music, therapy, and me

It's the beginning of the month which means little around here except that it is time to get my month in order. If you are familiar with my blog and way of doing things, then you know that I am a pen and paper person rather than a digital calendar person. I have been using an agenda or planner for most of my life, and I enjoy the routine of writing things down. I have two planners that I design and use on a regular basis. The first is my personal planner. I keep track of chores, appointments, celebrations, and all sorts of stuff in that calendar. My current personal planner is a red covered dot grid journal that I bought from Michaels when they had a buy one, get one sale. I tend to stock up on blank books when those types of sales happen. I have a set pattern for setting up this planner - one week per spread with limited changes to the format. My second journal is my work planner. This is the one that has changed the most recently because my work has shifted from an out-of-home jo...

It is Wednesday morning - very early. I have not been sleeping as much as I like lately. This will be helpful next Sunday when my part of the world changes to Daylight Savings Time (ugh!), but it is not really helpful right now. Last night, things were complicated by high winds and blizzardy conditions at my home. Things were wuthering all over the place, and my neighbors have a trash bin in their backyard that had a banging lid each time the wind caught it. (The wind caught it many times!) The one good thing about this particular blizzard is that my power has not gone out... yet. I am really hoping that I will not have to go out into the high winds, but schools are not closing around here. I will plan on going really slowly as I travel the 50 miles to work this morning. The winds are going at 30 miles per hour with gusts every couple of seconds that are around 60 miles per hour. I have a little car that catches every piece of wind that is out there. My job is located in a place where ...

It is time to take something that I have been doing for a while now and make it something different. I am taking a little bit of a break from a long time project of mine to shake it up a bit and make it better for me and for others. This is the type of project that I love. I get to make something that I already love into something that does more for me, and I hope, more for you as well. I sat down with a brainstorming book last night and started framing some ideas for changing things up a bit. I am currently getting my sing about mini editions updated and am making them a bit more robust for others. I am toying with the idea of including lots more things in each month's edition. There are so many things that I wish I could find when I need them. So, I am going to strive to make them. In the meantime, though, I am going to share one of the TMEs that I shared a long time ago... I hope this works for your clients! Happy Tuesday - here is a song that is part of sing about travel . If...

The author holding a black journal. It is fascinating to me how quickly the end of the year always approaches! I mean, it feels like it was the beginning of the school year about two weeks ago, and here it is, already November 21st! It just does not seem possible that it is late November and time to get things set up for the next calendar year! As you know, I am a bullet journaler (sorta - I use this term mainly because I use a jumble of planning and journaling techniques to keep myself somewhat organized!), and I like to use up my books completely before starting another one, so I will not be starting a new journal in January. I tend to use up my journals in June or July, so I will stay in my yellow, rainbow journal until the end of May 2022. At that point, I will be able to start up a new journal. Waste not, want not, am I right? Anyway, just because I am not starting up a new journal doesn't mean that I am not getting some new things going in the pages! I found my word of the ye...

Me in my almost house! After a long, busy weekend, I am heading back into my regular work routine. It is 4:24 am, and I am sitting here, gazing at my blogging post wondering what in the world I might have to say to myself at this moment. My home is a mess because I have started packing for the move that I will be doing next month. The to-do list is getting longer and longer as I try to sort through all the things that I will need to do during the next 30 days. I have my checklists to go through and get myself organized with, but I am also feeling a bit overwhelmed about stuff. When I get this way, I tend to try to compartmentalize myself a bit more than I usually do, and it gets very overwhelming very quickly. I am also a bit hesitant to commit to leaving my apartment and to make arrangements for things like utilities because of my parents' experiences losing houses after offers had been accepted and all that. So, my music therapy routine is a bit off kilter because my life routine...

I set up another Zoom meeting this morning. This one is focused on music therapy students and is all about finding an internship for each one of those students. I have a week to coordinate it, but this is a topic that I have presented on for many years, so I feel confident that I can get this coordinated pretty quickly. As I was putting this together, I realized that my website is pretty out-of-date, so revising that goes on the to-do list. This task joins several other tasks that I have neglected, so the list is growing and embiggening (word courtesy of Jenny Lawson, The Bloggess!) in leaps and bounds. Most of the things that I have on the list are things that I enjoy doing, so neglecting them is pretty silly. The only reason that I have not accomplished those things is because other things became a bit more important in the moment. I spent some creative time yesterday putting together a digital kit for theme-based communication boards for music therapy sessions. My goal is to have a ...

Things are getting done. I am pleased to see that my to-do list is shrinking a bit as things are being crossed off and other things are being placed on the list.  I managed to finish my first Sunday School video yesterday (the BIG task I was putting off due to my feelings that I might fail...). There are things that need to improve, but I think it wasn't all that bad for a first attempt and for making something up from scratch. We will see if anyone actually looks at it. I already have ideas for the next round. I have one big thing on my list for today - finish my sing about mini edition for January 2021. It gets released tomorrow, so I need to finish it up. That is added to today's list along with laundry and dishes and getting more done in the craft room. My goal is to get enough of the room picked up so I can start up my robot vacuum, Huey, and get him going again.  I like lists, mainly because (I think) I am a visual person. I enjoy seeing my to-dos getting smaller and th...

First of all, SURPRISE!! I decided to take a bit of time and change what the blog looks like these days. It is time for a change. Let me know what you think because I am open to changing it yet again, if it is not something that is easily accessible for others. Second, I am back to needing to think about what sort of theme call out to me for my Sunday posts. I tried to start video sharing, but I am not often all that interested in sitting in front of editing software for hours on end, and then the computer takes up all my bandwidth so I can't watch television while things are uploading, and there are all sorts of other complaints that I have about all of this that really aren't worth anything at all!! Anyway, what I want is a topic that interests me and keeps me writing every Sunday morning so I can crank the posts out on a day where I am busy with one of my part-time jobs. Over the years, I have had many different Sunday themes and post series, and each of them has run its cou...

My to-do list is getting smaller. I like to cross things off my list of things that I need to, have to, should finish up, and this morning, I can cross off the biggest task that I had in front of me. That makes me feel so wonderful! This is one of the reasons that I use a planner to organize my things to do and things done. I can see when I've made progress on a project or task, and I can also see what I need to do next. This visual representation is the way I can organize my self and my progress best. For some reason, electronic tracking systems are not good for me. I need paper and pens to keep track of what I am doing. It is time for a goal check. This is something that I do every so often to keep myself on track for things that I want to do and for things that I have done. My most immediate goal for today - that of finishing a project for my business - is finished for this month, but it is not over. This is an on-going type of project. Now that this month's contribu...

I am officially finished with all of my full-time job responsibilities for the next 12 days, for the month, for the year, and for the decade! I have from now until January 2nd to do my regular Winter Break things - a bit of cleaning, some last-minute gift shopping, packing, traveling, and resting far away from the things that I "have" to do. It is not quite enough time to become completely bored with my own company, but it is a change from the day-to-day routine. Today is my first day of break, and I have one commitment and that is all! My schedule is pretty empty this time around, and that's a great sight to see in my planner. This has been an interesting year on many fronts. My health has been the biggest concern of mine for most of the year, culminating in the surprise removal of my gallbladder and a related procedure immediately following that surgery. I have been feeling much better - less fatigued with more interest in things - since that troublesome organ was r...