random thoughts and what's been keeping me busy

So, I think the hardest thing about moving for me so far (aside from leaving friends) is recreating the kids' extra-curricular activities. Before moving, we were so settled into the things the girls liked doing and totally happy with all of their lessons. Having as much (or as little) access to the barn as we wished was just a dream come true. Then, as I've said before, the karate school and Master Doug are just not replaceable. I knew music lessons would be on the horizon soon, but other than that, I was all set for a long time.

I have been so torn lately. The balance between finding places that are similar to what we had before, while keeping driving times short and lesson times reasonable has been very hard. Also, the balance between letting the kids do the things they are most interested in and allowing them to go separate ways (thus creating more lessons) and keeping the costs under control is also crazy. Am I the only one who obsesses about these things?

I do not do well when I am on the go all day long. I like being home. I like the kids being home, and I don't like feeling frazzled and short on time. I don't want the girls to be in lessons every single evening so that we don't ever have time to do anything else. I don't want our weekends to be packed with places to go so that we never get to spend time with David and as a family. But, I also want the girls to experience lots of different things. I want them to have skills, be active, and have responsibility for and feel the accomplishment of mastering something. At the same time, I don't want to be so committed to any one thing right now that we just live at the barn or the karate studio or the dance studio. I don't want to sell my soul to anything thing like that when they are so young. And, I don't want to unknowingly make the decision for what they spend the rest of their life doing just because the lesson was easy and convenient for me.

We finally did settle on a karate place for Grace. Harriet did love going with her in MA, but she was starting to fizzle a little bit and now that we've moved, I don't think she'd like the kinds of schools we've found. They're a bit too serious and hard-core for her personality and her age. Where is the Master Doug of NM? He's not here. I have looked high and low. Grace continues to thrive on the martial arts though, and seems to be doing ok in her transition from being a blue belt in Kung Fu to starting over in Chinese Kenpo. It was the best compromise we could come up with.

Grace also wants to learn to play the guitar. She wants to be a rock star. Far be it from me to shatter her dreams at the age of 7. I don't know if she will really turn out to be a rock star or not, but it won't hurt her to learn to play a musical instrument in the mean-time. So, I have been carefully searching out guitar instruction for her. It is very expensive (or at least seems to be double what piano is), and/or is taught by a lot of greasy old washed up former "rock stars" who, quite frankly, are not going to come within 50 feet of my little girl. Still, the cute little gal has been saving ALL her allowance, birthday money, and other little earnings for several months now to buy her own guitar. I am so proud of her for doing that. We're going to try out a place nearby that does group lessons at first and then move her into private lessons if she does prove to be as serious as she seems about it.

Little Hattie, my princess, is going to try out dancing. I have always felt bad that the pink-hating, princess-avoiding, Gracie girl got to do 2+ years of dance when she was little and Hattie hasn't had a chance yet. I guess that may be a good thing about taking her out of karate, which I wouldn't have had the heart to do in MA. We have found a studio that seems to fit the bill, so the little darling will officially start this week. She did a trial class last week and totally loved it. She kept up with the class and the teacher, and looked just like the little princess that she is!

So, I feel pretty good about our list so far, but it has taken me many weeks to find these places and come to these decisions. My only hang-ups now are the other things we could be doing. I want my kids to be good swimmers, so we really have to fit in swimming somewhere. I feel like it's a safety issue, not a fun activity issue. Grace also likes sports and I know she'd love to play on a little soccer team. But, we just can't do everything nor should we. It boils down to choosing between lots of good things.

Then, there's the barn factor. I just flat out miss riding myself and frankly haven't done much of it in the last couple of years. I have sincerely tried to be as objective as possible and not make my kids ride if they didn't want to. But, I don't know if they really had a chance to turn it down when I put them on a horse with reins in their hands for the first time before they were each even 2 years old. They truly loved Hybid Farm and "their" sweet little pony, Tink. Hattie misses her. She talks about her all the time. Grace hasn't had a lot of time to miss her yet, but I know she will. Trying to ride without working at a barn just breaks the bank. I don't want to tie myself up again working right now. I am loving the freedom I have to really take care of my kids during the day and catch up on things at night. I am trying to let the horse factor go for the moment, but I know it will keep calling me. I'm hoping we can just do some random riding here and there and fill my horse bucket (and the girls') in a different way for now.

Well, like I said, random thoughts... but that's what I have been mostly occupied doing lately! It has consumed my days by phone and my nights by internet to research it all and figure it all out.

Oh, and I've also done a little painting. People who are on my facebook have already seen these pics, but for the grandmas who have avoided the facebook era, here is my latest home improvement project/settling-in-task to be done (which is to say that I tried to make the girls' room as exactly like it was in MA as possible!):

(closet with stenciled ponies at the top)

We have tons of other projects we'd like to do in the house. But, we're just going to do them one at a time as we have time and money. I'm very happy to have this room done though. It is so much more cheerful and feels more like our home than just a place where we put our furniture and sleep on it.