October: Football, Halloween and Pumpkin Spice Lattes.

Can you believe its October already?  I'm trying to wrap my head around the fact that its the 10th month of 2013.  Around here its football 5 days a week and I am constantly being shown pictures and given suggestions for creating 'THE BEST' Halloween costume EVER.  It gets harder and harder to out due myself each year.  Of course I love a challenge.

I remember the days where I spent weeks planning and finding things around the house or at the local Goodwill shop to make my costume.  The fact that my kids want me to make their costumes is probably my own fault...I'm awesome at making them! Of course I do get a little tired of doing everything around here. Of course if I am going to give up something it would be doing dishes or cleaning toilets.

Halloween is a chance to be creative, collaborate with my kids on a project and make those store bought costumes look like...well...crap.  So I will be working on making one son look like an assassin from 16th century Italy and another like some other video game character that I know carries a bat.  Before you think or say that these are not appropriate costumes, I would like to mention how many grim reapers and Freddy Kruegers I see every Halloween.

As for myself I am still deciding.  I was thinking about Ursula the sea witch from The Little Mermaid or a generic bar wench (both accent my assets and hide my flabby thighs).  My psycho-political option for a costume is to hang a closed sign around my neck and when people ask what I am I can say the 'Federal Government'...hahaha....yes I laugh at my own jokes.

Well, I hope you are having a good time deciding on Halloween costumes and if it is a holiday you do not partake in I hope that you are enjoying the crisp Fall air.  I now need to fashion a spauldron from a belt I got at Goodwill and make a cape from a red sheet, and a shirt with billowy sleeves and a gauntlet...wow I have a lot of work to do.  Moms move mountains one stitch at a time.

Any which way but sleep!

Its the end of Summer and part of me is relieved that the kids will be back in school, but that also means I have to get up earlier and make sure clothes are clean and lunches are packed.  I should probably start going to bed sooner, but then something won't get done.  I could choose not to do the dishes one night or maybe not grade papers, but then the next day there will be twice as much.  Some weeks I'm motivated to get it all done and find ways to be more efficient.  Its like completing another level of Jewel Mania with three stars when your last several attempts were only one or two stars.  As a parent I have one star days and I have three star days.  I definitely feel better when I do better, but my other responsibilities as a teacher and granddaughter, etc. make it hard to always have three star days.

I debate the choices I make as a parent daily:  should I let the boys crash on the couch or should I be making them sleep in their beds?  When school starts they know its back to their beds, but sleeping on the couch seems to represent Summer freedom.  We are growing some of our own food and raising chickens but its hard not to let the kids have Pop-Tarts and Slurpees.  My kids are actually great about eating fruits and vegetables and eat 99% of what I put in front of them.  I'm no Tiger mom and my kids will not play Carnegie Hall, but then many other children won't either.  It would be wrong to say that since your kids are average that means you are a bad parent.

Its late and I should try and get a little sleep before the day's activities get in full swing.  Let's shoot for a great day of average parenting!

Its been a few months since my last entry, but not for lack of something to write about.  Helping kids grow up can be as easy as getting out of their way and as hard as, well, as moving a mountain.  Lately I have been struggling with having to supervise or remind my teen and pre-teen to brush their teeth and go to bed at a decent hour.  If I act like a strict authoritarian mom I can supervise and threaten loss of privileges if they do not comply but that technique rarely leaves them in a good mood and leaves me longing for a better way.  I have tried the laissez-faire approach as well, letting them stay up as long as they like but waking them at the normal time in the morning, hoping their groggy state will be enough impetus to go to bed earlier next time.  It hardly ever works out like I hoped.  Most nights they get to bed at a decent hour and wake-up as expected. I myself stay up later than I should or want to, but as an adult I do what all normal adults do in this situation...go to Starbucks.  Only time will tell if my boys will figure out what is best for them and do it on their own accord, because I'm tired and do not have the energy to make them do it...at least not for the rest of the summer;)