Busy, Busy, Busy

This week has been super busy, and it's not over yet. You already know what went down Monday, the dentist fiasco. I can't seem to recall Tuesday, except that I was able to take a nap with Little Girl, and then be awake for all of Choral Arts rehearsal, all the way to 10:00 PM! Then Wednesday the whirlwind really picked up.

I had my day off on Wednesday this week. I went shopping for Big Girls' birthday party. I started around 9:30, and was almost late picking up Little Girl in time to go get Big Girl at 2:30. I went everywhere, craft store, grocery store, Christian bookstore, party supply store, toy store, Wal-mart and Target. I never realized how much energy it takes to shop. I usually don't bite off more than one or two of those excursions at a time, but I don't usually have the freedom I had Wednesday with no kids to buckle/unbuckle everywhere I went.

I settled down just a little bit Wednesday afternoon before the Wednesday night activities began. We always do our Chick-fil-a dinner before AWANA and that's exactly what we did. Then after we came home, I made a "Pin the bow on Hello Kitty" poster and the bows to be "pinned" (taped, really) on. After that, it was about 10:30 and I set about to trimming the meat I had purchased at the grocery store so that we could have dinner on Thursday night. I felt pretty smart for trimming more than we needed for Thursday night, and freezing the rest in a baggie with marinade. They'll be really yummy, and ready to cook once they thaw. Anyway, all that was done by 11:30, and I was pooped.

Then Thursday morning, the day began at 6:30, as usual, getting Big Girl up and ready for school. The house was a wreck, so that was #1 priority. I can't recall all of what I did yesterday, but I know that I was busy non-stop until it was time to get Big Girl from her early release day at school, 2 hours earlier than the usual dismissal time. After we came home, there was an awkward hour before we had to go back up to the school for a parent/teacher conference, the first official one of Big Girl's academic career.

The conference was great. Big Girl was excited to show me some of her work, and the teacher had a whole set of things to go over with me (standard for all her conferences, I gathered). Big Girl is reading and comprehending at a mid-first grade level. She knew all her letters and numbers going into Kindergarten, and was able to do almost everything they test for, except the one thing she didn't want to do when they did the assessment. She's an interesting kid that way. She's capable of quite a lot, but she's just not always willing.

Yesterday, back to party stuff, I realized I had forgotten one kid in my count of kitty ears and "pin the bow" bows. I had put kids' names on the bows so that when they tape them wherever, we'll know without having to remember who put it where. The bad thing was that I ran out of pink posterboard from which I had made all the bows. So now instead of making just one more, I had to make more than that so there can be an assortment, and the kid I forgot will never know that I forgot her. I had left a bow off of one set of kitty ears for the little brother of one of the girls coming to the party, so I just sewed a bow on that set of ears and then made another set of ears without the pattern (which I had thrown away thinking I was finished with it). The last ears (sans bow) ended up a little bit pointier than the others, and I didn't want the one with the bow to look distinguishably different, but it's OK for the boy ears to look different.

All day yesterday I was feeling the busyness of the day before in my back and shoulders. I could see my reserves depleting quickly.

I made dinner (grilled chicken, mashed potatoes and frozen veggies), Hubby bathed the girls and put them to bed while I cleaned up the kitchen. I made a list of things that needed to be done today and tomorrow, then I went upstairs. I lit some candles, and took a jacuzzi bath. After that I got into my warm pj's and went right to bed. I was in bed before 9:00.

Today I've been trying to do the things on the list for today (9 items, not including regular daily stuff like feeding the children!), and unfortunately, I've added to the list for tomorrow. Basically, any of the house work that doesn't happen today is not going to happen at all because there is just too much party-specific stuff that must happen.

One more thing I must mention: I broke my tooth yesterday. Well, it was really just a part of a filling, but still, now I have a broken thing on a tooth that requires me to go to the dentist. And we all know how happy that makes me. I have an appointment for November 7th.

When my iPod hasn't been playing (which hasn't been all that much these last couple of busy days), "Penny Lane" has been the song in my head. My brain has been alternating between The Beatles version and the King's Singers version, which isn't nearly as cool, but still I really love that song. For once the song in my head hasn't made me want to extract whichever part of my brain houses the music library!