Today

Good morning! It is a blustery one, here. Wind gusts, bursts of rain, leaves, twigs and small branches strewn in the road; just a lovely kind of day that really seems out of place in June.

Although a wet day, a lovely day.

Today I don’t much feel like writing; I do feel like reading. The problem is that I don’t really feel like reading what I need to be. I have two chapters of The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding which isn’t a bad book, and isn’t hard to read, it just isn’t what I’d like to be reading right now. There are SO many books and so little time.

Today Beauty and the Beast is out on DVD. I’m not sure I’ll actually get a copy today, but soon. Very soon.

Today Paul will be returning from the trade show he’s been at in Florida since Saturday.

Today I get to take a friend and her cat to a vet in Townsend.

Today I milked Zoey. I’m in the process of drying her up because she’s got a lump just anterior to her udder on her right side and I just noticed two days ago an odd little bump on her left teat. Time to dry the poor girl up. I didn’t milk yesterday, milked in the evening the day before, and the morning the day before that. After today, I’ll milk her again Thursday morning. Depending upon how she looks then, I may or may not milk again Sunday. And that will be it for now. I’m hoping a trip to a vet might be in the near future.

Today I worked on some sourdough bread. The starter has been just going crazy in the weather so I’ve been doing lots of sourdough stuff. Chocolate sourdough cake, sourdough English muffins (which I might need to do again today), sourdough bread, sourdough pancakes. There really is an almost limitless number of things that can be done with sourdough. I haven’t made sourdough biscuits for about ever; maybe I should do that soon.

Today Amena missed the bus. Not by much and she wasn't the only one. There were two cars ahead of us and she decided to chance it. Well, she made it because the bus drivers own grandkids (did I say that? of course I meant grandchildren) were late. While they were rushing to the road, a car pulled up behind me and another girl ran to the bus. I guess this was just the day to miss the bus.

Today I am tired. Yesterday I went to bed at a reasonable hour; earlier than I’d planned, actually, because my earbuds decided to poop out on me and they needed to be charged. I slept well all night and I woke up at my usual 5:00. I did go back to sleep until 5:30 and then got up. Actually, I think my eyes are tired. I need new glasses.

Today I am done for now. Have a fantabulous one!

Thus It Is

Good morning. My list of things to do today is very short. It has only seven items. The reason for that is because I do not yet know what the day looks like. I will proceed with my list as if I have nothing else to do and hope for the best.

I was waiting for Amena after work.

There are some problems with writing in a journal, electronic or not, with the sole intent of posting on a blog. One of those is that the mundane every day occurrences don’t get recorded. I have so many thoughts and feelings that just don’t get expressed because they are unpopular with someone in my family and probably with some of the people who might read my blog. And that is very sad because it means that I’m not really being me. Julia got her ear full when she was over the other day and I feel bad for dumping on her but it doesn’t seem to me that anyone else, with one exception, really gets it. Still, I should be writing things down somewhere and if not here (meaning the journal, not the blog), where? I don’t know. I do have some entries here, meaning the journal, that are not posted in the blog. And I keep this, the journal, on a password-protected flash drive. I don’t know.

This morning, however, I felt like writing and I almost have to wonder why. And some of the reasons why I won’t be posting on the blog and I’m not sure if I’ll even write them here.

Still, here I am.

We stopped at a cemetery in Gardner for some pictures of the sunset. This picture doesn't do it justice but I thought it was cool, anyway.

It has been a lot of fun watching Maddie. She’s getting so big and learning so many things. She’ll have her first birthday in just one month and ten days from today. Where has the time gone? And Elias is growing, too, but we don’t get to see that. And I miss it.

Anyway, Maddie has started waving good-bye and “Ma-ma-ma-ma” and “Da-da-da-da” have begun to take on meaning. I always listen for Joanna when she comes to pick Maddie up so that we can meet her at the door, and Maddie is learning to expect that. She’s started sucking her thumb when she’s tired but she tries really hard to avoid falling asleep. She just loves to talk and is very animated.

I am so looking forward to seeing together and spending time with her and Elias.

I have been taking a class called Starting and Growing My Business. It is part of the Self-Reliant Services of the Perpetual Education Fund of the church and it is fantastic. I was asked to participate in the class by the facilitator and I of course said I would. I’m pretty sure that he and those who know me very well who are also taking the class thought I’d use the information to do something with soap but that is not the case.

Maddie was having some fruit. I just love the expressions this girl makes.

Everyone makes soap now. I’m not going to stop making it and I might even sell at a Farmer’s Market again if I can find someone willing to work with me, but I’m not going to expect it to take off and pay my bills.

I decided to use the class as an impetus to finish my doula certification and begin working as a doula. My initial goal was to have the course work done and be ready to get my name out there by the end of the class. To be honest, I wasn’t sure I would be able to because it seemed like there was so much to do. However, although there was a lot to do, much of what there was I already had at least begun so it was really just a matter of finishing. This week we will have our seventh (of twelve) class and it is theoretically possible I might have everything done by then.

She's so much fun!

At this point, I have only two assignments to complete. For one, I need to finish collecting client evaluations. I have one, two should be in the mail, one I can get done as soon as the two in the mail arrive. That just leaves the fifth which might be a bit more tricky, but I’m going to be optimistic. The other requires attending a breastfeeding class. Since the current unit I am working on for midwifery is breastfeeding, I contacted the director of the doula program and asked if completion of this unit would count and she said it would. So, I have much reading and some assignments to do. If I am able to get lots of reading accomplished in the next couple of days, it is possible. Perhaps not likely, however, since some of the reading is seven chapters of a fairly dry textbook.

Seven-hundred ninety words, a green smoothie later, and 2/3 of my bottle of water later, I believe it is time to be done with this and bid you adieu.

Have a fantastic day!

PS Guess what will be out on DVD tomorrow?