One (Chaotic)(Fun)(Busy)(Exciting) Day

Being in a large family means that my day usually isn't based on what I want to do, but rather on what must be done. Cleaning up a mess here, making lunch there, finishing up schoolwork, or whatever happens to be more important than playing at the moment. Yet, somehow, squeezed in between the slim cracks of time during the day, I manage to find time to do some of the things I love most. Even though sporadic changes are common in my schedule, here's the basic blueprint of my day.





7:30: About this time, Mom yells up the stairs for her "lazybones" to get out of bed and eat
breakfast.


8:00: Finds me tearing the covers off my little sister, mostly because I'm wondering where my clothes are (she loathes messy rooms and hides my clothes if I leave them out. Grrr!).


8:30: Having finished breakfast and doing my hair, this is the time slot allotted for piano practice. Beating on the piano usually upsets the other piano players, since it means they'll
have to practice at lunch break (a cause for grief, I assure you).


9:00: History! An hour on the couch listening to Mom read is great but also a hazardous
endeavor since it means that all the kids will be wiggly by the time its finished.


10:00 - 12:00: Errand time, catching up on homework time, and cleaning time. Mom has a
system where everyone has an assigned part of the house to clean called the "hotspot."
When the house gets messy mom just calls for everyone to do their hotspot and the
house is magically cleaned in less than 15 minutes!



12:00: Lunch. My sister and I do dishes and then we are free for the rest of the afternoon.



1:00: Writing time. Anything that comes to mind is rapidly produced on a word document or a piece of loose leaf paper. I journal, write a poem that relates to my feelings at the moment, and brainstorm ideas that could potentially fill a novel. Instead of working on wordiness during this time (unless I am actually writing a story) I try to just focus on getting the idea on paper, the scenery at the moment, the feelings in the scene (IE, tension, excitement, an elusive feel etc.), whats racing through the characters mind, and other important things like that. Some days I'll have a character that needs to come to life (a lot of the times, the characters are based on someone I met) and I'll spend my time fleshing out the characters personality. Whatever it is, its always fun to spend time doing one of my favorite things.



2:30ish: When I've finished writing, if I've completed a poem I'll take it to the piano and see if it'll make good music lyrics. Sometimes they work, but most of the time I have to edit a lot before it makes any sense. The thing about poems is that their real wordy so they sound weird when put to music. Lyrics are a lot simpler and say what needs to be said in a lot fewer words. If I haven't I'll just play around, write a few funky lyrics and make a funny beat and sing to it. Just recently my Dad bought the software to record music and so I can put tracks down and layer them which is lots of fun.



3:30: If my youngest brothers awake from his crucial nap, I'll go to the basement and sing on my karaoke machine. Unlike some, this one has big speakers therefore making it loud (especially when you add the acoustic basement). Which is great if your preforming and stuff but not so much when you need to be quiet (or, in my case, when you're trying to get out of doing the dishes).



4:00ish: Mom and I start preparing dinner and the kids do their hotspots (again). Mom purposely made mine one of the easiest so it takes me only a few minutes to clean it, thus (to my horror) making it possible for me to help her cook. (I'll talk about this in a later post. Gulp.)



5:00: Eat dinner and discuss the day. My parents are into the "family dinners" and usually don't let us leave the table until they are done eating. Did I mention they're the slowest eaters I know?



6:00: Finds the family in the living room, either reading or watching movies. Our family favorite? Episodes of "I Love Lucy" on DVD. We've watched it so much, we can officially find a quote to relate to every subject known to man. And Mom thought it wasn't good for the art of The Great Conversation*.



9:00: We are supposed to be in bed by this time but really, there's too many good books in the closet to go to bed before 10. Right?!?!?

Glitches in our day are common occurrences. Perhaps Momma needed some time in bed this morning to recover from a sore throat or a snowy day calls for reading by the fireplace. The "schedule" hardly ever gets followed completely but whatever we may be doing, every day still just as chaotic and fun as every other day.

* The Great Conversation, as my mom calls it, is knowing important things that are conversation starters, or things that may help in a conversation. So, perhaps two people at a table have read the same book and they talk about a certain circumstance the characters are in. The people by them may have not read the book but they may know a quote or phrase that will add to either side of the conversation. These people have been part of the great conversation.