Ready or Not

So, school starts in 2 weeks.

I'm so not ready.

In fact, I feel like I'm on the brink of starting the school year already depleted. Maybe it's having Lorelei around All. Summer. Long. Or the fact that things are clicking along rapidly at work. Or the dog puke. But I just don't feel relaxed and recharged.

To make my life nuttier, we've gone and ADDED to the scheduling shit storm that was the 2015-2016 school year. Lorelei is adding ballet. Charlotte is adding soccer. And Mommy, in a weak moment of PTA un-involvement guilt, volunteered for Mileage Club, a running program at the school. (No, I won't be running. I made sure.)

This brings our obligations up to the following count:

• Charlotte: Soccer, ballet, violin. Oh, and first-grade student.
• Lorelei: Ballet, gymnastics. Preschool student, but that's actually more of a relief than a burden.
• Chris: Church treasurer, running. Oh, and works MORE than full-time.
• Ashley: Church elder, ballet (this is actually fun, but hey, it's scheduled), Mileage Club, backstage mom (come performance season). And works full-time.

Aware that Chris's work schedule has zero flexibility, I know that the majority of this must be handled by me, unless I can somehow teach Emma to drive. I tried to find areas to cut. Soccer? The sweetest woman EVER, whom I utterly admire, is coaching, and Charlotte needs to give soccer a chance.

Ballet? Charlotte loves it. LOVES it. And performing has been so good for her, so this is a no-brainer. She's ecstatic to be moving up to Ballet III. Lorelei has been longing and longing to do ballet, and this September she starts in the Ballet I class. How can I deny her? And finally, MOMMY loves her ballet class and ain't nobody talking her out of it. Period.

Gymnastics? This is Lorelei's thing. She loves it, so enthusiastically. It's a joy to watch her take class, and I can't bear the thought of taking it away from her.

And then there's the violin. This is our most stressful activity, as it requires practice in addition to lessons. But this is Charlotte's thing, and she wants to continue. Besides, we have a great new (closer!) teacher.

Chris needs to continue running, as his health depends on it. We're both locked into 3-year commitments with our various church roles, which is fine. Obviously, we both need to work.

Frankly, if you've survived working mommyhood through the infant stages of TWO children, you're not about to chuck your career.

So, here I am. Staring at an upcoming school year, scared to death of how I'll pull it off.

I've done what I can, I guess. We got a new nanny hired (the previous *amazing* one went off to Penn State in a PhD program). I bought school supplies, a new backpack, and a sassy little lunch tote for Charlotte. I've been putting in a few extra hours at work to try to counter any half-assing I have to do to get a kid to point A or B. Given dibs on particular trips, I opted for the less glamorous Cleveland in September because it works better with our family (read: ballet) schedule than Orlando in December. And, well, San Diego in October is a must, but instead of spending a few extra days in SoCal, as I originally hoped, I might extend my trip a mere night to see a couple friends, and then I'm hightailing it home to DC for Halloween festivities. Family first, right?

So, last night, on our first date night since Chicago (meaning a really nice dinner), I told Chris, after some cocktails (different restaurant) and a flight of red wines (and the start of a bottle---oh, shush your judging, the place is CALLED The Wine Kitchen), I apologetically informed Chris that the upcoming school year made me want to hide under the covers and not come out until June. We were screwed. Did he have any ideas on how to survive with our family dinners and marriage intact?

Bless his heart, he asked, "What can I do?" This was the perfect question. I started by telling him that continuing to run in the mornings was crucial to the evening routine. We can't eat dinner at 8:00 with small children. It's disastrous.

And on the note, WE NEED TO SIMPLY MEALS. The mindset of "it doesn't take that much longer to . . . . " needs to go out the window, because YES IT DOES, and garnish and warmed-up plates are not worth waiting for. Not when the children are circling like starving piranhas.

I had lots of other things in mind that I was so excited to share, but our food came and we got distracted by . . . food.

I have high hopes for the crowning glory of our summer, our annual trip to the beach, the week right before school starts again. The NC coast is my favorite place in the world, and I'm hoping I won't feel so antsy and not ready to begin this new year.

I'm tired, folks. I'm already tired. Not at all like I should feel at the beginning of a race, you know? And it makes me nervous.

Now then, let's be bookish.

Lorelei is reading a lot of books about Christmas and Easter lately. I don't fight it. Also, the easy reader version of Sleeping Beauty has taken her fancy, and Mums and I have read it to her so. many. times.

Charlotte and I recently read Dragon Dreams by Laura Rennert, which was okay, but I'm kind of tired of people thinking that spunky, sports-loving princesses are an original idea. And please, having the phrase "princess" in the title (it's a "Princess Academy" book, whatever that means--I'm guess the launch of an anti-princess series intended to capitalize on my princess-loving daughter), you're making a BIG mistake having the princess hate the color pink.

Seriously. Think about your audience for a second.

Anyway, Charlotte like the book enough, but didn't understand what the hell was wrong with PINK. Or DRESSES. Children's lit authors? You can wear a dress and like pink and STILL BE SPUNKY AND SMART.

Next, Charlotte and I read Victoria the Violin Fairy, which was terrible. Charlotte was excited because it had a VIOLIN, which was why she wanted to check it out from the library, but obviously the corporate writers who penned the damn thing, probably in under 30 minutes, have never held a violin in their lives. For starters, there was no bow. Second of all, violins were just left in boxes of musical instruments, along with the maracas. Finally, and this is not a violin-specific thing, the anatomy of a stage was completely bizarre. Of course the plot hinged on goblins being trapped on stage, behind backdrops. Um, hello? Stages have wings. And Charlotte, who plays the violin AND has performed on stage quite a few times, was utterly confused.

"It's bad, bad writing, darling," I told her. "Not all books are good. Now you know."

Me, I finally finished Helping Parents Practice, American Bloomsbury, and Amy Falls Down. I'm now in the midst of The Lake House by Kate Morton, which is very intelligent, and Euphoria by Lily King, equally intelligent. The Lake House is my second Morton book and it's a winner too. Set in Cornwall, we have a fantastic mystery about a missing toddler, but it's sooooo much more than that. Euphoria, meanwhile, is loosely based on anthropologist Margaret Mead, and is very good storytelling, along with a decent exploration of what "culture" means.

I have my reading list (ahem, stack) reading for North Carolina. It's gonna be awesome!