Things I've Learned - April 2010

I am often inspired by Amber Strocel's writing at strocel.com. Every month she puts together a review of what she learned during the previous month. What a fantastic exercise in recognizing your trials and triumphs on a regular basis - a sort of personal inventory-taking. So I am unabashedly copying her with my own look back today.

Things I learned in April:

1) How important exercise is to my emotional wellbeing. After exercising almost daily in March, getting back into a routine of good self-care, the days that I missed in April really drove it home for me how much regular activity has a positive impact on my outlook. Action begets action: when I'm taking the time to exercise, I'm getting more done in all areas of my life.

2) That I'd forgotten how great riding a bicycle is. I feel like a teenager again, pedaling my way through the streets of Vancouver. And I'm ecstatic to model a healthy, active, eco-friendly lifestyle for The Imp. I actually resent having to drive my car now.

3) That connecting with other moms in person is always a good time. Also, green shoes!

4) That if I blog regularly, I'm more productive. For several months, I didn't write anything in this space. I always felt like there were more urgent things that needed doing, that time to blog was a luxury I couldn't afford. But the not-writing had me mentally stuck, so most of the other things didn't get done anyway. Now that I'm blogging more regularly, I'm more productive at work, and more patient in parenting. And apparently, others like that I'm blogging too!

5) That my love for good food isn't just about eating, but about creating and sharing.

6) I love taking photos. Love. I'm not creating art (far from it), and I have a lot to learn from a technical perspective, but following through on my commitment to myself to post a photo of Vancouver every single day has made me ridiculously happy. I've especially enjoyed being more aware of and engaged with my surroundings, and finding things I never noticed before. Researching links for the paragraph I write to accompany each photo has me discovering a ton about Vancouver that I never learned in my 17 years of living here. And getting to photo locations by bicycle kills two birds with one stone. Photos + exercise = a really good use of an hour a day.

7) That I had no idea how spoiled I was with regard to The Imp's sleep habits, which went all to hell in the last few weeks with the introduction of the big boy bed. And I am a zombified version of myself as a result. Will happily accept toddler-sleep-inducing advice. At this point I'm on the hairy edge of locking him up in a wooden crate until he's old enough to leave home.



It's so easy with the busy-ness of living to forget to stop and look at what's been accomplished with all that activity. Do you ever take a step back and really look at the aggregate of all that daily "doing"? What have you learned this month?


I've been shortlisted for vancouvermom.ca's Best Vancouver Mom Blogger. I'd be ever so grateful if you'd swing by the voting page, tick my name, and click submit. Thanks!