daily journal

Well, I did stay up far too late (finished reading the book) and therefore was tired all day but. I did wake up from the alarm and for once did my whole morning routine start to finish. Which includes two writing sessions.

I did finish the second of those before my husband showed up. Crocheted some more and finally got the first border round finished.

And then it was time to change the sheets and clean the house. Before going to the climate strike event in town. I was a little afraid that there would be only ten people standing around but it was rather full. And we met a lot of people we know. I tried taking a picture but something went wrong so I can’t show you.

We did leave a little early because we still wanted to get lunch before we had to teach again. And tried a burger place for the first time. Very yummy. This is me:

And my burger.

We went back home with half an hour to spare, I taught some students including another potential new student, watched a bit of the workshop about pacing, then the boy and I did a little strength training, I ate some cheese, watched some extraordinarily bad episodes of Star Trek (interesting double whammy, highly unusual), started writing this post, wrote in my journal and went to bed.

Now I’m very much hoping to repeat the good parts of yesterday today. So writing, exercise and moving some projects forward.

So let’s hope there will be no Saturday slump today.

Woke up at 5.30. I should have been all refreshed with the amount of sleep I was getting but didn’t. I basically spent all day in a brain fog.

My morning went well, though, I did the whole morning routine including writing a few new words. Then breakfast on time. And then I worked on the crochet blanket while my husband was having breakfast.

We talked about guitar parts. And brain fog.

Did some chores, walked to the supermarket and helped to make lunch:

I did the dishes right away and then, um, nothing. Read stuff online, watched a video about productivity, fell into an internet hole following links until it was time to get ready for teaching.

I taught two singing students, started writing this post and that was it for the day.

For most of the day I felt like crawling back into bed. My mind felt fuzzy and sluggish. I opened the novel several times and tried to write but just couldn’t brain.

Research on what to do when one has a foggy brain was of no help, by the way. The tips I found were: eat healthy, get enough sleep, exercise, drink enough water, take breaks, learn how to handle stress.

Duh.

Yes, those are good tips. For most things. The problem I’m having is that I already do all these things. I’m getting a consistent seven to eight hours of sleep, I drink large quantities of water and mint tea, I exercise more than recommended, I meditate and eat fresh, home-cooked meals. I don’t think there’s a lot to tweak there.

So. I’ll be slowing down even more and will try to remember that the beginning of the school year is always crazy and hits me pretty hard. And that I’ll feel better in a week or two when things will settle down.

But today will be rather busy again, I want to clean the house and attend the local #climatestrike-thing with my husband. The boy’s school will be ending early so that the students can attend as well. The plan is to meet up there and then go for a quick burger afterwards.

From there we’ll go back home, hopefully in time for teaching. I’ll be seeing another potential new student as well. Bonus points for the strength training I didn’t do yesterday and then it will be the weekend!

Phew.

I still haven’t completely arrived in the new school year. Lots of potential new students (which is good) and re-scheduling.

I woke up fifteen minutes before the alarm, well rested. Yay! Still did diverge from my morning routine right away which meant – no words on the novel yet again. I’m being tiresome again.

I did get up on time, made breakfast and read a little. I found out that I had confused the right and wrong sides of the crochet blanket and had managed to crochet the first parts of the border wrong side up. After my husband was finished with his breakfast I was at the exact same point as the day before including finishing the second long side, ripping it back, re-crocheting it and then ripping back the first long side. Well, more crochet time on this project.

Then we found that we didn’t have enough rice left for lunch so I went to the health food store and bought some. Did the dishes and such when I came back. And then I went running. I’m doing intervals of 7 minutes of running and 2 minutes of walking and this time I did almost all the running. It did feel doable not only because I was rather determined but also because it was much cooler and I was pretty early.

I have to say that while I was walking along that road I was passed by one tractor, one digger and four cars. Also numerous people walking with and without dogs. Mind you, the road is closed for cars.

Then back home and I actually did my knee exercises right away. Part of me thought, „Oh, I’ll just do them tonight,“ as always but my inner parent stepped in and told me to do it right away. Because we all know that tonight they wouldn’t have happened.

Then I helped preparing lunch, took a shower and got dressed for teaching and then I sat down to lunch with my family:

Did the dishes right away, spent some time online and then started a full day of teaching. I saw another potential new student who is the mother of two former students of mine. We’ve known each other since our children were toddlers but hadn’t met for seven years. That was nice.

And the last student of the day is another new-ish one. She is about my age and a complete self-starter. She has been learning piano with the help of the internet. She plays really well for someone who only started a few months ago. The fun thing with her is that she basically teaches herself but then comes to me with all her questions. I’m really enjoying this kind of lesson where we hop from piece to piece and topic to topic. „Ask me anything“ on a professional basis. She even has a little notebook where she jots down her questions.

Afterwards I was completely done. Empty and exhausted. And still hadn’t written. And had loads on my list.

So I starte this post, did one other thing on the list, decided to skip practice and got ready for bed.

Today there will only be two students, both singing students. I’m not quite sure if I should record the next podcast episode today. If I do I need to prep for it beforehand. I will definitely go grocery shopping in the morning and I’d like to do strength training in the evening but that will mostly be it.

I seem to have less time to work on my project than I think I have. I might have to change things up a little.

I woke up before the alarm and thought it would be a good idea to finish the novel I had almost finished the night before. I had been so tired, though, that I kept nodding off.

And thus the morning routine went out the window.

I did manage to make breakfast on time, at least, and then decided I really needed another novel by the same author. Which I bought and dowloaded. And started reading right away. I only read about seventy pages that day so I consider it good.

My husband showed and told me some more about his new guitar. He had carved a bone nut for it the day before.It looks rather beautiful now. The guitar, I mean. Changing that part is always a little nerve-wrecking because it’s glued into the neck and you have to cut and rip it out.

I started the border on the crochet blanket.

Then dishes and chores and a big round of errands, the bakery and the butcher and the health food store. I got everything for lunch:

That was only the first half, by the way.

I was still pretty low on energy so I had a hard time to get going after lunch. My to-do list left unchecked. I did the dishes, hung up a load of laundry that my husband had started in the morning, called another potential new student back and then it was time for teaching.

Afterwards the boy and I did a little strength training, I got ready for bed, started this post, wrote a few words, read many more words and went to bed.

Today there will be running and lots and lots of students. I’m hoping to make progress here and there anyway.

Well, finishing a novel late at night and then starting the next in the series turned out to be a rather bad idea. I stayed up way too late and that overshadowed the whole day. Also, I wanted to do nothing else but read the next book. (Fortunately it’s only a trilogy and I’m three-quarters done with the third one.)

So I woke up at 5.30 before the alarm and decided to use those extra fifteen minutes for reading. Which meant that I read and read until I was a little late in making breakfast. Boo.

Had breakfast, more reading, crocheted while my husband had breakfast and sneaked glimpses into my book (this time on the phone so it wasn’t as obvious) every time my husband left the room.

Then some more reading. I pulled myself together at some point, decalcified the electric kettle and changed the BRITA filter, did the usual chores and then went running.

It was a little too warm and I was tired and hungry.

I had gotten out of the house a little too late, and so my willpower wilted in the sun and I walked most of the second half.

The pictures were all taken standing in the same spot, I just turned around. I then ran back towards that house and left and over the highway, through the fields and then the woods and then back home.

Where my husband was tending the potato beds. He had skipped his run in order to get ahead with yard work. We hastily threw together lunch because the boy needed to get back to school on time. He has a bit of a weird schedule this year where he comes home around 11.30 on Mondays but needs to be back at school by 2 until 5. This time the PE teacher had them come in, gave them nine pages of stuff to read and story for a test next week and sent them home again. They will be swimming but have to wait until the indoor pool reopens. His English conversation class was canceled.

 Lunch was good, even though I hadn’t used enough salt:

Only the carrots were homegrown.

I then had lots of plans and a long, long list but first I needed to take a shower, then do the dishes. Then I decided that I had enough and walked to the next supermarket for chocolate and gummy bears. Because that will make everything better. Especially the lack of sleep.

Things didn’t quite go as planned when my husband wanted my help because the computer in the basement that he needs for drumming lessons was acting all weird (fortunately it set himself right again just before I could install my old laptop there) and then the boy needed some more money and to order „Maria Stuart“ and we started the letter we need to send to the school so they allow him to skip school for a few days in October. He is going to that workshop thing again.

And then I met a potential new student. And taught all my usual Monday students.

Afterwards I packed my bag (I’m still using that laptop bag daily, best idea I had in a while. I added all kinds of chargers and hair ties and such to it.) went to the master bedroom, changed into pajamas and ate the rest of the gummy bears in bed.

The rest of the family showed up one after the other, my husband practiced drums, I read some more, started writing this post, finally washed my face and brushed my teeth and managed to go to bed on time for a change.

Today there will be all the errands and some teaching and some scrambling to get everything done today that I didn’t do yesterday. I need to learn a new song for a student until Thursday and write that letter and some novel-writing might be a good idea as well.

So much stuff that I want to do. Isn’t it great that things aren’t boring!

Not that the day before wasn’t quiet, I just spent more time idly sitting around.

I woke up at 6.30 after a long and restful night. Yeah! Meditated for five minutes and then wasted some time before getting up. I had breakfast and read a little. (I finally finished that „15 Secrets of Time-Management“-book. The beginning was good but the second half was mostly filler. Meh. Not the right book for someone who has read a ton of time management books, I guess.)

Then my husband showed up and had his breakfast, we talked and it was clear that he was pretty overwhelmed with everything. The boy came down at a reasonable time, hurray, and then there were chores until it was time for the weekly Sunday stretching session. This time the focus was shoulders. Very helpful.

After that I did my piano warmup for the first time in weeks. And then my husband fell over the bucket I had left on the porch to dry on Friday and broke it and I spent some time researching metal buckets and ordering one. And then I sat on the porch for a bit and read some more.

My husband and I made lunch:

This is how it looked during prep from where I sat. All the veggies are from our garden. Look at those tomatoes! (Not that I like them.) Then there was the appetizer:

Fried zucchini blossoms again with some leftover dough and then the main course:

As you can clearly see we are not into decorating, ahem.

After lunch I did the dishes with the boy’s help and then we researched English dictionaries because he needs one for school and then I finally ordered some containers for him to hold shampoo and such when he travels. The boy uses several kinds of shampoo, conditioner and such on his thick, curly hair and the last time we didn’t manage to cram all of that into his rather big toiletry kit.

Since I was already in the mood I also ordered things like BRITA filters and a CO sensor. As one does. Because I had just planned my week and was suddenly tired of moving the tasks „buy BRITA filters“ and „research CO sensors“ to yet another week.

The day before I had sewn the neckband to the burgundy tee. I was waffling if I should undo the seam and try again. I picked it up, looked at it and put it back down. I think it will all even out but I’m not sure. Will have to look again some other time.

I watched a session fro the online writing conference about „Writing in another language“ that made me feel rather good about my attempts to write in English, made myself a cup of tea, started writing this post, made the boy do strength training with me, brushed my teeth, watched some Star Trek, wrote some new words on the novel and went to bed.

Today there will be running and some stuff from the list including learning a new-to-me song for one of my singing students, meeting a potential new student and teaching the usual Monday students. If I have enough time I also want to start preparing the next epic English episode of the podcast.

Onwards and upwards.