Philosopher Jagger

Divorce: a sensitive topic

2012-01-24T11:35:00.003-05:00

Warning: This post is on a sensitive subject and I am just typing out my own thoughts and feelings without much thought to being sensitive to others thoughts and feelings. As this is my blog, I can do that. But keep that in mind if you stumble across it and want to ream me out for my opinions. You are reading at your own risk.

I've been thinking a lot about DIVORCE lately - not because we're having marital issues - we're actually doing pretty great these days - but because several of my friends are dealing with some major issues in their lives and I am saddened by it.

When I was in 3rd grade (back in the 80's) one of my good friend's parents were getting a divorce. And I made the mistake of telling someone about it, even though she had asked me to keep it a secret. It was shameful back then. People still whispered the word "divorce" in conversations. She was the first of my friends to deal with it, though I knew a few others who had dealt with it. (Even my own paternal grandparents were divorced, though since my paternal Grandmother had passed away before I was born, it didn't really come up at the time, etc.) It was a BAD THING.

I lost that friend because I couldn't keep my mouth shut about her secret. We never returned to playing together regularly and I was shut out of her crowd for the rest of our school days. We were always friendly and civil, etc. but our relationship was never restored.

Back to point at hand. Despite the fact that I am in my early 30s and my friends range in age from 40-25, I have several friends who are going through divorces. And I sit back sometimes I and I wonder... why do they find it so easy to make that choice? Growing up, we were taught that "good Christian people" don't divorce. That marriage is forever. And while I realize that many times there are things that you just can't get past (2 of the friends I'm speaking of have had their husbands cheat on them) I wonder why their first response is to find a lawyer.

My own mom swore she'd never divorce my dad, but when I was 19, she did just that. It rocked my world. I can only imagine what a little kid would deal with if it were to happen to them. And now she's all "oh, she's better off without him" whenever I mention a friend going through marital problems. Is it really that easy? Are marriages disposable? When I said "for better or for worse, 'til death do us part" I meant it. With all my heart.

And maybe I just don't understand. Maybe, since my marriage is pretty rock solid and I can trust my man with every fiber of my being and because he's my best friend, I just don't get it. But then I have to wonder, why would you marry anyone who didn't fit that description? And aren't there signs that you should see from the beginning?

One of my favorite high school teachers just lost his wife recently - I went to the Memorial Service on Saturday. He always referred to her as "friend wife" when he would mention her in class. They were such a great pair. They dealt with a lot, but were still together after 55 years when she passed a few weeks ago.

My oldest friend, Cherry - her parents are awesome. I love her family so much. Today is her parents' 36th anniversary and her mom says that she is more in love with him today than she was back then.

My grandparents could not have been more opposite. My grandfather was a quiet, solid, easy-going, gentle giant. My Gramma is a bit of a high-strung spazz at times. But they were married for 46 years before his death and my Gramma is still in love with him now, more than 16 years after that.

They just don't make marriages like that anymore, I guess. Or if they do... they are few and far between.

In review

2012-01-20T08:00:00.002-05:00

Oops. Computer issues, combined with debilitating neck pain/headaches and our bathroom being torn up (one having nothing to with the others) caused a stumble in my blogging. But here I am again!

Anyhow, I went an entire week without full range of motion in my neck - and to be honest, it's still only at about 90%, but I can drive (I could after about 3 days) and I am feeling enough better that I can say after my adjustment on Tuesday I finally didn't feel the pressure in my neck so much that I wanted to pop my head off and start over. Ugh no fun.

We're repairing and remodeling our one and only bathroom. We had to drive across town (less than 10 minutes away) every morning to shower at Nana's house. (My oldest friend, Cherry's, Nana's house is temporarily not being used, but the power and such - including the cable TV! - are still on and Cherry's Mama offered to let us use for it a bit. She offered to let us stay there, but once the water was back on and we could once again use the toilet, I didn't feel that was necessary and I thought the kids would sleep better at our house, etc.

The shower got finished at the beginning of the week and it looks great and for the first time in YEARS, there is no leak in my faucet and I don't have to use pliers to turn on the cold water. It's WONDERFUL. A new vanity, new lighting, paint, and wall tiles are going in as well. And probably a new floor. We've always hated the way our bathroom looked, so this is a WONDERFUL change after 5+ years in the house.

The Spring catalog for Thirty-one is out and I'm excited for the new year. I have a few people who have mentioned having a party soon and they are just checking their calendars. Looking forward to that. Also running one fundraiser now with offers for 2 others for charities I personally believe in and want to support. Closing out the one fundraiser and an order for the retiring stuff and sale Thermals next week. So things are starting to get busy there, too!

(midway through writing this Thursday our power went out. A problem with our bill. It took nearly an hour to get it straightened out and more than 3 hours to get it back on. I'm just now - Friday morning - getting back to my computer.)

Miss me when I'm gone

2012-01-06T10:11:00.001-05:00

Did you notice I was gone? I haven't had internet all week. Fun times. In addition, I've been incredibly down in the dumps, increasing as the week wore on. Related? You be the judge.

I'm busy. Usually, this is helpful. I've realized that I am incredibly good at faking it. I spent the bulk of the first two-thirds of my day yesterday out of the house, interacting with friends and I think I appeared to be happy and cheerful and normal. I wasn't. I'm struggling. I don't even know why. I'm tired. And I'm back to that place where I would much prefer to spend the whole day in bed - both because it is cold and we try not to run the heat in the house if we can avoid it - and because I really would just prefer to sleep my way through my days right now.

The kids are fine. They have their whiny, cranky moments as always. Little Man has been a little cranky the last day or so, probably due in part to the cold and some teeth coming in. Fuss has been off and on joyful and whiny. I think she's coming down off the holiday high. And maybe that is my problem, too. I look forward with longing to the weekend when I can spend time with my beloved because he comforts me, cheers me, and I get strength from him. Of course, this weekend, we're going to be spending lots of time apart due to our respective projects. (more on that in a second) But at least the evenings will be pleasant - spent cuddling with him on the couch, watching a movie or some such. He is my rock. He is my port in the storm. To borrow a quote from a Nicholas Sparks novel - he is my True North.

This weekend I am co-hosting a baby shower for my oldest friend, Cherry. It should be lovely and a lot of the work that I was thinking I would be doing has been lifted off my shoulders since her mom ended up moving the location to a hotel where the luncheon will be catered, etc. (the guest list got a little overwhelming for her nice, spacious condo. I think everyone will be happier this way and since money is no object for them, it worked out nicely!) I am truly so happy for my friend to be having her first baby. She's gonna be a great mama.

We are also tearing apart our falling-apart bathroom this weekend and Daddy Fuss and my Dad will be fixing the leak, replacing the tile and making my bathroom look NOT Ugly for the first time in 5 years! Plus, it should be more functional. So that's a plus. And not having a constant leak in the tub will be a big plus.

I also have my Spring Premier Event for Thirty-one on Saturday. I've been looking forward to this for awhile - they rented out movie theaters across the country to show off the new catalog and I'm looking forward to that.

Random bit of linkage

2012-01-05T10:43:00.000-05:00

Need to share this link I found via a friend on FB.

http://momastery.com/blog/2012/01/04/2011-lesson-2-dont-carpe-diem/

My favorite part? This quote:
“It’s helluva hard, isn’t it? You’re a good mom, I can tell. And I like your kids, especially that one peeing in the corner. She’s my favorite. Carry on, warrior. Six hours till bedtime.”

Not so happy in the old year

2011-12-30T09:11:00.000-05:00

Yeah, so my Gram moved yesterday and I have yet to see her. Apparently, I and my children would be in the way. No one has really said it that rudely, of course, but I was told last night that it would be too chaotic and I was supposed to come up today to take her to the grocery store and visit, etc. and I just got a call from her that it wouldn't work for today because other people would be coming over for other things and... could we do it tomorrow instead? Sure. Why not?

I'm really struggling right now to feel like I'm not really needed by anyone outside my home. At least my kids and husband still love me.

Looking forward to a quiet night in tomorrow night. Usually, we get together with friends and drink a little too much and laugh and play games, but this year a combination of things led to us just staying in for the night. I'm really looking forward to the special take-out we're going to bring in for dinner and the fact that the last Harry Potter movie is coming in the mail via Netflix today (so we'll save it for tomorrow.) A bottle of wine, some strawberries and my favorite snuggle partner (my husband) and it sounds like a bit of heaven to me.

Not feeling too happy right now, but I'm managing. Add to that that this is my late uncle's birthday and yesterday was the anniversary of his death. He passed away several years ago (before I was even married, actually) but we were close, and I really miss him.

It really hasn't been a bad year - overall, things are good, it's just I'm having some darker moments this week. Here's to hoping that 2012 is a little better!

Excited

2011-12-28T18:07:00.002-05:00

Excited about the outlet sale - already placed my order, got my SIL to place hers and now I have to get my mom to check it out. You too can get in on these prices - 50% or more off original retail! Stock up on gifts for birthdays, baby showers, etc.

My Gramma is moving to town tomorrow. I am also psyched about that. She's beginning to show her age a bit more (she's 84) and has been more forgetful and not as spry as she once was. Which is understandable, but still, it will be nice to have her closer where I can check in on her more, we can get together more often and if she has any problems, my mom and I are more available to her. It will be wonderful to have her nearby. I have been wanting to spend more time with her, but making the 2-hour car trip with the 2 kids is not easy. And since much of the trip is somewhat in the middle of nowhere, it's not something I like to do by myself very often. This move will allow me to visit her for an afternoon or just drop in to take her to lunch. As her favorite granddaughter, (well, in my mind anyway! she would never admit to that) I am very happy that she moved closer to us and not further away (and thus closer to my uncle and his family.) Not that I begrudge her time spent with the other part of the family, but I think this will ultimately be more relaxing for her as opposed to always feeling like she needs to help out with my soon-to-be 12-year-old cousin, T.

Anyhow, also a relation-of-sorts of mine is getting married tomorrow. I won't be able to be there, unfortunately, but I am so happy for her - I know that this guy is basically her best friend and that is the BEST way to begin a marriage. I am still madly in love with my best friend, nearly 7 years into our marriage and it just gets better and better.

Christmas Passed*

2011-12-27T11:42:00.002-05:00

I've spent my morning hitting refresh on a number of pages, waiting for the link to the Thirty-one Outlet Sale. We were told it would open to consultants on December 27th and to the public on December 28th. But no further info was given. I'm supposed to be folding the MOUNTAIN of laundry I have collected recently, (which I have done SOME), but I keep coming back to the computer to check to see if it is open. Geez, people!

I got a Nook Tablet for Christmas and I am LOVING it. It would be perfect if I could switch all my already-downloaded Kindle books over to it, but we shall see. Having a blast playing Words with Friends with my Aunt Sharon. Though, dang, that game takes a long time because you have to wait for the other person to notice that YOU played... anyhow. It's fun. I've already found several books and apps. Good times.

We had a nice Christmas overall. The kids were spoiled by everyone and we have so many new toys and things for them to play with! My mom was so excited about the Moon Dough she got for Fuss. My sister had told me about it and Fuss has played with some at their house - but OMG is this stuff a pain to clean up! I mean, yes, you can vacuum it, but it's like it doesn't really stay together, so you are vacuuming it up A LOT. On one hand, this means that I am vacuuming more than usual and getting my floor cleaner than usual. On the other hand, I am vacuuming more than usual and I hate to vacuum and both of my children are sensitive to loud noises and fuss, cry, and run away when the vacuum starts up. So there's that.

I've been having my daily headaches again and I am SO over it. Wishing there was a way to make myself feel better!

(* I stole the title today from Heather Spohr at The Spohrs are Multiplying.)

Christmas Adam

2011-12-23T13:59:00.001-05:00

My cousin posted on FB this morning that this is Christmas Adam - the day before Christmas Eve (and Adam came before Eve.) Apparently they made a tradition of an appetizer feast on Christmas Adam at their house. Sounds like fun.

My husband is home from work early today. He snuck into the back yard to put together the climber toy that we got the kids for Christmas. Now we have to finish wrapping and CLEAN UP THE HOUSE. Kat and Gracie came by to drop off presents for the kids and I was SO embarassed! The house is a disaster.

I'm cooking my crabcakes for lunch. I have another headache and I am just SO over the pain and discomfort I've been feeling lately. I'm not REALLY old enough to feel this old. I have joint pain, muscle pain, back pain and then there are the headaches. I just want it to be OVER.

You Live, You Learn

2011-12-22T09:24:00.001-05:00

I was with my in-laws (J, LP and my MIL) from 8:30am to 6:30pm yesterday. Seriously, I think 10 hours of them might be too much. Especially without my husband as a buffer. It was nice of them to include me (and the kids) in their holiday plans (LP's gift to her mom) to visit Bok Tower and their holiday display, but wow. It was a really long day.

Add to that that I almost (accidentally) killed my dog. Geez. We wanted to bug-bomb the house while I was gone. So my husband and I rushed around in the morning getting everything ready. When he left, I thought he had put the dog in the garage (where he would spend the day while the house was being fumigated) since I didn't see him anywhere and he didn't get up and make noise when the ILs came, etc. We loaded everyone up, I set off the bombs and we left. Forty-five minutes later, I had the thought - I really hope Daddy Fuss put the dog out. I called him to make sure. He didn't answer, so I called again and he answered. No, he HADN'T put the dog out. I called my mom who was THANKFULLY off that day and able to come by the house and rescue him. We was barking when she arrived, so that was a good sign and didn't seem like he was having a problem and has been fine ever since, as well. But here I was, on my way to a day that I didn't really want to be doing anyhow, worried about my dog... I was really trying to keep it together in front of my MIL and the kids.

Every time I spend a large chunk of time with my ILs, I always vow never again. (without my husband around - it's something very different when he is there to buffer and be on my side, etc.) And it's never really overt, but it's almost like they don't really want me around, they somewhat ignore me, etc. It's a little crazy. And separate, we get along just fine. We can talk and whatever with very little issue, but it's like when they are together, they are this impenetrable unit and I am an outsider.

And what's crazy is that they asked me to come to this thing. They paid. (or LP did.) They could have very easily just asked for Fuss to come along if they had only wanted her (and she was free admission) and I would have been (mostly) fine with that. (We've had one incident where I felt they made poor choices while caring for her, but I really try to not harp on it much. She wasn't hurt or in danger, so I'm working on letting it go. I haven't yet, but I'm working on it.)

Ah, well. I shouldn't really complain. Things are fine. There was no major problem yesterday (other than 2 tired kids at the end of the day) so since it was just my own interpretation of events that led to feeling slighted, I should just get over it.

As the Philosopher Alanis once said, "You live, you learn."

My achy breaky back

2011-12-20T17:21:00.003-05:00

The kids gift to their daddy is done, wrapped and under the tree. I'm kinda proud of myself for getting it finished.

I have so much crap to do around the house between now and Sunday. While the mess has improved, there is certainly plenty left to do.

And I am so tired. And I ache all over. I did something to my back. What started out this morning as mildly annoying joint aches has progressed to the point where I can no longer pick up my baby. Right now I'm waiting for my mom to come over to change his diaper (she's on her way). I hurt so much.

And I'm supposed to go to this thing tomorrow with my in-laws. Where we spend all day walking around some fancy garden or something. I'm supposed to drive. And bring the kids. And right now, it hurts to move.

I just want to lay down. I have all this stuff to do and I really, really don't want to.

I love wrapping gifts, I have so much fun making the packages pretty. But I am so tired of wrapping right now. And to sit on the floor and do it sounds like some sort of torture. I guess it's good that at least half of my wrapping is done!

Done!

2011-12-19T11:25:00.002-05:00

No seriously, I think I'm done with my Christmas shopping. Including prep stuff. We have our turkey thawing in the freezer (his name is Ignatz. Although, my husband keeps referring to him as Ignatius. I told him either way, he was going to get very personal with said bird and so he might as well just call him Iggy.) And this morning, Living Social helped me out with the final gift for my husband - something I didn't think I was going to be able to get in time, but did!

I am still waiting for one small package for Fuss. Technically, it's the package that contains the gift from her brother, but I have an alternate if it doesn't show on time. I bought it off Amazon and didn't realize that they weren't guaranteeing delivery by Christmas until I had already bought it. Also still waiting on the package containing the bulk of my husband's gifts - but that is scheduled to be delivered tomorrow. I'm not overly worried.

Regardless, I am done. I think. I had one other project that I wanted to do for my husband, but it might not get done. Depends a lot on the kids and if they cooperate. I really should do my best since it 's technically their gift to their daddy, but he won't really care one way or the other. I also need to go to the post office to mail my SIL's package, but again, that might not happen before Christmas and even if it doesn't, no biggie. So they get some gifts after Christmas, the girls will be thrilled!

I am so happy with all my homemade gifts this year! I'm proud of myself! Of course, my addiction to Pinterest should be credited and I keep finding other things I want to do, but my husband has declared that anything additional needs to wait until after Christmas. Which is fine. I can handle that.

I found something yesterday that I had bought months ago (September?) for Fuss and I'm excited about it. I mentioned that I thought she might have gotten the short end this year from us (though Grandma has totally picked up the slack) but I think there will be plenty for her to be excited about.

I made my Snickerdoodles yesterday and they turned out great. I'm hoping to make the pretzel chocolate things today and my husband's oatmeal, crasin, white chocolate cookies tomorrow. If I can I need to make Cowboy Cookies for him on Thursday. They are his favorite.

Things I made this year:
1. Bean bags for the kids. Sure to be a big hit.
2. Doll diapers for Fuss and her friend Gracie.
3. Stuffed, crinkly owls for my future niece or nephew and Gracie's little sister.
4. Rice-filled warmers for my SILs.
5. Picture frames (I decorated them) with pics of SILs and the kids for my SILs.
6. The annual family calendar for all the family. Courtesy of Shutterfly.
7. Framed kid-artwork for my Dad.
8. My Christmas Wreath.
9. Ornaments (with Fuss)
10. Decorated plates for my neighbors. I will also fill them with cookies.

I think that's it, but it seems like a LOT! And I have that one final thing to finish for Daddy Fuss. I'm quite proud of myself, actually.

7 quick takes

2011-12-16T09:30:00.001-05:00

I realized at 4 in the morning that I hadn't written here all week. Blogger (me, not the website) FAIL.

1. I have found myself intrigued by Christmas lawn decoarations this year. Mostly, I used to think they were tacky. (Though I liked to look at them, so apparently I'm attracted to tacky.) But I want to find something tasteful to put up - though I'll probably have to wait until next year. I think I want a nativity scene. But not the blow up kind. There was one that was popular a few years ago and I swear, Joseph looked like Osama bin Laden.

2. We went to Kat's house yesterday and Gracie and Fuss made ornaments. We had so much fun. All of my ideas were courtesy of Pinterest. We had a good time - and even the mommies had a blast trying different things.

3. Need to go to the post office today. Love our Christmas cards this year!

4. I have to buy some food for Christmas dinner, finish the stocking stuffers, wrap gifts (one of my favorite parts), and clean up the house. And then, I am completely ready for Christmas. Of course, the day that everyone is coming, I may be singing a different tune.

5. This year, the Little Man is getting a Baby Laptop, a Little People Airplane and a CD and book. Fuss is getting a Sleeping Beauty set (similar here), wooden paper dolls, and a handful of other things. Santa is bringing them an outside climber-thing. It's got a small tower, a slide, a rock wall, and a ladder. Little Man is also getting a bean bag chair and a step stool. Fuss is getting those, too, except they are from my mom. (the step stool will be here Christmas morning, though. The bean bag chair is coming later.) My mom also got her an Our Generation doll - similar to the American Girls, only MUCH cheaper and more accessible. (sold at Target.) I think I might have not made the gifts terribly even this year. It seems like Fuss is getting the short end of the deal, but mostly the climber is for her right now and my mom is more than making up for it with the doll, etc. I wanted to get her the doll, but I thought my husband might kill me.

6. I've planted my first 2 recruiting seeds for my Thirty-one team. I'm psyched. Because both friends I've talked to have mentioned that they thought about it, are considering it. If I can get them BOTH to join, I could get a promotion before mid-year! Which would be AWESOME.

7. I'm dealing with a cluster of headaches again. I went to bed with a bad one and I woke up with an even worse one. I am grateful to my husband for letting me sleep as long as possible this morning. Between that and Excedrine Migraine, I am currently able to function.

Contentment

2011-12-13T08:36:00.002-05:00

If you had asked me a week ago if I were content with my life, I would have sighed and told you no. For that matter, if you had asked me that the minute I woke up this morning, I would have answered the same.

But I'm reading a book that is reminding me how much I have to be thankful for - that being content in my life right now... is what I want to be. I look at my children - and they are SO beautiful. So smart and fun, and despite the fact that they often run me ragged, I enjoy them so much. And I wouldn't give them up for anything.

So it is my desire to be content in the gifts that I have been given. To enjoy each day and each moment of my life more fully.

People keep asking me what I want for Christmas - and they are trying to get a bead on what I want for my BIG GIFT when they ask. I can't tell them. I don't know. I don't really want for anything in my life right now. I have a beautiful family - a husband who loves me and two amazing children. I have a home that isn't perfect, but is more than sufficient for our needs. I have friends and a life that is really pretty good. I have been blessed. And I need to be reminded that I should be - and truly am - grateful for all of these things.

Wrappin'

2011-12-12T08:51:00.004-05:00

The holiday have come to our house. Our (small, fake) tree is up and has ornaments (at least all of the ornaments I'm putting up this year, save our annual family ornament I haven't yet picked out) my wreath has been repaired, improved, and hung on the door. My husband hung the hooks for our lights outside last night (our icicle lights have gone missing the last 2 years. I bought more lights at Target last night.) I don't think I'm putting up my Christmas village this year, though. I'm feeling lazy. And there are already 4 wrapped Christmas presents under the tree! Actually, I think I am done Christmas shopping. I have a few more things to make, but overall, I'm done. That always saddens me, though. I love to shop and I love to give gifts so open season on gift giving for my family and friends is one big shot of joy directly into my veins.

I have a couple more projects to finish - the bean bags for the kids, the doll diapers for Fuss and her friend Gracie (I found a simpler pattern for the diapers and I have lots of cutting out to do over the next few days!) I bought a really nice (but on sale!) journal I think I'm going to give to Kat instead of making her something. I just couldn't figure out what to make. (Though she'll also be getting a small bottle of homemade Limoncello, so there is that).

I'm unimpressed with the shipping this year. In years past, Amazon, Toys R Us, etc. have exceeded my expectations with the speed of their shipping. Not so much this year. I did most of my online shopping within a week of Thanksgiving. And most of it still hasn't arrived.

Now comes one of my second favorite parts of holiday prep - wrapping. I love making presents look pretty and I learned the art of making tissue paper flowers this year, so my packages will be festooned with pretty and full flowers and bows. I'm really feeling the festive RED this year, so I have lots of red paper and tissue and ribbons. Very pretty.

How exactly does one wrap a bean bag chair, though? Or a handmade (by someone else) step-stool? These are the challenges I'm facing over the next 2 weeks.

Brazil

2011-12-08T14:12:00.001-05:00

A week ago I went and got my first Brazilian wax. My friends, the Luckies, convinced me to do it, I had a coupon for 1/2 off and my husband was positively giddy at the thought. (I declared it part of his Christmas present.)

Holy crap. I mean, wow. I thought I had a high tolerance for pain. Apparently not when it comes to ripping the hairs of my nether-regions out by the roots. Twice I almost told the girl to stop, that I was done and couldn't do any more. I didn't, but I came very close. Hot wax, stinging, etc. not my idea of a good time.

The salon where I had it done was very nice. My esthetician was great, patient, personable, not too friendly, very professional. She really made the whole experience as pleasant as it truly could be. I kept apologizing for my occasional outbursts, but he assured me that it was completely fine, that I was hardly the worst, and that it was completely understandable to be surprised by the feeling, etc.

Now, my darling husband has been very appreciative ever since. He is enjoying it a lot. Only fair after the near 3-week break we had in November when his illness, my illness, and an untimely and annoying visit from Aunt Flo came sequentially, with no overlap. I made a follow up appointment for after Christmas, but wow, I'm not exactly looking forward to the experience. I'm going to give it the old college try -they say subsequent waxings are much less painful, so I'm certainly hopeful.

Cuteness abounds

2011-12-07T14:04:00.001-05:00

Have a rotten headache. I feel like someone punched me in the cheek bone - like the after effects of that punch. It's sort of dull, but really sore. I haven't so much as had a mild head bump, so I'm not sure what that's about. In addition, my head throbs, too. So you are stuck with a cute pic of my kids instead of a post.

Make it up

2011-12-06T16:34:00.001-05:00

Well, so much for posting every day. I had some great ideas, too... But Saturday night my husband declared that we were going to bug bomb the house on Sunday and while we were out of the house, we would go to Orlando to see ICE! with the kiddos. Worked out great. (we are having a problem with ticks and our dog and so the bug bomb to was to hopefully obliterate the current issue. Here's hoping.)

Today, I succeeded in making 2 felt crinkley owls for Christmas presents for my future niece/nephew and for my hopefully soon-to-be new BFF's baby girl. They turned out cute. I also cut all the fabric for the plethora of bean abgs I'm making for my own kids. I also want to make this really pretty personalized nightlight for Fuss's best friend, Gracie, but the tutorial calls for an item found at Hobby Lobby and the closest one to me is 90 minutes away. Not happening. I need to go to Michaels and find out if they carry it and if not, I need to go back to the drawing board. My current back-up plan is making doll diapers for both Fuss and Gracie's baby dolls, but I was honestly going to cut out the shape of the diaper out of some extra receiving blankets we had and leave it at that for Fuss (I am not great with my sewing machine and she isn't picky) but it seems tacky to do that for a gift for a friend, doesn't it?

I also finished the calendars for the family yesterday, and ordered our Christmas cards last night from Tiny Prints. I'm quite excited about them!

I'm really proud of myself for all the Made stuff I'm doing this year. I always love making stuff, but I have trouble coming up with something USEFUL that I can make, so I don't end up doing it.

Christmas-ish

2011-12-03T19:02:00.001-05:00

I went out with my mom this morning and we got holiday pedicures. Then we made a few stops at some stores, and I think I finished my Christmas shopping for the kids. (Well, I still need to fill their stockings, but all the presents are bought, I guess.) I hate getting it done so early, because then I see all this other stuff that I want to get them and I can't shouldn't for budgetary purposes.

The kids are driving me bonkers right now. They are just WILD. We finally got the living room sort of back to normal and I started to put up the Christmas tree. And by the time I got all the branches unfurled, I was over it. Geez, I'm becoming a humbug!

Picture post

2011-12-02T16:54:00.001-05:00

Bulleting

2011-12-01T15:15:00.001-05:00

We had more time with the nebulizer than I would have liked, but Little Man appears to be good as new. We have a prescription for a puffer and a nebulizer of our very own, plus the albuterol to go with it. We think we may have a recurring problem on our hands, so we're planning to be prepared. (My mom was a Girl Scout Troop Leader. This also explains the large size of my purses and why they are often so full and heavy.)
This week we had firsts for both children: Little Man stood up completely by himself - no leaning, no grabbing, no support of any kind. And Fuss colored in the lines of a coloring book picture and also drew her own toddler-stick figures on paper all by herself. I'm quite proud.
I had a migraine on Monday that nearly felled me. It had been SUCH a long time since I'd had one that strong and it came out of no where. And the fact that Little Man wanted to do nothing more than climb on me and smack me in the head ALL DAY LONG really did not help the matter.
My dear friend Kat - who I am hoping will one day be my life-long BFF (she is the mother of Fuss's "best friend") is having a birthday next Wednesday. I want to make her a present - something small, but thoughtful and sweet, as we aren't yet in the "usually exchange presents" place in our friendship. But it's something I want to do. I just don't yet know what to make. Argh. She's a great baker, so treats aren't really ideal (plus, 2 days later we're doing a cookie exchange at MOPS, so...) I kind of want to do some hand-made notecards, but I'm not really sure... seems like it's so old fashioned that I don't know if she'll use them and... I'm still scrounging for ideas.
I'm also looking for ideas for crafts for the kids to make for Christmas. Both at home (Fuss and Little Man) and as a fun get-together project for Fuss, Gracie, and possibly C (my friend Jo's son who is the same age as Fuss and Gracie).
My next Thirty-one Party is next week for my friend M. I'm planning to really play up the Christmas angle -wrapping and decorations accordingly. Hoping for some big sales!
I'm getting my first-ever Brazillian bikini wax tonight. I guess you could say it is an early Christmas present for my husband! I'm a little nervous!
I have this plan to get back into blogging regularly again. My initial idea is to blog every day in December, but that is probably ridiculous considering how busy December usually is - and that my calendar is filling quickly! But I will try!

Oh who knows

2011-11-23T10:31:00.001-05:00

I've been wanting to post for days but Little Man is sick (again? still?) and things have been busy, Busy, BUSY! Packing for our trip, dealing with life's usual schedule, etc.

The Little Man seems to be dealing with a form of asthma. The Dr doesn't want to officially diagnose him with such because it can cause problems in the future, so unless it becomes chronic and drastically worse, we have a diagnosis of hyper-something, (for the life of me, I can't remember). He's on oral steroids, nebulizer steroids, and anti-biotics. Poor little guy.

I was going to do a post on how it seems like now that we're not nursing, he isn't all about the Mama anymore, and I may still do it, but when he's sick... he still wants the Mama. It's nice to feel needed, though I hate that he's miserable.

Heading to the mountains tonight - looking forward to some time away, seeing the nieces, my SIL, etc. Fuss has been counting down the days for MONTHS.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Treading water

2011-11-17T13:42:00.001-05:00

So I got the bug that the rest of the family had last week. I am grateful that it waited until after my incredibly busy week/weekend to hit me, though, so I won't complain too much.

I had a successful party on Saturday and I am happy to report that I hit my goal for my sales for the first 45 days and I earned my Start Swell kit for FREE. I made over $2000 in personal volume (which isn't to say I earned that much of my own, but I sold that much) and I'm very excited about that. (I just wish that I would get my confirmation email already!!!)

We are now in the throws of preparing for our road trip over Thanksgiving and I feel like I'm up to my ears in clean-but-unfolded laundry.

Oy with the poodles already!

2011-11-10T15:51:00.001-05:00

I've spent the last hour googling things like "vomit, fever, child, 4 days" because my kids are sick. I thought it was a short-lived thing, since Fuss began her fever on Monday night and seemed better by midday yesterday, but her fever is back this afternoon with a vengence and brought along a friend, vomit. Fun times. The Little Man started his fever yesterday and threw up twice this morning, but other than the fever still hanging on and general fussitude, he seems better than his sister, at least for now.

I've got so much going on this week - yesterday was supposed to be the beginning of our non-stop 5 days of business and I've had to cancel a lot. Fuss did feel well enough to go to dance class last night, which was nice since it was Visitor's night and my in-laws all came along and it was the first time they let the parents in the classroom since the first week. So cute.

I turned in my latest Thirty-one order and have hit the 2nd-level threshold for my Start Swell Incentive, so I'm pretty psyched about that. I also got my first "paycheck" today - my commission check was deposited into my account this morning and it is so nice to be earning some $$ again. If I have an average party this weekend (which I'm really hoping, since I'm driving all the way to Orlando to do it), I will hit my top goal for my first 45 days and I will be able to get my second kit for free. Which is awesome.

I've booked another show for December, gotten my in-laws excited about the next 2 months of incentives, potentially booked a way-out-of-town book party for December/January and have a strong lead on 2 January fundraiser deals. I'm feeling confident right now.

But I really, really wish I could make my kids feel better. Fuss keeps telling me how much she misses her daddy - something I understand all too well. And the Little Man can't decide if he wants to be free or to snuggle and seems to whine every time his whim changes.

I have no idea what to do about tomorrow. It's MOPS and I have 3 of the four Mentor Mom's out this month. We have 3 alternates (one of which will be out of town as well) so I was supposed to lead my own Discussion group as well as my regular duties. Plus I really wanted to hear this speaker. But I can't bring my sick kids to the kid care. I don't even like it when other moms bring their kids with the sniffles, so flu-like symptoms seem like a ridiculous conflict. I just don't know what to do!

It's beginning to look a lot like....

2011-11-08T08:19:00.000-05:00

It's getting to be that time again - and while I tend to prefer to wait until Thanksgiving is over to actually put up my decorations, I have to start thinking about the gift list and the Christmas cards NOW. I prefer the picture Christmas cards, so that means I have to do the kids outfits (finished this weekend!) and get their pictures taken early so that I can find the perfect card to put their beautiful faces on.

And where better to find the perfect card than Tiny Prints? I've used them in the past for birth announcements because theirs are always the absolute best. They have a great selection of Christmas and holiday cards this year. From the classic to the whimsical, from the sweet to the humorous, Tiny Prints has such great options! Now, I just have to figure out which one I'm going to choose - which could take me a while!

This one made me smile.

I loved the look of this one.

this one is sweet.

I could just do a
pic of each kid for this one.

I liked this one for the typography, etc.

And I LOVE this option - an ornament card! They have a whole bunch in lots of styles/layouts, so there are choices, choices!

Shop 'til he drops

2011-11-06T10:13:00.001-05:00

My dear husband went to work for a free-lance client this morning - hoping to get it done and out of the way so we could spend the rest of the day together. Here's hoping.

He also agreed to a shopping trip later today. Poor man doesn't know what he's gotten himself into. My shopping list is as follows:

Boots for me. Most likely black, but I also need some sort of brown low-heeled shoe as well. It will depend what I find.
Christmas clothes for the kids - have pretty much picked them out online at JCP where my MIL gets a discount.
Overalls for Little Man. April's Henry had on the cutest outfit of a simple white polo and overalls yesterday and I couldn't stop melting every time he toddled past me. Must get some for my Little Man. Probably going to look at Old Navy
Warm jackets for the kids. While we're at Old Navy, I plan to check out the jackets. I've seen several online that I like for Fuss (she's only getting one, but I like to have options). We are going to NC for Thanksgiving in less than 3 weeks (!) and the temps are quite cold (for us Floridians) up there in the mountains. Considering we were all shivering when the house dropped to 71 yesterday morning, the temps that are predicted to be somewhere in the realm of "highs in the 50s" are going to demand warmer clothes for both munchkins.
A warm jacket for me. I have a lovely black wool pea coat that is 12+ years old that barely fits. Also my leather jacket that only fits over thin sleeves. I need something that looks good and will keep me warm.
Other warmer clothes for the kids. Fuss has a few things - I bought her jeans 2 weeks ago at the consignment shop and she has some stretch pants that still fit from last year - but mostly she has a few long-sleeved tees and a couple of hoodies and that's it.

Now don't know that we'll be getting all of these things, of course. I imagine that list will be quite expensive and we just can't afford to get it all at once. But this is what I'm looking for, so he'll be dragged around the mall for a bit. I'll buy him a Starbucks (which lengthens his shopping tolerance significantly) and I put on sexy undies and have teased him with that info, which also lengthens his tolerance (reward at the end, etc.) so I'm hoping he can deal while I at least look.

Musings

2011-11-02T10:45:00.001-04:00

Need sleep. Once upon a time, my bedtime was 10PM. It worked for me. But then, I had to get up by 6 at least several mornings a week, so it made a lot of sense. Then, when my job came to an end and I didn't have to get up as early, I started being able to sleep in a little ('til 6:30 or 7) and started staying up later. Over the last 3 days, I've been up past 11, and one of those days it was past midnight. So yeah, I'm tired.

Both kids are coughing these days. Yippee. I might take them to Bible study tomorrow, regardless. I know, I'm terrible. But I missed 2 weeks ago and don't want to miss again, plus it's like my only "adult only" time during the week, usually. But I hate it when other kids infect MY kids in the nursery, so... debating.

I have a party this weekend - very excited. Also nervous. Trying to decide what sort of presentation to do. Also trying to decide if I should do the gambling game or not. It backfired last time, but since none of my in-laws are coming to this one, I should be safe! I will talk it over with my hostess. But since I NEED bookings, I might do it again to see if I can get some more.

My knee started up again last night and this morning both my knee and my hip hurt. I'm falling apart. Ironically, when I read up on the meniscus injury, it mentioned that it happens to athletes (which I am not) and older people (which I apparently am).

Have to go to the store this morning to buy milk and nothing else. I have a whole list of things that I need or will need rather soon, but my husband paid a ton of big bills this week and we have limited funds until Friday. And I need gas. And he needs gas. So you know, trying to only buy the essentials. And maybe a new shirt for this weekend with the cash I've squirreled away.

Remembering/post-Halloween

2011-11-01T10:00:00.001-04:00

We took the kids to the Trunk or Treat event at my in-laws church last night. As we were walking up, I started to feel weird, remembering what happened the last time I was there... the last time I took Fuss to this church all dressed up...

You see, that's when I started the heavy spotting. That was when I began losing my baby.

I calmed myself down. I reminded myself that if that baby had lived, I wouldn't have the Little Man. And I wouldn't give him up for anything. It helped that the church had changed a lot in the last 2 years, there were new buildings and a new football field for the attached high school. So the event wasn't laid out the same. It was crowded and the kids were having fun and my MIL and SILs were oohing and ahhing over the kids, etc. I saw my 31 sponsor with her kids. I saw a couple the my husband and I knew in high school (he graduated with my husband, she graduated with me), we saw some really cute and creative costumes... it was a nice evening. But I was exhausted by the end. Physically and emotionally. And I started to wonder if realizing the date had something to do with the way I had been feeling all day - tired, grumpy, like I just wanted to spend the entire day in bed.

While we were there, my knee started acting up and by the time I was driving home, I seriously didn't think I was going to make it all the way home. The pain had gotten horrible. I was limping when I got to my moms. She thinks I might have injured my miniscus (sp?) and I'm going to have to get it checked out, I guess.

I'm remembering my lost baby today. And enjoying the 2 that I have with me.

7 Quick Takes

2011-10-28T08:56:00.002-04:00

1. I just submitted my second Thirty-one order. I have officially earned the right to purchase my bonus kit, though I still have 3 weeks to earn it for a discount or for free (which is what I'm hoping for). And I have 2 parties coming up before I'm done with that time, so there is a good chance I'll make it, too! Yay!

2. This weekend looks to be busy - stuff to do, another garage sale, Trick or Treating for the kids and errands to run. Also: my car is acting up and I've had to jump start it the last 3 mornings. Gonna have to look into that. My neighbor was so kind to take care of it for me the last 2 days and we checked it before my husband left for work this morning and he was able to do it.

3. I had what seemed to be a completely random panic attack this morning. No idea what triggered it, but my body got all tense and I was having trouble breathing, etc. The weird thing was my brain was rational the whole time, it was my body that was reacting and I seriously have no idea why. But I'm better now.

4. My mom is going to visit my Gramma this weekend. She's going to be moving closer to us here, into her sister's former condo, and she seems to be wanting to give everything away. She's 84, and she is starting to show some signs of age, but up until about 2 years ago, I always joked that she was healthier and more active than I was. She's survived breast cancer, a car accident (not at all her fault) bad enough that she had to be cut out of her car with the jaws of life, and a fall that broke her shoulder. She has outlived her husband, her younger sister, many of her friends, and even one son. But she still has SO much life left and I kind of can't imagine my world without her.

5. It's not even 9am and I need a nap. My head hurts, my stomach has been bothering me, the kids got us up extra early today, and then the panic attack... I'm seriously ready to go back to bed!

6. My munchkins are going to be a "Beautiful Ballerina" and Linus Van Pelt (from Peanuts) for Halloween. I can't wait for the pictures.

7. I was thinking about wearing this new dress I got recently for Trick or Treating this weekend. It's sort of Spanish Dancer style, but it needs more accessories for me to really pull off that look. It's pretty much plain black, so I wouldn't really look in costume, just over dressed if I wore it plain.

Friendship morphology?

2011-10-26T09:40:00.001-04:00

I'm a busy girl this week! Didn't do much on Monday, but yesterday the kids and I got to have lunch with April to chat and for me to deliver her Thirty-one stuff. Today I Fuss has a play date with her best friend, Grace and I get the chance to chat with my friend Kat. Tonight Fuss has dance. Tomorrow, we have Bible study and Friday... we don't have plans, but I'm expecting my order from Thirty-one to arrive, so I'll be spending some time sorting and working out the delivery schedule. I am SO psyched. Saturday we're going to the City of Halloween/Trick or Treat event and having a garage sale in the AM. I know Fuss is excited to T or T.

I was having a conversation with my husband last night about adult friendships. How i always wanted a friend that would be my best friend until we're old and grey and we move into an ALF together or something. I've always felt like the odd one out. The third wheel. It's frustrating. In high school, I was part of 2 close-knit groups, but I was always the odd one when there were pairs. (Freshman year I was part of a foursome that did everything together. J and T were BFFs and H was my BFF, but she had a BFF from where she had lived before. And then she got a boyfriend and I was squeezed out. We remained friends, but weren't as close. Sophomore year it was my friends Liz and Cherry - we've all been friends for eons, but THEY are best friends and I'm just along for the ride. You get the idea/see the pattern.)

I feel like my closest girlfriends around here don't see our friendship as important as I do. And I feel left out. I and I feel stuck. I feel like my lot has already been cast - my adult best friend is K and that's who I'm stuck with, for better or for worse. My husband says that's not so. And if I want to pursue a friendship with Kat, that I should.

Is it immature to continue to label people "best friend" as an adult? And how does that work anyway? I mean, when you're on the playground as a kid, it's easy to say "do you wanna be my friend?" or "my best friend is ______" and it's done, but how does that happen when you're 30?

Busy, busy and emptying out!

2011-10-24T09:58:00.001-04:00

It's 9:30 and I have already changed 3 diapers - 2 of them poopy, wiped one poopy bottom, and cleaned up a puddle of pee on the floor and 2 yogurt messes. It's going to be one of THOSE days.

I ignored my business responsibilities this weekend and didn't make any calls that I should have made. But you know, it happens. We had a very successful weekend - had a garage sale on Saturday and got rid of a ton of junk and made some money in the process. We then purged and emptied another section of the main room in the house - so now things around my desk are much more organized and clear. I know one part of the party order I just submitted is already on it's way! (a direct ship order) But that probably means that the rest of the order is coming along, too and I'm so excited to get it!!!

We had a few cool days recently, weather-wise. I actually had the opportunity to put the kids in a few of their warmer clothes and I broke out one of my long-sleeved tees for the garage sale the other day. It's fun to see the new stuff.

I got Fuss's new tights for ballet in the mail and the new Children's Place order I ordered for her - a couple of dancing themed shirts, some leggings, and a tutu-like skirt to wear over leggings. She looks ADORABLE in it. And she LOVES it, so score one for mom. The Little Man has a couple of hoodies that are keeping him warm and I got both of the items I had to have for their Halloween costumes this weekend, too. (Her new tights have an opening in the bottom so that they can be peeled back off her foot when she's not wearing her dancing shoes. Reminds me of the footless tights the more advanced students in my own ballet school wore - I was so jealous. I thought they were SO cool.) But I'm hoping that these are more comfortable for her - they seem like they are WAY better quality, so here's hoping they last longer.

I am loving the need to purge all the junk and unused items in my house. My husband is very supportive. I even sold a table that I had an emotional attachment to, but was really just taking up space in my home at the garage sale. It wasn't useful to me, and when someone made me a good offer, I took it. My husband was surprised, but pleased. I am just so over having all this stuff taking up space. I haven't purged all my knick knacks yet, but things are thinning out.

I also sold my Christmas wreath at the garage sale - which means I get to buy a new one!!! I'm sort of psyched about that!

Bits and pieces on Thursday

2011-10-20T17:22:00.001-04:00

I was SO looking forward to submitting my first order for Thirty-one, but OMG, it is taking forever. Now, that is due to some mistakes by my customers (someone ordered something that I realized she didn't actually want and now I'm waiting on her to decide what to do about it...) and my mom not bringing me a check last night... so you know, not entirely the company's or my own fault, but wow. It's a little time consuming. I tried to do it during the Little Man's morning nap - thinking I could also get in my shower. Didn't happen. I wasn't even done by the time he got up. Oops.

Fuss is still incredibly fussy about the pain/sores in her mouth. I get that, I know it must hurt horribly, but wow - I am so sick of it already. Probably makes me a bad mom - I'm really trying to be sympathetic to her, but I really hate whining. So it's getting on my nerves. My nerves which are already fried due to hormones, lack of sleep, and my own stresses.

I woke up this morning with this AWFUL headache. I can only describe it as "my brain hurting." It was all in the top, front part of my head, but behind my face, all inside my head, not sinusy, but in the inner part of my head. Thankfully, an Excedrin Migraine and another hour of sleep seemed to help, but I can still feel it there, lurking behind the painkiller. Good times.

Sick Fuss

2011-10-19T13:19:00.002-04:00

So Fuss is sick. She has some sort of viral infection in her mouth - lots of little sores, sore throat, swollen tongue, hurts to chew/swallow/eat. Mild fever. Was thinking Hand, foot, mouth, but no rash on her body, it's all confined to her mouth. She wailed all night long in her sleep. I got very little sleep. Poor thing. She's wiped out. And miserable. And she is hardly talking and when she does, she does so with her jaw clenched shut like that's going to help the tongue/swallow factor (no idea if it does, but that's what she's doing nonetheless.

Meanwhile, tired, exhausted mama (who hasn't gotten a good night's sleep in a week because of various reasons) is also menstrual and stressed, etc. Our plans for the rest of the week are shot - because she'll be contagious for several more days and can't be around other kids. But we'll make it. But I confess, my plan for keeping my sanity is to allow a lot of TV again. (I've been trying to cut back.) Ah well, we'll go back to limiting it when she's better. Right now she's a lump on the couch.

My party is closing today or tomorrow. I think I'm going to end up with some pretty good totals, so that's happy! I have 2 open book parties right now and a display (sort of a casual party) at a MOPS event this weekend. My schedule is starting to fill up and I'm loving it.

I'd like a nap, but the baby fell asleep in the car and refused to wake up when we got home. So I have a feeling about the time I get Fuss to lay down for a rest, he'll be getting up. Ah well. I've got lots of work to do, I shouldn't be sleeping anyhow.

10 on Tues: Vacationing

2011-10-18T10:17:00.000-04:00

1. You’re packing for a week long vacation, do you pack ahead of time or wait until the last possible minute to pack?
I start the planning part ahead of time. I make lists, and if it's clothes that I won't need in the meantime, I start some small piles of stuff, etc. But mostly I do the bulk of the packing in the last 24 hours.

2. Are you a light or heavy packer?
Somewhere in the middle. I hate not having the clothes/extras that I want, so I tend to bring 2 sets of PJs (one for if it's cold, one for if it's warm), tons of extra undies, extra shirts, etc.

3. What are your favorite road trip snacks?
Goldfish, pretzels, and Coca Cola

4. Do you take any reading material along?
I always take a book or two or my Kindle, but I get carsick if I read in the car, so it's for any downtime once we're at our destination or on a plane...

5. Do you prefer to drive or fly to your vacation destination?
Depends on how long it would take. If it's less than a day and I get a whole week, then I'm fine w/ driving. But if it's a really long trip, then I am all about the airplane!

6. What is your favorite time of the year to take your vacation?
Probably summer - so I get out of the sweltering heat of FL.

7. Where is your favorite place to vacation?
North Carolina mountains, New Orleans, St Augustine.

8. You are vacationing in the mountains, what is your favorite thing to do while there?
Shop. :) As a kid, we'd go to all these cute little towns and look in the quaint little shops. I loved it. Also, I loved checking out the historical areas nearby. We used to go to NC every summer and I loved Old Salem Village, Cherokee, The Biltmore Estate... it was great.

9. You are at the beach for your vacation, do you like to take it easy on the beach or play all day in the water?
Take it easy. Partially because I burn easily and hate being out in the sun very much and partially because I'm not really a beach person in general.

10. While your on vacation do you prefer to eat out every night or cook some of your own meals?
Depends on how long we're gone, but I love to eat out in general. My husband and I do a lot of lunches/breakfasts by getting stuff at the grocery that we can store in our rooms (fresh fruit, crackers, etc.) and then eat out in nicer restaurants at night. I love sampling the local cuisine.

For more, visit Chelsea, here.

Follow up

2011-10-17T08:58:00.002-04:00

So, the party was a success, overall. My "booking game" backfired since the only 3 people who drew the "book a party" cards were my 3 in-laws who probably won't do it, or at best, will only do a book party. But oh well. I did get one booking during the night and another call from a friend who couldn't make it saying she wanted to book a party, so there's that.

I had several last minute cancellations - including one from one of my closest friends, a lame "something came up" text 30 minutes before the party started. And several no-shows. But all my in-laws showed up (and they were only maybes) and one friend brought a friend, so... overall we did good. The sales will put me more than half way to my minimum Start Swell goal. And I have 2 more official parties before that deadline and a book party closing and an informal showing... so I think I will totally make it!

I have follow-ups to do this week. I have to check in with those who said they were going to do outside orders and haven't yet followed through and those who took the catalog home with them to decide. I feel like I got a good start and now have some things to follow up on. They claim the key to success is 3 (calls per day) 2 (parties per week) 1 (recruit per month, though I don't care so much about the recruits at this point. I won't turn them down, but I'm trying not to make a big push at this point.) But up until now I've felt like I would be completely cold-calling people if I called them up and were talking about booking or ordering.

My 2 best friends didn't show up. But my 2 oldest friends did, despite the fact that they both had to come from other counties (and one of them drove 2 hours each way to be here.) I got really upset about the one at the last minute and I'm sort of pissed about the other in general. How can someone who calls herself your best friend just not make ANY effort to support you in something that you're really excited about? I don't get it.

Quick Takes

2011-10-14T17:02:00.002-04:00

1. I got peed on at 4:45am today. It was not the start to the day I was hoping for.

2. The good news is that my day did get better.

3. I hurried around this morning and got ready for MOPS which was fun and mostly snag-free. I got some feedback from my church friends regarding the party tomorrow - and even have another outside order coming in.

4. I had a chiropractor appointment this afternoon to (hopefully) fix the problem I was having in my back. When he tried to adjust me, it didn't work right or something, so he made me sit with ice on my back for 5+ minutes. It was COLD. But then the adjustment seemed to work and I'm hoping for some improvement.

5. I'm sort of psyched about tomorrow. I've been practicing more than I would have if this were a school project (not that that is saying much - I was known to do very well on off-the-cuff oral presentations in high school, but I'm seriously out of practice, so I think it's best to practice.) and I have a written opening and tons of notes. I really think it should go well.

6. Neither kid got more than about 20 minutes worth of napping today because of all our running around. I'm looking forward to a good nights' sleep tonight for the first time all week. (the baby has been waking in the 5 o'clock hour and today went even earlier (see Quick Take #1) and I've been yawning all day long.

7. My Fuss has a best friend. It makes my heart happy to see them together, how they play together so well and how they love each other. It also makes me happy that her BFF's mom is a good friend of mine. So play dates? They're awesome. :)

"Mastering" the art of sales and early rising

2011-10-13T08:19:00.001-04:00

I'm starting to figure out how to do this Direct Sales thing. You have to be friendly and a little pushy. But not too pushy or you'll be off-putting. So you make extra phone calls. And you send extra emails. And you mention your party/business/event slightly more often than is natural. And you bring it up. And up. And up.

Yesterday, I made a couple of phone calls to the people who said "maybe" but I knew were leaning against it. I left upbeat messages about how much I was looking forward to seeing them at my party. I sent emails and FB messages to others who hadn't RSVPed. I implied that I was assuming that they were coming. (because isn't that what you have to assume when someone doesn't RSVP? Otherwise if they show, you don't have enough stuff/food/supplies for them.)

I'm up to somewhere near 20 if all the maybes come and people bring the friends that they have mentioned they will be bringing.

There are also about 10 more people I haven't heard from. So things are going well.

_______________________________________________
The baby keeps waking in the 5 o'clock hour every morning. Mostly, he'll go back to sleep if we pull him into bed with us, but then I don't get as good sleep as I do when he's not there. He's gotten big and he twitches. And the last two mornings, my brain has kicked in and I can't go back to sleep. I'm sitting here at 8:20 and my eyes are SO heavy and I'm sleepy. But I've been up for 3 hours and I have Bible study this morning (which reminds me, I have to make the kids a sack lunch for today, so I'd better wrap this up.) so I can't go back to bed, even if I wanted to.

Looking Up, Business-wise

2011-10-12T08:07:00.000-04:00

I visited my husband's work yesterday with the kids and passed out some more of my business cards and left a catalog and order forms with my husband. We had invited several people to the party already and some mentioned that they would be coming and some mentioned that they would have outside orders. I also got an outside order from an old friend who is going out of town, so that's 2 before the party even happens! Things are looking up.

If all the confirmed and all the maybes show up, I'll have 15 people attending plus up to 5 outside orders that have already been mentioned to me! I'm psyched. I'm sending the packet for a book party today and I have a casual showing next weekend as well.

One of my closest friends works with my husband and I asked her yesterday if she was coming. She told me that one of her friends from the office had said "are you going? Because if you go, I'll go," and M answered "well, she's my friend so I kind of have to." I think she was joking around, but I'm finding it hard to stop thinking about those words the way they COULD be interpreted. She's one of my closest friends. We've grown very close over the last 3 years and she's dealing with some major things in her life and I've supported her through thick and thin lately. I would have thought she would want to support me, would want to encourage me. Because that would be MY attitude if the situation were reversed.

Meanwhile, my best friend still hasn't committed to coming, technically. And then she casually mentioned that her step-son's mom is also starting out selling the same stuff and I'm a little livid. Not at the step-son's mom - because she can do what she wants, I'm certainly not the only person selling this stuff! - but if my best friend doesn't show up to my party and does buy something from her, I'm going to be really, really pissed. But, I'm not going to borrow trouble, so I'm just going to move forward and see what happens.

I'm feeling very encouraged right now. I feel like things are moving forward and things are coming a long. I feel like this just might work after all. And I am SO excited to be doing something new, something I believe in. I'm ready. I'm still a little nervous, but I seriously think I can pull it off.

Ten on Tuesday: All About Pasta

2011-10-11T15:31:00.002-04:00

1. Red Sauce or White Sauce?
White, but many of the cream sauces mess with my stomach unless they are literally freshly homemade. So I eat plenty of red or butter sauces, too, and I LOVE them.

2. Do you prefer pasta you can twirl or stab?
I like twirls, but I'm really pretty equal opportunity on my pasta. My husband uses the term "evil pasta" for those which you can't twirl and don't often stay on your fork easily. He hates penne, for example.

3. Baked or boiled?
Boiled.

4. Do you like meat in your sauce or do you kick it vegetarian style?
It depends. I always hated my mom's "meat sauce" spaghetti as a kid, but I love some meal that includes meat - I just don't like it to be equal parts meat and sauce.

5. Where have you had your very best pasta ever?
Ooh, boy, that's a tough one. I have no idea. My husband makes this stuff we call "O"-fredo sauce (because it's like having a little orgasm in my mouth!) so maybe here at home?

6. What is your favorite pasta dish?
I love a good seafood pasta in a lemon butter sauce.

7. Do you serve meatballs when you make spaghetti or just do a meat sauce?
I don't do meat sauce. We either do meatballs or italian sausage.

8. Why type (rice, whole wheat, egg, etc) of noodles do you use?
I love spinach noodles and egg noodles, but more often than not, we use whatever is cheap and on sale or BOGO, so it's pretty standard white flour pasta.

9. What type of meats or vegetables do you put in your sauce?
I love mushrooms in pasta sauce. We do a lot of sea food and Italian sausage in our pastas. I also make an aribiatta sauce with lots of peppers and mushrooms and onion, too which is great!

10. Do you make a “Sunday gravy” to use throughout the week or do you just open a jar of whatever and heat it up? (No judgment on this one!)
I don't make Sunday gravy, but I nearly always doctor a jar of sauce to make our regular dinner sauces. I only use it straight out of the jar if I'm microwaving it to put on some lunchtime noodles or something.

Check out Chelsea and the rest here to see others' answers.

Weekend in review

2011-10-10T08:57:00.001-04:00

We had a nice weekend, full of family time and productivity. We did another "unplugged" Sunday, which was nice, but also... by the end of the day I was really ready for some TV or a movie. I have really cut back on my own TV watching this week, so by Sunday night I was ready. But we stuck to our plan and I made it through the evening without TV. But I am starting to think that Fuss thinks it's a punishment instead of a break from the norm or whatever. We're trying to explain it, but...

I got my consultant kit from Thirty-one and I'm psyched! I also got my new business cards and labels, so I'm in business! My Kick Off Party is this Saturday and I'm a little nervous and also very excited. I've gotten a few more responses, some yeses and some nos, but at least more people are responding. And my SIL LB (from NC) has already given me an order, so I've officially had my first sale! And I've had a couple more people tell me they will check out the website and a few more commit to some orders. And as long as I can get a couple of bookings, I'm good.

We have another busy week ahead - MOPS, my Bible study, and party prep, of course. I have to assemble my customer, hostess, and recruiting packets and I need to continue to purge all the JUNK in my house for the garage sale we are having in 2 weeks. I am DONE with having all this STUFF in my house and we've been making some nice dents lately. I am just ready to be organized and it's frustrating to not have it be done with a snap of my fingers. Of course, I've been collecting things for 31 years, it's very likely to take at least SOME time to sort and purge!

Loyalty

2011-10-06T17:46:00.001-04:00

You know, it's funny, my closest friends - the ones I confide in, the ones who come to me when they need someone to complain to, the ones who I spend the most time with... they haven't so much as RSVPed to my party. I take that back, one of them did, but it was a no. None of them have offered to host a party and a couple of them have completely ignored every mention and invitation I have made/sent, etc. But my 2 oldest friends? The ones I met in Kindergarten and 1st grade, respectively? Yeah, they're coming. One is even driving across the state (a good 2+ hours) to come and she has even said she'd be interested in hosting a party if I was willing to drive that far to do one. (I am.) I find it interesting to see how people react to their friends when they are asked to do something for them like this. You would think that my BEST FRIEND would want to help me and support me, as I have done for her for years and years. But she can't even leave her son's t-ball game a little early to be there for me in this.

I know I keep complaining about this, but I feel like it's incredibly rude and stressful to have so many people ignoring the RSVP request on the invitation. I have made it as painless as possible (email! FB!) - I mean, really, you don't even have to DO anything. Click a flipping button.

Nothnig to write about 10 on Tues

2011-10-04T09:59:00.001-04:00

1. How do you take your coffee?
Light and sweet

2. Do you prefer soft or crispy chocolate chip cookies?
Soft! As a matter of fact, my husband over-cooked our cookies the other night and it has made it SO much easier to resist them. I am unimpressed by crispy cookies.

3. Do you wear a belt everyday?
Nope.

4. What is your favorite color combination?
Brown and _____. I feel like brown goes with so much. Right now I'm really focusing on brown and sort of a light, aqua blue.

5. Do you like sour candy?
Sometimes. Used to love it.

6. How often do you do laundry?
Several times a week.

7. Did you ever wear braces?
Yes.

8. Are you good at Roman Numerals?
Not really. Only through the 100s.

9. What is your favorite form of social media?
Facebook, I'd guess.

10. How do you feel about chin dimples?
Lift a cleft chin? Neutral

For more ToT click here.

Red hats

2011-10-03T15:20:00.001-04:00

My great-aunt passed away last week and today was her funeral. It was a very nice service and all my cousins were there (sans the one who is away at school out of state) even my cousin W who I often jokingly refer to as "my deadbeat cousin" because he often seems to forget he has an extended family even though he lives within a mile of my mom and me. My Aunt Jean was a very friendly, fun-loving, and flamboyant lady so there were lots of people and lots of colorful flowers all over. It was so nice for her children to see how much she was loved.

My usually tough uncle was there and I heard him let out a sob when he stood by the casket, which surprised me. I guess you never really know a person and how they'll react to a family loss. I don't even want to know what he'll do when my Gramma passes - I don't even want to think about it, really.

We saw the movie Courageous over the weekend and both my husband and I were really moved by it and it's message. We have spent the bulk of the weekend discussing the changes we need to make to the way we live and the way we parent. If you have the opportunity, I highly recommend that you see this movie.

I'm increasingly nervous that I'm not going to have a good turn out for my Kick Off party - I haven't heard back from anyone else yet (though my Gramma did tell me that she is planning to come down for it!) and when I mentioned my new endeavor to my dad over the weekend, he didn't seem that supportive or encouraging, which sort of surprised. I would have thought that he would be all about me trying to do something to earn some money, etc. but he seemed a little sarcastic about it. Ah well.

7 (Neuroticly Obsessive) Quick Takes

2011-09-30T14:11:00.000-04:00

I'm starting to freak out. I have only gotten regrets from my "Please RSVP" note on my party invitation. Granted, even then, it's only been 3 of them and I invited 50 people, but still. AND! My "cousin" (my mom's best friend's daughter - she's "aunt Sharon" to me, so "cousin") is hosting a Thirty-One party the week before. We don't have a lot of friends in common, so that's not an issue, but she was one of my top prospects for both coming AND hosting a party, so that's out.
And I keep finding these amazing deals for great little things I can put in my hostess gifts, door prizes, and "bring a friend" gifts. But I really think I should stop buying now. I don't even know what all I have at the moment - I need to stop, take stock and put the gifts together to see what I need still and yet, I have all this other stuff that is a higher priority for RIGHT NOW.
I also keep thinking of cute little ideas to MAKE for said gifts, but then I'm like will people actually like them? I mean, every single one of these things is something I'd like to get, but I am not everyone. And I have a weird obsession with paper and journals and notepads, so there's that, too. And part of what I'd like to promote with my shows is the opportunity to help with organization, so do little things I've made (decorative candles, framed inspirational quotes) really help support that?
What if this doesn't work out? What if I've spent time and money and effort and I fail from the get go? I know that these types of things are not always "easy" since you are only successful if you can continually book parties and you will quickly run out of friends to help you out.
And that's the other thing. My closest friends? None of them have offered to host a party. I'm going to have to get a little more pushy and I don't really want to! My BF, K, even told me she wanted to do a Pampered Chef party soon, so she couldn't host a party for me. Seriously?
I wanted to do some "bigger" gifts as well, like Starbucks giftcards, and even a couple of products (smaller ones, obviously) from Thirty-One, but I don't really know how to go about getting the freebies since I already placed my big order (I should have thought of this ahead!) and I'm assuming that I will have to send in a minimum order once I get started officially. I wish I didn't have this time limit hanging over my head and I could go ahead and sign my contract NOW. But then, since I'm freaking out about it a little, maybe that's not a good idea, either...
Loyal reader Jessica asked "What is Thirty-One?" in the comments the other day. And I'm happy to explain! Thirty-One is a great little company that sells bags, totes, organizational items, as well as gifts. Many of the items can be personalized. Their selection is fun and functional and it is set up as an in-home product party type of of scenario and their employees/consultants are "independent contractors" so they have the opportunity to work for themselves and be flexible in their schedules. (Think Mary Kay, Party Lite, Pampered Chef etc.)

Never-ending to do list

2011-09-28T09:28:00.002-04:00

My first party - my own Kick Off - is scheduled for October 15th, about 2.5 weeks away. I am nervous. I've heard some interest from friends and my husband's co-workers, but my mind constantly flashes back to the first product party I ever hosted in my early 20's (not as a consultant, just as a host) that was Party Lite and only my mom and my sister attended. I was heartbroken. It all worked out in the end (your hostess rewards were based on both sales and getting another booking, so I just booked another party for a date when more people could come), but I remember setting up the house and getting all excited and then the feeling of no one coming... it was bad. So that is my fear, that no one will come. I haven't really started to fret over the whole "what am I going to say to these people?" issue yet, but it's there in the background of my mind!

I've purchased a handful of things to help me present - a black sheet (in lieu of a tablecloth), purse holders, prizes, hostess gifts, etc. I'm still trying to find a few more things and I'm going to be hitting up a great sale/coupon at Michaels this weekend (20% off the whole order, including sale items!) for a bunch of organizational-like calendars and organizers I found. I really want to focus on the organizational aspects of these products. I feel like that is so needed in this society and in my own life that I know others can relate.

The invites are being mailed out today, though several of the hand-delivered ones have already been handed out. My best friends are getting theirs tomorrow when I will be seeing them anyway.

I'm both nervous and excited about this. I'm also a little nervous since I just found out that one of the friends I was counting on to book wants to put off scheduling it for awhile because she had already committed to hosting a Partylite party in October. So I really only have a couple of bookings (2) plus my own.

But I feel like it's going to work out okay. I hope.

Tummy Drama

2011-09-27T10:48:00.000-04:00

I have gastrointestinal issues. I always have. So there's often at least a little tummy trouble around this house. But over the past few days, my tummy has been the least troubled.

Both kids got sick over the weekend - seemingly random, both threw up during the night on Friday night/Saturday morning and no one got much sleep. I blamed it on a bad bottle of apple juice, but then on Sunday, my husband started getting sick and spent about 12 hours near a bucket or in the bathroom. He got little sleep and once his stomach stopped purging, he slept most of the day.

The baby had more troubles over the weekend, but seemed better by yesterday. Fuss seemed fine over the weekend, but started with troubles (not vomiting, though) yesterday. And last night... oh dear. She repeatedly woke screaming in pain. I can't tell you how I felt when I heard her - it was awful. And she was so tired so it took forever to calm her and get her to stop wailing. She was hurting so much and we're fairly positive it was simply a ton of gas built up in her belly. She feels so much better this morning, but slept in until 8:30.

Here's to hoping that the tummy drama is over around here.

2011-09-26T08:53:00.000-04:00

After some (minor) drama in getting it moving, I finally got my Thirty-One order submitted last night. For $150 I got nearly $500 in product once I factored in my Hostess rewards (credit and half-priced items) and it's a great business investment PLUS I get a bunch of fun, useful stuff! Yay!

And then this morning I realized that I should have ordered a pen case to hold all my pens, but I'll get that the next time around.

Anyhow, I am so psyched about this. And part of my excitement is that my husband is also really excited for me. He sat down the other night and said, "I have something I need to say," and I thought he was going to tell me to slow down, not get so caught up, quit buying the stuff until my contract was signed (I've been searching for and buying hostess gifts, supplies, etc.) But he told me that he was really excited for me, he was so happy to see me doing something that was making me happy, that he was proud of me for taking the leap and making steps to do this, etc. He pointed out that 3 months ago, I wouldn't have (because of the way I was feeling, etc.) and he's so happy that things seem to be moving forward. He's such a supportive husband! I am blessed and lucky to have him.

On the other hand, some of my excitement is tempered by the fact that no one else from my initial list of "might possibly book a party" friends has offered to do so! I sent out the email Thursday, I think, and while I do have 4 shows committed (the minimum to sign up) I was hoping to get at least 2 more before my big kick off. At this point, I'd be happy with one. But it will happen! I'm (somewhat) confident!

Grrr. Argh. and then something good.

2011-09-22T11:57:00.003-04:00

Last night I was stressed, grumpy, achy, frustrated. I don't know if it was hormonal, chemical, exhaustion or what. I took a bath. I picked up my Kindle and soaked for awhile. It helped my aches. But as I went to sit up, I put my hand on the soap holder and ended up pulling it down on top of me. So there's a whole in the wall of our shower. And a leak in the faucet. And I think I'll just go sit down and cry now, thanks.

I had a rough morning. I was rushing around and the baby was fussing (his favorite thing to do these days) and Fuss was dawdling and I had to go to Bible study... I didn't want to go. I was grumpy about the subject matter (Genesis/Creation - something I've studied a million times through school) but I really wanted to have this extra time with my friend Kat and it IS 90 minutes of free babysitting while I get to talk intelligently with other adults, so I made myself go. I had to stop at 7/11 to get a cup of Coke. (because of course, I didn't have any caffeine in the house!) I also didn't have my "homework" done - so I had to rush in the car and finish answering at least some more of the questions.

Once I got there, I still felt so rushed and pushed and my head was pounding (lack of caffeine) and I just didn't want to be there. BUT once the discussion started... I got into it. I got passionate about it and it was really good. I took notes during the lecture that followed (never a strong suit of mine in high school or college, but at least I won't be tested on this!) and it was really good.

At the end of the lecture, I picked up the kids and made plans for a play date next week with Kat. I struggled to get the kids in the car (diaper bag, bag with my stuff, baby who doesn't walk, toddler who does...) and came home. I arrived home and settled the kids down (Little Man missed his nap this morning and consequently fell asleep in the car, so I plopped him in his crib when we got home) and found an email from my friend April (thanks again!) who told me she was willing to do a party for my new business! I have my 4 parties now, so I can get started! That really helped my mood.

I ate my carryout sushi (from last night) and my dad came over to look at the bathroom catastrophe. I'm hoping the rest of the day continues to improve! I have cake class tonight, but I need to dump this headache before then, ideally.

Recipe!

2011-09-21T09:51:00.002-04:00

I am starting a business - as a consultant for Thirty-One Gifts so I've been very distracted of late getting things ready! But! Today, I have a recipe to share that I found on Pinterest and it is yummy, yummy! (I promise, I made some myself. I'm also already plotting how to get a mini-loaf pan to give this stuff away for Christmas gifts, too!) So I thought I'd share in lieu of a real, post!

Cinnamon Sugar Bread

Ingredients

1 cup white sugar
1/3 cup white sugar (divide it out, as you need some for the batter and some for the "filling")

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 tablespoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 cup white sugar

1 egg, beaten

1 cup milk

1/3 cup vegetable oil

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly grease a 9x5 inch loaf pan.

In large bowl combine flour, baking powder, salt and 1 cup sugar. Add egg, milk, and oil to flour mixture.

Stir until just moistened.

Pour half of the batter into pan.
Sprinkle with cinnamon and 1/3 cup sugar (you can mix together cinnamon and sugar before hand, I didn't though I just sprinkled away).
Cover with remaining batter.

Top with more cinnamon/sugar if desired.

Bake in preheated oven for 45 to 50 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into center of the loaf comes out clean.
Let cool in pan for 10 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.
Wrap in foil and let sit overnight before slicing (I sliced off pieces then wrapped the rest of the loaf in foil).

Weekend Review

2011-09-19T09:45:00.003-04:00

I went to a product party this weekend. Technically, my mom and I were co-hosting. But, while I'd seen the products before (and even owned a couple, thanks to gifts from my mom) I'd never been to one of the parties before. My mom kept telling me that I should consider selling this stuff. And now I am. I will be signing up to be a consultant with this company - more on this later. But I'm very excited. I'm just nervous. I know I can get up in front of people and talk about the products, but my concern about these things is always - will I get more bookings? And once I've hit up all my friends to book parties, then what? My mom can and will only host so many, you know?

I took Fuss to her first movie-theater movie this weekend. They did a short-term re-release of The Lion King in theaters to promote the release of the Blu-Ray version coming out. I hadn't seen it in theaters before (on video, but missed it in the theater) so it was a new experience for me as well. She loved it. She loved the theater experience, the popcorn, the seats, the big screen. She behaved wonderfully and excitedly asked "can we see it again?" as the credits rolled and the lights came up at the end.

We had a bad week last week here at Casa Fuss. Fuss has just been very difficult lately and the tantrums and the disobedience have gotten out of control. Things improved over the weekend with the constant monitoring/teaching of both parents on her, but between that and my PMS last week (I started on Friday) I think we have found the reason for my horrible week last week. I no longer feel as if I need to sell her to science, so things are looking up!

I need this to stop

2011-09-15T15:29:00.002-04:00

I feel like I'm living off of caffeine and chocolate and the occasional handful of goldfish. I'm not eating. I'm not hungry. I eat dinner because my husband is home and it's the thing to do.

I've had a few really bad days. Today I wasn't so much depressed as anxious. Where'd that come from? Sure, I was walking into a new experience (Bible study with a friend at a new church) but seriously, I felt like I was having a panic attack. I was tense and started getting hot flashes... it was so weird.

I want this to be over. I don't want to deal with this any more. I am tired all the time. I don't seem to ever get enough sleep. I just want to sleep.

Ranting about nothing

2011-09-13T11:15:00.002-04:00

Yesterday was a good day. Today not so much.

I went out to the craft store yesterday and got inspiration for homemade Christmas presents and bought some water color paints for Fuss. She had a blast painting this morning. And things were okay until she got real whiny and demanding today and then I just SNAPPED. My house is a disaster. You would not believe the mess/chaos that is all around me and I just... don't know where to begin. I hate it.

I got lost in Pinterest and Bejeweled this morning to "hide" and I hate that, too. I hate that I don't want to talk to my kids when I'm stressed. I hate that I get upset with them over accidents (like when the baby knocked over the water color water this morning because we hadn't put the paints away yet (she was finishing the painting she was doing when he got up from his nap) and I yelled. I feel like there is nothing good in me right now. Which is crazy, because up until about 7:30 yesterday things were peachy and happy around here. What the heck is wrong with me?

It's like I just don't want to do this anymore.

Whirlwind out of the east

2011-09-08T16:02:00.004-04:00

Raise your hand if you assumed I forgot I had a blog... no one? Oh, that's probably because all my readers have disappeared due to my unscheduled hiatus.

This is going to have to be quick, because I'm on a time-crunch, but here's my last few weeks in bullets with a few pics thrown in to help with the monotony:

Little Man's birthday: he turned one, he had a party (which went very well!) and he got dedicated. He had his well-check (22 lbs, 5oz, 29.25" tall) and is starting to pull up and stand while leaning on things. We lowered his crib, he got 2 more teeth (at once - he's up to 6 now) and he got his first pair of Stride Rite shoes. And even those seem like they might still be too narrow.
I got my haircut. I loved it in the salon, though I was a little surprised as she kept cutting away at my hair, but it's cute, it's at least a little different (as I told her that I had had the same haircut since I was 4 and wanted something different without sacrificing my versatility). I loved it, I hated it, I tolerated it and I've embraced it. (All in 8 days!) I'm currently rocking the semi-big hair look that reminds me of my mom in her 30s, but hey! I'm in my 30s. I can pull it off. :)
Fuss: is still fussy, she's 3, she's a whirlwind of cuteness, sass, and trouble, but I love her. She began dancing school (ballet/tap/tumbling) this week and is loving it.
I'm on the MOPS committee this year, so that's kept me busy. We have our kick-off tomorrow and I'm already worn out. But it's fun, it gets me socializing more, gets me active at church, and lets me socialize.
I'm still taking cake decorating classes. I love them and I'm about to start one that focuses mostly on fondant. Yay!
Our street has been flooding regularly lately due to some drainage issues and my husband unfortunately flooded his car last week. Thanks to an old friend who used to be a mechanic, it is running once again and all seems to be well. We haven't reported it to the insurance company, so I'm thinking it won't show up on the record for when we need to resell it. Not that we're planning to do so any time soon, but nonetheless.

Thirty-one

2011-08-25T15:04:00.002-04:00

So, I had my birthday on Tuesday. It started out great, but wasn't quite as wonderful by the middle. Three-year-olds and nearly-one-year-olds don't care that it's Mommy's Special Day and that she should get treated extra nice. The Little Man did sleep in until 7, so that was nice, though.

I'm struggling again with mood swings and anger and anti-social tendencies. The several nights of little sleep recently haven't helped, I'm sure. (We stayed up WAY too late at my party and got up early, and then Little Man has been teething and has some sniffles and isn't sleeping well the last few days). But I almost canceled my annual Mother/Daughter pedi-and-lunch-and-shopping trip yesterday because I didn't want to go out. Now THAT is strange for me.

So I'm hoping I'll start getting more sleep and things will even out, but if not, back to the Dr. I'll go. No fun, but neither is feeling so out of control.

Birthday weekend

2011-08-22T08:51:00.003-04:00

Whew! We had SUCH a busy, fantastic weekend.

We spent the morning on Saturday getting ready for the rest of it. Daddy Fuss fixed the car (which ended up being a PITA, but it got done and all is well) and went grocery shopping and ran the have-to errands I hadn't been able to take care of yet. I finished packing and tried to clean up some more so that my mom and Gramma wouldn't have as much mess to deal with. I failed, but it was at least BETTER, so there's that.

We left the house around 3 and drove down to the beach. Over 4th of July we had left my husband's sunglasses at Cherry's mom's house, and Cherry just announced that she is pregnant (!) so I wanted to deliver some maternity clothes for her. We checked into the hotel and ended up in an upgraded room with a view and a little more privacy than originally expected and began to get dressed for our evening out. Our best friends picked us up (there were parking issues at the hotel) and we drove the throwing distance to the restaurant (I was wearing heels and there was a LOT of traffic, so we were lazy and drove instead of walked.) We had an excellent dinner and I got my Espresso Martini (theirs are the BEST thanks to Van Gogh Double Espresso Vodka - yum!)

My cake turned out beautifully and delicious and I will certainly make the ganache topping again some time. Everyone loved the look of the cake, so I was happy that my second attempt turned out so nice.

We had a fun time with our friends - a few things got out of hand, we all drank too much, stayed up too late and the other 2 guys (not my husband) got into an argument that could potentially end up being really awkward in the future. But all in all, things went well and we had fun.

My mom and Gramma cleaned and scrubbed while they watched the kids and also set up the wading pool in the back yard for them. My fridge is spotless for the first time in a year (we had something very sticky spill and it was really a mess in there, but I didn't have the time or energy to deal with it) and and while both of them were exhausted by the time they were done, (my mom reported taking a much-needed nap Sunday afternoon) they all had fun.

The Little Man's face lit up and he practically swam across the floor to see me when we returned. He does good on the cup and bottle, but he misses his Mama Milk, too. He fell asleep in my arms after emptying my full-to-overflowing breast and slept for 2 hours.

We attended a friend's 1-year-old's birthday party on Sunday afternoon. It was fun, though I was a bad mama and forgot sunscreen and the Little Man got a mild sunburn on his back from being exposed while in the wading pool. It's so funny because I was SO good about coating Fuss when she was younger assuming that with her pale parents she would burn easy. Nope. My girl tans. And she tans beautifully. It's sort of amazing. She gets beautiful tan lines from a mild exposure to the sun, even with sunscreen on.

April gave me a bunch of clothes that she has shrunk out of (she looks amazing. I'm somewhat inspired) and I ended up with practically a whole new wardrobe. I had almost no dressy clothes (like nice pants and skirts, etc.) so her work wardrobe really filled in some gaps in mine. I am incredibly grateful!

We had a pleasant and quiet evening at home and my husband made dinner and it was great.

Accomplishments and plans

2011-08-15T11:23:00.002-04:00

Ugh. My son is having more separation anxiety issues lately. And when I say separation anxiety, I swear it's like he doesn't ever want to be put down, let alone have me or whomever walk away from him. At this age, Fuss was walking so she constantly wanted to get down and run around - she had to be really tired to even snuggle with me.

Anyhow, we cleaned out our garage this weekend and I am SO happy with the progress we made! We have it all organized by category, and we know where everything is. I finally got the Christmas decorations box out of my bedroom. My laundry room is under control and I can walk in there without stepping on things. We'll be having a garage sale within another month (every weekend is booked from now until then with birthday stuff) and I am SO excited to get rid of STUFF. There is also a HUGE pile of garbage out by the road. Yay for dumping it!

My birthday party is at the end of the week. I'm going to be baking a lot on Friday - making the cake, filling it and then covering it with homemade chocolate ganache. Doesn't that sound incredible? I think so.

I have a bunch of work to do on my kitchen, I have to make the icing and color it for my class tomorrow and I have a Steering Committee for MOPS tonight (which I am nervous about because I have had NO LUCK finding group leaders) and I want to organize a play date this week for Fuss at the bounce-house place. It's gonna be a busy one.

Quick takes while the baby fusses at me

2011-08-12T08:48:00.002-04:00

1. Apparently I'm only blogging every other day this week. In some ways this is a good thing. It means I am coming out from behind my computer screen and not glued to a chair. In other ways... I liked having a dedicated writing of SOMETHING daily. And also I'm addicted to Pinterest and am spending much of my computer time pinning stuff and looking at things others have pinned. There are good things there, too - I'm feeling the creative juices start to flow!

2. The TV in my living room is currently playing some sports news show (Mike and Mike maybe?) because Fuss is on TV restriction for coloring on her brother and I am too lazy to get up while I'm computing and turn it off/change the channel.

3. I was awake at 4:00am last night making a grocery list and planning what I wanted to do for my birthday cake. I probably should have been sleeping. Current thoughts on the cake: Butter yellow cake w/ chocolate fudge icing in the middle and chocolate ganache topping. There will likely be some sort of floral decoration on it, as we're focusing on advanced flowers in class right now.

4. My house is a disaster, but I am going to do something about it this weekend. Right now, though I am SO OVERWHELMED with the mess that it is creeping me out to look at it.

5. Going shopping w/ my SIL and her best friend today to take advantage of the ax Free weekend and get Fuss some new Crocs (at minimum) since she lost one on our trip. Love to shop, but A and LP tend to be shopping marathoners, so I anticipate being very tired this evening.

6. My mom and I are planning to make back-to-back hair consultation appointments some time soon. I am excited as I am completely bored with my hair right now.

7. Fuss peed in her bed last night and came to ME when she woke up wet. She usually goes to my husband in the middle of the night, so I don't get it. Ah well. I set her up on the couch because I wasn't going to change her sheets right then at 5am with the baby likely to wake any moment.

Bits and pieces and stream of conciousness

2011-08-10T12:14:00.003-04:00

Things have been so busy!

Had my Dr's appt yesterday and my BP is back to normal after 2 weeks of no BCP, so no more estrogen pills for me, I guess. Going back on the mini pill and hoping it works. (80% effective) Also had them run a pregnancy test since my periods have been so wonky, but it's negative, so big sigh of relief. (I want another baby, but not NOW)

However, I got the word today that my oldest friend, Cherry, is pregnant with her first and I am so excited for her! Happy times! She's due just before Fuss's 4th birthday! I'll be passing her some maternity clothes, etc. I also want to throw her a shower, so I'll have to get with her mom on that. Exciting times!

Things are coming together for the Little Man's 1st Birthday party! I have ideas for favors (still need something for the baby set, though) and I've ordered stuff from Etsy that I'm totally excited about. I got confirmation today from my pastor that he will be able to come and do the baby dedication at the same time. Things are really working out nicely. (Though I found out awhile ago that my BFF and her family will be out of town that weekend, so I'm bummed that they won't be there, but you do what you can.) I still need to design the cake and buy some plates and such and finalize the menu. (I was just reminded of "puppy chow" which I love, but is it a bad idea to have something so yummy that my older child can't eat because of her peanut allergy?) I also need to find a pinata because I want to do that, too.

I'm back - here's what you missed....

2011-08-08T10:58:00.002-04:00

So we had a great, if exhausting, trip to NC. My kids played with their cousins and had so much fun. There were fights and arguments, but mostly they got a long and everyone was happy.
I have become a Pinterest addict. I'm gonna need a 12-step program if this continues. But I'm finding some awesome stuff, some great ideas, and some fun dreams, so overall it's a good thing, right?
My birthday is right around the corner. So is one of my closest friend's, Little Man's, etc. I am also enrolled in class 2 for cake decorating and I am so psyched. My cake turned out very cute at the end of the first class and I was so proud of myself for being one of the only ones to have come up with an original design.
With all the driving time we had, my husband and I spent a lot of time talking about our lives, our goals, our dreams. We are on the same page in so many ways and I am looking forward to implementing the ideas and plans we worked out. Goal #1 is to simplify our lives by purging the quantity of stuff we own and get into more of a rhythm with what we do. Goal #2 is to take some regular time to stretch my creativity. I miss being a creative person, something I once prided myself on. I will be getting back to my drawing, my scrapbooking, and I'm obviously getting into my cake decorating.
A garage sale is in our future. I can't wait to dump some of this stuff.
I'm trying something new with my hair - it's really more function than "pretty" per se, but until I get a haircut, I'm going for function.
I got cute new tennis shoes yesterday - I had admired my SIL LP's so much that I had her pick up some for me when she was at the store last night. So cute.

In review

2011-08-01T16:35:00.004-04:00

Wow. So I've been ignoring my blog lately. I don't know what it is exactly - a combination of things, really, I'd guess. I'm busy with stuff - we had VBS and now we're leaving for a working vacation of sorts, my cake class, just all sorts of stuff really.

The kids are doing great, though the Little Man seems to be starting either a cold (runny nose, cough, cranky) or another tooth because he's been cranky and not sleeping well again. Fuss has been a handful, but she's also been a joy. When she is being good, she is SO much fun. She sings and dances and is just a major entertainment. I love it. She's curious about everything, she's learning her letters, she's been playing with her friends and she is just a ball full of energy.

It is dreadfully hot, so I pretty much hate doing anything outside. We're planning a couple of play dates indoors soon - bowling, the bounce house place, etc. Should be a good time.

We leave tonight after my final cake class. I wish I could say that the teacher had improved, but I can't. She's scatter-brained and rude to the students, though I have learned a lot about beginning cake decorating. I look forward to tonight's class and putting together what we've learned on a big cake.

I'll be gone all week on a trip to North Carolina. Looking forward to seeing my SIL and nieces. Also hoping to get some reading done, though I won't hold my breath.

Wild Weekend in review

2011-07-25T09:48:00.002-04:00

We had a wild weekend. We left both kids with my SIL who was house-sitting nearby on Saturday night. Fuss has spent the night w/ Aunt LP a couple of times in her life, but Little Man has never spent the night away from home without me. (The combination of not-his-bed and no mommy made me very nervous, but it all worked out well.) He took 2 bottles of cows milk with no major issues, though he was very interested in Mama Milk when we picked him up on Sunday morning.

We spent the evening with our best friends at their house (they also farmed out their kids at the in-laws) and had an evening of silliness (helped by the fairly large quantity of liquor we all consumed) including card games, tipsy Wii playing, and my first experience skinny dipping. Then my husband and I spent the night on the 2nd-worst air mattress I've ever slept on and we woke very sore and comfortable the next morning. I am still recovering.

Fuss insisted on going to church with her aunt, so we took the Little Man and went to breakfast at IHOP. The food really hit the spot and the Little Man LOVED it. He kept eating and eating and actually had pretty good accuracy so most of it actually got in his mouth. He loved eggs and pancakes and kept smacking the table to tell us "more, more!"

We had an early dinner cookout at the park with our best friends and our other good friend, M and her 3 kids. Over all there 13 of us and the kids had a blast despite the heat and the copious amounts of ants that were all over the place. The Little Man astounded us again by eating an entire hot dog (cut into small pieces, of course) plus a small helping of baked beans. He was wearing half of it, but having a wonderful time.

It wore out all the kids and both mine at least slept very well last night! Since our sleep the night before hadn't been so good, that worked out very nicely for us!

I'll be spending a good part of my day today making cupcakes and mixing icing colors for class tonight. I'm looking forward to this class. I'll be doing a lot of cleaning this week and packing by the end of the week for our trip to North Carolina next week. We'll be going up to visit my SIL LB while my husband does some work up there. (And his boss pays for our travel expenses.) LP will be staying at our house while we're gone, so I need to make it much more presentable in anticipation.

All that and more

2011-07-20T08:31:00.000-04:00

Dang, is it hot. I've been suffering more than I remember the past summers, and I looked it up and my Zoloft has "exessive sweating" as a common side effect. Good times. I am just ALWAYS hot. Except when I wake up in the morning when we've been running the air in our room all night. Then, I'm just about right.

Anyhow, Fuss has been enjoying her time at VBS, and Little Man has been enjoying the one-on-one mommy time. (Though we've been running around a lot and I'm afraid he's not been getting his regular morning nap all week and my right bicep is killing me from carrying him all over all the time and holding him for long periods of time. I'm also going to need an adjustment after all the hip-jutting with the baby on my hip.

I'm having so much fun in my cake decorating class. The teacher is horrible, but having adult time and having a creative outlet one night a week has been a blast. And my first cake turned out pretty good, but I don't have any pictures because I had a horrible carrier this week and it got smashed en route so no pretty pictures. You can see my cupcakes after next week.

And that's all I've got for now. I'm trying to get back in the habit of posting daily and I'm struggling because I don't have optimal computer situations. I've been neglecting my reading, too. I'm hoping to get back to that soon as well. I miss my blog friends.

Lack of title

2011-07-19T18:16:00.002-04:00

I've been bad about posting lately, but it's actually somewhat of a good thing. I've been busy - getting away from the house, getting away from the computer screen and the cave of my bedroom. I'm starting to feel like me again - a drowsy me, but me nonetheless. I sleep okay, but it's never long enough and I have SO much trouble waking up no matter how long I've slept, but I'm managing.

Fuss is going to her first VBS this week - she is loving it. It's being held at the church that I grew up in, the one where we got married and served as Youth Leaders (our church was too small to afford a full-time youth pastor, so they took volunteers to lead the youth group, though after our first year we did get a small stipend that worked out to be about $2 per hour, but I digress...) we had a falling out with the pastor a few years ago, though I still think he's an amazing teacher/pastor I think sometimes he's not a good administrator... and I miss that church. I miss knowing everyone and being a part of it.

Anyway, she's having fun and I'm enjoying the break. I still have the baby with me the whole time, but suddenly I find it so much easier to cart around one child instead of 2! I discussed this with a friend yesterday who just had her 2nd as well and we both remembered being over-whelmed with carting our first child around, but now that we have 2, one seems easy.

The kids are both going to spend the night with their aunt at her house this weekend. This will be a first. Little Man has done well in the past sleeping outside of his bed, but it will be a different experience since he has trouble settling down without nursing as it is... but it's her choice to let him try.

6 quick takes

2011-07-15T09:02:00.002-04:00

1. I think the meds might be working a little. I've realized that this week I've at least made some effort to get out and be social and I've enjoyed it. I even made multiple phone calls yesterday trying to find someone to do something with (it ended up not working out, but that was good because the kids ended up taking extra long naps and I got one, too). But this is more like me - trying to get out of the house, trying to see friends.

2. I want to get to the mall to buy some shorts. I have one pair of shorts, so they are needed. And I live in FL - the land of the eternal summer - so I really should have more than one pair of shorts. And my BFF found some really cute ones at JC Penney's recently (and I tried on hers and they are SO comfortable, too) so I'm hoping to get to the mall soon.

3. At midnight last night, the baby woke up and wouldn't settle down. He wanted to be held, and he wanted milk. I had only fed him 4-5 timesyesterday (instead of 5-6) and I'm seeing that despite more solids, he's resisting my very slow weaning process. This could get interesting.

4. As I was rocking him last night, he had his head on my chest and was snuggled close and then he just decided he wasn't tired and sat up. He's got his paci in his mouth and he's messing with the taggies on his blanket and he looked so serious with his round little head and chubby cheeks. It was so adorable. But I was so tired, so I was still trying to get him to go back to sleep, but sometimes I look at him and there's just that moment, that pang of unbridled love... it's amazing.

5. My little girl has really sprouted up recently. Ever since she was born, she has had her daddy's short little legs, but recently, they have stretched out and she's getting to be like a little filly. And she is SO pretty. Sometimes I look at her and I wonder if there has ever been a more beautiful little girl in the world. (I know that this is maybe a little biased, since I am her mother, but seriously, this girl is just beautiful.) Her big eyes, her long, dark eye lashes, she beautiful smile, the dimple, her curls... she's amazing.

6. My husband was listing all the things that we have going on this weekend - and I'm frustrated because almost all of it involves him doing stuff and me and the kids doing stuff - just like the bulk of every week. Frustrating.

7. I'm out of things to say for my 7th thing... and this is a new computer, so I don't even have any pictures to share.

Some bits and pieces

2011-07-14T08:43:00.004-04:00

So Wednesday, the Little Man randomly wanted to go down for his morning nap an hour earlier than normal. I chalked it up to randomness and the fact that he slept horribly the night before and fed him and put him down. He then slept longer than usual and I woke him up because we were planning on going somewhere and I wanted to guarantee he would take an afternoon nap, which sometimes is more difficult if he gets too much sleep in the morning. But then, he did it again this morning. Only he slept pretty well last night. And I completely missed the signs because he'd been a bit fussy all morning anyhow and he just passed out without getting fed. I mean, it's fine for him to take a nap earlier, but I've got one porn-star-sized leaking breast right now, so that's unfortunate. But it really might be for the best - this rescheduling of the nap time. It will make it easier to get things done if he sleeps and wakes earlier in the mornings.

My mom redid my childhood bedroom recently. It's been a guest room, but it was still filled with a lot of my childhood stuff, the bed I slept in in college, etc. Now, it's not even recognizable as my childhood room - new flooring, new paint, new curtains, even a new fan. And she gave me a bunch of stuff yesterday that she no longer has room for, so I joked "you're really kicking me out, huh?" The biggest problem is, I don't have room for much of it, either. So I'll be Craigslisting and ebaying a bunch of collectibles and such in the coming days. I'm sort of psyched about that anyhow, because I'm all about down-sizing right at the moment. I feel like we've just got too much stuff! But the couple of things that I really wanted to keep from childhood - I have no idea where to store them!

Fuss asked me the other day what I collected - and I really didn't have an answer for her. I used to have SO many collections. I collected dolls, I collected figurines, books, even names. But now? I don't have any real "collections" of anything. My house is decorated with pictures of my friends and family, but not really anything else. (I have a few flowers from my wedding and a candle or two, as well.) I wonder sometimes - is this a sign of less interest in things, or is this a sign of my desire to clean out the cobwebs.

Chaos Catastrophes, Cakes, and Craziness

2011-07-13T16:33:00.003-04:00

I've been missing for a few days due to some craziness and some catastrophes. On Sunday, Fuss purposely smeared water all over her daddy's laptop and now the monitor on the laptop is friend, so we have Frankensteined the computer to an old monitor. I suppose it could be worse and I could have lost the whole thing, but this is incredibly inconvenient to a girl who hasn't sat at a desktop computer for any length of time for over 3 years.

We spent Monday morning at the zoo with my BFF and her boys and the kids had a blast. But it was SO hot, mid-90s, very little breeze, mild cloud cover, incredibly humid. I was sweating within minutes and the Little Man who is very temperature sensitive was cranky by the end. There is just no break from the heat at the park, so it was a long, hot morning.

Monday night I had my first cake decorating class (which was sort of a nightmare - this lady was so flustered by the fact that they overbooked the class to almost double the capacity that she wasted nearly the whole first hour and got nothing accomplished and was so spacy... I am hoping that that is what the problem was and that she won't be like this every week because she was seriously awful.

Immediately after that, I had my first MOPs Steering Team Committee meeting which was long, but very productive. I didn't realize we'd be out so late and I didn't get home until after 9:30 and needed to feed the hungry baby before he could go to sleep.

Tuesday was a very bad day. I'd gotten little sleep the night before due to a congested baby waking up every hour and I was already on edge. When Fuss refused to eat the food that we had for her (left overs - her requested dinner from the night before which she hadn't touched) she was then difficult and cranky too, and the combination just didn't work well. I had one of my crazy bouts of anger and had to lock myself in my room for a bit and turn off the monitor because I couldn't handle it. My friend M talked me down and my husband came home for lunch and allowed me to get a short nap. The day got better, but it was still this miserable cloud hanging over me. I don't know if my meds aren't working, the the lack of sleep just didn't allow them to work well enough that particular day or what. I hate being angry all the time and I just want to be me again, be friendly and fun to be with and be a good mom to my kids. I was not a good mom on Tuesday. I shouldn't have even been around my kids.

We may be coming to a point where I'm going to have to tell more people about my struggles. My husband wants me to tell my SILs because he thinks they might have the opportunity to help me and would be more willing if they knew what was going on. I hate the idea of telling them that I can't handle my life. I am already incredibly vulnerable to them - I've never felt accepted by them, I always feel judged and I am hate the idea of showing them this major imperfection in myself. In addition, I know they have made some disparaging comments about a couple of cousins who are on anti-depression meds (one of which should actually probably be on anti-drama meds, but they haven't yet come up with those, so this is why she's on anti-depressants) so I hate to think of them talking about me behind my back in the same way.

Food and stuff

2011-07-07T08:45:00.004-04:00

I feel like my posts have gotten very depressing (pardon the pun) lately. I'm trying to change my attitude and some days it works, some days it doesn't.

My little boy loves to eat. We've introduced a lot of table foods now and this boy can eat! He eats more than his sister (it also helps that he is much less picky than she) but he is simply demolishing everything we put in front of him. I'm not really sure what to feed him sometimes.

My little girl is picky. Picky, picky, picky. She has a variety of foods that she WILL eat, but she doesn't like to branch out at all and refuses dinner most nights. She wakes up hungry at 5 in the morning, but she is so stubborn, that she doesn't learn her lesson and eat the next time. Most of the time, she won't even try the food I give her, so it's not that I'm serving somthing yucky or whatever. (And if it's a meal I know she won't like at all - like our spicy shrimp creole - I always make her an alternative.)

I really just want a nap.

2011-07-06T07:34:00.000-04:00

Sometimes I feel like these meds are all about making me sleepy, but doing nothing else. I'm still irritable and angry a lot, I'm a lot more anxious than I ever was, I'm a lot more anti-social... I spent 2 whole days coming up with excuses to not go to Cherry's party this weekend. My husband had to talk me into RSVPing as it was, and then he spent Monday reminding me that I'd have fun once I got there. That is totally not me. And I know this, but I can't seem to get past it.

When Fuss was a baby, I spent 3 mornings a week hanging out with my BFF at work. (She worked for my dad so I could do that.) I would make plans on the days she didn't work with other friends, I was walking with Jo, etc. I planned most of my errands for those days. I would do anything to get out of the house and it worked for me. Even a few months ago, I was doing my best to get out of the house 3-4 days a week - errands, visiting friends, play dates, whatever. But now it seems like SO much effort and I'd rather just sit here, locked in the house with my crazy kids. And to be honest, if I had my way, I'd spend my days sleeping and watching TV and would make the kids fend for themselves. (Not possible, and I am still interacting with them, etc.) But I feel awful all the time.

I told my mom last week that I was taking anti-depressants and she took it with no surprise or judgement and even told me that she took them for awhile when I was a kid. She was able to stop after a long family vacation we had where she was able to unplug, get away from her schedule and just relax for 2 weeks. I don't see that happening here any time soon, so for now, I'm hanging on.

the 4th and the 10

2011-07-05T09:52:00.002-04:00

We had a wonderful long weekend with Daddy Fuss arriving home on Friday afternoon. The Little Man couldn't stop smiling that first afternoon. It was so cute!

We spent time together on Saturday and Sunday - not doing anything special, per se, but just being together as a family. It was easy and low-key and mostly relaxing. (The non-relaxing parts involved the Fuss being temperamental, dramatic, arguementative and obnoxious. In other words, Being Three.)

We spent the evening of the Fourth at my oldest friend, Cherry's parents' beach condo. Good food, good friends, and brilliant, gorgeous fireworks on the beach.

And here's the T on T questions...

1. What do you traditionally do for 4th of July?
When I was a little kid, we would go with my best friend's family to their beach club and watch the fireworks on the beach. As an older kid, my dad and I would buy the kits at the grocery store and we'd light off the legal ones in the street.

The last several years, we've gone to Cherry's parents' place and watched the fireworks on St Pete Beach. You can see a bunch of shows from that vantage point and it is always a good time.

2. Did you follow your tradition this year? How did you celebrate yesterday?
As I mentioned above, we went there again this year and the kids had fun. Little Man just stared and stared at the pretty lights until about 5 minutes before the end, when the overstimulation and way-past-bedtime-ness hit him. He burried his head in my shoulder and was SO over it.

3. What’s the best fireworks show you’ve ever seen?
Last night's was pretty spectacular. The show got rained out last year, so I think they might have saved up.

4. Have you ever been injured by a firecracker?
No.

5. Burger, Brat, or Hot Dog?
Burgers if I have a choice. I'm not a big fan of brats, so I'd take a hot dog if that's all that is offered. Yesterday we were treated to ribs, though and they were amazing!

6. Do you sport red, white and blue on our Independence Day?
I usually do something akin to that. Often, I sport blue and white (I don't have a lot of red) and claim my hair is red enough to count as my red. I did have the kids decked out in Red, white and blue, though.

7. If you had to be from any country other than the USA, what country would it be?
I'm not sure how to answer that question. I've only been to Canada and I liked it, but I know it would be too cold for me year round, so I don't know if I could live there all the time or not. Maybe England?

8. Charcoal or gas?
Don't care. We have a gas grill and I love it.

9. What’s your favorite thing about this fair country of ours?
Hmmm, I don't know. I love our country, but I'm a little frustrated with some things right now, so nothing is coming to mind. I know there is a lot of good in our country, though!

10. God Bless the USA, My Country Tis of Thee, or the Star Spangled Banner?
I love a well-done version of God Bless the USA. But I also like the other ones, too.

7 Quick Takes and the end of a very slow week

2011-07-01T09:43:00.002-04:00

1.My husband comes home today. I am relieved.

2. I finally got a normal night's sleep last night. So glad the kids both slept through!

3. I need to go to the store, mop the floors, and reload the dishwasher.

4. The baby's nose was so congested this morning, he couldn't latch to nurse. He was SO upset. I fe him some apples and then brought him into the bathroom while I took a shower to let the steam do it's work. It worked! He is so much happier now!

5. We've had SO much rain this week. It's hampering my ability to go to the store this morning. But it's been nice to have a break from the mid-90's temperatures.

6. The Little Man got a walker last week and is motoring all over the house in it now. He can follow me all through the living area now that he's learned to go forward. He also loves to bounce in it. He's so fun to watch.

7. I'm so looking forward to my husband being home. I miss him so much. And not just because this has been the week from hell.

Treading Water...

2011-06-30T11:06:00.002-04:00

Two and a half days of no help at all with 2 kids, one of whom is teething and one of whom had a stomach bug - and I am broken. I fell apart yesterday. Called everyone, no one answered, cried over the phone to my out-of-town husband... sobbed some more.

Eventually, my mom and my MIL came over and helped out. My mom cleaned up my house a bit while my MIL took the kids out to dinner and wore them out/kept them out of my hair. I still barely slept, but at least it was a rest AND some work got done around the house.

My mom, who had gotten off work early for the day under the guise of helping me out had "fallen asleep in the other room" and didn't hear her phone ringing. Seriously? And then she had the nerve to list all these errands she needed to do before coming over... I told my husband I was ready to smack her. He surmised that it was sort of like telling a starving person that they were late because they got caught up at the buffet line...

While the baby did sleep through the night, Fuss was up several times with tummy explosions throughout the night, so I still only scored about 5 hours (non-consecutive) of sleep.

I have also done something to my back and I'm hurting something awful. My sisters-in-law are taking Fuss for the bulk of the day today and I promised her we could have a movie night tonight after her nap. I need to get to Target to buy some toilet paper (among other things) and I have no idea when I'm going to get to that. I'm actually hoping I can convince my SIL to stay with the kids when she drops Fuss off so I can go alone. Right now, a few minutes of alone time sounds like heaven.

2011-06-29T16:24:00.002-04:00

I'm running on 7 hours of sleep total for the last 2 nights. None of it was consecutive. Please excuse me if this post makes less sense than usual.

Teething is of the Devil.

I'm so tired it hurts. I've never been this tired in my life.

I no longer care than my son is crying every time I leave the room. I know that is horrible, but I can't stand it any longer.

10 on Tuesday

2011-06-28T09:39:00.002-04:00

1. What’s the recipe for your favorite drink? (Smoothie, alchoholic, coffee, whatever.)
Espresso Martini
Equal parts Van Gogh Double Espresso Vodka and Vanilla Vodka and half as much Kahlua. Serve chilled. Add espresso beans and or chocolate drizzle to garnish

2. What kind of razor do you use?
Venus

3. Who is your favorite Sesame Street character?
It was Grover growing up, but I don't know if he still is (was he as weird back then as he is now?) I like Cookie Monster and Abby Cadabby

4. What makes the perfect salad? (Lettuce type, toppings, dressing, etc.)
Spinach and romaine lettuce, tomatoes, mushrooms, celery, cheese, Italian dressing

5. What was your favorite subject in school?
English and American History.

6. What’s your favorite summer tradition?
My birthday!

7. Do you suffer from season allergies? How do you combat them?
Not really.

8. How often do you have to charge your cell phone?
Every other day or so.

9. Do you have a bucket list?
Not really. Most of the things that I would put on my list, I know I'll never have the opportunity to do!

10. Do you have any desire to go back to school?
I kinda hated school. I loved the social aspects of having people to talk to and I like to learn, but I hate taking tests and even when I was in art school and it was more about projects, I could never get things to come out the way I wanted them to... it was really frustrating. I would probably need to go back to school to have any sort of career in the future, but if I could skip it and get a good job without it? I would.

More 10 on Tuesday here.

M

2011-06-27T10:30:00.004-04:00

MEDS - I've realized that my constant tiredness is a side-effect of the meds - there is a time period in the middle of the day where I can barely keep my eyes open. Before the meds, I was tired from lack of sleep and would have been willing to sleep all day to escape my life. Now, I'm having to fight to stay awake and I'm "self-medicating" with extra caffeine during the day and taking some mid-day naps when the kids are asleep. My friends assure me that I will adjust to it and not feel so sleepy soon. I can take it for a little while, though I do find it annoying!

MISSING MY HUSBAND - My husband left this morning for his week-long trip. I'm anxious about how things will go.

MOM - My mom was unreachable on Friday night and my Gramma got worried and called me. I started calling and texting both she and my step-dad. When my step-dad called me back, he said that she'd gone out at 4:00 with a co-worker "for a drink" and hadn't come home yet. He confessed that he was a little worried about her alcohol intake of late and she wouldn't talk to him about it. He told me the next day that they finally had a really good talk that afternoon about it and he's optimistic that things will improve. I'm still worried about her. I don't know what to say to her if anything at all.

Quick Takes - I need sleep

2011-06-24T05:51:00.001-04:00

1. We might be looking for a new church some time soon. We love the pastor that teaches our Sunday School class, but we rarely ever attend the worship service. At our old church, we loved the worship service, but there were no Sunday School classes or small groups that we really fit in (plus, there was the incident where we ran the Youth Group and got burned out and abruptly unseated after a couple of years and very little thanks... which is the reason we ultimately left that church, where I grew up and where we were married.) But it is SO hard to find a church home.

2. I HATE birth control pills. Here I am, 2 weeks after my last period, and I'm having another one.

3. I want to sleep. I want to sleep for a week. I am so tired. And my husband is leaving for a business trip next week, so it isn't getting better.

4. I'm so tired, I don't even want to put forth the effort to go over to my best friend's house today as planned. This is a surefire indication that there is something wrong with me - I haven't been out of the house all week. Usually I am craving social interactions.

5. Fuss peed in her bed last night and I had to move her to the couch because it leaked through to the mattress. After dealing with that at 4:00, she woke at 5:30 to tell us she was hungry. We sent her back to the couch, but then she got up again at 6:00.

6. The baby was up several times before that. As a matter of fact, he woke up just before 11 and thought it was play time.

7. I'm so tired, I'm not even thinking straight.

Rough day

2011-06-22T20:15:00.003-04:00

Wednesday wasn't a good day. The baby woke at 4, ate and refused to go back to sleep. I had a headache and really didn't want to get up and my husband was up anyway, so he stayed up with him. I took some medicine and went back to bed. I didn't want to get up at 7 when he came in to wake me because my head was still hurting.

My emotions ran the gamut for the next few hours from being motivated to get a bunch of stuff done to wanting to cry because my mom was being difficult. I then felt like I hit a brick wall and all I wanted to do for the next couple of hours was sleep. I couldn't since the kids were up, but oh, how I wanted to. Thought about calling my SIL and telling her I had a headache to get her to take Fuss for awhile, but I still wouldn't have been able to sleep because of the baby and after the other day, I really didn't want to ask her to watch them again any time soon.

Things got a little better later, but I still struggled for the better part of the afternoon. I had some stomach issues toward the end of nap time (I didn't get one, but the kids did) but I was certainly glad that my husband was able to come home at a reasonable hour.

This morning, I woke up early (decided to let my husband sleep in since he was up late with an upset stomach), fed the baby and then discovered some bleeding when I went to the bathroom. Without going in to too much detail, it was red, thick, clotty and a lot heavier than my past experiences with breakthrough bleeding. Freaked me out, though the internet says that breakthrough bleeding can be heavy.

Better... maybe

2011-06-22T05:31:00.000-04:00

I seem to waffle back and forth between feeling a little better - being more in control of my thoughts and feelings and not so overwhelmed with my life - and wanting to just wallow in the sadness/misery/depression. There are moments when I start to consider having a couple of drinks or taking some sort of pill to make me float through my day. I don't. But sometimes, I'd like to.

Is this normal? Is this really what depression feels like? Or am I going crazy? Or am I just being overly dramatic because everyone feels this way at some point or another?

The anger has been under control with one exception - or maybe 2. I got really angry the other day when Fuss lied to me (direct lies, to my face, twice) and then disobeyed when I tried to doll out her punishment and then ran away when I moved closer to her to give her her punishment. I spanked her several times and I was angry and I know I scared her. I hate that I scare her sometimes.

And then my SIL started butting into our family business the other day - I'm not going into details here because I need to just let it go, but suffice it to say she brought up a presumed slight to my husband and was all "holier than thou" about stuff and it just really PISSED ME OFF. I didn't do anything but tell my husband that I didn't want to talk about it any more and bang around the kitchen doing dishes. (So, a productive use of my anger, I guess!)

The Perfect.... 10 on Tuesday

2011-06-21T11:28:00.002-04:00

Provided by Ashley D at That Super Awesome Blog.

1. What’s the perfect meal?

Depends on my mood, but probably some sort of seafood pasta.

2. What are the perfect pair of shoes?

Something that is both cute and comfortable. I have yet to find the perfect pair of shoes. I've come close, though.

3. What is the perfect afternoon?

Right now, the perfect afternoon would involve 2 kids napping for several hours while I got both a nap and some time to watch TV or read a book.

4. What’s the perfect house?

I love my house, but if money were no object, there are some things I'd change. I'd love to have more bedrooms and a dedicated office space that could be closed off and I NEED more bathrooms. (We have only one.) I'd love a fireplace and a bigger kitchen.

5. What is the perfect outfit?

Again, depends on my mood, but something that makes me feel pretty, sexy and comfortable.

6. What’s the perfect wedding song?

The song that reminds me of my wedding is "When You Say Nothing At All" and I love it.

7. What is the perfect job?

Something that involves both reading and writing that is flexible and also has some social/professional interactions.

8. What’s the perfect hairstyle?

Something cute and stylish that is also easy to maintain and gives me some versatility options. I hate doing the same thing day in and day out.

9. What’s the perfect music festival?

I have no idea. My music selections these days run the gamut from Disney show tunes to preschool sunday school songs to the Glee soundtrack. They don't make music festivals for that.

10. What’s the perfect day to yourself?

Leisurely breakfast and a small cafe, pedicure, shopping, nap, reading a book and joining my husband or some friends for an amazing dinner and cocktails.

It's nice to dream, isn't it?

Monday's weekend in review

2011-06-20T10:12:00.003-04:00

Blogger just ate my post. Grrr.

So - in review - great anniversary - wonderful dinner out - kids stayed up way too late with my mom and neither was asleep when we got home after 10:30. So yeah, my mom had some babysitting struggles.

Father's Day was good. My husband let me sleep in, made breakfast, took us to lunch and the wine store, let me get a nap, made dinner (I helped, but he did it) and helped me work on my organizing project by helping me completely reorganize our gigantic bookshelf and we've officially begun our reorganize and downsize project for the summer. So yay!

Feeling better about things... the hormones in the BCP must be helping, and I'm beginning to adjust to the Zoloft... I think. I dunno. Today I'm feeling more sleepy and foggy than usual. But! Yesterday I didn't have one of those awful, horrible headaches for the first time in a week, so that's progress!

Happy Father's Day

2011-06-20T09:36:00.003-04:00

My husband is awesome. On Father's day he let ME sleep in. He made breakfast, he took us out to lunch and then to the wine store. He helped me reorganize the big bookshelf in our living room, which I've been wanting to do since I was pregnant last summer. We've begun the clean up and clear out portion of my summer project of reorganizing and downsizing. He made dinner, too. (I helped, but we were in the mood for one of the meals that was really more his forte, so he did it.) He even let me take a nap. (He relaxed, too, by watching some stupid movie on Netflix, but at least I didn't have to watch it!) He played with his kids and spent time with me. We had one thing we had to pick up at the store and when he declared that he really had no interest in going out to get it, I went to the grocery store by myself while he stayed home with the kids.

It was also our anniversary this weekend. Six years of married happiness! We went to a beautiful dinner on Saturday night and while we stayed out late enough that the kids should have been sound asleep when we returned, they weren't. The Little Man doesn't do so well on the bottle. Oops.

2011-06-17T07:49:00.000-04:00

1. Liz made the comment at my appointment the other day about how they use sleep deprivation on prisoners of war, etc. I've read that before, but I think I read it as this humorous little anecdote that they put in the books about the early days of having a baby at home to remind you that you are cranky, but it will get better. But I'm now taking it more seriously. My kids have it in for me and if sleep is what I need to get better - get back to "normal," to be more balanced, then... well, I just don't know how to get there living in this house. (not that I'm planning to leave or anything, but my kids are both causing troubles in the sleep arena lately.)

2. My house is a mess. I've been planning on my summer project being to weed out and re-organize, but I've had some other things to deal with and now we're halfway through June and I haven't begun. I need a bunch of boxes. It's donation time, ladies and gentlemen. I am DONE with the overflow of junk.

3. Busytown Mysteries and Go, Diego, Go have been a joy on Netflix. My daughter is always willing to watch one of those shows and mostly they don't annoy me to insanity.

4. My son has attached himself to his blankie that I made him. This is wonderful on one hand, because it means he's got a comfort object AND that it's something I made him, but on the other hand, I was going to try and make him a lighter-weight lovie and I can't find the spare supplies for the copy of the one I already made him, so I can't seem to get him to let go of this one long enough to clean it.

5. Sometimes in the middle of the night when I'm rocking the baby back to sleep (again) he snuggles up to me and I swear, he's trying to share my skin.

6. Tomorrow is my anniversary. We've been married 6 years. I'm looking forward to a night out with my wonderful husband.

7. The newest picture of my kids together is amazingly beautiful to me.
Happy Weekend!

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary.

Headaches

2011-06-16T07:12:00.000-04:00

Somewhere around mid-morning every day, I get a blistering, blinding headache. I described it as my face feeling like it was on fire. It pounds and aches and throbs and hurts so bad I want to put a knife in my head to cut off the hurting part. I take Tylenol and it does NOTHING. Sometimes I take Excedrin Migraine which dulls it, but I'm not supposed to take a ton of that while nursing.

I bribe Fuss with snacks and Netflix movies and usually the baby is asleep or willing to go down around this time, so I can curl up and moan quietly for a few minutes. It's awful. Not even my daily dose of caffeine is helping anymore. I don't think this is a caffeine headache. But I don't know what it IS. Is it my teeth? Because that's part of the pain. It is my neck/shoulder that is so tight? Is it the stress I've been dealing with? Whatever it is, I'm hoping it gets resolved soon, because this is awful.

I'm tired. My first pill made me nauseous and I was still incredibly grumpy all day. (Of course. I didn't really expect to have it be a miracle pill that cured me of the bad attitude in mere hours. But it's like now I'm more aware of it - that I shouldn't be feeling this way - and it makes it both better and worse at the same time.)

A bottle of potential sanity

2011-06-15T08:05:00.003-04:00

So yesterday I had my appointment with my OBGYN, Liz. We actually started talking about how long I've been her patient - and seeing as I met her when she was at another practice, it's apparently been at least 12-13 years, which surprised me. She reminds me of my sisterfriend, in that she is friendly and nice and energetic and you just want to be her friend.

Anyhow, as we checked in everyone kept asking "what are you here for?" as part of the questions for check in. I didn't really feel like telling every person in the office that I felt like I was going crazy, so I just told them "birth control." Now, that is true, as I've finally succumbed to going back on the pill, but I would have probably waited a little longer if that was it.

Liz was awesome as usual. I wasn't planning to do a full exam, but they pointed out that it's been over a year since my last Well-woman visit (they did a pelvic exam at my postpartum appointment, but no pap, etc.) so despite the fact that my husband was there, I got the whole once-over. (Not that my husband can't be there, but it's usually something I do on my own.) She listened well to my issues. She said she thought that it truly might be more sleep deprivation more than anything else, that that can really mess up your hormones and your thinking, etc. She put me on a steady dose birth control pill which may help (low dose because of the breastfeeding) and also a low dose of antidepressant. So I'm on Lo Estrin and Zoloft for now and we shall see how things go. I go back in 6 weeks, which should be plenty of time to see a difference.

She had to ask if I had any plans to kill myself, because if I did, then she would have to Baker Act me (a state-thing that means committed for 72 hours) Which I of course told her no. Although, I have to say that there seems to be some appeal to the idea of having 72 hours off and sleeping. But I don't really relish the idea of doing that in a mental ward, so...

We came home and my husband had me take a nap while Fuss napped. That was probably a good thing since we had yet another horrible night with the baby. My husband helped a lot, but he is a heavy sleeper and I truly don't see the point in both of us being up when I'm the one who hears him most of the time.

So I started my pills this morning. I'm taking half a pill for the first week and then I'll up it to a full pill. But it could take 2-4 weeks for it to really take effect, though she said the BCP might have an effect before that if it's just a mild hormone issue.

So, here's hoping. I don't know how I let things get this messed up. Some of the thoughts I've been having lately - including the desire to drink during the day (I never, ever have an alcoholic beverage without my husband being home. I won't put my kids at risk in case of emergencies.) and float through life a little numb. When did I become this way? In my saner moments, I know that that makes no sense!

10 on Tuesday

2011-06-14T07:16:00.000-04:00

1. How do you pronounce the word aunt? Does your pronunciation rhyme with ‘haunt’ or ‘can’t'?
When I say it by itself, I typically say it as rhyming with "haunt", but if paired with a name - especially when talking to my daughter about her "Aunts", it comes out closer to "can't". I had an English teacher in school who used to insist that "ants" are little bugs that run around on the ground.

2. Do most of the people in your life know you blog? Or are you partially or totally anonymous?
I'm mostly anonymous.

3. When you grocery shop, do you prefer to bag your own groceries or do you like it when the store bags them for you? Paper, plastic, or reusable bags?
I prefer them to bag, traditionally use plastic bags, but I'd use reusable if A) I had enough reuseable bags to make it work, B) I remembered to bring my reusable bags, C) My husband would let me buy some reusable bags to use. I have a handful, all given as gifts by my mom or as promos from some store or another. But not nearly enough to do my grocery shopping.

4. Do you have a green thumb?
When I remember to work on my plants, they do very well. That tends so come in phases. I've had some amazing success with Dahlia bulbs that I once had a master gardener tell me I wouldn't be able to grow in this FL heat. (ha!) These gorgeous, crimson bulbs lasted all spring and most of the summer because I watered them daily. But with this heat, if you forget 1-2 days, your flowers are done for.

5. If you watch the Food Network, which chef/show host is your favorite?
I rarely watch FN. And right now, the only shows I can think of are Rachael Ray and Paula Dean, not so much because I watch them, but because they are well-known.

6. Do you like to take baths? Do you take them very often?
Sometimes I'm in a mood for a bath. I don't get one often. There being only one bathroom in our house really prevents anyone from hogging it long-term and expecting any privacy. And if I'm taking a bath, I want it to be relaxing.

7. What color are the walls in your kitchen?
Pale ice blue.

8. Do you prefer to dine outdoors or indoors?
INDOORS. God allowed man to invent air conditioning for a reason.

9. Describe your ideal weather.
High of 75 and sunny. We get maybe a week of that per year here.

10. If you could learn any foreign language, which would you choose to learn?
Italian maybe? Just for fun. Spanish for practicality. Of course, there's a debate around here about whether Spanish should be considered a "foreign" language, since there is a large Spanish-speaking community in the state of FL. :)

Ka boom

2011-06-13T08:33:00.003-04:00

I'm not sure what happened this week. But Friday night, Daddy Fuss and I sat down to have a talk after an argument earlier and putting it aside long enough to eat and put the kids to bed...

We both had our complaints. We both shed a few tears, aired frustrations. And ultimately, I ended up confessing that after 3 and a half days of not even getting out of the house as far as the mailbox, then having an argument with him, etc. I had (briefly, fleetingly) thought about how my family would be better off if I weren't alive and had (briefly, fleetingly) considered the options of killing myself. (I had subsequently rejected such ideas, of course)

Now, don't get me wrong. That's a big deal. But I felt that the bigger part of my ranting was me crying over and over "I'm worthless, I'm useless. I can't do anything." But he seemed completely stuck on the other thing and asked me several times how long I'd felt that way, commented that he didn't realize things were this bad, etc. But I've said this before. I've told him I've felt worthless before. I don't know what else I can really say - for an incredbly sensitive, caring, wonderful man - well, I guess I don't feel he's been listening.

He had me make an appointment to see my GYN (tomorrow, 1:30) to see what sort of help I can get. I'm still within the boundaries (one year) for postpartum depression, so we're assuming this is that. We went through a checklist we found online the other night, and I had between 8-9 out of 10 of the symptoms. (one of them I didn't think described me all the time, but sometimes.)

Things have been bad. I've lost my appetite for food and for sex. I want to socialize, but sometimes I feel like it's not worth the effort. (for example, my best friend invited us over for a swim/burgers and dogs on the grill yesterday and when we were nearly ready to go, I was like "do we really have to go?" which is totally not like me at all.

I'm scared of the idea of pills though, because I feel like they might be a slippery slope - sure they can help me feel better now, but what happens later? When do I get off of them? When will it be over?

So, I'm going to see Liz tomorrow and I'll see what the options are. I'm not sure how I feel about it, but I know that I need some help. I wish I could just have my husband home more, have some help with the kids, etc. but that isn't a viable option right now, so we'll see what happens.

Quick Takes that took all day

2011-06-10T11:35:00.002-04:00

1. Another day, another headache. Did I mention that after 50 days without a period, I finally got mine again? This breast feeding cycle really sucks. And the hormonal headaches are seriously trying to kill me.

2. I've been playing with some digital designs for cards/invitations and I'm hoping to open my own Etsy shop. Stay tuned for updates.

3. My mother-in-law bought us a (groupon) kayaking session for two for Christmas. I am SO not an outdoorsy type and if I wanted to go kayaking - ever - I'd go w/ my mom who loves kayaking so much she owns her own. But anyhow, we're going this weekend. Yip. Eee. (Cancelled due to availability.)

4. We're also getting together with our best friends this weekend. My best friend and her husband and kids. There is a new member of the family that we haven't met yes - my best friend's 13-year-old step-son (who is now starting to have a relationship with his dad for the first time) so that should be interesting. We haven't hung out with theme since April, so it will be nice to see them and hang out for awhile.

5. I think I might have finally decided on a theme for Little Man's birthday - and it's not really a theme. I picked the colors and it's a bunch of shapes for the card I designed. I think we'll take the idea of the "block" party and make all the food standard shapes (squares, circles, triangles, etc.) I need to get my husband to sign off on it, but I think he'll be fine.

6. Bought a groupon deal for family pictures. I'm psyched. The photographer is a friend I went to art school with (who I lost track of over the last 3 years or so) and her portfolio is awesome. I cannot wait to do this. I have been wanting some beautiful, creative family pictures for ages and this came as a great deal, plus the added bonus of Tracy being a friend.

7. I am looking for an all-to-mostly satin, lightweight blanket for Little Man. I cannot find anything like that even on Etsy. Everyone has a lot of the fluffy/furry/fleecey/minky stuff with a little bit of satin, but he LOVES the feel of satin and just gets SO hot with the heavier stuff on the blanket. I'm thinking about contracting a friend who just opened her own Etsy store who is a great sewer to do it so that it's nicer than my skill level, but I don't know how much she'll charge and I can't afford a lot.

Baby birthdays

2011-06-09T06:35:00.002-04:00

My baby boy is 9 months old. I'm trying to plan his first birthday party and I'm STUCK. When Fuss was turning one, I had all these ideas for a theme. It was pink and green and was "Sweet Pea" themed. I handmade the invitations and I made the cake, I cleaned the decorated the house and we had all these people over for a party.

I cannot find a theme that I like, that works for my son's first birthday. Or rather, I can't find one I like that my husband also likes and I'm not in love with it enough to fight for it...
?
I'm scouring the internet. I've already booked a shelter at my favorite park, and I'm willing to make the invitations myself - as a matter of fact, I've been designing things and playing with ideas for days, even though I don't have a theme, so I don't really know what I want anyhow! Why is there no cute baby boy themes? Why does it all have to be Elmo and Dinosaurs?

I've thought about doing a Cookie Monster theme because I've made some really cute Cookie Monster cupcakes in the past, and I thought - hey! I can do that!

I kind of wanted to do a sailboat/nautical theme because that was one of my top choices for a boy-specific nursery theme that I didn't get to do because we were being smart! responsible! and went gender-neutral.

I've considered Cowboy, blocks, baby ducks, cupcakes and donuts. I'm afraid that cupcakes will be too much pressure when I go to make the cake/cupcakes. All the donut ideas seem to be PINK.

So, what to do?

Bad night, rough morning

2011-06-08T08:52:00.002-04:00

The Little Man spiked a fever out of the blue last night - no sniffles, no congestion, just fever and fussiness. I should have known something was up when he slept for 2 hours in the morning and nearly 3 hours in the afternoon nap.

I was supposed to meet up with an old friend (she likes to emphasize the *old* as she's 9 years older than me) today, but with the sick baby and her big group of kids (she has 6 and she's pregnant with number 7) I just don't want to risk exposing anyone to anything, especially since I have no idea what he picked up and why he's feverish. I'm hoping my SIL who has been out of town (out of the country actually) will come by and see the kids and give me at least a bit of a break.

Because of the baby not feeling well, neither my husband or I got a lot of sleep last night. And this morning, we over slept and had a few little disagreements. He drank the last little tiny bit of milk last night with his cookies. Which I had been saving for Fuss's cereal this morning. But he didn't tell me he drank the rest of it, so I had poured her cereal before I knew there was no more milk. I was irritated.

Because of that, he decided that today was a bad day to take the car to the mechanic's after all... I just said "whatever you want." I'm sort of over it.

10 on Tuesday - Cell phones

2011-06-07T15:19:00.003-04:00

1. What type of phone do you have? Do you like it?
I have an LG something. It's nice, but not overly fancy. I just like that it has a QWERTY keyboard.

2. How old were you when you got your first cell phone?
19 or so - when I started driving. I got into an accident shortly after I started driving and happened to still have my mom's phone in my purse from the night before when I'd gone out late in the evening. My mom bought me a cell phone a few days later.

3. How many cell phones have you owned since your first?
maybe 8?
4. How much is your average monthly phone bill?
I have no idea. Bad, I know, but my husband pays that bill.

5. When you were a kid/teenager, were you allowed to have a phone in your room?
Nope. I begged and pleaded.

6. Do you like talking on the phone or do you despise it? Or somewhere in-between?
Love it, although less now than I did as a teen.

7. Do you text a lot? Is texting/talking while driving illegal where you live? Are you guilty of it anyway?
I text a lot. It's not illegal where I live and I talk while driving a lot and have for years. I try not to text while actively driving - keep to stop lights, etc.

8. What sort of texting keyboard does your phone have? Touch screen, slide out, or something different? Do you care?
Slide out. Also touch screen, but if it's any length of a message, I use the slide out. A yes or no or 2-3 word answer can be done via touch.

9. Look at the last call in your call log – who is it? What were they calling about? Who calls you the most?
My best friend K. She called back after the Little Man had called her when playing with my phone. My husband calls me the most. Followed by my mom and then my best friend, K.

10. What is the longest phone call you can recall having?
3+ hours with my childhood best friend Katie B.

What a pain in the tooth!

2011-06-06T08:55:00.002-04:00

Oh goodness, my mouth hurts! I've got a couple of impacted wisdom teeth that are driving me crazy. The other night, I had pain bad enough to wake me up in the middle of the night and then, KEEP me awake. I raided an old pack of Baby Orajel to help me get back to sleep. I had to keep applying all weekend and now it's just a really, really uncomfortable pressure in my jaw.

Our benefits have all changed and I have no idea how to find out the info that I need to go see the dentist and hopefully get some relief. And the worst part of it is, even once I figure out my insurance issues, I'll still have to make an appointment, have a consult and then go back for the actual procedure, assuming that they want to pull the wisdom teeth, which I assume they will. So still gonna have to deal with this pain for awhile. Grrr.

In other news, the weekend was pleasant, tooth pain not withstanding. We spent the bulk of Saturday at my friend Rachel's wedding and I got to see a lot of old friends who are more like distant family. Fuss spent the day with her Aunt J and was, apparently, perfectly behaved. (This changed on Sunday - when we had problems over and over, but that seems to be the pattern lately - she spends a day with family and behaves amazingly well only to become a bratty child the next day with us.)

I'm hoping to be able to make some plans for this week, I but I have to get my dental issues dealt with/scheduled. I need to get out of the house. And I'm trying not to spend money.

7 Quick Takes (sorry for all the lists lately)

2011-06-02T21:43:00.001-04:00

1. Wedding this weekend. Looking forward to it. Looking forward to leaving Fuss with her Aunt J and Oma. She's been a real handful lately. She's a joy one minute and a dramatic, whiny pill the next. So we could use a little break from each other.

2. The Little Man had his 9-month well-baby check up yesterday and he's in the 50th percentile for head, height, and weight. He also has his Daddy's flat feet that we want to keep our eye on. He got one shot and has been fussy, but hopefully tonight will be better than the last few.

3. I'm more than 2 weeks late on my period. I'm still getting negative HPTs and it's probably just the nursing messing with my hormones or something, but seriously? I have never wanted my period to just DO something already.

4. Things are tight financially these days... and when I'm stressed, I want retail therapy, which is, in turn, causing a little more stressed.

5. I LOVE online shopping. But it's causing me some difficulties. I can find all these wonderful things without even having to drag the kids to the stores, but I can't actually buy the things I find, even when they are a GREAT deal.

6. I think I might love tickling and kissing and hugging my kids more than anything in the world. Seriously. They are both so much fun to cuddle and squeeze. And it gives me great joy to hear them laugh and giggle over and over again.

7. My SIL is in Aruba with one girlfriend and a cell phone without service. I know she's a big girl, but the idea of that terrifies me. I never, ever would have done that. Maybe I have no sense of adventure (and of course, I don't even have a passport. The furthest I've been is Canada and they didn't require passports back then, so obviously I'm not very adventurous.)

Stream of consciousness

2011-06-02T12:07:00.002-04:00

My baby boy is 9 months old today. Wild.

He's been SO fussy today. After a bad night's sleep last night and then a vaccination this morning, I suppose that is to be expected.

+I'm cranky. This is also to be expected after a bad night's sleep (see above), but oh my goodness am I tired and frustrated and irritated, etc. I hate being this way.

My husband's cousin's wife - I love her dearly. She has a 4 year old son, but has struggled with secondary infertility for the last couple of years. They just tried their first IUI and are on the 2 week wait. I am praying for her fervently. Thankfully, they have plenty of money and can afford a few treatments. But of course, that doesn't account for the emotional strain, etc.

My brain isn't working well today, so this post is horribly written and all over the place. Ugh.

10 on Tuesday on Wednesday (again)

2011-06-01T07:06:00.000-04:00

1. From your childhood, what do you miss most about summer vacation?
Vacations. My mom and I (and my grandparents, usually) always went on a trip of some sort for a week or more. We can't afford to do that right now, but I loved it.

2. Are you going anywhere on vacation this summer?
Nope. we were going to go visit family in AL, but now we can't afford to go (gas is SO expensive and we just spent all our savings on the darn car)

3. What foods do you like to barbecue?
Well, I used to hate to BBQ, but I've found some other styles of BBQ sauce that I enjoy (I can't stand standard KC-style BBQ sauce - too sweet). We BBQ ribs and chicken.

4. How do you celebrate the fourth of July?
The last few years have involved a party at my friend Cherry's parents beach condo and then a trip outside to watch the fireworks on the beach.

5. What’s your favorite beverage to drink in the summertime?
Lemonade. And margaritas. (but I like those year round)

6. What movie are you looking forward to seeing this summer?
Something Borrowed? I dunno. I haven't been paying attention to what is coming out.

7. In the car: windows down or AC?
AC. I get headaches from the constant road noise.

8. Have you ever had a summer fling?
Nope.

9. Do you wear sunscreen?
I am a pale, freckled red-head. If I don't wear sunscreen, I become a walking lobster. I don't tan.

10. Do you have any favorite summertime activities?
Swimming.

Things that make me go Hmmmm (updated)

2011-05-31T08:47:00.003-04:00

1. My daughter is a perfect angel when she is in public with a bunch of people. We were with an old friend of mine and her family and friends most of the day yesterday, and despite not getting her nap until late when we left, she was sweet and fun and well-behaved and polite. Why can't she be like that with me?

2. I had a bit of a meltdown Sunday night - the kids were climbing, crying, fussing, kicking, shoving, slapping me all day - and my husband went off for a few hours of fun in the middle of the day. We had been watching something on TV and I couldn't hear for all the noise and chaos and my husband was happily piddling on the computer, ignoring it all. I tried to hide in the bedroom and he came after me to see what was wrong. I ended up telling him I was done, taking a long hot soak in the bathtub and then we had a long talk about how I needed more of a break and how despite the fact that I told him to go (I know he needs down time, too) I was kinda pissed when he left to go out with his friend.

3. I recently ran into a group of girls I went to high school with. Between the 4 of us, we are the ones who married within my graduating class and the class below us. They have all also had 2 kids a piece ranging from the oldest being in Kindergarten to the youngest being about 5 or 6 months old. Standing near them made me feel so inadequate. They were all skinny and looked fabulous. In one case, I think one of the girls looked better than she did in high school. I felt like a frumpy blob. I've put on more than 40 or 50 lbs since high school.

4. However, yesterday we spent the day with a friend of mine - probably my oldest friend that I still keep in touch with (we met the first day of Kindergarten and became fast friends) and she is pretty much exactly my age, has never been athletic (like the girls I mentioned above who were very athletic in high school) but she hasn't had any kids yet. She has always been on the thinner side, not overly curvy like me (who has always had a lot more hips than most of the people I grew up with. My midwife and my mom tell me I have childbirthing hips) and she was swimming in a tiny bikini yesterday with my kids... I noticed that her body wasn't so perfect anymore, either. She's not fat - not anywhere near as heavy as I am, but she's not tight and toned and perfectly shaped anymore, either. We're in our early 30s, so I know it starts to get harder to keep in shape, but it made me feel a little better about myself that I'm not the only one struggling with my body, and failing to keep up my high school physique. (Not that I was hard-bodied in high school, let me assure you. But I was significantly skinnier.)

5. And here is a pic of the new curly thing I'm trying to do with my hair. It's not a great picture, but it was a great hair day.

There are lots more things that make me go Hmmmm. But I have a wailing baby, so I must continue that later.

6 quick takes and a picture!

2011-05-27T06:21:00.000-04:00

1. I think we're going out tonight with my sisterfriend and her husband. We're bringing the babies, but the older kids are all staying home. She's leaving her sleeping older children with her in-laws (who can only handle them when they are sleeping) and Fuss is spending the night with my mother. I'm kind of thrilled at that prospect.

2. Our internet is so inconsistent lately and it's sort of ticking me off that we are paying for a service that is so incredibly inconsistent.

3. I'm looking forward to this weekend for no other reason than having my reasonably-healthy husband home for 3 days in a row.

4. I've been doing something different with my hair lately - adding some product to my natural curls to help them stay as curly as possible and I was kind of happy with how it was looking. My husband likes the curls, and I do have fairly decent curls when the product does it's job. But the other morning I came across some reruns of the early days of Will and Grace and I'm minorly afraid that I might be looking like the early days of Grace - when she had little style and big frizzy curls that were sort of outrageous. Ah well. We work with what we have.

5. Yesterday Fuss ate terribly. All day. She never does this, so it was weird, but all she wanted was junk food and she wouldn't eat the regular stuff at all. At dinner, I gave her some food that she loved and she just wouldn't eat it. We gave her chance after chance, but I think she ate one fry and 2 bites of quesadilla in 60+minutes. So we put her to bed early. She was up at 4:30 complaining she was hungry. Hopefully she learned her lesson (since she has to stay in bed until 6).

6. The baby was up around the same time, so I was awake between 3:30 and 5 this morning. No fun.

7. I don't have a 7th thing, so here's a picture.

Aren't they cute?

Quick

2011-05-26T09:17:00.002-04:00

Today is my mom and step-dad's anniversary. 5 years of wedded bliss. Congrats!

She took some time off this week and spent the day yesterday hanging out and shopping. I still find it funny that I get as much enjoyment out of shopping for the kids' clothes as I do shopping for my own. We got some really adorable things at a sale at The Children's Place yesterday. I can't wait to dress them up in these fun little summer outfits.

We've been running around all week and I'm looking forward to taking it easy today and working around the house a bit. Laundry is a priority.

10 On Tuesday (on Wednesday)

2011-05-25T07:28:00.000-04:00

1. Have you ever used Craigslist?
I've sold stuff on Craigslist and I've advertised for garage sales on there, and I've shopped, but not actually bought anything from someone on craigslist.

2. Can you sew?
I can sew a straight line. I'm completely self-taught. I took one lesson from a friend who is such an amazing and creative seamstress/designer that she designed and made her best friend's wedding dress recently. She taught me how to follow a pattern and I almost finished a dress for Fuss when she was much tinier. But we never got to how to put in the zipper and I didn't finish it.

3. Do you pour syrup on your pancakes or dip your pancakes in the syrup?
Both. I do a little drizzle and then a puddle and dip. I don't want to get it too soggy, but I want it to soak up some of the flavor. But I really only like IHOP pancakes, so I don't do it very often.

4. Rain storms: Love them or hate them?
I like them as long as I am safely in the house, hopefully curled up with a blanket and a good book.

5. Do you like swimming?
In small doses. I like to swim, but I'm not a terribly strong swimmer. I loved being in the water the summer I was pregnant with the Little Man. Was the only time I didn't feel heavy.

6. What kind of drink do you order at Sonic?
All of the ones around me have closed, so I don't get to order from them much, but I liked the watermelon slush.

7. Are you funny?
Sometimes. My husband thinks I am and he is one of the wittiest, funniest people I know, so there has to be something to that opinion.

8. At what age will your kids get cell phones?
My current theory is when they start driving. That's when/why I got my first cell phone (not that it was an option before then, really) and I think that makes sense.

9. What’s your favorite vegetable?
Broccoli.

10. Were you a Girl Scout?
Nope. My mom was a troop leader before I was born and I wanted to be a Brownie/Girl Scout when I got to that age and my neighbor friend joined Brownies. But it didn't work out. My mom put me in the church group we had that was sort of similar - Pioneer Girls.

Too Many Things

2011-05-24T12:23:00.002-04:00

Both of our computers got a virus this weekend so we were really up a creek. It was a pain. More so for my husband who had to fix it on Monday night after his softball game.

We bought a car over the weekend. A 2004 Chrysler Sebring. It's very nice and it seems to fit my husband well. I feel like I've spent the last 2 days working on the paperwork to get rid of the Jetta. I'm going to miss that car. My Jetta - that I named Jenica - has been a great car for 10 years. It has gotten me where I needed to go and kept me safe. The only problem I've had with it is the need to replace the water pump in the AC twice. Really, she's been a wonderful car.

I still haven't gotten my period and I'm a week late. I took another test this morning, first thing, and it came up negative. I've never been this late without showing up pregnant and the prevailing thought is that the nursing is messing up my cycle. But I find it wild to think that I'm having an anovulatory cycle after only one cycle postpartum, but that's all I've got as far as my own self-diagnosis. (I'm hoping to get my Taking Charge of Your Fertility book back from my friend this weekend. Maybe I'll get some more information from that.) It's driving me crazy to not know what is going on.

It's weird. Because I don't really want another baby this quickly, but on the other hand, it would be so nice to just have the decision out of my hands.

I'm feeling so fat lately. And I'm eating terribly and I've gotten away from exercising again. (No big shocker. I hate exercise.) I've lost a few pounds, but not really enough to make a huge difference in my shape. And sometimes, I think I'd like to be pregnant just to have an excuse to be fat. Which is a terrible reason to want to be pregnant. My biggest problem with my weight/eating right now seems to be weird fluctuations with my desire to eat/what to eat. I go back and forth between being ravenous or not wanting to eat at all and when I'm hungry, mostly I just want food that isn't all that great for me. With all the chaos that was our week last week, we only cooked once or twice - the rest of the week was full of fast-food, pizza, snacks, etc. It was horrible. (And yummy)

This Week is trying to kill me - 7 quick takes

2011-05-20T14:02:00.002-04:00

1. I'm late posting today because at 7:30 this morning, I did something awful to my back (possibly popping a rib out? but I didn't have the proper reaction several hours later at the Chiro for that, so maybe not, though he said that what I was describing sounded exactly like popping an upper rib). I'm hurting and sore and swollen in my shoulder/neck area. Fun times.

2. Daddy Fuss came home last night not feeling well and felt nauseous all evening. He ran a fever all night, but was much better this morning.

3. On his way to work this afternoon, the car overheated. Need to find the title of the car so we can hand it over to the insurance company pronto. I also have to go pick him up this evening so we can have the car towed. Good times.

4. I also need to find a bathing suit this weekend. Not looking forward to that in the slightest. We're going to a pool party on Memorial Day and I have nothing to wear to a pool.

5. I still haven't started my period. CD 30. And I really want a drink. But I shouldn't have one until I know for sure that I'm not pregnant. Can nursing mess with your cycle even after it has returned postpartum?

6. I'm so tired. I haven't slept well in days and I am physically exhausted and in pain. I want some time off, how does one get one of those?

7. I can't get the darn AC repair guy to call me back, either, which is pissing me off. I'm hot and I'm grumpy and I want this week from hell to end right now.

Blech!

2011-05-19T11:02:00.002-04:00

This morning Fuss woke up complaining of a stomach ache. A few minutes later, she came over to me with her arms held up like to hug me or ask to be picked up and threw up all over the place. My little girl never gets tummy upset - she never even spit up as a baby. She has thrown up several more times throughout the morning. It's going to be an adventure today!

Meanwhile, the Little Man seems to have a cold. Not a real bad one, but late yesterday he started this horrible sounding cough that has me worried. He's been extremely fussy today, too, so in addition to a sick toddler, I also have a cranky baby.

I'm on CD 30 with no sign of AF. I have no idea what is going on with my cycle and I'm a little freaked out. This is the first time I have ever had sex without being on the pill or trying to conceive, so I'm a little worried. I really don't want my kids that close together, ideally, but at the same - man, wouldn't it be nice to not have to deal with all the pressure of trying to conceive?

I'm feeling mildly nauseated myself this morning. Add to that I have a horrible headache and this house is a miserable pile of bones.

America's Next Top Mommy?

2011-05-17T13:27:00.004-04:00

There's a cable station - Oxygen, I think - that shows America's Next Top Model marathons every Tuesday. I love that show. I love seeing the make overs and learning the posing, etc. I have loved Tyra for a long time. I don't watch it on Prime Time because my husband isn't a fan. Neither of us like "reality TV" as a general rule.

Sometimes, watching it makes me feel old, frumpy, ugly. I mean, these girls are so young and beautiful. Even the ones who have had a baby have these FABULOUS bodies. I'm 30 years old and I have NEVER had a body like that. It's intimidating.

But sometimes, it's inspiring. I learn new make-up tips. I learn about fashion and little tricks to make myself look better. It makes me want to put my make-up on even when my only audience is my 3 year old and my 8 month old.

And I can be fierce. Even when I'm covered in baby drool.