creative.mother.thinking

Guess who stayed up too late again? Yeah. I might just as well give up.

I did do my morning routine in full but only spent ten minutes on the manuscript. I had high hopes of working for an hour or two on it in the afternoon but, well, that didn’t quite work out.

Husband and I had a very nice conversation and then I called my mother on the phone. I spent the time between that and lunch trying to figure out why my spinning wheel is so noisy but with no success. I did tighten all the screws and tried oiling the parts that need oiling but misremembered something so I’ll get the spinning wheel oil out again today.

I also pulled out the fabric for the two things I want to sew this week and found the t-shirt pattern – progress!

Then it was time for lunch:

I read a mediocre novel that was just barely good enough the I am still reading it, ate chocolate and a few gummy bears and then played some more Genshin. I failed slaying the dragon yet again (my son keeps telling me that challenge is really easy and mostly boring). One of the problems might be the configuration of my controller so we changed that last night and I’m hoping that will work better.

I played some more and explored parts of the map which was fun, and then I went and did both my singing and piano warm-up. And practiced Chopin for a bit. This will take a while for sure.

I thought I could open the manuscript again after that but the boy was in the kitchen, we got talking, and that was that. Oh, I got some new characters? And the boy said the chance of one of them happening was 0.3%? Anyway, we put video games aside and did bodyweight training.

I feel equally stupid doing both, so same difference.

After that it was finally time to eat dinner, then more reading, more video game, and then I started writing this post, found that I was too late to play Duolingo again, made a list for today and watched a bit of C-drama while the boy took a shower.

Oh, and I also logged into my account with the cover designer and looked briefly at the blurb for book 1, and I did some more research on rolling shutter repair. Which is one of today’s tasks.

So, not a spectacularly good day yesterday but tiny progress on many fronts.

I almost went to bed on time again. Fingers crossed I’m starting a trend.

Did my morning routine but only had 25 minutes left for novel revision, so there is room for improvement. (Isn’t there always?)

Breakfast conversation was great and I even wove in a few ends, I did my usual internet rounds and the breakfast dishes and then I went on a bit of a longer walk/run. 73 minutes of alternating 2 minutes of walking and 3 minutes of running with  5 minutes of walking both at the beginning and the end. So I’m now at the point where I have to run for longer than I walk and while I am doing a little better I still am massively struggling. But the weather was gorgeous and I found that I’m making a little progress. So right now, most of the running doesn’t feel like I just want to lay down on the ground, so that is good as well, I guess:

There were hordes of older couples and families out, most of them biking, and most of those with massive e-bikes.

I came back home, took a shower and had lunch:

Mmh, very tasty.

I read a little and ate chocolate (and a few gummy bears), then played some Genshin and then I planned the month and played piano for a bit. Mostly just a warm-up but also a few bars of Chopin.

Then my weekly writer Zoom, this time an hour earlier for me because we already had our time change and the US only had it last night.

Zoom was night and I made nice progress on the crochet blanket.

Then it was time to hang up laundry, heat up frozen pretzels and get ready for watching ‚Columbo‘. This episode made fun of MENSA which was a little weird. Columbo himself was great but the members of the high IQ society were very, very stereotypical.

In between I got myself a ticket for the J-Hope concert movie. I don’t know anyone who’d like to go with me and I am a bit apprehensive about going alone but, well, maybe I’ll find someone after all. And if not I can still enjoy the outing. And if I don’t enjoy the outing it will have been an interesting experience either way.

Then I played some more Genshin and failed shooting the dragon spectacularly, I guess I’ll try again today.

I did Duolingo, started writing this post and then it felt like almost midnight when in fact it was only 9.30, so I watched some C-drama and went to bed.

Today I’m hoping to make plan for the week ahead, my husband and I have all the plans and we have to see if it will all fit in.

I went to bed almost on time and then woke up too early again. No, I definitely don’t love the time change, thanks.

I did my complete morning routine including opening the manuscript and did the 30th day of yoga for the month. I only missed once, I say that is a major win.

Husband and I had a great conversation over breakfast but then had to get going because we had another busy day.

First, an unexpected task, the rolling shutter in the kitchen started acting up a few days ago and then the evening before I couldn’t lower them anymore. I opened the window and tried pulling and shaking and it feels like something is lodged inside but they wouldn’t budge.

So I started looking up how to open the mechanism in the morning but didn’t do anything and after breakfast my husband fetched a stepladder and we tried a bit around but came to the conclusion that this is a job for another day after some research.

There were dishes, I changed the sheets on my bed and then I started the weekly cleaning routine. That isn’t all that routine. I was very determined to not start fall break with a dirty house. So I cleaned the mirrors and touched all the surfaces with a duster.

In between I played around with my new powerbank and adapter that I ordered and found that I can charge my phone, watch, eReader, headphones, keyboard and iPad with it. The iPad was slow as molasses but, hey, I take it. So I guess I’m all set for my next trip.

Meanwhile my husband went running and then started making lunch. I interrupted my cleaning and folded a load of laundry and then it was finally time to eat:

I ate two, a bit of chocolate and then one of the mini bags of Haribo that I had bought for the trick-or-treaters.

After lunch I played a quick round of Genshin Impact and vacuumed the house. I briefly thought about doing the washbasins and toilets as well but would probably not have finished before I had to teach.

I had a little more time after lunch because my first student canceled.

I taught my three students, all very nice, then succumbed to the draw of social media. I then started a new project that I had conceived in the morning. I have decided to learn a new piano piece and document it. Because I have students who get very disheartened by their lack of progress and who think if they just play the piece over and over they will somehow magically reach the point where everything flows smoothly, they don’t make mistakes anymore and that stage will then continue forever and ever.

Sure.

So I played some exercises for warm-up (badly, I had to slow the metronome down considerably) and then I filmed myself playing the Chopin Nocturne by sight. Very slowly with load of mistakes. And I found that these days I don’t actually start a new piece by playing it all the way through, if I hadn’t wanted to document my first fumbling attempt I would have stopped after a few measures and actually practiced stuff. Played first one hand and then the other and figure out fingerings and grouped parts together but no, I spent 16 minutes fumbling.

It’s a gorgeous piece of music, though, and I’m looking forward to playing it well at some point in the future.

Anyway, I really want to document my learning process. This will be interesting.

After that I finished cleaning and found that I was completely wrung out.

And then it was time for bodyweight training with the boy.

We only used the back part of the house because we didn’t want to be interrupted by the doorbell every other second. In the end the doorbell rang three times and every time I had reached the door with my bucket of gummy bears no one was outside. So I made the executive decision to just turn the doorbell off and hide.

Then I could finally eat dinner, I played more Genshin, started writing this post, did Duolingo, made a list for today that included all of the days dishes because I was too exhausted to tackle those in the evening, decided I was too tired to watch TV and went to bed after reading for a while.

And now it is time to switch gears to a week off teaching. Well, mostly. I want to do all the things, naturally, maybe including sewing but we’ll see.

Yeah, adding more sleep debt will do that for you. I did have a lot of fun the evening before but getting up was not quite as fun.

My morning routine went very well, anyway, I even spent 45 minutes revising the contemporary romance novel. I really like it, the two main characters are just so cute! And I was surprised at quite a few details that I had included. Writing dialogue for a pair of 6-year olds can be surprisingly fun. Lots of non-sequiturs, though.

There was yoga and time with my husband and no weaving in of ends despite my best intentions. While writing morning pages I decided that I need to get back to playing music more often and devised a plan. I opened my calendar and put time for vocal and piano warm-ups in on all days that I don’t start teaching early.

I went on an epic grocery haul. On the way I had to find that one of the streets I need to take was half closed but I just transformed into a pedestrian for a few meters. It looks like the street crossing they are working on might soon be done, fingers crossed.

I came home and unpacked while my husband finished cooking and we ate a very good pasta salad:

I ate some chocolate, read a bit and played Genshin for 20 minutes. Then I decided that doing the dishes was more important than other things but I did manage to get a vocal warm-up in before my first student. And some scales on the piano before the second because I had a 13-minute gap there.

Which also meant that my student who was waiting outside hear me fumble through all the scales I hadn’t played in years. Well, such is life.

I taught some more, the started writing this post right away because I was pretty sure I wouldn’t have any executive function left later.

I ate dinner with my book, played some more Genshin, watched some C-drama and went to bed.

Today will be cleaning day, this time for real, a few students and then fall break. Oh, and maybe Halloween, no idea, but for the first time in many years I bought some candy to give out because it’s the last day of school, so everyone will be organized enough to actually go trick or treating. And we can’t turn the lights off and close the door because it’s already starting to get dark in the afternoon when we’re still teaching. So, candy it is. My hope is that it is a) enough, and that b) there won’t be a lot left afterwards. Because I know myself, and everything that is left over will be devoured.

But I’m doing it anyway. It’s rather interesting that I can do these things when I know someone might be looking forward to it.

I went to bed too late again and slept extremely bad which is unusual for me. I’m still blaming the time change but, well, what can you do. (I actually read about a writer back in the 90s who decided to just refuse changing her clocks. I don’t think that would work for me.)

I did my complete morning routine, and instead of opening the manuscript I started a new spreadsheet to track the time it will take to revise the single gay dad romance (or is it gay single dad?). Of course my secret hope is to revise it in record time and then write the next book in the series in November. Sure, solid plan, no notes.

Husband and I talked, I crocheted, and I found I was very slow which was no surprise, see lack of sleep.

I went on my walk/run in beautiful weather. On the way I met an old school friend of my husband’s and we talked for a bit, then I got to listen to music while walking and running and started prepping for my monthly coaching session in the evening in my head. I like using my time out in the woods to mull things over. That conversation with my husband’s friend was really motivating to me because he kept saying that his knee is shot and he is old and exercise is beyond him. Um, no. I don’t recommend going real hard on a busted knee but there are very few people who don’t gain anything from strength training or just walking. I have been having chronic back pain since I was a teenager, busted knees for years, including a stint where it was so bad I couldn’t walk for more than a few meters, and my hip has arthritis as well, you might remember the time where I spent the whole summer swimming and biking because walking hurt so much, and then there is the plantar fasciitis that is only slowly healing. (It’s definitely getting better, though, I can forego the orthotics in the house for half the day with no problem. Anyway, here is me out in the sun and wind:

I came back just in time to take a shower before lunch:

I did not do the dishes, the boy showed up right after my husband left to take his nap and then it was time to teach. No Genshin either.

My new wallet came and I managed to cram almost everything in there but I had to take a serious portion of coins out and move a few cards to a desk drawer. Turns out when you get yourself a smaller wallet you can’t fit as much stuff into it, oops.

I taught two students, looked up what we needed to do for bodyweight training next and prepped the manuscript of book 3 for publishing, then taught some more students. After that the boy and I did some bodyweight training and had to concede that a one-week break does, indeed, make you weaker. Who would have thought?

We did have fun, though, especially since we were doing 3-rep pyramids where you make each set a little harder. My arms actually gave way when I tried doing knee pushups with really good form and I was relieved to see that I did not land on the glasses in my face but on my torso.

The boy and I talked about Genshin which was nice, and then it was time for a quick meal and the group coaching call.

Coaching was rather nice and very uplifting while I was working on my crochet blanket. Just for the people who keep telling me they don’t really have time for knitting, that is a moment that works. Not for the coach, though. She was the one who said it’s the time of year where she buys yarn for a knitting project that she then doesn’t finish.

After that it was late but not too late, so I ate chocolate, talked to the boy some more, did Duolingo and then I opened my computer and there was YouTube and all those BTS videos.

Bad move. But we all knew that beforehand.

I finally started writing this post when I was an hour late for bed, then did a quick list for today and finally went to bed. I had brushed my teeth in between BTS dance practice videos but that didn’t really make much of a difference.

And today is grocery shopping day and the next to last day before fall break.

Now the big question is: should I buy Halloween candy or not?

Because if I do and there aren’t enough kids at the door I will end up eating all the candy. It there are kids at the door I need to interrupt everything I’m doing all the time to give out candy. And tomorrow should be another bodyweight training. Training and opening the door every other minute don’t really go together.