But then what? In this week’s episode, Sarah and I (who both moved in 2022) answer a listener question about the longer process of adjusting to a new place. Giving yourself a longer time line on big projects can be a big help. It also turns out that Sarah and I have different perspectives on putting things on the walls…

After talking about moving, we tackle other listener questions including some on later evening kid activities (while these can be challenging, we also appreciate that late start times allow kids who are in after care to participate), boundary setting, hormonal mood changes, and more.

Please give the episode a listen! And as always, we really appreciate ratings and reviews.

Over the weekend I did cross a major parenting milestone. The 2-year-old can now reliably sit and watch a video like Peppa Pig or the wide variety of YouTube offerings (“Hazel’s Mom” is a particular favorite). So when my husband took the 10-year-old and 7-year-old out for the afternoon, I left the little guy in the care of the two older boys while I went for a run in the neighborhood. He sat at the computer with the video on, and I had the 12-year-old sit in the same room with him (watching his phone), and basically neither moved for the 30 minutes I was gone. Success!

Speaking of the 2-year-old, he has been on a strike against napping in the crib. So over the weekend, I gave in and let him nap in my lap both days. In related news, my screen time totals on my iPhone are quite high…

I’ve been showering at night because it makes getting ready in the AM much faster. Unfortunately, I’m sometimes cold at night (though we’ve now set the bathroom heat to come on around my shower time). So I’ve come up with the strategy of hanging two towels over the shower door. When I turn the water off, I immediately wrap one around me. Then I can use the other for my hair without getting too shivery.

I also found my real towels this weekend, so I’m no longer using beach towels, though I did like that they were very large.

The 7-year-old recently celebrated a birthday. Since writing is a source of real tension, we had him record video thank yous to the people who gave him gifts. This inspired far less resistance.

We now have our “real” fridge and freezer, which is great, because we have more capacity. One current helpful life strategy is having set meals for certain nights. Wednesday, for instance, is always breakfast-for-dinner day. This tends to be pancakes, scrambled eggs, bacon, and fruit. Easy, and everyone eats it. Friday is pizza night. This will be make-your-own-pizza night again once we get our oven but for now I’m ordering in. We do Sunbasket kits on Monday and Tuesday (usually) as a way to have some variety. We often have steak one night over the weekend, which only leaves two days to sort out. In the morning, I almost always give kids toaster waffles plus fruit. (Some people add milk, or yogurt, and the occasional handful of chocolate chips). Most people have one toaster waffle, though my daughter has two. If you do the math this means we go through a normal box of toaster waffles in two days. This explains the appeal of Costco!

Photo: Ice on a trail from one of my weekend runs.

Perhaps this shouldn’t astonish me, but it does. Work was heavy, though not overly so. The planned personal events consumed many hours — the new house end-of-project walk-through, organizing and wrapping presents (that took over 3 hours to ensure under-the-tree equity…), a child’s band performance, choir practice — but these were built into the model. The complications happen when you throw in the curveballs: the forgotten earth science project materials that necessitated a trip to Michaels, the 6-year-old scratching his eye with the foam at gymnastics last night such that it is swollen and he can’t keep it comfortably open so he is home with me today, a during-the-week house showing that came up yesterday….

Life seldom goes as planned. But the upside of thinking through the week ahead of time — which I do each Friday — is that you can identify what absolutely has to happen. Then you can think about when it can happen. And then you can build in open space for when the inevitable crises arise. Since you know what has to happen, those priorities get automatically rescheduled for the available open space. And one way or another, stuff gets done.

Well, most of it. I didn’t order the mat to go under the exercise equipment at the new house, but to be honest, despite the time sensitivity there, it probably wasn’t a top priority…

Do you plan your weeks on Fridays?

I set my alarm for 6:10, intending to nudge the teenager out of bed, so he could take the bus to school. (He shares a room with his little brother, who can sleep a little longer, so we come wake him rather than have him set an alarm that is going to wake his brother too. This will not be the case in the new house thank goodness!). My husband and I had a walk-through meeting at our new house at 7 a.m. with the contractors to take stock of what needs to be fixed before we move in a few weeks from now. Our nanny agreed to come at 6:45 or so.

Well, I woke at 6:40. My alarm was ringing…but silently. I’m still not sure what I did there. My husband was up and in the shower but I guess hadn’t noticed that none of the rest of us were moving (including the teenager). I threw on some clothes, woke the kid up and drove over to the new house while my husband did the school run (since the bus was long gone by that point).

The house is coming along nicely. I trudged through with my coffee, flushing toilets to make sure they worked, turning on faucets and light switches and so forth. We may not have an oven when we move in, but we will have a stove so I guess that’s good. In any case, I was in the midst of that when I got a text from another child who asked if I had the felt and foam half-sphere he needed for an earth science project. What? He’d mentioned something on Friday, but I had not understood that this was needed by Monday morning. He thought I had ordered it or something and then when I was gone when he needed to leave there was general panic.

And so I found myself at Michael’s craft store after the construction walk-through. This was quite the place! They did indeed have foam half spheres. And full spheres. I bought a variety, plus felt for creating the various layers of the earth. And potato chips because I was hungry by this point and not inclined to make healthy breakfast choices. Is there any thing this store doesn’t have??? It’s a good thing I don’t go there often.

Anyway, I drove my bag of stuff over to the middle school and left it with the security guard who has a book shelf for just such forgotten things. Indeed, I saw that there were materials for other children in the same class sitting there.

By the time I got home it was 10:30 a.m. I attempted to get started with work, but wound up needing to deal with the forms to lock in the movers for early January. On the plus side, I learned that the Notes function on an iPhone can scan documents and turn them into PDFs. This is very useful knowledge!

Anyway, we’ll see what I get done over the next few hours before I take two of the kids to get dose #2. The people running the clinic (for 5-11 year olds) have promised a special guest at the post-shot waiting area. So…is it going to be Santa? I’m not sure it’s possible to keep kids socially distanced from Santa, and streams of children all piling on the same guy would be ironic at a Covid vaccine clinic. So maybe it won’t be Santa. One of the area sports team mascots? I’ll report back!

Photo: Colorful felt!

So it goes. This tree’s glowing red and the magnolia in the front yard’s showy pink spring blossoms last for just a week or so each year. Whatever else is going on, I know I need to stop and notice them. Savor them for a few days in April and November. This year this savoring has had more poignancy to it as we will be living in our new house for the spring blossoms. There are going to be beautiful ones there. I walked a row of late blooming cherry trees, for instance, and once we start taking care of the place it will blossom. I know there are fiery trees there for autumn, too. But we come to know “our” trees and their rhythms and this year I am saying goodbye to these.

Anyway, it has been a long week, with much interrupted sleep. The toddler has been clingy and unhappy (the interrupted sleep isn’t good for him either, even if he’s causing the problem!). But the kids’ activities are winding down, so this weekend should, theoretically, be more relaxed. I sorted through some kid clothes and found size 12 jeans for the 12-year-old. I also found a pair of *my* jeans tucked in that same pile, which I guess had been missing for a while. Since it’s raining today, the workmen aren’t working on my neighbor’s roof, so I can get ahead on recording. I will take these little wins!