I think on Monday, I woke up on the wrong side of the universe. By 7:30 a.m., Steve and I had an argument about division of responsibility in our morning routines. He takes the girls to school for me most morning, which is a huge help for me, except when it isn’t. Steve is very, very structured and he likes things to run on a precision time schedule. I’m happy if I get where I’m going at something close to on time. On Monday, the girls were running behind because I woke them up late and they were procrastinating brushing their teeth. I, of course, hadn’t signed all of the girls’ weekend paperwork; I hadn’t printed out Abigail’s reading forms for the books; I hadn’t finished their little gifts for their teachers for 12 Days of Christmas. So, Steve was barking out how many minutes the girls had left before they need to leave; the girls were whining and procrastinating. I snapped and yelled at Steve and basically told him he was no help at all and that I would start taking the girls every morning. He snapped and said if I didn’t wait until the last minute to do everything, we wouldn’t have this problem. Both of us were angry; both of us exaggerated. Abigail went into her angry bird mode and fussed at us for fighting; Gracie went into her bedroom and looked upset. Brilliant way to start the week. Steve and I rarely fight. Luckily, when we do, our fights don’t last long and we usually talk things out and things turn out better than they were before we fought. This was the case this time – I’m writing this on Thursday and the girls have been walking out the door for school on time, with no stress on my part and no drill sergeanting on Steve’s. But, I still didn’t like the way I felt on Monday morning after they left.
The rest of the day was equally as tough. Abigail was a complete handful and by the end of the evening, she had me in tears. Gracie struggled with her homework. By bedtime, here’s the only living thing in the house who was really still speaking to me!
I love this dog so much! She is my constant companion when I’m working and she’s always willing to be a test subject for my photography trial runs.
The day did have some high points, though! I’m photographing a wedding on Saturday and I’ve been having a bit of trouble with my telephoto lens focusing – it is several years old and has been put through more than a normal lens – beach photography can be rough on equipment! Then, yesterday, my five year old flash bit the bullet. I’m not really sure what I want to get for replacement equipment, so I rented a lens and a flash from BorrowLenses.com. They arrived on Monday and I am in love! It’s been well over two years so I bought any photography equipment so it was nice to be able to play with some new toys. I can’t get over the detail this lens has. It looks like I could reach out and pet Ella Bella’s fur right through the computer screen. The flash is pretty sweet, too. It’s much more powerful than the one I had which is going to be a big help on Saturday!
After school, we had scouts. The girls made cards for the nursing home where we’re going caroling next week. Before the meeting, Abigail worked on her homework. She’s so funny – she gets her homework monthly and she usually does the entire month’s work the first day. This month, she decided to wait and do some of it all along.
I guess the downside of doing December Daily is documenting the not-so-good days along with the good ones. Life is certainly not all sunshine and daisies around here, but even on the bad days, there are bright spots!