Help! Stop Me Before I Go Nuts!

For some weird, compulsive reason I feel the need to completely overwhelm my life with projects and work. I wish I could hang out at the nail salon and be a Botox Barbie like my ex-boyfriend's wife probably does, but I just can't bring myself to do it. Maybe with that much silicone in you your brain shuts off and it doesn't bother you anymore. I'm completely free of silicone at the moment, so I'm self-destructing in other ways.

I just finished three knitting projects and am working on a smocked dress for Tinkerbell. It was supposed to be done by next Saturday for her baptism, but it has been the project from hell. I've had to pleat the thing FIVE times, and then one of the pleating threads broke and pulled halfway out of the dress. Argghh. And of course I'm planning on making a matching dress for her American Girl doll. Smocked, french seams, the whole works. And I'm supposed to be working on another dress as part of a SAGA course (Smocking Arts Guild) that I need to mail in for grading. Of course, I would have to start it first. Details, details. Plus Sweetie's Jack Sparrow costume for Halloween that I didn't do last year.

I need to inventory my food storage and be ready for a massive week-long dry-pack canning session at my currently filthy house in July. It can't be filthy then, though, because that would be gross. Especially since my sister-in-law and others will be bringing their stuff to dry-pack at my then spotless house. Never mind that I'm getting Kitty Boy and Sweetie ready for a Scout campout this week, Tinkerbell's baptism (and people probably coming by my currently filthy house), Sweetie's Colorado conference, Girls' Camp for Elvira, and DrummerBoy & Sweetie's two week trip to Europe. Mom wants me to fly home for five days in August, which would overlap with Caro's birthday. But I need to fly right home for Kitty Boy's birthday and then get him and Sweetie off to Boston for a week. Then everyone goes back to school (Note to Self: School Shopping!) and Drummer Boy has his birthday. No La Push this year I'm afraid. So sad about that. But Elvira and I will still go get "Breaking Dawn" at the midnight release. That will be my early birthday present to myself. I can lose myself in blood-thirsty vampires and werewolves for 24 hours. Who am I kidding--I'll probably stay up all night and have it done in seven.

Forgot to mention picking four currant bushes and canning about 30 pints of jelly. And I'm doing peaches, pears, and tomatoes for the first time. Did I tell you I just bought a dehydrator so I can turn all our grapes into raisins and dry our own herbs?

Just so we're clear on how pathological I am, I just applied to work 30 hours a week at the kids' school, volunteer in their GT program after school, organize an after-school merit badge program at the school, and retake Stats 221 at BYU so I can apply to grad school in February after taking the GRE. Oh no! Forgot to study for the GRE! I need drugs.

Help me!

Want To See Our Yard?

I found pictures of our yard online from the 2006 Hidden Garden Benefit. It looked so nice! That was before we lost the globe willow and the apple trees in the backyard that pretty much destroyed the landscaping back there. Now we're going to lose the peach tree. So depressing. But, it has given us room to expand the garden by two 5x10 raised beds, a better composting station, and hopefully a potting shed/greenhouse in a year or so. So click on the link and we're the first six pictures on the 2006 photos and you'll at least see what the front and the vegetable garden looks like.

Also, if you're one of the lucky few who knows who I really am, you can pull up our address on Google Maps and see a picture of the house/garden. Isn't my Sweetie a talented guy?

Sleeping

Maxfield Parrish, The Sleeping Beauty, 1912


I haven't been sleeping well for months--years, really. It has been particularly bad these last four or five months. I average about three-four hours a night. The funny thing is that once school (read "job") ended on Friday, I have been racking up the sleep hours like crazy. I went into Tinkerbell's room yesterday to look for laundry and woke up an hour and a half later on her bed. After getting Sweetie and the boys off to a Scout thing on Saturday, I folded laundry for about 20 minutes, then woke up three hours later. I LOVE this. I feel absolutely no guilt whatsoever about passing out cold. I appreciate sleep so much more (don't look at the time I posted this). In fact, I'm going to bed now. Good night!

Holly-Batali

Elvira, my lovely daughter, has a pseudonym. Actually, Elvira is a pseudonym, but she has yet another. For some months now she has been publishing her work under the nom de plume "Holly-Batali" on Fanfiction.net. She's so amazing. Check out her Springtime With the Cullens. It's my favorite!

Letting Go

Drummer Boy got his driver's license yesterday! Yay!!! Of course, there is the caveat that we still accompany him on the freeway. Okay, make that Dad accompanies him on the freeway since I don't have the stomach for it. And I'll probably drive with him at night for a little longer. And maybe during the day, too. Let's just say, he's not getting his own set of keys yet, okay?


I spent the last two days helping our art teacher pack up her room. Our school is not going to have a separate art lab next year due to budget cuts. There were supplies in there from the 60s and 70s, if you can believe it. We dumped so much stuff in the trash I think the world's global temperature went up a couple of degrees. Someone must have ordered supplies every year without inventorying what they already had. We threw out so many full gallons of paint--it was so sad. But it had been sitting there for years and was all separated and nasty now. Tons and tons of stuff. But the room is completely done now, and I've been snagged for more purging duty tomorrow. It's very freeing, throwing away other people's things. It's like spending a million bucks on television ads in one day. What fun! I think I'll dedicate my college career to that. Oh, wait. I did do that.

So I came home and threw out all our old markers and pens that were dried out. I also put a whole stack of expired credit cards in the shredder. I'd been meaning to do that for ages! If I can just keep telling myself that all this junk belongs to somebody else, it will be a whole lot easier. Next I'll go online and order lots and lots of fun things and pretend someone else will pay the bill. That sounds like fun! Just kidding, sweetie.

Another One Bites the Dust

Well, another school year is almost over. Almost being the key word. Drummer Boy ended up doing very well, and Elvira is doing well, too. If she can just retake a Geometry test or two so her teacher will pass her for last term. If only ... She has been so swamped that I'm surprised she doesn't have Power Point slides tipping out of her head when she nods off.

Kitty Boy and Tinkerbell are doing great. The GT room is all packed up and generic again. We're looking forward to La Push in August and a handful of other places in the meantime. I'm building a reading list for myself and have decided I want to complete one task every day this summer, whether it's dusting the ceiling fan or sewing on a button I've been meaning to. I'm the master of starting things but never finishing them. That's my big goal. Just one thing a day. More than one is gravy, but not expected.

I love summer vacation. I really want to go home to see my family. I miss them all. I got to see Caro last week on her way from Idaho to home for good, but it was only for a few hours. Not enough. I found myself just staring at her because I've never really spent much time with my own sister and I was just trying to memorize everything about her. I want to be around my family enough that their very appearance isn't so captivating, just reassuring. I want to see Jim's store and help out. I want to take my mom out to lunch and dig up weeds at the house. I want to sit on Dad's bed and spend all the time in the world with him. I want to be there when Suzy comes with the kids. Utah is nice, but it's never going to be home.

This post ended up differently than I thought. Funny how that works.

I'm No Longer Gifted & Talented

I'm about to be just average again. Waaaa. I found out today that our GT program is ending, for the most part. They'll still have an after school component, but I won't be involved in that. I like what I do, but most of all I love the kids. Even the ones that drive me nuts are actually pretty engaging, bright, funny kids.

I don't know what I'll do next year. It would be nice to not do anything, quite honestly. I think I could make enough E-baying our excess stuff to probably match my income! Plus, I have a million jobs and projects that have been put on ice for the last umpteen years while I was working or had tiny kids at home.

Let's see ... I could have lunch with Tinkerbell and help in her class. I could get the rest of the photos in albums. I could go through our digital photos, burn them onto CDs, get some printed out, and get those in albums. I could edit our million hours of home movies and burn them on DVDs. I could catch up on my ironing and make Sweetie's Halloween costume BEFORE Halloween--what a concept! I could work in the garden and get things straightened up out there. I could research scholarships so Drummer Boy can pay for college. I could work on Dad's genealogy so Mom can just focus on her own. I could finally paint some walls, rip out carpet, lay wood floors, change out light fixtures, tear down wallpaper, and the list goes on and on.

Come to think of it, who has time for work? I mean honestly--I'm way to busy for that.