Polar Bears

We went downtown at noon today for the Polar Bear Swim. It happens every year, but this is the first year we had a reason to go.

Pablo and his current host father, Greg some how got roped into the swim today. I don't know the whole story, but I believe Pablo was volunteered by another Rotarian and then the whole thing turned into a fund raiser. If $1000 was raised for a charity then Greg agreed to swim as well. Naturally the club raised the money.



They both turned out to do the swim but lady luck it seems was on their side. You remember how cold it was a week ago? Well it has frozen over some of the river (the most I have ever seen frozen). I guess by the time you walk out on the ice to jump in the water is about 10 feet deep. It was decided by the city that the conditions were unsafe to do the swim. There was concern about the ice breaking and about the swimmers being able to get out the water once they were in.

Pablo and Greg did earn the $$ anyway, they rolled around in the snow in their swimsuits. As you can see in the picture above it was cold enough for Pablo.



We had fun playing in the park for a little bit. It is a nice day to play outside, about -5C and snowing. Very pretty and mild.





Some folks decided not to heed the safety warning and go for it anyway. I snapped a picture of this guy thinking I might be capturing the picture to accompany the Darwin award for 2009, nice to have that out of the way early in the year.

I like the idea of wrapping a rope around his middle. Ouch. He was able to get in and out on his own accord. And others followed. Lemmings.



Pablo and Greg after snow diving:



A picture of the railroad bridge I have never been able to get before. I am standing 10 feet out on the iced river to take it.

You Must be Tired of This

Winter was quite serious about it's first day around here. That is -17F. It is so cold it feels weird to take a deep breath when you go outside.

You know what I find really strange about the cold? I find it odd how quickly we adapt to it. Today it warmed up to -18C and snowed a bit. Everyone who came into the office today was talking about how it is so much milder than the day before. People are very happy that it has warmed up to -18C. Funny.

I drove the truck to work today. Usually I drive the van around town, but Paul had the day off with the kids and had some errands to run so he asked me to take the truck to work.

The van lives in the garage this time of year, so it stays nice and cozy warm. The truck lives in the driveway, it has a block heater and the van does not. So we can plug it in and it won't free up. (Except for last week, when it was parked at the office and the fuel pump froze, chalk that one up to Mysteries of Winter)

When I left for the office I double checked with Paul, is the truck plugged in???? He mumbled something from our warm cozy bed and I scooted out the door. (which I am sure now was a "yes, don't forget to unplug it.")

I got in the truck and drove merrily away...you know where this is going don't you?

I forgot to unplug it from the house first. I did not even realize it until I got to the office. It dawned on me as I turned the engine off. A little to late.

I ripped the plug (it looks like your standard three prong cord only it plugs from your vehicle into an extension cord that plugs into your house) off the block heater.

I am a good wife, I went to the auto parts store to get him a new cord on my way home from work tonight. They were out of them all over town. It is nice to know it's an epidemic. I said to the sales man, "I'm not the only one?" He said, "Oh, no! you have plenty of company."

Still Cold

It is still a bit cold outside, I think it is -17C right now and the wind is blowing pretty good making it feel damn cold.

We don't usually have any trouble with our vehicles or anything when it gets cold, we are pretty well winterized. This year the truck decided to make an exception to our winterized rules.

On Tuesday the mercury hung out at -20C all day. Paul had just filled the truck with supreme gas (I guess that supreme has a lower freezing temperature than the regular stuff.) Anyway the truck would not start in the evening leaving Paul stranded at work.

He thought his fuel line froze and put in an additive that was supposed to thaw things out. It did not. We figured out how to get home from work (gong show) and how to get him at work by 7:00 am Wed while I got the kids off to school before I went to work (another gong show)

He calls BCAA from the office and traveling mechanic comes out to take a look at things. He has Paul turn over the engine and the traveling mechanic says he can fix the problem right away. He gets out a rubber mallet and crawls under the truck, in the snow, in the very cold snow. He instructs Paul to turn over the truck and the mechanic whacks the fuel pump a few times with the rubber mallet. The truck starts right up.

Apparently the fuel pump was frozen and few whacks was all it needed to wise up.

This morning I am at work and Paul calls. He can't make it in, the truck died getting on the highway....blah...blah blah.

The moral of the story is the truck is still in the shop waiting on a fuel pump. They have it in stock, they just FORGOT to call us to approve the work order, so they did nothing instead.

As a lovely addition to this story while Paul was outside trying so hard to get the truck to start on tuesday night. He just about froze. How cold was he you might ask? He froze his cell phone. He has a three year old blackberry that has been through thick and thin with him. He froze it so that now when you dial the numbers, letters pop up.

I did not know you could freeze a cell phone just standing around outside with it did you?

It's Cold

I have been working hard to keep the kids busy with inside fun stuff lately.

Here they are building a gingerbread house:



They worked on this for a couple of hours together with no fighting. I even had some time to make homemade turkey soup while they were working on it.



Up until this weekend our winter had been unusually warm. We had only a bit of snow, and what we got had just about melted away.

Our cold weather has decided to come with a vengeance and plenty of snow along with it. I think it snowed for about 24 hours straight. Starting Friday afternoon and was still going on Saturday night. It was -15C yesterday with a nasty wind.



For the metric challenged:



Today we woke up to clear skies and the wind has settled down some. It was -20C when I woke up this morning, I think that is -4F. The kids saw the sunshine and and decided they wanted to play outside. They were out for about 2 hours on and off today and even longer yesterday.

I guess if there is enough snow to play in then the bitter cold is tolerable? They have been building forts and snow tunnels. I think in this picture that Sebass (in the red coat) is relaxing in his snow bed while PJ and Q are digging in the snow.



I found better ways to entertain myself, cleaned the house, baked some bread, started a puzzle with the kids and now I am thinking I will spin for a bit and watch 27 dresses.

I loved your comments on the last post, I was trying to remember if I told you about the patient that asked me if I was Paul's daughter. He recognized the last name thing...but that was as far as he got. He is my favorite patient of all time.

Smart Cookie

My patients often make me laugh. Yesterday I had a young lady in to see me at the office that really cracked me up.

This young lady came in with her mom and her brother to get adjusted. I know the family well, it is a big family that reminds me much of mine back home. There are four daughters and their husbands and all their children and the parents of the four daughters. As far as I know the entire family comes in and sees us for all of their Chiropractic care.

It just so happened that on this occasion I was seeing a brother and a sister that I have not yet adjusted, they had only seen Paul.

I adjust the young lady first and I talk to her a bit about how she was feeling and why she was in that day. I showed her some range of motion stuff you know; pre-adjustment ROM compared to her ROM after her adjustment that sort of thing. I give her some exercises and some stretches and tell her to come back in a month for maintenance care.

I then adjust her brother, we go through some of the same stuff, but specific to how he is feeling. I talk to him about nutrition and a bit about allergies and ask to see him in a month for maintenance.

When I am wrapping things up, the young lady says to me..."You must have gone to school for a very long time, you are way smarter than that guy we usually see."

I laughed until I was in tears.

I guess you have to know Paul a bit to understand why I laughed so hard. Paul is crazy smart, he is so smart that sometimes he is so far ahead of me I wonder if I will ever catch up and sometimes I think he so smart it puts him a bit behind the rest of us, if you know what I mean.

I told the young lady that Paul and I went to the same school for the same amount of time, Paul just spoke to her about different things than I did, because he saw her body differently than I did.

I really believe that in our office Paul spends far more time on pt. education than I do. He is so good at teaching pts about their bodies and it is one of the big things that sets our practice apart from others in town. Paul and I both love to teach, what I said just resonated with her more than whatever Paul had to say.

Hanging Out

We have been hanging out and playing in the snow. We don't have as much snow as we usually do by this time of year, but I don't doubt it will show up when it's ready too.

The kids made this snowman mostly by themselves. It is pretty big, almost 5 feet tall, the kids got Paul to lift the middle and the top up for them. Good wet snowman snow is heavy stuff.

-10C today, I think that is about 14F. To cold for snow, just right for putting up your Christmas tree and drinking hot chocolate.

Hockey Stars of Tomorrow

I took these pictures while we were skating with the kids on Sunday. It is not actually their hockey skate, they just love gearing up. We do shoot the puck around and what not, and the pads do make for a soft landing when you fall.



That is Q above in the red and below Paul, Sebass and PJ. I think you can guess who is who.

PJ is so funny when we skate on Sundays. She skates around a bit, whacking the puck around with her hockey stick. After a while she skates to the bench and puts her stick down, then she skates up to me and says, "Mom, are you ready yet?"

"Am I ready for what?" I ask her.

"For your skating lessons." She says.

She makes me put my stick away and she skates me out to center ice. She makes me do crossovers (lifting one foot over the other, like your are climbing stairs sideways is how PJ explained it to me, you do it to get around the corners of the rink and to maneuver quickly around other players). Last week after fumbling my way around the circle in center ice, she shook her helmeted head at me.

"Mom, just stop. Try doing them just standing in one spot for a while and when you get the hang of that then you can try the circle again." Totally schooled by a six year old who can out skate me. Priceless.





Apparently next week I am learning to stop on a dime. "You know mom just skate like this" PJ demonstrates skating across the ice. "And when you want to stop just turn your back where your front just was." The kid executes a perfect stop. I may need to wear Paul's hockey shorts for the padding, I fear my backside may suffer during next weeks lesson.

I love how much my kids make me laugh. And oh yeah...they teach me stuff too.

Inspiration

We had a really fun really full weekend. We took the kids to the Santa Claus parade on Saturday and then we took them to "Seussical" performed by the Western Canada Theatre. If you ever have the chance to see this production I highly recommend it.

It is a musical based on the works of Dr. Seuss. Dr. Seuss wrote 48 books this musical manages to wrap 18 of them up in the same story line. It is wonderful and witty and the kids were glued to their seats the whole 3 hours.

Sr. Seuss used his stories not only as art, but he used his works as political and social commentary. This musical spoke to the good Drs. ideas that "a person is a person no matter how small." (Horton Hear a Who) and managed to put forward the idea that our thoughts create our realities. (Oh the Thinks you can Think) all while keeping kids both children and adults entertained. It was wonderful.

Sunday morning we took the kids skating for a while and then Paul and I were off to an afternoon with Deepak Chopra. Yes you read that right. Deepak came to our little town and spoke to a group of three thousand people a sold out show. He was wonderful.

He opened with some idea's from quantum physics and in the end wrapped it all around to the idea that we are world on the verge of a metamorphosis. He talked about the change of consciousness that is occurring the world today. That we create our world and our reality with our thoughts.

If we all choose to be conscious and present we can change the world. I had this moment during the lecture that I realized that I had been give the same lecture twice in the same weekend. I found it amazing that Dr. Seuss and Dr. Deepak Chopra are delivering the same message in there own ways.

"Oh the thinks you can think...."

Gobble Gobble

We managed to bring American Thanksgiving to Canada again this year. I think this was the 5th annual. I think that may make it an official tradition here in our house. I am getting smarter and smarted with it every year.

This year we had 21 children with Layne and Sebass the two oldest at 7 years old. We did two seatings this year: kids first and adults next.



We hired Uncle Chris the Clown to come for an hour and entertain the kids. It was the best idea I have ever had. 23 adults enjoyed a great meal while their children had a blast with Uncle Chris. Priceless.





I don't have any adult pictures. Kathryn was kind enough to grab my camera and take the ones you see here, or I would not have any at all.

Why I Don't Post Things I Knit for Me

There is an easy answer for Mom's question. I don't post pictures of my FO's that are knit myself because I have no one to photograph them for me.

Here is a photo our baby sitter took of Paul and I last week. I wanted to show you all my pretty dress, that looked really great on. The kids hopped in the photo, the baby sitter was game to take the picture, but you can see how great we look. (NOT)

In fact, I look strained. I look like a crazy mom, trying to out the door on time and before a kid spill spaghetti sauce down the front of my dress. Paul looks equally pained, like he is wondering how many pairs of shoes I am going to try on before we get out the door.

Not a pretty photo is it?



Here is another prime example. I got my haircut last Tuesday and came home and took these photos. Trust me again, it is a great haircut. See the way my bangs appear crooked in the photo, they are not. See the weird look in my eye, I look stern and icky. It seems to be very difficult to photograph oneself in the mirror.



The back photo is no better. Honestly it's a good cut. It is an A line, but not crooked in the back as it appears in the photo below. Maybe I need to see my chiropractor.



Paul is not interested in taking a few pictures of me so I can post my modeled knits on my blog. He will take to bad pictures (with my head cut off or something) and will roll his eyes and complain if I ask him to take another. "This one is fine!" he says.

I don't want "fine" I want a good picture of my FO. So you see them on the living room floor, or draped over the arm of the couch.

Digesting

I have not had to much to say lately.

I have been digesting the stuff that is going on with Pop in CA. and just hanging out in my cave.

Things are good here. We have been doing a lot of the usual stuff kids, hockey, work, school, dentist, haircuts and the like.

I have knit another pair of gauntlets for Q and and hope to start a pair for Sebass this evening.

Basically I have not been posting because I am enjoying being totally boring.

Gaile's Pedicure Socks

One of my favorite patients at the office is a knitter. She is a lovely women who donates almost all of her knitting to charity.

She knits preemie hats by the dozens. A few months ago she told me she was knitting 20 children's sweaters to be sent to one particular charity. 20! She will knit them up in a matter of months. She knits for the joy of passing her stuff onto those who might otherwise do without.

A month ago she brought me a whole bag of sock yarn, enough for five or six pairs of socks. She had purchased a Pedicure sock pattern along with the yarn. She handed me the whole works and asked if I could put it to good use. Sock yarn..of course I could put it to use.

The yarn is quite fine and has elastic in it. She found it to fine to work with. I offered to pay for the pattern and the yarn and she would have none of it. "Just use the yarn" she said.

I did:



This is Sonya (she has the smallest feet in the office) she is the willing model of Gaile's pedicure socks. I knit them up for Gaile and planned to give them to her on Thursday, she called and rescheduled her apt. with me. I will leave them on my desk until I can pay a little something forward to someone who deserves it so much.



The socks only took one ball of yarn...I am thinking I can make her some gauntlets with the other ball of the same colour.

Knitting Content

I only have one picture from the dance. The dance was a family deal, it was from 6:30 to 8:00 and the kids had a great time. I don't know if you tell in the terrible picture below, but all three kids are in it, have a close look and you will see them all. It was fun and PJ even won a prize for "shakin' everything her mama gave her" Go girl. She won it in a show your moves hip hop thing. Made me laugh.

If you really squint you can make out Debbles, Rory, Layne and Wren in the background.



I have hit a good knitting stride lately. I just finished a pair of socks, I will photograph them at work Wed and show them to you then.

The kids have been asking me to make them fingerless gloves like mine. I decided to finally give it a go. I made mine up without a pattern and did not write anything down as I went so starting a new pair seemed a bit daunting.

I faked it and ended up with a pair for PJ I am pretty happy with, I wrote down the pattern so I can do up a pair for Q and Seabass. It only took me two evenings to get them done, they were very quick and fun to do. I like the immediate gratification.

In the first photo below the colours are no where near true but you get a size idea, that is mine and PJ's.



Here is PJ wearing her's for a modeling session. The colour in the photo below is the most accurate.



PJ is the best knitting model I have ever had, she just kept posing and smiling. The pictures made me smile and I needed practice using the flash so I just kept clicking away. I posted a few of them to make you smile too.





My favorite:

First Dance

We are getting ready to take the kids to their first school dance tonight.

How cool is that?

I recently heard about a web site for Obama, I checked it out and it looks like you can actually give feed back and send ideas for change. Check it out here

Jazzed

I am so proud that our nation has elected our first African American President.

I now have hope and a feeling of optimism for the Untied States.

Thank you for all who voted!

Halloween

Here is the gang on Halloween. We all had a fun time, Paul took them out trick-or-treating. It was the 7th annual trick-or-treat with Layne, Deb and her crew. I love that it has become a Halloween tradition to get them all together. We are up to an even 6 children between Deb and Rory and Paul and Myself. Impressive.



I thought these two pictures were funny. PJ and Paul before the candy fest:



PJ post candy fest:



All three kids were an absolute blur for two days. Paul has been very sick, seems to have a nasty cold/sinus infection thing. He went to the doctor yesterday and has been on some heavy antibiotics since. I am the last one to send a guy to get drugs, but I could not stand the growling bear in house either.

Sebass quote from Monday: "Mom, Dad must be feeling better, he did not even yell at me once today." proof that occasionally medication is necessary.

Dirt Bike School

I told you about the dirt biking class that we were planning on going to this past weekend. It was lots of fun and we all learned tons. They did a great job of dividing everyone into groups based on skill level and making sure everyone got what they wanted out of it.



Here is Sebass cruising around one of the tracks we practiced on. There were three different groups and Paul, Sebass and myself were all in different groups.

I was amazed at all the kids taking jumps and handling the turns with an amazing skill level. I don't know how many times I was passed by 6 and 7 year olds.



A couple of tips on how to turn and how to sit on the bike and I feel way more comfortable on the bike. I think you take this course once every year and get something out of it every time.

I achieved my goals: I learned how to corner with confidence, I made it to third gear and as a bonus on my last trip around the track I got a little airtime. I think I rode as aggressively as I ever want to, rest easy mom and dad, third gear is plenty for me.


This is one of the instructor's taking a quick rip around the track at the very end:


Most of the instructors are competitive racers. Very cool to watch but not for me to do.

A bit of Girly Stuff:

I mentioned this to Shannon when I was visiting earlier in the month. As my body has been changing with age (read I think I might be peri-menopausal) I have been getting nasty headaches when I ovulate and when my cycle begins. I went to the health food store and had a chat with one of the ladies that works there, who I find to be very knowledgeable. I told her what was going on that my gut feeling was it was related to hormone changes as I age. She suggested I try Her Energy

I find I have way more energy since I have been on it. It has cleaned me out a little bit if you know what I mean, but not in a drastic or uncomfortable way. I lost 5 pounds of belly fat in the first two weeks and have held steady since. I had my ovulation headache yesterday but it did not last long and the intensity of it came down. I had been taking Advil for them (and I hate taking crap like that) and I got through the headache with no medication, I just upped my water intake for the day.

I have felt great the past two weeks and I often start to feel the season change this time of year and get a bit down. The time change this weekend will be a great test to see if this supplement continues to help me out.

Acorn Ass

I was going to tittle it "Acorn Butt" but let's face it "Acorn Ass" has a nice ring to it.




You don't see a whole lot of Oak trees where I live. It is one of the first things I noticed (after the I got over the whole cold/snow thing) when I moved up here. I have always had a soft spot in my heart for Oak trees.

We had a huge Oak that grew in the backyard of the house we grew up in. I remember a particular camp ground we would go to that was full of big beautiful Oak trees. How about that huge Oak that grew right in the middle of the main street in downtown Danville. (I think it may be gone now?)

I noticed this Oak tree while walking the kids to school one day. I have meaning to take its picture for a couple of seasons now. The changing colours had me out of the house with my camera on a special walk just to grab a few pictures of it.

In the picture above I was not really trying to get the ass end of the acorn. The wind was blowing like mad and that is the end mother nature pointed at me when the camera clicked. I love it.

Pictured below: that's me, on a dirt bike. My maiden voyage. Fun and bit scary. I never did make it out of second gear. I played around with changing gears a lot. First to second, second to first, getting the hang of the clutch being in my hand and the changing gears with my foot when I have done just the opposite since I learned to drive.

Sunday Paul, Sebass and myself are taking a dirt bike course with the Yamaha dealership here in town. If you are going to do it you may as well learn as much as you can about technique. I am hoping they cover tips and tricks on how to fall...

Another One

I just came accross this one reading my morning blog posts. I could not help but load one more. It is just so perfect. I guess everyone knows I cast my vote.

I am really learning to love Fridays. I work Monday through Thursday and have Fridays off. Today the kids have an in-service day and we are having a relaxing pajama morning. I am planning to catch up on laundry house work through-out the day.

I have another blog post planned after I download some photos from last weekend so stay tuned. I am going for two posts in one day! Shocking I know.

Maybe I will even get a chance to finish a sock and practice my piano today. I have high hopes don't I. I am always surprised at how fast the day slips buy when I work around the house and play with the kids.

Have you Seen This?

I think some of you have already seen this, but it is worth a second look if you have.

It made me bust a gut.

Reunion

The reunion was a great time. I think both Shannon and I had more fun than we expected to have. In high school I was never quiet sure where I fit in, so I was not sure where I would fit in at the reunion. As I spoke with many old friends and some people I barely knew in school it turns out that almost all of us seemed to feel that way.

Shannon was a great date, she looked hot, got tipsy on only one drink and we got hit on as a couple. One guy bought Shannon and I both a beer and chatted us up. He was quite flirty with us until he pointedly asked us "What's up with the two of you?" Shannon and I replied that we were sisters and he disappeared without another word. Once he realized he was not getting luck with lesbians he just turned around and walked away. Shannon and I got a great laugh out of it.

Most everyone looked great. The women have all taken care of themselves and looked beautiful. There were a couple of guys that had gotten paunchy but not to bad. Anyone going bald went for the shaved look that is so fashionable now anyway.

There were several people there that I renewed relationships with and I am sure we will keep in touch now. So glad that I went.

The visit with Shannon and Will was loads of fun. I had a great time bonding with Taylor and Morgan without my kids around. I got to really spend some time with them without my kids competing for my attention. Taylor talked my ear off and held my hand all through the corn maze, what a character she is! Morgan is at that great age where you can embarrass him with the right word dropped into casual conversation....fun stuff that.

Mom and Darryl are amazing with the horses, I wish I had more of a visit with Darryl, but he had to work. Their house looks wonderful and they seem very happy and lead a full and wonderful life.

Shannon and I had lunch with Dad on Monday. I got to bond with everyone...the trip was such a wonderful whirlwind. I just can't tell you all how glad I am that I went (I guess saying twice will have to do the trick)

Muddy Fun Weekend

This weekend we took the kids out to Inks Lake to do some dirt biking. It was a blast. The weather was perfect: enough rain to make some good puddles and enough sun for a rainbow. We packed a lunch and had sunshine and wore our t-shirts it was great.



Sebass rode his own dirt bike and did a great job. He and Paul are registered for a dirt bike course together in a couple of weeks. I think they will have a great time and learn a lot of safety stuff.



The quad belongs to my friend Doug. He was kind enough to let us borrow it for the weekend. I had PJ and Q on the quad with me some of the time and sometimes Q rode on the front of Paul's dirt bike.



Don't worry to much I was the only one with a speedometer and I don't think any one went faster than about 20KPH. I did go 35ish once but on an easy road. It was a blast.



Here is Sebass after slipping a bit in a puddle, he pulled himself out and then kick started his bike on his own. He had a great time. It looks like Q is riding Paul's bike, but he just sitting on it waiting for Paul.



One of the best things about the bikes and quad is being able to go to places like this:



and spending time with these people:



Priceless.

Time Flys

I can't believe how long it has been since my last post. Where has it gone? I am feeling more like I have found my rhythm the past week. It is as it blogging about it smoothed things out a bit. Thank you all for the comments and great ideas to help keep me grounded. The ideas from so many moms that are there or have been there is so helpful.

I am headed to California for a weekend. Sounds crazy doesn't it? Remember that Paul went to his 20 year high school reunion not long ago? Mine is this year as well, Paul has encouraged me to go to mine because he enjoyed his so much.

I will fly out of Bellingham on Friday afternoon, the 10th? I don't know the date and don't have a calender in front of me and I fly back on the Monday evening. Quick and dirty. I got a great price on airline tickets, about $200, I told Paul even with the airline tickets I will probably spend less money than he did at his! He laughed. He has no idea I am planning a trip to the BE store with mom and Shannon that should add a little cost to my trip!

It seemed like my trip was months and months away and now it is around the corner. I keep thinking have lots of time to get some shoes to go with my dress and now I realize I don't have to much time at all.

Q had a birthday late last week. He turned 5. Be still my heart, they are all growing up so quickly. I have some pictures to post for you, but I had a computer incident have been unable to download my photos.

I moved my Sony laptop (the one with Vista on it) buy grabbing both the base and a steadying hand on the screen and the screen cracked under my thumb! The LCD is totally shot and you can see nothing on the screen. This has made it a bit hard to see the pictures. I am hoping to have it covered under warranty but who knows?

Rhythm of Running

Part One:

I step out my front door four days a week with my runners on, iPod on the go and a water bottle in my hand headed out to run where ever my feet take me. I go as far as want as fast or as slow as want, I turn off my brain and I center myself to the earth and to the music and I find peace.

Sometimes I get going and everything falls into place, I have hit what I call my 'rhythm'. For me that is when my heart rate, my breathing pattern and my legs all decide to work together and I feel like I am flying. I can't say at anytime I feel like it is effortless, but it sure feels good. I come home collapse in the driveway happy that I laced up my runners.

Other times I never hit IT. I don't get everything to match up, it feels like I am working harder than I have to; my shoulders are up high around my ears, I clench up my hands a bit. Or maybe its just a day that my legs feel heavy and I can feel my ass jiggling behind me as I pound my way down the hill. I does not feel good to run on these days, but when I get home and collapse in the driveway I feel good, happy that I laced up that day.

Part Two:

The kids have been back to school for almost a month now (APL they start back the Tuesday after Labour day, mine missed the first week, they were in Vegas with Paul) Sebass has started second grade and PJ is into first. Quentin had some choices to make this year, he could do one or two Kindergarten classes.

He is in the Montessori class and has been in the preschool for a few years now. He had the option of doing the Montessori kindergarten, the public school kindergarten or to do both classes on in the morning and one in the afternoon. Quentin thought about his options for about two seconds and said to me, "Mommy, I would like to make more friends so I think I will do both classes."

He does montessori in the morning and then a lunch program with the teachers of the morning class and then they walk him to his second classroom for the afternoon. (It is all at the same school and PJ and SeaBass are at the same school as well) What all this means is that all of my kids are in full time school.

I, being the fool that I am, have decided to most of my newly found free time to work. Yes, you read that right I volunteered to work more. I am now in the office 4 days a week. We have added office hours, we now have two days a week that between Paul and I we work straight through the day. We open the office and 7:00 and a.m. and we close at 5:00 no closing for lunch. It is working out well, but it means a bigger work load for all of us. Both Paul and I are feeling the crunch as we get into the rhythm of things.

Here is where I tie in Part One and Part Two:

I am struggling a bit to manage everything. I feel like I am sprinting from point A to point B all day every day. The kids have homework that needs to be attended too, they have piano lessons one afternoon a week (and practice their lessons 4 days a week, I only ask them to do it for 12 min. let's keep it reasonable, it is supposed to be fun.) they start Peter Puck on Thursday of this week and will do that only one day a week.

Learning how to get everything done and still keeping it fun for the kids has been like one one of those daily runs where I never quite get my rhythm. I feel like I am doing the right things and getting the right balance but I am struggling a bit to do it, shoulders up around my ears, my hands clenched to tight and my ass dragging along behind me while I completely forget to breath in and out. At the end of the day when I collapse on the couch I find myself glad I put on my runners and laced up but damn I can't wait until I find my rhythm again.