{ing} life September 27, 2012

{thinking}  How did life get so complicated???  When you're little you think adulthood is going to bring with it lots of choices, lots of freedom.  You can do whatever you want, right?  Yeah, right.  I feel like we're constantly doing all the things we "have" to do and very little of the things we "want" to do.  We really want to go see Rebekah, finding the time to do it is proving very difficult.  I know, the popular sentiment right now is you make the time to do what's important to you, but like lots of platitudes, it's just not always true.  Jacob has commitments the next few weeks that have to be honored; church, school, scouts.  There are some choices there, sure, but not as many as I'd like.  One thing I did decide is that scouts is going to have to go in October.  They have three weekend events planned, two of which are campouts, one of which is four days.  Um, no.  Last time I looked there were four weekends in October.  I like my son, thank you very much, I like spending time with him.  Three weekends away is not going to happen.  The first weekend it conflicts with a church retreat for 6th grade confirmation students, the last weekend it conflicts with something else.  The middle weekend I'm just saying no.  :-)  Our school district does a 6th grade camp experience, required, and Jacob will also be going to that for three days.  Enough!  Trying to figure out how to make all the other puzzle pieces work is proving tricky.

I won Cedar Point tickets from Tracy at Just Another Mommy Blog.  Very cool!  Trying to figure out when/how we can go is proving ridiculously difficult.  I'm trying though.  There's one weekend in October that might work.  One.  Hopefully we can pull it together.  I will not cede my family to the busyness of life.  My kids are lucky, Mark and I are lucky, they have wonderful opportunities, but it's important that the activities not become everything.  We've always had a close family.  Perhaps unusually close, a lot of people comment on it, but it's special to us and I will fight to keep it.

[Sidebar:  We're thinking about making a long weekend of Cedar Point.  Has anyone ever stayed at any of the water parks in Sandusky?  There's Kalihari, Castaway Bay, and Great Wolf Lodge.  As an aside, should it worry me that Google search of Great Wolf Lodge Sandusky has an immediate link for "Great Wolf Lodge Sandusky Bed Bugs"???  What was your experience?  What about indoor water parks in general?  I'm not sure my kids are going to be the water slide types.  Would they still have fun?  Honestly it seems horrendously expensive, which we can't really afford, though we could stretch for something special, I'm just not sure it's a good idea for us.  I'd love your feedback.]

{thankful}  Jacob survived his weekend.  Not only survived, actually thrived.  Eventually.  Friday night must have been pure H*** for him.  By the time they got to where they were camping, it was pouring.  Yup, camp (and tent) set up in the pouring rain.  Jacob had never set up a tent by himself before.  By the time he and his tent mate got their tent set up, it was literally full of water.  Not good.  Fortunately one of the dads gave up their tent to the boys and slept in the car.  (Actually, they probably would have been a bit better off in the car.)  It rained all night long.  Not great, but not horrible.  What was horrible was that it stormed.  Jacob is terrified of lightening when he's outside.  I know he was so scared.  He told us he just kept thinking I want to go home, I want to go home.  (I was disappointed they didn't put the boys on the bus.  When we're camping and there's a storm we always get in the car.  You have to be safer in a lightening situation than in a tent.  Not too happy about that choice by the adults.)  Mark and I pretty much sat on radar all. night. long.  Around midnight Mark wanted to leave and go get him, we knew how he'd be feeling, but it was three hours away.  Three hours when you're tired, in bad weather, plus three hours back?  Not a good plan.  We knew we really didn't have any way to help.  Not a good feeling.   The good news is he made it through.  Saturday dawned.  They crossed over to the island and...it rained.  Pretty much all day but they made the best of it and had a good time anyway.  So proud of him!  Saturday night he even had the chance to come home but decided he was having too much fun.  Yay!  Somewhat surprising, especially considering he really didn't have enough clothes nor warm enough clothes.  The weather forecast was not exactly the reality.  Anyway, when we went to pick him up one of the adult leaders warned us he had had a really rough time full of lots of challenges but that we should be really proud of him, he did a great job and he made it through.  I am happy for him.  I'm not sure I'd let him go on a campout again with more than occasional rain forecast, but I am happy for him.  Very, very thankful for a mostly happy ending.

One more thing I'm proud about.  We gave him a little pocket money to spend on the island.  Not a lot, just some "fun money".  He used some of it to buy his sister a present for her upcoming birthday.  A thoughtful present she will really love.  Very cool.

{hoping}  You know the saying when a door closes a window opens?  Here's hoping.  My work situation did not turn out the way I would have hoped.  It's sad.  Julianna will really miss her buddies, our family will definitely miss the income.  But.  In many ways it's good.  It will be good for our family to have me get off work a bit earlier everyday.  It will be good for Jacob and Julianna to maintain their homework time when they get home from school, before activities claim their time and attention.  It will be good for me.  You see, taking this job, the way the family wanted it, would have been bad for me.  I thought I could do it.  I thought I could suck it up and just do it, because financially it would be good for my family.  Then, more information came and I realized I just can't be super woman.  There are limits.  This job, would have pushed me too far and I said no.  I was able, though it was very difficult, to say these are the parameters within I can do this job, outside of these, I can't.  Unfortunately, it was a deal breaker and I lost a job I would have loved to have and it caused a lot of angst, but I'm hoping I will look back and see that it was a good thing in the long run.  Hoping.

{overwhelming} I really enjoy my job.  I love the little people in my life, I love the families, I love being home for my family...I love almost everything about it.  However.  For the first time in our lives, my family is dependent on my income.  I don't work, we're not okay.  If I get sick, and can't work for an extended period, we are literally not okay and that terrifies me.  Almost to the point of panic scares me.  It's truly overwhelming.

{dreaming} Wouldn't it be lovely to have one weekend, I'll even be greedy and say from Friday afternoon until Monday morning, where there was nothing.  Nowhere we had to be, no place we needed to go, just nothing?  A girl can dream can't she?  Unfortunately, there's not even the possibility around here until end of December.  Possibly it might happen December 29-30.  *sigh*  That's a very, very long time from now.

Dreaming too of a clean house.  Not going to be willing to spend the money on it, but since I'm dreaming, I'll dream of hiring a cleaning service.  Just once.  Just to gave it clean, for at least a few hours.  

While I'm dreaming I'll throw in one more.  Dreaming of a pedicure.  Ahh, sounds so relaxing, doesn't it?  Maybe one of these days the stars will align and I'll have the time and money and feel okay spending both on it.

{reading}  I just finished Whipped, Not Beaten by Melissa Westemeier.  I won it in a giveaway by Kat from Seeking Sanity, then promptly got sidetracked.  This week I picked it up and loved it!  Such a fun story, very well written.  I thoroughly enjoyed it, thanks Kat!

Now I'm reading the next Susan Wiggs' novel Return to Willow Lake.  So good!  I'm getting to the point I love sequels and series.  When you invest so much time in a book and grow to love and care about the characters, it's so fun to have them reappear down the road.  Enjoying this book very much.

{excited}   Excited to spend some time with my parents this weekend.  I know we'll all enjoy that, though it will be brief. 

{working}   On everything!  I did a two hour grocery shopping this morning, picked up preschool kids, home to make lunch.  Now it's time to get two down for naps, clean the kitchen, make Chicken and Dumplings for dinner with pull apart rolls (no, I'm not really insane, Jacob's been begging for it since before the campout, I really need to get it done), clean the kitchen again, supervise homework, finish working, eat dinner, bring all the groceries that weren't perishable in from the car, put groceries away, take the kids to their drama class...you get it.  You do it.  It's just what we do, but I am working!

{praying} Giving thanks that so many things are working out for Rebekah.  The beginning of this year there were a lot of hurdles for her.  Thankfully, they're working out, and, not just working out but working out for the best.  So, happy for you.  I'll definitely continue praying for her, but so glad to see where she's at in her life.  Praying for all of my kids right now, obviously.  They're each facing things that I'm praying all work out for the best.  Praying too for Mark, he's having a hard time right now with some health issues.  Nothing too major, but praying for relief for him.

{cooking}  Still not a whole lot of good things happening on this front.  Still flying by the seat of my pants.  Still not good.  :-)  At least I was able to do a good meal plan for next week and even the shopping to go along with it.  Hopefully that will mean things will be looking up this next week.  If nothing else, there's the chicken and rolls for dinner tonight.  

I did make butter this week.  I know!  All my years and I had never made butter.  I was amazed at how easy it was.  I was making Bobby Flay's waffles with sauteed apples and cinnamon and sugar butter.  Bobby, of course, says to make the butter.  When I realized I had heavy cream just taking up space and making me feel guilty for that ice cream I still haven't gotten around to making, I decided to go for it.  Best part of the recipe. The waffles were fine.  The apples were puzzling.  He calls them sauteed, but they're actually simmered.  Next time I'd saute them and simmer the apple cinnamon syrup until it's nice and thick.  I served them with candied bacon (I know! but it's so good for a once-in-a-while treat) and it was a pretty good meal.

Thanks for coming by.  I hope you've had a good week and that your weekend is full of wonderful things. 

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Thank you for the blogging idea to Abby at Murdock's Mama.