I just haven’t done them.

But then this year, I did a Life List instead of a year list. And while a Life List should be (theoretically) more difficult, it’s actually waaaay easier because it just consists of a bunch of  things like “Drink champagne while hiking Mount Everest” … things with no deadlines, or even any basis in reality, so I don’t feel the need to actually do anything. I like this.

But then Alice got me thinking. She wrote this swell post about making five writing resolutions for the new year. And I like them. And I like how she’s thinking, so I’m going to go ahead and do five more resolutions for myself that all contain the word more.

1. Wear more color. This year I’ll wear less black and more fun. Like Punky Brewster.

2. Sleep more. I love this one.

3. Run more. I hate running. But I want to do it more because I like the way it makes me feel afterwards. It’s a love/hate thing. And I want to focus on the love.

4. Grow more food and eat it. Ever since we moved to the country, I’ve been growing vegetables…but I always give them away instead of eating them. I don’t totally know what that’s about, but I bet a therapist could have a heyday with it. So instead of paying this therapist, I’m just going to start eating my vegetables.

5. Eat more cake. But not in the obnoxious Marie Antoinette way. Because, obnoxious. But I love cake. It’s so celebratory. So I want to find more reasons to celebrate, then bake cakes to celebrate more often, and then eat those cakes. All of them. I predict, 2012 will be the year of cakes. You heard it here first.

So that about covers it for me. It is decided. I’m now pro-resolution. And I feel good about this. Totally doable. Almost restful. Also, cake.

Here’s to a great 2012!

*Art from Someecards. Get it here.

So here’s another thing about our new life in Central Texas. Football is a big damn deal, y’all. That’s not a stereotype, not just something you see on TV. It’s real. Super real. And as the mother of a little boy, it sorta freaks me out.

Before we moved here, we still lived in Texas. But it’s a big state, and Houston is a melting pot of everything. An international gathering place. (Don’t believe otherwise, no matter what political commercials say.) And the other kind of football was king. Soccer ruled our house. And really, it still does. But I can see its American nameshare sneaking in.

There’s a kiddie football league in our town, where kids can start playing at four years of age. (Spine injury before nine! Yeeehaa!) Harry has no idea that this exists, and I’d like to keep it that way for as long as possible.

There are parades in our little outside-of-the-big-town town for Football. Football parades. That’s right.

The big town we go to everyday for school and work…well, let’s just say it’s rather coocoocuhchoo for the sport. It’s a college town, and the team’s head coach is on the news more than the mayor, the governor (who sadly, gets presidential coverage, sorry about that y’all.), and Austin City Limits combined. My brother calls this coachlebrity ‘The Burnt Orange Jesus.’ It’s true. And Longhorn football is always the news. (“Today in Austin, there was a fire, it’s still hot, and now 27 minutes of UT football analysis!”)

And a few weeks ago, the university that Harry’s parents went to…the school that has never been known for its football anything…this year, our quarterback won the Heisman Trophy and our Alma Mater is going to a bowl game right up the street from our house.

So….

Harry is now super into football. And his number-one Christmas wish was tickets to the Alamo Bowl. And a Baylor jersey. So, that’s where we’re going today. To fling our green and gold afar waaay past his bedtime. Go Baylor! Go football. Etc. Etc.

Next year he’s getting a chess set.

We’re stumbling out of 30 days of Holidaze. And I, for one, am punch drunk.

We had our first Christmas two days after Thanksgiving, and we haven’t slowed down since. I’m still high on sugar and tinsel, traced with claymation specials, Santa sittings, figgy pudding, relative visits, and a partridge in a pear tree.

Maybe it’s because I only have one child that I make things such an all-out sprint, rather than a long-run marathon.

I only have one.

One shot.

And we only have about two more years, three if we’re lucky, of seasonal tidings when he still believes. When it is still so magical. In just a blink of an eye, he’ll be eyerollingly over it. And before we all know it, it won’t be the same.

So, for now, I’m eating it all up. Drinking it all in. Being Merry Merry OhMyGodMerry!

Because when it’s all over, I know it’s going to be one hell of a wake up call.

I’ve always loved ritual. I’ve never been great at complying to it, but I like the idea of traditions, habits, routine. There’s power in that. Babies dig schedule and routine from the moment they enter the world, and it seems we don’t change all that much as we get older.

So maybe that’s the thing. There are a lot of rituals and rules around Advent, including, but not limited to, color, foods, activities, song choice, mascot. It’s really too much for me to keep track of, so mainly, I’m into the calendar.

As you probably know, Advent calendars begin on December 1, regardless of when Advent begins, which can be as early as November 27 and as late as December 3 (I understand that this year it was the 27th). This is usually around the time that people start yelling at me.

See, I typically say that advent starts on December 1, because that’s what my calendar says, and some people find this to be an incorrect statement that needs to be vehemently, immediately, and loudly squashed. With loudness.

Like, for instance, there was this lady today at my small town store (that’s right, I said store, singular).

I mentioned something about how I was making an Advent calendar because tomorrow was Dec. 1 and I needed to get it finished before the first day of Advent, and you would have thought I’d said something offensive about baby Jesus himself. Because this woman went off. First of all, I was wrong. Super wrong. Secondly, she was tired of everyone always saying Advent started on December 1 because it doesn’t and that’s just what’s wrong with Christmas right there. (She even made hand gestures. It was intense. And protestant.)

So yeah.

But no.

I wasn’t trying to ruin her day. I just wanted to make an Advent calendar. About expectant waiting and preparation for the celebration of the the coming of Christ, parceled out with small useless trinkets and candy. That’s all.

Want to celebrate advent with me? There’s still time to make a calendar. Here’s what I did this year. And here are some ideas for easy, quick, inexpensive calendars. And I promise, I won’t yell at you. No matter what day you want Advent to start.

We have barely finished Thanksgiving dinner, we still have Advent and Hanukkah and Christmas and New Year’s to go, and I am already exhausted. Am I alone in this? I can’t remember ever being so tired from the holidays before the holidays…and I blame small town life.

Image by Lou Mora found on Kirtsy.

I completely get the hustle and bustle of the city sidewalks and busy sidewalks dressed in their holiday best, but seriously, in a small town, the feeling of Christmas and all its related holiday cousins is not just in the air, it’s in the water, the land, the molecules. Everything.  And it is exhausting.

Just when you thought that the true spirit of the season was killed in some big box outlet somewhere, let me tell you, that is not so in a small town. Every day, every hour, every minute there is something official and festive happening. The choir concerts, the bake sales, the fire department lighting of the everything. And don’t even get me started on the porch decor.

I’m going to be posting a lot here over the next three weeks about the holidays in a small town. I’m also going to be dusting off my camera to share some things with you.

Because let me tell you, Norman Rockwell is alive and well.

And he is exhausting, ya’ll.

When  it comes to Know-it-alls, here’s what I know: I don’t know what you’re saying. Because I don’t get it. Because there about 87 million versions to 87 stories, and everyone has different experiences within each of them. In the end, the math is blowing my mind. Of course, you know this. Because you know that we know our stories. We get our stories. And, if we’re lucky, we own our stories….which is excellent…And 100% right…And 100% contradictory to 99% of the rest of the stories out there.

So yes, Know-it-alls, for sure know what you know. Own what you know. Speak what you know. And while you’re busy knowing things, please know that other people know their stories too…and most of the time, their stories and their experiences aren’t in alignment with yours. At all.

But they all happened. They all exist. And they’re all valid.

So stop talking.

And start listening. Because when that happens, we might start to hear each other.

And then we’ll all know know more.

(Which you should know, means you’ll be even closer to knowing it all. You’re welcome.)

*Print from Kal Barteski, which I found from my friend Brené Brown’s twitter feed. And Happy Birthday, Brené! Here’s to many more years of imperfectly not knowing and being rad!

I know how time works. Of course, I do. I’m not an idiot.

And yet….

I can not get my brain around how, in just a very few very short years, we went from this…

To this…

(Just focus on the kid on the left. The ice cream cone on the right is my niece, Harper. She likes to wander into every photo she sees happening. She’s cute like that.)

In the blink of an eye.

Because seriously, I just blinked.

And blinking is idiotic.

Because when I open my eyes, and look at just a few costumed photos, I realize we only have a few more to go. Three if we’re lucky.

And then it’s gone.

Halloween is scary.

My friend Jenny is always coming up with these fantastic things that make her (and others) furiously happy. (!!!!!!)  You may know this about her. You may have heard about our Beyonce adventure. Or her WOLVERINES! campaign. Or her ongoing Wil Wheaton collating responses.  Or the time she and her readers saved Christmas.

But on this Halloween holiday, I’d like to talk about something more specifically related to fear and dressing up and furious happiness. I’d like to discuss the brilliance of the Traveling Red Dress adventures.

It started as almost everything does with Jenny…a random idea. She wanted to wear the dress but she couldn’t imagine doing it just for herself…she wanted to share the joy. Because, as silly as it may seem, there’s something a bit magical about that dress. In Jenny’s words...

I want, just once, to wear a bright red, strapless ball gown with no apologies.  I want to be shocking, and vivid and wear a dress as intensely amazing as the person I so want to be.  And the more I thought about it the more I realized how often we deny ourselves that red dress and all the other capricious, ridiculous, overindulgent and silly things that we desperately want but never let ourselves have because they are simply “not sensible”.  Things like flying lessons, and ballet shoes, and breaking into spontaneous song, and building a train set, and crawling onto the roof just to see the stars better.  Things like cartwheels and learning how to box and painting encouraging words on your body to remind yourself that you’re worth it.

So she got it. And she wore it. And she began sending the dress around to those who needed it for whatever reason. All different reasons. All have stories attached to them. And there are many…You can read about them here. (Top photo by Better in Bulk.)

Or here.

Or here.

Or here.

Or even about mine here.

Jenny brought this dress over to my house on my 40th birthday and insisted that we do a shoot. I say insisted because she did insist, but also because I was uncharacteristically hesitant. It wasn’t like I didn’t want to do it…I really, really wanted to do it…but I was also really scared of it. The dress is intimidating. It’s large. And it’s red. And I was uncomfortable with that much energy being focused on me and actually on me.

(And seriously, not to get all Northern California on you, but this dress has some serious energy attached to it. I can’t totally explain it, but imagine the thrill of the biggest-greatest party you’ve ever been to, add some angst from a middle-school tryout for something, plus a side of the excitement you felt on the first Halloween you can remember. It’s like that. Then multiply that energy times all the energy of anyone else who’s worn it, that’s The Energy-of-The-Dress math.)

Plus, if I’m honest, I’ll tell you I was afraid of what the photos would look like. I wasn’t sure that they’d match up to the way I felt in the dress. Or the way I felt about myself at 40. It’s complicated. But on about four levels, I would say, I didn’t want to see myself.

Because even though I still feel almost exactly like I did at 16, I know that I’m not. I’m not at all. The 16-year-old me was naive, and predictable, and safe. While my current self has lived enough and seen enough to know that life is anything but safe or predictable. Sometimes it’s shocking, disappointing, thrilling, and really scary. Sometimes it’s all those things at once. And sometimes the most shocking part is how you’re able to handle it, and how you’re able to wear it.

And that’s the thing about The Red Dress. It’s also the thing about Halloween. There’s power in putting on a costume…becoming something new, something uncharacteristic, something better.

I know tonight, as little kids everywhere don their fantastical princess outfits, their super hero leotards of justice, or (in our case) their super evil Darth Vader garb, for just a few hours, they’re becoming something completely different…and something completely themselves too.

I think costumes and masks get a bad wrap in life and in literature. Of course, it’s always preferable to be authentic, but I believe that sometimes it takes dressing up as something else to recognize who we are.

Happy Halloween.

As I mentioned that I realized yesterday, Halloween is Monday. Oh you already knew that? Well done, You. But for me, it’s all last-minute Friday around here. Here’s what happened: I went to the grocery store this morning. That resulted in all of my Halloween Decor. All of it. (And a bag of Butterfingers). Here’s what we did to decorate in an hour (or possibly less):

1. Jar-o’-Lanterns. I attempted to make Jack o’ Lanterns with Mason Jars. Because I have a lot of Mason Jars. And we had orange paint. And a marker. I saw these originally in this book Martha Stewart just put out (it’s actually really good, lots of easy stuff), and then I’ve seen them around online.

I didn’t follow directions well so we painted on the outside of the jars instead of the inside (as Martha says to do). I was like, “Oh crap. Ruined. I’ll never get that 15 minutes back.” But then Southern Living said to paint on the outside and add some clear glaze spray shiny stuff. I don’t have that, so I’m not doing it. It turned out alright anyway. I think they’re even cuter when you do them right. Harry completely helped me with this, and it’s a great kid activity. So there’s that too.

You’ll need: Mason Jars, Paint, a Black Marker, Thin Wire if you want it. (I had everything but the wire. All of it was at my grocery store.)

Decoration 1: Done.

2. Jack-o’-Lantern Garland. Cut out circles in the shape of jack-o’-lanterns from orange construction paper. Or, my grocery store already had a stack of these already cut out and ready to go (score!).

Draw faces on them with a marker.

Then tape ribbon on the backs of each one to connect them together. Then tape another on the back to cover the tape/ribbon thing.

Hang them.

Tape the extras on random windows throughout the house.

What you’ll need: construction paper and scissors (or already cut out pumpkin shapes), markers, scotch tape, ribbon.

Decoration 3: Done

3. Pumpkins. They’re everywhere right now. There’s a cute little church up the street from me that’s selling them for as low as 50 cents.

We loaded up. We’ve put the all around the house and it’s instantly transformed.

You’ll need: Pumpkins.

Decoration 3: Done

All in all, I spent less than $30, and we’re ready for Halloween. $20 on pumpkins, $1.50 on wire, $8.00 on paper and ribbon.

Not bad for last-minute. Now we have a lot of time left to sit around and eat Butterfingers. As it should be.

Happy Halloween Weekend from Austin!

Okay, so technically it’s been October for 27 days. But I’m somehow just realizing this.

No.

Scratch that.

The truth is, I haven’t realized it yet. But apparently, it is October. And next Tuesday it will be November, and 17 minutes later, they’ll start playing Christmas music.

And then this morning, as I was checking the Internet, I read the first part of this tweet from my friend Karen.

And I was like, um, disgusting. That’s some really old milk. Honestly, Karen. Clean out your refrigerator. Gross.

And then read the second part of the tweet, and I realized that she’s talking about new milk that will expire in five weeks.

And holy shit. It’s December in five weeks.

I haven’t even done Halloween stuff yet.

Clearly, I am a failure as a mother and as a blogger. I should have shared at least four well-styled craft ideas and recipes by now. Orange and black inspirations of pretty for Halloween, healthy and themed alternative treats for costumed tricksters, and perhaps some stylish shrine ideas for Day of the Dead to round it out.

In other words, I have 30 seconds to pull off the CUTEST HALLOWEEN EVER! or I lose. What I lose, I’m really not sure. But it will be OhMyGodISuck completely lost.

So. Anyone have any ideas? Or should I just buy some Butterfingers, break into them prematurely, and call it a (holi)day.

Also, doesn’t it feel like it should be April?