Good Morning Fellow Mama’s,

I did a lot of thinking last night.  While I often, almost always, think way too much, I did reflect on the past year for quite a while.  When I started my journey last summer, it was because I finally had closure.  My divorce, while in the end was an amicable one, wasn’t the case last June.  After 5 months of separation, we decided that we wanted to try again and see if we couldn’t make it work.  My son was in Boston for summer vacation and this was our perfect opportunity.  To my surprise, we ended it late June with a physical bout of just anger.  We were done!  Too much anger, resentment, and too much emotion for us to ever work healthily.  That day, we became ugly people.  It was the closure I needed desperately.  My misery and oh woe is me attitude lasted about two weeks.  Mid July, I woke up one day and said ENOUGH!

By September, I wrote my post on minimizing.  I needed to make my entire life different.  I needed to start over and start over MY WAY!  Though the next few months, I read blogs, read articles, websites, watched You Tube videos and learned a lot.  I started implementing things little by little, perfecting them as I go.  Most all I still have set in place and much more I want to do.

But sitting on my porch last night I was thinking how all these changes have impacted me and my life.  By cooking from scratch and going back to basics, I’ve learned control.  It’s not as easy to snack and binge if the food isn’t made!  It’s not easy leaving the house to get a burger if there is no money left in the budget.  And by making things myself I learned portion control because ultimately I’m making enough for a few meals.  By the time I’m done cooking, I’m tired, I haven’t sat down yet after a long work day, I just don’t have that IM STARVING appetite.  I enjoy sitting with my son discussing our day and rarely finish my plate.  To date, I’ve lost 13lbs in the past two months. No beer, no fast food, no eating out, no soda, nothing pre-packaged, nothing frozen except what I made.

I am also more organized.  My house runs like clock work.  We are on time for the most part, things have their place, I now have my home management binder, my grocery plan, cooking plan, cabinets are organized for finding things easily.  I LOVE coming home after work now where as before I dreaded it. I couldn’t be alone…ever!  Now, I stay occupied and busy.  A lot of what was adding to my insanity was my house was a mess.  Not a mess as far as clutter and crap lying everywhere, I had piles in corners, closet full of clothes that didn’t fit, the trunk of my car was full of useless crap I could throw away, my son still had a toy box LOL at 11 years old full of toys, my home just needed an overhaul.  I kept a lot of things because it was the only thing during my marriage I could control.  It made me happy to know I “chose” to hold on to things and they stayed.  Letting go of these things gave me a sense of relief.  A huge weight lifted on my shoulders and I could finally breathe.  I highly recommend doing this every few months.  You won’t be disappointed and it will revamp your life and give you the boost you need if you fall off the frugal wagon a bit.  It was my turning point.

I’m also genuinely happy!  My organization, money-saving, and budget skills are doing a number on my happiness meter!  I’m not running ragged.  I’m ONE mama, who has ONE kid, on ONE income, and I’m only ONE person.  It’s hard as hell.  But maintaining a schedule by way of my binder, Cozi app on my phone, and my pocket calendar, I can stay on top of things, plan them out, create a routine and get everything done.  It’s been a lifesaver.  I’m no longer absolutely exhausted.

In closing, a happy mama is a happy kid.  Our attitude rubs off on our children.  If we are happy, they are happy as they feed off our energy.  By my organizing my life and my home, developing strategies that make being mom doable, I can have a calmer demeanor for my son.  He is less agitated and less anxious.  With his ADHD this is a huge accomplishment for both him and I.  He is picking up some skills along the way too and is finding that my homemade food tastes a thousand times better than the grocery store equivalent.

So far so good, but we are becoming ONE HAPPY HOME =)

Just my thoughts…