Category Archives: Creativity

The Simple Woman’s Daybook: June 4, 2012

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Simple Woman's Daybook

FOR TODAY June 4, 2012

Outside my window… dark. We had rain today. It was positively glorious even if I was walking to and from preschool in my pretty clothes to pick Daniel up in the midst of it.

I am thinking… that the rain and cold temps should have stayed longer. I enjoyed my afternoon in fleece pj bottoms and Daniel was extra cute in his lion jammies.

I am thankful… that the funeral at church went well and that the family catered the main food portions — we had at least 200 attending with probably 100+ of those coming back for lunch. The church ladies also came through excellently with dessert.

In the kitchen… funeral food! I baked butterscotch bars yesterday too.

I am wearing… blue old navy shirt and black running shorts.

I am creating… various things associated with Brett’s Blogathon.

I am going… to have to get swim diapers and a swimsuit for Daniel at some point tomorrow. Target ho!

I am wondering… if I will ever catch up on sleep.

I am reading… just finished A Trick of the Light by Louise Penny and Honeymoon with Murder by Carolyn G. Hart. I am going to start on the next oldest one I have as well as ask for the older ones from the library.

I am hoping… I get through all my plans tomorrow.

I am looking forward to… Ladies’ Night Out on Wednesday.

Around the house… a Cheerios tornado to be vacuumed up.

I am pondering… too many things to list.

One of my favorite things… chocolate frosting. I managed to snag some really good cake with a thick layer of frosting.

A few plans for the rest of the week: end-of-year program for Daniel tomorrow morning, last day of school and Ladies’ Night Out on Wednesday, probably story time at the library on Thursday, and a massage on Friday.

Hosted by The Simple Woman’s Daybook

7 Quick Takes: Cute Little Boys, Fundraising Pleas, and Human Rights Petitions

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7 Quick Takes

Spring has come to Sacramento which means the air conditioner is turned on again. Whee!

— 1 —

Is there anything better than eating Cheerios and watching Winnie the Pooh with a cute little boy on your lap? I think not!

Just hanging out.

(The little boy fell asleep shortly after this picture was taken. He loves to nap on someone’s lap.)

— 2 —

Daniel is fully adjusted to preschool. We had an hour of tears on Monday, maybe a minute of them on Tuesday, and smooth-sailing the last two days. He likes his teacher and aides and they are positively smitten with him. I’m so thankful that the local public school campus where they house the state preschool classes is only a block away and that the teacher for the autism class does it because she loves the kids. Next Friday, he gets to go to the local zoo with his class and I’m excited for him to experience his first field trip.

— 3 —

There are no words to adequately express my horror and disgust at this. In a nutshell, the dictator of Uzbekistan has ordered the forced hysterectomy of women without their knowledge or consent. Please join with me in signing the petition to Secretary of State Clinton to cut off U.S. funding from this monster.

— 4 —

My mom sent me an interesting article about an autism study conducted by the University of Washington. Apparently, there are differences in white brain matter present in kids with autism. This actually isn’t a surprise because we know that Daniel’s MRI last year showed some white matter abnormalities. I’m not taking this as a “surefire” sign that predicted Daniel’s autism but it is an interesting idea.

— 5 —

Anyone else excited for the crossover between Hawaii Five-0 and NCIS: Los Angeles? I’d prefer one with just the NCIS shows but I’ll take this one. I’m probably not going to be able to watch Hawaii Five-0 on Monday night as it conflicts with Hart of Dixie so I’ll just catch it online while Daniel is at preschool that Tuesday.

— 6 —

I have a blog set up for Brett. I would blog for him here but I have to use my last name to do that and I keep that off this site because it’s incredibly searchable. I also wanted a site where I could add his adoptive parents as bloggers if they so chose. Peacefulwaters.Org is the domain I use for various projects so it fit that I move a blog over there. I’m having a really bad time with the WordPress on it and I think I’ve re-installed it three or four times. Argh.

— 7 —

I have two weeks until the Promise Walk for Preeclampsia.

Support me in the Promise Walk for Preeclampsia

For more Quick Takes, visit Jen at ConversionDiary.Com.

How to Get Ready for Preschool

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Daniel starts preschool tomorrow (OK… technically today because it’s 1:30 a.m.) and at 12:50 a.m., it occurred to me that I should probably get some things ready so that I’m not in a huge rush tomorrow. So… here’s my process for getting Daniel ready for preschool:

12:50 – Decide that you should probably prep some things ahead of time. Remove the comforter and peel yourself out of the recliner. Walk across the living room that is covered with Cheerios. (I didn’t get a chance to vacuum today. Stop judging me!) Step over the baby gate into the kitchen and switch on the light. Catch a picture of yourself in the microwave and realize that your eyes are mostly closed. Realize that you are also hungry so get Lean Cuisine meal out of the fridge.

12:55 – Wash out sippy cup using zip ties to poke the congealed formula out of the crevices. Make sure that sucker is CLEAN. Dry sippy cup and latex plug for it. Fill with properly-sourced apple juice from Trader Joe’s. Take a swig of juice while you’re at it.

12:57 – Remove a tortilla and pub cheese (think spreadable cheese that is two steps up from Velveeta) from the fridge. Use butter knife to spread cheese over tortilla. Roll as tightly as possible and cut into thin slices. Eat reject slices and put majority of roll-up in snack bag. Take a handful of Cheerios and put in another snack bag. Ponder investing in another kind of Cheerios for variety’s sake. Obsess about the fact that your kid probably will not sit down for any period of time to eat. Freak out about this. Remind yourself that these teachers are used to this and getting paid for it.

1:02 – Realize that you have not microwaved your midnight snack (which is actually dinner). Remove meal from box and stick in microwave for some ungodly amount of time. Remember that you need to supply diapers and wipes.

1:10 – Find alternate clothes that are not too holey (thank you broken dryer!) and label with initials. Label lunchbox, diapers, and wipes with name.

1:15 – Finally get dinner out of the microwave. Be thankful that it has cooled sufficiently so that it can rest on laptop while eating. Climb back over baby gate and settle in recliner. Remind the pair of glowing eyes nuzzling your left hand that rescue panthers don’t eat Lean Cuisine meals.

1:20 – Take plastic dish back to kitchen and toss it. Feel pangs of guilt for not recycling it. Decide that it’s too late to really care about the environment and that we’re all screwed anyway. Settle back into recliner. See a figure moving toward you. Point your laptop toward it and discover that it is the sissy tabby. Watch Mr. Tabbykins shrink away to cower on the couch. Feel guilty that the big orange lump is spooked.

1:24 – Type this entry with your eyes closed. Proofread later.

He has already seen his classroom and met his teacher today while I was trying to drop off paperwork at the school. I’m glad he got to meet his teacher — it might make things easier tomorrow. She is made of awesomeness and wasn’t fazed at all by Daniel running around and opening/closing things. She also has promised to call several times a day with updates on him during this week. I am blessed.

Some Poetry for Today (I)

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I’m dealing with exhaustion and blurred vision due to my eyes being dilated today for an opthalmology consult so I’m just going to give you the poem that I’m reading for my devotion next week at Ladies’ Night Out. It’s a 19th century work by Sidney Lanier, a former Confederate soldier and fellow at Johns Hopkins University specializing in English lit.

I chose this one because I sang a setting of it during Lent 14 years ago. I found the arrangement but no audio file. Sorry!

Into the woods my Master went,
Clean forspent, forspent.
Into the woods my Master came,
Forspent with love and shame.
But the olives they were not blind to Him,
The little gray leaves were kind to Him:
The thorn-tree had a mind to Him
When into the woods He came.

Out of the woods my Master went,
And He was well content.
Out of the woods my Master came,
Content with death and shame.
When Death and Shame would woo Him last,
From under the trees they drew Him last:
‘Twas on a tree they slew Him — last
When out of the woods He came.

(HT: Poem Hunter)

Anniversary Posting: “As the Bridegroom to His Chosen”

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Today is my 10th wedding anniversary and unfortunately, I didn’t put any post seeds together on Wednesday night so I’m having to come up with something at 2 a.m. Go me.

I got a CD of Rutter pieces from my mom for Christmas a few years ago and this one is probably my favorite. It is called “As the Bridegroom to His Chosen” and is based on poem written by the 14th Century German Dominican, Johannes Tauler (1300-1361).

The lyrics:

As the bridegroom to his chosen, as the king unto his realm,
As the keeper to the castle, as the pilot to the helm.
As the captain to his soldiers, as the shepherd to his lambs,
So, Lord, art thou to me.

As the fountain in the garden, as the candle in the dark,
As the treasure in the coffer, as the manna in the ark,
As the firelight in the winter, as the sunlight in the spring
So Lord art thou to me.

As the music at the banquet, as the stamp unto the seal,
As refreshment to the fainting, as the winecup at the meal,
As the singing on the feast day, as the amen to the prayer,
So Lord art thou to me.

As the ruby in the setting, as the honey in the comb
As the light within the lantern, as the father in the home,
As the eagle in the mountains, as the sparrow in the nest,
So Lord art thou to me.

As the sunshine in the heavens, as the image in the glass,
As the fruit unto the fig tree, as the dew unto the grass,
As the rainbow on the hilltop, as the river in the plain,
So Lord art thou to me.

The first three verses are Tauler and I believe Rutter wrote the 4th verse? (I’m trying to recall from the album notes which are at home and I’m in the guest room at my parents’ house.)

It’s sung on this YouTube video by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and they do it complete and absolute justice.

7 Quick Takes — Updating Since Thanksgiving

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7 Quick Takes

Daniel is out of the hospital and we’re finally back home. (Only a 4 day hospital stay instead of 19. Yay!) Time for updates on the rest of my life!

— 1 —

I had to give up on “winning” NaNoWriMo. I had worked a little ahead to compensate for being gone for a couple days at Thanksgiving but Daniel in the hospital and the sheer sleep deprivation of all of it completely shot my chances of finishing and validating by November 30th. I probably could have squeezed it in but I had a really fussy and angry toddler during the hospital stay and I would have had to do two 5000 word days when I got home. Both options were unreasonable so I’m settling for just making it to 40K again. Nothing I wrote is wasted though — I have a setting and characters for a murder mystery next year.

— 2 —

Kathleen of So Much to Say, So Little Time… had her baby. Go congratulate her. Do it now.

— 3 —

I have a massage tomorrow. Due to timing issues last month, it worked out that I only ended up getting one massage. I will hopefully have a chance to see my massage therapist more this month. It’s keeping the fibro at bay until I can get in to see a rheumatologist and it’s benefiting a small business owner in town — a win-win situation.

— 4 —

I am enjoying “Judge Judy” waaaaaay too much. I did feel sorry for a plaintiff today who thought she had a legal contract and whose cousin/aunt took advantage for her but the vast majority of people really need a good dose of reality. I could totally do a quick takes post on lessons that one can learn from watching her show, the most popular one being not to co-sign for a loan for someone unless you are married to that person. Almost every other case is someone who co-signed for a car loan with their boyfriend/for their spoiled adult child/for a sibling…

— 5 —

Daniel has taken to coming over and taking my hand to lead me wherever he wants me to go. Usually, it involves going into a forbidden room at which point I have to fake an inability to open that particular door. In one case, he led me to my parents’ room on Monday and he started flipping out by the bed under which their sissy Maine Coon was hiding. I didn’t realize it was possible to fluff a Maine Coon (especially this one) but it can happen. Sorry Bubba Cat! (I scritched his ears and his shoulder blades before I let him out and apologized to him.)

— 6 —

My local CVS has Cadbury Dairy Milk bars. It’s hard to find these outside of the Commonwealth so I took FULL advantage of the “buy 2 get one free” deals on them. I’m having to force myself to limit it to one (or part of one) per day though.

— 7 —

Here’s another plug for Postcrossing. I seriously recommend it for teaching your homeschooled kids geography or starting a postcard collection for your child. (I’ve got one started for Daniel.) I got a postcard almost every day this week from Belarus, Singapore, Finland, and Australia. Part of the reason for being at CVS was to get postcards to send out.

For more Quick Takes, visit Jen at ConversionDiary.Com.