Year 5, October 23rd-25th, 2020: Time to Rest

 As the previous blog post(s) indicated, it was a whirlwind of a week. I woke up today after not sleeping well, not only still in physical pain, but with mental and emotional exhaustion. I decided to cancel a playdate for Abishai at his request. Park Day was going to be in Fishers, which is a 40 minute drive and coming home would have taken more than an hour. The kids were still supposed to be on their way home from Michigan today, so no Bible class, we are still "on vacation." Because I try to leave the house in pristine condition, no matter how long I'm gone for a vacation, it was easy to "catch up."  Leah had started a load of laundry because Abishai threw up on the way home yesterday. So I finished that one and got the 2nd load all the way through the washer and dryer before this morning. I had the kids tackle the two loads first and I'm glad I did. I only had a minimal amount of our stuff to put away. Even Abishai tried to put his clothes away and he got his pjs, socks, and underwear put back right! I heard Abishai chanting, "Home Sweet Home." I felt bad about canceling the playdate but I couldn't handle another embarrassing scene. Especially after how I messed up the last hour of yesterday's drive home.

I have spent a good portion of the day going back and forth with my friends about Joe Biden, running on the Democratic ticket for President. It's been an awesome discussion and very civil. Something I love to engage in. And I thanked them for it. Other than that, we've just done nothing. I cleaned up my desk a bit. I'm glad I wrote some words for Tuesday and Wednesday and now I just have to type something up for Thursday. And when I'm up for it, I'll put it all together. I'm currently working to upload photos and it's driving Justin nuts. The bank accounts are budgeted. Keturah and I showered. Leftovers for supper. And we had a short burst of thunderstorms come through. I don't know what tonight will look like. I left probably 50 text messages for Jared and he's not responding because they have a virtual conference tomorrow. I kind of just want to be left alone. I'm feeling better now that I've talked to others. Two friends texted me (not just messaged me, but actual texts) when I wrote about how I felt. And I texted my sister. It's just good to tell someone.

Back to normal I guess. Which is not where I want to be at all. We'll see how the rest of the weekend goes and then I have 5, yes 5!, appointments next week so school is going to be all over the place. I need to rest up this weekend and do nothing. Even if it means I put off sorting through clothes, again. So be it.

I signed up, did you? Smitty is actually the emcee this time!

6 years ago I think? At a "pumpkin patch" in New Orleans. Oh yeah, right before the cruise perhaps?

Bwahahaha

I didn't need to even ask, Abishai took it upon himself to put all his snacks away in the drawers today.

Amen.

Saturday Jared had the e2 conference thing, so I played a game with Abishai and then we set up a barricade so we could shoot Daddy when he came home. 

I watched a seminar about ADD and middle schoolers, which relates to teens as well. Pretty great stuff!

I love this visual instead of putting up number of minutes. She was suggesting to use an analog clock, not digital.

Schedule of all family members.

"Masterpiece" is an "old" game, barely used, and it's about auctioning art pieces to each other and to/from the bank. We did play with at least some of the regular rules. The art cards have the artist's information and name of the art piece. Very educational. I think we played it for almost 2 hrs.

All set up with our barricade for Daddy.

Gotta take a break from watching for Daddy to eat a snack! It's all he ate for lunch! Whoops!

Abishai would not make a great sniper since he can't sit still!

Is Daddy here yet?

Always fiddling with something.

Attacking Daddy

At least I had clarity of mind today (thanks to two cups of coffee). I decided to try my lighthouse cross stitch again and discovered I really don't have much left to do. So I think I just listened to 90 minutes of "The Scarlet Letter" while I stitched two colors worth, which wasn't much overall. I have 4 colors left, but I can only identify 2 of them on the sheet. It has been the most time consuming, mistake ridden project I've ever done. The colors on the sheet didn't match the colors of the thread. They should have used some symbols. Thankfully, the sky, sand, and sea are forgivable. The fabric itself is so supple from so many years of handling, it's ridiculous. And it's only about 5x7 inches! I think I started it soon after my mom died and I went through their things. Definitely before PEI. I have a much, much larger cross stitch, of Jesus, but I think less colors and more rows of each color. That actually is easier to to do than all the starting and stopping in the smaller projects. Sigh. But, I finally got into "The Scarlet Letter" after half a dozen tries today. Now I'm hooked and didn't want to stop! I'm enjoying the audio book kind of thing because I usually listen and half watch a TV show while doing my phone games anyway, so why not listen and play my games or cross stitch. It does stick in my brain a bit better than reading right now. I'm hoping Justin can get it easier with audiobooks as well. I told him to read the first chapter which is two pages total and draw me the scene they describe because it's so rich in vocabulary. And then I'll let him go chapter by chapter with a study guide and/or me using the audio version. And our library system is the best of the best! I have so much access to so many platforms, books, TV shows, ebooks, audiobooks, ah! Anyway, that felt good and to watch a bit of this 5-step learning process by a PhD who wrote "The Switch on Your Brain" book. I still haven't read the book and it's not in an audio format for my phone app. Oh well. I think this course is quick, with only 9, 12 min videos, so I want Justin to go through it in the next few weeks. We'll see, this week is a beast, so no guarantees.

I spent the afternoon working on these week's blogs. I took care of the doing the photo backups, including CD's last night when I couldn't put two thoughts together. I had Justin make taco meat for supper and Keturah distributed the load of sheets from the dryer. Everyone got to help make their beds. Chores were done. Jared had gone for a nap and based on what he was wearing and his moaning, he didn't feel good because he didn't sleep well. Well, I didn't sleep well either. We will go to church as normal tomorrow but won't be eating lunch with Gary and Leah. Gary's out of town, Benaiah is going downtown to vote, and I don't think Leah liked what I wrote in an email last night regarding Jared's article that was in the e2 enewsletter/blog and how it was his opinion and not mine and how I hoped no one thought we were on agreement. When you are in leadership, your marriage should be solid, above reproach, unified, all the things. And I don't want to promote a falsehood. When we totally disagree on politics, how to do church, parenting, education, even how to paint a bathroom, he and I shouldn't be putting ourselves out there projecting something the other person doesn't agree with. Anyway, so there's that.

A package for Benaiah came today from Door Dash. Apparently he signed up to be a delivery boy. Yeah for a side gig! We'll have to figure out mileage and car usage and taxes, but I can ask my brother for help on that. What a big boy Benaiah is to make big decisions, lol. 

Truth

My ADD is showing, bouncing between different things today.

Socks played "blankie monster" with Abishai where he knows he can nibble us through the blanket. However, there was a moment where the blankie wasn't in between Socks and Abishai and Abishai thought it was funny that Socks was actually nibbling on him. I had to sternly tell the kids never to let him do that because I don't want Socks to become a mean old dog.

Where is Keturah? Hiding of course! But she was working on her guitar practice.

Sunday - Well, we woke up late. It's a good thing I was only staying for one service. We were out the door in under 50 minutes, including a costume for Abishai. I just have to leave more undone when we are late like that and I don't like it. Church was fine. I'm still kind of mad that I have to wear a mask and I don't see this mass increase in attendance or enough volunteers to open more classrooms so more families can come back. If you all are sending kids to school, why are you not coming to church? If people are scared to come to church because people aren't wearing masks, then why aren't they coming when we are? Maybe the social media team needs to send out photos of the congregation doing all the things they think are necessary. So, I wrote a post. And, I wasn't terribly nice. And, if I get called out by leadership, I don't care. Hey, guess what, we aren't in leadership anymore, so what does it matter what I post on social media? Ok, ok, I think I technically signed something about that for when I serve in the nursery. Whoops, I'm just remembering that now. Again, if I get called out, than I do. And if I don't, then no one cares. Anyway, lots of other things made me mad and I'm in full PMS freakout mode. Trying to distract myself with other things like learning about the brain or listening to "The Scarlet Letter."  I looked at my Bible study, too.

Leftovers at home and Jared got his usual nap. (A trigger for me, btw.) I worked on the computer. Kids had screen time. I quickly got library books and dog food at the grocery store because Socks didn't even have breakfast because we were out. Yes I picked up cookies and chocolate for myself, and milk and bananas for the others. PMS week, y'all and I can't find the stash of candy I hid from Keturah. I already ate a whole chocolate bar last night. 

School starts tomorrow. Rough week ahead I'm sure. But I'm also sure I will feel accomplished once I'm caught up on all these appointments. I don't know what else. My brain isn't functioning well. Must be the lack of sleep. As you can see, we did get outside for a few minutes and I did manage to bring in some clothing boxes. I hate going through clothes and making decisions. But now that both Keturah and Justin can tell me what they will wear, I just go by what they say. Well, I make them keep a couple of nicer things of course just in case. I pulled all the child sized clothes out of Justin's closet and drawers yesterday and didn't even check if they fit. He's taller than me and can fit in men's things. Let's just make it easy and start there. It was mostly jeans he wasn't ever going to wear anyway. After we really reduced Benaiah's things to just those couple of sets of plastic drawers and a few hangup clothing items, I think I just shifted into doing the minimal for the other two. I mean I started doing that when I started purchasing items for them when I think we moved to Canada, at least with Benaiah. I say that time frame because the copious amounts of extra pants were sizes that Benaiah wore before and just after moving. Anyway, maybe I just hope the kids learn how to be minimalist in at least one area. But Abishai's stuff is a beast. He does have his favorites, and although I try to bury them, he pulls out the same things. I might just start asking him the same questions of "Do you like it? Will you wear it?" and THEN seeing if it will fit. That typically reduces the overall amount a lot. My problem is that I ask myself that question and then discover it doesn't fit. I like it all. I haven't switched over my clothes yet. It's just some of the shirts that I need to do. But mine are all hanging up and available to me at any time so I don't have to go through boxes of stuff.  I did go through things last fall when I bought some nicer things from Old Navy, so I'm not too worried. It's just really Abishai and then deciding if I'm keeping anything of Justin's to pass down to Abishai. I think Abishai will be skinny, but Benaiah was until he was 10. So, I might need to keep a bit of both. 2-3 jeans of each size/type? Husky and skinny? Don't know. I don't really have another box to put them in to put them in the shed though. Grrr.....Anyway, it's a process, and I brought some boxes in so that's no longer the excuse. We inventoried Justin's stuff and he's good for the moment. We'll see if this box will yield anymore helpful items and if not, then we will hit the store for 2-3 jeans, one more nice dress pant/short, maybe another pair of gym pants since he wears those the most. You can get away with a lot when 90% of the time you are wearing gym shorts and a t-shirt. He's got a nice collection of hoodies going though. Hand me downs and his own. A few dress shirts. And he gained two pairs of nicer shoes for church. Justin's feet haven't grown much, so he's been able to wear the same two pairs of sneakers for awhile, plus his croc sandals. It kind of feels awesome to get this stage and think "these will be his permanent clothes until he either gets tired of them or they wear out."  I still have to think Keturah will get bit bigger and I will need to purchase more for her each season. I'm glad we don't need to have a huge clothing budget!

And Jared took Abishai to see the fireworks display at church that the youth group was doing! And per usual in this township, people started chatting about it on the township FB page. Hang in there, folks! It's just for a few minutes! And it's well controlled by competent adults! Promise! I'm just glad for Jared and Abishai to get out of the house and I don't have to leave again to get the kids. Wahoo!

Dress-up day at church (the Sunday before Halloween). Abishai had his costume all picked out a couple of weeks ago when they announced it. We rigged up this big boy costume and made it work. He wore rainboots which really helped the costume from dragging. He said he took off his costume mask at a few points during the hour. And he colored the right and left brain because they were working on doing the right thing or something. He was able to talk about the skit though.

"Look, Mom, I'm surfing!"

Keturah found the extra swingset parts so she tried to put them up. One of them got stuck though when she was trying to adjust the length. I went out to take photos for Miss Stephanie, but then remembered that I really needed to try to find some boxes in the shed for switching out the clothes. I found a small box of bigger sized clothes for Justin, and then I think that's it for the boxed up hand me downs. I think after that box I had started to just shift anything that Benaiah wasn't wearing to the back of Justin's section of the closet or the back of his drawers. Then I pulled out the two boxes of clothes I set aside of mine that are too small. There should be some size 5's in there that Keturah might want. She says she has enough, and I agree with her that we are trying to be minimal, but I know I had purposefully been saving some things or these moment, so we'll see. And I pulled out the heavy winter stuff to go through per usual. I don't know if I'll find time and energy to tackle this stuff, but we'll try.

Hey, I said you need to go exercise! Goof! This was after lunch, and he hadn't changed out of his Sunday pants/costume yet. He did change into shorts when he came in and we had to beg him to put pants back on because they were going to be outside watching fireworks tonight. I did see some adults setting up the fireworks at the back of the building. I'll try to send Jared early with Abishai.

That's a bit better. You can count on Abishai to make the kids MOVE around.

FYI, the slide isn't screwed into place yet. Which is probably dangerous. It's pretty solid though and doesn't shift. But Abishai had the idea of getting a sled out to go down on it. We haven't cleaned the slide yet, so maybe this will keep his clothes clean?

 

 

The End