The Seat of My Pants

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I used to be pretty good at flying by it--the seat of my pants, that is.

I first discovered this when I became a teacher. If something happened and a part of my lesson plans weren't going to pan out, I was pretty good at coming up with a last minute activity. Sometimes they were really good! Like, really, really good. Kind of scared me, actually.

And something happening out of the ordinary--such as an assembly--did not throw my day off. Boy some teachers would be upset. They liked their schedule and their routine. Me? I liked the occasional "different" day. It kept things interesting.

The older I've gotten, the more I like planning. I still like to think of myself as flexible, but I do like to have stuff planned out.

I make a menu plan every week before I grocery shop. Otherwise we spend $150 at the store and have nothing that makes an actual meal.

I plan out expenses each month and we make a budget. Otherwise we spend all the money and have nothing to actually live on.

I plan field trips. I plan errands. I plan parties.

I try to plan lessons every week. I'm really trying to relax that this year. I have spent too many Sunday afternoons to count planning lessons or at least writing out which lessons I wanted my daughters to do over the years. This year, I really tried to be a "just-do-the-next-thing-open-and-go" kind of homeschool mom. But I realized after the first week that I couldn't do it. The girls both had laminated checklists of what they were supposed to do, but *I* didn't know what we were doing!

So I made a little form and filled in some information. I don't like it just yet. It needs some tweaking. And this last weekend I didn't get any planning in anyway. I hate opening a book and finding out there are materials we need and I haven't gathered them or we don't have them. It's been a frustrating week on that end and it's only Tuesday. Hopefully next week I'll be more together.

My husband is kind of a planner too. He likes to use technology. He uses nearly every feature on his phone. He uses apps. If there is technology out there to help plan something, he uses it.

I think I nearly killed him earlier this month when I went to buy a 5 subject spiral notebook. I'm too low-tech for him.

Of course, he also uses these. So...just whatever. My notebook is bigger, that's all.

I guess what I've learned is....I CAN fly by the seat of my pants. But life works a lot better when I plan.

Adulthood. It sneaks up on you.

Signing off,