Starts now! Well… tomorrow.

Although this Catholic girl may not go to church every Sunday (or any, really) it doesn’t take away from part of my heritage. The Catholic part. The part that taught me every year for 40 days I need to give up meat on Fridays and sacrifice something to make me a better person. I always have a hard time deciding what to give up because if I give up the simple I feel like I haven’t grown in those 40 days and if I’m going to give something up for 40 days, I should get something out of it. To date one of the hardest things I have given up was parmesan cheese. It sounds ridiculous, I know, but this girl has a cheese problem. That little green bottle of “cheese dust” (as Molly calls it) gets put on way too much food. It was a sacrifice!

This year I decided on something that not only will help me shape a new habit but it will rid me of an old one and maybe make my house a happier place. I’m not going to yell, especially at the kids, for 40 days. Not that I yell at them non-stop. Far from it. I’m actually surprised how much patience I’ve gained over the past couple of years, but there are still the moments that I have crossed my threshold and the yelling starts. Unfortunately, I tend to go straight to Jerry Springer guest once the yelling starts. I’m sure it’s not pretty and it’s not what I want my kids to remember, because I know they won’t remember the 30 minutes of carrying on because I accidentally threw away some sacred piece of string they were saving but they will remember how mom just flipped out over nothing. I now understand why my mom once told me “I hope you choke on it!” as I continued to eat snacks before dinner. 

The bigger question is, how do i do this? The answer… I have no idea. I’m hoping some breathing, “mommy time outs” and exercise will keep me going. I also hope that it helps change the dynamic of our house as Stampy is joining in on the challenge. If nothing else I have a built in support system until Easter.

Do you give anything up for Lent? What would your biggest challenge be?