Camping
I dodged a bullet; the camping trip was cancelled because the highs were in the teens, and neither of us adults was interested in a freezing camping trip. I ran the Journey at my house, and it's done. Our Service Unit does Gold and Silver workshops where they walk the kids through getting started, and unfortunately the soonest I was able to sign Zoë up was a few months from now because they're all on Thursday evenings which conflicts with her piano lesson.
Speaking of piano lessons, she's really being stretched by her new teacher. Very few classical pieces, lots of popular music. This week it's all Billy Joel. One of the pieces is 16 pages, and I asked her if it was because he wants her to practice turning pages. She kind of laughed, so I think I pegged it. For the past month+, she's also needed no reminders to practice. It's been ... pretty amazing.
We finished up the psychoeducational testing so she can potentially get extended time on college board exams. What an arduous and expensive process. I need to get back in touch with her school and find out what parts of the report I need to set aside for giving to the exam folks. I'm just done with all this stuff. Too much of everything to keep track of.
For the fourth weekend in a row we're going to have people over. Mike's running an old school D&D game, so there'll be lots of guys and lots of beer. Zoë needs me to drop her off at the mall and then she's going to be picked up with a friend and go back to his house to watch movies, and then I have to pick her up and take her to another friend's house for a dinner party, and then pick her up around midnight to come home. Which means I don't think I'll be joining the D&D game. I think I may just hole up and read in between being a taxi. Or maybe see if I can make some more progress in the craft room. One of the kids doing the Journey loved making friendship bracelets. She'd never successfully made one before. I had her grab as many skeins of embroidery floss as she wanted so she could make more at home, and goodness knows I have more than enough embroidery floss. Giving away half a dozen skeins doesn't make even the tiniest of dents.
The primary benefit of having people over regularly is it helps us make sure the main areas of our house aren't ridiculously cluttered. The dining room table's staying clean. The living room isn't a complete tornado of dog toys. School and sports debris is semi-contained. The upstairs landing isn't a collection of laundry baskets full of clean laundry. I don't like having people over. I like the less cluttered house.
Speaking of piano lessons, she's really being stretched by her new teacher. Very few classical pieces, lots of popular music. This week it's all Billy Joel. One of the pieces is 16 pages, and I asked her if it was because he wants her to practice turning pages. She kind of laughed, so I think I pegged it. For the past month+, she's also needed no reminders to practice. It's been ... pretty amazing.
We finished up the psychoeducational testing so she can potentially get extended time on college board exams. What an arduous and expensive process. I need to get back in touch with her school and find out what parts of the report I need to set aside for giving to the exam folks. I'm just done with all this stuff. Too much of everything to keep track of.
For the fourth weekend in a row we're going to have people over. Mike's running an old school D&D game, so there'll be lots of guys and lots of beer. Zoë needs me to drop her off at the mall and then she's going to be picked up with a friend and go back to his house to watch movies, and then I have to pick her up and take her to another friend's house for a dinner party, and then pick her up around midnight to come home. Which means I don't think I'll be joining the D&D game. I think I may just hole up and read in between being a taxi. Or maybe see if I can make some more progress in the craft room. One of the kids doing the Journey loved making friendship bracelets. She'd never successfully made one before. I had her grab as many skeins of embroidery floss as she wanted so she could make more at home, and goodness knows I have more than enough embroidery floss. Giving away half a dozen skeins doesn't make even the tiniest of dents.
The primary benefit of having people over regularly is it helps us make sure the main areas of our house aren't ridiculously cluttered. The dining room table's staying clean. The living room isn't a complete tornado of dog toys. School and sports debris is semi-contained. The upstairs landing isn't a collection of laundry baskets full of clean laundry. I don't like having people over. I like the less cluttered house.