music, therapy, and me

It is Friday again, and lots has happened to my loved ones this week that has affected me a bit. I am separated from the situations since I am far away, but I have engaged in phone support while waiting to hear if I will be called for jury duty here at home. As I wrote about yesterday, I am struggling with the change of routine that I have now. I am trying to figure out how I am going to work both here at home and outside of my home. One of the things that I want to get into doing is professional development on a daily basis. I am a member of Skillshare, so there are many courses available to me, but I have to actually open them up and do the work. I have also signed up for a consulting class that I need to start because my access goes away in four months, and it cost lots of money. I am trying to figure out how to get into the course right now because I only have four months left!! I am trying to get back into a routine that makes sense for me. This has been the most difficult part of...

It is Monday, and I am feeling my weekend. You wouldn't think that 13 hours of sitting and making things with paper would wreak havoc on a body, but it does. Also, the change in medication regimen has something to do with this, I am sure. I crashed hard this morning and did not want to get up at all. I have also not been eating well, so there are lots of things happening, but this weekend just coalesced everything into one big energy reset. Boy, I am just one big complaint this morning. Time to reset. I enjoyed my time making things with paper this weekend. I worked on my themed journals on Friday evening, and I putzed around with brainstorming as well as some other paper projects and Zentangling on Saturday. I made lots of plans on Saturday, and I have started to work through those projects.  I am working on passion projects right now. These are things that do not provide me with much financial benefit but that really make me feel satisfied. If I can get some financial support thr...

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 ...

I am sitting at my computer, listening to an episode of J.A.G. , and wondering what I can possibly write about on this morning. This is why I need themes. I like having enough structure that I can predict what I will write about on most days, especially at the start of the work week. I don't always follow the structure, but I like having it in place. I started my Songwriting Sunday series two days ago. I continued with my Internship Supervision series yesterday, but I am not interested in doing anything with therapeutic music experiences (TMEs) this morning. I feel like I have done everything I can do with that particular topic right now. Until I get inspired with a new way to think about TMEs, I think Tuesdays will be something else entirely. I just don't know what they will end up being. Finger update - I have been playing the guitar for the past six days. My finger still hurts, but I am able to bend my finger enough to get all the chords and the strength seems to be okay - n...

My sister (who now reads my blog, apparently) is my favorite second grade teacher. Just wanted to say that up front. I am totally biased about who is Teacher of the Year, every year, because she is my sister and I've known her all her life. There you go. Now, today's post is inspired by my sister and by the countless numbers of classroom teachers who are currently working on making their classrooms into engaging and comfortable places for students. Some classrooms include complex themes, lots of different elements to go together, and countless dollars of teacher money spent on things that teachers feel are needed in order to promote a sense of love and comfort and engagement. There is lots of controversy in the teacher world between the decorators and the non-decorators about whether this type of environment is necessary, but I know many who just feel better in a coordinated environment. My sister is one of the thematic teachers. She has an overarching theme for her classroom e...

It is 5:39 am, and I am eating breakfast after taking my mother and my sister to the airport to head home after a week here with me. I decided not to try to go back to sleep - there is still a bit of doubt about whether they will actually get out of here due to COVID-related cancellations. I am way too awake to sleep now. With their departure and the end of my apartment life, I now have time to get back into my routine. When I moved in a month and a couple of days ago, I established a chore routine that has been working pretty well for me. I keep it tucked into my bullet journal, behind the picture of my Dad, and try my best to keep up with the chores for each day. Today, being Sunday, is my bullet journaling day and my catch-up day for all other chores. I really haven't done my jobs this week, so I will start this week off right. Tomorrow is laundry and bathroom day, so I will spend a bit of time doing those chores in between setting up the office space and the craft room.  (I hav...

4rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrre00000000000000000000000000000000000000 (Bella's thoughts, I guess...) Here I go again. Yesterday was rough to get through, mainly because my demands for myself are pretty high, and I just can't seem to get them done. I did manage to get three videos done (almost brings me to my self-imposed expectation of four per day). I also decided that I needed a backdrop for my films and for any sort of livestreaming that may happen in the future. I made the basic frame for that yesterday. Now I am on the brink of tears because I cannot get my acid reflux medication to open - one of those "match the arrows and the top will come off easily" type of bottles. I think I'm going in with the saw I found on Wednesday. That worked. I have now transferred the pills from the impossible bottles to one that works much better for me and my current finger situation...because let's not forget that I still have two broken fingers...Thanks, 2020! I ended yes...

Happy Friday! I am trying my best to get myself into a firm routine, but it is not happening yet. This is the fourth day after our "do less while you are here and do more when you are at home" talk at work, and it is Friday, so I am working entirely from home today rather than going into work. This week has also brought us a mandatory mask order (mine is rubbing a blister on the tip of my nose) and 24 hours where we went from 87 degrees to 29 degrees Fahrenheit...in 24 hours! Over the past three days, I have tried to figure out an afternoon routine. I now have more afternoon hours to fill because I have to leave as soon as my essential work duties are finished. I am getting home in the early afternoon now, but I have done almost as many groups in the morning as I used to do all day, so my therapy fatigue level is the same as if I spent the entire 11 hours a day I used to do - 9 hours at work and 2 commuting. I am now only doing 6 of those hours at work, but I am strugglin...

I am going into work on a regular Friday!! I am going to work a regular Friday!! Today is a regular Friday! Why all this enthusiasm for going to work?? Why am I emphasizing a regular Friday? Well, readers, for the past two weeks, our Fridays have been inclement weather days which means that I have had to do extra music therapy groups for our residents. They still have to come to school on snow days because we only have the school staff available to coordinate their care on those days. So, I trudge through the ice and snow (when I can) to go down and do music therapy on those days - sessions that are completely different from our regular therapy - these sessions are more geared towards energy expression and fun than our usual sessions because, hello, SNOW DAY! Most of my students live at the facility full time. It is not something that they choose - they have to be there. Since they don't get much choice in whether they come to school when the rest of the world gets to stay ...

Today is the last day of my Fall Break, and I am getting ready to reveal my 2019-2020 professional goals to the world of this blog tomorrow, but today, I am focusing on what types of things I want to learn about this year. I try to expand my knowledge of music therapy as much as I can, but I tend to do better if I think through it all. Since I have decided not to go to the National Conference this year, I have decided to spend the money that I usually devote to that particular event on other forms of professional development. I've already spent about half of that money on a CMTE course for business development, so I have about half of that money for other pursuits. When I finish the business course and submit my CMTEs for being an internship supervisor, my 20 CMTEs for the year will be complete, but I will still be on the lookout for more educational opportunities. One of the things that I like to do is to delve into my library to enrich my knowledge of all things music thera...

Have you ever noticed that songs that have to be written are less compelling than those that just happen? I'm kinda in a place right now where that is happening. I want some more songs for a Halloween theme subscription idea that I have, but everything that I think of just falls flat - you know? Like a balloon deflating? On the other hand, songs are springing into mind that have nothing at all to do with my self-imposed songwriting topic. Blech. I am currently practicing creative composition. What is that? Creative composition is where I set myself some ground rules for songwriting and then just go where my brain takes me. I find that my creative process is helped out by setting rules. With rules, I end up finding pathways into creative expression that I miss when I am sitting there without any type of structure. So, I am going to start out by making up my rules. I want a couple of songs to supplement the Halloween-themed lapbook that I am making. On that lapbook, I have a ...

It is time to say goodbye to ice! I no longer want to be frozen or slip sliding away. I do NOT want to build a snowman, and Frosty can hurry on his way. I'm finished!! I now have enough Paid Time Off (PTO) to take off another week at some point. I will need to spend some time thinking about when I want to do that - it has to be done by June 30 because of the contract year. So. I get to take some time off at some random time because I have spent all my snow days at work rather than at home. I like this system SO MUCH! Hate to say it, though, but I don't want any more of these days. I'm just outright finished with the novelty. It's not all that novel now - especially after three days in a row. Ugh. We are all feeling it. Students are ready to see their missing classmates and teachers. We want to have our regular schedule back. We really want to spend our time doing things that make us frustrated and challenged and that give us things to complain about. Too much rela...

Have you ever read the rhyme about children and when they are born? Let me see if I can find it on the internet (be right back!)... Monday's child is fair of face Tuesday's child is full of grace Wednesday's child is full of woe Thursday's child has far to go, Friday's child is loving and giving, Saturday's child works hard for a living, But the child who is born on the Sabbath day Is bonnie and blithe and good and gay. (Retrieved from: https://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/Monday%27s+child+is+fair+of+face ) (In the interest of self-disclosure, I am a Thursday's child. There you go.) My mother has always chanted this poem to us. She seemed to like that all of us were Thursday's children. She, herself, was born on a Sunday, and she likes being a Sabbath day child. For the purposes of this post, however, I am going to change things a bit to fit my point. Yesterday was another snow day. My Tuesday groups missed out on another opportunity to do ce...

I am spending some time looking over my therapeutic music experience (TME) collection, trying to isolate everything that includes social skill development and coping skills. Why? Inspiration from conference, of course! The problem? I have 25+ years of my own TMEs and 23 intern TME collections (there are lots of gems in my compilation of TMEs from all of my interns - their intellectual property, so I use them, but do not share those TMEs outside of my music therapy clinic), and I have no effective way to search for specific skills or goal areas. I have a dream where I put in a couple of search words and a list of TMEs pop out - with links to sheet music and/or the music in my library. One of these days, I will have this type of database/software program, but I don't have it yet. So, I am going through my database (currently just an excel database), selecting everything that includes "social interaction" and/or "coping skill development" to put on another ...