A Mother's Journal ~ Remarkable January

It was a remarkable month filled with unremarkable days. I thought I would do A Mother's Journal this morning.

On my mind ~ This has been a stressful month. Tim's surgeries although successful were also very stressful. Our daughter Katie's life is in absolute turmoil from our point of view. We hardly know what city she will be in next and with what man she will be relying on. It is so far from the way we raised her to be!  She is back in our area at the moment but not interested in the stabilizing ideas we come up with.  Lastly, our daughter Rebekah is very stressed out by audition season for summer dance intensives. She is also almost panicked about a dance competition that is coming up in which she feels extremely unprepared.  It is a ballet competition in which she will be doing one contemporary solo, one group piece and one  solo ballet variation. Her stress is affecting the entire family. It is stressful, to say the least, right now. 

Outside my window ~ We have about an inch of snow on the ground and it is bitter cold with a wind chill of minus five. We have had two other snowfalls this month that were  deep enough that they didn't melt away in hours. This one inch snowfall won't melt quickly because the temperature is so low.

What I am working on ~ On the homefront, I am working on keeping the home moving as smoothly as possible, trying to stay ahead of meals and keep everyone healthy. I am also working on lots of travel plans. We are traveling almost every weekend through March for summer intensive auditions, a dance competition, a dance festival and post-operation appointments for Tim. 

Where we are going ~ This month was filled with travel. We spent ten days in Duke University Hospital, which is almost four hours away from home. We also started to travel for an audition, but the in-person portion was cancelled while we were on the road. We had to turn around and return home, so Rebekah could do the audition on Zoom. Next week, we are traveling to Atlanta for the dance competition. 

What we are watching ~ Our family movie this week was The Dig. It was on Netflix and we really enjoyed it. Elijah even gave it a good review, and he is our family's harshest critic. Rebekah and I are also re-watching Call The Midwife for stress relief. The males in the house don't understand how watching childbirth is stress relieving, but we enjoy the mother-daughter time. Dear husband and I are watching The Hardy Boys on Hulu. 

What I am reading ~ I started the month off with reading A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles. I really enjoyed this book and hope to read some others by this author. I am currently reading Five Children and It by Nesbit. This was a book I had wanted to read to my children because they love this author, but we just never got to it. I decided I needed something light and fun. This is a perfect fit. 

What I am grateful for ~ Although this has been a stressful month, I am pleased with the results. Tim is safe and sound. His recovery is going well and he has returned to his six hour a week job. He has managed all of his pain with Tylenol and didn't need any of the stronger pain killers that were prescribed. 

This week, Elijah told me that he really likes his job and work friends. I am so glad that he is fully settled into his job at Target. His benefits started this month, too. Target gives benefits to part-time employees after six months! I am impressed. 

Rebekah passed her first audition with flying colors and received an acceptance letter. She was given the opportunity to take classes between two and seven weeks at their academy.  She will most likely be signing up to do two weeks with that ballet school in the middle of our state. She also was accepted to a one week professional training contemporary dance program at UNCSA which was a deferment from last year, because she did their ballet program which overlapped this program.  Both of these opportunities will be her first times living away from home. She is trying to piece together about six weeks of dance intensives/workshops in different schools and dance companies to maximize her overall experience. 

My favorite photo this week ~ 

Blessings, Dawn