And they're back...back to school that is.

First day of 5th grade for Ian and first day of 2nd grade for Samantha.  I have such wonderfully high expectations for a SPECTACULAR year!! 

Sam's class looped this year; meaning she has the same teacher and kids in her class as last year.  This is a good thing....a very good thing.  Sam loves her teacher and her teacher loves her.  And Sam has adjusted to the kids who are in her class.  There are 2 or 3 girls she is friendly with and will acknowledge their presence outside of school.  That is about the best we can wish for.  Given that there will be no adjustment period to a new teacher or different kids, Sam is off and running!  She is willingly going to school.  Yay!

Meanwhile, Ian had a disappointing experience last year and really didn't care for either his homeroom or math teacher.  It was hard listening to him at dinner tell us how miserable he was each day.  Steps were taken to try to help Ian, but at the end of the day, we just needed the school year to end.  I met with the principal to make sure this coming year would be better for Ian.  The kid used to love school and it was hard seeing that feeling diminish because of the teacher.  

This year is such a different story!  I am thrilled that Ian got assigned this particular teacher (Mrs. S.) this year.  It is going to be a perfect fit and just what Ian needs.  Furthermore, this teacher will be doing math too for Ian's level.  From what I've observed, she has a great way with the kids and understands their vast amounts of energy.  She doesn't expect them to stay seated, keeps the students moving and is very engaging.  On the afternoon of day 2, the teacher called to let me know Ian was doing well and how much she has enjoyed his sense of humor.   I haven't gotten a call like this since Kindergarten.  :) 

I always follow the kids into their classroom and take a picture.  Both kids hate that I do this.  I will never stop doing it!

Getting a hug from the teacher on the way in to her class.

With school starting, our schedule is back in full swing.  When you throw in my 3 part-time jobs I do during the school day, this makes for a lot of running from point A to point B to point C to point D. 

Each weekday at 5:30am, I am either meeting my friend Tami for a 4 mile walk or going to a boot camp class from 5:30am to 6:30am 3 times a week.  I am determined to be a healthier me this year!  It makes for a full day, but "me time" needs to happen when the majority of the family is still sleeping. 

School is from 9:10am to 4:00pm. 

Monday:  ----
Tuesday:  religious school for both kids (4:40pm to 6:30pm)
Wednesday:  therapy for Sam at 5:00pm
Thursday:  gymnastics for Sam at 5:00pm
Friday:  ---
Saturday:  flag football (practice and game) for Ian
Sunday:  religious school for both kids (9:00am to 12:00pm)

We continued with our back-to-school tradition and went for ice cream after dinner on the first day of school.  It sort of makes going back to school a little sweeter when you know you get ice cream at the end of the day.  Sort of. 

Three cheers for a GREAT year!!

Ch..ch..ch..ch..changes

Ah, the start of a new school year....is there any better time for wanting to get organized, instill new practices that are healthier, get into a good routine, and make a fresh start?  Other than New Year's day, I don't think so.  It's like getting a blank slate and resolving to do things better, make it easier/smarter/more efficient. 

I've been thinking (now you know you are in trouble if you live in this house!) about what I'd like to change with the coming year.  I've come up with a short, but powerful list.  I presented it to the family and so far, everyone is on board.  If even 1/2 of these brilliant ideas of mine continue through the first month, I will be a happy camper....a very happy camper.

1. I am no longer making dinner on Saturday nights.  For over 10 years now, I've planned dinners for every night of the week.  95% of the time, the dinners go as planned.  Every now and then, we will have a spontaneous night out or bring food in, but for the most part, it's all me putting dinner on the table each night.  I'm not complaining, but I am tired and burned out.  So from this point forward, I am no longer worrying about feeding my family dinner on Saturdays. I think I will enjoy the other 6 nights of cooking a lot more if I know I have a break one night a week.    When I told this Jeff and the kids, instantly Jeff and Ian said they wanted to take on Saturday nights.  I happily said, "go for it."   Whether they cook, bring in take-out, or plan for us to go out to eat, I don't care.  It will be so nice that there is one day every week that I don't worry about what we will be eating.


2. Sam gets dressed on her own.  Completely on her own.  She is 7 years old.  It is beyond time that she picks out what she wants to wear without a huge battle from me.  No more whining "I have nothing to weeeeeeaaaaaaaarrrrrrrr" or screaming "I DON'T WANT TO WEAR THAT!"  or "I DON'T KNOW WHAT MATCHES" allowed anymore.  No more begging me to put 4 different outfits on her bed to choose from, only to whine she doesn't want to wear any of them.  When the mood strikes her, Sam has shown she can get dressed on her own.  She has a great sense of style and knows exactly what goes with what.  She manages to get dressed all on her own on the weekends.  But for some reason, she enjoys pushing my buttons and putting a big wrench in our mornings before school throwing a fit.  I am done with this nonsense.  Sam has more clothes than the whole rest of the family put together.  I recently went through her closet (with her!) and pulled out everything that might be questionable on what fits and organized her closet by skirts, dresses, sweaters, long sleeve tops, and short sleeve tops.  We went through her drawers and organized them by capri leggings, full-length leggings, shorts, biker shorts, pants, and jeans.  There are easily 30 different outfits she could wear for any season/type of weather.  As of my writing this blog, she is in agreement with everything in her wardrobe.  It's all been picked out by her personally in the stores and given the green light that she will wear it at some point.  Although historically this doesn't matter if she will actually wear it, but it's a start.  I told her I would help if she needed it with a zipper, button, whatever, but I will not help with picking out an outfit.*

*For those who think we should pick the outfit out the night before; we've done that many, many, times.  However, she will still wake up in the morning and change her mind and throw a fit.  Ugh.


3. Sam makes her own lunches for school.  Again, I think the more I tell Sam has to do for herself, the more control she will feel like she has.  Sam likes to be in control.  I told her I will help her with cutting, cooking, etc, but she has to take the initiative on getting her lunch made and assembled.  Ian has been making his own lunches for 2 years now and it is a pleasure in the morning to know he is responsible and making healthy choices on his own.  And if she drops the ball on this (because she is spending too much time figuring out what to wear :), then she will have to buy her lunch from the school cafeteria. 


4. Help with cleaning the house.  We will see how this goes, but here's the idea:  I came up with a list of 28 different tasks to do around the house.  Everything from clean a bathroom, vacuum the bedrooms, clean the glass door, unload the dishwasher, clean the inside of the microwave to fold a load of laundry and put away, etc.  It's broken down into manageable chunks with no chore being that time consuming or too big to do.  I created an excel sheet with 4 columns next to it.  Each column belongs to one of us; Jeff, Robyn, Ian and Samantha.  Every week one of us has to pick an item and do it.   When you've done it, you put the date next to the item, under your name.  Once all the items have been done, I will provide a new excel chart to begin these tasks again.  In less than a month's time, all the chores should be completed and the house will be clean.  The best part is, the kids are learning some very important life skills.  They get a say in what they want to do in terms of helping (it can change each week/month for them too), and I get some much needed assistance with the upkeep of the house.

Yep, this is what I sprung on the family.  No one had a bad word to say and agreed to give it a go.  I have high expectations that all 4 things listed above will go splendidly.  How awesome would this be if it does?

Changes are brewing.

There were two things I could always count on;  General Hospital coming on at 3:00pm each weekday and eating dinner together as a family. 

Within the same week, both constants in my life took a left turn, when it should've gone right.

I've been watching General Hospital since I was 5 years old.  For the past 36 years that I've been tuning in, you could set your watch to it starting at 3:00pm on ABC.  Over the summer, commercials started announcing that as of September 10th, it was moving to 2:00pm. I guess I should consider myself lucky that they are keeping the show on and not giving it the same fate as "All My Children" and "One Life to Live".  When something like a 3:00pm start time has been happening for as long as this show has, it really throws you off to shift everything up to an earlier start time.  Not that I plan my day around watching General Hospital, but I knew exactly at what point I'd have to leave the house and pick up Ian from school. No more.

Unless Jeff gets caught in a late meeting or I have a girl's night out, our family can be found at the kitchen table having dinner each and every night. It was the rule, not the exception.  I find eating dinner together as a family one of the most important things we do with raising kids.  It gives us a chance to talk, recap our day, go around the table and give the best highlights.  We are able to put down all the electronics and enjoy each other's company.  Take some time and unwind.  Not to mention, this is the best opportunity to get a well-rounded, healthy meal into the kids and have them try new foods.

I plan our meals for the week on Sunday and go grocery shopping accordingly to be ready to make dinner each day.  As each day flew by last week, I realized even if I made the meal, we wouldn't be around to eat it.  I thought for sure, I'd be able to get our act together for Tuesday.  Nope.  Then Wednesday.  Nope.  Three nights of dinner planning that will get moved to this week.

With our new Fall schedule, Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays can find us in the car during the dinner hour shuffling back and forth between activities.  As soon as I pick Ian up from school, he goes directly to his next stop.  There is no passing "go", no collecting $200, and no time to gather the family and eat together at the table.  It is a bit of a mess.  The only bright side in all this is that I don't have to cook dinner.  By the time we are all in one place again, at the house, it is too late to begin serving dinner.  In order for Ian's energy level and focus to remain elevated, I've been bringing him a substantial snack to eat in the car, when I come to get him at the end of the school day.  I've been rotating between pizza bagels, chicken & cheese quesadillas, or a burrito filled with bean, rice and cheese.  It's a nice, tasty, hot mini-meal that he can eat on the go and be ready for religious school or gymnastics.  Because Sam likes to do exactly what her brother is, all of a sudden, Sam is hungry too and needs the same exact thing, at the same exact time.

When the activities are over, it is time to wind down with our bedtime routine.  The kids usually need another snack at this point, not a full blown dinner. 

I never thought we'd get to this point where we weren't home for dinner.  But then again, I never thought they'd move General Hospital to 2:00pm either.  Each occurring on its own was a lot for me to wrap my mind around...both in the same week, I feel like we are entering the twilight zone where anything goes.

Throw me a snorkel, please.

As some of you may have noticed, my blog had been on hiatus this past week - for a WHOLE week!  I think this is the first unintentional break I've ever taken.  From the get-go, I got into a groove and wrote consistently every other day for more than 2 years now.   My blog has become a way for me to unwind and document the day-to-day life has in store for us.  It's nice to know my blog gets read by others, but more than anything I love this diary that has formed. From time to time, I go back and reread past blogs and what life was like with the kids at those ages.  Right now, this blog is more for me, than anyone else.  Still it was nice when a few family members called and were very concerned that the blog hadn't been updated and wanted to know what happened.  As my dad said, "We were worried you went bonkers."  Nice, huh?

I am not sure what is going on, but I feel like I am on the verge of drowning.  There are way too many balls in the air. I've done (mostly) a great job up until now keeping them from falling, but I am not sure for how much longer.  I really thought that with Sam and Ian back at school, I'd have loads of time to get things done; leisurely at that.  However, this couldn't be further from the truth.  The 3 to 4 hours I have (up to 4 days a week, unless a Jewish holiday gets in my way and closes Sam's preschool) is being spent with me running around like a chicken with their head cut-off.

Now that I have the power to schedule things and go without kids in tow, I made this month full of drs appointments, dentist, getting blood drawn, and running various errands. I've also signed up to volunteer at Ian's school on Friday mornings helping out at the library.  It seems like my to-do list just gets bigger each day when one place I go causes another visit for follow-up later that week.  Oy!

I'm guessing I was delusional earlier in the month when I dreamily planned to go room by room and really organize and declutter.  Oh yeah, and this was after starting my kid-free time at the gym each morning.  Ha!  In the last 3 weeks, I've only gotten to the gym once during the daylight hours - I mostly try to squeeze it in before Jeff leaves for work in the morning. 

It's a good thing the kids are safely at school and not a victim to my insane to-do list.  But once you throw in our ridiculously over-scheduled weekends on top of an already busy week, its making for a very cranky Robyn. 

Jeff likes to joke when about a year and a half ago I went through this phase of feeling like we had too much going on, I just went out and bought a bigger calendar to have more room to schedule things.  Ha!  I don't think they make a bigger calendar than what I found and is currently hanging in our kitchen.  It had to be moved from the refrigerator to a nearby wall because it wasn't staying put with the weight of the pages.  :)

Here me now - I am going to do less.  I am going accomplish less.  I am going to schedule less.  I am going to be okay with that.  I won't need to borrow a snorkel long, just need it until the kids are in college.

Welcome to Fall

With the start of a new school year, we begin all our extra-curricular activities again.  Here's a peek at our current schedule:

IAN:

School

• Mondays from 9:05am to 1:15pm
• Tuesdays thru Friday, 9:05am to 3:45pm

Soccer - practice on Mondays from 5:30pm to 6:30pm
Soccer - games on Saturdays - time varies

Religious school - Sundays from 9:00am to 11:15am


SAM:

School

• Mondays from 9:30am to 12:30pm
• Wednesdays, Thursdays, Fridays, from 9:30am to 1:30pm

Gym Jam class - Tuesdays at 10:00am

Dance class - Wednesdays from 4:30pm to 5:00pm

Soccer - Saturdays at 10:00am


I have to say I LOVE our schedule.  The kids have enough to keep them busy and with full day school for Ian, the running around I have during the week isn't bad at all.  I definitely don't feel like I am a chicken with their head cut-off not sure of where I need to be next or in panic mode that I am going to forget to pick-up a kid.    I feel like we've got a great groove going on.  Each of the activities have a few of Ian and Sam's friends joining them.  This is the first year that I don't have to actively particpate as a parent and I can enjoy hanging out and watching the kids enjoy themselves.  And with the weather finally getting cooler, I can say I am enjoying too being outside.  Life is good.