Week 4: What's Saving Me Now

Inspired by this Modern Mrs. Darcy post, I thought I'd do a 7 Quick Takes: What's Saving Me Now edition (linking up with Kelly (hilarious today, BTW) because I like to pretend I'm a real blogger). I needed a reminder to stop seeing everything that's annoying, or angering, or just plain crappy, and see some good in my life, of which there is plenty. So without further ado:

1. My Out of Control Center from a few weeks back is standing strong! There's a big mess of stuff I need to go through hiding under my planner, but I've mostly been able to keep the island cluttered with only appropriate items like a zillion water cups, bagel crumbs and sticky spoons. In an apartment with a house's worth of stuff, the small victories matter! 
2. Read Aloud Revival book lists (found here). I'm loving the Read Aloud Revival podcast and book lists right now. They have boosted my enthusiasm for reading to the kids. I printed the annual calendar to mark off days we read aloud at least 10 minutes. It's not every day, but for me the visual reminder does help me take the time. I love searching the library for treasures and I'm looking forward to the day we finish the Magic Tree House series and can move on to another chapter book for the big kids. 
3. Taking Facebook off my phone has had the expected pleasant result I'd hoped for. I love Facebook for some reasons (keeping track of people I don't want to lose touch with but don't talk to often, finding interesting events, seeing pictures of people I love) and hate it for others. Before Inauguration Day I decided to step back a bit by logging out of the app. I can still access it through Safari, but scrolling and reading comments that way is a pain, and so I haven't done much of it. I log in once or twice a day to check my notifications and respond to things I deem worthy, but excessive scrolling hasn't happened all week and I'm so pleased. Nell wrote this great piece about handling our differences. I disagreed with one commenter who said curating a social media feed that matches your beliefs and interest is a bad idea. I do see how viewing opposing opinions or following people with whom you disagree can be fruitful, but I think that depends on what you are using social media for. I tend to use it to relax, see a few funny things, and keep up with what my far-away friends or favorite bloggers are doing. And so if I want to curate my feed to unfollow people who can be jerks online (but maybe not in real life!) or who are posting constantly so that I can scroll my feed without my blood boiling, I think that's OK. I have plenty of other encounters with position-challenging information and opinions and if I don't want it in my Instagram or Facebook feed, so be it.  
4. Adele. I know I'm the last person on this good planet to fall for Adele. I've always liked her songs that I've heard here and there (thank, James Taylor Pandora station!) but until I finally downloaded Spotify on my phone recently, I hadn't taken the time to really listen. I've been enjoying her amazing voice all week. I typically prefer men's singing voices but she's undeniably fabulous. 
5. Werther's Original Caramel Hard Candies. I'm trying (TRYING) to limit my chocolate intake because I deduced that high levels may have been contributing to my frequent headaches. I recently replaced many, many handfuls of dark chocolate chips with Werther's. They're certainly not as satisfying as dark chocolate, but I had forgotten that I do love them, and they are doing the trick for my after lunch sweet needs. 
6. My Spouse is endlessly patient with my laziness. Some might call him an enabler, I call him a generous husband. I'm grateful that he keeps getting up early to get the crazy toddler out of bed, even though our precious third child screams "I want my mooooooommmmmmmmyyyyy" at him every day. We both wish he'd quit getting up in the 5:00 hour, and I treasure those few extra minutes in my bed each morning. 
7. Inauguration Bad Lip Reading. Nothing needs to be said. 

Hap-happy Friday, folks.