Finding Quality...

My blog is called The Pursuit of a Quality Life because I truly do attempt, at the very least, to find quality in the every day. The mundane, the hectic, the good, the bad and the ugly. Quality is what I strive for. It might be messy at times, but like a lot of things, quality is what you make it. There's no definition of what it means for each of us individually.

It's kind of funny, because since 2010 I have selected a word that embodies what I want for the year. Traditionally, this is usually around the Christmas/New Year's holidays. In 2010 my word was Peace; 2011 was Quality (see there it is right there!); and 2012 is Strong. When I selected Quality as my word, I don't think I fully understood it. Peace was a VERY strong word for me and it tested me constantly throughout the entire year, starting off early in February and never letting up. It brought me a lot of tears, but a lot of growth. So I think I was a little gun-shy when I was selecting a word for 2011, and quality seemed to be just the benign type of word I needed. And it kind of stayed that way all year never truly becoming a mantra or a way of life. However, I can look back now and see how it manifested itself, especially when I look at the word I picked for 2012. You can't truly be strong if you don't even understand quality first. Because there are lots of ways to be strong...you could be a strong pile of dog doo-doo, but that doesn't necessarily mean you are going to be a QUALITY pile of dog doo-doo, does it? ;-) Okay, now that some of the background is out of the way, I have to say that the past couple of months have been a journey in quality. I feel like I'm finally finding it...

This past weekend was pure quality from spending awesome time with Joshua - the boy grand baby - reading books and singing softly as he falls asleep...until he lets me know he's nowhere near asleep with a little huuuuunnnnnnhhhhh and then a giggle. Silly boy...

Feeding the ducks that decided they wouldn't bite, and feeding the fish in the lake instead.

Doing a puppet play at my niece's birthday party where we acted out the book "Give a Pig a Party" (I think...) with little wooden spoons and handmade hand puppets with a group of girls that giggled and played along while my sister read (I got to be the pig getting the party!!!! So Fun!!)

Running hill repeats at The Beast. Yeah - I call that quality!

Making a new recipe on both Saturday and Sunday night for dinner.

Enjoying the Sunday night dinner with the hubby by candlelight at our little kitchen table because candlelight makes everything special and magical even if it's just a little Sunday dinner between old married people.

Taking a bubble bath by candlelight while reading a great book.

Cross stitching while snuggled up in my recliner and beams of sunshine filter in to illuminate the task.

Doing laundry...okay, okay - I know I might be pushing it there a bit, but the pile was getting pretty crazy so it was most definitely quality time when I was able to put the last of it away!

There were lots and lots of littler moments in there, but the reality is that it was full of quality...and I loved every second of it!