Transition Time

Well, around my neck of the woods we are having a scorcher of a day-- anywhere from 108 degrees to 114, depending on who you believe (to me it feels like 120, but I'm probably off by a little bit).  It's also our back to school week.  Despite the fact that this is our seventh year of starting school in July, heat advisory days and back to school just seem flat out contradictory to me.  Ugh.  Some strange part of me insists on thinking of crisp autumn mornings and maybe even leaves changing color when it's time for a new school year, which is just silly.  As a kid I went back to school in September and even in San Diego it was usually quite warm still-- for San Diego, anyway.  None of us were wearing jeans and sweaters on the first day of school.  In Arizona, the idea is ludicrous.  We don't get crisp sweater weather until at least November.  The leaves on our backyard trees don't usually get the idea to change color (right to brown) and fall off until at least January.  At least the stores out here have finally got the memo and the back to school clothes aren't all pants and long sleeves.

This is a big year for us.  M started junior high, and K started kindergarten.  The big schedule change.  All the kids have moved to a full day school schedule, including K.  Everyone kept telling me I would love the longer kid-free breaks in my day.  Yesterday about 1 pm while S was napping and I was able to get about a third of our Primary Sacrament presentation written, I thought so too.

But by bedtime?

I cried myself to sleep last night.  I haven't done that in quite awhile.  Quite a long while.  I don't know if I can do this.  The evening was brutal.  I picked the kids up and we headed straight up to the valley (a 40 minute drive) for M's piano lesson.  Dropped M off, ran quickly to the bank, took J & B to a chiro appointment, stopped at the music store, then headed back to my mom's house to get M and feed the kids dinner.  We didn't make it home until 7:30 pm.  And then we had to face homework and chores and bedtime routine and scripture reading.

It didn't go well.  By then, having been up since 4:30 am, I was a raving madwoman.

Today I've kept my sanity by getting a nap, but I fit that in the schedule because I only had to teach 2 of my 7 piano lessons today.

Can I do this?  I have to.  I HAVE to.  I'm the mom.  Got to pull myself together.  But I have a feeling it's going to be a rocky ride until we find our new equilibrium as a family on this schedule.  Hope it comes sooner rather than later.