Wednesday. Oh. my. goodness.
It looks like this is going to be my view on Wednesday afternoons for awhile.
Just in case you don't know what this is, it is the on ramp to the Mississippi River Bridge that gets us across the river and into Baton Rouge. And traffic is bumper to bumper. Everywhere.
When Mason graduated from Occupational Therapy (OT) in May, a lot of people thought that meant our afternoon therapy schedule would become a lot easier. That was not really the case. Last year we had therapy on Mondays and Wednesdays. Mason had Speech and Educational Therapy (ET) on Mondays and OT and ET on Wednesdays. So even though he doesn't have OT anymore, we can't "drop a day" yet because ET requires two sessions a week. So in addition to our therapy schedule on Mondays and Wednesdays, Hannah Kate had dance on Tuesdays. So for three days in a row, we would carpool after school, fight traffic, get home late and live off of crockpot meals. I also had Bible study in Baton Rouge on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, too, so those were some long days that eventually wore us down by the end of the school year.
But we had summer time to rest up and get ready to do it all over again. Not that I was ready or wanting to do it all over again! Scheduling activities for multiple children in different locations is not easy. So I knew that I'd just have to do the best I could between the therapy and dance schedules and prayed in the meantime that God would just work it out for us. He did last year, and I knew He would do it again.
The dance schedule was posted first. Hannah Kate was placed in a Wednesday class this year. At first my heart sank because I already had a feeling that Mondays and Wednesdays would be our therapy days again. But the more I thought about it, the more I thought it just might work out. Hannah Kate wanted to take jazz last year in addition to ballet and tap. But we just weren't able to do that because of scheduling and time constraints. She really wanted to take jazz this year so I told her we would try it. Instead of dancing for an hour, she now dances for two hours. Her ballet and tap classes are a little longer, and the jazz class was added.
Her class begins at 4:00 and dismisses at 6:00. I knew if I could schedule Speech and ET on Mondays that we could schedule only ET on Wednesdays. And it would have to be in the same time slot as Mondays, which is 5:00-5:30. So I could take Hannah Kate to dance, get her dressed and to her class and then leave and head across the bridge into Baton Rouge for therapy. We would have an hour to get there. It's a 15 minute drive on a normal day, but I knew it would take a little longer during "rush hour." But I was hoping "rush hour" would begin more around 4:30 and that it would take no more than 30 minutes or so to get across the river. And then I should have enough time after Mason is finished at 5:30 to run back over the bridge and pick up Hannah Kate at 6:00. Whew! But at least we'd drop a day this year and have to do this only two days a week instead of three days a week. So I specifically requested the Monday-Wednesday schedule for therapy, and I found out this past Monday that they accommodated our request. Yesterday was our first Wednesday.
It was a mad rush getting to the studio and getting Hannah Kate dressed, all the while dealing with Ellie, too. And then I got her settled in her class, and Mason, Ellie and I headed over to therapy. But traffic was. a. nightmare. It was so awfully frustrating. Just sitting there with no other way to go and no reason for traffic to be that way other than a poorly design interstate system that no one is addressing, not to mention Mason and Ellie lost their patience pretty quickly so it was all kinds of crazy up in my Tahoe. A 15 minute drive took us 51 minutes. But we made it. We made it.
After all was said and done, we didn't get home until 6:50. Again, traffic made a 20 minute drive home 50 minutes. And we still had to eat supper, take baths and do homework. By the time it was all said and done, all I wanted was a big bowl of ice cream. I had ice cream left over from Ellie's party. But I didn't have any chocolate syrup. And last night called for chocolate syrup!
One Wednesday down. But we sure have a lot of them to go! And we just can't have every Wednesday like that. I'm always reminding Seth to have a glass half full instead of half empty. But last night I kept focusing on the half empty. Heck, my glass was EMPTY. Some of my Facebook friends have been posting three positive or thankful thoughts each day for seven days. I've not participated in that "challenge," but when I woke up this morning, I thought of all the many positive things about Wednesdays:
We only have to do Mondays and Wednesdays this year. We get three afternoons at home instead of only two!
We did make it to therapy on time yesterday and had nine minutes to spare!
Hannah Kate absolutely LOVED her classes! I was a little concerned that two hours would be too long for her, but she said it didn't seem like she was dancing for two hours at all. She said it only seemed like 50 minutes! And jazz was her favorite. (And because we were so rushed yesterday and just trying to figure things out, I didn't get a great picture of Hannah Kate on her first day of dance. This was all I got.)
Because we have to be somewhere else at the same time that Hannah Kate has dance, Mason, Ellie and I do not have to sit in the lobby at the dance studio for two hours waiting on her! Oh, my, I don't even want to think about that! Because Ellie. sitting. two hours. DOES NOT HAPPEN.
My neighbor friend called last night after I put the kids into bed and asked if she could come borrow my sewing machine really quick. I love neighbor friends who need to borrow my sewing machine and come bringing gifts of chocolate syrup! So I had chocolate syrup on my ice cream after all!
My Bible study class will begin in less than a month so I'll have a super fun Wednesday morning teaching the life of Moses to my sweet children. I can think of no better way to start a Wednesday than that!
So I am determined that next Wednesday will be better, traffic or no traffic. Okay, so traffic is guaranteed. But it WILL be better.
Today was a welcome relief. But I am so. tired. It just honestly seems like the week that never ends! The first day of school seems days and days ago! I'm telling you, those 12 weeks of summer time sure were a lot shorter than these 4 days of school! And would you like to hear what I did today?
I made chicken enchilada casserole for supper tonight. I really didn't feel like being in the kitchen this afternoon. Ellie and I took care of a week's worth of errands today so when I got home, all I wanted to do was sit down and rest a minute. But I knew I really needed to get my casserole together before Mason and Hannah Kate got home from school. I was really tempted to wait, but I didn't. I got it all put together and finished right before they got home. I washed the dishes and then turned around to admire my enchiladas. That's when I noticed it. The pot of brown rice I had cooked to add to my chicken, black bean and roasted corn mixture was still sitting there. In the pot. Beside my already-assembled casserole.
But looking at the glass half full . . . Maybe we should have stir fry for supper tomorrow night. The rice is already done!