Rise

What time do you rise in the morning? Do you set an alarm? Do you hit the snooze button several times before you actually get up? Why do you get up in the mornings?

I've always been an early riser. I mean, I don't wake up and bound out of bed with excitement to get up. No, I would much rather take the dogs potty and then come back to bed for another hour or more. But once I'm awake, I'm glad I'm awake and I go ahead and get started with my day.

Easing into my morning is necessary for me. I don't like to rush in anything that I do. I am more of a slow and steady kind of girl. Getting up early in the morning gives me the opportunity to start my day slow instead of hurried, even if I am getting up way earlier than I wish I was.

I set my alarm for 4:00 a.m. When it goes off I sit up, shut it off, and immediately turn on the light. The dogs are awake by then and ready to go potty so I grab my robe, head downstairs to take them out, and fix myself a cup of hot green tea. Then I am awake.

What in the world do I do at that crazy hour?

First I climb back in bed with my tea, one of the dogs (because the other two head into a kids room to go back to sleep), and do a little reading. This is my time for personal development. Right now I am reading little bits of Liturgy of the Ordinary by Tish Harrison Warren.

Then I grab my phone for all of that mindless social media junk. I review Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat, look at my e-mails (99% junk mail), and then do a little blogging.

At 5:15 a.m. I get up and get on my workout clothes and drink my pre-workout drink, Energize. At 5:30 a.m. it's time to workout with Beachbody on Demand. Finally, it's coffee time! (I don't like to drink coffee until I have my workout complete. It gives my body a chance to take advantage of the antioxidants in the green tea and then be flushed with water and lemon.)

Once I am done working out, I get ready for work. At about 7:00 a.m. I am downstairs making my green smoothie with Shakeology, getting my coffee ready for work, and brushing my teeth.

Then I'm out the door and to work by 7:45 a.m.

And all that will change in just about a week when Brynne goes back to school with 5:30 a.m. basketball practices. On the days she has practice, I will get up at 4:00 a.m., immediately drink my Energize, workout, take her to practice, come home and shower and get ready, and then sit down for some social media, Bible study/personal development, and blogging. I won't like those days as much, so on the days she doesn't have practice I'll go back to the other schedule. The alternative is to get up at 3:00 a.m. to do all that I want to do to ease into my day. But even I'm not that crazy.

Why do I do all of this? To keep my sanity and to be the healthiest version of myself as possible, both physically and mentally.

To make it all work I have to get a solid 7 hours of sleep, which means I am in bed by 8:00 p.m. (most nights) to read and shutting off the light and asleep at 9:00 p.m. On an average day this all works perfectly. But it takes commitment. It takes me saying "No" to a lot of things.

Doing all of this means making myself a priority in my life. Gasp!

Everybody else gets taken care of between the hours of 8:00 a.m. and 8:00 p.m. They are fed, taxied, schooled, dressed, loved, snuggled, disciplined, activitied, and we even usually get in a television show together every night (we love anything Gordon Ramsey!). But the other 12 hours are mine. And they should be because, say it isn't so, this is my life. As I think about it, I don't ask anyone else to do anything else for me at all during the day, except pick up after themselves! It's more than okay if I take the time to take care of myself. And it's okay if you do, too.

That might require you getting up WAY before the sun comes up, and it might require you to go to bed much earlier than you really want. But I guarantee that it is worth it! It's not easy all the time, but it is worth it.

And the added bonus is that I have so much more energy and feel so much better about myself. Getting those things accomplished first thing in the morning, especially working out, has me checking about 5 very important things off my list before the sun even comes up in the morning. Talk about a mood-booster.

I challenge you to give it a try. Make of list of all the things you want to accomplish each day (especially those things you never seem to find the time to do). Figure out how much time you want to devote to each thing. Then count backwards from the time you have to start getting things done for others (for me, that's when the first kid gets out of bed or I have somewhere I need to be.) And that will be the time you need to set your alarm. I used to get up at 5:00 a.m., but I found that I was too rushed. So to make sure I was able to get it all done in a slow and steady manner, I made the decision and commitment to bump it back to 4:00 a.m. That was one of the best decisions I ever made.

Stop letting your life live you and LIVE YOUR LIFE!

Wednesday Hodgepodge

Where have you found unexpected magic or delight this holiday season?

In the fun antics of two new kitties. The holiday season is so busy anyway, and we have piled home renovations on top of that. It's been a hectic and frustrating season. But, I have giggled and smiled and felt happy more these past couple of weeks since we have gotten Rebel and Jedi. They are just fun wrapped in fur.

What's your favorite type of holiday gathering? Will you/have you gathered in your favorite way this month?

My favorite gathering has always been Christmas Eve. When my grandma was alive we had it at her house. Now we celebrate at my parents. We exchange gifts with everyone, have a good meal, and just have a really great time. It's probably my favorite day of the whole year.

Time has named "The Silence Breakers" (women who came forward with stories of harassment) 'person of the year' for 2017. Do you agree? If not, who do you think deserves the title?

I'm going to be in the minority here, especially among women, but I do not think they deserve this award. In fact, in an attempt to make women appear stronger, my opinion is that they have made us look weaker. I was sexually harassed by a senior attorney when I practiced law years ago. Later several secretaries went to the partners reporting his harassment, and they should have. When it blew up I was questioned as to why I didn't come forward. I told the partners that I was a grown ass woman and could handle him myself, which I did. I put a stop to it believing that if he tried to make me lose my job and the firm did not support me, it was not somewhere I wanted to work in the first place. As women we have got to stop demanding equality and then crying when we are are treated like men. Women do have the right to have equal opportunities in the workplace. But they better toughen up if they are going to enter into those positions. We are tougher than this, women. It is an uncomfortable position to be harassed, absolutely. But, we don't have to stand for it while it's happening. And if we do in order to gain position and promotion and "equal rights", then we are partly to blame for allowing it to continue to happen.
If we are going to name a group as 'person of the year' then my vote is for "The Teachers". In this day and age they have an impossible job of raising the youth of today, yet they get up everyday and do it against all odds.

How did you spend your time this year? Are you happy about that? Elaborate.

No, I felt like I have spent my time spinning my wheels this year, running to the next thing only to be preparing to run to the next. This is not the peaceful, slow life I want to live. I need to make some changes in 2018, but I do not see an ability to make that happen much. Super early rising with particular attention to exercise and nutrition and then doing everything possible to shut down early in the evening is about the only thing that keeps me going through the busy days. Making rest and quiet a priority on the weekends in something else I can do.

Bid farewell to 2017 in 10 words or less.

"Hit the road, Jack, and don't ya come back."

Insert your own random thought here.

It's 5:00 a.m. and it's time to get up out of my warm bed and workout. I tell you, I cannot wait until this weekend. I have some projects to do at the house, but I am planning to do some major vegging out. This body needs some rest.

The Hap Hap Happiest Christmas

First of all, welcome back to Taulman Times. A lot has changed since you were here last, so it might take a while for us to get caught up. As you can see, the blog layout is pretty primitive. I might make some changes later. Then again, I might not.

It is currently 5:00 p.m. on December 26, 2017. It is snowing. I am laying in bed in my new attic bedroom watching it snow while drinking a cup of coffee. It doesn't get much better than this.

In the past four days we have worked hard to get my master bedroom moved upstairs and to get Brynne's bedroom moved into my old one. We still have a lot to do (the addition is far from complete), but it sure feels good to be in a fresh, new space.

We had a great Christmas. As our house is still in construction chaos, Collin and Kyndal hosted our annual Christmas Eve "Christmas Vacation" movie viewing and all festivities on Christmas Day. Although it was really difficult for me emotionally to give up control of having the activities at my house, it was neat to be able to spend time as a family at my grown-up daughter's home. She and Collin have created such a wonderful home for their family.

This year I bought each member of the family a Christmas Vacation quote t-shirt and matching pj bottoms. We opened them on Christmas Eve. Once the first person had his open and everyone else figured out what they were getting, they got really excited to see which t-shirt was theirs. I tried really hard to pick out ones to match the personalities of the ones wearing them. I did pretty good. Then when we watched the movie we each stood up when our quote was being said. It was lots of fun.

Christmas Day was a lot of fun, filled with a yummy biscuits and gravy breakfast and then a gift-a-thon. There were great gifts exchanged! Favorite gifts were: Kyndal's personalized stadium chair for watching all of Brynne's sporting activities; Dawson's gandolf pipe and lighter; Eli's Xbox One X, and Brynne's personalized sports duffel. My family spoiled me with all of the things that are most important to me ...  items to create my tranquility corner, a canvas of my grandson, Bennett, and a Kuerig for my upstairs wine and coffee bar. (I don't put tags on the kids' gifts. I wrap each kids' gifts in a separate wrapping paper. They have to get a piece of the paper from the bottom of their stocking to tell them which gifts are theirs. Then they dig under the tree to get them. It's fun!!)

A cool thing we did this Christmas was to make One Word bracelets using a kit I purchased MyIntent.org. Some of the words chosen for the bracelets were Emcompass, Achieve, Live, Journey, and Might. Then we took turns answering questions from thought-provoking cards provided in the kit.

My word for 2017 is Might. Have you chosen yours? Hope your Christmas was Merry and your New Year is the Hap Hap Happiest ever!

Who are those people in that photo up there? This blog is now Under Construction and will be reopening in January.

Until then ....