When you need a weekend

photo-222Last week was kind of intense. I managed to complete a round of edits on the novel, write 2 articles plus my normal Fast Company posts, and hack through another revision of Their Own Sweet Time. I evaluated potential covers. I covered an unexpected childcare gap. I went to New York for meetings and a conference. That day was particularly fun because the little dude woke me up with his kicking at 3 a.m. and I never did get back to sleep. I managed to be fairly coherent through 20 straight hours. But by the time I got to Friday, I was pretty beat.  

So I was perhaps not terribly enthusiastic when my husband announced “hey, we should go to the Y and go swimming!” I planned to stay home, but then the kids whined about wanting me to come, so I went to supervise. One of the area Ys has family swim until 10:00 on Fridays. The water felt nice enough that I probably should have brought my suit, and in the future if we plan on this as a fun Friday night activity, I’m sure I’ll look forward to it. I was just reminded of an observation from one Mosaic Project woman, recounting why she calls her husband from the bus on the way home and they figure out what they’ll present to the kids as their evening fun: “If you come home and you’re tired and you don’t know what you’re going to do then surprises wear you out.”

I got up Saturday morning before everyone else and went for a 45 minute walk/run (I am slowing down and starting to need more walk breaks. Hello third trimester). We had soccer games at two different places again, but my 7-year-old’s ended before the 5-year-old’s, so he got to come and watch and we could all hang out there as a family.

After, my husband’s brother and his family, who have similarly aged kids (6, 4, 2) came to visit. They brought my mother-in-law, so it was a big party. The kids had a blast driving our little toy cars and tractors around the backyard. We started to watch the Texas A&M game, but it was just too painful. We sat around the fire pit talking in the cold October night.

[I’ll admit that I “turned in” at 10:30 and came inside and worked until 11:30. I was giving the immediate family members time to catch up…]

There was more playing in the morning, and then the cousins departed. My mother-in-law stayed, and we went to the Morris Arboretum, where the neighboring farm was having a little festival. My kids were shockingly interested in wood carving and weaving. They tolerated a tour of the mill because they handed out corn muffins along the way (see photo of corn decorating the mill). We also got to vote for our favorite scarecrows at Morris. My 3-year-old voted for Princess Sophia, even though there was no Princess Sophia. I guess she’s a write-in candidate.

We came home and grilled steak, and then my husband and I drove downtown to choose the picture from our kids’ photo shoot several weeks ago. I am happy to report that the kids looked incredibly cute. Since we chatted on the drive downtown and back, it was like a pseudo date night. We spent the rest of the evening packing for a trip (more on this later in the week).

It was not a perfect weekend. I didn’t sleep well Saturday night. It is possible that my husband and his brother had some scotch together, which exacerbates some snoring tendencies. I took short naps both weekend days. I think this may wind up being a pattern through the rest of this pregnancy. But overall, the weekend was pretty relaxing. I’m hitting Monday feeling like it was a pretty good time, and that I’m mostly on top of things. Mostly.

In other news: I’m contemplating doing NaNoWriMo. If you’ve done it in the past, I’d love to hear time management techniques you learned from the craziness.

I’m also working on a post on “things that make people hate you on social media.” Like auto-DMs asking you to like the person on Facebook after you’ve followed them. Ugh. What are your pet peeves?

13 thoughts on “When you need a weekend

    1. @Griffin – there is something about FB that is so well suited to this. Also, sometimes there is much drama in the lives of people who don’t have particularly dramatic lives.

  1. Vague comments like “so sick of this crap” or “people are so mean” without further explanation. It’s attention-begging without being interesting. Also, “friends” asking you to join Amway, Herbalife, or buy their ugly crafts.

  2. I don’t like those posts such as, “Quick, name 10 books that have influenced you! Then tag 10 of your friends and make them name 10 books.” The book exercise itself could be kind of fun, but I don’t want to drag 10 other people into it.

    1. @Karen – yep, making lists can be fun, but without dragging in friends, you can’t be a meme…so there we go.

  3. I also dislike. the. trend. of. posting. sentences. that. are. interrupted. by. periods. after. every.word. As in, “I. have. no. words.” Word.

  4. Or people who just post stream of consciousness junk prefaced by a hashtag, instead of taking the time to write a coherent thought.

  5. When someone does the “Suggestions for (fill in the blank). Ready…go!”. I don’t know why, but the “ready go” gets on my nerves.

    1. @Katherine- possibly because it seems like a race, or an instruction to a brainstorming meeting, neither of which you signed up for just by checking Facebook or Twitter.

  6. I think by definition social media is annoying 🙂 Every single possible thing you could post would be annoying to someone.

    That being said, two things that cause instant unfollowing from me – “flooding” my stream with a million posts one after the other, like the guy who felt like he needed to do a play by play on the NFL draft as he watched it. People do this on Instagram too. Not every single photo you take needs to be shared 🙂

    The second thing is racist or homophobic posts. Most people I know are too smart for that, but I have some high school friends who seem to be living on another planet. I call them on it, then unfriend. I know they don’t care, but it makes me feel better 😀

  7. I still have my FB account active but the only time I use it is when I post pictures of our girls (so that my family in the Philippines can see them).One thing I don’t like about it-you see other people’s dramatic lives(via newsfeed and I hate scrolling down),posting selfies every other day and showing off their stuffs which I think not really necessary.In short,this medium becomes online diary to many.

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