October is my Spring.
I go kinda dormant in the Summer months. And then in October, I experience THE AWAKENING.
Someone protect the children; it's OCTOBER STEPPER! I go a little crazy and want to do ALL THE THINGS.
I want to be outside all the time.
I randomly burst into a run because I gotta burn off some of this October Sauce and also: WHY NOT?!
I start the plotting. You know. Because energy and that creative burn and HALLOWEEN.
I start a book. A painting. A BLOG!
I start throwing everything away. STUFF IS DUMB when it's October! The kids watch me with suspicion wide in their eyes, making sure I'm not headed for their treasures. They start to check garbage cans. I strike while they're at school, because, remember? PLOTTING.
I remember it's actually FUN to get up in the morning.
I wear. the. fuzzy. BOOTS.
I feel like a tree in the spring, shaking off the dust of a sleepy winter and then shuddering as I examine the newness of my growth. Only instead of blossom buds and sweet fruits, I seem to randomly produce ghost pumpkins and an unreasonable amount of sweaters.
And I feel so FREE, so ALIVE and so ARRIVED that when I hear complaints of cold and gloom and where'd-the-precious-darling-sun-go during these tender October beginnings, I get a little...
Defensive.
(Defensive isn't the word my fingers went for, but this is a FAMILY FRIENDLY blog.)
Bill and I have an inside joke that there was a mix-up somewhere and I am actually not a human girl at all. Human girls typically enjoy warm summer evenings and days spent poolside or at the beach. Turning pretty freckled faces up to the sun and all that. But I'm not a human girl, but a water nymph; preferring the cool and the rain to cloudless blue skies and uninterrupted sunshine.
Clear blue days are BORING.
Bring on the drama of the CLOUDS! That overcast haze that makes everything smell, feel, taste ALIVE.
(The sun and I have an understanding. It's fine.)
And. You guys. HOODIES.
Amiright?
But....I also go completely nuts with house projects. Side gig ideas. Creative outlets. I have more ideas than I can keep up with, and I kind of make my people a little bit crazy with all of my crazy.
Go figure.
So I'm TRYING to reign it in this year. Really.
I mean, we are in the middle of a major back yard overhaul - but that's not my fault. That one started in the dreaded summer months. It's just that now I'm actually interested in getting out there in the dirt!
We are DIY-ing one of those ladder library thingies...re-doing the girls' room (I get to build furniture tonight!! IKEA furniture!!! Puzzle level: MASTER), overhauling the kitchen because I listened to a blog that told me I need a STATION and then we watched Salt. Fat. Acid. Heat. and I now want to be a seriously amazing intuitive cook like Samin.
And I may just secured myself a sign-off from the hubs for a climbing wall for Henry in the back yard. Which might also require building some kind of wall. I mean, probably.
BUT - I'm NOT teaching myself how to sew, or making a pallet swing for the back yard, or accepting every invitation to join interest groups that look interesting, or committing to the PTA because...come on. I'm REINING IT IN.
(OK - I'm totally making a pallet swing for the back yard.)
(I'll just shove those things a little further down the list).
If you see a mushroom cloud of DIY dust form over my house...please send pizza for my kids, because I guarantee I forgot all about dinner.
