Friday: stuff done

I got stuff done today!  I just worked my way down the list and even got stuff done that wasn't urgent.   It was all in the "do this soon" section though.  The big project of the day was cleaning out drains.  They weren't as clogged as I was expecting, so the job wasn't as yucky as I was expecting either.  Everything seems to be draining better, hopefully, so hurray!

It was sleepover day for the lovies.  I was wearing a shirt that said, "There's a nap for that" which caused Isaac to remember that Giraffe wanted to join me for nap time and then all the other lovies (including the Gnome, who usually just sits in a corner) showed up too.  Creeper propped up my book while I was reading/falling asleep and he was really glad for that job so he didn't have to cuddle.

Three weekends ago: Indy/Fort Wayne

 Three weekends ago we had a big weekend and I'm just getting things under control and so it is time for the blog post.

Isaac had his first USAC competition in Indianapolis, and of course he got the morning slot so we had to stay overnight.  Ben was going to come with us, but in the end went up to Mackinac Island to have some bonding time with his mom.  We left Friday night, obviously.  I had wanted to leave about fifteen minutes earlier, but things happen and we left just a little later than ideal.  The drive was good until we got close to Indy and I saw that we had missed being able to take our preferred route by about 10 minutes due to a nightly road closure.  Oh shoot.  Well, I couldn't really look at the map very well, but we went the opposite way on a highway and only got to our hotel six minutes later than expected.  So we must have been going in a circle.  We got into the hotel and the kids got to sleep.  It wasn't all that late, so I did a little grading and then went to bed too.

In the middle of the night we had to weird things happen.  1) A car alarm went off.  After waiting a few minutes I finally got up and looked out the window.  Hmm...is that our car?  I went to find my keys to turn it off, but luckily it turned off right as I grabbed the keys.  I can imagine it though - two car alarms going off at once because I couldn't think straight in the middle of the night to see if it was my car.  2) Joshua yelled, " ZOUP!" (pause) "Ha!"  And went back to sleep.  It was our rally cry for the rest of the weekend and could always make Isaac smile.  

Saturday started out pretty well, although we maybe should have gotten there fifteen minutes earlier.  Not a huge deal.  There were six routes for Isaac, and he really wanted to top at least one.  Well, he topped the first one on his fourth try.  Ok, goal achieved.

The next two hours were...a bit harder.  The routes were hard.  Some of the lines were long.  A mistake was made.  Isaac was feeling the pressure.  We took a break and had a snack.  The coaches had been around and talking with him, but at this point they started talking with him a bit more.  

There was one route he hadn't tried yet, so after a very nice talk from the coach he went over to try it.  Aside: the coaches were amazing.  They're always amazing, but, as one put it, they want to make better human beings.  Becoming a better rock climber is just a secondary goal.  Isaac ended up spending the last half hour and all ten tries on this route and he got so, so close.  He got one hand on the top hold several times, but couldn't quite get his second hand on it.

He was disappointed.  We had another pep talk.  He tried climbing it after time was called but he was so tired by then that it just didn't quite work.  But since time was called, the pressure was also off at this point.  He had something to eat, walked around a bit, and started to shake off the bad parts.  He said, a day or two afterwards, that he enjoyed it.  I loved watching him as always.  It was definitely a good growing experience for him!

After lunch we headed over to Fort Wayne to see family!  They also had some competitions away from home on Saturday as JJ had double header soccer games, so we got to their house a few hours before they got home.  In the end, it was rather nice though.  It gave Isaac some times to unwind, take a shower, and work on a math test before cousins and all the fun showed up.

I didn't get many pictures at Fort Wayne.  The kids kind of just disappeared after dinner.  We had a fire on the deck with smores.  I talked with Nathan and Liz.  We left a bit after lunch on Sunday.  It was a short trip, but it was also really, really nice to see them!

Oh, while I wasn't with Ben, obviously, I did get one really nice picture sent to me.

Thursday: still laughing

I: what are we watching for dinner?
A: I'm not watching anything for dinner.
I: no, what are we watching for dinner?
A: I'm not going to watch anything for dinner.  I'm going to eat my dinner.
I: hahahahahaha

Wednesday: bath, trunk or treat

I gave Snackxalotl and Catcachino a bath today.  They were both pretty happy about it, although Snackxalotl wanted to play in the water more.

We went trunk or treating at church tonight.  Isaac was a rock climber.  Joshua was a Creeper and made Ben go as Steve.  I'm not sure anyone realized that Ben was dressed up too.

Monday: school pictures, fall dinner

Both school pictures have come in...

Joshua wore the same shirt as last year.  We knew that ahead of time.  I like this picture better than the last one.

Isaac missed getting his picture day when he actually dressed up a bit for it.  It got cold, so dressing up wouldn't have worked as well.  This picture is also ok, but we have some better ones from the mid-summer family pictures.

I also made the once a year meal of ham and squash.  The squash went over well (which is good, because I froze quite a bit of it).  I tried putting it in the air fryer this time instead of baking and mashing it.

I didn't finish my grading today, but I did get a surprising number of other things done.  I graded in the morning, had coffee with Pat, took a short nap, and then accomplished stuff.  I'm hopeful the toilet is fixed, the squash was cubed, Christmas cards and other pictures were ordered, the kitchen mostly cleaned, a few emails dealt with, and more!  After a slow start this morning I was a bit surprised.

Saturday: lock-in

This morning before anyone got up Joshua made us a "lock-in"  (i.e., escape room).  He usually does a nice job with these things, so I was somewhat excited to do it.  I had had an itinerary of the day in my head and it did not include a lock-in, so that was the part I was a little annoyed with.  I got over it.

Anyway, Joshua had put a bunch of items on the table and there were several that I thought were going to add to the story but were complete fakes.  A large bowl of Lego dots, a stack of books, and two glasses filled with colored water, for example.  The first puzzle was a little confusing, but after that we figured things out pretty well.

In other news, the cats finally posed for a Christmas card picture.  I had on my calendar, "Christmas Cards!  Just do them! Now!" because we always get to December and I'm overwhelmed and don't want to do them.  So obviously, I'm going to do them in the middle of one of my busiest semesters in a while.  I'm only getting 25 though, so that should keep the crazy to a minimum.

Friday: status

Groceries: gotten.  I was only asked once if I got groceries.

Toilet: probably fixed.  It might have a slow inner leak.  One time I noticed the water level inside had dropped an inch and therefore the valve was slowly leaking water into the tank.  It is function for now but I need to keep an eye on it.

Black belt recertification: Done.  I wasn't going to do it, but the timing has been rather inconsistent.  It's been a while since the last one and I wanted some new material for the next several months.  I didn't feel confident in everything, but the teachers said I'd be fine.  I was fine.  I wasn't great, but I was fine.  (Think normal belt test, but for black belts.  There isn't a rank up associated with it, but I need a certain number before I'm allowed to go to the next rank of black belt.)  

Friends: Joshua and his friends got Boba tea after school.  They were all so excited.

Laundry: put away

Grading: in progress

Kitchen: almost clean

Nap: taken

Thursday: groceries? groceries? groceries?

Oh my children.  

I usually get groceries on Wednesday.  I didn't get groceries on Wednesday this week because I ended up getting groceries last Friday and wanted to work on the toilet this Wednesday.  The number of times between yesterday and today that I've been asked if I got groceries is a little insane.

We are out of milk, but that's usually not what they're asking about.  Joshua is usually asking about donuts.  Isaac...I'm not sure what he cares about.  Furthermore, they know I work on Thursdays.  They just can't wrap their heads around the fact that I haven't gotten groceries yet.

If it wasn't for being out of milk, I might not even go tomorrow.  Milk is rather important though, so I'll go.  Oh, I guess we're out of apples too.  It's an Aldi week, so there might not be donuts.

Wednesday: toilet saga

 Ok.  So Dad came over Tuesday morning before we went to work and replaced the shut-off value.  There were a few minutes of touch-and-go, but he got it!  No more leaking, which is the biggest deal.

Today I continued to work on the toilet.  I put in a new supply line.  I finished putting in the new value.  I put in a new handle, the thing that started this whole process, but it wasn't ideal.  I got a cheap one from Lowe's and it is curved the wrong way such that it rubs hard against the front of the tank.  And I turned on the water.

There was no leaking!  It was a miracle!  The tank filled and stopped appropriately.  I was able to flush.  (Which was rather necessary, since the kids forgot once or twice not to use the toilet.)  But.  The water kept draining into the bowl.  

That's right!  Now the flapper isn't working either.  I'm happy with the progress I was able to make, but it would have been nice if the flapper just worked.  I hate the flappers - they're always so finicky.

Tuesday: Grey Bear

 This notification on my phone made me smile all day. 

Grey Bear has a birthday notification.

Monday: normal

 It was a pretty normal Monday, really.  Aunt C came over so I opened Isaac's window so the cats could say hi.  It was a beautiful day so I was glad to air out the house a bit.

I wasn't planning on doing some of my winterizing, but since it was such a nice day I spent a bit of time on it.  There's still more to do, but some is done.  That's how I felt about most of the day.  There's still more to do, but some is done.

Sunday: half week in review

I'm getting close to being on top of things.  I know, I talk a lot about how I have a lot to do lately.  But making sure I get the minimum done is often in the forefront of my mind and so it ends up here.  Last week had a bunch of good things happen that just took extra time too.

Thursday was busy as normal.  I had a few extra things going on at Hope but still fairly normal.

Friday I attempted to fix a toilet and instead broke the handle off the water-off valve.  So now we've had a bit of a leak.  Lowe's didn't have the valve I needed (really?) so I need to wait an extra day for amazon to send me one.

Saturday we went to an escape room at the library.  It was well set up, but there were a lot of problems to solve in a short time!  So we used several hints to keep us going.  It was a fun thing to do together.

Saturday evening we went to a friends house and that was a lovely time as normal.  The kids played well and the adults talked well.

Sunday was normal; we did nursery at church.  We ended up going rock climbing because that's when it worked best in the schedule.  Isaac's science teacher is at the front desk for a few hours on Sunday so it was nice to see her.

And then we get to the end of the weekend.  Do I still have a crazy amount of stuff to do?  Yes.  Am I feeling a bit more in control?  Usually.  This coming week is just normal busy, so I should be able to catch up.

Wednesday: field trip

I joined Joshua on his field trip to Outdoor Discovery Center.  This is the third year he's gone and while they change up the information a little bit it also feels like kind of the same information each time.  That isn't necessarily a bad thing and a break from school is always nice, but it also isn't the most exciting.

It was also cold.  It was quite cold in the morning and pretended to warm up, but never really got warm.  I come dressed in a winter coat, hat, and mittens.  There are some people that only have a light jacket on and I just don't understand.

I had an hour after dropping off the kids before I had to pick them up again, and had been hoping for a nap.  However, my co-teacher had a minor emergency and didn't know how long it would last so instead I ended up answering student emails from her section.  And since I was answering those questions I dealt with some emails from my other class too.  By the time I finished all of those it was time to pick up the kids.

I had a dream of a nap after picking up the kids - once in a while it can happen.  I just lay down on the couch and get a brief snooze in.  (Emphasis on brief.)  However, I was needed and then decided I should start dinner and start a load of laundry and then nap time was gone.  

But I at least had a relaxing evening.  I'm hoping that things will be under control, or at least as under control as possible this semester, by the weekend.

Monday: work

 We had a great weekend - I'll post on that eventually.

Today we worked hard in the morning.  I had a mountain of grading (that I just finished), Isaac had a mountain of math (that he is on top of), and Joshua forgot his math packet this weekend so he had about a week's worth of homework.  He was going to bring it and work on it during the competition, but it got left at home.

Then Joshua went to the optometrist for contacts.  He got the contacts in and he got one out - I did the other one.  It was an emotional time for him, I think because he wants them so badly and they didn't just pop in and out of his eye.  But he did the minimum required at the office and it'll get easier over time.

Then Isaac had a dentist appointment.  He needs to have a wiggly tooth pulled because it's preventing another tooth from coming in, but no one seems otherwise worried about it.

At home I decided to make applesauce to go with dinner.  There was good reasoning in my brain: the fruit flies had enjoyed the smell of the apples while were were gone and I'm afraid they're about to turn.  I'm not sure that a) they're about to turn as they seem just fine and b) that it was a good use of my time.  There's a toilet that's rather high on my priority list that I didn't look at today.  But!  Grading is done ...for now.  Unless something changes on the calendar I expect this will have been one of the hardest weekends to get that done.

Wednesday: reading

While Joshua was at church the rest of us ended up snuggled under a blanket, reading.  Then Joshua came home and joined in.  It was lovely.

Tuesday: fall break

 Today was fall break.  I cleaned the laundry room.

I also found our Christmas tree and a stash of the cats' toys.  I understand how the cat toys get there, but why where there so many fake Christmas tree needles?  The Christmas tree is on the other side of the house.

I am 3/4 finished...but those three quarters are cleaned well.

Monday: ghosts

Scene: Getting the kids out of the house for school, which means making breakfasts and lunches and, most pertinent to this story, snacks.

I'm not always the cleanest lunch and snack maker, taking out food slowly and then putting it all away at the end.  I don't always close the cabinet doors.  

Ok.  Well, I cleaned up a bit and closed the cabinet door.  I dealt with something else.

Oh, the cabinet door is open again.  I must not have closed it.  I got everyone off to school.

Oh, the cabinet door is open again.  Have I really not closed it yet?  I thought I put all the snacks away.  I close it - I am certain it is closed.

Oh, the cabinet door is open again.  I haven't even been in the kitchen since last time I closed it!

I close the door and watch it.  Over the course of the next three seconds it opens all the way up.  I wasn't imagining it!  But it opened slowly enough that I had moved onto the next thing and didn't see it open.

I put a rubber band around the knob attaching it to the cabinet above.  It'll work for now.  Surprisingly, no one has said anything about it to me yet.  What changed to make it suddenly want to be open?

Sunday: D&D

After rest time we had a bit of a rocky go of things.  I'm not really sure what happened, but several of us weren't happy.  We finally made it through and decided to start Joshua's D&D campaign.

I'll be honest, I wasn't expecting it to go all that well.  And I was happily proven wrong.

So far we've defeated a sewage monster, found (and opened) a hidden door/wall, found a sword in a stone, defeated a metal blaze, and defeated a mimic.  We also found some new weapons and spells.  Joshua has everything quite organized: he has a spell book for Isaac, monster information for all the monsters, and a story.  The monsters were on the easy side to defeat, but better than way than too hard.  It meant that we made progress.  I think there's also a few misunderstandings about the exact rules sometimes, but everyone just goes with the flow and it works.

Joshua's monsters are also well created and the hidden door/wall actually opened and closed.

It might be a while before we have time to play again, but it should be fun to continue on.

 

Friday: things getting done

I'm currently on fall break for a short time but it started off well.  I finally got a bunch of stuff off my to-do list.  I had time to get all the small stuff off and it felt good.  (Tornado helped by walking all over the clean clothes in the dresser.)

I was eating lunch and heard a thump.  Tornado had knocked Giraffe off the table!  Then Tornado circled around Giraffe like he was going to eat him.  It was definitely the bad part of Giraffe's day today.  (Isaac found it a little funny though.)

Saturday a long time ago: noodle wars

 Several months ago we had some friends over to our house.  We had a noodle fight.  I got the cheap pipe insulators from Lowe's instead of real pool noodles.  I'm not sure it was the best choice because they were a little flimsy, but they worked.

We sent the kids out first and then a few minutes later the adults came out with a surprise attack.

Thursday: ok

It felt like I made several minor mistakes today.  Oddly enough, they didn't make it a bad day - it was just that I could have done better.  Some of them weren't even mistakes.  They were the right choice but not quite how I wanted the day to go.

Wednesday: one at a time

 It was a pretty normal Wednesday.  There were a few notable exceptions though...

1) I went to the Spectrum store to cancel our internet and bring back the modem.  Now, I decided to do it in-store because we had to bring back the modem and I was afraid that doing it over the phone was going to be a nightmare - we've had to deal with them in the past.  And my experience was lovely.  I had just sat down when my name was called.  (I bypassed several other people in line which I felt a bit bad about, but I had made an appointment.)  I told them I wanted to cancel my service and they said, "ok" and proceeded to process it without issue.  I was in and out within about five minutes, and one of those minutes was waiting at the kiosk to sign in.

2) I found another army man.  One day Isaac was on a mission to hide them all, and he has hidden them well!  I have found them in places that I only look a few times a year, if that.  This time it was on the headboard of the guest bed.  I'm a bit surprised it was still there because it had to stay there while I was sleeping on the bed for several nights and when I took off the sheets.

3) One of Joshua's spelling words is 'equation' and he just can't remember it.  The other words are coming along, but this one wasn't.  So instead of writing it again three times I made him draw it.  We'll see if it actually helped tomorrow.

Tuesday: busy

Today was busier than most Tuesdays.  I had several students in my office, so I didn't get as much prepped for Thursday as I needed to.  (However, one of the meetings was rather uplifting and we were able to celebrate some small victories.)

During rock climbing Isaac fell off the wall and got the wind knocked out of him, again.  Of course, I was belying Joshua and he was at the top of the wall.  There were people around to help Isaac, but I also got Joshua down quickly (and of course safely) and went over to see Isaac.  By the time I got there he was breathing again so I attempted to back off.  I'm not completely sure it worked, but I also think it mostly worked.  I'm not sure he got back on the wall again, but the coaches were there checking in with him and by the end of the practice he was mostly ok.  He was really tired this evening and went to bed earlier than normal though.  I did want to mention that while falling was Isaac's bad part of the day, rock climbing as a whole was his good part.

Monday: venting, a bit

After feeling someone productive yesterday, mainly because we all worked hard during our extra half hour of cleaning, today felt the opposite.

If I think about what I did accomplish, it was quite a bit!  I even put a new toilet seat on, although admittedly that isn't a very hard task.

In the morning I had finished raking the edge and clearing out all the seaweed that had washed ashore.  I was glad Joshua had helped on Sunday, as it was one of the largest seaweed volumes we've had.  I looked back at the lake in the afternoon only to see a significant amount of seaweed back by the shore.  Six hours from clear to not clear.  Laundry at least gives me a week before it requires more attention.

That's not really true.  I'm still working on last week's laundry.  I try to finish by Saturday, but there was a lot of bedding that needed to be done this past week.  Everything is now clean from last week's wash, but not put away.  And the new cycle starts on Wednesday, so there'll be more to do again.

Am I on top of things?  Yes.  The important things are getting done.  Do I feel in control?  Not quite...but I do expect to eventually be back in control and so I'll hold out until then.

I also found a spider in my refrigerator this morning and I felt like it was taunting me.  "haha.  Things are so dirty in your house that there are even spiders in your fridge!"  I was running behind this morning and so I left it.  I told it, "haha.  Fridges aren't good places for spiders because they're cold."  I did finally save it this afternoon because I was afraid Joshua would see it and it would be an ordeal.  Laura suggested that maybe, since it was an itsy-bitsy spider, it just climbed the wrong water spout.

Sunday: happenings

 For the third year, Isaac grew watermelons.  Today he picked his harvest.

To be fair, there were two watermelons on the vine.  The other one was a tiny bit bigger, but a pest got into it recently and so it remained out there.  I thought this was going to be our year because the melons were visible early!  Yes!  And then they just stopped growing.  Not enough sun?  Maybe the raspberry bushes covered them too much??  I don't know if he'll want to try again next year.

We finished up our Lego D&D campaign today.  The dragon came to collect its egg that a bad guy had stolen and we got caught in the cross-fire.  It turns out that we were "supposed" to let the bad guy help us wound the dragon so that it would leave with its egg, but we killed the bad guy really quickly.  Also luckily, the dragon had a bad roll and so didn't see three of us hiding in almost plain sight.

It was a fun game and the kids loved it.  Their imaginations have gone crazy making spin-offs.  Ben did a great job being the dungeon master, but it's also a lot of work to DM so I don't know if we'll do something similar again soon.  Well, besides the stories the kids have come up with.

Saturday: dinner

 We had dinner with Ben's family.  Isaac sat by Larry.  There were water bottle shenanigans happening.

Friday: rock climbing

 The sky was pretty this morning.

Night mode picture actually added a lot of colors that weren't yet visable.

Tornado has been sitting in cute poses.

We brought Grandma to the Scrapyard today to see us rock climb!  I was a little surprised that she wanted to come, but also very excited that she was willing to.  It was a great time to go since the gym was rather empty - it made it easier to roll around the wheelchair.  (Which was surprisingly easy to get on the mat, so I was also excited about that!)

She said she was scared for us a few times, but no one got obviously hurt so that was good.

Thursday: I did it!

 I got Wordle in one try!!  I was so excited all day about it.

Also, there's another Tropical Storm Isaac.  The last one was in 2012 - it was pretty bad, but not bad enough to remove the name from the rotation I guess.  This one might spend most of it's time in the ocean.

Tuesday: rain

 It was a beautiful, rainy day today.  The rain was sporadic, but sometimes barely there and sometimes torrential downpour.  They had the garage doors open during rock climbing, so you could see and hear it well.

One of the many good parts of the day was flu shots.  (I heard the flu is coming a bit earlier this cycle, so we got them today.)  We went to the flu shot clinic at our doctor's office and we were probably in and out within ten minutes.  This is so much more amazing than doing it at a pharmacy, where it always feels as though you have to wait forever.  By the time we got there there was no line and it went nice and fast.

I also went out to lunch with Natalie.  I probably would have gotten chicken salad on a bagel, but they were out.  So I got the veggies on a bagel...it was delicious.  I'll probably get it again.

Ben is starting to feel better.  I wore a mask at work though because those poor students have about 100 illnesses going around and they can't catch a break.  I don't need to accidently get them sick.  (And to be clear, I am currently symptom free and feel fine.  It's been about 48 hours since Ben started feeling sick, so I'm hoping to be in the clear.  But I didn't know that when teaching.)

Monday: oh Creeper

Tonight I was doing good part/bad part of the day for the lovies, as is normal.  Creeper loves anything to do with explosions, and usually this means that he says inappropriate stuff.  Joshua and I just sigh and say, "Oh Creeper."

Amanda: Bad part?
Creeper: When Dad stopped throwing up
Amanda: Good part?
Creeper: When Dad threw up all night!!!  *nods head vigorously to emphasize*

On the other hand, Grey Bear is very loving.

Amanda: Bad part?
GB: Dad being so sick
Amanda: Good part?
GB: When Dad stopped throwing up!!

So then I put Grey Bear over Creeper's head and Grey Bear pretended to talk for Creeper.

Grey Bear, as Creeper: Dad being sick is not good.
Grey Bear, as Creeper: Dad not throwing up is good.

Joshua found that last part funnier than I expected so I did it a few times.

And, in case you're wondering, Snackalotl's bad part was Dad being sick and his snacks for the day were a spice bar and a Snickers Ice Cream bar.  He only gets two snacks per day, otherwise he gets in big trouble.

Catcachino's bad part was not coming with me to the coffee shop today and his good part was that Grandpa Pat drank coffee.

Giraffe's bad part was Dad being sick and his good part was taking a nap with me.

Snowfoot's bad part was having to spend the whole day in a sick room with a sick person.  His good part was that someone was going to get him and not make him spend all night with a sick person.  (Cue Joshua to the rescue.)

Sometimes bed time is exhausting.

Weekend: stuff

It was a pretty normal weekend.  We did go to a friends' house yesterday evening and everyone had a good time.  The kids played really well, and Ben and I got to play some games.

Isaac did better than I expected with his time management this weekend.  I felt like I kept gently reminding him to stop flopping around and do something.  (Whether that was something fun or something work, I didn't care.)  We made it through the weekend though and I don't think either of us was too annoyed with the other.

Oh!  I wasn't asleep before Isaac got home on Friday.  He and Ben pulled in about 10minutes before I would have fallen asleep.  I was just getting into my sleeping position with my book and didn't expect my eyes would stay open long.

Friday: a first

 I think we're going to have another first tonight...I think I'm going to be asleep before Isaac gets home. 

He and Ben are at a magic event and I'm so tired.  It's been close a few times in the past, where I've been in bed when they get home, but tonight I might actually be asleep 

Stay tuned 

Thursday: story time

 A few weeks ago I was at the library during story time.  And they started doing the Bunny song.  ("See the little bunnies sleeping til it's nearly noon..."  Oh, that was my favorite song at story time.  The kids were so still, trying to sleep.  And then so excited to hop.  Anyway, it got stuck in my head today.  I told Isaac about it while dropping him off at rock climbing.

Then at karate we were doing some finger stretches.  "Open,  shut them.  Open, shut."  ...which of course reminded me of another story time rhyme, "Open Shut them"  So I told Isaac about it when I picked him up.

(Also, having Mr. Rob do the songs instead of random internet channels was 100x better.)

Wednesday: by the numbers

Yesterday at bed time I had 101 items on my to-do list.  This is rather high, but I also had put all my weekly Wednesday items on it already - laundry, groceries, etc.

Today at bed time I have...99 items on the to-do list!  Oh my goodness.  Today it felt like for everything thing I did I put at least one thing on the list, and that was pretty accurate.  I also didn't finish nearly as much as I was hoping, so most of my "really fast" items are still on the list.

Oh well, I still got stuff done.  It just wasn't the stuff I was planning on.

Isaac was trying to trick the facial recognition on the laptop.  It still recognized him.

Tuesday: in the kitchen

 We had about an hour between getting home from school and going to rock climbing.  I had to get dinner ready.  The kids were trying to eat a filling snack and were blocking the way out of the kitchen.  So I sat down in the middle of the kitchen floor.  It hadn't really been a long day, but I talked more than normal during classes.  Isaac joined me, because when you do something funny he joins in.  So then Joshua joined in, because now sitting on the kitchen floor is cool.  Joshua was trying to stop eating the peanuts and having a hard time...he would have just one more.  I'm not really sure what we talked about, but it was the best part of my day.

There was a new 5.9 route up at rock climbing that I got on my second try, but boy was I tired afterwards!  I sat for several minutes, being happy that I made it.  About 2/3 of the way up I thought about quitting, but the next foot placement was solid enough to keep going.

Tomorrow I'm working on the normal Wednesday things, but also trying to get as many things off my to-do list as possible.  I've prioritized them by estimated length of time instead of importance like normal.

Monday: plot twists

 This morning I found Tornado on my chair when I started work.  He didn't stick around very long.  A bit later I got up for a five minute break and what do I find when I come back?  Tornado on my chair.

Later I found this on my ground turkey and thought it was a bit hilarious, so I texted it to a group of friends.

It seemed like a weird brag.  "3 larger LB size!"  33% more than the 2.25lb tray...what a weird thing to say.  Who sells 2.25lb trays?  Apparently Aldi/Kirkwood does!  I thought it was just a random fact that they put on for selling purposes.

Lastly, an actual plot twist.  The lab for this week has the x-axis in the horizontal direction, but there were some typos in the procedure such that sometimes the vertical axis was y and sometimes it was z.  So my co-teacher and I made a decision that twisted the plot for some of the steps.  (Hahahaha.  I've been waiting all afternoon for that one.)  In case you care, y is now vertical.  I was a bit intimidated by my co-teacher at first, but she's super nice.

Saturday: laundry & rock show

I put down a basket of clean laundry next to Horizon.  He looked at it with disdain.  I agreed.

The boys and I went to a rock show this afternoon.  We went in the afternoon instead of the morning - it was a good choice as it wasn't as busy as last year.  There was a nice scavenger hunt and the kids enjoyed figuring out what to buy with the money that I gave them.

The scavenger hunt prize was some crack-you-own geodes.  Joshua's turned out really cool.  (He's saying "oooo" in the picture.