“Mind what people do, not only what they say, for deeds will betray a lie.“ – Terry Goodkind ๐๏ธ
Last Week: Doing some good things, but not super consistent yet.
This Week: My husband traveling is throwing me off more than I expected.
HEALTH OVERVIEW:
Mental Health: Still stressed, but I think I’m going to be like that until I pick my husband up Sunday from Florida, during the pandemic we spent a lot of it apart, yet I knew he was comfortable at his mom’s house, having him just on the road feels different. I know he will be okay he was in the army and has traveled, but at the same time it doesn’t feel good, it just feels unsettling.
Physical Health: Wanting to start exercising again, but didn’t, ran through some kind of respiratory bug so it’s okay with me. Starting to drink two bottles of water, cook more healthy foods, and be more patient with the kids also playing a bit of computer games really takes the edge off of my stress, even though there is no direct pay off it’s a huge stress reducer, of course so is alcohol, no offense to alcoholics, but games function for me in that way so I have to be careful not to neglect my kids, pets, and responsibilities if I am playing. It does make me feel happy to be alive, I guess there isn’t dopamine in much else I do since I eat healthy, a lot of people get dopamine from sweets and junk food.
Social Health: Passed on our violins, I hope the kids who borrowed them enjoy them, if not nothing lost.
LIFE JOURNAL:
“Without forgiveness life is governed by an endless cycle of resentment and retaliation.โ
– Roberto Assagioli
โThere is no small act of kindness. Every compassionate act makes large the world.โ
–Mary Anne Radmacher
Saturday: Last week was the last week of school for first grade. This week is summer school, even though we are doing mini math and mini science it feels like less pressure, which feels good. I drove a good part of the day dropping off my husband at the airport 100 miles away, so 200 round trip.
Sunday: Last week I went out into the garden. This week I was feeling short of breath so I took it as easy as I could. My sister was grumpy that the dog pee pad smelled bad in the dining room, she wanted to move it somewhere else, I think it just needs to be cleaned more no matter where it was so she was frustrated but came around to the same position after an hour when the dinning room smelled just fine after the pad was switched. One thing about open concept is open smell, not that I agree with just transferring the problem, but even if we wanted to it’s not that possible.
Monday: Three weeks ago I wrote some school notes: that I wanted to focus on enthusiasm, breaking skills down, patience, more enthusiasm, and changing the system as needed to fit the student and encourage the kids to study smarter so you can learn more and contribute to your own well-being and that of others. Last week I felt good, this week, not as much. My daughter just click-failed a Chemistry quiz that wasn’t even due today and lied about it, again, I don’t know if this is the fifth time, but something like that. I threw such a fit, she finally seems to get that she has to stop. I feel half ashamed for being impatient and mean, but half satisfied that it got results that will lead to a future for both of us, it’s a weird feeling.
Tuesday: Last week we got a new robot, this week I was nursing a hurt ankle praying it would get better in time for our beach day.
Wednesday: Last week was a day that made me happy to be alive and I felt good about myself and my choices and my family (yes, a rare day). This week was actually even more cool, we did a magnetic vegetarian fishing trip, a lot of kids had fun, many fished for the first time, other than that it was fun swimming and being at the beach. I hope I remember to make the fishing contest graphic soon to put on the back of the ribbons.
Thursday: Last week my son finished Foundations of Music, I am still proud of him. This week a friend came over for a shoulder massage, I think I helped her, which is nice because she is a more dedicated massage therapist helping heal the world more than I want to.
Friday: Last week had musical friends over and that was fun. This week had my coding/math/baking friends over. It was really cool, they have a big age range, the baby liked Number Blocks as well as balls and the four young children also really enjoy Number Blocks as well as block play. The baby had a few balls to explore size and 1-3, the two year old worked out 2×2 or 2+2 on the whiteboard with help after seeing his big sister use the whiteboard and made some cinnamon bread, the next oldest mostly focused on Number Blocks (but for the first time) and made a dinner bread, the next oldest got a small pass but did work on 4×4 and kept working on it after having a bit of trouble, but I found his tell is legos and his theme is dinosaurs, my daughter did her 3×7 under pressure just fine by counting by 5s, which is good. The second oldest did a ton of long division but also 12% of the STEM 1 Coding Course and watched “Hidden Figures” a movie I had been wanting to show forever, it was cool because her, and her mom watched it together, so they both know a bit about how women were at the forefront of coding and especially Katherin Johnson’s math taking humans to the moon. The oldest child in our summer school group did 9% of STEM 1 Coding with no help, I hope to change him to his own interest soon, but he moved from needing help to working well independently so the tech skills in general are helping pave the way for digital learning fluency, which is cool, found out he likes Architecture and Geography, so perhaps later we can transfer to something more passion based. It was fun having them over, it inspires my kids to do math with others and I think it drives them to do better in robotics and coding that my daughter is younger than them, so all the kids get a bit more driven. I think I can help fill in a lot of gaps for them, even though their base is strong, they are more linguistic, ethics and art focused as a family, and out tech influence and STEM influence could be good for them. Three of them enjoy the plasma ball as do my two (and I) so there is that bridge to chemistry that we can take if we want to take that. I love that we cook, so it’s a chance to be counting with the younger kids and measuring with the older ones, it’s a way to feel more comfortable and let the low tech and high tech integrate.
My week is ending, I know I have been stress spending a bit, no one is perfect.
Something new this week: I am noticing a timer helps a lot with kids taking turns, it’s been that way for a long time, but I am noticing that it “helps a lot” not just a little, it helps the one who has to get off and the one getting on, the one waiting and the one getting a full turn, it makes it feel doable to wait for 2 and 3 year olds, it makes it feel fair, they seem to enjoy their 1 minute turns a lot, which to an adult mind isn’t a lot of time. Then sometimes they stop needing a timer after a certain amount of turns.
Something good this week: Taking three breads out of the oven, one baked by a two year old, one by my three year old and one by the five year old, I think they felt empowered, but I’m pretty sure they did it because they see their older sibling baking bread so that they know it’s something “real people do.”
Something unexpected: How happy I am with my friends and my kids, when my husband isn’t here, I want to miss him helping, but I don’t, since he doesn’t. I’m not mad, he handles working and finances, but I imagined it would be more of a split between money, child care, and educating the kids together, and it isn’t, it’s like a Ying Yang where he contributes nearly all the money and none of the emotional support or educational motivation or instruction and I contribute almost no money and almost all the emotional support and educational motivation and instruction.
I thought we were modern people in a modern world, but if we are, then we are modern people still stuck in traditional roles, while in a modern world with many traditional mechanisms still operating.
Born to Be Alive 