What was that? Something just whizzed by....

Zzzzerrrrooooosh!

That would be me - in my fly-by posting mode. I've been a bad, bad blogger of late. Life is just going full-tilt of late and not leaving me much time to ruminate, much less write about my ruminations.

Some of the stuff I'm doing these days:

• working 2-3 full days a week

That is going very well and I'm loving my job. I love the techie side of things and learning about all the new and exciting stuff in the world of augmentative communication. And I've met some really great kids who are an inspiration and a challenge all at the same time. My co-workers are amazing. Even though I've been dealing with a fair bit of chaos and certain conflicts among members of the team, I would not want to work anywhere else at the moment.

Eliza is dealing (mostly well) with the transition to my status as a WOHM. She has her moments of not dealing so gracefully but I have two capable and loving people who care for her (her Grandma and Godmother, no less...) and she is just having to make that adjustment of not having me 24/7.

• Getting more involved with the Parent/Guardian Organization
  

I have not been as involved as I feel I should be in the past couple of years - I'm making that more of a priority and looking ahead to next year. They have lost quite a few of their highly involved parents over the course of the year and they are down to bare bones and looking at the dissolution of the PGO if people don't step up to the plate. I certainly don't want to see that happen.

This week I'm trying to help out by typing and binding a few books for R's class. Each year the K-3 graders write and illustrate their own books which the PGO volunteers to type and bind so they look more professional and official. I went to the Ice Cream Social with Rick and the girls last week and while families were enjoying a bit of musical entertainment I went to the community room and learned how to bind the books. I have a bag sitting in my kitchen just waiting for my attention. Must find time! Soon.

• Board of Christian Education (CE)
  

I'm a member of the CE board at church and we are in the process of trying desperately to hire a new director for the youth/family program. It's not been easy! This week things have come to a head and we are in the process of scheduling meetings and interviews. I'm sort of the coordinator by default since I was the only subcommittee member at the last committee meeting. It's been a bit hectic and crazed pulling that bit together in a very short time. I am also the board secretary and still have the minutes from the last meeting to type up -- which is probably what I should be doing instead of updating my pals here on my blog? Nah....

• Preschool Graduation

A's second, and final, year of preschool is coming to an end. I am so sad to say goodbye to her little schoolhouse for the next year but E will start there the following year so it's more of a 'see ya later' than an actual goodbye. And it's truly a bittersweet transition because while I say goodbye to her preschool days I'm thrilled for her as she enters the next phase and becomes one of the big kids who rides the yellow school bus and look forward to all that she has ahead of her. Ask me in a few years if I'm as excited for my 'baby' to be heading off to Kindergarten and you might find that I'm in a completely different mindset about that 'last one heading off to the big kid school' -- or maybe not. Both A and E are October babies and I'm sure E will be just as eager and ready at nearly six-years-old as A is right now. A is chomping at the bit for bigger and better things and seems to want to be older NOW.

I've stepped into the role of coordinator for the teacher gifts for the past two years. It's not a huge deal but it is one more thing that needs a bit of attention. I am collecting money from the families to present (along with flowers and cards) to the teachers to thank them for their hard work. The check will be used to buy something for the school that would not ordinarily be purchased from their budget. For instance, one year they replaced the clothesline/clothing pin system with an honest-to-goodness drying rack for all the beautiful artwork the children create each day. I had honestly not even realized until last week that the graduation date was fast approaching. No one else mentioned teacher gifts so I just decided to take the bull by the horns again and get it done. Everyone is usually very appreciative of the effort and I don't really mind doing it because I love our preschool....but I won't be there next year so it is time to pass the torch along! And with everything else going on I'll be glad when I can check one more thing off my list!

• Birthday/celebration central

Over Mother's Day weekend we celebrated on Saturday night with Rick's parents and had a nice steak dinner here at home. On Sunday I drove to Boston with R and A to meet up with my two sisters, one niece, two nephews, my brother-in-law and my parents. We all went to see one nephew in a HS production of West Side Story (which was amazing and fabulous and funny and heartrending). Then we all went out for a Mother's Day dinner at a restaurant in the Back Bay section of Boston called Fire & Ice.

This week is not only Rick's (40th!) birthday (today!) but also his mom's (Saturday) and my mom's (yesterday). Happy Birthday to all the special people in my life! Tonight we are doing a very quick dinner and cake and ice cream with my in-laws (because of my 6:30 meeting at church regarding the CE director position - see above!) and then on Saturday we are doing a full-blown cookout with more family in attendance. Burgers! Hot Dogs! More cake and ice cream! (And to think that life is creating a perfect storm of late that is keeping me away from the club and my morning walks! eek.)

• Head cold or tree pollen?

Every year since the year of R's birth I have suffered from a 'seasonal' (April and/or May) onslaught of cough, itchy throat, and sinus congestion. It lasts for a few weeks and from the best I can tell by googling symptoms and allergens each year at around this time, I think I'm allergic to either oak or birch trees (or both). It's a total drag. And it's really not a convenient time - particularly this year - for me to be dealing with this nasty crap. I'm giving Claritin a trial but so far, three days in, I'm not noticing any difference. A friend recently told me that the 10mg that is the OTC Claritin is not actually clinically beneficial and that I should give Zyrtec a try. Another friend suggested Tylenol Sinus. I was very glad for those tidbits and will likely make another trip to the drugstore to give one a try. I'm trying to be patient and wait another day or two with the Claritin before I toss them and try something else. But, something has to be done. And soon.

• Was there anything else? Or perhaps that list is the exhaustive (and exhausting) list at the moment. It is certainly plenty to be juggling and I'm hoping that I've not forgotten something... What a crazy month this is!
  

Little Update on This and That...

I'm still here. Not a whole lot going on that is all that compelling.

This past week was school vacation week so it's been a bit busy around here. I managed to keep the kids fairly busy with activities - despite the nasty weather at the start of the week - and tomorrow the older two will be back to school. Happy dance!

Today is Sunday so it was church day. The girls were very excited because we missed last week. They love going to church school so it's a disappointment when they miss a week. Rick wanted to get some work on making more concrete pavers for our eventual backyard patio (it's been in the works since last summer/fall and he hopes to finish it this spring!) so we took E to church with us for the first time since she's been so mobile. I wondered how she would do with being in the nursery without me for the first time. The last attempt was futile. She screamed and screamed until they finally came and got me. Today she did great! She and A were in the room together and one other toddler was with them. E stayed busy coloring, eating snack, and playing and she was absolutely fine. She is finally able to stretch her naptime to just after lunch so that helped, too.

We are in the process of planning our summer trip to Virginia to visit Rick's brother and nephew. It's a long drive, but we hope it goes at least as well as it did last year. I need to research hotels and find a suitable one (read: 2 queen beds and an indoor pool) for our first and last nights. It works best if we break up the driving into two segments each way. We usually drive a longer leg the first day and stay at a hotel and then do less driving and hit an attraction of some sort (usually a musuem) on the second driving day. Last year we drove to Philly, stayed overnight, and then headed to the Maryland Science Center for the afternoon. It was fun, but we saw less than half of the exhibits so I think we are going to try for a similar itinerary this year on the way down. Our visit this year will include seeing the new house that Rick's brother just bought, a visit to a few local attractions (both in D.C. as well as in the greater Northern Virginia area), and hopefully some hiking/geocaching. I guess Rick is going to need to start building up his back muscles so he can carry E in the backpack for moderate-length hikes!

The weather has finally turned spring-like (even verging on summer-like) around here. This weekend has been mostly sunny and in the 70's and tomorrow is supposed to hit 80 or higher. But, then we will see a crash back into the 50's later in the week. The t-shirt weather is here but briefly this week. We will enjoy it while it lasts.

Yesterday my parents flew in to a local airport for a short visit since the weather was expected to be beautiful all day. My parents own an aircraft electronics business at a small town-owned airport and they both have their private pilot's license. Due to their buisness they also own a small four-seater airplane which allows them to cut their travel time in half when they come to visit us. They arrived at lunchtime and we invited Rick's parents over to join us for some salad, sandwiches, and dessert. It was a really nice visit and the girls were thrilled to have my parents here for the day. It was such a treat for A to be able to include my mom in her pretend play so much that she actually gave Rick's mom the day off telling her "Grandma, you can go and talk or do whatever you want to because I have Grandma G. here to play with today!" Wasn't that so nice of her to allow Grandma T. to do whatever she wanted for a while?? LOL My mom dutifully went into the playroom and played 'classroom' with the girls (she was given the moniker of Mrs. Floogle for that game). She also read them a few stories and played with them for a bit outside. The girls are very excited about their next visit with Grandma and Papa which will hopefully be in about a month. This time we'll make the 3-hour tour down their way for a weekend.

That's about all the news for now. I'm still hovering at the 20-lb. mark with no more losses seen this month. It's kind of frustrating but I'm trying to focus more on how far I've come and less on what I still hope to lose. It will happen eventually - sometimes it just feels like the plateaus will never end! I had bought some new jeans last week and with the change in weather I went out and bought a pair of capris, a skort, and a few t-shirts to get me through this transition weight. I found that I'm actually down 1.5 sizes so I'm currently "between" standard sizes which is kind of annoying. I can almost fit in the lower size but it's just a wee too snug for comfort so I bought a couple of the larger size and hope to be buying the smaller size before too long!

So, that's all for now!

Ciao!

In Which I Manage to Get Off My Lazy Ass...

Today was pretty slothful overall, but I did get some cupcakes baked for the bake sale at church (cookies just seemed too time consuming - what with the multiple batches to go in and out of the oven...). I frosted them after the kids were in bed and drew little hearts on each one with that gel-writer-frosting-stuff that comes in a tube.

After I finished the cupcake chore I went downstairs and forced myself to do day 6 of the Slim in 6 program (still working on the 'phase 2' workout called "Ramp it Up"). Tomorrow is my rest day - which is a good thing because I won't find much time to exercise given the fact that it's church day and Rick and I have date-night scheduled. I am finding that the evenings are the easiest time to get the exercise chore completed. And even when I'm tired and don't feel like it I find that once I get it over and done with I feel so much better. Funny how that works. ;-) So, I completed my first full week of "Ramp it Up" and if I follow the recommended schedule I am supposed to do another full week of that workout. However, I'm finding that I am actually getting through that 45-minute workout without too much difficulty at this point. After my rest day tomorrow I'm going to jump right into "Burn it Up" on Monday. It's a 60-minute program, which may very well burn my ass to smithereens, but I'm willing to give it a shot anyway. I can always revert back to "Ramp it Up" on Tuesday if I feel like it's too much, too soon.

Time to go relax on the couch with Rick and work on my knitting (still working on a pair of socks that seems to be taking forever because I am not finding much time to knit these days...).

Kickin' Ass

It is nearly time to get my ass to bed, but I thought I'd give a brief update.

I've been doing my workout program faithfully all week. Just finished my fifth consecutive day of "phase 2" in this workout program that I'm using. I am finding that it is a little easier each time and tonight I actually did not work up as much of a sweat as I did when I first hit that "play" button earlier this week. I am building endurance and muscle! And the scale is indicating that I'm doing something right! Tomorrow is my last workout day of the week before my schedule "rest day" and I think next week I might try out the "phase 3" video since I'm doing fairly well on "phase 2". There are still a couple of spots that burn my butt a bit, but overall I'm finding it much more do-able.

Today was an "off" day as far as food was concerned. I went to church for a "crafty ladies" luncheon and of course the lunch that was provided was homemade, super yummy, and not at all diet-friendly. Gotta love the little old church ladies and their delicious recipes! But, it meant that my calorie count was a bit on the high side for today. Nothing too disasterous, though, and I'm glad I still got in my workout to counteract some of the calories. I also learned that my body is adjusting to a diet without much refined sugar. I have not had much in the way of sweets since I started tracking my food and I definitely notice that I am not craving them quite as much. Today, however, I had a cookie mid-morning (had to try one - warm from the oven, no less - while baking some oatmeal raisin cookies for a memorial service at church tomorrow...you know - just to be sure they tasted all right), and about an hour later I was literally falling asleep on the couch! But, I couldn't understand why. Then, later at church I had some dessert and again I was feeling logy and out of sorts this afternoon. It was not until much later that I put two and two together and realized that I was likely experiencing a sugar crash. Doh. Amazing how quickly the body adapts and equally amazing how crappy refined sugar can make me feel now that I've decreased my exposure to it over the course of a few weeks.

Rick and I have a date night planned for Sunday - a little pre-Valentine's dinner and a movie date. I need to plan ahead that day to try to keep the calories at a decent level. I know they are going to be high - I just hope I can keep them from being SUPER high. Plus, it's my 'rest day' so I won't be working off those extra calories. Maybe I won't want to step on that scale on Monday morning...

As for the girls - a quick update: E never puked again and so far I've only taken her for brief 10-minute or less car rides. So far, so good. We can hope that she is slowly acclimating to her new perspective and that the lower, more reclined car seat is aiding in her comfort level. R just brought home her mid-year report card and she received glowing reviews! She is above grade level in reading and her math and writing skills are comparable to a 1st grader at the end of the year - so she's a good 6 months ahead in those skills as well. Her teacher noted that she has made excellent progress so far this year and indicated that we would receive more detailed notes on her progress soon (her teacher was out of school for a short while because of a death in her family so she's trying to play some catch up on some of the administrative tasks). As for little Miss A - she is continuing to love her preschool program and today she came with me to the luncheon at church. She was not thrilled about going but once we got there she settled in and was so excited that one of the women at the luncheon is a teacher who often substitutes at her preschool. She sat next to "Ann" at lunch and enjoyed chatting it up with all the ladies who asked her about preschool and about the things she likes to do.

Alright - time to go to bed! I need my beauty sleep...you know...it is not easy being this beautiful and glamorous. It really takes a lot of work...and plenty of sleep. Trust me.

A quiet moment...

The older girls are watching an "Arthur" dvd and the youngest was acting psychotic so I plunked her in her crib with her paci and she is happy to play in there....go figure. Guess we all need a few moments of solitude now and again. I know I do.

Rick is being the good husband and is off doing the grocery shopping. (Thanks, hon!) My hip is still being irksome and so he's trying to help me rest it for now. I did well all morning at church but by lunchtime it had started to twinge and then it was aching up a storm by early afternoon. I took some ibuprofen and stuck a heat pack on it to warm up the muscle and one or both took the edge off for now. Here's hoping I don't need to go for another adjustment before this bout of sciatica clears up. I'm so sick of dealing with the damn hip at random intervals!! It is so frustrating, particularly when I tried something new like the workout video I did before this recent flare up and then I get sidelined because my hip can't handle it. It really makes a body feel old, ya know?

Speaking of feeling old, I have been doing some internet searches to try to find other "old folks" like myself who apparently have an evil milestone fast approaching. I managed to find a couple of fellow grads and passed along whatever information I could glean from websites and online articles to the appropriate coordinators. I think I've tracked down about three people and we now have about 50 graduates that have been "found"....out of over 400. There's lots more work to do, obviously. One of the coordinators emailed me her current list of "finds" and I saw a name I recognized on the list and asked her to forward that person my email. A short while later I got an email from "Sue" and got caught up on the basics of her life over the last 15 or so years since we last spoke. It was great to hear from her and I hope we can reconnect and perhaps get together when I am visiting my hometown again. (I could even invite her to join Karyn and me when we have breakfast at our usual hangout!)

Other than that, not a whole lot going on. We won't be watching the "big game" tonight - heck, the only reason that I even know it's Superbowl weekend is because the Youth Group held their annual "Soup-er Bowl Sunday" fundraiser. The youth collect money in big soup pots as people are leaving church and they decide where to send the money. They collected over $300 this morning ($100 more than they collected last year!) and will be sending it to a local shelter.

Rick just got home from the grocery store and the girls movie just ended so my quiet time has come to an end. Time to go figure out what's for dinner and get the girls started on their evening clean-up routine. Have a good one!

No pain, no gain...

Ok, yeah, I'm reacquainting myself with the muscles in my upper body today. Every time I move it's "Ow - oh, hello, there Deltiod. Where have you been lately?" or "Hey! Oh, it's you - Sternocleidomastoid. I'd forgotten all about you! How's it hangin'?"

I can recall a time when I could get through the exercises without experiencing much in the way of pain. But, I'm so out of shape that right now they are kickin' my butt.

I did not manage to get on the treadmill today. But, after Rick left with R and A to go to the owl program at the library I tackled our bedroom which was a mess. I spent a good 45 minutes to an hour cleaning and vacuuming the room while E wandered around the room getting into trouble and needing to be shooed away from things every few minutes. I'd say I got a decent workout without stepping foot on the treadmill.

Tomorrow the girls and I will be at church in the morning. I am teaching the unit on "The Good Samaritan" over the next few weeks. I have the "arts/crafts" segment and we will be making quilt squares that will later be made into a quilt to present to a long-time church member who is moving to an assisted living facility. Should be a fun unit to teach. No plans as yet for the afternoon, but there is always some project or other around here so I'm sure I'll find something to keep me busy!

I just popped some ibuprofen for these sore muscles of mine. I hope they are no longer trying so desperately to communicate their displeasure in the morning. I think I'll go get in my jammies and read a bit before bed.

Nighty-night.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

We were busy elves around here over the weekend. I spent most of Friday morning trying to get this place cleaned up a bit and organized so that I felt like I could actually get down to the task of decorating. The girls were quite anxious and spent the morning hovering and asking "is it time to decorate yet?" over and over. There was a bit of kid-style helping when they got to play with their matching yellow feather dusters but otherwise it was a lot of onlooking and impatience over this trivial matter of cleaning that mom insists is necessary (geesh).

Once the cleaning, vacuuming and dusting was complete it was time for snack so I got them some fortification and they ate up quickly and were ready to help haul the boxes out of the basement!

We spent about 45 minutes unpacking and finding homes for our various snowmen, elves, santas, kid-friendly nativity, angels and other assorted decorations - and this year the challenge was to put everything in a place high enough that it was out of reach of The Mobile Menance, but low enough so the girls would also be able to enjoy the decorations and actually be able to help me do the decorating. It now looks much more festive around here! Here's a shot of our stockings hanging on the hutch with care. This is the time of year I always wish we had a fireplace with a nice big mantel.



On Saturday morning, with Rick home to help, we got the little fake tree decorated and set on a card table so that it would be (mostly) inaccessible to The Mobile Menace. As you can see in one of the pictures below she is mostly certainly a hazard to the tree and we are just praying that the damage to ornaments is minimal this year and that she doesn't manage to pull the tree down on top of herself!

The girls had a lot of fun opening the boxes and finding the ornaments which, at this age, still seem new to them each year. As we hang the ornaments I tell them the stories that go with certain ones - like the year that R begged for the fragile porcelain Rudolph ornament and then dropped it accidently. It broke into too many pieces to try to fix and I couldn't find a replacement for it anywhere. She was crushed...but Santa came through and on Christmas morning and a brand new and perfect little Rudolph was hanging on the tree! This year we put those fragile ornaments back in the box for another year and only put up the ornaments that were more or less unbreakable - just in case we do have a tree-toppling event!

All the Christmas-themed books came up from the basement along with the decorations, the fake tree and the ornaments. This year R is reading them to herself and I often find her curled up on the couch with a stack of Christmas stories by her side. A is constantly asking me to read her "one more story" from the Christmas box. We have a lot of nice ones and I like to add to the assortment every year, but by Christmas I am more than ready for them to go back down to the basement again until the next year!

Yesterday was a busy day at church. We had service, followed by choir practice, followed by pageant practice. They were assigned their roles for the pageant - R will be a dog and A will be a piggy. The Christian Education director found some cute plush masks at the Dollar Store for the kids to wear and they have one line that they repeat a number of times during the play along with a bunch of other kids dressed as farm animals. So, that was our morning. We went home for lunch and had a few hours to hang out before we headed back to church for the Advent Workshop. Our church has this nice tradition where everyone brings sandwiches to share and we have a soup and sandwich supper followed by Christmas-themed craft making. I brought along pipe cleaners and red, white, and green beads and at our table the kids strung the beads on the pipe cleaners and bent them into wreathes and candy canes. At other tables they made ornaments from old Christmas cards, placemats (also from old cards), gift tags with stamps, stickers, and glitter, pompoms out of thick yarn, and placed potpourri in Christmas fabric and tied it up with a fancy ribbon. The girls had fun bouncing between tables creating all the different crafty items. I invited my MIL along to help me out in case I was being pulled in two different directions by the girls but this year they were both quite independent and found other adults they were familiar with from church to give them a hand. Regardless, it was still very nice to have Grandma along to share the evening with! :-) It was a long day and the girls were riled up and difficult about going to sleep --- 'tis the season, I guess. And when we are busy with all good stuff, how can I complain?