As if I Didn't Have Enough...

I enjoy feeling like I have stuff to do that I find worth while, but sometimes I put too much stuff on my plate. Right now I am enjoying everything that I need to get done and look forward to it, but I think it will get old pretty quick. Alhamdulilah, the class I signed up for is only 6 weeks long, so I should be freed up pretty quickly.

So, added to being a homeschooling mom, a landlord, coordinator for the Dawah Training team at Building Blocks, a wife, and mom to a 10 month old, I've added on an online class through Qibla Online Academy (I think a lot of online schools are junk, but alhamdulilah, I really like Qibla), teaching at a weekend Islamic studies school, serious couponing, and knitting gloves people have ordered!

Here are the gloves... I love them!



My older daughter is big into fencing, and just signed up for the National Saber Team at her fencing gym. This means that she is now going to be competing nationally! This is super exciting, but also pretty expensive... on top of her getting braces soon, this sparked the need for more couponing. Well, and the couponing was also partially motivated by watching Extreme Couponing and getting inspired. :) Right now, I'm saving about 50% at each trip, and I just printed out organizational dividers so I can organize my coupons by category and inshaAllah take more advantage of sale items. Of course, this takes time too, added to every thing else!

I'm using the to do list feature in my calendar application, in hopes this will keep me in line! Each week I have homework for my class, plus preparing for the upcoming classes I will teach at the weekend school. What intimidates me the most is the Prophets class because I will be teaching one class starting at the beginning (Adam (as)), and the other class is starting at Musa (Moses (as)). I'm praying that the prep work for the Prophets class isn't as much as I'm thinking it will be. I'm using Ibn Kathir's book Stories of the Prophets and Anwar al-Awlaki's lecture series as my sources (to those who have only heard of al-Awlaki in the semi-recent news... he has done amazing work at bringing these subjects to life in the past, even if he moved towards a less tolerant viewpoint recently, which I'm a bit skeptical of.... anyway...). This is not quick reading or listening, but inshaAllah it will prove very beneficial for me to learn this as I go along. Of course, I know the basic stories, but the details escape me.

The knitting orders I'm not as much worried about completing because I can do that while doing other things, or while waiting (braces may open up a lot of waiting time for me!). I'm excited, and thinking I will open up my Etsy shop to get people's feedback, and even start selling stuff for a profit! We'll see.... I should again remember not to get out of hand with all the things I want to complete.

So, as much as I think the things I want to do (blog, read the Bible, etc.) will be out of the picture for a while, I wonder if I will find myself here, like now, escaping from my to do list, almost in an act of defiance. :)