Waiting for your schedule to calm down and return to “normal” can feel like running around a hamster wheel. After one more attempt I’ve driven this thought home: my new normal just won’t fit back into the box.

So, now what?

Getting angry and stomping my feet will get me absolutely no where, except burn a few calories. It’s time to let go of what once was. Wait, but it was so nice and pretty. Okay, one more second to mourn…that’s enough. I must move on and make this work. It’s time to either accept the pace of my week or make changes to the few things left under my discretion.

I had a pretty good evil day job week, back to the hours I signed up for. My week should have slipped right back into the normal routine, right? Wrong. My youngest turned three at the end of August. I’ve been waiting to give him his big boy room until I had a moment to breathe. So instead of enjoying a week with some extra room, I filled it to the brim with last minute details, painting, sorting, hanging…and the big reveal. The results are spectacular and somehow fit into our budget, even better. My little guy likes robots. The silver lamp you see was my childhood lamp. Up until a couple days ago it was an adorable baby room yellow with delicate white striping. Don’t tell my mom, she doesn’t know yet.

The Goals – week-4 results

• Spend at least 1-hour a day with my characters- done
• Weekly progress in word count, editing, and/or plotting- done. This week started with plotting and ended with a battle won round of edits. More huge steps on the critique partner front. I think I might have found the golden egg. The partner that has the skills you need/vice versa and in your genre. She’s a writer I’ve been enjoying too, which is nice. Plus, she’s very active, which is huge. So often things don’t work out, because one or both are not on the same path. Fingers crossed. I hope to send her back my crit of her MS tonight and last night I sent her mine.
• Finish reading current craft book- I spent a few hours with Margie yesterday. Love her packets.
• Workout a minimum of three times a week and round it out with plenty of water, sleep and my calorie limit- done.
• Study one of the Nia 52-moves each week- Spinal Roll: stand in “A” stance, inhale deeply, look up, sense the front of your body lengthening and opening. Use your hands as support and slide them down your legs. Sink until you reach the point your body says, “enough.” Exhale and look toward the earth, round up, push your feet into the floor and walk your hands back up your legs until you return to a standing posture.
• Finish the Nia Sanjana-routine bars and start the Nia Opal-routine bars (i.e. studying the song/movement structure)- no progress. This task is falling down the hole again this round. Mostly due to my work schedule and apparently it’s prioritized after my writing, which I find very interesting. BUT I do want to study, practice, and teach Nia…I need to find time for this goal in the New Normal. WEEK-5 PRIORITY
• Stay on top of my co-op preschool Treasurer responsibilities- done. Huge deposits made this week. I could have done more, but I accomplished plenty, which means I have loads to do this coming week. yeah.
• Organize something in the house each week-  done. In preparation for the big boy room change, I needed to to go through my oldest’s closet. A couple weeks ago I pulled out all the clothes he can no longer wear, or so I thought. I’ve found more! I also sorted through my old suits, which I had hanging in his closet. At the end of the review I had more clothes in storage waiting for my youngest, a bag for donation, and a large stack ready for consignment. The organization continued big time as the change in our youngest’s room went into full swing. Glad that is done, but there is still more to do. Including selling all the baby room things. Anyone need a crib set, including valances and hamper in a yellow and green frog/pond theme 🙂

I hope everyone has a great week. I’ll be attempting to change things up this week, which is a must. Later today my hubs cousin from CA is coming to stay with us for two days. Her  boyfriend dumped her cruelly and she’s a little brokenhearted. I’m going to do my part, strong hugs, good coffee, and Nia. She loves Nia.

Be sure to come back this week. I’m super excited to be sharing with you two books I’m totally geeked about. Until then…

What you might have missed here this week:

Review: Wicked Allure by Leslie C. Ferdinand
Spotlight: Anna Doubles Down by Missy Martine
Flash Fiction #28 – Release the Tension