7QT: window shades, granola, running selfies & Easter Dress Dance Parties
So I'm going to attempt some quick takes here, although it feels a bit like my brain is leaking out my ears. You see, music theory is actually somewhat mathematical, or at least it's kind of tedious in the same way as, say, proving a theorem or solving a quadratic equation. After grading part-writing or student compositions for 4 to 6 hours at a time (as I have been doing every day this week), my mind goes completely numb and it's really hard for me to even put a sentence together. The other night when I was making dinner after a long day at work I had snapped the stems off the bottoms of some asparagus, and then I swiftly put the stems in the oven and was about to throw the fresh asparagus into the compost bin when I realized I had gotten it backwards. Last night as I was getting ready for bed, I pulled out and cut a piece of dental floss for myself, and then, as I began flossing, I absently threw the (full) box of floss into the trash.
You know... the putting your keys in the fridge kind of things.
So although we've been on school vacation, it fell on a really busy week for my class, and it hasn't felt at all like a vacation for me. But it's actually pretty lucky it worked out this way, because I have no idea how I would have gotten all of this work done if M hadn't been home to be with the girls this week. It's a bit like Christmas vacation was, if you remember.
The end is in sight, though! I'm finished with the heaviest of the grading and it should gradually get lighter from here.
But please excuse me if I make absolutely no sense throughout most of this blog post.
My Mom took the girls for two days early this week. While I worked pretty much all day both days, M hung cordless shades in the living room and dining room, which pretty much completed our room makeover!
Yay! Our living room/dining room area is no longer a fishbowl for viewing by the entire neighborhood!!!!
Just as an FYI, I bought these cordless shades about a month ago (at Ocean State Job Lot for $20 each, BTW... tightwad triumph!!) and they've been sitting in our basement ever since. Just in case you're thinking about having three small children anytime soon, just know that it will take a month of time passing *plus* your mother taking your children for two whole days in order for shades to get hung on your windows. Don't get me wrong-- I had these shades out several times attempting to get them hung myself while the girls were around. But we were missing the right equipment or I couldn't find the right screwdriver or the drill wasn't charged or what have you. Never did I have the block of free time necessary to just find what I needed and complete the whole project. And I probably shouldn't have even tried to start it, because a couple of the essential brackets got stolen from one of the packages by the girls behind my back and hidden, which made the job that much longer for M because he had to search the entire house for the lost brackets, then go out and buy some more, only to find the lost ones a day later under a couch on the porch.
But it's done now. When he went out for the brackets, M even got another set of cordless shades for our room... and he went a step up and got the "room darkening" kind. We now have a cozy little cave in which to sleep. It's pretty awesome.
It feels sooooooo good every time I walk into those rooms and see our fabulous window treatments for which I waited so long. You just appreciate the little things, don't you, when you're a parent?
Lest thou think I doth complain too much about having kids, let's take a break now for some extra cute pictures.
I've been lucky to be able to spend the first few hours of each day this week doing an activity with the girls before diving into my work for the rest of the day. Thursday morning was craft day at the library. Their butterflies turned out adorably!
And Miss C just being silly at breakfast.
Dear Quinoa Granola,
How I have missed you! I can't believe I haven't made the time to make you for almost a year!
And thank you. Because of my craving for you, I discovered that there actually IS a small whole foods store in our town, tucked waaaaaayyyyy out of the way where I never would have found it had I not done some major research fueled by my granola craving. And they have every health food I could ever need, including enough buckwheat groats to make batches and batches of you to my heart's content. And their prices are pretty darn reasonable!
Despite the fact that I came out of the store smelling like "Cypress Hill concert" as my husband put it (a.k.a it is not just a health food store but an incense warehouse) I think I will be spending a lot of time there in the future drooling over bulk whole grains, because I guess I'm kind of turning into a weird hippie.
Thank you again.
Sincerely,
Ab
So I'm having a bit of a love/hate relationship with my Nike+ running app on my iPhone.
It's really fun and motivational to track your runs when you're seeing improvement in your fitness level. But when you're taking steps backwards...... not so much.
Y'all know it was a really snowy winter around here and not really conducive to much running outside. And we all got so sick so many times and had such a hard time getting better that I actually took about a month off from running because I thought it might help to rest up.
I've been back to running pretty regularly for about a month now, but now that it's finally warm and I'm doing most of my running outside, the hills around here are just killing me. And it's really no fun, when you're already feeling a bit out of shape, to think, "Boy, I must have set a fast pace today; this feels really hard," only to look down at your phone and see that, actually, you're going astoundingly slow.
So one day I got to thinking, when did this become me? When did I start to hate running, almost every single time? When did I stop being content to be a tortoise?
And I had to date it back to the time when I started keeping track of my time and pace on my phone (if you'll remember, this started when I got my iPhone about 4 months ago).
Gone are the days surrounding my training for the half marathon last winter, when I didn't care how fast I ran. At that time I just thought if I could run 13.1 miles without stopping and dying that would be a huge accomplishment. I was actually excited to get out there and conquer the challenges, whereas now any kind of even remotely challenging run just feels overwhelming and... not fun.
I guess what I'm trying to say is, I've become a bit of a prideful, self-competitive person about running lately, who is addicted to thinking about speed and overly obsessive about pace. It feels really weird because even at my fastest I've never really been fast. But all this over-thinking is taking away my love of the sport.
So this week I've left my phone at home for a couple of runs. And it has been freeing. I realize how much I've missed just running for the sake of being outside, getting a mental break, letting my mind wander, and... well... relaxing. Running just as slow as I darn well please, thank you very much.
(A motivational selfie taken before I ran a 10K around the neighborhood on Marathon Monday, right before which I gave my phone to the hubby to track *his* run so that I wouldn't be a slave to it. I quickly snapped this picture on his phone and then went out the door phone-free. It was a hard run, but one of the best head-clearning times I've had in weeks.)
So since I'm fairly addicted I'm sure I'll come back to Nike+ again in the future, especially if I train for any races any time soon. But right now I don't need any more stress than necessary in my life, or any extraneous reminders that I'm not keeping pace.
So there!
*Ranting Terminated*
Today M had plans to go mountain biking with a friend, so I was *forced* to abandon my work and spend pretty much the entire day with my girls. We went to a local park and picnicked, walked the trails, and threw rocks into the lake. It was hands down the best day of my week.
*Warning*
Lots of Auto Awesomeness Comin' Atcha
C just wanted to throw rocks in the lake all day long. I love how she asks if she can have a "rope to swing out to the water" (she means a fishing pole... there were some people fishing there today which was quite fascinating to all the girls).
N took this series of pics from the car of me, L, and C, when I realized as we were leaving that I didn't have any pictures from the day with myself in them! :)
Sorry to be a narcissist, but I did want to document the fact that I was there-- perhaps because I feel I've been absent much of the week.
Lastly, the only real pics we got of girls in matching Easter dresses, from a few days after Easter when the clean laundry came through and they all decided to wear their dresses again.
They're having a dance party, and there's chairs in the way, and you can't really see the dresses too well.
Oh, and I suppose I could have cropped out the messy dinner table in the foreground, and/or photo-shopped the green potty chair out of the background, but... it's getting to be past my bedtime here.
This is our real life, folks.
Oh and also this face:
...which reminds me of this face:
...which is absolutely the most hilarious photo I've ever taken.
She's an amazing person, that girl.
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