on being the "grownup"

Sometimes I forget that I'm a grownup now.  I forget that if life gets too crazy, I don't have to wait for someone to give me permission:  I can slow it down, even stop it.

I don't need to wait for people to exclaim "I don't know how you DO it all!!" in exasperated admiration.  I don't need to wait till I've gained five pounds from eating chocolate trying to stay awake in order to "do it all."  I don't need to wait for my husband to say, "honey, don't you think that's enough?"

I'm a grownup.  (I may not look or act like one, but that's another post).  I can do this pace thing.  I can cut out unnecessary extras.  I can do hard things!

So today, Monday, official "get it all done" day - here that usually means hit the books / housework / laundry at top speed - I didn't.

I took a nap in the morning while Lil' Snip rested and the girls played with the marble machine they made from a PVC pipe, a box, a funnel, and some shoestring.

We played around with "sun-printing" paper instead of doing Real School (well, actually, it was after we finished Real School, but somehow it felt deliciously illicit all the same).

I napped again in the afternoon during Quiet Time.  And then made tea, and a ridiculous number of entries in my gratitude journal while I sat on a step in the sunshine with my mug.

After Quiet Time, since the first attempts at "sun-printing" were noticeably less than stellar, we tried again, patiently watching the sun fade the special paper ... all except where our objets d'art cast their shadows ... we're still waiting for that one to dry.

And now I am cooking hot dogs and baked beans for supper (if that can fairly be called cooking).

And do you know what?  It has happened again.  In trying to "waste" a day, I have accomplished just as much (or as little) as usual, only minus the urgency, the sense of losing control, the frustrated impatience with children, the nagging feeling that I've dropped the most important of the all balls that I'm trying to juggle.

I don't miss any of that.  And I think I found the lost ball.