School Year End?

Yes, I know some of you are already out of school. But here in the PNW, we don't usually finish school until mid-June, and this year, Snopocalypse 2019 made that even later. I think our last day has been pushed out to the 24th or so.

So, a month left. But the end-of-school activities are such that I actually had Abby make me a list of all the school, Studio East, and social activities she has planned, so I can add them to mine and Lizzy's (Lizzy is 11; I still keep her calendar). That month or so left is going to be busy. And I still need to triple-check with the Studio about some things both for Abby and for me, because they may come into play the second weekend in June.

As an example, this week after school/work we have one piano lesson, one ASL rehearsal, and three evenings of continuing to earn Studio East tuition. This is in addition to homework, practicing piano or ASL at home, and the like. Friday night we have the first ASL performance, Saturday we're going to see a matinee at Studio East, and Saturday night there is a second ASL performance. Forget "soccer mom" because the mom of any child with extracurriculars of any sort is just as busy. Sunday I have my online World of Darkness game, which is Mommy's fun time; the kids are old enough to do their own thing for an afternoon every other week.

That's just this week coming up.

Yesterday both kids went to separate activities and different times: Lizzy went on this amazing adventure at iFly with her Girl Scout Troop yesterday ( I told you how awesome her leaders are!). 

And Abby went to a reunion karaoke party for all the students who were in their cast of Into the Woods last spring. And one of the kids - I think he's 17 - organized it; he came up with the idea, found a venue, got a karaoke guy, ordered pizza, all of it, as far as Abby is aware. She just showed up with her voice ready for karaoke and had a blast!

In any case, between the end of the school year which affects my job too, performances both attending and performing, Laston's birthday and Fathers' Day (we have plans to keep us busy and relatively happy), and the beginnings of summer camps (both attending and camp-counseling), it's gonna be nuts around here! If I don't post for a month or so, you know why.

Respect

I have it, in spades, for the leaders of our Girl Scout troop, in a similar way that I do for teachers.

And I only seem to become aware of all they do when I'm a volunteer/chaperone.

You see, it's easy to forget - in the day-to-day - how much they do. Except for Cookie Season, when we all pitch in, and Service Days like the one we just did today, when there are parent volunteers. Today was a relatively calm one of these, as we had eight Scouts and six adults; they didn't outnumber us by too much.

These are good kids; they've been working on their Promise and Law, after all. But they're still kids, ranging from nine to eleven, with all that entails. Personality clashes, fatigue after a long day of service, the beginnings of puberty, neurodivergence, and the usual schoolyard squabbles over who does what.

Given that  I got up this morning at five to take my mom to the airport, only to find that our water heater turned itself off again (and apparently the quick flip of the breakers I did at five didn't change anything, so I just went and flipped them again), I think I coped pretty well.

So yeah, got up at five, cleaned up as well as possible without hot water, took my mom to the airport (all the way on the opposite side of Seattle; thank goodness it's a weekend!), took her car back to her place, loved on her cat, took a shower, and walked home (only a matter of a couple blocks worth of fairly uneven terrain, but I'm still getting used to this exercise thing). Then Liz and I took off for the Service part of Service Day, which was helping a local food bank sort and pack their pantry stuff for their clients. Then I took Lizzy and a sister scout to lunch with the group (complete with misunderstandings of how much was allowed and a hoodie left at the food bank), then we all went to Target to perform the Money part of Service Day - buying toys and books and things for kids their age at Seattle Children's Hospital, and finally took the sister scout home before coming home myself.

I'm beat.

But in spite of all that unaccustomed activity, and issues like no-hot-water, and a small bobble on both Lizzy's and my part at Target, we did well. Out of spoons/bandwidth/spell slots, but we did okay.

And at least some of that is due to the good offices of our troop leaders.

Respect.

These Are a Few of My Favorite Things

Or companies, anyway. And this is - surprise! - not (primarily) a post about the weather (beautiful), my allergies (awful), everybody's mental or physical health (improving), politics (yeah... nevermind), or money troubles (currently solvent).

This is a post about three companies I really, really like.

The first of these you all know about if you've been reading my blog for any length of time. Studio East is a home-away-from-home for us, a teacher, a counselor, an employer, a volunteer opportunity, a place to find new friends and reconnect with old ones, and above all, really excellently great at what they do. And what they do is legion. There are up to eight "mainstage" plays per year, homeschooling classes, school break classes, summer camps (including YAPI - the Young Actors Performance Intensive - which is the six-week-long performing arts camp for teenagers, and it's well... intense), community events like the Kirkland Independence Day Parade, and opportunities for the older students to work as camp counselor assistants to earn some of their own tuition.

I'm sure there are more things that I've forgotten because there are just so many things they do, but there you are. What they're doing right now? Tonight is opening night for Peter and the Starcatcher, running for three weekends. Come see it; it's hilarious!

While we're talking about the Performing Arts, I want to tell you about 4/4 School of Music. You see, while Abby thrives in the quick-change atmosphere of musical theater, and Lizzy enjoys her time there, Liz needs more structure in her day-to-day to succeed. We first started her with private piano lessons, and the instructor was nice enough, but her method was pretty inflexible and focused on form. Lizzy just wants to play the piano, and she needs a teacher willing to accommodate her quirks. We switched to 4/4 School of Music just over a year ago and we love it there. Our teacher, Michelle C., teaches at both the Canyon Park and Lynnwood schools, and the place has schools in several different states, while still managing to be a family business. 

Most importantly, Michelle learned the best ways to accommodate Lizzy very very quickly, most notably getting very specific as to how to practice; instead of saying "practice for half an hour," which is way too unspecific for Liz, she made a chart (on her own initiative) with the number of times Lizzy should practice each piece, scale, arpeggio, chord, etc. And while Lizzy may be picking this stuff up more slowly than some of Michelle's other students (like her maternal grandfather, she has an excellent ear, so if it "sounds wrong" she has trouble sticking to the written music), she's enjoying herself, learning a valuable skill and discipline, and getting some daily routine for something that's not "just school."

Now, speaking of Lizzy, my last company of the post is Awesome. In fact, it's Princess Awesome. The idea is that just because your kid is a girl, it's still okay - even encouraged - for her to love both pink and trains, or sparkles and math, or frills and dinosaurs. And it was a problem for these two moms who started the company - as it was for me - because as a rule, you can find the pink, sparkly frills in the girls' section, and the trains, math, and dinos in the boys' section. This led to a lot of pairings (at least at our house) of orange stem t-shirts marketed for boys with pink, sparkly, frilly skirts. There's nothing wrong with that, but it's not the best look ever, either. So these lovely ladies - read about them and their brand at the link above - made Princess Awesome for these girls.  Zoom in on Lizzy's Dancing Robots dress and headband under the Girl Scout Vest.

What's that? What about boys? The boys' line - Boy, Wonder - is coming out in spring or summer. As is the adult women's line, up to size 26 (though I don't know if they're calling that something different. Queen Awesome, maybe?) and with some stretch. It's a goal for me, as I generally wear a 28/30. And in the meantime, I can wear their accessories, like the awesome (ha!) game-controller infinity scarf.

Support these guys, folks, really. They're good stuff, made (or taught) by good people.

Snopocalypse 2019

Note: Lots of pics mean this post is better viewed off mobile.

Dear Diary:

It is Day... oh. 

Oh, I've lost track of the day. Well, in any case (she says bravely), it's the second week of this group of winter storms. We've had worse, but in Seattle-ish, these only happen every few years. We haven't the infrastructure in plows and sanders to help as they do in the Midwest. And our area has at least seventeen microclimates - we have two mountain ranges with an inland sea nestled between them and that gets messy. There are hills and winding country roads everywhere. I live - as you know, Dearest Diary - in a small pocket of drained swampland at the bottom of a hill out in the country.

A black cat is zigzagging across the snowy street. 

The squirrels are going to be angry about the lost tree limbs on The Big Tree out front.

There have been some good times, with board games and snowpeople and neighbors pulling together to help. Our local school district has had grab-n-go meals (and they'll bring it to you if you can't get out and they can). 

We have traded baked goods for child care, and someone with safer transportation picked up some groceries for us while they were out. We're staying warm and the kids and I are all getting some educational time in. Lizzy's reading the book Abby gave her for Christmas. 

As I write this, a few brave souls are out moving cars out from under trees and shoveling off their low-pitch roofs. I can hear chainsaws and snowblowers in the distance. The kids are getting some exercise and fresh air playing with the neighbors.

But it's still snowing.

Horrible things are happening.

Tree limbs are down. I'm afraid to check my apple trees, much less my grapevine.

Schools were canceled for the fifth day in the last seven (and the other two were partial days). Our Governor has declared a state of emergency.

I can't work my primary job (because the schools are closed) so I'm working my second job for the schools (which I do from home, thank Itztlacoliuhqui). It doesn't pay as much.

And this particular project is hard (but I love it).

A good friend who never does things like this snow-splained us all.

My pharmacist just texted me to let me know my prescription is in. Yeah, that's not happening today.

Knowing it's likely down to climate change pisses me off. Continuing to call it global warming (and smugly pointing out that it's not warm, so it can't be global warming) to avoid the reality that we are in an emergency is just stupid asshattery by way of circular logic.

Fresh fruit is running out, and we just opened our third loaf of bread. We're down to canned corn and frozen green beans. Thank Hestia that Abby likes to bake.

The power keeps going out as tree limbs fall on the lines; thirty seconds here, an hour there. I hope the power line people are as safe as possible. On that note, stay safe, everyone.

If you don't hear from us, we've succumbed to scurvy.

Stay safe.

The Roller Coaster

So, after my last post, which was all about how much of a PITA winter is to my psyche (for the umpteenth year in a row), you are probably all out of patience with my ramblings. I know I am. But that's Anxiety talking, and Anxiety can go take a flying leap.

This post is different; it's one of those rambly-but-funny ones of the ups and downs of a day in the life.

My mom nagged suggested I take the final step with HSBC to get my old car's** title (or the declaration that they have no claim to it) so I can get rid of it. I've been trying to find/obtain the title for three years, and the car hasn't run for two. This time, Mom went so far as to sent me the address of the nearest HSBC branch. Grand.

To do this, I need to make sure I have the proper documentation. The car's VIN, my current ID, the current(ish) registration, the name-change paperwork, and may as well throw in the death certificate for Laston for good measure; everyone else seems to need it. So I leave the house in South Snohomish County, go to the courthouse in Everett (in "freeway rain") to get a copy of my divorce decree and my 2nd marriage certificate (I probably have those somewhere anyway, but I may as well have them all in one place).

Hey, as long as I'm here, I should talk to the Treasurer for the county about getting the property taxes put in my name, since Laston never paid them and I tended to ignore or destroy the (mostly junk) mail addressed to him in the early months after his death. I had already had a stress-out when I saw that their website said that "installment plans" are one full year, and they haven't answered my inquiry email. So I talk to them, and "of course, we can help you set up a reasonable payment plan, Mrs. Kirkland; we'll send you a payment book next week." A few tears of relief, an offered tissue, and a smile from the person in charge. Good.

Now, down to Redmond (via Lynnwood, where Home Goods does not have my favorite olives in stock, dammit) to HSBC. Once I'm done there, I can pick up the groceries at Trader Joe's and the kids' requested dinner at Fred Meyer in Totem Lake on the way home.

Oh, look, HSBC and Trader Joe's and QFC (also a Kroger company these days, and therefore has the same chicken strips the kids like from Fred Meyer) are all in the same parking lot! Awesome!

But "I'm sorry, Mrs. Tincher? Oh... Mrs. Kirkland. So HSBC Auto Credit doesn't really exist anymore, my branch manager is in a meeting, and the other managers are both on vacation this week. Let me see..." He makes a couple phone calls and finds out the current customer service number for old HSBC Auto Credit customers. Yay! But it's in New York City. Boo, I'll have to call Monday.

Trader Joe's and QFC go well though, and now we have a fruit tray for Second Christmas tomorrow morning. Cool. I go home (via Woodinville, where Home Goods does not have my favorite olives in stock, dammit). And my FitBit tells me I've reached my goal for the day.

I get home. Abby puts away groceries while Lizzy and I go to Mom's to practice piano (on Lizzy's part) and regale Mom with this story (on mine). We get the mail on the way back, to find... that the social security overpayments they said they were taking out of February's payment will be taken out of January's instead. Awesome.

It'll work out somehow; it always does. But what a crappy end to an up-and-down day.

**2002 Mitsubishi Lancer ES sedan. This is the car that Abby's dad and I bought when I was three months pregnant with her, in May 2002. My first new(ish) car. I paid it off long after he and I were divorced, and I had been married to Lizzy's dad Laston for almost two years, in January 2009. I took the payoff information and my ex-husband to a Notary to put the title in my name, but no-one told me (or I don't remember) that we had to file that with the Department of Motor Vehicles, so there is no lost title to find through them. And we lost the copy we had during one of our moves, Laston and I. I have torn the house apart looking for it, been to any number of government agencies trying to get a copy, sent emails that received no reply, tried to wade through the worst IVR system I've ever heard, etc. 

Messy Mental Musings

Warning: this post will ramble.

It's been a Potato Chip Effect or Dropped Spoon kind of week and its only Tuesday. Actually, it started Saturday, when I told Facebook to eff off for a day. Some people thought this meant I was staying off entirely, and sent me little I-thought-you-were-off-Facebook texts when I was on later, which were not helpful. So I ignored them; better that than biting their heads off.

Physical health is generally measurable and treatable, and there are specific goals (reduce pain, close wound, clear infection). But mental health is a slippery beast, and while it may not hurt to know that mid-December is always a problem for me even before Laston's illness, it's isn't something that my fairly logical mind can really grok as a useful data point. Until I sit down and write it out, of course.

When you have even mild mental health issues (hello, Seasonal Affective Disorder, anxiety, and emotional exhaustion) on top of things that are still sometimes considered to be mental health issues but aren't (like ADHD or ASD), the tendency is to try to analyze, at least for me. How much of my emotional exhaustion (it's not really compassion fatigue because that implies I'm less able to feel compassion than I was) is due to winter? To financial stress? About things that are neither my monkeys nor my circus? To grief? To living with children? To being a single mom on a budget? To missing a deadline because I couldn't log in? To fretting about my friends who are also having hard times, in different ways? About my mom's recent knee surgery, even though she's fine? To feeling guilty because my friends have it worse so what am I complaining about? About the things my country is doing to people who are not straight white males? About the little things, like head colds and power outages and traffic snarls? To my therapist being out of town for the holidays?

It doesn't really matter how much of each issue is affecting me in what way. But try telling my busy little brain that in the moment. It's just as effective as telling Meltdown Lizzy that her art project can be fixed; you have to step back to a place of calm for it to even register.

I did that today in the car on the way to school. I said to Lizzy that we need a plan for when mom loses it, because otherwise I'm Shouty Mom (who nobody likes) or even Weepy Mom (which unnerves them somewhat). What can we plan for right now, when I'm not Shouty or Weepy? "Um..." Lizzy says reluctantly, "We could like do chores before you get Shouty."

Well, that's terrific, but I've been trying to get you to do that for years and it hasn't worked yet. "Maybe you could use one of the code phrases? Like "Potato Chip Effect?" So we know when you're about to be Shouty Mom?"

The child is a genius. Now to get my brain to notice the path and act accordingly before I start being Shouty. If I can expect Lizzy to do this, I can expect me to do this.

And now I'm going to sign out before our second windstorm in the past five days causes another power outage. Because if I typed all this and didn't save before Mother Nature gets Shouty, I'm going to Drop Spoons loudly and all over the floor.