Really, really, really.

I'm working this weekend. I really need to send in some more applications and try harder to get another job, but I really don't want to just jump out of the frying pan into the fire (again!), so I need to be careful what I choose. I'd really like to get out of the field of transcription and into writing, but I'm not sure how to do that. Really, I'd kind of like to see what's like to be unemployed. I went from school to work with not a break, other than when my oldest was a year old and I stayed home a while. During that time, I wrote a book, took a course in medical transcription and ended up babysitting for a friend's baby so I wasn't exactly idle ... my book was not published and was not really any good, but it was something I wanted to do so I did it. I'd like to be able to write novels, but I don't really think I have the gift. I do think of book ideas all the time. Maybe if I had a ghost writer. Or maybe I just need more self-discipline to sit down and write every day.

I've thoroughly enjoyed the Thanksgiving holiday weekend, even if I did have to work, except I did not enjoy my stuffing today. I didn't do a good job making it. I really need to work on adapting the recipe or something. Other than that, it's been really nice. Tomorrow I get to go with the homeschool mom's group for our Christmas party. It seems a little early since it's still technically November, but I'm really hoping it will help get me more in the Christmas mood. I did write a Christmas list (for me, it has to be handwritten, not computerized) and just put the names on there, but no gift ideas because I don't have any. I'm sure I'll get inspired soon. Really.

* After I wrote this post, I looked back at it and realized how many times I'd used the word "really" and changed the name of the title from something about working on the weekend to this one. I think it fits, don't you? I REALLY need to work on my vocabulary!!!!

Part of Thanksgiving Postponed.

We had a great T-giving dinner yesterday, good company, cute babies, great food.  Today we were going to have another one, but my brother has got some type of upper respiratory infection so we figured that he'd better stay home for a couple of days and get better.  We postponed it to Sunday.  So today, the kids and I (poor DH has to work) have been playing the Sims, eating leftovers, watching Christmas movies and generally having a pretty good time.  I'm working tonight but the kids are still holidaying.  I would be if I could.  I got another shipment from Freshwater Fred, a bunch of things that looked interesting to me.  I haven't gotten time to look at them yet, been too busy goofing off.  (I also went and played a game of UpWords with my parents.)   I haven't done any Black Friday shopping.  I simply cannot wrap my head around the fact that Christmas is so close!  Even though we've drawn names, even though the Christmas tree is up!  Still.  Can't. 

I've so gotta work on that, get myself in gear, and do some shopping.  I have gone over to look at CurrClick's Holiday sale and giveaway.  (Look for the link in the margin, I'm too lazy to make one!) 

I may also look at a couple of clothing stores online to see if there are any good bargains.  I desparately need some clothes!

Happy Thanksgiving!

In the midst of the festivities today, take a minute (or more) to count your blessings!

Thanksgiving Eve 2009

That's what we call it around here.  Thanksgiving eve.  I'm going to do a little bit of cooking today, make myself a gluten free sweet potato pie and also some stuffing without gluten.  I'm trying to make it to the 4 week mark on this diet and see if I feel better, but I do really think it's working.  I've been taking fewer naps and hurting less.  There are some things I'd really like to eat, like the broccoli soup that I made sure we were out of before I started this and then my husband re-stocked because he likes it too, so it's in there, calling to me and so far, I'm resisting, though it is not easy.  I haven't found a recipe that comes even close to Kroger brand cream of broccoli soup, but I have tried.  Maybe someday.

The son with the sprained ankle hasn't awakened yet.  I suspect the good pain meds he's on have something to do with that.  Hopefully it is way better today because the boy is not good with crutches.  At all. 

I don't think we'll do any school today.  We've discussed it.  The county schools are out today and since we've got one kid down with the sprained ankle, so we may skip it.  Or I may do a bunch of Thanksgiving-y activities with the younger two and call that a day.  I haven't decided yet.   Don't you love the way I plan things in advance? 

It's always somethin.

At 4H today my oldest tripped and sprained his ankle.  We had to go to the immediate care center to find out that it's a sprain, not a break.  We were at the clinic for a couple of hours then at the Kroger pharmacy for an hour and finally, we got home.  I've been working since we got here and keep getting the worst of the worst dictators.  I'm getting kind of tired of today.  My youngest summed it up on the way home "This has turned out not to be so great of a day."  Yeah, I hear that.  Not really that bad in the whole scheme of things, but just long, tiring and kind of annoying. 

4H and then other things.

We've got 4H today and the assignment the kids were supposed to have done since last month was filling out a paper about the birds at our feeder and taking a picture of one. Guess what they're doing right now? In their defense, they did try the day after the last 4H class, then forgot about it until now. We've only really had 3 kinds of birds at our feeder, tufted titmice, cardinals and some kind of chickadee ( the kids could tell you). The cats think that this feeder is facinating. They'll sit under it and watch the show but so far, haven't jumped or harmed any of the birds as far as we know. This is a tufted titmouse in the photo. The second photo is our calico cat, Zoey.

So I'm doing a few different things this morning, blogging, bird watching, fixing lunch, trying to help my husband with fixing my foot pedal, cleaning and getting ready for the 4H class. I'm on day 5 of my menstrual headache so that's fun.

I guess a post titled M-O-N -D- A-Y

would be too soon after the F-R-I-D-A-Y one? Okay, here's what's going on today without making an acronym poem. I'm trying to think a little about Christmas and trying to think a bit about possibly earning more money to pay for Christmas. Last night my footpedal would not work properly and I have no idea why, so I was going to see if I could get my in-house tech support to take a look at it. I really don't want to have to buy a new footpedal. I feel like nothing, not. one. single. thing., has gone right since I went back to this job. It has been a constant struggle to barely get by and I have been desparately trying to keep my head above water. Not fun. The writing job I applied for hired someone else, so I'll keep looking.

I've got to teach 4H tomorrow so today is the day I'll pull the lessons out and take a look at them, just to get a little bit prepared. I think tomorrow's going to be a fun lesson, as we'll be talking about flight and making gliders. We should probably do school here at home too. We've been doing the bare minimum for a while and we need to get back to the regular, full routine.

That's it. Can you believe this is Thanksgiving week?

Fun and yummy.

I know that this has been going around the internet for a while and maybe everyone's heard of it but me, but tonight we made the 3 minute chocolate cake in a coffee mug. It was so much fun. I made mine gluten free and from what my daughter says, mine wasn't as good as theirs, but it was still very good. Here's the recipe and some pictures.

Original 3-Minute Chocolate Cake )
4 tbsp flour

4 tbsp granulated sugar

2 tbsp cocoa

1 large egg

3 tbsp milk

3 tbsp oil

In a coffee mug, mix flour, sugar, and cocoa. Add egg, milk, and oil. Mix well.
Microwave on high for 3 minutes. Let sit in the microwave for 3 more minutes more as the cake will still be rising and baking. Then take it out and dig in. You can also add chocolate chips. We added icing.

All you have to do to make it gluten free is use a gluten free flour. I used the rice flour and corn starch mix that is featured on http://www.glutenfreeeasily.com

Movie Review.

We went on a field trip with the homeschool group to see Disney's A Christmas Carol starring Jim Carey. It was not well thought out. I should have known my children better and did more research. We don't have television anymore because of the whole digital TV thing and so I hadn't seen a preview, and I just didn't think when this movie was mentioned. I should have realized that it would be too scary/intense for my younger 2 kids or at least wondered if it was and checked it out. But I didn't. We just went. About 5 minutes in, I'm starting to get a vibe that this might not have been a good idea. It seems dark and forboding, not funny as I would have expected from a Disney/Jim Carey movie. Anyway, it was too scary for some and my youngest son got up and walked out. We spent some time in the theater lobby sitting on a bench. (While I'm thinking how much money I spent, having paid extra for the 3-D effects which gave me a headache which I still have 10 hours later.) We finally came back in and watched the happy ending. Later on, we were talking about something else and I said something I wish I hadn't done and my daughter said "I wish we hadn't seen that movie." My older son did like it and really enjoyed the 3-D effects. I just wish I'd read a review like this one.

This is totally my fault. I hope my youngest can sleep tonight.

Sigh.

Book Review.

I think it's probably no secret that I dislike my job lately and have been looking for something else. I picked up this book http://www.amazon.com/Will-Work-Home-Cash-Without-Commute/dp/0425222853. It's called Will Work From Home by Tory Johnson and Robyn Freedman Spizman. It's an excellent general resource for working at home. It has a lot of good ideas. It does not tell you completely how to go about getting started in each one, but it will give you a starting place. It mentions medical transcription and gives a couple of web sites to go to. I personally would recommend http://www.mtdaily.com/ and http://www.mtstars.com/ and http://www.mtjobs.com/ in addition to the ones listed in this book. This book lists every kind of home job from babysitting to housesitting, photography and virtual assistants and gives a ton of web site links to get you started. I would recommend that you read it if you need to make an income but also need to stay home.

F-R-I-D-A-Y

Feels like November.  The weather is finally getting cold.  I've been leaving sweaters here and there and everywhere, thinking I'll need them because after all, it's November, then getting warm and taking them off and leaving them there. 

Really annoyed at my job right now.   I got a report last night, back from the quality assurance editor, that had some really odd things on it.  I emailed it back with questions and I'm waiting for a response.  Meanwhile, I'm thinking of where can I apply for a new job ...

Internet connection=Bad.  I've been having trouble getting pages to load.   Everything takes so long because we are the only people in the country still on dial-up.  (Okay, maybe not, but it seems that way.).  This seriously limits the jobs I can apply for as an MT.  Seriously, like down to about 10% of the available jobs. 

Debating whether or not to do my school list.  I mean we've got a field trip this afternoon, so is that an excuse not to have to do it? 

A All of my passwords are having to be replaced this week.  My husband has done some kind of update to my browser and I am having to try and remember every password I've ever used for everything and it's not going all that well.  Maybe I should just use the same one all the time? 

Yikes!  I don't feel ready for the holidays.  I haven't even THOUGHT about shopping yet!  They're coming and there's no way I can get an extra week, but wow, I'm so not ready.

What we are up to around here.

It's Thursday.  I don't have to work today but as usual, I'll probably do a little to help my line counts.  They've been kind of dismal this week because I've had some really difficult work.  Also, I'm going to write some articles for Helium because I'm trying to get an on-line writing job and I'll need some articles here and there for people to look at.  For school, we've been on a break from reading The Story of Science and today we're going to start back.  In the meantime, we've been watching DVDs and video tapes from the Freshwater Fred Lending Library.   We watched a facinating one on the brain yesterday.  it showed a woman who was very organized, a neurologist, who had a stroke and then had to use her right brain more because her left brain was damaged.  She was less organized but more creative.  I think maybe there is more than one right brainer living in this house.   

Our lives have been going on in kind of an uneventful way which is kind of nice.   I like it.  We've got skating tonight and tomorrow we've got a field trip with the homeschool group to a movie.  We're going to see A Christmas Carol.  I hope it's good.  The last movie I saw in the theater was G-Force and I was not impressed.  

A chance to do some good in the world.

I saw this link on the Starfish blog and thought I'd pass the new along.  For every comment they get on the blog, this family is going to donate a dollar to the Starfish children's homes in China.  Chinese Starfish - Made a difference to THIS one.  Here's the blog in case you  want to go directly to it Lots O Kidz

Here's a web site where you donate rice to hungry people just by answering trivia questions.
Free Rice

And here's a link to The Hunger Site to donate free food, the amount varies each day.  The food is donated by sponsors of the site. 

You know how I love these!

It's a blank day on the calendar, a blank day on the calendar, oh yeah.  I almost want to burst into song.   I'm doing my morning list this morning and finally getting to pay attention to the housework that I've been neglecting all weekend.  Friday I went shopping, then work, then Saturday work, then Harvest Party, then Sunday, work, work, work and yesterday, I finally got the grocery shopping done and got reaquainted with my parents whom I hadn't seen for quite a while and now, today, I get to do things I need to do.  It's not that I'm excited about cleaning the house, but I am going to be glad when it's clean.  Well, cleanish.  Cleaner anyway. 

After school is done, we may go to the library.  I really don't need to go, but I sort of want to.   I signed up to get their new book lists emailed to me and there are some interesting looking new items on there.  Plus, it's Tuesday, which is dollar scoop night at Baskin Robbins ...

Can you all believe how quickly the holidays are coming?  Yesterday when I was at the grocery store, they were playing Jingle Bells on the Musak.  I'm not ready.  I really have no idea what to get anyone and even more important, how to stretch the budget to fit it in.  My youngest started going through the Lego catalog and his total of what he wanted was 700 dollars on the THIRD page of the catalog.  I told him he better go ahead and close it now. 

Anywho, I'm off now to enjoy my unscheduled day!

I think of all kinds of good blog posts

while I'm in the grocery and in the car but then when get home, whoosh, nothing in my brain.  I think there's some kind of brain eraser device in our driveway.  Or maybe it's the van itself.  That would explain a lot.  Anyway, I'm home now and I've got nothing to write about.  We're doing school and work and the usual stuff.  Nothing too exciting and some days, that's exactly what we need.

 

Hmmm.

I can't think of a title. We've had kind of a busy weekend around here. I've been tired because of not sleeping (it's a long story) but not feeling horrible and aching all over since I went gluten free last week. I think it might be the way to go for me. I also think I'm doing pretty well with it. There is gluten in so many things that it's not easy sometimes to figure out what to eat, but plenty of yummy things are gluten free naturally so I don't feel deprived or anything - - - most of the time. Last night, we had a harvest party with the homeschool group and there were some things that were a little bit difficult to resist, but I just thought about all the muscle pain that I'm not having and that made it easier. When Thanksgiving gets here, I may have to try and make myself some gluten free gravy and stuffing. :-0

Have I mentioned lately that I love my homeschool group? This has been one of the best things about homeschooling - finding this group. It took a while but it was so worth it. A good homeschool group gives support, gets together to do classes, gets field trips at cheaper group rates, can use Boxtops for Education, and Pizza Hut Read to Succeed, but most of all, they provide friendship for the parents and the kids.

Anyway, I'm working tonight and I'd better get started!

Teacher Rejuvination Day.

Today is an official teacher rejuvination day.  I'm going shopping.  The fun kind of shopping, when you go out with the girls and just piddle around looking in the stores and talking.  Not the kind of shopping where you are looking for something not fun like groceries.  This is part of our 'Take a day of fall break whenever you need a break" plan.  I could use a break today. 

Busy and dizzy.

Those 2 words totally should not rhyme, but we have an odd language, a hodge-podge of other languages with their own spelling and pronunciation rules. My 11-year-old who is not a good speller, gets frustrated with it. Anyway, that's what I've been, a little bit busy and a lot dizzy. Last night we went to Walmart to get a couple of things and when I was putting the bags in the car, I felt dizzy and started stepping sideways. I was very, very dizzy for a couple of hours after that, even after taking one of my Dad's prescription dizzy pills (Antivert). I was still dizzy when I went to bed, but now I'm doing okay. The trouble is though, I took a pill that "may cause drowsiness" and that made me sleep until almost 10:00 a.m. There's no way I can get my list done today before noon, since I haven't started yet and I don't feel all that energetic, so maybe there's no school today? Unless I can thing of a loophole in THE RULE. I'm thinking ...

My youngest son just woke up and the first thing he said was "Hey, it's Thanksgiving eve, eve, eve, eve, eve, eve, eve, eve, eve, eve, eve, eve, eve, eve."

Well

We spent the day Sunday doing screen and clean which is just about my best inspiration ever.  We clean for an hour and then we get an hour of screentime.  I spent my screen times yesterday watching old episodes of Whose Line is It Anyway.  Laughter always helps when you are cleaning.  Our dogs have had fleas which have been driving us CRAZY and we have been spraying and powdering and fogging and washing all the stuffed animals and all the afgans and pillows, basically everything in the house.  I stacked up a pile of laundry in the bathroom yesterday that was literally 5 feet high, Mount Washmore is what Flylady calls it.  I'm not sure why, after 4 years of having Max, and having no trouble, all of the sudden we've got problems?  Maybe the damp weather we've had outside has made them get in the yard?  Anyway, now the yard has been sprayed too.  Sigh.

Good news from the weekend- I picked up a kitchen island at a yard sale for 25.00!  Cool, huh?  I'm not sure if I'll leave it the way it is, which is pine, or paint it or something to make it fit in more in the kitchen which has oak cabinets.  Anyway, my daughter and I are making pizzas today, side by side, one with gluten and one without, using the island and we feel like we're on a cooking show.  We keep laughing and we're having such a good time.  I think occasionally, that if she were at school, I'd be missing this.  We never seemed to be able to create much of that kind of fun after they got home from school because they were so tired and had so much homework.  So, I'm thankful for homeschooling today. 

I changed up the schedules a little today too.  See, I implemented THE RULE a few weeks ago, the one that says that mom has to get all her stuff done in the morning or the kids don't have to do school ... but I didn't actually mention it to the kids until today.  Today, I gave them a schedule that said "Check Mom!" so they checked me today at noon and I was done.  I'm not sure if the gluten-free is making me feel better.  I do feel like I've had less aching in my muscles so maybe.  Could be a coincidence though.  We'll see.  It's not proving too difficult now that I'm into it more so I'm going to give it some time.

Still here.

I had hoped to go on a little mini-vacation this weekend, maybe just overnight somewhere to recharge our batteries, but that didn't happen and we are still running on nearly empty around here. The kids and I are facing an unprecedented week of very little planned. This is the most blank week on my calendar since I got the calendar in July. It's weird. I'm not sure how that happened. :-) I'm going to try and get a lot of things done, some fall cleaning and winterizing. I'm hoping to feel more energetic this week as I've been doing pretty well on my gluten free diet. I've managed to be gluten free (as far as I can tell by reading labels) for 3 days. So far I feel pretty good - not fabulous or anything, but I do think my muscles are aching less. That's good.

Since I wasn't able to take a real vacation (none at all for this WHOLE year) I've read a lot this week. I was going to take a picture of the books I've read this week but my cameras are not working so here are pictures I've listed from Amazon. (If you want these books shop there!) . Anyway, here they are, the books I've read this week. Keep in mind, I don't watch TV and I read very fast. .

Yes. I do realize I have a book addiction. I need to work on that! I may have to see if the library will put me on a 3 books a week ration or something.

Thankfully,

I'm not grouchy, like I was yesterday, today. Going to the skating rink and having the night off last night helped me I suppose. Whatever. I'll take it. The only thing is, my back is doing one of those things that it does sometimes, just to remind me that I'm middle aged. I stretched yesterday afternoon and my back kind of went into a spasm and now I can't really turn my head or look down ... it's so fun and interesting.

We're doing school today I guess. We've got one more item from the Freshwater Fred lending library to look at/listen to then we'll be done with those and I'll send them back. (and get some more!!) The copywork thing is going well. He's doing really good with it. Unfortunately, he's still reversing his numbers on math. I may have to make him do another problem if he reverses numbers in the one he's on. I don't know. That may take his concentration away from the math problems and just make it overwhelming. Any ideas?

Youngest son's word of the week this week is "menacing". It's not an official thing, I've just noticed him using that word a lot this week. He told me that when he gets up and sees his list of things he has to do with no marks on it yet, it's menacing, but then later after he gets a few things done, it's not so bad.

I'm reading a lot of fiction this week. I had a lovely browse in the Young Adult section of the library the other night. There weren't any young adults around so it was free and clear. I'm reading a book now called, believe it or not, Fat Cat. So far, it's pretty good. ;-)

Awfully crabby today

I got up on the right side of the bed this morning, but in a crabby mood anyway. I'm doing my stuff this morning, working, cleaning and teaching math. I made a pot of gluten free chili and it's pretty good. I need to try and get in a better mood for the afternoon and evening activities, so I won't be whiny at the skating rink tonight.

Field trip!

We had a field trip yesterday to the Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft.  It's a very cool place in my opinion.  We did a tour and looked at some amazing quilts and other art and then the kids did a polymer clay workshop.  They seemed to have a good time.  After the workshop, we went to Target.  We don't have a Target in our hometown ( unfortunately), so we love to go in and look around.   On the way home, we were getting tired and the kids were getting sleepy.  The younger 2 were stretching in the middle seat of the van and had this conversation, which I thought was funny.

Kid 1 - You know, when you stretch, you've got to make some kind of noise.

Kid 2 - Right!  Otherwise, it's just not satisfying.

Kid 1 - You've got to at least grunt.

Kid 2 - Yeah.

Love it!

We got our materials from the Freshwater Fred Lending Library today. Excellent. All free and it includes a list, when it is due back to them and a postage paid shipping envelope to send it all back. No cost to us. How cool is that? Since I'm teaching the 4H science class on birds, we got Eyewitness videos about birds, video, computer games about birds, a complete unit study curriculum about aeronautics from NASA, which looks like it would cover a few weeks of science. I probably will add some of the experiments in it into the 4H classes, if we get time.

Wow, November 1.

It will be Thanksgiving before we know it.  I'm starting to crave turkey and stuffing and also starting to feel the urge to get started on my Christmas shopping.  If this hadn't been such a financially difficult year, I'd be looking forward to it more.  I'm really not enjoying this recession.   Also, I'm tired of working on Sundays.  Blah.  I have managed to be gluten free for the last couple of days though.  That's good. 

Except, shoot, I just ate a couple of pieces of Halloween candy my daughter shared with me, a KitKat and some Whoppers and they aren't gluten free.  Maybe tomorrow?