looking for the positive

Day four of my month of gratitude, and I'm tempted to whinge, so let's see how I go finding the silver lining ...

• I'm a bit overloaded with work at the moment - partly because there's a lot of it coming in at the moment, but partly because I'm having trouble getting back into the rhythm of solid work days, after having the kids around all day for six weeks. The positive is that I have lots of work, which means I'm earning enough to pay the bills and put some aside towards the Europe trip. Every job means that trip is a little bit closer :)
• The children's activities notes (for school and after-school activities) are coming in thick and fast, with the accompanying requests for payment. Today's notes equal several hundred dollars. But I'm grateful that I have plenty of work to pay for everything, and that the kids have all these opportunities available to them :)
• I need to pay out over $1100 for a CPAP machine of my own tomorrow, and return the hire one. Again, I'm grateful that I have enough work to be able to buy the machine that's making a big difference to my sleep, energy levels, mood and life in general :)
• My sister and her family are moving from Sydney (3 hours away) to near Brisbane, Qld (about 15 hours away by car) on Monday. It's been a quick decision (the removalist was only booked this week), and I won't be able to get to Sydney to see them before they go (Miss Tizz and the X-man are particularly disappointed not to see their cousins). BUT - there's email, the phone, and potential seaside holidays - they'll be 7 houses back from the water, and a short ferry trip from several islands :)
• My calendar is rapidly filling up with work, meetings (work and school related), children's activities (they're enrolled in swimming lessons plus one other after school activity each week), and my Italian course (Monday nights for this term). On the plus side, it seems the more I have to do, the more organised I become and the more I can fit in without it being too much of a burden. I get a lot done when the calendar gets busy, and yet somehow it all fits in and the ensuing sense of achievement is worth the effort :)

 I had a lightbulb moment this week - bleeding obvious, but I have been so much in a rut I'd completely lost perspective. I realised that going to bed at midnight or later every night is not normal, at least not when you have children who are up by 7am (and that's quite a reasonable, civilised hour for the day to start!). But it's what I've been doing for years, and it has to stop. So it's almost midnight now, and I'm heading for bed, and the plan (how I love plans!) is to bring bedtime forward to something like 10.30 or 11pm, or earlier if I'm tired. Goodnight!