Piles and other stuff

My life is such an organized mess right now! I know where everything is, but I despise piles and they currently cover my desk and dining room table.

Caught Calvin trying to go through my piles this afternoon!

I probably shouldn't even be blogging right now with all I need to get done, but blogging always seems to help clear my mind and keep me focused. So, just gonna get some random stuff off my brain. . .

My calling in Primary has been monopolizing my time. Our music leader decided to call it quits 7 weeks before the primary program and I'm not sure how long it's gonna take to call another chorister. So now I'm working on planning music for Sunday (trying to come up with a fun game to gauge where the kids are with complete memorization of each song) along with finishing the program, printing out parts for each of our 65 primary kids and emailing all parts to the parents. On a positive note, I finally got a new secretary called on Sunday (my last one moved a month ago) and I think she's going to be fabulous!

Staying on top of Madi with her reading is exhausting. She's totally self motivated when it comes to her math homework, but reading is a different story. It definitely requires my undivided attention. I've been trying to use our 2-2:45 time for it, but since Calvin's usually just waking up from his nap, he also needs my attention.  I try to make good use of every reading opportunity. This one was a fluke - I turned around at a stop light and happened to catch it:

Spencer had taken my car to be cleaned this particular day, so unfortunately moments like this won't happen too often.

Madi's currently on level E books and I'm determined to help her move up quickly. I want her to be able to get into chapter books and enjoy reading, but for now it's still a chore. I made flash cards with all the first grade sight words and even got the 2nd and 3rd grade word lists. We'll see how it goes. I signed up to be the home reading mom every Monday morning - I start on the 30th.

School mornings are always so crazy and I haven't been getting my regular 4-5 mile run in. Since school started I've been running Madi to school every morning which ends up being a measly 1.8 miles. But since most days we're cutting it close on time, it's usually a sprint while pushing a double stroller, so I try to justify that I'm getting a good workout. When Spence is out of town (which he has been this week), Madi bikes along side the stroller which slows things down and we have to leave quite a bit earlier. I'm not a fan of the hustle and bustle of trying to get out the door in a rush. Always makes me feel like a crazy mom.

I'm currently working with the girls on taking care of their things. For awhile they'd run into the house after school, leaving backpacks in the car or just tossed in the garage. So now we're doing some serious training with hanging backpacks up, bringing lunch box into the kitchen, homework folder into the house, and shoes lined up in the garage. Clothes are another issue! Pajamas are always left on the floor and other clothes tossed into the closet or drawers. We're also working on looking at our clothes at the end of the day and deciding if they should go into the dirty clothes basket, or folded and back into the closet. I'm constantly finding dirty clothes folded and put away! Gotta work on that! One of these days my hard work's gonna pay off though - I'm sure of it! Today we were super rushed but I was shocked that Madi remembered to put jammas away and clear her breakfast dishes! Yay! Another thing I like the girls to do at night is lay out their clothes for school the next morning. Elle's loves doing this! The picture below is an old one, but the only one I have (she was trying to decide what to wear). Wish I would have taken one yesterday afternoon when she layed out her soccer clothes before leaving for preschool and they layed down next to them to show me how it was going to look!

Aside from church, school, and kids, Spencer and I have gotten sucked into watching the "Breaking Bad" series. I was initially against watching it after hearing how intense of a show it is, but then I justified how I should be supporting "Jesse" (Aaron), who was my neighbor for several years before he left for Hollywood to "make it big". He was the first friend I made when my family moved to Boise and it's been fun watching him on TV and feeling like I'm sharing in his excitement of achieving his dreams!  It's been impossible for Spence and I to stop after one episode though, so on nights when he's in town, I don't get much else done aside from kitchen clean-up and stuff ready for the next day of school (also a big reason for all the piles and why I'm behind on my blogging)! Spencer's had to travel a bit for work and I'm quite pleased with everything I've been able to accomplish in my evenings alone when he's away!  We're almost done though (just one season left), then life can get back to normal! :)