The Reason Why

A few people have asked me what's happening with the blog.

Short answer: I don't know.  Long answer: I still don't know.  It sounds like a cop out, I know.  How can the author not know what's happening with the story?  I don't know what to tell you.  Late this summer, instead of being the creative outlet it once was, the blog became like a millstone around my neck.

After leaving the blog alone for a few weeks, I could see two major reasons for my burnout.

Reason #1:

The wretched schedule.  I don't know how well you can see it, but this is a picture of our September calendar.  I actually stopped writing things on the calendar because I was running out of room and it was depressing me.

My kids are not in multiple activities. I would not call them over scheduled, but I found that most coaches/instructors look at you like you have three heads if you say that a practice schedule is too much because it cuts into family time.

I think that's what made the schedule feel so onerous.  There was very little time for us to be a family together, and it made me sad.  Even Sunday, the day of rest, was cross country meet day.  For a CYO team!

I felt crushed and rushed and drained by the schedule.

Reason #2:

This is what my baby looked like when I began this blog:

This is what that baby looks like now:

I have been blogging for 7 years.

Maybe you didn't catch that.  I have been blogging for SEVEN YEARS.

I've made four more people in that time. I think it's fair to say I was (am?) experiencing a little ennui.

Sometimes, I just don't know what I want out of this blog.  What am I trying to communicate here?  I don't home school; I don't homestead; I don't farm (or even garden very well); I don't know how to craft anything (except people, apparently).

When I started this blog, Francie was still young.  She was the same age Sally is now, an age where I felt I could comfortably share her funny, sweet little stories.  Now both Francie and Fiver have passed that invisible border between childhood and adolescence. I can't tell everything about them now - they have to tell it themselves, in their own ways.

But then, while I was changing my template around, I spent some time going through my archives.  I went back to the beginning.  There were so many sweet things about the children that I have already forgotten, with only a post to remind me, and I found myself very glad that I wrote them down.

So I think I'll keep going for a little while longer.  Maybe not until Sally turns 14 (!!!!!), but definitely a little while longer.

In 7 more years, she will be 9.
Whoa.