Ohhhh, what a LONG day!!!

Finally -- the big day has arrived, and finally -- it is OVER!!! My 11 year old had her Suzuki Book Party today. My responsibilities have included: preparing the program; inviting the guests; schlepping said child to 60 instrumental lessons over the past 15 months; paying for said lessons; assuring that this child rehearsed all assigned lessons; securing a location for the Book Party; and providing refreshments for the reception after said Party. "Refreshments" being a homemade apple cake, two different kinds of homemade cookies, fresh fruit, and various beverages. (Am I CRAZY???)

For the uninitiated, the Suzuki Method is a program for teaching the violin. For the past 15 months, number one child has been studying Suzuki Book One. While that sounds like a LONG time -- it really is not. This kid had to learn, memorize, and perform 18 different pieces of music. She did a SUPER job -- and I gained about 12 dozen new gray hairs. On top of this little feat, she performed with her teacher (at church) last fall, and at Christmas, and this spring, and on Father's Day. Additional school concerts were in December, February, and May. She also took group lessons at school, so there were assignments from that teacher as well. So there was quite a repertoire of music that this child needed to master in a short period of time.

I will say that she has been diligent about practicing, though her work ethic is about average for an 11 year old. Fortunately, she has quite a bit of innate talent for this instrument, which helps immeasurably.

You may be wondering.......how does this relate to Nory's desire to lose weight??? Well, let's see now. My obsessive-compulsive mind can usually only process one major task at a time. This particular item has been all-consuming this whole summer. We wanted to get this milestone out of the way before school begins, and the insane schedule starts again. So, if I occupy my mind and my time obsessing about the kiddo's repertoire, I don't have to obsess about my diet (or lack thereof) or my weight (or excess thereof). Now that this is out of the way, I feel much freer to turn my attention to my sorry state of affairs. Except that school starts in only two weeks, and I have done virtually NOTHING about the whole diet and exercise thing. AND I am going away for 6 of my remaining days of vacation.

My new mantra (for lack of a better term for what goes on inside my head) is: "Stop beating yourself up and do something constructive". Reading weight loss blogs has put a new spin in my head, and I can feel myself gearing up for something good. I have actually been doing some kind of exercise every day for the past couple of weeks. I have also been trying to up my intake of all things good: water, vegetables, fruits, and whole grains. Maybe this alone is enough to make a shift in my thinking. (Though, I must say that I ate entirely too many of the cookies that I made for the Book Party.) Ah, well, tomorrow is another day......

Take care!

Nory