A Welcoming State of Mind

I think I sounded a bit whiny yesterday in my blog post titled, “No Favors Right Now.”  Wow, how self absorbed and selfish can I be?  Any person who writes a daily blog is already way too self-centered and for that I apologize.  I know from the cravings I am fighting that the hormones are playing a part, but that excuse is so tired, so I’m going to look for other reasons for my rebellion.

One possible reason for my bad mood yesterday might be the cooking I was doing that I can not eat.  One of my volunteer roles at Carter’s school is being the Welcoming Committee with my partner Jaymie for the new families to the upper school.  I have been part of the Welcoming Committee for about eight years, moving up through the ranks of lower school rep, then middle and now upper.

I am a big fan of doing everything possible to integrate new people in the nicest possible way.  It has to be a little scary as a kid to come into a new school, especially one where many of the kids have known each other since Pre-K.  One thing I hope all the new kids find out is that those students who have been around are down right excited to have some new faces on campus.

When kids are little it is easy to get new parents involved because parents are needed to help, but it is much harder as a parent of a new high school age child to get to know people because our kids aren’t that interested in having us around.  That and quite frankly it is time to let young people do things on their own.

To span that place between the helicopter parents who are hovering and those parents who drop a kid and run never to be seen at school until graduation is a tricky job.  This year Jaymie and I changing up how we welcome new families by having dinners in our homes for all the new families so they can meet each other and a couple of old families too.

This all seemed like a great idea when we planned it in May.  Three days, three parties of fifty people each.  Being the former caterer I volunteered to make the lasagnas, a meat version and a veggie one for each party.  I started cooking yesterday making the sauces and doing all the prep I could do in advance.  I have not eaten much if any pasta in a long time.  The more I worked on this dish the more I started craving this lasagna, but I can tell you this is the last thing I should eat.  I am sure that this is contributing to my mood.

Russ came home last night to a house that smelled like his Italian restaurant dream only to be disappointed when I told him we were having salad Nicoise for dinner.  It was a cruel trick to play on him, but at least he will be able to actually eat the lasagna tomorrow, me not so much.  Tonight he is not going to be any happier because we are going to have to eat leftovers so I have room in the fridge for all this food.  I know that when this weekend is over and I have done my best to help welcome new people I will be much happier and let’s hope less whinny.