End of September Update

I still don't update this very often, now, do I? School is school--lots of pressure this year for a variety of reasons. I have good kids, but I despair of how to help some of them excel. It is an uphill battle at this point in 4 of the 5 classes. I'll be making parent phone calls tomorrow (yes, on a Saturday--and on my cell phone since I need to accomplish it and the only time I have is while sitting at Nutcracker rehearsals waiting for my daughters). Hopefully, some of these kids will wake up and salvage their grades pronto!

Eleanor was tapped into National Junior Honor Society this week. I teared up but valiantly didn't actually proceed to tears of pride (she's in the middle here with her best friends on either side of her). She then learned a hard lesson about scholastics though. The next night, she had to finish a project that she had procrastinated on and was up until 1:15AM finishing it. It looked good, but holy moly. I made her go to school the next day and when I picked her up, she wanted to go home, do her homework and go to bed. I told her no. She had to go to dance. She finished homework before ballet and then decided that ballet raises her endorphins and that was a good thing. She turned in much earlier that night and felt better today.

Eleanor learned a new classical variation tonight. She is performing at a trade show next weekend for her ballet studio and she didn't like the one that she learned last winter. Stevan taught her a variation from Cinderella tonight and she did really well learning it for the first time. He is confident she will master it by next weekend, so that is what matters. She is motivated to do so.

I joined facebook tonight. It was neat seeing some of my former students on there...two have even consented to add me as a friend. :-) That's encouraging!

I've been on Weight Watchers for about a week and a half now. Tonight was not a good night. I was doing well today and then temptation stepped into my mailbox at school in the form of a "Payday" candy bar. I love those things. I decided that I would sacrifice the points from my weekly "extra" ones that I've been trying hard not to use. Of course, that was late in the day and made me not want dinner on time. I've been snacking ever since, albeit on lower calorie and somewhat healthier things, but still too much. The only bright side is that I have far exceeded my water goal for the day. I think I'm on glass 12 at this point. I may float away soon! I've lost about 4.5 lbs. I wish it were a higher number, but I'll just keep reminding myself that it didn't come back overnight, even though it seems like it, and so it won't leave overnight either. Pity--that would be truly awesome if it would!

Tomorrow will be busy. Amelia is spending the night tonight with a friend and that throws a small kink in my daily schedule, but not enough to deny her the outing. Eleanor has dance from 11-1 and then rehearsal until 3PM. Olivia has a birthday party for a girl in her ballet class from 12:30-2:30 and then rehearsal from 3:30-5:00. Luckily, they will bring her to rehearsal since the birthday girl also has rehearsal. I need to pick up Amelia somewhere in the 1PM range, I guess. I was hoping to get a few chores done at home too, but it isn't looking very likely.

I guess I'll go back to the studio after I pick up Amelia and sit and grade papers. I have two sets of news quizzes to grade and a few make-up tests and quizzes. I also need to write the news quiz from Monday and I need to make some progress in reading "Wicked" for the teen book cafe' at school which is in about 3 weeks. It is a tough read so that needs to become a leisure reading priority as soon as I finish the no-brainer novel I've been working on--probably tomorrow night.
Maybe I can mobilize the girls to help me clean tomorrow evening...doubtful, but I can dream, can't I?

Gotta go to bed, I guess. It's midnight and the witching hour. I need sleep!

So, how do you get it all in balance?

Work, parenthood, marriage, life..... ?

We are rolling along, but there is definitely some stress right now. I am trying to stay on top of increased responsibilities at work without drowning. Eleanor is taking more dance and that puts all of us at the dance studio a little longer each day. Will is having to do all of his own clerical work for his operations managing this football season and that adds stress because he isn't good at the clerical part of the job! :-) Amelia is adjusting fairly well to middle school and is doing much better academically than we had thought possible, but she is a bit moody and we fear that is the beginning of something longer lasting...ahh, the joys of having all girls. Olivia is moody and stressed too. If she would get her room cleaned up and organized like I have been asking her to do for months now, her life would get simpler and more manageable because it would be easy to find things, easy to choose clothes, easy to just relax and "be". Eleanor is feeling the stress of 8th grade and the pressure of taking two courses which will gain her high school credit if she takes the next level next year. I'm thinking that is almost too much stress for her. She is already concerned about GPA for college. While I want her to care about her grades and her progress, the stress levels that she is feeling just aren't normal at the start of 8th grade in my opinion. I've tried to alleviate her stress, but since it always comes to the forefront when we are both tired late at night, I don't think I've done a very good job. Whew!

I'm going to type through a plan and maybe we can follow it (suggestions are good if anyone is reading this besides me!):

1. Supervise Olivia this weekend to get her room cleaned up and organized once and for all.
2. Help Eleanor come up with a plan for more gradual study and preparation--this is somewhat dependent on the teachers and when they assign things too.
3. Institute a daily Bible study and reflection time for all of us to center us spiritually.