Real Talk: Winter Blues

Let’s face it- February and March are two of the hardest months of the year. All of the momentum and excitement from the New Year is starting to wear off and winter is usually the worst in these two months. The slump because real when the skies seem to be a never-ending shade of grey, the temperatures are frigid (although we have had a couple good days) and those super cute summery clothes are mocking you from the deep recesses of your closet.

While I personally am a fan of grey, rainy, dreary weather, I too can become a victim of the Winter Blues. When everything becomes stagnant, and there seems to be a general slump of feelings and just sadness. As cheesy as it sounds, the sun plays a vital role in your feelings and well being. It’s always cheery when it’s sunny. Right now though it’s a rough time of year and it is super easy to just let those feelings take over your life and seep into everything you do.

I recently posted about my top 5 tricks to getting out of a bad mood/day, which you can find HERE. This Real Talk is kind of an extension of that, because this is such a time of year for these types of feelings. The Winter Blues are kind of a tough cookie to deal with because it’s not always so simple to break out of those slumps. Sometimes it’s all you can do to just hold on and ride the slump out till better days hit. If you can though, it’s always better to try and pick yourself up and keep moving forward.

So, how do you do that?

Find one positive thing in everyday. This may sound like an over simplification, and in some ways it is, but realistically if you try and focus on the good the bad doesn’t have a chance to take over. The positive thing may only be that you got out of bed and put on real clothes instead of just sweats or it may be that you crossed every item on your to do list off. It doesn’t matter how big or little you think the positive thing is, find it.

By making a choice at the end of everyday to find one positive thing you will not only find that there are more than a few positive things, but you will find yourself a little more energized to do more the next day. By continuing to focus on the little “wins” of everyday, you will slowly turn your mindset around and before you know it, you’ll be out of that Winter Blues slump.

So what do you do when the Winter Blues hit? Do you find that you are able to quickly bounce through those blues and back to a happy mood or does it take you a little while to get back into your happy place?

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A Weekend of Nothing…A Little Recap

I don’t want to feel like a broken record, so I WON’T talk about how busy this past week was or how I really needed to get away from all the busy and soak up a little bit of life. Instead what I WILL tell you about is our weekend of glorious nothing.

It’s been so long since we just had a weekend of nothing. The only time we left the house was to go get groceries. I think I only got out of my pajamas once (to go get groceries), I didn’t put make up, we ordered in for one of the nights and just overall relaxed.

Of course my husband ended up having to spend a good amount of his Saturday writing a paper for his class, but he did that during nap times and didn’t miss out on too much. I got a large amount of no pressure reading done.

We sat and watched our oldest run in never ending circles, our youngest explore the dog dishes, and quite a few movies. We even fell asleep on the couch for a little bit!

Honestly, I couldn’t think of a more perfect weekend for us. It was just so relaxing, so lovely, and I really enjoyed every minute of it…

Funny enough, Daylight Savings Time couldn’t even bring me down! Sure it made me a little more tired, but par for the course. I just added a little bit more tea to each cup to soak up a bit more caffeine and just took it easy. It didn’t even touch the kids (or their never ending energy).

Next weekend we will be back to our normal of getting out, exploring, and being out of the house more, but this past weekend…such a wonderful thing! It made getting up this Monday morning with a smile on my (and everyone in our home) face so much easier.

How was your weekend? Did you do a lot of running or not so much?

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The 5 W’s of A Cuppa Cosy

I wanted to take a quick moment today and touch base with myself, with you, and just lay out who I am (which most of you probably already know), what A Cuppa Cosy is/what I want to do, where, when, and most importantly WHY.

So…

Speier Family in Alexandria, VA

Who: If you’ve been around for al little while you know who I am. If you’re new, hi! I’m Mia, a wife, mom, homemaker, business owner, and employee. I am a lover of all things cosy, an avid reader, a serious tea drinker and a semi adventurer. There are a few things I am passionate about (aside from my family) and those things are: mental and physical health, travel and being 100% in every aspect of your life. I don’t mince words, I wont BS you, and will always be 100% authentic.

What: This is a place for me to share my life, my stories, my everyday to help you not feel so alone. A feeling of meeting up with a good friend a chatting over a cup of tea/coffee. Someone that you feel like you are right in the trenches of life with in a place where not everything is perfectly curated with all the sunshine and daisies. A place that is true to every aspect of life, the good and the bad. I want to create a community of women and moms who are just experiencing life together.

Where: Well, I’ve got this blog which will feature 2 posts a week, along with a Facebook Page (HERE) and Instagram Page (HERE) for everyday day glimpses. I will also have a Facebook Group for the community and all of us to share day to day, but that is currently in development. Like & Follow the blog and social media and check back for updates on the Facebook Group!

When: Blog Posts will be posted on Mondays and Wednesdays- Mondays being more of a recap/spontaneous style, Wednesdays being more of a tip or learning post.

Why: I see a lot of either end of the spectrum- the perfectly coiffed, always perfect, ready to go mom and family OR the over the top hot mess, don’t care mom. I have not seen a place where there is a middle ground. Where there is a place that is both good and bad and in a way that is completely real and authentic. I didn’t see a view of just a real woman who is going through real life- with all of it’s ups and downs.

I want to help women and moms by sharing my story/life and giving them a real community to share, learn, and uplift so they can be their best selves in their own lives (all while being as cosy as possible 🙂 ).

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A Lesson Well Learned…A Little Recap

I feel like I’ve had those back to back weeks where you just don’t catch a break. The first week was just a rough week. Everything that could go wrong went wrong and we all just tried to hold on to the ride. This past week, I felt like I was a hamster on a wheel; never stopping and never getting anywhere. I had SO MUCH that I was trying to accomplish. So many thoughts and ideas constantly going through my head, that it felt like if I didn’t get them out right then and there, they would disappear into the great unknown of my brain.

Basically, rough week followed by insane week. I’ll let you be the judge as to which type of week is worse.

It was around Wednesday or so that I realized I didn’t even know how I was spending my time. I was so far on the wheel, that I couldn’t truly account for where my time I had gone. Sure, I know what hours and work I had accomplished for my part time work, but beyond that- no idea. I was head deep in everything else that I needed to do, needed to get done, and needed to get out of my head that I hadn’t even taken two seconds to look outside. IMG_0491

It was a beautiful day on Wednesday. A perfect day some would say (seeing how the weather turned bad quickly, others may say it was a “calm before the storm”). The sun was bright, not many clouds in sight and whats more, it was the perfect temperature. I sat at our dining room table just stunned for a moment as the realization of what was going on hit me.

I needed to get off that wheel and get off it fast. I decided that lunchtime on that beautiful day would be spent outside, getting some rays (and Vitamin D!) and just overall reveling in what was a perfect little break. Not only did I come back in feeling much more refreshed and ready to get back into the thick of things, but I got some much needed free time with my children. Such freedom is found when you can just galavant across the backyard.

To top off my insane week even further, at some point in the past week my youngest started developing more of that “big boy” look to him. He is still young and is still a baby, but he just started looking and doing things that just made my mommy heart cry out- my little baby is starting to grow up. I didn’t even know when that had started, just a week ago he was still wanting to snuggle and sleep on my chest (ok, ok, he still does some of that) and now here he is, standing against furniture, babbling, scooting all over the place, and just overall acting and starting to look like a little boy rather than a baby.

It took these two “shocks” to my system to remind myself of a couple things.

One, I am never going to get these times back. My children are not always going to want to just run around with mommy in the backyard. They aren’t always going to find that little joy in the birds flying overhead or the trees swaying in an absolutely ridiculous windstorm.

Two, anything that falls with number one goes ahead of ANYTHING else. My little family is above anything else. It is so easy to get caught up in everything else that is going on and trying to get things done and it can be so hard to see that you are losing sight of what is truly important until you have a moment like I did on Wednesday.

We’ve had a relatively easy weekend, getting back from the insanity of the week and re grounding ourselves into our little family and just focusing on each other.

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Five Tips to Get Out of a Bad Mood/Day

Let’s face it, we all have those bad or “in a funk” days. The days that kind of end up like this:

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fun fact- this is a real shot from a real life in a funk day

This is life and even if you are living a fulfilled life, you still have these kinds of days. The days where it just starts off on the wrong foot and seems to go downhill fast OR maybe it starts off well, but just descends into chaos. Recently for me it just seemed to be a mess in all facets (see weekly recap post HERE). I am not a person who likes to live or dwell in those bad day or funks – really who does?- so I’ve created a list of tips for erasing those bad feelings and getting back into a good head space.

  1. Stop what you are doing. Whether or not what you are doing is the cause of your frustration or bad mood, continuing to do whatever you are doing will be a wasted effort. Once you are in a bad mood your productivity decreases, your enjoyment/fulfillment decreases, and you may end up creating more anger/frustration and ultimately more work for yourself by continuing. Take a break from what you are doing and physically leave the space that you are in. This is a very important step to getting out of this bad head space that you are in. Possibly the most important step.
  2. Get outside. This step kind of co insides with the next one, but I find that a lot of times that just getting out of the house (or office), breathing in some fresh air and soaking up a little sun will start to turn things around. We are not meant to be indoor creatures and just getting a little daylight, getting some fresh air, and being away from whatever physical space you were in may be the remedy for you.
  3. Do some sort of physical activity. The top of this list would be to go and take a walk outside. Not only does just simply getting outside into daylight and fresh air immensely help a bad mood or funk, but the physical exercise of a walk will stimulate your body and senses. When you come back you will feel refreshed and start to feel a bit better and more collected. If you cannot get outside, simply walking around your home or doing a couple of quick full body stretches/quick yoga routine in a sun/day lit part of your home will do the same trick.
  4. Make yourself a cup of tea or coffee. The simple act of making yourself a cuppa combined with taking a few minutes to yourself to enjoy it will do wonders for yourself. Not only will this simple act turn things around, but the cup of tea or coffee will do a lot more for your mood than you would think. Drinking a cup of tea or coffee almost forces you to stop for a minute. It makes you take that step back, breathe and really just savor the flavor of your drink. Some people would equate this to drinking a glass of wine, I would shy away from that. Depending on what you are doing prior to this bad mood or your responsibilities, this a) may not be a possibility, but b) it doesn’t always provide the same mood booster as a cup of tea. Ultimately though you know what will work best for you.
  5. Do one thing for yourself. This is beyond what you’ve done in the previous steps. Sometimes we just need that one extra thing to set us up for a true good mood. This could be watching a couple videos, taking a little bit of time to goof around, having an impromptu dance party, reading a bit of a book, whatever it is that you can do to have a little treat for yourself. Make this be a separate action from the previous steps so you can fully just enjoy a little bit of time.

By doing those 5 little tricks when I am having a rough day, I find that my mood lifts and while I still may need to go back and deal with whatever frustrated me or whatever was wrong in the first place, I can do so in a better, clearer head space than before.

I hope these tips help you out and I would love to hear what your tips are as well! Leave me a comment down below!

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Coming Back from “Hot Mess-Ville”

It was a rough week. To be brutally honest, I had one of those weeks where by the end of it, you are just grateful to have gotten yourself, your husband, and your children through the week unscathed. I don’t even know if I could tell you what happened to set the week off, or how we got to such a rough spot, all I know was that somewhere along the way I had boarded the express train to Hot Mess-ville.

Normally I can still keep my head up if it is just one person in our family having a rough week. I can up the care that that person receives and adjust everything else as needed. But when everyone is just in that rough spot, it makes it ten times harder.

Let’s see…

Our oldest was just having an “off” week. There isn’t anything going on with him aside from an exacerbation of the normal 2 year old problems. It seemed like everything was magnified and even the littlest things became a major temper tantrum. We did a lot of bedroom cool downs, mom/dad snuggles, and just lay and cries with him. The combination of him being such a stubborn independent child, with a very full, strong willed personality makes for some good and some bad situations. We are still trying to learn what works best for him and how to teach him.

Our youngest was having a nice amount of his own issues as well. He’s getting those two top teeth and he is an angry teether (our oldest was quite mild with teething until his canines and molars). We had a lot of fussing, A LOT of snuggling, but not a lot of day time napping. I know I shouldn’t complain because he is an excellent night time sleeper, but daytime naps play such an integral role for both of the children and when they are cut back in time or don’t happen it makes for a tough rest of the day.

On top of that, both boys are going through growth spurts. It seemed like I was trying to feed double our household. I know this is going to be a situation we frequently encounter as they are boys and will continue to consume more food than I thought possible (our oldest had 2.5 pancakes for breakfast one morning?!) for the rest of their lives. At times it seemed that we would never get a reprieve from the crying.

With all of that going on, I was dealing with a come and go migraine all week long and was overall just feeling all out of sorts. I felt like I wasn’t accomplishing anything when it came to day to day tasks (although I was) and there were a couple moments over the week that I just ended up “throwing in the towel”. My husband was trying to sort out what his new assignment and responsibilities would be.

Somehow though, we’ve all made it through the week and it’s time to put this bad one behind us as we step into a new week. Things seem to already be looking up as I am writing this as we’ve got the grocery shopping done for the week (cheaper than last week!) and I have a bit of free time to just relax before getting dinner ready. I fully plan on enjoying my cup of tea and getting a little reading done while the kids (actually) nap! Ah such bliss after a rough week.

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What Motivates Me

*Please note- I don’t “do it all”. Most days I do what I can and simply let the rest go. Some days I don’t even end up getting that far. I’ve been on both sides and while I don’t have all of my $h** together, I try to at least do what I can do. This post is talking about what motivates me to do what I CAN do rather than how I “do it all”. *

A lot of times I get asked- “How do I do it?”. Balancing life, work, children, a home, etc is a lot. How do you manage? To start with, I don’t always, BUT if we want to go down that road…

While that is an excellent question and a good topic to talk on in the future; the more important question that should be asked is WHY do I do it? Why get up so early? Why keep everything tidy? Why get yourself ready every morning, even if you are not leaving the house? WHY????

To answer this question, you must look at one thing:

WHAT MOTIVATES YOU? What drives YOU to do what you do? EVERYONE has a lot going on in their lives and a balancing act is essential to anyone’s life. What is different for each person is not how that person does it, but why. Pinpointing this fact will help keep everything in perspective when you are trying to balance things (it may even end up helping you cut down some things that you do that aren’t “necessary” to your own balancing act).

For me,

  • I do it for my kids who deserve a mother who is at her best both mentally and physically.
  • I do it for my husband who works so hard, with long hours everyday, and doesn’t need to come home to a dirty home and whole bunch of other tasks. * Not to say that he doesn’t do anything at home- he helps out A LOT, but if I can take some of that strain off of him, I will.
  • Most importantly, I do it for myself. In order for me to be at my best and to take care of everyone I need to take care of myself. There are things that I like to do and get done throughout the day to keep both myself and my family running smoothly.

When you think about what motivates you, the why you do it suddenly becomes clear.

Why, you may still ask? I do what I do because I want to be at my personal best to be the best for myself and my family (and by extension my friends, my work, my business).

Being able to see my husband able to come home and simply relax after a long day, or my children having free reign of a clean house, or for me being able to sink into my chair with a book and a cup of tea- everything else becomes totally worth it.

It also helps me keep things into perspective with my own balancing act and really helps on those days when I feel like I don’t have anything “together”.

So, before you ask Why, think What Motivates You?

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A Not So Noteworthy Revelation | A Weekly Recap

I was thinking and thinking about what to write about today in this little recap. A lot has happened this week, but it was more of random bits and not really a huge post worthy situation. Little things here and there- Colton finally loosened the “sticking” of his door enough to open it without us, Andrew continued on his quest to conquer the entire house, me hitting my eye on the corner of our nightstand- but nothing that I really felt truly noteworthy. Then, in the course of my weekend, I realized something really important this past weekend and while it didn’t come as a huge surprise, it definitely solidified my thoughts in this stage of our lives.

Over this past weekend I decided to do something special for my business that would require my full attention for a whole weekend. Even though I would still be at home, my husband would be taking over all of the child care and just overall weekend chores. I’ve done a whole weekend once before at the end of September for a craft show, but for that weekend I actually left the house and was physically away during the day.

I think that it is so so important that everyone have some self care and take a little time to treat themselves, away from family, spouses, whomever. This self care can take different shape for different people and will be different lengths of time for different people. For me, typically, I’ll take a couple hours every couple weeks to go get pampered or go to the bookstore. This past weekend though, I decided to take a whole weekend and stay home, be by myself, and just read. *There is more to this, but I am shortening it for the point of this post.*

Honestly- I don’t think I will be doing it again at all in the near future. I’m just not in a space or time in my life that I really want to spend time without my children. I always knew that I wouldn’t be someone to be actively taking time away from my kids or traveling without them, but this weekend just continued to solidify that for me. Taking a couple hours of time away from them or having a date night out with my husband is one thing, but I do not want to actively choose to do things separately from them or spend a whole weekend without them.

It is quite simply not for me. If it works for someone else or is important to someone else that is completely fine, it’s just not for me. The whole weekend I felt like something was missing. Not that I was missing any big moments or anything super special, but not being able to just be doing the everyday things with them – I felt like something was missing.

My children definitely had their moments as well where they just wanted mommy and while I would take some time to be with them, it definitely wasn’t what was normal. I know that this is good for them and they had a good time with their dad and that it is good on all counts to have a little time away, but a whole weekend is a long time.

I honestly would NEVER judge another mom or dad who decided to take a weekend away and I know that this opinion may change as the continue to grow older, BUT at this time in our lives I just don’t think I could do it again. I think I’ll just continue to stick with a couple of hours here and there.

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Real Talk: Long Term Love

I know, I know…talking about love on Valentines Day- cheesy. Bare with me for a minute though 🙂 Love is a perfect real talk topic and when better to talk about it than the most highly “publicized” day devoted to love. *I will clarify that we do not actually do anything for Valentines Day in our relationship for various reasons*

Speier Family in Alexandria, VA

Maybe you picture love as it is portrayed in most movies- all sorts of beautiful romantic grand gestures; always being completely and utterly smitten. Maybe you picture moments of intense passion – an intense disagreement ending in a passionate “embrace”. In both scenarios ultimately everything is absolutely and completely perfect, with love being completely romantic and…well…love.

While both of those visions may occur during your relationship, there will also be times of normal. Where you and your spouse are just doing life together. Riding the ups and downs together, weathering a storm or basking in a sunny glow. While you may not feel that all encompassing smitten feeling go away, there will be a point where it does subside a bit and life takes over. When that moment comes it, I’ve learned that two things are essential to keep that feeling fresh in your mind and heart:

  1. Don’t compare your partner to anyone else. COMPARISON IS THE THIEF OF HAPPINESS. You did not marry that perfect man in the movies (or TV shows) and there is a reason for that. As we all know, what we see in the movies and on TV is NOT always real and not the way life always unfolds. The individual that you have chosen to spend your life with has their own qualities and perfectness to them. There is a reason that you are with them. It’s true when they say, you don’t find the perfect person, but the person who is perfect for you. I will be the first to say that my husband IS super romantic, although not in ways that people (or I) expect or realize. I love him exactly as he is (and has been) and he is perfect for me in every way. I would not want a man that “seems” perfect, because to me that is not realistic.
  2. Take care of your relationship. It has been said time and again, relationships are like gardens. They need to be watered and taken care of in order to truly blossom and flourish. Sure, you may be working around conflicting crazy schedules and children and many other factors, but you’ve GOT TO take care of your relationship. There is always more that you can do to help, more that you can do to take care of your relationship. Find your “thing”, to keep coming back and connecting to your spouse. In our home, we do one night on the weekend where there are no phones, no books, no distractions. It is just us (and the kids- for at least a bit of the night). Starting off before the kids go to bed, we have an easy to make (or take out/order in) dinner, and some sort of movie (or tv show catch up) afterwards. At some point in all of this the kids go to bed and we curl up on our big couch to just take a bit of time for each other. This allows us to reconnect and take a little time for each other. We do also take a proper date night out every so often when it works out between kids and schedules as well as just getting in little snippets of time of just the two of us throughout the month. We tend to be more of the homebody couple and love to just have a relaxed evening in rather than going out. This is what works for us in our current season of life and you will need to find what will work for you and your spouse. It may also change throughout the phases of life.

When you stick to both of those things, your relationship will not only thrive, but you will have that same completely and utterly smitten feeling that you see portrayed on your screen. Not only will this feeling stay, but you and your spouse will thrive through all of the phases of life, good and bad.

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These Are The Moments…A Weekend Recap

This weekend we decided to do something fun, possibly crazy and completely new for the kids. We decided to camp out in the living room- tent and all.

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This has been something that we have been thinking about doing for a little while now (especially since we plan on going camping for real once our youngest is a little bit older). Now that our older son is at a good age and has a good sleeping routine down, we figured we could just give sleeping in a tent in the living room a shot. My husband and I have “camped out” in the living room before, maybe a little more than normal, but we don’t mind spending a night in our living room. This whole “adventure” just became a really fun thing to try and do and it turned out to be a big hit! Seeing the huge smile light up his whole face made the entire night perfect.

Our younger son is not quite at the age to really just stay out in the living room and get a decent sleep (plus he really likes his bed) so after he went to bed, we unpacked the tent, got it set up and ready to stay in for the evening. Tent setting up was a huge hit for our older son as he recognized it as something new and fun going on.

A big hit with us (as parents) was the fact that he ended up sleeping his normal hours of sleep. We had to shut off all of the lights in this portion of the house (our house gets really bright), but he ended up falling asleep and waking up close to the same hours that he does in his own bed.

*For space reasons, I actually ended up staying on the couch, but still enjoyed it.*

The fun didn’t end there, we left the tent up through nap time the next day so our younger son could enjoy it as well! He had fun exploring the new space and feeling the different texture of the tent and the sleeping bag.

All in all it added a fun twist to what would inevitably become “just another rainy weekend at home” (which we do actually love). With all the rain, there wasn’t much playing outside, so it was nice to bring some of the fun inside! These are the moments that I just want to remember and share.

 

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