768th Friday Blog Roundup

The twins took out a cricket for me this week. I didn’t even have to ask them. They saw it upstairs, alerted me of its presence, and then sucked up the cricket with the vacuum. They learned the SAT word “tenacious” from the experience when I thanked them for their tenacity in hunting down the cricket when it tried to hop behind the dresser. And this thing was huge. It was the size of about half a doorknob. Which means that it felt like it was the size of a truck.

I know some parents brag about their children’s grades or awards. But do those things really hold a candle to cricket hunting? Not in my world.

They immediately followed up the experience by confirming that I would be making them their own batch of cookies as a thank you gift.

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Stop procrastinating. Go make your backups. Don’t have regrets.

Seriously. Stop what you’re doing for a moment. It will take you fifteen minutes, tops. But you will have peace of mind for days and days. It’s the gift to yourself that keeps on giving.

As always, add any new thoughts to the Friday Backup post and peruse new comments in order to find out about methods, plug-ins, and devices that help you quickly back up your data and accounts.

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And now the blogs…

But first, second helpings of the posts that appeared in the open comment thread last week. In order to read the description before clicking over, please return to the open thread:

• “The Experience of a Lifetime” (LindsayMader)
• “Cultivating Gratitude” (Infertile Phoenix)
• “Baking” (Inconceivable!)

Okay, now my choices this week.

Empty Arms, Broken Heart tries to blow some adoption myths out of the water when she sees a cousin’s thoughtless post, though her words were ignored. Still, they’re important to say. She writes, “I think if anyone is going to promote adoption they should do it with their eyes wide-open to reality. There are beautiful sides to adoption but there are also hard truths that can’t be overlooked.” Thank you for expanding the story.

Baby Ridley Bump has a post about postponing her IVF cycle. These are the types of posts that people need to read when they cavalierly speak about IVF as if it’s the easiest solution in the world. She writes, “Sometimes when I think about it I think to myself, such is life–there will never be a perfect time with no stress and nothing going on, I realize that, but there will be a better time, a time when things are a little more settled & I think right after the holidays, first of the year will be exponentially better for us.” It’s a post about listening to your gut and knowing that it rarely steers you wrong.

Slaying, Blogging, Whatever… has a post about missing writing in her space. I love this (not the fact that her year has gone off the rails, but because I also give myself stern lectures): “This year has gone off the rails so fast and we have never really recovered. I told myself that I would steer into the slide, and with each new road block, I have found myself having a harder time having the emotional (and sometimes physical) energy to steer. Okay, self. Enough!” I related, which is why I love blogging: When you connect with another person’s story because it reminds you of your own.

Lastly, The Next 15000 Days suggests practicing acts of kindness and including someone on the sidelines. She writes, “I realized why it has been so hurtful to go through life unnoticed and excluded – just because I am a childless woman. I stopped counting how many times I was excluded from conversations just because some people assume I have nothing to say (just because I don’t have children of my own).” Reach out today to another blogger.

The roundup to the Roundup: The twins are braver than I am. Your weekly backup nudge. And lots of great posts to read. So what did you find this week? Please use a permalink to the blog post (written between November 8th and 15th) and not the blog’s main url. Not understanding why I’m asking you what you found this week? Read the original open thread post here.