Like AA, but for people with no follow through

I did things! Not big things, but some steps were made.

First for my weekly goals.

1. I did make my flyer for private lessons! It looks pretty good too. My husband also made a flyer for his sax studio and put together a list of the secondary music teachers our area of the county. 
2. I did spend more time with my kids. I don't know that they noticed, but I did. The problem here is that they have never had "enough" mom-time (or dad-time, or friend-time.)  My daughter especially has a bottomless need for playmates. So, in addition to spending more time playing with her myself, I made sure she had more time to play with other kids in the neighborhood. We need to be more strict about bedtime, but we'll work on that this week.
3. Cleaning! I actually did ok with that this week, up until Friday. On Friday I had a day when I was done.  I can't be the only one who's ever felt like this, but I didn't want to be productive, nice, motherly, or tidy. I was tired of being touched, called for, and being needed to mediate between a 5 and a 2 year old. So, Friday night I quit. Luckily, Friday is the easy day when I iron. Unluckily we had a storm come through yesterday, when I was supposed to catch up, and we lost power for about 8.5 hours. So, the ironing is still hanging on a rack in my den. Maybe during tomorrow's nap time. 
1. I would like to note that I did feel a lot better about things. There were still messes to be cleaned. We had some confusion between washable marker and dry erase marked that resulted in me scrubbing some paint off a door near the kid's play table, but there are enough layers of paint on that door that I don't think anyone will notice.
4. I did finish The Neverending Story.  And it was good. I liked the second half better than the first half.  The first half was pretty closely aligned with movie (visa versa, I guess) but because it was so close to the movie I was a little bored with it. The scene with Artax in the swamp of sadness wasn't as moving in the book (seriously, that was the saddest part of any movie, ever when I was a kid. See.) But the second half of the book was much better. The movie ended about half way through the book. In the second half Bastian comes to Fantastica (Fantasia in the movie) and has some cool adventures. It bears a passing resemblance to the second movie, but the book was better. In the movie there is an actual bad guy (lady) but in the book, while she makes an appearance, the conflict is much more within Bastian and a lot more thought provoking. If you stumble upon it in the library (which is how I found it) and you're a fairly fast reader, it's worth a few days. If you're a slower reader, while it was good, I think there may be other books more worth your time. 
1. Also I read The House at Pooh Corner including reading a chapter aloud to my kids. They seemed to like it more than I did. I still liked it, but maybe I just wasn't in the mood for it. I'll hold on to it, maybe renew it, and read a few more chapters to them.
2. Started Misquoting Jesus, which is a fairly interesting read. It talks about how the Bible, specifically the New Testament, has been changed over the centuries. Nothing that I didn't understand the basics of before, but it's interesting to get some specifics and learn about how the historians go about determining the most authentic reading of a text. (Most authentic because we don't have a single original document. From what I gathered the best we can do is about the 2nd Century. That's like reconstructing the Declaration of Independence based on what we all remember from 7th grade, when only about 5% of us can actually read. Yeah, really) 
5. Got behind and didn't pick an economics class yet. I'll put that on my to-do list for tomorrow, along with the ironing.

So, one cool thing, which I haven't had a chance to follow up on yet, was a step towards a teaching certificate. On Tuesday night my husband had a gig about an hour away and ended up driving the van with the Boss in it. During the two hours of driving my situation came up and J found out some cool things. The Lt.'s wife is also a music teacher, prefers elementary music and is currently working on her Master's degree. She commutes to the University of Washington via ferry (holy long commute, Batman), but apparently there are a lot of people there who are in about the same situation as I am. That is, a bit later in life and wanting to supplement an existing degree with a teaching certificate. So, it can be, and is being done. This week I'm going to try and get in touch with her somehow (I'm not sure about the protocol on this) and see what she can tell me about the program. If it's something that some of the classes can be done online, or a couple of days a week commuting we *might* be able to swing something. I hope so. 

I'm continuing to prepare for a 10k at the end of September, but I've gotten to the point where I'm kind of bored with running. I need to change it up somehow, but I'm not sure how to go about it. On Saturday I needed to do 4.5 miles, but because of the weather I had to do it on a treadmill at the gym and got so bored I could only do 3.5. (Also, this was a weird ol' treadmill and I don't think it was reading things properly, because by the end of 3.5 I was totally beat and it had me running really, really slow.) Running friends! Any ideas?

Another thing to work on this week in being more steady about my scripture reading. Because I'm working on finishing the Doctrine and Covenants before the end of the year I have daily readings in my to-do list. But lately I end up missing a day or two, or three, and then spending a bunch of time reading in one day. And then I miss the next day and the process repeats. The daily readings help keep me on track and remind me that it's been a while (other wise I've been known to go back and realize it's been weeks and weeks since I've read the scriptures) but I need to make it a daily habit. So, this week I will try to set aside time everyday just for scripture study. (I will note that I have found a HUGE difference between reading my scriptures and doing scripture study, but that's a soap box for another day.)  I'm not sure when that time will be. First thing in the morning I'm pretty bleary eyed and when I get back from running (when I run the am) the kids are usually awake and hungry. By afternoon nap I need to do the cleaning project and by evening I'm just ready to check Facebook and go to bed. But! There is time there. I have the same 24 hours everyone else has. If it matters I'll make the time. So, we'll go with first thing in the morning. Before or after my run I'm not sure, but it will be in the am. 

So, in summary, for the week to come:

• Pick an Economics Class
• Talk to the Lt's wife about UW's teaching certificate program
• Find something to reinvigorate running
• Daily scriptures first thing in the morning.
• Finish Misquoting Jesus and read... something else. I'm up next for The Lightning Thief and I just checked out Outliers.

Pithy cheer to keep me motivated!