Finding My Bliss: Against the clock

Friday, September 12, 2014

I wish I could say I was one of those people who is always on time. I really do strive for that, and sometimes I do achieve it. When it happens, it typically means I have arrived ON TIME. As in exactly on time. Not one minute early. Unfortunately, my arrival tends to land in the 5-10 minute late category. It does not matter if I set my alarm to an earlier wake up time. If I have more time to get ready, I will simply find a way to fill it, and be late anyway.

To complicate this issue, I also struggle with "planning ahead". I, once again, strive to be one of those perfect planners, who has her clothes set out the night before, lunch packed, all necessary items for the following day neatly stowed in my sassy satchel (that coordinates with my fabulous outfit, of course) and ready to go by the front door. All I need to do is get ready and go! All I need to do is go shopping for that sassy satchel!

Shall we step back into reality?

Today I am meeting my sisters for an afternoon of fun at the fair, followed by dinner with our families. This sounds simple enough, right? Well, thrown into this day of excitement are a few appointments that we need to attend to. We have to get mom to the Dr. at 9:30, then a hair cut at 11:30, my nephew is playing with the jazz band at 12:30 and then my niece needs to get the staple removed from her head at 1:15. (A sewing machine fell on her head. I can't make this stuff up.) This sounds simple enough, except we have three sisters, coming from three different directions, at three different times, and I am the only one who has a cell phone. I won't even go into the number of phone calls we have made already in an attempt to figure out who will meet who where, and what will happen when. If we actually manage to locate each other (I am not even going to get into the fact that there are 12 kids between the three of us that factor into this whole potential disaster) then we need to start making more decisions...like food. Feeding a brood of 19 is always an adventure, especially when there are 4 bottomless-pit teenagers, and 8 toddler through middle schoolers who may or may not benefit from a good strong dose of ritalin, and three husbands who conveniently disappear 3 minutes after we all arrive, only to re-appear 30 minutes later, as they "inconspicuously" sneak a couple cases of beer downstairs to sit in front of the TV, while we do all the cooking and deal with the hoard of children. Since we are excellent parents and would never dream of doing something as simple and pain-free as ordering pizza, we always opt for a nice, big, home cooked meal. Fortunately, both of my sisters happen to be quite gifted in the culinary area. Even more fortunately, my sister Emily has a farm, and she knows how to do amazing things, like grow vegetables, and raise animals, and farm things like that! And even better, she takes those vegetables and animals and turns them into some pretty fabulous food. (Seriously, if you tasted her cooking, you would REALLY wish she was your sister!!) I, of course, steer clear of the "turning animals into food" part. I enjoy the food part...but the "turning" part....I just can't bear. I am still boycotting pork after watching a horrible video of mean men working at a hog farm, doing terrible things to little piggies. Don't even get me started on that. I would have a pig sanctuary in my back yard if my husband would allow it.

Wow. I wonder why I run late. Back to topic. I admire my sisters for not giving into the money sucking world of phone technology, but I can not begin to tell you the number of times we have said "ugh...if only you had a cell phone!" My sister Kris does have a banana phone. Unfortunately...it really is just a plastic banana with people's phone numbers written on it, so it doesn't help out much. I believe she does carry it in her purse, in case of emergencies. Anyway, I need to go pack up some matches and blankets, so I can send smoke signals once I arrive on location. They will surely know that I am signaling them, right? I would call to tell them to look for my smoke, but alas......my attempt would be futile.

Speaking of futility...you will have to wait a bit longer for my "after" pics. My cooking took precedence over the "creating the magical mud-room" yesterday. The fabulous birthday dinner, however, was a lovely success. Bethy Crocker did herself proud. ;)

Pretty birthday bouquet