A Day In My Life

5:00am - Roll over and try unsuccessfully to open an eye and smile as husband leaves for work.

6:30am- Totally failed attempt at quiet time. Sorry God, I'll make it up this afternoon. He knows I was up 'till 12:30am hemming a costume.

7:00am - make chocolate chip waffles, check email, and get a little bit of schoolwork set out for the day. Get dressed and partly ready for the day.

8:30am - Bible time with kids and math lessons for the 2 youngest. We are so busy today we will only do Bible and Math today. We have a spelling bee later in the day so surely that counts for something. Everyone did some spelling bee words on spellingcity.com -in a feeble attempt to study. My kids were very resistant to the spelling bee this year - and no one studied much.

9:30am - finish getting ready, house chores, start loads of laundry and dishes, move chicken tractor out of shed so the girls can get some free-range time.

Begin process of packing for various activities of this day. 3 ball uniforms, 1 play costume, various props, items for entertainment and food. Everyone has bags in the laundry room for special uniforms and all the pieces go immediately from the dryer into these bags hanging on a hook in the laundry room-so we always know where everything is.

11:00am - Take Ally to the beauty shop for Civil war era ringlets in her hair. Sure, I could do it myself, but then she would just blame me for looking like a poodle. Walk to Good Will next door to beauty shop and buy great skirt and shorts for $6.00 total-tags on them both, too. 12:00pm still waiting...I decide to treat myself to a professional manicure since I am just sitting here doing nothing at the beauty shop. I kinda thought this would be a 15 minute hair do - not 1 1/2+ hours. Choke over $45.00 price for hair do! Mercy! shouldn't've gotten that manicure. Although, I must say the manicure was educational for Gracie, who pelted the lady with question after question and is now highly interested in how fungus can be transfered under fingernails.

The hairdresser did a great job; even though she didn't know who Nellie Olsen was, and she had never heard of Little Women. Ally wasn't too thrilled to go to the spelling bee with curls and a big blue bow.

12:45pm - Run through a drive thru for a quick bite to eat before heading out to Spelling Bee.

1:00-2:30pm - Homeschool Spelling Bee.

2:15pm - Leave spelling bee early to take Ally to dress rehearsal before her 5:00 performance of Little Women. She will play the part of the youngest March girl, Amy. Carefully pin Ally into poorly constructed (by me) costume and hope everything holds together until the play is over - and restrict all fluids so she doesn't have to go to the bathroom until the performance is over. Notice upon leaving how badly uneven that hem is! Note to self - pin hem while child wears dress next time.

3:30 - Leave two girls and take two boys back to the beauty shop where little brother left his Leapster. Then back to my house to play Wii until their baseball game. Yippee 1 hour for house chores, make supper, and have some quiet time.

4:30pm - dress 2 boys in white baseball pants and threaten them severely about getting dirty. Spend 30 minutes pushing baseball belts into the too small loops in baseball pants. Why don't they just make the buckle thing smaller or the loops bigger? Lay out husband's coaching uniform, print out his line ups.

4:45pm - Send boys with dad to ball field and go to see Little Women play. Our house rule is you must be 1 hour early to all games, 15 minutes early to all practices. Dad will have to watch the play later on video.

6:30pm - After play, unpin Ally and give her softball uniform to change into. Help her shove mass of hairspray stiff ringlets into ponytail.

6:50pm - Load girls in car to go to softball - meet boys at the softball field and settle in for the last activity of the day! A kind of chilly, windy night at the ballfield, we all snuggle under a blanket!

10:30pm - Home. Ally's team lost 7 -8. Kids to bed quickly. Put chickens up. Make coffee and lunch for husband. Plan a recovery day for tomorrow. I'm beat! The house looks like a tornado hit it. More games tomorrow and Saturday; gotta get those uniforms clean again.