Category Archives: The Senator’s Wife

Fifteen Minutes

So, I took a visual tour of my own, dormant blog the other day and loved re-reading some of my older posts.  Not because they were some brilliant masterpiece or anything, but because it was a brief record of the past few years and some events that I had forgotten about.

I have been busy lately.  Really busy.  Last May, I was elected to serve as the board president for this organization. It is a national non-profit that has honored outstanding moms across the country for roughly 77 years.  I have written about it here. This was going to be a huge responsibility and in an effort to budget my free time, I had wiped my plate clean.  Well, rather I had dropped off some non-profit boards that I was currently serving on and had scaled back on some other activities like blogging, exercising, socializing, basically anything that filled in the blanks between mom responsibilities and Senator’s wife responsibilities.   You get the picture.

This blog has been neglected and that made me sad.  Until I read a post from a terrific young mom (pictured center above) that I met last April in Salt Lake City.  She writes a blog and had been named the Arizona Young Mother and subsequently, the 2011 National Young Mother of the Year by none other, than American Mothers.  She is just a fantastic spirit of energy and I was thrilled to be working with her in this organization throughout the next year.  So, I started reading her blog and immediately decided that is one smart momma.

Recently she talked about being so busy and how blogging was consuming more time than she had to give- and so she was going to limit her posts to fifteen minutes.  Basically, allowing herself only fifteen minutes to write them and post. I knew I liked her.

Hence begins my new strategy.  I know I have not suffered from a lack of potential content lately, just a lack of time management skills and the ability to prioritize what is really important to me in the big scheme of things. This seems like a simple solution in my attempt to continue to manage it all!

I’m thinking I should apply that to exercising too.  A forced fifteen minutes a day could go a long way…

But, these fifteen minutes are almost up!

SW

Southern Comfort

We have just returned home from a road trip through the deep South and I must confess, it exceeded all my expectations.

I am not one to like car rides, but to see this lush country-side, their historic points of interest, and major universities combined with some of the most hospitable people you will ever meet – made our journey down south absolutely awesome!

I am still catching up on the laundry and mail and all the things that get neglected when you are gone that long……but I will post a few of my favorite pic’s from a long the way for now.  Enjoy!

Arkansas!

Mississippi………..

Tuscaloosa.

And, just across the street from the tornado at the University of Alabama…..

Tennessee for a legislative conference….

And Elvis!

And, Alabama again….but not in that particular order!

Then there was Florida….where I should like to live forever.

But, seeing that I don’t have that option, it was certainly nice to see this common and beautiful sight on the long road home.

More tales from our trail soon……..

Feel free to jump in…

The Senator’s daughter wants a trampoline.  She has wanted one for as long as I can remember.   In fact, the word trampoline has been included on every Christmas and Birthday wish list for as long as she has been able to write…. Yet, there has never been a glimpse of a trampoline or glimmer of hope for one to magically land in our backyard.

The reasons are simple.  The Senator has a real phobia about these contraptions.  He thinks they are a liability and an apparatus just begging for children to break something.   My father, who is a physician, concurs.  In fact, he has always insisted that no child or grandchild of his shall own a motorcycle, trampoline or go sky diving. Ever.

Alright, so I lived with that growing up and turned out ok.  Bikes and planes were never my thing and the neighbors had a trampoline.  Sorry dad.

Yet, the Senator’s daughter….well, she refuses to accept this. Although, I’m sure if any of the neighbors had a trampoline I wouldn’t be having this online conversation.

But, this girl has some serious sass and determination when it comes to finding solutions….and, she wants to jump on a trampoline.  Her trampoline.  Before she is too old to jump.

She also realized early on that it wasn’t going to happen in the traditional manner considering her overly protective family situation.

So… the Senator’s daughter has been working hard, saving her money and has now banked enough pocket change to purchase a trampoline for herself…plus tax and shipping if necessary!   She made the announcement around 7:00 p.m. on Sunday evening in the presence of the Senator, and her grandfather.  It was fun to watch.  Even more enjoyable was watching her take them out into the backyard to show them the site she had selected for the trampoline she was going to purchase. Priceless.

Her grandfather approved with one condition; no flips.  As in, you can and will not do a flip, forwards or backwards of any kind. Period.  The Senator’s daughter agreed without hesitation, realizing this was nearly a done deal.

The Senator….not so much.  He is still trying to figure out how he lost control over the situation.  I imagine he will soon realize, if he hasn’t already, that his daughter is one sharp cookie and had this one all figured out before he knew what was happening.  She will also jump using extreme caution.  I hope.

Like I said, feel free to jump on in the conversation.  I’m sure it will remain an ongoing debate around this joint even after the trampoline has magically landed in the backyard!

I’ll keep you posted.

SW