Weekly Mileage #142 and the Concerts

Monday as soon as I dropped off Ocean at preschool I placed my paper order. I had hoped to go for a trail run and hike after that, but it was cold and pouring rain all day. I still wasn't over my cold, so I was not willing to get wet and cold.

Tuesday we drove Jeremy to the VA hospital after music lessons so he could get another shot in his back. They decided not to and to wait another month or so, which is good, but a pain since we all had to drive there and back for nothing. They decided to wait since his last one is still working a little and they don't want to do the shots too close together since they will eventually stop working. Keeping them spread as far apart as possible prolongs the usefulness of this particular therapy.

That night I started staining and painting the rest of the kitchen cupboards. I stained half the bases and primed the uppers years ago, but then pooped out and never finished. We're refinancing the house and need a new appraisal, so I figured it would be a good idea to have the house looking as good as possible. ie, no mismatched, leprous cupboards.

those uppers may not look bad in the pic, but in reality they were pretty terrible.
half the bases on the island to the right of the pic were also only half done.

Wednesday it was cold with a teensy tiny amount of snow:

It may look like frost, but we're calling it snow, even if it did melt away pretty quickly.

That morning I picked up my music paper and got the orders shipped that needed to go out that day. Then I finished staining and painting the cupboards. I've been wearing a mask and using a neti pot and my sinuses are staying clear and not gooping up into a sinus infection.

Thursday I put doors and drawers back up and put the knobs and pulls on them. I still need to paint the walls, but I should be able to get that done this week.

That night we went to the Trans Siberian Orchestra concert with the older two kids (Ocean got to hang out with friends). Jeremy and I went to a TSO concert 15 years ago and when we saw they were coming to town, we decided it was time to go again. I'd ordered etymotic ear plugs to filter the noise, but I forgot them at home. Definite noise overload. Also light overload. They still love their laser lights and we were sitting in the nosebleed seats and ended up with super bright spotlights blinding us during two songs.

Despite the noise and light overload, it was a good concert.

Friday evening was Jeremy's work party. He took the older two kiddos while I put Ocean to bed. He was so sleep deprived (he always is since he insists on waking up earlier than he needs to and he doesn't take naps) and I was still dealing with system overwhelm from Thursday's concert. This happened after we had the mobile sawmill out in the spring, too, but it wasn't quite so bad this time. The best thing to do afterwards seems to be to keep stress and stimulation to a minimum and wait for my system to calm down.

Saturday morning we dipped pretzels for our YW fundraiser. It went quicker than we were afraid it would, even with only a few girls showing up. I'm not sure yet if we made enough money to make this worthwhile, so the jury is still out on whether we'll repeat it next year.

After dipping pretzels, I worked on notebooks. I cut out covers for my 12 open music notebook orders and then folded and sewed all the paper I picked up Wednesday. I've figured out some routines and made up some templates that I use when cutting the leather and marking the holes for the stitching that make things go faster.

That evening Sunshine and I went to the Lindsey Stirling concert. Sunshine's a big fan so even though it was right after the TSO concert, we went to this one too. I remembered my earplugs this time and while the noise level wasn't nearly as bad as the TSO concert, it still would have been too much. The earplugs meant I was functional the next day, so they're definitely worth it.

waiting for the concert to start

It's funny that we haven't been to a concert in 15 years and this week we had two. As I joked to a friend, it'll probably be another 15 years before we go to another one. These two worked out because they were both local. Time is an issue, so we're not going to a concert if we have to travel to see it.

Sunday we were up at 4 to drive 3 hours to drill. Jeremy's unit had a Christmas party that family members were invited to Sunday afternoon, but they still had drill stuff in the morning. It was a bit annoying on the timing, since the kids and I had to find something to do while we waited for Jeremy to do his drill stuff. I wasn't about to take the kids to some random ward by myself. Ocean is a high energy child and has a hard time sitting still and being quiet for longer than 5 seconds. After way too little sleep I did not have enough energy to try to help him be calm and reverent. Too bad I can't siphon some of his energy into me.

We stayed in the car for an hour or so while I attempted to nap, then we found a park and went for a short hike. The boys were able to run around and the fresh air helped me feel more alert. It was a muddy hike, but I'd anticipated this (it was a rainy week) and brought a change of shoes and pants for everyone.

that's the trail, not a stream

After our hike we changed into clean clothes and went back to the armory for the party. It was a reasonably good time, but not enough to make this an annual thing.

We had a rainy week and between that, doing the cupboards, and catching up on my notebooks, there wasn't much time for hiking. Thankfully, I did get a lot done, and I'm feeling more like I did in October, before I got glutened.

Weekly Mileage
Sunday- 1.40 mile hike
total- 1.40 miles

43 hikes towards #52hikechallenge
2.56 kayak miles towards #365milechallenge

157.57 outdoor foot miles towards #365milechallenge
41.16 indoor foot miles towards #365milechallenge
130.0 bike miles towards #365milechallenge
331.29 miles total