Sunrise Before the Snow

The sunrise was gorgeous this morning. We've got a storm moving in and we're supposed to get anywhere from one inch of snow...to over a foot with strong winds and blizzard conditions. If you ever wonder why meteorology is so imprecise, I recommend reading The Signal and the Noise by Nate Silver. At any rate, we'll see what tomorrow night brings!

Have a great weekend out there!

Slow Down

I really enjoy the album Our Darkest Days by the band Ignite. There is a song on that album titled Slow Down and one of the chorus lines is, "When the day is through all I want to do is slow down." This is kind of my theme for this post, or at least, I'm trying to make it so. Things have been terribly crazy lately in my life, and I haven't had the time or energy to post on the blog. I've been trying to make some choices where I can to slow myself down. Next Monday I should get some relief at work when the woman who will be reporting to me returns from maternity leave. I'm hoping that once she gets back and we're splitting the workload that I will have some energy left over to focus on my personal life once again.

My son's transition back to school after winter break was...bumpy. That has added another layer of complication to our already full lives as he's currently suspended from the bus. So we've had to rearrange schedules in order to get him to and from school each day. Luckily my current job is close enough that I can work from home in the mornings, drop him off, and still be at the office at a reasonable time. We're in the process of searching for a new counselor to try and get some additional help; as much for our parenting tool belts as for our son.

I've been using what little free-time I've been able to find to really catch up on my reading, especially the pile of physical books that have been sitting on my nightstand. I just finished reading The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August by Claire North. I had picked this one out to read last summer and just hadn't ever gotten to it. It was a very interesting and unique story and I would highly recommend it. I think I'm going to try to finish The Story of Edgar Sawtelle next, although I did start that one previously and am almost halfway through, it's been a bit of a slog. But it's supposed to really take off soon I've been told!

I've also been trying to focus more on my photography, but in a different way. I learned how to take photos on a SLR camera, notice there is no D in front of that. But in the rush of my busy life, I'd become somewhat dependent on the automatic settings in my current DSLR camera. I would often use the aperture priority mode, but I was allowing the camera to pick some of the settings for me so I could quickly take the photos that I wanted to use. I decided that wasn't providing me with the control and satisfaction that I wanted, so I've slowed down and starting shooting only in manual mode again. Not every image is turning out exactly as I'd like, but it's quickly coming back to me and it's just more fun.

I took a couple of pictures that didn't turn out great, so I played with the Topaz plug-in that I have for Lightroom to turn the photos into "paintings".

This picture was of the moon getting ready to go down behind the mountains while surrounded by clouds. I didn't use a fast enough shutter speed to capture the detail on the moon, but the other elements showed up nicely so turned it into a black and white painting.

This picture is of the last light of the sunset one evening. I didn't get the focus as crisp as I would have liked, so I turned this one into a "watercolor" that ended up sort of looking like stained glass.

Autumn is Officially Here!

Today is the autumnal equinox and I'm super excited! This is my favorite time of year and I finally get to read October Dreams II. I'll probably also reread October Dreams, and of course The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.

Today also marks the start of being able to watch horror movies exclusively until Halloween. I watch horror movies all year long, but I don't even have to compete with other movies this time of year.

I'm hoping that we can get up to the mountains this weekend because some of the trees have starting changing colors already at the higher altitudes. It's sort of challenging right now because my daughter has a band event every single Saturday. But this coming Saturday they're doing an exhibition rather than competing in the event, so they'll be done by noon. So right now anyway, my plan is to head up into the hills after the performance (and a shower for my daughter). I'll be sure to post photos of Colorado's high country if we do indeed get up there this weekend.

Weekly Progress Report #12

We've got our deck furniture out and we even ate dinner outside last night, though it was a little chilly after the sun started to go down. Spring is in full swing here in Denver. Chances are pretty good that we'll get at least one more snow, but for now it's sunny, warm, and beautiful.

Weight: 140.8 pounds

Weight Change: -0.2 pounds

This week wasn't nearly as drastic as last week even though I was just as dedicated. I'm trying not feel too discouraged since I know this is a normal part of the process, and last week wasn't a normal pace at which to lose weight.

I'm making an effort to really watch my language these days. My hair and nails had gotten pretty long not out of preference, but because I just never did anything about it. When people commented on it I would reply that it wasn't because I liked them long, I was just lazy. But that isn't true. I'm not a lazy person. The real issue was that I was choosing to spend on time on things that were more important to me than personal grooming. As long as I looked clean I wasn't overly worried about it. This weekend I decided that the length had become inconvenient enough that I was willing to give up time for other things to take care of it.

I still found time to read a book though. I recently watched a mediocre horror film (as so many of them are, sadly) called Devil's Pass. While the movie itself wasn't very insightful, it was based on a true incident that I decided I wanted to learn more about. So I did a little research and found a book called Dead Mountain: The Untold True Story of the Dyatlov Pass Incident. It was very well written and I devoured the book in just a little over a day. I don't know if the author really discovered the true reason that nine experienced hikers abandoned their tent in subzero temperatures without adequate clothing, but at least there seems to be some evidence for his theory. I'd highly recommend it if you have any interest in historical mysteries.

My kids and husband are on spring break this week. While I don't have time off from work, it's still like a small vacation for me since I don't have to monitor homework all week. I hope that whatever your week brings, you enjoy it!

My Children Make Me Feel Inept

While I'm all too aware of my faults, I used to think I was a fairly capable person...until I had children.  Then I realized that there was a great deal I didn't know.  I used to run a before and after school daycare program at an elementary school and was pretty good with the kids there, so I thought for sure I'd be able to handle my own children.  Little did I realize, my job was working with those kids at the elementary school.  As a working parent one goes to a paying job all day and comes home exhausted, and then still has to deal with one's own children.  I love my kids, and I'd never want to change anything about my family, but I feel pretty incompetent quite frequently these days.

My daughter is leaving on a trip to Europe for nearly two weeks on Monday.  Last evening we were talking about it and she said she's not feeling any anxiety about it because it still doesn't feel real.  I told her she doesn't need to feel any anxiety because it's a tour run by an educational group with three of her teachers as leaders.  She doesn't have to worry about anything, all the details are taken care of for her.  She agreed and seemed fine.  Then at dinner last night she spilled her drink which she found incredibly embarrassing, and that was all it took to send her into a very dark place.  The rest of the evening was filled with tears, especially after she got her group lists for the trip and realized she wouldn't be with her closest friends or her first choice of teacher.  She does get to room with those friends on several nights, but oh man, the group assignment was DEVASTATING!  Of course I think she should be flattered, because I'm sure she's seen as a steady child who can handle any assignment.  But she wasn't in a mental place for me to help her go there last night.  So she went to bed still crying, and I felt like an utter failure as a parent.

My son (who will be turning 10 tomorrow) was a complete basket case for the final two weeks of the school year.  He was always mad at either my husband or me for something, and it was generally a totally irrational reason.  We even dealt with a suspension from school at that time because he was such a mess about the year ending that he was making horrendous choices.  Now that we're one week into the summer break, he seems to have calmed back down, thank goodness.  But again, I don't know if I'm handling everything correctly and properly balancing empathy and support with guidance on how to make different choices.  I'm not sure that there's an experience out there more humbling than parenting.

The other day I came home with my son when my daughter had been watching one of her favorite movies, The Shawshank Redemption*, so my son caught the very tail-end of the movie (we won't let him watch this movie yet).  If you've seen the movie, you know that there's a scene where one of the men carves "Brooks was here" into the wooden beam in his room.  Apparently my son saw that and it inspired him to carve his name with "was hear" into the beautiful wooden ledge in his room.  Not only am I frustrated that we're now going to have to replace that at some point, but he didn't even spell it properly!  He informed us that it wasn't vandalism if you were defacing your own property.  Then I had to explain that he's not the one paying the mortgage on the house, and that someday he'll turn 18 and move out.

The good news is that as of this afternoon, everyone seems to be back on track.  Both of the kids are out with friends, and my husband is at a happy hour with his co-workers.  So I'm sitting in a quiet house, all by myself, listening to the gentle, soothing rain falling.  Maybe now I can start to rebuild my self-confidence that has been pretty battered by my seeming inability to properly parent.

* In case you didn't know, this movie was based on a story called Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption by Stephen King from his book Different Seasons.  He wrote a story for each season in this book, and three of the stories have been made into movies.  His spring story is titled Apt Pupil and the movie shares the name.  Shawshank is the summer story.  His fall story is called The Body and this is the story on which the movie Stand By Me is based.  To my knowledge there has never been a movie inspired by his winter story, The Breathing Method.  But if you haven't read this book yet, I highly recommend it.  None of the stories have many supernatural elements, they're just really good stories.  I didn't really care for Apt Pupil, but you may have a stronger stomach for that sort of thing than I do.  But the gentleman's club that he created in The Breathing Method is so vibrant and creepy, I keep hoping that someday he'll write a story all about the club.