I get a little obsessed.
A little crazy.
In the words of Nacho Libre, “And over there is a crazy lady.”
He’s talking about me.
Emmett’s 16th birthday has been on the calendar for oh…say…16 YEARS.
And when do I start planning it? I started thinking about it a month or so before his birthday. We talked about if it should be a surprise or not a surprise. Two weeks before the day of the party? That’s when I got to the planning place. (andddd…ummm….that’s when the invitation should have already been out…I realize this.)
I was trying to make decisions about what to do. And I wanted this party to be amazing since we only do big parties every 5 years.
This would be the last friends party before leaving home. It had to be off the charts.
And so…I became obsessed.
But that’s kind of my thing. Obsession.
Occasionally.
I started coming up with ideas for a Nacho Libre and Napoleon Dynamite party once we decided surprise parties aren’t quite all they’re cracked up to be.
And…
That was when the true crazy, focused, overboard lady came out to play.
I think my family saw that crazed look in in my eye and knew that only one thing mattered. Emmett’s party.
Every living moment would be devoted to Emmett’s party.
And thankfully, I have a family that’s down with that.
They are happy to jump on board to help make things happen, they get excited with me.
Together we worked on the little details of Emmet’s Napoleon vs. Nacho party.
Emma did a drawing of Trish (from Napoleon Dynamite)
Mike sketched my vision of the invitation (and did it perfectly)
Miriam cut fringes for hanging in the back yard
Emmett went to Party City and Goodwill with me to find just the right wigs for costumes and and the perfect recreation clothes for Nacho.
Grace spent hours in fabric stores finding just the right color nun fabric for Encarnacion and crosses for necklaces
Mike and Emmett shopped for tatter tots and corn on the cob to put on a stick
It became a family obsession…
and everything else went out the door. We gave up stuff for this grand, chaotic adventure…there was no bedtime reading, no dinner around the dinner table, and all surfaces in the kitchen were covered with party creations. Everything was secondary to Emmett’s party.
The whole week was not balanced. Not even close. It was not the way we envision balanced people living their lives.
But is was living!
It was exciting and fun and thrilling to be on a mission to make something grand happen…TOGETHER.
It was familyness in an amazing way! It was ugly and messy and crazy and our house was trashed and our life was one minute of chaos blurred into the next minute of chaos.
And sometimes that just works!
The thing is, as moms we sometimes think that there’s a perfect way to do mom-hood. We have a vision in our head of what it’s supposed to look like. That dreamy, fairy tale, looking thing, in our mind, isn’t what we have and so the way we measure our life ends up always coming up short.
But what if the way you do mom-hood is already awesome?
What if who you are, the way your day goes, the way you spend your time already measured up to what you want your family to look like? Who you want to be? What if you saw all of the good you are doing instead of all of the ways you’re falling short?
The week of Emmett’s birthday I could totally have looked at it and seen all of the ways that I fell short of my perfect mom dream/fantasy I have in my head…the one where my kids go to bed every night at 8pm, I get up at 5am and have devotional time, I work perfectly from 9am-2pm after I go running for an hour and eat a perfectly healthy breakfast.
Honestly, though, if I’m waiting for 7 days in a row to go like that, I’m going to miss most of my life…and all of the awesomeness that happens everyday.
Realizing that even that crazy week of chaos and planning a birthday party had lots of familyness in it (and the kind of familyness I love), makes even the days that don’t come anywhere near the ‘perfect mom-hood day’ somehow end up being perfect days anyway…
What does one of your non-perfect/chaos days look like? What perfection ideas are you fighting against?
Make sure to sign up for all of the super fun stuff I send from the Familyness Fort!
14 Comments
smiling SO big!!!!!! that cake! those costumes! way to knock it out of the park!! xoxo, -m-
Thank you, Melanie! We had such a great time!
That is so so true and so on time for me to read and rethink my ideal day. Thank you for sharing! I’m constantly fighting the idea, that my home should be clean and my days should be planed… But that’s not true with little ones. Still the most important is that I am the good mom for them (not for my home 🙂
That’s pretty tempting, Ausra! Having a crazy messy home can make me feel a little crazy so I hear you on that one. Having a clean space can sometimes be really challenging with kids. When I was first a young newlywed I was pretty obsessive about having our house clean. We cleaned our bathroom every weekend. I have NO idea what we cleaned. Not compared to what needs to be cleaned now! 🙂 Over the years I’ve been able to slowly give up the idea of a completely clean home. It comes in steps. At the same time, I don’t want to live in a sty. I have a few ideas for you but I’ll share one here and then I really ought to do a blog post about it…we’ve evolved with our ways to keep things clean without being obsessed.
Are you able to have a space that can be yours that you can keep clean? I know when I want to accomplish something I like to start with a clean space…when you have little kids (and big kids) it can sometimes feel like you’re living in a mine field of toys or clothes or backpacks. If you can have a quiet space where kids are not allowed it can help you to save your sanity and give up a perfectly clean space in the rest of your house…knowing you have a place of your own (no matter how small) to escape to for moments of solitude can really help that feeling of wanting a perfectly clean house.
You seem to be doing a wonderful job of knowing what’s most important to you and acting on that. Being aware is such a big part of it. I’d love to hear what you’ve discovered over the last couple of months. I’m confident you’ve been inspired in your home life!
Thanks for sharing one of the things you struggle with, Ausra. 🙂
Absolutely love this post! Two of my favorite movies … and how you poured all your energy into it as a family makes it something really special. Love all your posts. 🙂
Thank you, Stacy! I agree with you, having all of our family be part of the entire planning and creating made it especially wonderful. I’m sure you have tips to share. I’d love to hear them!
holy smokes!!!!! Amazing party! So glad I got to see the pictures!
And I love your perspective about finding the perfection in the chaos 🙂
Thank you, Brooke! It was so super fun!
AMAZING party!! I absolutely LOVE it!!!
You guys are hilarious. When Mike sent Jay a picture of the invitation, we laughed so hard, and we both wished we could be part of the celebration. So glad you shared more pictures!
I love what you created here! So wonderful! Hope E had an awesome celebration… it certainly looks that way!
Thank you, Ajira! It was completely awesome!
Where did you find the blue v neck sweater for Nacho?
Marin, we found the Nacho blue v-neck sweater at Goodwill after a lot of searching. I wish I had easier news for you! Are you going to have a Nacho Libre party or is it for a Halloween costume?