My Personal Plague of Locusts

Usually on Sundays no one wants to cook dinner. It's undoubtedly been a long week and another is on the verge of beginning. This, coupled with the fact that cereal is expensive and filled with all kinds of junk, often leads us to make lots of pancakes on Sunday nights. This way we have dinner and a hot breakfast item for the morning. Last night I tripled the recipe....
Apparently I need to pentuple the recipe. I don't think that's even a word but I'm going to use it because my locusts (ages 13, 10, and 8 ....all male), devoured the leftover pancakes this morning before school. ALL of them.
So this morning I spent about an hour making a triple batch of waffles. That's a lot of waffles. Let's hope it lasts the rest of the week. They should last. I'm hoping they last.
For waffles I use the recipe from my mom's vintage Betty Crocker cookbook. Circa 1970 something.
We also add a little cinnamon and vanilla.

*SUCKER*

SUCKER
It is tattooed across my forehead.
It must be.
Or perhaps those closest to me just know that I cannot decline their requests for help.
It has been awhile since I have posted a blog entry.
Why?
Because I am easily taken advantage of.
Especially when my sister sends my sweet, beautiful nieces in to do her dirty work. "Aunt Gwenn," they coo at me. "Would you make a video for our Girl Scout bridging over ceremony? You make such good videos......"
My ego has nothing to do with this. Flattery never would have worked if it hadn't been accompanied by their rosy cheeks and bright eyes. I caved and then dozens and dozens of pictures started trickling in. I know there is software that allows you to just drop the .jpg files in and it mixes them and motions them and it's awesome. I don't work like that. I like the pictures to flow with the music.
So. On top of writing. On top of gardening (and thank goodness it has been raining lately...I HAVE to stay inside). On top of handling some media issues for my church...I am putting together a bridging over ceremony video and an awards video (because people at my church also know I'm a sucker).
This is why I haven't had time to blog. It was either blog or let the children eat nothing but cereal all week and wear the same clothes everyday and walk everywhere they need to go. (We live in the sticks, I'd probably get arrested if I tried to enforce that.).
I'm alive. I'm writing. Just not blogging.
Hope everyone is doing well.

Happy New School Year!

If I seem distant, don't take it personally.
During the school year I morph into personal assistant to three grade schoolers.
I spend my days researching curriculum and finding good reads to supplement their lackluster
public education, making worksheets to drill math facts into their head, figuring out what they need to finish up their requirements for this year's Scout badges....and on and on. O and it's time for me to return to teaching Bible study to teen girls on Wednesday nights. And there's forcing my son to practice his piano and taking him to piano....
It's been really difficult to get any work done. My days are so choppy. Get up, get the boys up, pack their lunches, break up squabbles, take two to one school and the other to the upper elementary school, go home, write for an hour before my husband wakes up. Spend time with him, read while I wait for his call as he's driving to work, work at writing or marketing for another two hours, pick the one boy up and then the other two and then go to the library to get their homework done. The evenings are varied. Church class on Monday nights. Scouts on Tuesdays. Church Wednesdays. NOTHING on Thursday. I love Thursdays. And then Fridays...every other Friday I have to get them ready to meet their dad and then I go home and try to get more work done.
Blech.
Most nights I have passed out around 10 or 10:30. I finally broke down and bought some Zyrtec, hoping that will help take the edge of my allergy issues and therefore maybe give me some energy.  I can't get anything done. Except for laundry and laundry and dishes and tending the ducks and watering the garden because we're in the middle of a drought.
For those of you who bought my book last month, if you're reading this, thank you. Back to school month is always difficult financially speaking and, because of you, I could put gas in my car without having to bum money of my husband. Not that he minds but still....thank you.