One thing I hate about my personality is that I am a perfectionist. The reason it is so annoying is because I just keep failing to be perfect. I have total melt downs when things don't go the way I plan for them to..and even if things do go the way I planned I have panic attacks anticipating that they won't.
If you have ever been a part of anything I have planned, I can promise you that before you got there I was freaking out!!! I don't get as excited (nicest word I could think of)as my mom does but I get pretty nutty. It doesn't even have to be a big event.
Like today, we were having a Halloween lunch after our Wednesday play group. I was supposed to bring cookies. No big deal, right? It was just going to be me and 3 other moms that I know really well and our kids. That shouldn't cause much stress...for a normal person. But this is how it went down in Julie's world...
I dropped Alex off at play group and went home to roll out and frost little pumpkin and ghost cookies. I got started and Chloe started crying. She never cries so I thought she would get over it quickly, but NO, she cried for 2 hours. I had to roll cookies, bake them and frost them while holding a crying baby. So, of course they looked terrible and I was terribly frustrated. I was just sure that my friends and a group of 3 and 4 year old kids were going to stone me for making such ugly cookies.I was also upset because I frosted half my house since I was holding Chloe.
Seriously, I know this is NO BIG DEAL!!! I know that and I can tell myself that, but if you are a perfectionist you understand that the panic sets in and totally overrides logic. I was so upset driving to play group that I drove past the street I was supposed to turn onto by 6 blocks. All because I was thinking about cookies.
When I got there, 40 minutes late (because I was waiting for the icing to dry) no one cared about my cookies. The kids were playing, and my friends were busy wrestling with their kids. It is not all about me all the time and no one is ever judging me as much as I am judging myself.
I AM NOT PERFECT! I will never be perfect. Sometimes my house gets messy (especially when I frost cookies one handed), sometimes my dinner gets burned or undercooked, sometimes I don't even take a shower until Chloe goes down for her nap at 1:00-2:00 in the afternoon. I am not superwoman. I really want to be but I am not and I am not going to let cookies rule my life anymore.
By the time I was driving home from play group I was just laughing at myself. When I saw the huge mess upon entering my kitchen again I made myself leave it there so that I could rock Chloe to sleep (which is what I should have done during the cookie debacle) and talk to Alex and Alyssa about their Halloween parties at school/play group. But now, Chloe is sleeping and the other two are watching a movie so I must go clean up that mess. (baby steps)
*Mom, I know you hate these "philosophy" posts, as you call them...so I will post pictures in a little while.
Second Week of School
3 years ago
5 comments:
This reminds me of when we had the cake decorating contest. Remember when you broke out your scrapbooking tools to get all the cuts and lines perfect.
As for driving past the house in shame of your cookies, you are nuts!
JULIE JULIE JULIE... You make me laugh :) I had a GREAT time reading that post. I could easily imagine you driving down streets in kenosha as I was reading it, then getting to the park and having everyone eat your cookies and talk about how good they are, not even worrying about what the cookies look like. I bet they were good! Thanks for posting more pix, i too, LOVE IT. It makes me feel not SO SO far away. Chloe did look so cute with her little hoodie and tight jeans. And the pix of you and Alex is really good! Keep the pix comin!
ps- I will get to that tag... promise :)
I understand totally. I am that way with my house being clean. Sometimes I stress myself out if there are dishes in the sink, or if the floors haven't been cleaned. I also can't stand to go a week without my bathrooms being totally cleaned. I just can't relax if I know there is a mess.
I am the same way. I haven't always been as much of a perfectionist as I am now but it's so hard sometimes to not get stressed over everything when I want to be doing everything and doing it perfectly.
Oh well, I have been trying lately to not let it get to me as much but it is really hard. I know that no one is as hard on us as we are on ourselves.
I didn't even know all of this, and let me just say, (besides the fact that you are crazy but cute) the cookies were delish!! Maybe I didn't realize all of your drama, because I had been having my own because the kids all wanted to paint their pumpkins blue, green, etc, and I just wanted them to do them ORANGE!! Why do we let these things bother us? But if it doesn't cause another panic attack to even bring it up, I want the recipe--:o)
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