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Saturday
Saturday, M12 spent all day working on his HAM Radio Merit Badge. Aaron and I took IL5 to the McDonald’s Playplace and then to buy a turkey for Thanksgiving and a balloon for D14’s birthday celebration. The rest of the day was spent recuperating from a stressful week.
Sunday
Sunday I took M12 to Barnes and Noble and picked out a book for his present, and then paid for it myself. So I’m pretty sure that counts as a gift from me. But he took the credit. 🤣😂 It’s hard picking books for her.
M12 went to band, and then we celebrated D14’s birthday. We celebrated early so we could separate the birthday cakes out by a little longer. IL5’s birthday is a week after hers. Then D14 picked The Truman Show to watch together. Afterwards, she went downstairs and M12 played on his tablet, so IL5 and I watched Jurassic Park. He hid his face a few times, but was generally pretty excited about the movie. Apparently he takes more after his mom than his dad as far as scary movies go.
Monday
Monday I took dad to cardiac rehab and then to a fitness center to get him a silver sneakers membership. He also got a personal trainer. Then I ran errands with Aaron, followed by a phone call to a major clinic to get IL5 on the psychology wait list. Apparently, the person that I talked to earlier was wrong about the wait. (She said two months) The system is a mess. First, I wait zero to 3 months for an initial assessment. Then, after the 2 hour assessment, I get to call daily to see if there are any openings for a psychologist until eventually I get one. It sounds like a lovely system, since it’s a half hour wait on hold each time I’ll call. I’ll probably keep looking in the meantime.
After roast for dinner, Aaron and I watched a little Supernatural M22 watched YouTube, IL5 wrote a book (fanfic of the Minecraft book we’re currently reading) and watched YouTube, and D14 worked on a puzzle.
Tuesday
Tuesday I spent the morning making phone calls. I was trying to find a psychologist for IL5 in shorter time than half a year, and with less effort than being on hold a half hour daily. But there were no openings anywhere. Then I called the clinic that would be doing IL5’s OT, and spent almost an hour at “spot 2 in queue” before getting an answer. Then they told me the referral hadn’t come through.
Then I went to the gym with dad. I got a membership as his gift, while he did his trainer appointment. I spent the rest of the time on the treadmill.
After that, Aaron and I ran errands. We bought D14 a new bed that would fit in her room better. It will be delivered after the asbestos tiles are removed in January. The other errands were rather mundane.
I made some salmon for dinner, and then relaxed for the rest of the night. All three kids watched YouTube.
Wednesday
Wednesday I was sleepy all day, and the kids were home from school. First, I took dad to his appointment, and left him there for my sister to pick him up. I went to the gym for a while. Then I fell asleep on the couch. In the evening, I brined the turkey in the evening, then read to D14. Other than that, the kids brain rotted all day. I think Aaron napped most of the day? I wasn’t paying attention to him.
Thursday
Happy Thanksgiving! After work, I rushed over to the gym to get a workout on the treadmill before cooking the feast. We had turkey, corn casserole, asparagus, sausage and veggies, mashed potatoes, stuffing, and pie. (The pie was store-bought.) My friend Liz came over to join us. IL5 even ate some turkey after I picked off every stray herb.
Friday
Friday I was busy catching up on some of my goals for the week early in the day, plus IL5 took at lot of my time after 5pm, so I didn’t get my exercise in. That was the first time for the week, so I did pretty well. I wrote a letter to Letters Against Isolation (which had to be mailed by the 30th), and a letter to Pennsylvania. I took dad to an appointment. And I read. IL5 relaxed, as did Aaron.
Week’s Photos


Reading to myself
- Children of Blood and Bone, by Tomi Adeyemi
- Return of the Native, by Thomas Hardy
- Warmth of Other Suns, by Isabel Wilkerson
- Carpe Jugulum, by Terry Pratchett
- The Week: Wrecking Crew
- Behave, by Robert Sapolsky
Reading to IL5
- Last Block Standing, by Nick Eliopulos
- Crack in the Code, by Nick Eliopulos
D14 reading
- This Lie Will Kill You, by Chelsea Pitcher
- Neverseen, by Shannon Messenger (I’m reading this with D14)
Weight loss

Cross-stitch

Media Completed

This is the 5th book in the Woodsword Chronicles, a Minecraft series that IL5 really enjoyed. It doesn’t really end the story, though. It leaves a thread hanging for the follow-up series.


IL5 picked this from his school library. After reading it, he decided it was very short. It would be considering I read him mainly 3rd grade chapter books. This was a cute story, though.


This is the first book in the Stonesword Chronicles, which is the follow-up of the Woodsword Chronicles. Like the first book, it is about teamwork. IL5 enjoyed it so much that he wrote a fanfic of it.
