Day 61

I haven't written for a while.  The cause would be Thanksgiving, which was nice but busy.  The only thing I can think of that I could have written about was yesterday.  We came home from church, and I announced that we were going to work outside.  I heard a chorus of "Nooo!"s, and I then told them that game-time was riding on them helping.  I went out to work alone. 
Pretty soon, Emily came out.  I told her where the work gloves were, and she got them.  She asked if she could do the job I was doing, which was raking muck out of our small pond.  I gladly let her so that I could start taking dead stalks out of the pond's surrounding garden. 
While I took the sopping muck and dead leaves to the edge of the woods for disposal, Emily asked if there was something else she could do ("What, you don't want to help move mucky bio-hazardous waste?  What's the matter with you?") so I sent her to Rabbit Hill.  Rabbit Hill was at one time a pile of dirt that we had delivered.  It was supposed to be screened top soil.  Instead, it contained little surprises like half of a brick, or broken glass.  Not cool.  So, instead of being used and spread and beautiful by now, we had Rabbit Hill, a collection of ragweed and other noxious weeds that could not be mown.  The dirt had been delivered in April.  It's now the end of November.  It was getting to the point that we couldn't open the car door on that side of the driveway because of the weeds. 
Anyway, all this time, Luke was whining at me from the doorway.  I told him go in or grab gloves and come out and help.  To my Utter Astonishment, he grabbed gloves and came out to help with Rabbit Hill.  We ripped out weeds and they climbed up and got the top weeds out, and we soon had an impressive pile of weeds to cart to the woods.  Emily took a well-deserved break, and Luke and I carted the stuff.  He helped until it was all gone.  I think somewhere along the line, it became less about a reward, and more about enjoying doing the job.  It was uber-cool.

Now, on to Monday:
I am constantly surprised by how up and down one day can be.  This morning, anticipating trouble from the ranks, I pulled out the big guns right away.  "No video games for a week if you give me trouble!"  As it turned out, though, I didn't really have to.  Luke gave me very little trouble on our way to orchestra, and even played well.  His only comment was to ask if we 'had to stay' after.  I said no, as we were going to Aikido, and that seemed to help.  It also helps that we have an audio book in the car, and the only time we listen to it is if we are in the car.  It's not the most cerebral stuff, but it is entertaining, and at least the vocabulary is ok, and the characters have moral questions to deal with.  But while Gregor the Overlander isn't exactly educational, it helps get us where we are going. 

After Aikido is when things started heading downhill.  School after Aikido in the afternoon seems to be a big issue.  I may have to reorganize our 'schedule' that we put together to take that into account.  Luke is also extremely tired which, while I understand it, doesn't excuse him from doing work or being civil to his sister.  Things deteriorated until Dad came home and saved the day.  He displayed the utmost patience when I couldn't, helping Luke through math and English.  After dinner, he even cooked with each kid, seperately.  Luke and Dad made chocolate chip cookies, then Emily and Dad made banana bread.  Dad also did all the dishes and made the coffee for the morning!!  He's the only reason I'm sane at the moment.  I need all the sane moments I can get.  I love that man!