four types of posts that are seriously annoying

Social media is a great invention.  If you wonder what ever happened to so-and-so, all you have to do is type their name into the search bar of your social media site of choice and nine times out of ten, voila! You have a thumbnail sketch of their life, with pictures.  You can get up-to-date articles that like-minded friends have linked.  You can get information on things happening locally, i.e. family friendly events.

There are, however, a few types of posts that drive me up a wall.  These posts are like nails on a chalkboard to me and I scroll quickly past most times.  Sometimes I get sucked in and those are the times I think that I waste too much time online.  Here are a few of these posts in ascending order of annoyance:

The "When I was a kid..." posts
I'm sure you've seen them - "My curfew was lightning bugs; my parents didn't call my cell, they called my name; the TV was my babysitter; Cheetos were a well balanced snack."  Ok.  That's great.  But things are different now.  Cell phones make it easier to keep track of kids old enough to own one.  We know more about nutrition now, or maybe more people are concerned about it.  Likewise the benefits of limiting screen time.

Sales posts
I'm not trying to denigrate anyone who chooses to earn money for their family by participating in the pyramid schemes that are work at home sales jobs.  I just know those opportunities are not right for me.  I don't have the personality for sales and I'm probably too broke to buy your stuff, so constantly seeing these posts on my newsfeed is a tad irritating.

Political rants
There is only one thing more maddening to me than political rants on social media (and that's something we'll come to).  Nothing shows ignorance faster than half researched political diatribe and nevertheless remaining staunchly unbending in their ideals despite proof to the contrary.  Even well researched and eloquent political commentary is annoying because it brings out the ignorance of their fellow commenters.

This brings me to:

Conspiracy theory posts
These are possibly the most annoying, irritating, simply ridiculous things anyone can post.  Sandy Hook was a government conspiracy for gun control; this woman is a crisis actor who's shown up in Sandy Hook, Aurora, the Boston Marathon and now Paris; global warming is a hoax; vaccines cause autism.  These conspiracy theorists demean the victims of such horrific events and harm the united front that occurs after such happenings.

Basically, if it's not a funny cat video or silly toddler story, I don't want to see it.  I like pictures of your kids and pets, photos of major events in your lives, and stories of same.  But lose the minion memes.

Christmas letter (wish I was writing to Santa)

Christmas time is often a time of reflection of the year past.  Some people choose to pen a letter to include with their Christmas cards, chronicling their family's exploits throughout the past year.  This is my Christmas letter.

The Mearnses have certainly been busy this year.  February saw us pregnant with a six month old, which to some may have seemed impetuous.  How were we to know that after it took two years to get Teddy Bear it would be ten months from initial thought to full grown baby this time around?

I made the decision to stay at home for a while with the boys.  It was awesome to be able to spend the months before Oliver was born with Teddy.  Teddy changed so much this past year - it's really amazing to think he's only 16 months old right now and exactly one year ago, he couldn't sit up or crawl.  Now he's walking (running), talking, signing, communicating, playing independently, dancing, eating human food and exerting his will.  He's smart; he understands so much more than you realize.  He is a joy to be around, happy most of the time.  He loves to read books and play drums with Uncle D.  I can't wait to see what he has in store for us the coming year!

Oliver made his way into the world three and a half weeks early (according to the due date my doctor had established).  He spent four nights in the NICU due to glucose issues and came home from the hospital two days after I did.  In the nine weeks he has been with us, he's already changed so much.  He's losing that newborn look and entering chubby baby phase.  He's sleeping 5-6 hour stretches at night.  This next year will be spent watching him grow and change like Teddy did this past year.

Ed's working hard as always.  I know he wishes he could spend more time at home, both with the boys and completing various projects he dreams up.  He's currently working on mulching all the leaves in the world as well as burning various piles of brush.  He planted our paw paw trees recently as well as a fig tree.  Our garden this year was much more fruitful, due mostly to Ed's hard work in preparing the area.  (Moving it to a slightly sunnier location may have helped too.)

The extended Mearnses/Bronsons seem to be faring well this year.  The Wileys have seen the addition of two more grandsons, Oliver and sweet Landon.  The Wileys have moved to NC, to be closer to their grandsons.

Finally, here I sit, full time mother, haphazard housekeeper, writing various blog posts and trying to figure out how to earn money from home, through writing or...  suggestions welcome.  (Unless it's sales.  No sales.)