Not to mention the fact that it curtailed Oliver's newest hobby of collecting fistfulls of leaves on the way to--and from--preschool each morning. (Okay, maybe that's not so bad. It does take us twice as long when he stops to inspect every leaf that catches his attention. As we live on a tree-lined street, this is a lot of leaves).
This past week was a little intense for me. On top of the usual things (Evelyn's gymnastics, Andrew's Tae Kwon Do, writing deadlines, etc.), this week was Pitch Wars. For those of you non-writers (most of you), this is a big annual contest where writing mentors select aspiring writers to work with and read and give feedback on their entire manuscript, and at the end of the two month revision period, the pitches and first pages are posted and literary agents (the people who submit your manuscript to big national presses) publicly request the books they're most interested in.
It's a great contest. I had a lot of success from it last year (that's the book that's going to be published next year) and I wanted to pay it forward (the contest is all volunteer run), so I volunteered as a mentor. I got to spend most of September-October working with two incredible writers on their books, and this last week was the agent round. Both of my mentees got requests, which was a huge relief (it's hard to spend so much time on something with little to show for it). But the three days of the agent round also meant I was even more distracted than usual. I think I was more anxious for my mentees to get requests than I was for myself last year.
Anyway, because Dan had to put up with me talking about it all week, I figure it's only fair to subject you all to it as well. If you're interested, you can peek at my two mentee's projects here and here.
Andrew got to go to an event for the Confucius Institute on campus and break a board (part of his Tae Kwon Do group). He was really excited. Dan, who won the parent lottery to attend with him (I got bedtime duty), was less excited. He said there were a LOT of people there. Supposedly, there are pictures, but I haven't seen them yet.
Dan and I went to the temple Saturday morning (much overdue) and it was much needed for both of us (it helped me, in particular, feel peace about some things that had been troubling me a great deal recently. Not going to say more than that, because it's still a little raw, but as this is an account of our family life, it would be less than honest to gloss over that entirely). (And wow, this post has a lot of parentheses!) Afterward, we got to have lunch with Bubby and Poppy at an all-you-can-eat sushi buffet (with, thankfully, other options as well. I've discovered I like *some* sushi at the Ninja, but unfortunately, that has also made me a sushi snob . . . ). We took the kids to Costco, which was just as exciting as you'd think on a Saturday afternoon and then headed home to clean the basement.
We've been playing "The Lake Game" (I learned it in high school as "The Expletive Game") with A and E most nights this week and it's been a lot of fun. Partly because I like the game, but partly because I enjoy watching the kids learn about gaming strategy. Evelyn's still working on it--she tends to overbid or underbid--but she's fun to watch.
It's nearly time to head to Bubby and Poppy's for our weekly dinner, so I'll sign off. Hoping our readers had a lovely fall week.
Oh, and two pictures.
I got my hair cut (finally!) and the lady also straightened it. It's a different look for me--I'm not that patient to do it in real life. And since I was taking selfies, Oliver had to have his picture taken too (with, what else, one of his leaf treasures).
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