New Year, New MumMe

I’ve seen a lot of posts about a New Year New Me this past week, and so I’ve decided for me I'm going to give some thought to a 'New Year New MumMe'. If you’ve read my post on Mamazou.com about guilt, entitled 'Guilty Feelings Have No Rhythm' you will know that I feel guilty a lot and therefore I focus too much on what I’m not doing as opposed to what I am doing. A link to that post is HERE

This year I want to be mindful of what I am doing as a Mummy and make some tweaks and changes. So here goes: 

Shout Less. Now this is top of my list because I wish I could be one of those zen parents that never loses it, discusses things with their children and concludes the issue. And sometimes I very much am and all is well with the world. But sometimes, yeah those times, when I’ve asked the same thing over and over and I’m being plain ignored, or I’m just getting 'No' said to me again and again, and time is tight. Those times, well I'm not proud of it, but I can..... SHOUT, really shout. And more often than not, it really doesn’t achieve very much at all. So New Year New MumMe number 1 resolution is to shout less. 

Slow Down Time. I mention those times when time is tight, and I've always been a very good time keeper. I’m the early one to everything basically. But with kids keeping good time can be trickier and because of this, there can feel like a constant urgency to get out of the house and ignore the beauty and happiness in front of me at that precise moment in time. Like my son singing a song with every step down the stairs he takes. Maybe it adds on a few more minutes to our journey, but he’s singing and happy, and it’s those moments I need to slow down and 'live in the now' because in no time there will be teenage grunting and less singing as he plods down those stairs. So number 2 New Year New MumMe resolution is to slow down time. There's a great book I read years ago called 'The Power Of Now' which helps us see what's in front of us at that very moment ignoring the past and the future. It's written by Eckhart Tolle. I need to re-introduce abit more of those teachings into my daily life again.

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Get Organised. With the mad first year of newborn and toddler under my belt, I have to start to get my sh*t together so to speak. Our home is overflowing with toys in every single crevice and I need to find some sort of order. I am in love with storage by Minene ( thanks @mother_of_daughters for the tip) and intend on buying lots more of these fab storage boxes and giving some order to the toy mayhem. Pre-kids I was seriously organised - I had files for everything, and I was known to alphabetise my CD collection as a teenager. So New Year, New MumMe resolution number 3 is to reclaim some of that teen organisation into my life.

However, we fly to LA.....THIS Sunday, so do you think it’s ok to put off starting all of the above until the 1st Feb? Maybe I need a number 4 resolution, to stop procrastinating!

All I will say is thank goodness that a small conversation between my husband and myself about travel items for kids resulted in a lightbulb moment where we went and started a little business creating pre-packed travel packs for kids, because I am relying on our KeepEmQuiet travel kits for this long haul journey! Now that we've got the entertainment side of things sorted, we need tips about fighting the jet-lag that our little ones will suffer from - so please do let me know any tips or tricks you have in the comments section for jet lag, long haul flights (and of course any tricks to sticking to New Years Resolutions). 

Happy New Year! 

x