The worst idea ever???

It's a new year, everybody!!! Full of hope and promise... Or at least it is for about three weeks. Until I begin rationalizing the old habits I was trying to break with the annual changing of the digits.

The resolution this year is a little (okay, I'll admit it, a lot) weird and, I'll just put it out there, it scares me... Which is why I'm writing it down for all to see. Oh geez... I sorta have a tear of fright in my eye. Yes, I get a tear in my eye when I get nervous... Also when I get scared... Also when I'm happy... And sad... Or watch a sweet commercial... Or my kids do something cute... You get the drift, every emotion is attached to the old tear ducts.

Anyway, I have resolved to try something new... Something that I daydream about, obsess about, have always wanted to do, and that absolutely nobody, not my husband, Mom, or best friends even knows I have been thinking about doing. Before I tell you what it is, I want to explain to you (in my typical long-winded fashion) why I would contemplate such an insane, ridiculous, and potentially humiliating undertaking. Warning: The following is super sappy and may be boring in the extreme.

I'll start out by saying that I love being a stay at home Mom and I think about the implications of that a lot. It has been the most amazing blessing and privilege of my life watching my little people grow and be who they are. They are the coolest! And because I am the Mother of such cool, creative, special children I must toot my own horn a bit and say they're cool because of me. Kind of. Well, alright, I packed them around in my belly for a bit and they came out cool. Either way, I was involved.

Sometimes you get knocked on your ass a little (the pretentious may call it being humbled) by the idea that you were a part of creating this little miracle and making the world better by bringing it into existence. (I would like to note, that as I was writing this, one of my little miracles was unzipping my couch pillow and gleefully tearing the stuffing out of it.) The whole Mom gig is super fulfilling on the most primitive and important levels. I would rather be doing this than anything else in the whole world.

Okay, barf-worthy and mushy as that was, thinking about that and how much I love my kids and want them to simply be themselves and follow their dreams is what prompted this whole resolution idea thing to begin with.

So how many of us parents are following our dreams? I'm not sure. So many of us have been detoured off of the path we originally set out on or intended and have made happiness out of where we landed. Which is wonderful, but also not exactly what we want our children to do.

Of course that does not diminish our happiness or the passion we feel for our lives. Nor does it erase the fact that, in our heart of hearts, many of us still have a personal passion. Something that is completely, 100 percent selfish and has nothing to do with anyone else or what they need and want and feel.

As every parent knows, we make a lot of personal sacrifices to be good at what we do and mostly forget about the selfish personal dreams. While I do feel that much of that is necessary, I'm also not sure it is setting the best example for my babies. Can I tell them to follow their dreams when they don't know what that looks like?

Some mothers show this to their children through working at a job they love, or cooking, or going back to school, or volunteering, or doing a hobby they love... Well, me, I am basically lazy and spend my free time worrying about bills, bitterly cleaning up after everyone, or cooking something for dinner.

So... I have resolved to do something this year that I desperately want to do that scares me to death.

I am going to follow my dream.

My ridiculous, embarrassing, insane, nerve-wracking, super-secret (for a good reason) dream.

And I am going to show my babies what living the life you want to live looks like. I'm not going to sit around fighting lethargy and passing time, I'm going to do it.

I am going to potentially humiliate myself, possibly die of embarrassment, and do what I dream of.

And I thought you guys might want to watch the (potential, have to think positive) train wreck.

I'm going to write about it, the whole thing, on this blog so that I have no chance of chickening out.

Help. HOLY HELL!!! I'm freaking out a little bit. Putting it out there and writing about it makes it real. Panic setting in. Need. Paper. Bag.

So, I am scared to death... And if you want to find out what the secret dream is, that I keep locked up in my head and never ever let out, you'll have to keep reading the blog. I'm too embarrassed to tell you yet.

Maybe some of you have already guessed it by now...? (Hint: It does not involve wearing a bikini in public.) Or maybe you've just been counting how many times I have written the word "dream." It's a lot.

Well, feel free to speculate... I have probably built this whole thing up in my brain to a level that can never live up to the hype...

But you won't find out for sure until next week.