I Am Woman...Oh Gosh.

I thought this was supposed to get easier.  Truth be told, I never had it that rough to begin with.  Even when my kids were young, I made a conscious effort to be not busy.  The most chaotic time that I can remember was when I was juggling 3 kids under the age of 10 while studying my way through Massage School 9 years ago.  When I graduated, I vowed never to be that busy again.

I've spent the past few years making sure to schedule my days with plenty of stress-free time.  Happy Mommy; Happy Home, right?  Maybe I was doing something right, or maybe I was doing something very wrong.  Whichever the case may be, I find myself completely frustrated by my ever shortening days when my oldest is graduated and my youngest is in all-day-every-day Kindergarten, which should mean that I can go back to bed until Noon and still have plenty of time before they get home.

What I didn't bank on was having a sudden change in standard on some things that didn't used to take priority.  Take house cleaning, for instance.  When the kids were little, I didn't even bother.  Suddenly, with the help of a dear Sis, I've broken my home down into sections and days and I'm on a strict cleaning schedule.  When in the heck did a clean house become a priority for me?

Next up; workouts.  Although my involvement in events requiring extreme physical training seem to have stayed in 2012, I've grown accustomed to these size jeans and I'm not yet willing to let myself go.  (Yet.)  Therefore, daily workouts are non-negotiable.  Then factor in my regular home-clients, recently accepting the Massage Therapist position at the local Salon and my occasional writing projects and suddenly I have a scheduling situation on my hands.  And that's not even counting doing the Wife/Mom thing.

The icing on the cake was beginning a Beth Moore Bible Study with my closest girlfriends.  Gone are the days of casually sitting down with my bible and latest workbook at my leisure.  No, suddenly, I'm being held accountable and although it's exactly what I need, I'm not used to it.  This past Sunday night was our first meeting with the assignment to have the first 2 Chapters done.  Guess who skipped the 2nd half of the first Chapter and was still unable to complete the entire 2nd Chapter on time?  Yours truly.  By Tuesday I realized I was already behind schedule on chapters 3 & 4 and became increasingly angry every time C would interrupt me during the lesson on the importance of being slow to anger.
Yes, God has a twisted sense of humor.

I'm starting to relate to the chaotic schedules I hear so many other moms talking about except I don't know how to handle it yet.  What I do know is that a change is in order and today was Day 1 of being on a very strict schedule starting when the girls walked out the door for school at 7:30 and it's been non-stop all day.  Part of me is feeling completely exhausted and ready for a nap, but the other part of me is feeling a little Proverbs 31'ish...minus a few things like 'buying fields, planting vineyards and bringing food from a-far'...I bring food from a-Walmart, but considering where we live, it's kinda the same thing.

Unfortunately, the thought of doing it all over again tomorrow has me completely depressed.  But if the Proverbs chic could do it, the least I can do is follow through with this experiment till the end of the week.

That means I have one more day to teach my children to arise and call me blessed.
Oh, it's gonna happen...