Today of the First Day of the Rest of the Year

Hear that sound? The whining and feet dragging? That would be my beloved children going back to school. New teachers. A new routine. This has been a crazy summer and I don't have enough words to say how relieved I am that school is back in session.

I am trying to come up with a decent routine for school. I am not a morning person, as my sister can attest to. Coming up with something that suits four people, only one of which is an early riser, is challenging.

Getting the baby to bed is the biggest challenge. I almost feel like nothing else will get done until he's asleep. For now, I sit next to his bed until he falls asleep. He rolls around. He asks to brush his teeth again. He lists every last person he knows and asks what they are doing. Sigh. He doesn't nap anymore, so getting a good night's sleep is really important.

In other news, I spent the better part of three days in the most god awful heat, digging holes. When we moved in, there was a single clothesline. I don't own a dryer, and I don't intend on ever owning one. The clothesline broke. Not the line part, the pole part. It just wasn't fixable. Hubby got a new one, and I put them in the old holes. There wasn't any concrete, so I thought it would be ok.

They fell over.

Ok, off to Home Depot. I got quick setting concrete, thinking, surely this will do the trick. I'm not Bob Vila, but I AM pretty handy. The kids and I had a good time digging the holes. I poured the concrete and thought that was a job well done.

They fell over.

Back to Home Depot I go. I talk with some random employee walking by, and at his suggestion, get two bags of concrete. I am to redig the holes, going down in a v shape for the old concrete ball, then wider, for the new concrete.

The heat index was 110. I ran out, dug a bit, and ran back in to sit in front of the fan. That kind of heat is just illegal, or should be, anyway.

Finally, Saturday evening, the clothesline was put back up. Sunday I really needed to do laundry. We were out of almost all of the clothes, except the ones that rarely get worn.

The load of laundry finished. I stood in the yard, eyeing the line warily. I was so afraid that it would fall down again, but we were about to totally run out of clothes. Tenatively, I began hanging up my laundry.

It held.

Huzzah!