Smellyann Strikes Again

Friday Fragments: Smelly Returns!

Wait. "Smelly Returns" could mean a lot of things, couldn't it? Well, don't sit and think about it too long! It means I'm going to try to get back into FF after a long absence, not... those other things. Just be forewarned that I'm listening to Bob FM online through my ear buds, very loudly, so if one of my fragments suddenly turns into song lyrics, well, that's why.

Another forewarning: This is going to be long. I have a lot of stuff to unload. Feel free to, you know, NOT read it!

 

Link yourselves up right here if you're fragmenting along with the awesome Mrs.4444 (who is not so awesome at Words With Friends - aka Scrabble - on the iPhone, it turns out. Heh heh heh)!

And away we go!

☼

The past two weeks have been insanely busy for me, so I'm pretty much going to post about the goings-on then. For starters, Rob (The Hubs) was in the hospital for 8 days, starting on Tuesday last week and ending on Tuesday this week. He's all right now and stuff, but he didn't plan that visit too well for me, timing-wise. I guess I'll forgive him, but our bank account may never recover from the amount of babysitting I had to pay for during his absence!

☼

For starters, it was crazy Girl Scout Cookie week last week. Tuesday morning, I had an hour and a half of mandatory Leader training for that (I'm my younger daughter Sophia's Daisy scout leader). In the evening, there was the monthly Leader meeting, which, uh, I missed, because... we'll get to that. Thursday afternoon was our regular scout meeting, and Friday night was the big Cookie Rally. My co-Leader and I had to keep track of all 13 of our scouts by ourselves (8 of whom are 5 or 6 years old), because no parents were allowed. (It was insane!) Saturday, the cookie sale started, but it's been too freakin' cold out for us to go around the neighborhood, so I've been spared that for the moment. Still, I'm a little Girl-Scouted out at the moment, know what'm sayin'??

☼

And yes, I will be happy to send you six cases of Thin Mints... if you pay for the shipping. ;)

☼

After the cookie training last Tuesday, my Cookie Chair took me to BJ's, where she has a membership. We had to bring fourteen #10 (the huge ones) cans of veggies and fruits to Friday's Cookie Rally - one for each of our girls - for donation to the Food Bank. Our local council is really pushing the Food Bank this year. Which is great and all, but those things are 'spensive! ANYway, not the point. I did get some groceries for our household while there, and I decided I'm going to get a membership on payday. The pantry has been slim pickin's around here lately. Every time the kids turned a corner and found more giant containers of delicious-looking food, they would yell, "JACKPOT!" It was funny and sad at the same time. They were really relieved (and excited)when I told them not all that food was going to the Food Bank, and some of it was coming home with us...

☼

So after I finally got home, schlepped all the groceries up to my door and got the kids out of the van, it was with an unimaginable amount of dismay that I discovered the water shut-off notice on the front door. Yep. Went in and checked: no water. None. I literally went berserk. I had forgotten to pay the bill last cycle, yes, but as soon as Rob got the notice on the door one single day before, I sent the payment. Online. Which takes a couple days. I didn't know they only gave you one day of notice to pay before shutting it off. Gulp. I sent the kids upstairs to play in their rooms so they wouldn't hear me fall apart on the phone with the water people. I was in tears and threatening to do things that would put me back in the Psych Ward I visited in December. You just can't have three kids at home with no water. Can't cook, can't wash dishes or yourselves - can't FLUSH. And have you seen what three little kids put out? You must have The Flush. Needless to say, I got them to come turn the water back on within hours, after swearing on a virtual stack of Bibles that I had, indeed, paid that %^&*( bill.

That was definitely not the highlight of my week.

☼

I just don't get to say "schlepped" often enough. It's a fun word.

☼

Moving right along...

Wednesday, I saw my shrink for the second time since I got out of the Looney Bin. It was a good thing. My bipolarity has me swinging off the chandeliers one moment and contemplating slicing up my wrists the next (not kidding). It's been pretty hellish inside my brain lately. He changed one med, increased another, and refilled the third. Fingers crossed that this is the combo that works.

☼

Jack was supposed to go to his Urologist on Thursday morning for a follow-up after his surgery on September 1st, but uh, it took me so long to get him scheduled that his referral expired. Stupid, sucky Mommy. (He had a bilateral orchiopexy.) Yet another thing lately on which I have dropped the ball. Hopefully by next week's Fragments, I'll have scheduled the appointment to get a new referral...

☼

Thursday afternoon was, at long last, our Girl Scout Christmas party. The girls each exchanged gifts. Sophia completely and totally embarrassed me when she opened her present (from my Cookie Chair's daughter, no less), saw what it was, threw it, looked like this:

 

for a few minutes, and then burst into tears. Why?? Because it was Tinkerbell/Fairy goodies, and she thought *I* had given her MORE Tinkerbell stuff. She had all Tinkerbell things in her stocking this year, and Chloë got Disney Princesses stuff, and she wanted Princesses, and here was more Tinkerbell, and ...ugh! It was mortifying. I had to take her out of the room, lecture her once again on the proper way to receive a gift, and then put her in the corner when she was STILL being bratty. And then go apologize for her behavior. I'm still embarrassed!

☼

The Cookie Rally on Friday night went really well, and I didn't lose a single Daisy. (The chemist in me thinks of my troop of Daisies as a whole lot of excited valence electrons, if that's any explanation!) Sophia was probably griping here about not getting more cookies... See her red shirt? One of the troop parents had the bright idea to put all our girls in the same color, and we chose red. Worked like a dream.

☼

Saturday and Sunday, the kids and I spent pretty much all day at the hospital with Daddy. Thankfully, they provided crayons and paper to keep the little ones busy. It helped. Mommy and Daddy got into the drawing and coloring for a while there, too. It was pretty therapeutic. I smuggled in some chocolate for the patient, even though no outside food was allowed. It was most appreciated. I smuggled in my new iPhone 4 for him to "ooh" and "ahh" over, too. Daddy likey.

☼

So far this school year, I've been working a ton with Sophia on letter sounds. She kept getting them mixed up, and she found the whole process rather boring, so we didn't really graduate beyond that - until December, when things suddenly clicked for her, and she began to read! Still, I didn't go back to the Hooked on Phonics program we'd been using, because we did so much traveling last month, and because I wanted her reading skills to develop more informally in that period. We went back to HoP on Monday, and she did a beautiful job with the program, even reading her first three stories to me, unassisted. So she finally got to put her first sticker on her reading chart, which has been up on the wall since September. It was a momentous occasion, so we all did the Happy Dance! Yay, Sophie!

☼

Monday night was dance class for Chloë and Cub Scouts for Jack, so we didn't get to visit Daddy at the hospital. That sucked, and we all missed him like crazy. I may have cried a little.

☼

Tuesday was nuts. I had to go to the mall to get an eye exam (yes, for a mystery shop, but I really needed it). My vision has jumped another big step, for the worse. Awesome. Not that you care. After that, I stopped in at The Children's Place to check the clearance racks. Score! I got over two dozen pairs of good, quality pants for less than six bucks each - half for the girls, half for the boy - since they've all been in high-waters lately. Imagine that, my kids actually grew! Now to take the 3Ts and 5Ts to the kids' consignment shop...

☼

In the afternoon, I still hadn't heard when Hubs was getting out of the hospital, and I was starting to panic. I had to take Jack and Sophia to gymnastics (the boy joined his sister in class last week, too, and he's über-enthusiastic about it) in the afternoon, and then spend four hours at the Girl Scout council doing my CPR certification class, and I really didn't want to get another sitter for that... plus I wanted him HOME, of course! I called the head nurse, his command, his chief (because he had to be released to the command, not his wife, argh), and finally found out they were discharging him in the next 20 minutes. Really? You couldn't keep me in the loop?? I dropped The Littles off at the gym and then raced my tush over to the Naval hospital to scoop him up, before rushing us back to the gym to pick up the little gymnasts. In rush-hour traffic, both ways. Normally, that should have taken me about 2½ hours, but I did it in an hour and 15 minutes. Go me.

☼

Tuesday night, I spent four hours learning CPR, for the first time. I meant to do it after I had my first kid, and then the next two, and then the last one, and then... I never did. Now that I'm a scout leader, it's time. It was an adrenaline rush, for sure. I've been on the lookout for an unconscious victim ever since. Next month, I'm going to take the next step and take the course to be a Red Cross CPR instructor. I'm doing it for free through the Girl Scouts, in exchange for teaching a couple classes a year after that. I'm nervous and excited!

☼

Wednesday night was our monthly Bunco night. I almost forgot to make my cupcakes! 1700 rolled around, and I finally got started... or at least I did, after I sent Hubs out to pick me up some eggs. Well, I wanted to make some really cute cuppies, only all the Wilton food color gels I wanted to use had dried out. So I had to use blue. I tasted some of the blue frosting... can you tell??

Then, I put the tinted frosting in the fridge so it wouldn't be soft and melty like it was in the tub, while I showered and got ready. Only, I left it in there so long, it got TOO hard, and I couldn't use the swirly tip I wanted to use. So I ended up doing these slapdash basketweave cupcakes, in blue, and getting exactly nothing like I wanted. Apparently they were good, though, and I was asked to bring cupcakes every single time.

☼

This morning, I had my two-year check-up with my gastric bypass surgeon. Hard to believe two whole years have gone by since I weighed *gulp* 341.3 pounds. I've lost about 205 of those lbs along the way, dropping from a BMI of 62.xx to somewhere in the mid-20s (hard to tell with all the extra floppy skin I'm still lugging around). I'm happy, but I'm not finished yet. I look okay in clothes, but when I take them off, it looks like I'm 92 years old. No lie! So Plastics is in my future, and I'm okay with that. Just don't touch my face, because I'm pretty adorable. Ha!

☼

Tonight, I went for the follow-up to my CPR class, which was the First Aid portion. I aced my test. Well, I did get one wrong on the child first aid portion, because I read the question as a CPR one instead of a choking/abdominal thrusts one, der. That'll teach me to rush to be the first one done! (That's a lifelong habit I've had, so dumb.) It was a good class, and I'm seriously glad I've had it. My only complaint - and a major one - is that there was waaaaaaay too much joking around and talking during the instruction and videos. A little laughter is fine. The entire six hours? Not so much. Not when some of us aren't taking it for the 7th time and actually want to learn this stuff! Now I need to stock a first aid kit to bring with me everywhere I go!!

☼

Well, I could bore you to tears for another hour, and THEN share some cute-and-funnies from the kids, but I shan't. This has gotten long enough, and I know you agree. Have a fantastic weekend, and send me any extra gauze and band-aids you have in the house. ;)

Fin.

P.S. Scroll down and read my Poop Story, if you missed it. I'm told it was a good story, anyway.

Sayonara, Señoritas

So, we gave up Vanna a week ago to the dealer where we're getting our new Honda Odyssey. (Which, by the way, will be green, instead of ocean blue, or dark cherry red, or, well, a different green... lots of switchy-switchy with this process!) We were put in a loaner Odyssey for a few days (I named that one "Mona." Monah the Lonah. Heh), and I really liked driving it. Not 100%, because I truly miss a lot of the features about Vanna that are missing from this new vehicle. She was a great van, and nicely appointed. Yeah, I might be a bit too sentimental about a dumb ol' minivan, but what can I say? I loved her. And she has some serious sentimental value, too, since we got her immediately after we found out we were expecting twins. We're in a Pilot right now (Mona got sold out from under us! Way to go, Hall Honda), and I absolutely despise it. If you're considering it, don't. I hate it.

Also, we gave up our pooch, Tiger Lily. We drove her up to PA this past weekend, to live at a longtime friend of mine's house with her family of six kids, another dog, a cat or two, a bunch of chickens, and lots of room to run. She'll be well taken care of and hopefully will put back on some of the weight she's dropped in recent weeks and months. She wasn't completely healthy, and we could no longer afford to care for her in the manner she deserved, so rehoming her was done solely with her best interests in mind. We miss her. There's not much more to be said, but I know she is in great hands. Thank you, C!

We've also drop-kicked at least a couple dozen other females from our lives (no exaggeration) in the past week, but that's all I'm going to say about that here.  You're welcome.

Life has been rough lately. Really rough. I've had a tenuous grip on it, but I'm still here, so I guess I'm coping okay. Some have said, better than expected. I - we - have a long, hard road ahead of us, but if the path we've traveled so far is any indication, we'll navigate it well together and come out on the sunnier side.  Thank God for my children, because I don't know where I would be right now without them.

There is a lot more I would love to say, much of it snarky, but I'll save that for a different venue where I know such snarkiness isn't going to come back to haunt me. Being with my Bunco pals tonight was great for me - such a supportive group of ladies who I know have my back. Thanks, girlies.

I'd like to leave you with one thought: The grass isn't greener on the other side. It's greener where you water it.

Fin.

Friday Fragments

Mrs. 4444 is the brainpower behind Friday Fragments, so be sure and link up with her if you're in pieces this week!

☼

So, despite the fact that:

 - We still have some fleas and our natural solution (sprinkling diatomaceous earth everywhere) isn't working well,

- we still don't have AC in the house OR in my van,

- last year's housefly problem has returned,

- pigeons have invaded our attic, and

- my bipolar meds are in need of tweaking, apparently, because my moods are all over the map lately,

I'm having a pretty decent week. I'm feeling happy, content, and grateful for my wonderful life. It's not a feeling I've experienced often in my mixed-up life, so I'm holding onto it this time with all my might.

☼

Our monthly Bunco night was Wednesday, and I was the "host" (although it's always held at T's house now). These are the prizes I brought, and they were pretty well received. I love getting Bunco prizes and always put a lot of thought into it. I actually kicked butt this month and won TWO prizes, so I brought home the chunky red necklace from Torrid that I liked, and the Salt Water Taffy that my kiddos had been eyeing since I picked it up. Steph subbed in this month and snagged a couple herself!

Btw, see those cards with the elephants on them, near the top left? Made with real elephant poop. Awesome, right? :D

☼

 

Speaking of Bunco, I wore this pendant that I reviewed on my giveaway blog, Fishing and Wishing, and it got raves! Check it out if you'd like one for yourself. ;)

And not only that, but I'm thisclose to my goal weight and very definitely plan to reach it by the time I hit the 1½-year post-gastric bypass-surgery mark on the 26th, so my new figure got a lot of attention at Bunco night, too. I purposely dressed up in my LBD (Little Black Dress) to show it off a little, hee.  Two of the other ladies were talking, and they told me that I should be a spokesperson for the surgery! Another one even called me "skinny," which is, like, the awesomest compliment I can get right now.

Love those girls, MWAH!

☼

I had my 18-month follow-up with my surgeon (Dr. C, thank goodness; I think the other guy is a complete @$$) this morning, and he was full of praise for my progress.

He doesn't want me to lose much more at all, actually. I'm at about 152.5 lbs, and he'd like to see me go no lower than 150 lbs, even though I'm only 5'2" and my "ideal" BMI-chart weight is about 125 lbs. He said that a frame that can hold 341 lbs (I know!! Shame on me) just would not look good at 125, and I would probably feel terrible. I asked him to elaborate on that, and he just said I'd feel completely miserable. (Wouldn't I like to test that theory, though?!)

So, I know I will go substantially lower than 150 when I get my jiggles and stuff cut off, which I plan to start doing as soon as our still-outstanding tax refund comes in, but maybe the 120s aren't the destiny for me. Eh. I got called a "MILF" by two hot guys recently, so what more do I need?! :D

☼

Oh, also, I asked Dr. C. about the fact that almost every time I stand up, I get so light-headed that I almost black out. It's a major nuisance. I wasn't sure it was related to the weight loss, but he confirmed that it definitely is and is very common.

The problem?

My blood pressure is too low.

Which is a switch, considering I used to be on meds for my very HIGH pressures.

The solution?

I need to add more muscle mass, since I've lost a considerable amount of that, to help bulk up my weakened blood vessels, and I have to add more salt to my diet. (You don't hear that often, eh?) And hydrate, hydrate, hydrate, of course, which I am always conscious of, but it's especially hard in the current heat.

He promised that it would stop when my weight loss finally levels off, and that is one thing I am looking forward to. Having to stop and hold on to something for 10-20 seconds every time I get up is a major pain in my arse!

☼

Tonight was fun. With the Amazon.com gift cards I've been racking up with my Swagbucks, I was able to get a free Ice Cream Maker, and it arrived last night. Rob went out for the extra ingredients we needed tonight, and we made some awesome organic vanilla soft serve. I can't really have any, but I did steal a few spoonfuls of the finished product. Oh, my stars, it is GOOD. GOOD!!! Next time, I forewarned them that we'll be making me some sugar-free strawberry sorbet, so Mama can actually enjoy some frozen goodness. I can't wait!

(Those pictures are from my shutterbug-in-training, Chloë.)

☼

I had two free passes to see Toy Story 3, so I bought two more tickets and took the kids to see it at the local theater today. What a great flick! I actually cried my eyes out at the end. The kids loved it, too, and they talked about it all evening. Have you seen it?

☼

That's it. I didn't record any Cute Kid Quotes this week; hopefully I'll get some for next time!

Have a great weekend, y'all!

Fin.

In The Still Of The Night

I should probably go to bed soon, but I'm wide awake. I hope that changes soon. I have to go up to Richmond - and back - tomorrow for Day One of the homeschoolers' convention. Tomorrow is just preliminary stuff, like learning how to homeschool, but for me, that's the crux of the matter, so I intend to be there. I planned to get a hotel room, and I still might for Friday, but we couldn't afford it for both nights. Friday and Saturday will be long days, starting early and ending late, so it kind of sucks that I have to drive home tomorrow night. But, such is life.

Anyway.

This afteroon, we all gathered up and went to Sophia's dance recital for her Creative Movement class.

Look, she is the tallest one in her class! Kind of funny, isn't it, since the other two are always the smallest in theirs? Rob whispered to me, "She gets that from her father... who isn't me." He can claim that all he wants, because there isn't a thing on her that she gets from him... except her blood type. And, well, her DNA. The rest is ALL Simmons (my maiden name, btw).

The recital, as always, was pretty cute. Here is a video of Sophie and the class singing "Where is Thumbkin?":

 

(Let me know if that works or if I need to change the way it's embedded. It looks weird on my screen.)

They do lots of fun things in that class, always with children's music that you probably know. Sophia has a blast. She is a bit of an attention whore right now, too. See where she's looking? Back at herself in the mirror. Chloë was exactly the same way at that age!

Here, they were doing a train song, and toot-tooting the horn. Sorry for the red eyes; these pix are unedited.

Jack was not heavily invested in the proceedings. He kept whining to me, "When is it over? When can we go out to the car? I'm hungry. I'm tired. I'm thirsty. Etc." At this point, he refused to watch any longer. Brothers!

 
They do a lot of "animal action" in this class, and this is Sophia pretending to be an elephant. She had a silly noise to go along with it!

I think she was a snake here. (No shoes, because she just outgrew them a couple of weeks ago, and I wasn't about to drop more cash for new shoes at the very end of the year!)

A frog. Sorry about the dirty wall; not my fault.

Here, all the girls kids are waiting for their end-of-class stickers. What I love about this is that for the last song & dance, all the siblings kind of spontaneously joined in, although Jack had to be urged at the last moment. It was great fun! 

After the recital was over, it was picture time. Sophia took that to mean she should do a couple of sweet poses for Mommy's camera.

Sophia with her teacher, Miss Jessica. What a ham she is, look at that hand on her hip! Do you think she knows she's cute? It's kind of sad for me, because she plans to do gymnastics next year instead of continuing on with ballet, but she has such a natural affinity for dance that I won't be disappointed if she runs from the gym again, like she did two years ago. I think she'll be great at anything she does, though - she's just got a great physicality that I totally envy. Too bad she was unmotivated on the soccer field, because I think she could have been great at that, too!

We totally failed on getting her a mini bouquet of flowers, which is a post-recital tradition, so I was so pleased when another little girl gave Sophie one of hers! How sweet.  And someone else gave her a Silly Bandz, which she also loved. I think those things are, well, dumb (and ugly!), but whatever. They're harmless.

Then she started gathering props and posing for Mama. Silly girl! There are a ton more pictures from the recital on my Facebook page, if you're interested. If we're not friends there, and you want to see, add me! I keep pix for friends only on there.

After that, Jack and Soap played on the ground next to the van while Chloë was in her Jazz class. Rob napped - sorta - and when he was awake and playing on his iPhone, I was busy peeling his back. He got a wicked sunburn the other day, which is horrible, but also a big gift to me, a born peeler. It's kind of like my crack cocaine. Poor Sophia's fingernails peel like crazy, and I am always attacking them! Anyway, what?

Oh.

Tonight was also Bunco night, so after we came home, I rushed through a shower and then mixed up some brownies to take with me. I always pick a dessert, but next time, I have a side and have no clue what to make.  Hummus? Maybe. We'll see.

Tabitha, our everymonth host, now lives right down the road from me. I would have walked, but I was already a half-hour late, because the Brownies wouldn't cook through. And I had to carry five chairs, and my prize, and my Brownie pan, back home again. So Rob dropped me off and picked me up again when the night was over. Kind of wasteful, but necessary.

Bunco was a lot of fun this time. It usually is, but occasionally, it's kind of not. I had a bunch of caffeine onboard, though, so I was really into it. We had a lot of laughs, and I really enjoyed myself. Good times.

When I came home, I'd won a butter dish, so I decided to whip up some butter. We were out. I'd never made it before, but Rob had informed me that all I had to do was whip the crap out of some heavy cream, and it would turn into butter. I took his word for it and didn't bother looking up directions. I now know that I should have, but it's okay. Half-decent, anyway. Edible.

Here's the beginning, with the cream just dumped into the KitchenAid. How I love that thing. On top speed, it only took about 4 minutes from cream to whipped cream to butter to whatever I ended up with last.

You can see I overwhipped, and it started to get kind of curdy. And also, I tasted it at the stage after whipped cream but before butter, and it was quite bland, so I added two pinches of salt. Now I know I should have stopped at one pinch. Salty!

Sorry for the flash; it looked greyish without. That's my new butter dish, sans top. I like it! I also baked bread in the machine while I was at Bunco, and it finished at the same time as the butter, so of course I had to have a little of both together. I had improvised a bread recipe, just kind of throwing in some stuff willy-nilly, and it turned out great. I like it. It's a small loaf, though, so I'll have to make more this weekend.

And lastly, remember this sweater from a little while back, for CARE Package? I'm putting sets together now, so I decided to whip up a hat. It's the Puff Stitch Baby Hat, which I was glad to find on Ravelry, since the sweater also has puff stitches. Does it need a pompon? I can't decide. Next, of course, I'll improvise some puff stitch booties, and then a wee blanket. I think after that I'll move onto that pink kimono I made a while back and didn't love...

Okay. Off to get ready for the convention. Have a great Thursday!

Fin. 
  
  
  
  
 
 
  

 

 
 

The Week In Review

So it's been another busy week, and I haven't had much time to post. I'm going to give you the abridged version here, since even though I have some time now, it's already almost 0200, and I have a trillion and one emails and blog posts to catch up on, too!

Tuesday

Okay, seriously, I don't remember what I did during the day, because I didn't put it in my calendar, but I know I was busy every day but today! Chloë had math tutoring after school, but like most days, I had to pick her up early for Ballet. (Once, she told me that her tutor said, "How are you supposed to learn anything?!" but really, no one asked me if Tuesdays and Thursdays worked for us - and they don't!)

I was going to bring my crocheting to Ballet, but I couldn't find the red I was using (thanks to the cat, I'm sure), so I just played Scrabble on my iPhone and read a magazine. Jack napped, Sophie played. After dinner and homework at home, we worked on laundry. Yay.

Wednesday

I had an 0900 appointment to pick up cookies from the cookie cupboard, which I did. I hate to pick up more cookies at the end of the sale like this - it's over on Sunday night - but we had orders to fill. Hopefully we can get rid of the remaining cases tomorrow, but I'm worried about it. We have a booth sale at Kroger, plus the church where we hold our meetings is going to recognize Girl Scouts that day and said we could sell cookies there, PLUS Steph is going to hold a booth sale with her troop and said she'd take some of our cookies to sell at that, too. So, fingers are crossed!

At home, Rob was just getting ready to leave to take the kids to school. Their tardiness has been an ongoing problem since he has been on that job. After that, I decided to take back the job and let him sleep. After all, he has been getting home around 0300-0500 most days. And while it's true that I usually stay up the entire time to wait for him, and it's also true that he can usually go right back to sleep after bringing them to the bus stop/school and I can't, I don't have to stay awake until he gets home. So from now on, I plan to go to bed when I'm tired and get the kids up for school - on time! Except when I don't, like today - but somehow he managed to get them up!

While he was gone, the contractor who we called to get an estimate on some home repairs we can't afford came. I had just gotten out of the shower, so I ran down in my towel and asked him to wait five minutes for Rob, which he did. The fecking homeowner's association, which I absolutely hate, is now fining us $10 a day until we get it fixed. Our only hope is to do the repairs and then appeal to the HA to waive the fines. Only, we still haven't gotten that estimate... guess we'll be going with someone else! As for why Rob doesn't do the work himself, he spent $40 to rent a super-tall ladder (since all the problems are on the second story; he's done the first-story work) from Home Depot, only to get it home and not be able to extend it himself or with my help. That thing was a bear! I was super-pissed about the 40 bucks thrown away, too. Argh.

After he mostly bullshat with the contractor about motorcycles, we went to my 1015 doctor appointment with the shrink who prescribes my meds. Rob usually doesn't come along for those, but since we rarely spend time together these days, what the hey. Everything's going well with my current drug cocktail, so we didn't change anything. Haven't for a long while, now. Hopefully things will stay good going forward, too. Lord knows I need some mental stability, even if it has to come in the form of a pill or three! Anyway, apparently one of the drugs throws off cholesterol and blood sugar, so I have to go in and get more labs drawn for that.

We drove down to Oceana (another Navy base in town) to do a mystery shop at a restaurant in the Food Court. Rob got a steak sandwich, and I had a tuna wrap. It was SO good, and huge, so I took most of mine home. Rob brought the leftovers in the house, which I assumed meant that he was going to put them in the refrigerator... so I was really mad that night when I found my bag of food on a kitchen chair, pushed under the table! Hello!! More money down the drain.

After that, he went to work, and I did whatever I did around the house. I actually think I took a necessary nap until the kids got off the bus. Then the girls went to dance class for two hours, and I still couldn't find that yarn, so I played more Scrabble and read magazines. And played with the kids. It was a really nice day - we've had weather in the 70s this week!! - and the kids wanted to go to the park. I should have taken them, but I was so tired. I remember now, I didn't read, I mostly lay back and snoozed while they played games on my iPhone and listnened to kids music on my iPod.

When we got home, I started making dinner (just mac & cheese and some green beans) for the kids, when Stephanie showed up to babysit. I didn't feel like bringing the kids to Bunco night this time - after all, it's supposed to be my "break time" from them, a night out for ME! Steph and I had negotiated; instead of paying her cash, we were going to swap babysitting for the six My Little Ponys and a Schick razor I'd gotten from my deals and steals shopping recently. Works for me, and for her!

So after we chit-chatted a little while, and I held the wee cute man, she reminded me that I needed to bring dessert to Bunco. Oops! I was going to bake chocolate chip cookies, but I'd forgotten and no longer had time. I sent her up to our very messy bedroom to get something for a snack out of the snack stockpile bin. She came down with two packages of Keebler cookies, and we called it good. (They were not a big hit; I'll have to stick with baking!) Tabitha teased me about bringing cookies that weren't of the Girl Scout variety... I didn't even think of that!

I carried the five chairs she (Tab) asked met to bring, and the cookies, out to the car, said goodbye to the chillens, and left for a couple hours of fun. At Bunco, I had two cups of full-caffeine Diet Coke, which I normally don't drink, so I was in rare form that night! Everyone was laughing at me - I was cracking jokes, dancing, and generally being silly and a bit obnoxious, too. But it was fun, lots of fun, as usual.

Steph and her boys (Tim had come to pick her up) left right away, so I gave Jack his shot and sent the kids to bed. I got more of his meds in the mail, so he's back on the nightly injections again and not liking it one little bit!

That night, I didn't go to sleep at all. The caffeine had me COMPLETELY wired, and I was hyper all night long. I hadn't had a chance to go deal-shopping, so I stayed up and worked the weekly deals for Target, CVS, Rite Aid and Walgreens. Several of you have asked me to keep doing those posts, so I will continue just for y'all! ;) (And hopefully I will get to your emails this weekend, too.) Look for a post on that following this one.

Thursday

Rob got home really late, like 0500, and I was still up, so I got the kids ready for school. Unforch, I couldn't find any more juice boxes for their lunches, so I had to wake him to get some out of the stockpile for me. I also had to write a quick letter to Sophie's teachers, so that the neighbor-lady can get her off the bus on the days that I substitute teach, now that I'm good to go.

After they left, I showered and got ready to go deal-shopping. The stores I go to are near Little Creek (the Navy base in town where I go to the doctor), so I was going to go get that lab work done, but then I remembered I was supposed to fast. I hadn't done that... it'll keep 'til next week, I suppose.

I hit Rite Aid and was pretty successful there, and then CVS across the street. Another good trip, although that store is always out of half the deals I go in for. The other CVS in town is too far away to go to on a regular basis, and I don't know if Wags and Rite Aid are nearby, so it's not really cost-efficient to do that. But, I saw recently that a new CVS is coming in just down the road, in the same shopping center where I used to work at Harris Teeter. Woohoo! I can't wait; am I silly for being excited about that? ;)

I did a super-fast Walgreens trip and missed out on half the deals there (go on Sunday, I'm telling you! I keep saying it but not doing it, gah), but still made out pretty well. When I got back in the car, where I'd left my phone, I saw that it was 1257 - and I was due at the school for a meeting at 1300! Eek! I quickly called up and said I'd gotten stuck but was on my way...

Everyone was waiting for me when I arrived. Oops. Couldn't really tell them I was out shopping, so I made another excuse. The meeting was for Jack's IEP eligibility meeting. I had hoped that Rob would be able to attend, since this was the first time he'd had the full scope of evaluations done since he was a two-year-old. After a synopsis was given of the results by his regular teacher, his special ed teacher, his occupational therapist, the social worker, the counselor (not sure of her actual title) who ran his IQ tests, and the vice principal, it was determined that Jack is no longer eligible for services, because he doesn't qualify as "disabled." This is a good thing - it means that the little tiny 31-week preemie who was so far behind at two years old is all caught up now, five years later!

His intelligence testing showed, suprisingly to me and his teachers, that he his completely average across the board, except for slightly above-average in spoken language. We were kind of expecting him to "pop" on the gifted testing, because he really shows an incredible depth of thought in the questions that he asks. To have him be "average", well... I admit, I was disappointed. Hard to say why, exactly, other than that his father and I are both quite intelligent, and it's natural, I suppose, for us to expect that our children would all be the same way. On the other hand, Jack is in no way your average boy, and he certainly has his own gifts. And shortcomings! As do we all.

The difficulty, now, lies in the fact that he is seriously underperforming to his abilities. He seems to possess, I believe, no intrinsic motivation for getting his work done and done well. Granted, he's not even 7 years old and will hopefully develop that over time, but there is no sign of it at this point. He has a terrible time attending to directions given and focusing on task. So, our next step is to get him in to his pediatrician, with the assessments his teacher and I have filled out, and see about a dx for ADD. I'm extremely loathe to medicate him - I really don't want him to be a zombie! - but we will take it one day at a time and see what's what. If he needs help, I'm damn sure going to get it for him, but it won't be without many reservations. Stay tuned...

Halfway through the meeting, I started getting weepy. Not outright sobs or anything, but my eyes kept tearing up like crazy, and I couldn't get them under control. I just feel thoroughly responsible for any of the issues and problems Jack faces, like it's 100% my fault he is the way he is. I don't know whether that's completely irrational, but it's just the way I feel. I don't think Rob has any such ideation, so maybe that's just the "Mom Guilt" that all of us mothers have. It was completely embarrassing to be crying in front of a room full of professionals, though. I hate that! I am so emotional, and I can't stand it. I felt like saying, "I can't help it, I'm bipolar - just ignore me!" but of course I didn't. Everyone was really reassuring, too, telling me they'd be more concerned if I was unemotional about it and didn't care. And when I said that it seems Jack butts heads with me more than anyone else, and it's the hardest for me to get him to "do" things, like his work and reading and stuff, they all reminded me that this means he is most assured of his mother's love. I'll always be there for him, no matter what - and they won't. That helped.

Anyway...

In tears, I left and called my father back. He has long been telling me that he and his soon-to-be-fifth-wife, Kathy, would come up for Jack's 7th birthday this month. First, it was going to be the weekend right before his birthday. Then, they planned to get married that weekend and would come the following week. So I finally booked his party for the following week, only for Dad to call and tell me that they'd come the first week after all. What! I asked him to make up his damn mind (not in so many words) so I could get the invitations out... only to talk to him today and find out they're not going to come up until April now. Watch they don't even come at all. Whatever. I've long since learned not to tell the kids when he plans to come...

I didn't have much time until Jack and Sophie got off the bus - another tutoring session for Chloë - so I puttered until then. After the arrived home, I whisked them off for more deal-shopping! We went to the Walgreens down by Target to see if I could hit some of the deals that I couldn't get earlier, but I only got one thing. Oh, well, that's the way it goes, especially when things are on clearance. We ran to Target after that, where I had quite a long list as you will see. I managed to get all but two "deals" off that list in about an hour's time. Chloë had nothing after school, so I'd told her to stay the whole time and come home on the late bus. Normally, it takes an hour for her to get home on that bus, after dismissal, so I was counting on that. We raced home afterward, but she still beat me by a few minutes.

Luckily, I'd left the door unlocked just in case that happened, but I really need to go out and make her her own key. At 8½, we feel she's more than ready to be home by herself for very short periods of time, and she was completely fine when we arrived home. She bounced out of the house to help carry in the bags, smiling and talking all about her field trip that day do the Chrysler Museum in downtown Norfolk. She'd enjoyed it immensely!

Since I'd stayed up all night, I was tremendously exhausted by that point. I'd had Rob make me some coffee in the morning, which I haven't drunk in over a decade, and wowee!! That sure did the trick for long into the day, but it wore off. I fixed the kids a quick dinner out of some food from the Target trip, and then sat down on the couch to watch a movie with them. I forgot all about doing Jack's homework, and I fell sound asleep during the movie. Next thing I knew, the kids were heading upstairs for their bath and bed, kissing me goodnight. Such good kinders. (Not really; they can be so naughty! But they were good that night, at least...)

Friday

Rob got up with the kids, since I was dead to the world. I'd fallen asleep around 2000 Thursday night, and I didn't rouse until just before noon Friday. I had no idea what time it was, because my phone was dead, so I was worried I'd missed the kids' bus! I stayed awake for an hour after that, but I could barely keep my eyes open the whole time, so I went right back to sleep until bus time.

It was actually a big disappointment for me, since I'd planned to take my first subbing job Friday. I remember being called three times during the morning call-out period, but I just couldn't wake myself up enough to take a job.  Hopefully I won't pull any more all-nighters anytime soon. If it means taking my sleeping pill, I guess, so be it, because I just can't do that anymore. Not a spring chicken, y'know!

After the kids came home and had a snack, we went upstairs and worked on our rooms from 1600 'til 2200. Jack napped most of that time, but the girls helped me with the laundry and putting away all the stuff for our toiletry and toy stockpiles. I didn't even stop to cook dinner! I just sent them down to eat some of the huge yogurt stash we have going on... the girls were willing, but Jack fussed about it. He wanted mac & cheese, dammit! But no, nope, and nuh-uh, so yogurt it was. I even ate it myself, plus some salad. The Littles went to bed around 2100, but Chloë stayed up a little later to help me with the laundry until she was practically falling asleep sitting up! She wanted to keep helping, but I steered her toward her bed, poor sweet thing!

I kept working until Rob texted me at 2200 to say he was on his way home. Woohoo! I was supposed to host the 2300 hour in my monthly crochet-a-thon thing online, but I begged for someone else to do it so I could spend some QT with my guy. They happily took over, so I fixed him a quick dinner of salad, dirty rice and turkey sausage, which was a surprise when he came home. Usually he's left to fend for himself and has a bowl of cereal or a can of soup. We smooched a whole bunch, too - I'm so happy he's here!

Of course, the reason he came home is he is to go right back in to work all day Saturday (today), so not too thrilled about that. But the good news is, he's qualified to be promoted to Chief on the boards he took in January, which is GREAT news. He didn't think he did well on the test at all! Hopefully the rest of the qualifying stuff will go well, and he'll actually get promoted this time as he should. Fingers are tightly crossed and prayers are being said!

Also, he may be getting his LPO job back and switching back to days in a few weeks. More great news!! I seriously can't wait... the kids miss their daddy, and I miss him - and the normalcy, too.

With that, I'm heading off to bed. I was going to post the deals, but I'm tired now. Even though we've got no Saturday plans for once (woohoo), I still want to get up at a decent hour and be productive all day. So look for that post tomorrow, if it interests you!

Have a great weekend, y'all.

Fin.

P.S. Can you believe this was originally intended to be a "bullets" post! Pshaw.

We Survived.

So I stayed up all night Tuesday-into-Wednesday, so that I would not miss my early-o'-thirty follow-up appointment at the Plastic Surgery clinic on Wednesday morning. By the time I got there, it was snowing and blowing, and I was exhausted.

I checked in, watched 20 minutes of the "Today" show in the waiting area, and then was called back up to the front desk.

"Mrs. Odette, are you a post-op patient?"

"No..."

"I didn't think so. Tricare messed up, they scheduled you for a post-op appointment, and Dr. T is in surgery. He can't consult with you right now."

Awesome. I'm so glad I stayed up all night and braved the now-blizzardy conditions for nothing! My rescheduled appointment is in two weeks. Hopefully in a pre-op slot??

I went home and went to sleep until the kids came home. Then the fun began.

I hadn't showered (and I actually forgot what I was doing and went to the doc wearing nothing but my long underwear and a coat! Haha!), so as soon as the kids got off the bus, I instructed the girls to change as fast as they possibly could into their dance clothes while I took my quickest shower ever.

We left 10 minutes late, because even though I had time to shower, I really didn't factor in, uh, getting dressed and brushing my hair and teeth. Oops.

Sophia arrived, therefore, ten minutes late to her Creative Movement class. With black tights instead of pink, and no ballet shoes, because Mommy didn't have time to fix things! Oh, well.

Chloë and Jack worked on their homework, while I worked on crocheting the little sweater I'm making. It really should have been done by now, but I'll finish it later and show you tomorrow.

Jack finished his work, but Chloë was still only half done by the time the girls had to switch out. Sophie came out to play with Jack, and Chlo went in to her Jazz class. I kept crocheting and answering a hundred silly kid questions. They are so amusing!

We got home at the usual time, quarter to six. Chloë's Thinking Day event for Brownies was supposed to be from 6-8 PM. Her Troop Leader was supposed to pick her up. We had never set a pick-up time, but since the location was just down the road, I assumed it would be about ten-of or so?

Fortunately, I had baked a pizza the night before, so I only had to heat it up for a minute to get some dinner in her belly. And the other kids' tummies, too. They inhaled it.

By 6:00, the TL still hadn't showed, and I started to wonder whether she was running late (entirely possible), had already come while we were on our way home from dance, or had simply forgotten. I called her house and spoke to her son, who said that maybe she forgot. She had left 45 minutes ago!

Since I didn't have time to bring her to Thinking Day, I broke the news that she might not be going, because TL hadn't shown up. She burst into tears and was really disappointed, having worked for hours on her swaps this past Sunday. Then she hit her brother for no reason other than she was upset, so I sent her to her room to calm down.

While the Littles finished eating, I was going to bake my brownies for Bunco. Yes, it was Bunco night once again. But I looked at the box, and I wouldn't have had time to get bake them and get to Bunco on time... so I pulled out four different bags of those Pieces candies, and decided that would be my dessert for the evening! Hey, it works.

At 6:30, one of the other troop moms called me to ask where Chloë was. Um... TL never picked her up, and I couldn't bring her! She put TL on the phone, who claims she knew she was supposed to drop her off afterward, but didn't know she was picking her up, too. Yes, that had been the arrangement. Yes, I am annoyed. Yes, I do have a crying child upstairs... She was SO sorry and sent the other troop mom right out to pick up Chloë.

Then the hunt for the Brownies vest began. She swore she wore it home on Sunday, but it wasn't in the current usual place (on the back of the chair I'm sitting on, still waiting for me to sew on the patches she got in December), or in the van, or hanging up in the closet... Eureka! It was under a pile of coats by the front door. Phew. The troop mom showed up a few minutes later, and off they went. Chloë was a much happier girl by that point.

I went to get the kids' coats out of the closet, so we could go to Bunco, and the folding chairs all fell on top of me. Thank goodness they did, because I had completely forgotten I'd promised Tabitha I would bring five chairs over! So I bundled up myself and loaded the chairs into the van, and then got the kids ready to go to Bunco. I brought two sets of headphones, my iPhone (which has an iPod in it) and my iPod (which, by the way, doesn't have a touch screen and doesn't work like the iPhone, a fact which I'd forgotten after lack of use and was SO confused), to keep the kids busy during Bunco.

And the candy. Almost forgot the candy, but I done brung it! (No, I don't really talk like that.)

I'd already warned Tabitha that, since Rob is working nights and all my babysitters also go to Bunco, I'd have to bring the kids. No one else knew, though, so they all looked surprised when my little ducklings followed me into the house, helping to carry folding chairs.

Sorry, guys, no choice!  It would be an interesting evening, that's for sure. I had already told they kids the rules for behaving at Bunco, more than once, so I was hoping it would stick!

The kids were all over Tabitha's new puppy Mickey, a little chiweenie who looks like a purebred Dachschund. He's so cute!! (and hey, look, a rare picture of Sophia actually keeping hair doodles in her hair for more than five seconds. Usually she pulls them out as soon as I put them in.)

Little Mickey shivers like a Chihuahua, so that's how you know he's half one. He was such a sweet puppy, so lovey and cuddly. I wanted to take him home with me!

Tabitha's 9-month-old, Lily, is such a sweet baby. She sits and plays so well with all her little toys! I held her little chunker butt as long as I could, until my arms got tired. I just love holding a sweet baby. She held my hair whenever I carried her around, like a security blanket.

Love those chubby cheeks!

So, Bunco went well after all. The kids were... active, but not at all naughty. They didn't bother us hardly at all while we were playing the game. The iPods only kept them busy for about 10 minutes, but hey, that was ten minutes of sitting still that we enjoyed! They ate a little, drank a little, and didn't spill (whew whew whew), which I consider a huge miracle at this point in their spilly little lives!  No one complained, though that doesn't mean nobody minded they were there. I just didn't hear about it, and I've asked around. I'm crossing my fingers that Rob is back on days by the time next month's game rolls around, though!

Chloë showed up, thrilled and happy from her Thinking Day night, around 8:30. She had lots of new swaps tos hare (ooh, I should show you those, too. Tomorrow) and had tried lots of fun things, like Greek chicken and other foods, a dance from Israel (I think?), and more. I wished I could have gone, but alas.

After the game, the kids and I cleaned up the toys - they were ALL out, because thankfully Tabitha runs a daycare and has plenty of them - and then packed ourselves up and bid adieu. It was past bedtime when we arrived home, so I sent the troops up for jammies and teeth brushing. I thanked them for behaving so well, which I could see they appreciated and felt proud.

As soon as I was sure they were asleep, maybe an hour later, I took my tired and cold self right up to the bed, turned on my heating pad, and zonked out. I didn't wake up until Rob came home, around two in the morning!! Usually, he's home by midnight. Poor guy.

At 0300, it was clear I wasn't going back to sleep, even though he'd given me half a sleeping pill. Suckage! I went downstairs to work on the bills, but my head was too tired and fuzzy to think about it. Fortunately, by 0400, I was ready to lie down, and crashed on the couch. 

Really, though, I'm ready to sleep normally. I've tried sleeping pills, but I don't wake up the next day - if they work at all. I've tried all manner of tapes and programs. I've looked into hypnosis and Cognitive Behavior Therapy. We'll see. I've been like this my entire life, though, so I'm not too hopeful anything will change. It never lasts for long.

And that's that.

Fin. 
  
  
  

Hello, Cupcake!

Catching up...

Tuesday

Honestly, I did plenty of stuff on this day, I just can't remember what now! But I did get this in the mail:

Ten skeins of Peruvian 100% wool, for $50 for CARE Package! That's a really good deal; I got it from Discontinued Name Brand Yarn. I've purchased from them several times before and have always been happy. They offer steep discounts on great yarns. I like this green, but it's not extremely soft. It's not too scratchy, I think, but now that it's not so soft I'm not sure exactly what I'm going to do with it. Perhaps a felting project that I design myself? Eek, nervous about that. We'll see!

Wednesday

As usual, I spent my first hour after the kids got on the bus screwing around online, doing my Facebook games. That is a given, and I don't apologize for it. I'm not a morning person and it helps wake me up. Plus it's hard for me to move and do things when I'm so cold. But after that I got busy!

I spend a lot of time now looking at couponing and deal blogs. Money is so very, very tight right now that I'm pretty obsessed with saving money and getting the best deals. On Wednesdays, the grocery ads come out for Farm Fresh and Harris Teeter (my favorites, although I need to branch out more because those are also the two most expensive stores);  Farm Fresh doubles coupons up to $1.00 on Wednesdays. Both double up to 99cents every other day, so I look at those blogs to see what I can get for free after sales and coupons. I'm going to start stockpiling, too. I just have to figure out how to get massive amounts of the coupons I need to do so, without spending too much to make it a worthwhile cause. I'm already stockpiling the toiletries from CVS and Walgreens, and now I'm going to start doing it with food, too.

Rob says to me after I tell him this, "What are you, Mormon?"

Well, no, but it would be much better to get a ton of stuff for the pantry for FREE and then shop from the pantry, planning our meals around what we have on hand, then having to run out and buy stuff at full-price! Right?! So that's the plan.

(Also the current plan, because of super-tight finances, is to scrap spending the summer in L.A. and use the money I will hopefully earn from subbing to, you know, live off and stuff. It sucks, and Chloe was bawling when I told her, but we gotta do what we gotta do to stay afloat.)

So anyway. The deals I got Friday were thus:

This 8x10" photo collage from Walgreens was completely free! I paid nothing out of pocket for it! And it turned out really nice, too. I don't know what I'm going to do with it yet, but I like it.

 
(Sorry for the crappidity of this picture. I hate my camera!!)

All of this, which is 1 bottle of Gatorade G2, 2 single-serve bowls of Kashi cereal, 8 bottles of DanActive, 8 Activia yogurts, and a Tony's cheese pizza, were free after deals at Target (the Kashi) and Farm Fresh (everything else)!  Only the Kashi and some of the Activia still remain in existence; everything else was quickly consumed. My kids are BIG fans of yogurt shakes and smoothies, so when I can get these free, I act quickly. Might have to take subbing off on Wednesdays so I can be sure to have time to get the freebies! ;) I kid... sort of.

My total out of pocket for the above was five whole cents for tax, at Target. Would've been 13 cents at FF, but I had a $5 gift card that I'd JUST gotten in the produce department for signing up for a second Sunday newspaper delivery. I'm getting it for the coupons for $1.47 extra a week, and I KNOW I will recover that in savings each week, so it's worth it. Too bad I can't just get the extra coupons and not waste the whole rest of the paper, but I'll definitely Freecycle that.

And I got a free lunch, too! I can't eat very  much, so just a few bites satisfies me. I got a cracker with smoked salmon spread from the seafood department, a slice of bread and a bite of donut (not the best, but one little bite won't kill me) from the bakery, and a hunk of cheese for my bread from the deli department. All free samples, and it filled me up. Hey, I have no shame.

I made myself laugh going out and doing that shopping, too. I don't have pictures of it on this computer, but I knitted Jack a hat with cars on it a few years ago. He wears it now, and it's still big on him. It turned out HUGE, because I didn't really pay attention to gauge back then. Anyway, I hadn't showered yet but really wanted to go out and get my deals before they were sold out. My hair was a mess, so I went out wearing Jack's car hat! It's blue and yellow and orange and green... and oh, so not grown-up. Every time someone would glance at my hat and then look away, I'd chuckle to myself.

When I got back home, I realized I still hadn't made anything for Bunco that night. I was supposed to bring a dessert, but I had no mixes of any kind in the pantry, and absolutely no money to buy something. So from-scratch it had to be!

I couldn't find any recipes I liked on AllRecipes.com, so I used the one for vanilla cupcakes in the back of my beloved Hello, Cupcake! cookbook. I got it from the kids' school Book Fair last year, but I've seen it around everywhere.  The recipe was supposed to make 24 cuppies, but since I way overfilled the cups, mine only made 16. That was enough for the 12 for Bunco and one each for the family, so it worked out fine.

They turned out beautifully! It has been harder for me lately to resist sweets, but fortunately I'm not a big cake lover, so I had no temptation to try these. Still, they looked pretty good!

I just dipped them in that chocolate Betty Crocker frosting I got from Walgreens the other day and then used the pearls from Williams-Sonoma to decorate them like the colorful petit-fours I made one other time. The kids remembered those, too, and kept saying so. 

Dontcha want a bite?

While they were baking, I was talking to my dad on the phone as he drove from his home down to Florida to pick up his fiance girlfriend.  Their wedding, which was to be his fifth, is off, but they rented out her condo, so they're still moving in together! Eek. I'm worried for him. It is kinda funny, though...

Also, while I was on the phone with Dad, my doorbell rang. It was a fellow Freecycler dropping off yet another awesome package of stamps for my grandfather! Grandpa has been collecting stamps for over 60 years now, and he's got dozens and dozens of albums full of them. He loves all kinds - used and new, foreign and domestic, whatever I send him - so I always ask on Freecycle for people to save the stamps from their holiday mail. Several people responded and sent me stamps for him, which was great, but then I hit the jackpot with Ken! Ken brought a huge pack last week and another one Wednesday, filled with thousands of stamps (old AND foreign) I'm sure Grandpa doesn't have. I'm so excited; he's going to be thrilled!

I also got another freebie in the mail Wednesday: My e.l.f. cosmetics! Remember I'd bought that e.l.f. mascara on Target so I could get a free $5 off $5 code for their website? I just bought five random things that I really didn't look at, on a whim, just to see what I ended up with. It came yesterday; I haven't tried anything yet, but it looks fun! And if I don't end up using it, it would make a great gift (or Bunco prize?)

(By the way, if you want me to stop posting my deals and steals, I'm not gonna, because they excite me so. But let me know if you hate them and maybe I'll do it some other way. If you love them, let me know if you want to know how I save money, and maybe I'll get it together to write a post on that. I'm still learning how to do it big-time, though!)

After dance class that night, I had Bunco. I had to remind Rob to come home so I could go, because he completely forgot and was going to work several more hours. Poor Rob is having a tough time these past couple of weeks. He's got a new chief whose mission it is, apparently, to make his life a living hell. He's coming home more disenchanted with the Navy than ever, wishing I would win the lottery and get him out. (Too bad we don't play.) It sucks, and I feel bad for him, but there's nothing I can do. 

Also, speaking of Rob, he's going back to nights starting next week. Bah. I hate that. HATE IT. But it might solve the problem of how I'm going to get the kids on and off the bus once i start subbing, now that our nice Japanese neighbor-lady has moved to Texas!

And further Rob news: He may be going to Haiti with 48 hrs notice, for up to three months. I am not worried about it and am not complaining, but I will miss him terribly if he goes. If they need him there, though, so bet it. I'll let you know when I do.

Back to... Bunco. I quickly decorated the cupcakes and got my stuff together to leave, as soon as he arrived home. Fortunately, T was hosting it at her house just down the road from mine, so I wasn't late. I drove so carefully so my poor cupcakes wouldn't roll around in the cake case! Bonus: because her wee baby girl goes to bed at 7:30 every night now, she's going to host it every month now so the baby can go to bed on time. Yay for me; I hate hosting at my house!

Bunco was a lot of fun. We had a new face there, and she turned out to be really nice. And Steph was there, which took me by surprise; I had no idea she was coming since she quit back in April and didn't tell me she was subbing this month! That was a thrill, and of course I got to love on Baby Luke some, too. The cupcakes mostly got eaten, except for three for the kids to take to lunch today, so that worked out fine. And I was really hyper and silly and in a great mood. I kept cracking myself up, and I think maybe I made a few other people laugh, too. ;) Hopefully I wasn't too annoying. I didn't have caffeine, so I don't know what was up with that...

When I got home, we watched our Netflix movie: Bruno, with Sacha Baron Cohen. Oh. My. God. Do not see this movie if you have weak sensibilities! Rob thought it was stupid as hell, but I laughed my ass off! He is SO wrong. I mean, don't get me wrong, I thought it was stupid too, but there were many hilarious parts that just had me laughing because I couldn't believe he actually did that! On film! For the whole world to see! What a riot. Have you seen it?

Friday

I've been sleeping upstairs in the bed still, with my heating pad on and snuggled up to Rob. Keeps me nice and toasty, but man, I miss my couch. My eyes are always in bad shape from the way I sleep in the bed. All puffy and crusty and gross. Nice, right? Plus I can't stay asleep; I toss and turn and adjust all night. It's not the best sleep. When it warms up, I'm back to my couch, thank you very much.

At ten, I picked up Jack from school, so we could go to our respective doctor's appointments. I had my one-year (!!) post-surgery check-up first, in Newport News, and then his appointment was two hours later in Portsmouth. He was happy to be out with Mama and NOT at school - so long as he didn't have to get any shots. He didn't.

I had been praying all morning about being blessed with abundance, because those places are NOT close together, and would require a lot of gas. I only had an eighth of a tank left, and like I said, not one penny in the bank account. I was hoping for a loaves-and-fishes type miracle. Well, that didn't happen, and my gas went down almost to 'E' by the time we arrived in Newport News. Then I remembered there was still a little money in the CARE Package account. Now, normally I am very carefully about not touching CP money except for CP needs, with no intermingling, even though I use OUR money for CP needs all the time. But I had no choice; I had my son in the car and couldn't afford to just run out of gas in Newport News, so far from home. So, I put $20 worth of gas in the van - which I will pay back tonight  since it's payday now, phew - and considered that the blessing I was asking for!

We arrived at 10:30, a half-hour early for my 1100 appointment. So when I was sitting in the waiting area at 11:45 with a very antsy six-year-old boy, I was pretty annoyed. Especially after the receptionist called me up to tell me that my referral had expired on the sixth, and I could either reschedule or try to get a new one, backdated for today's appointment. Or pay out of pocket. Um, no. So now I need to get a backdated referral, which they refused to do last time, because no one in that whole stinking office can figure out how to set up a system for contacting patients to let them know their referral is running out?!?! What the hell? Every other place I go handles that themselves. Or at least lets me know - well in advance - that it's time to get a new one. I made that appointment THREE months ago, which is plenty of time for them to have noticed that I would need to get new insurance paperwork. Shame on them.

I found a suggestion box in the bathroom - which I always use before weighing in, hehe - but nothing to write with. I should have just said something at the desk about it. Very annoying!

Anyway. My appointment went really well. Doc was extremely pleased with my more-than-150-lb loss in the last year (it's actually not my anniversary for 12 more days, so I'll post more pictures then) and congratulated me thoroughly. They only guarantee - and not even really that - a 75-lb loss, so I've done well with his help!

My protein is still on the low side of normal, so as usual I was admonished about that. I've been eating a ton of eggs since my labs were drawn, though, so I'm betting it has come up since then. My iron is still quite low, even though I've been taking the ferrous sulfate, so he prescribed chelated iron, which will be more readily absorbed. And that should help me stay warmer, too. My vitamin D came up nicely, though, at least!

He answered all my questions (and a couple of Jack's), and when I was getting up to leave, I was overcome with gratitude and instead of shaking his hand, I grabbed him for a big hug! He was a bit taken aback by that and kept saying, "Oh! Okay!" and laughing. I thanked him for myself and for Rob, and told him how happy I am now. And I am. It's been great, this past year. I love my RNY (roux-en-y gastric bypass surgery)!

It was late by the time we got out of there, probably about 1225, and Jack's appointment was at 1300, more than half an hour away! I still had to get the gas, so I stopped and did that, and then I stopped next door at the Burger King to get him the free lunch I'd already promised him all the way up there. He was so excited - not by the food, but by the watch in his Kids Meal! He kept telling me the time, which was actually the date and never changed. Funny!

Then I drove like a bat out of hell to make it to the hospital on time. It's pretty sad when I'll drive more carefully with cupcakes in the car than with my kids, so I'm resolving now to do the opposite. I'll just have to consider them my little cupcakes, instead of my little ducklings. We got there late, not getting to the peds office until 1313; they consider you late if you're not there 15 minutes early, so I was worried they wouldn't see us. But they did, so yay!

He needs a new referral to the endocrinologist who prescribes his growth hormone shots, and also he needed his physical form filled out for the school testing he's getting for special services. We spent until 1400 with young Dr. A., a little cutie who I really like (not in THAT way, just as a doctor). He's very patient and attentive, and he really cares about the kids. I kind of sprung the physical form on them without notice, but he was more than willing to get that done for me, so I appreciated that.

Jack will be seven in just over two months. Hard to believe... He weighs 32.4 lbs and is 39.5 inches tall. I said to Dr. A., "Well, he's stil the size of your average two-year-old, huh?" He said, "Yes... but think of it this way, he's the size of a small three-year-old, and a really small four-year-old - isn't that better?"

Um, sure.

He failed his vision test again, so I need to take him back to the eye doctor to see if his prescription needs to be adjusted. It's been less than a year since he got his glasses, so I was kind of surprised to see how bad he did! Maybe he just wasn't concentrating enough on the chart?

Otherwise, everything went well, and he's healthy and happy. He was bouncing around, having fun, and cuddling with me at times. A couple of years ago, I didn't even think he liked me at all. I was very sad about that. Things have done a 180, and now we're quite close. It's fantastic!

I was worried about being late for the bus to get the girls, and my phone was dead, so I couldn't call anyone to go get them. So, again, I drove too fast. Just around the corner from our house, a policeman pulled me over for doing 40 in a 25. Eh, oops. I looked right at him as I was passing his unmarked car, and knew he was going to pull me over. Sure enough. I was cringing at the thought of yet another bill to pay the whole time, so I was beyond grateful when he told me that because I have "plus points," he was going to let me off with just a warning. And warn me to slow down, he did. Twice. He also saw Jack in the back seat and examined his carseat to make sure he was buckled properly. Hopefully he didn't notice what a mess the van is right now, but at least the boy was safely harnessed.

When we got home, I was surprised to find Rob in the driveway! He usually doesn't get home until at least 1800, but it was before 1500. Jack was excited to see Daddy, too. He bounded out of the van and ran into the house; I followed, sure that either Rob was sick or there was trouble at work. It was neither (although there WAS trouble at work); he just got off early today! What a nice surprise.

We all walked down, with Lily on her leash, to get the girls from the bus. Jack wanted to drive his Caddy down there, but it doesn't move fast enough. He was so bummed. When all the kids came off the bus, they surrounded the dog and gave her loads of attention. She's so shy, though, I'm not sure she enjoyed that!

Rob and the kids played outside, working on Jack's Pinewood Derby car and driving the trucks around, while I took a nap. I'd planned on an hour-long snooze, but it turned into three hours! Which meant we missed the Parent Reading Night at school. I'm so bummed about that, because the Math Night was so fun and informative. Darn it. I really, really wanted to go.

And now I have to pay the bills before I get back to sleep. Happy Friday, everyone!

Fin.

 

Dark

I'm kind of in a funk right now. I got an email tonight from a disgruntled mother who most definitely did NOT appreciate the CARE Package she recently received from us. I have never, in 5½ years of running this charity, received such an awful email from someone like that. To say I'm upset would be an understatement. Rob thinks she just doesn't "get it," what we do, but I don't know. It's one thing to say, "hey, no thanks, I really don't want this," but it's another thing entirely to be so nasty about it.

Rob thinks I should do nothing, say nothing... not even apologize. But too late; unbeknownst to him, I already did email her back and not only apologize but explain things that she may not understand. Not to argue with her - I would never argue with a newly bereaved mother! - but maybe to ease the way she feels about what we do.

*Sigh*

I hope she doesn't write back. I don't wish to hear from her again. She made me feel very bad.

********

Jack was supposed to be in his Veteran's Day parade with all the other local Boy Scouts this morning, but it was canceled due to weather. We are having quite a nasty storm in this area today - and probably for the next several more. He didn't seem to care, though. When I asked him yesterday about wanting to be in the parade, he said no. "Why?" I wondered. "Because, I don't like to walk." It's true. He's inherited his mother's tendency to be lazy.

So we lazed away the day, until I realized I needed to get baking for Bunco. We were having a Thanksgiving-themed party this evening, and I had promised to bring the pies. And the rolls, for Stephanie, since she was busy with baby Luke.

I decided what pies to make (Dutch apple cream and Nestlé Tollhouse), made up my shopping list, showered, and headed out in the rain. I got all the way to the store, when I realized I'd forgotten my damn wallet. Home, wallet, back to the store.

The store was out of nearly everything I needed. There was ONE package of frozen pie crusts in the freezer. Sure, I could make my own, but time was now a factor. They didn't have the variety of apples I wanted (Braeburn), so I settled for Granny Smiths, my favorite for regular apple pie but not for apple cream pie. They didn't have the on-sale regular size of Cool Whip, so I had to buy the giant tub. Which I then forgot to take to Bunco, I just now realized. And so on...

But I managed to make do, and started baking the pies. While I did that, the kids sharpened pencils. For, like, two hours, they sharpened pencils in our brandy-new electrical pencil sharpener, that Rob went out to Walmart to buy last night for me. It worked great. Until it started smoking. I thought it was going to catch fire, and then I got the bright idea to unplug the thing. Dur! But it kept smoking, even after that, so the kids went to get their Daddy out of bed to investigate it.

It was fried. Kaput. No longa with us. He'll have to take it back and get a new one. Nice, huh?

And then, *I* did catch the oven on fire! The pie filling leaked out of the Tollhouse pie, and it caught on fire. Fun stuff. Rob scraped and scraped the lit pie filling out of the bottom before finally dumping half a box of baking soda on top of the flames. It worked, and all was well. But still, that was more than enough excitement for one day. I have a picture of the fire, but I can't find my camera.

Rob took the kids to Chloë's dance lesson while I finished making my pies, and the rolls for Steph, who wasn't even coming. But I'd promised...

I was kind of voluntold to drive five people to Bunco, since it was way the hell out there tonight, so I had to wait for three of them to arrive. They finally did, and I got them settled before we went to pick up the other two. Then I made my announcement: "Ahem! Since I baked TWO pies, AND Stephanie's rolls, AND she's not even coming, AND brought my card table and chairs, AND am carting five of you to Bunco... if you want to actually USE the table and chairs, I'm not bringing them in!"

And I didn't. They did. And brought them back out at the end, too.

I've been kind of grumpy all day. No telling why. Actually, I do have a few reasons, but whatever, I was just grumpy.

Bunco was fun. We somehow managed not to have any ghosts, even though four people canceled on us at the last minute (fricking hate that). There were four kids playing, though. Fricking hate that, too - well, at least the really young ones. Don't mind the teens, but with all the kids and my dirty mind? I can't say what I'm thinking most of the time! ;)

So I won for most "baby Buncos," and I picked a set of four washcloths that go with our downstairs bathroom. Otherwise, I'd probably have forfeited my prize again, in an effort to reduce the amount of "stuff" we are amassing.

Oh, and we are up another pet. Another kitty, which I took from our Bunco hostess. This one is called Star, and she's another beautiful beast. She may be slow to adapt, but she will not be anything like the last one, Blue. And best? She's fully returnable if it doesn't work out. She's all black, very fluffy, and really sweet. Hopefully, she'll be friends with Tinkerbell in no time. Right now, though, they are feeling each other out...

Okay, I'm off to stew some more over that email. Say something reassuring. I need it.

Fin.

Ayer y Hoy

Yesterday.

I woke up, sick as a DOG, man. I think I already shared that with you? I called into work and was told that, since I was possibly exposed to the swine flu last weekend, I couldn't come back to work until I had a doctor's clearance.

So I went to the doc.

They don't even test for the swine flu in the military system, which seems strange to me, but what do I know? And they didn't test for the regular flu either, maybe because I hadn't had any fevers. I sure did all day today, boy howdy. (If you're wondering why I say that phrase so much, being a New Yorker, it's because that and several other "South Carolina-isms"  rubbed off on me when I lived with my dad there.) (He's still there.)

Anyway, they checked for strep throat, which came back negative.  I did have a huge ton of fluid in my sinuses and ears and throat, and in my chest but not my lungs, so my official diagnosis was a sinus and bronchial infection. I got all kinds of prescriptions (Claritin, Mucinex, Tylenol, Tussinex) to "dry me out" and help me sleep through the night without coughing.

It was going to be, like, a two-hour wait at the pharmacy before my scripts got filled, and I did not have the physical fortitude to sit around for that, so I left.  I drove straight home and slept for the next three hours.

Thankfully, I did not miss the bus this time. I woke up with eleven whole minutes to spare. Phew.

When Rob came home, he informed me that (1) He wouldn't be able to get leave to go to Missouri for his mom's 70th birthday party next month and (b) He will start working nights on the 20th. Wonderful. (Mom, I'm assuming he called you and told you this already today, like he said he would, and if not and you're finding out this way, I'm so sorry.)

So that bites, hard. I guess they are way short-handed at work right now and he had to deny someone else's leave, and no one will get to take any until at least the new year.

I wanted him to go fill my prescriptions for me, since I still felt like butt, but he refused to take any of the kids with him. You know what? That didn't work for me, so we ALL went. And I drove the "new white car," as Jack calls the (awesome) rental. I sat in the car with the sleeping Sophie, and Chloë, while the boys went in. I think I dozed; I can't remember.

I can't remember what happened for the rest of the night. I took my Tussinex, which not only knocked me out for the night, but for the whole day today, too. Wow.

For the first time this school year, I just didn't have it in me to make the kids' lunches this morning. I fed them breakfast, but I had to sit down and put some lunch $ in their online accounts. That was such a relief. I'll only do that when I *really* have to, because at two bucks a pop, PLUS service fees, it's not cheap.

After they got on the bus, I went straight back to bed and slept from 0800 to 1415. I tossed and turned, waking up periodically, but falling straight back to sleep. I had a bad fever and was sweating buckets. I dreamt some crazy, medicine-induced dreams. Be glad I can't remember them, to share with you. (I like sharing my dreams, but I hate hearing about other peoples'! Selfish, I know.)

Chloë's soccer practice was blessedly canceled due to rain, but since Sophie's team was having their pictures taken, we still had to go that one. Only I forgot the form, so we had to run home while her pictures were taken, and I didn't get to snap any myself. :(

There was no practice after that, so we left to go to one of the furthest-away S***cs for a mystery shop I'd signed up for for tonight, before I got sick. And when we got there, I realized that I'd forgotten my wallet for the SECOND time, even after running home for it and the picture form.

Annoyance.

So that put me in a delightful mood, and I was already charming. Folks, when I'm sick, I hardly have the opposite of the patience of Job, whatever that is. Are you the same?

We went home, got the wallet and went back to do the shop. And since Rob was working way late, I accepted two more S***c shops - close by our house this time - when they called up and begged me. At least this way, I wouldn't have to cook the dinner I didn't feel like making.

Except I forgot that no one did their homework yet, because I sent everyone upstairs to play after school, so I could nap some more. Oops.

They're doing it now. It's late. Very late.

Fin.

P.S. Oh yeah, I completely forgot that it was Bunco night last night, too. I went, sick and all, since the doc said I was not contagious. If y'all get sick next week, don't blame me! I wish I had known that there would be an extra there, because I would have stayed home in my bed. But it was fun, as much as it could be when you don't feel well, and I enjoyed myself. Pretty much.

Morning Chaos

So today has been a bit crazy and entertaining so far:

First, I was in the middle of feeding my kids breakfast (oatmeal for J & S, eggs for C) and packing their lunches, with the dog weaving in and out of my way in the kitchen, the cat mewing loudly for some victuals,... and I put the stack of glass pans that we're Freecycling on top of the garbage can to get them off the table. I needed more room to work. The doorbell rings, the dog starts barking and shoots to the door, nearly knocking me off my feet, and slamming into the garbage can. The glass pans crash to the floor, splintering this way and that, and the dog is still barking her fool head off. Exasperated, I open the door to let in V., the 4th grader who will be waiting for the bus at our house, and tell her, "From now on, you can just walk on in, honey!"

Phew. Glad I didn't want those pans. Damn dog.

Then, at the bus stop, one of the mothers decides it's time to organize all 47 kids into a line, to minimize the nuttiness and get the bus going quickly and out of the way of the morning commuters. Well, we tried, but it still didn't go that smoothly. And one of the mothers had to talk to the bus driver after the kids were loaded, so there was a further hold-up. So the lead morning commuter, who is on her phone the whole time, starts honking her horn like a maniac. One of the bus moms shouts back, "What is your problem?! There are 47 kids at this bus stop, be patient!!" They start screaming back and forth, and then two or three more bus moms join in, with the car lady shouting obscenities. The bus driver seems oblivious to the whole thing. Finally, the bus driver sits down and turns off the "stop" sign, and the car lady whips around the corner, flipping off the bus mom who started the shouting.

It was hilarious. Very exciting; it definitely woke me up this morning!

********

Oh, yeah, yesterday. The school day went well, and everyone seemed happy again when they got home. Jack's highlight was getting a huge Hershey bar, which he said was for being quiet in line in the hallway. I let him eat it for his after-school snack. He was wired after that! The girls had a good day, too, although no stories stand out in my mind. They were just excited and thrilled about their day.

I took Chloë to her first Jazz class of the year, which begins her SIXTH year of dance lessons! I can't believe it's six years already. She fought us on the jazz lessons, wanting to take ballet instead, but we prevailed. Just one dance class this year, because she decided to do soccer, and that takes up three days a week. Anyway, I sent her up as soon as she finished her snack, to get dressed for dance. And wouldn't you know it, already she couldn't find the brand-new ballet slippers I bought at the beginning of summer, for the June show. I told her to dance in her socks until we found them, but she decided to cram her piggies into the painted-black ones instead. Bah. We WILL find them; I am NOT buying another pair!

Before the class, I had a quickie session with my prescribing shrink, to get new prescriptions written out. He switched me to the generic form of Effexor. I'm nervous about it. I know, I shouldn't be, it's the same thing... but when you're so dependent on your daily pill for your sanity and rationality, well, it can be a scary thing.

And during the day, I picked up a job application at the new Harris Teeter down the road, which I just dropped off today. While there, I bought some shrimp to take to Bunco last night. I didn't want to cook, and I had a couple extra dollars, so I bought a pound of the little ones for shrimp cocktail. The ladies liked it; I didn't take home a single shrimpy.

Bunco was fun. We only had 8 again this month, instead of the normal 12. And since we're going to be seriously paring down our belongings for boat life, I didn't want to take a prize. (Everyone wins a prize in our group, every month, and I hate it. We only started doing that after I went to Europe and made sure everyone had something from there when I hosted immediately after, and the trend stuck. I'm tired of it!) Finally, with much coaxing from the host, I found a pretty barrette for the girls. Chloë's wearing it to school today. It looks lovely!

That is all. I have much cleaning and unpacking to do today.

Fin.

Skinny-Me

So I got called "Skinny" tonight - two times!! After I got showered and dressed for Bunco, I went downstairs, where Rob told me, "You're looking skinny tonight!"

What?! Me? Skinny?

Not quite.

But it was lovely to be called that, just the same.

And then at Steph's house for tonight's Bunco game, someone asked me something and called me Skinny at the end.

"Did you just call me 'Skinny'?" I shrieked. "You're my new best friend! I LOVE you!"

So then everyone looked over and started commenting on how I looked, and I told them I was down 115 pounds, and I was just smiling from ear to ear. It felt great, really made my night.

Skinny!

********

I don't have a whole lot to tell you about today, because I didn't feel well until mid-afternoon and we didn't go anywhere, and then there were major, floody thunderboomers so we couldn't go anywhere. Instead, I'll show you yesterday's pictures:

 

Just a couple cute ones of some father-daughter snuggles

Chloë's tooth needed to come out. It's been looser than a three-dollar hooker for at least a week, if not two, and it was jutting out of her little face. She's just afraid to pluck them. So Rob took some dental floss, laid her down and... well as you can maybe tell, she was screaming absolute bloody murder. It didn't hurt at ALL, she said, she was just scared of it. So of course I had to pick up my camera to document the occasion, and what did she say? Er, wail? "Mom, stop taking my picture and save me!!!"

So I put it down and held her hand and told him to stop, and the next thing I knew, he gave a little tug and it popped right out. She didn't even notice and stopped yelling when he showed it to her! Phew. That was hard on Mama as much as Daughter, because I thought she was in pain, but she was just freaked out. She was thrilled when it was over and holding the toofie in her wee hand!

 

Gee, that wasn't so bad after all, she says as she admires the new gap in her mouth.

"Check me out!"

I think she looks a little witchy with this new space in her face, but before long it'll be filled in.  I just can't wait for her to be 12 or something (How old? I don't know) so she can wear contacts and get those glasses off her purdy li'l face. I think she looks better without, and Jack with, the specs.

********

So I stayed up much later than I should have, and I was just turning off the light to go to sleep around 0330 when I heard Chloë at the bottom of the stairs, crying. Bawling, really. Asked what was wrong, she informed me that she'd lost her tooth and she didn't think the tooth fairy was going to come, soooobbbbbbbbbbbbb.....!

Well, she came around the corner and found the money and Tic-Tacs the Tooth Fairy was going to leave lying in the middle of the floor, but TF hadn't quite gotten upstairs yet. It was a good thing, too, because as it turned out, Chloë had lain awake, lo, all these hours in order to catch the poor fairy in the act! Hahaha. This was all told to me tearfully, and there was much hugging and cuddling going on while I explained that TF doesn't come when children are awake, so she left the presents with me instead. That seemed to work. The tears dried up, the smile came out, and then, "Can I play a game on your iPhone?"

Um, it's like 0400, so... sure, why not? You do that while I go to sleep, m'kay? So she played quietly next to me for a tiny little while until the battery died (it was almost dead already when I gave it to her), and then she dutifully plugged it back in the charger and went back upstairs to bed.

********

This afternoon, I was calling someone on my iPhone, and when I hung up, we had this conversation:

Chloë: "Why are you and Daddy using your iPhones as your regular phones now?"

Me: "Because these are our new phones, honey!"

Chloë: "Ohhhh... I thought you just got them to get apps and play games!"

BWAHAHAHAHAHA.

********

So, Bunco. The rain was coming down in buckets, and it was a bit of treachery to drive out to EBF, Chesapeake. I brought four of the other players, and Tabitha's baby girl, along in my van, so at least I had good company for the slow, careful ride. The van was packed, though, because we all had our food and I brought our tables and chairs, too!

There were only 8 of us there tonight, instead of the usual 12, so we just played with two tables instead of the normal three, and everyone got prizes - some got two! I was not one of those, but that's okay because I'm getting tired of prizes anyway. Hee.

Steph was rolling Bunco after Bunco tonight - she was kickin' butt and takin' names! We were all loud and laughing and having a good time, so it was lots of fun. And The One Whom I Don't Like wasn't there, so even better!  There wasn't ... I have no idea what I was going to say; I stopped to smooch The Bob and now I forget. ;)

So that's Wednesday for ya!

Fin.

P.S. I opened another support ticket with Typepad about Google Reader not updating my blog, so we shall see if that works out. Forgot to mention Bloglines. Oopsy.

Paying Attention

So I guess I'm way behind on the blahg. I'll catch you up on our doin's since Independence Day.

Warning: This won't be short.

But I bet you knew that already.

Sunday the 5th: Was Tinkerbell's birthday. Honestly, I can't remember if she turned 4 or 5. We didn't do anything. She doesn't like a fuss.


I had a mystery shop at a certain carousel in a certain local mall. I've done it a few times before, and the kids always enjoy it. We never went up to the upper level before, so this time we did.


The girls are always happy to pose for a picture.

Not so much the boy. He refused to let me take his picture on the merry-go-round. Can you tell it was a rainy day?

It really is a beautiful ride, and quite conspicuous being located inside a mall!

The rest of the day was spent packing up most of the office, in anticipation of the arrival of our floor materials the next day.

Monday the 6th: The kids and I spent most of the day farting around and finishing packing up the office. There was a surprising lot of stuff squished into such a small room.

Fun things arrived in the mail:

My yarnie prize from Claudia's MS ride arrived! Ooh, it is luscious. Top: 2 skeins Oceanwind Knits' Fingering Superwash Merino (185 yds ea) in Berrijus; Bottom: 2 skeins Radiant Twist's Superwash Merino Sock (375 yds total) in Ancient. What am I going to make with it? I don't know yet, but it's calling my name!


Susan even sent along a bonus gift: These size 0 DPNs (double-point needles, for socks and other such things knit in-the-round) in bamboo. I didn't already have size 0s, and I don't know when I'll need them, but now I have them!

Even more of the yarnie stuff arrived in the mail. Oh, people, this Drops Alpaca is some gooood stuff. This is the first time I've bought exactly the yarn called for in the pattern (except the colors), which I'm not going to reveal. I'll be doing some covert knitting from now until November in preparation for Steph's baby. Rats, I've spoilt the color surprise. Oh well, there will be more.

Rob brought a young kid home from work to help him move the desk out of the office. They worked while the kids and I ran around doing about 7 mystery shops (there was lots of free food and gas that night - one not necessarily related to the other...). I told Rob if I'd known he'd be bringing home such a cutie pie, I wouldn't have looked so dumpy! He threatened to tell him I said that; I don't know if he ever did.


So that night, Rob stayed up all night ripping up the rug and tack strips in the office and hallway.

The floor guys were supposed to be here on Tuesday. Rob got maybe a half-hour of sleep in preparation?

Tuesday the 7th: Linda from Bunco picked the kids and me up for two lunch shops. There was one way out in Chesapeake that I'd never done before, and it turned out to be a really fun assignment for both of us. She's still talking about it. Then we came all the way back to do a certain well-known 24-hour restaurant that I do all the time. It was pretty uneventful. She came in and observed our naked floor. The floor guys never came, because they never received the materials. We had originally been promised the work would be all done for Bunco on Wednesday night. Things weren't looking good for that!

The foreman called and promised that it would be done on Wednesday by 1300. I believed him. Silly, foolish me.

We ran out to Oceana (Navy base here in town) to do another dinner shop at the Exchange and go him and sit, looking at the cement floor in the office and jam-packed living room.

Wednesday the 8th: Bunco night. The floor guys never came. They still didn't receive the materials. It wasn't their fault; there was some problem with the delivery truck. I couldn't really blame them, because they kept communicating with both the truck and me about the problem, and it wasn't on their end, but still. I wanted a new floor to show off at Bunco, and I didn't have it.

We managed. Bunco was still fun, and we had everyone there and no 'ghosts.' There was some bitchiness happening, but what do you expect when 12 women get together?  There was fussing over someone not bringing the food they signed up for, grouchiness over being fussed at for that and for doing our first annual birthday exchange differently than she wanted to, and bitchiness (on my part) for C (the one I don't like) wearing the $55 silk scarf I donated into the prize pot after being tired of looking at it on the virtual Etsy sales floor. At least I apologized...

Thursday the 9th: I woke up sick. I had planned on taking the kiddos to the pool while the floor guys were finally here doing the floor, but I was completely wiped out from The Sick. Summer colds suck. It's the worst time of year to get one. I hate them with a passion. This one wasn't actually so bad, but it was bad enough that we just hung out in the living room, watching TV and chillaxing, while they did the floor. I occasionally fell asleep for a minute or two here and there and woke up to find the kids in the floor guys' faces, asking them a billion and one questions. They laughed it off and took it in stride.

Et voila!

The kids LOVE it. Well, they love the smoothness and slipperiness, but they also love the fact that the room is completely empty! Chloë asked if we could make it their playroom. Um, dear, the whole damn house is your playroom, so no. This room is MINE!

We like it, too. The pets, not so much. They're doing that cartoonish running place while their paws struggled to get a purchase and let them move in a forward motion - so Rob keeps taunting the dog and getting her to run around. It's good for a giggle.

We went out to Chesapeake that night for another pizza shop. As soon as I got there, I realized I'd forgotten a very critical piece of information all the way back at home and couldn't do my assignment without it. Suck!! Palm T|X to the rescue! I managed to get a signal right there in the parking lot of the restaurant, get into my Yahoo! mail account, and find the tidbit I needed. Sweeeet. It was such a relief not to have to go all the way home.

Wal-mart was right there, and we desperately needed milk, cereal, and cat food. And Rob wanted white thread for the uniform he had to prepare that night. So I went in to get those few things and, $240 later, I came out with a humongo cart full of groceries - and no thread. They no longer carry it. Thread! Can you believe it? They have sewing machines, a whole aisle of sewing notions, but no thread. Utterly ridiculous. So he was disappointed, but the kids were overjoyed, since I'd purchased all manner of yumminess for their personal enjoyment.  Sans coupons and canvas bags. It kind of killed me a little to do that.

So I'm going to kill this post right here and make the weekend a post in and of itself. Be right back!

Fin.

Fast Break

So I'm not in a very bloggy mood for the moment. I've had some uninvited guests stirring up trouble here on the blahg again, and that always ruins my mojo. I don't know why people don't just leave me alone. If you don't like it, don't read it. That's all. If you simply can't do that, then you need to grow up. I'm too old for the childish drama.

As for the rest of you, thanks for hanging in there with me.  I'm getting a little depressed over being housebound for four months - and I've just found out it will be five before I have my van back. We're reading, playing games, doing some crafting, cleaning house, etc., but I can only do so much of that before I go crazy. And I'm going crazy. I've got the cabin fever something awful.

But I don't want to keep harping on that, as much as it's always at the forefront of my consciousness.

Yesterday was Sophie's recital for her Creative Movement class. I have lots of pictures - all of which I posted on my Facebook - and videos to post, but I'm not in a slow upload mood at present. Then Chloë's regular Jazz class. We're starting to get all the instructions for how to dress her and make her up for the big show in a couple of weeks, and it's a little stringent. I don't want to call it ridiculous, but after all we've spent on monthly lessons, costumes, and tickets for the show so we can see our own daughter dance!!!, I hate to hear that I've got to spray-paint her ballet shoes black and buy a new pair of pink shoes for the other classes. Ugh. Good dance shoes aren't cheap. But what are we going to do, otherwise?

She'll be in both acts of the show this year, as opposed to just the first one as in prior years. Normally we go to the back of the theater and pick her up at intermission, so she can watch the second half. This year, she'll be backstage the whole time, and it'll just be Rob and I in the audience. (Unless you want to join?) That will be nice. The Littles are still too young to sit still and quiet, so they'll be home with the sitter. It'll be a nice date.

But I digress. Yesterday.

It was the monthly Bunco night. I didn't eat anything but two crackers with cheese dip, and I had to yak that right up. Too bad, because that stuff was yummy as anything. Otherwise, we had a lot of fun. Tabitha had the baby there, so I held her and petted her fuzzy head before the game started. Then she slept, the little monkey. Mmm, sweetness.

The one I can't stand wasn't even that bad last night. Maybe because I was only at one table with her? She just didn't irritate me much at all. Thank heavens for small favors.  If she tried to pull her junk with me next month, when I'm hosting, I'm going to have to go off on her. Last time, she threatened to dump food on my front lawn if I didn't keep it (it was beef). Nowadays, she's going through people's cupboards to find containers to put her food in, so she doesn't have to take it home, without asking first. Klassy. And NO ONE wants her food. It's gross.

I was in a goofy mood as usual. I won a rain guage statue thingy, and I kept telling people that "it's for outside." Captain Obvious, me. I get that from Chloë.

But what am I even going on about? So much for not being in a bloggy mood...

 

I'm making these socks right now. The purple dress is long since blocked, sewn and finished, and I came across this sock pattern a day or two ago. Oh, I know, I started it the night I took Bounce to the ER, so I could knit while waiting for him to be examined. I didn't have much time for that, so I finished knitting the first sock while I stayed up all night with him. Now I'm working on the second one. I'll show you when they're finished. I was going to either sell them on Etsy or put them in a CARE Package, but it looks like they'll fit any or all of my three children, so I might actually give them to the kids for once. They'll like that.

I'm on another forced break from sewing, since Sophie ransacked my sewing goods. She's absconded with my good cutting shears, and she unwound the entire spool of yellow thread for the jammies, and I'm just annoyed as hell. So until my scissors are found, I'm not sewing.

I haven't done the digital scrapping in a little while, either. I did so much of it at once that I got burned out, and I need to take a little break. The good news with doing it on the computer is that it's always right there for me to start up again, without having to set up all kinds of supplies.

So knitting it is, and I did that today in between motherly duties. When Rob came home, we quickly ran to a decidedly "urban" clothes store in a decidedly "urban" mall in Norfolk, so I could do a mystery shop. I had to stick out like a sore thumb there, and it'll be a wonder if I'm not called out as the shopper. I got some shirts, and I was excited that there were no "X"s in the size! I can put them on, but I'll need to lose more weight before they look decent. Which is fine, because I plan to do just that. (Although I barely lost anything in the past week, ugh.) And I got some accessories that I'll use for Bunco prizes. All covered in my shop fees.

Then we tried to cram into the photo booth, so I could update the four-year-old picture up there at the top of the blahg, but it wasn't working. Darn. Now we're on the prowl for another booth.

Rob grilled up some pork ribs (I think? Maybe? Something piggy) for the kids and himself, and he broiled some yummy-delicious scallops for me. Sooo good. I ate five, although I probably could've gotten away with three or four...

Blah, blah, blah. Back to my knitting, and Conan.

Fin.

Bunco Night

Well today sucked. I had a horrible migraine and had to lie down, so Jack and Sophia completely trashed the house. Rob was majorly pissed off. Oh, well. It's all clean now.

 

I baked these mini cupcakes last night and decorated them like petit fours today. Aren't they so cute? I loved them. Of course, by the time I got to Bunco, they had all rushed to the side and several were turned over. Bah! (And I have the cupcake holder for them, but it's for regular size, not minis, and it wouldn't have worked. I already thought about it.)

They were a hit anyway, and Bunco peeps ate every last one of them.  Yay. That always makes me proud and pleased.

Bunco was annoying. Steph had a migraine too and wasn't there. I hate that. She's my partner in crime.  And there were a couple ladies there that I don't like - the usual one I always bitch complain about, and another who was there as a sub and - if it's possible - even more irritating than the first one.

Not only that, but there were three kids playing, ages 12 and under. Way under. I freaking hate that. I go to Bunco for an escape from children, not to be around others' (undiscliplined) ones. I think, if it's going to stay that way and always have kids playing - not even teenagers! - then I might walk. I hate to do it, but three kids? That's ridiculous. And normally it would've been four!

Anyhoo. I'm going back to my digital scrapping. For those who asked about the digital webinar link, it's not working right now! Sorry! I will email it to you as soon as it's back again.

Fin.

Eggstra, Eggstra!

Wanh wanh wanh, I know. Lame.

 

 

 

Today was definitely an indoor day, as it was brrr, chilly outside. To pass the time, we colored Easter eggs! First, the kids colored theirs:

 

You can see some writings and drawings on the eggs where I had them use a clear crayon before dyeing. They were really confused about that at first, but then they got into it.

 

And these are the ones I made from the Williams-Sonoma kit. So pretty! Jack was funny; he thought the ones with the wrappers on them had been turned into glass. They are pretty hard and shiny!

While I painted eggs, the children watched movies that I'd gotten from Redbox for free yesterday: Bolt and Madagascar II. They've seen both before but loved them so much, I rented them again. They were really bummed I had to return Bolt tonight; 'tis their current favorite movie.

********

So while Rob and Chloë were out at her ballet class, and Jack and Sophie were having a nap, I started thinking about maybe not going to Bunco tonight. I just don't feel well at all.  I called around for a sub, but the person who was going to find one for me never called me back. So, reluctantly, I got into the shower and got ready. Bah. I never don't want to go, so it takes really feeling crappy to get me not in the moood for Bunco.

After I stopped at the store for a rotisserie chicken to bring, and showed up at the house, it turned out the had a sub for me ever all. Well, too bad - I'm playin'! It was a long drive out there, and I wasn't going to not play! But it worked out, since someone else was missing anyway.

Despite the fact that we had a young child playing with us (which was quite annoying for several of us there. Don't get me wrong, I like young children - even have a few of my own! - but Bunco is really supposed to be a chance for adult women to get out and get together without having to deal with kids, censor their language or topics, or anything. I personally think we should make a rule that no kids under at least 10-12 are allowed to play, but that's just me...), it was a lot of fun.

I didn't have a voice, so I kept making other people 'talk' for me, like when I rolled a Bunco and couldn't yell it out like I like to do! Steph and I had a lot of laughs tonight, and I even actually ate pretty decently. I ate more than I thought I'd be able to, and I didn't get nauseous afterward. Always a plus.

So the woman who irritates the hell out of me was no different tonight. I was not in the mood to deal with her crap tonight, so I kept pre-empting all her little habits like dice-grabbing and insisting on keeping score by doing it myself! She was clearly annoyed, and I enjoyed it. Not very Christian of me, but... none of us can stand her, and maybe I can irritate her right out of the group? Yeah. That's not very nice. But after two years of her, I don't care anymore. Really, I don't.

Anyhoo, Tabitha was really nice and gave me all the tissue paper and gift bags from her shower, for CARE Package, so I'm gonna organize them now and then do some scrapping. Toodle-oo!

Fin.

Soccer Mom

Oy. It's been a long day, and I'm tired. But for your sakes (hehe), I'll try and muddle through.

What sucks is, I slept right through my alarm, and we waaaay missed the bus this morning. And I had no van with which to carry the children to school. And Rob couldn't leave work to come and get them.  So we had an unintended day off, which I don't intend to repeat anytime soon.

What doesn't suck is, I weighed in this morning, and I've hit the 50-pound mark today! Yippee!!! It'll be a long time before I reach another level this big, so I'm reveling in the feeling.  I seriously can't believe I've lost fifty pounds, though, because I still can't see the difference. Where the heck did I lose it from?

I did a lot of knitting today, and now, as you probably could tell from the previous post, it's abundantly clear that I will run out of my good yarn. I have yet to find a source for more, so I'm going to have to do something drastic and finish with another completely different kind, I think.  I have more of the same yarn, but in a totally incompatible colorway, so that's out. Suck.

My children were constantly hungry today, and I couldn't seem to feed them anything that would sate their little appetites. They had oatmeal, they had cheesy broccoli, they had yogurts, sunflower seeds, etc. but were all constantly whining they wanted more. A very odd phenomenon, for all three of them to be like that at once. I blame it on the beautifully warm weather we had today.

Nothing really notable about the daytime hours, except that after my shower, I decided we needed a group cuddle on the bed together. They were SO cranky and whiny, I thought we should hug it out.  Once we were all lying down, Sophie sighed and said, "This sure is a big responsibility." Hee! The whining didn't cease, however, and the hungry-monsters persisted. So my dreams of all of us napping that way went down in flames.

We had a busy afternoon and evening. I had another Cookie pickup from our troop leader, and then had to hurry and get the girls dressed for dance class. It was at the very last minute that I remembered I needed to get Jack ready, too! Rob came home just in time, and off we took, only to realize that he'd forgotten his license plates.  I did a quick 180 and was annoyed to find that not only did he not bring them, he hadn't even taken them off the truck yet! So I pissed and moaned while he removed them, and off we took again.

Rob carried Sophia into the dance studio, where she didn't want to leave the cute baby in the waiting room and actually go into class. Then the rest of us drove around the corner so I could deposit some cookie money, before heading back to drop off us girls at the studio.

Chloë and I sat, her dancing around and chatting everyone up, and me reading my Martha Stewart magazine (I got a free subscription that just started, woot!), while the boys went to run their errand. Rob had to turn in the Land Cruiser's license plates to the DMV so I can finally cancel the $%^ing insurance on the thing. Without doing that, bam! An automatic $500 fine. Can't risk that!

They still weren't back, so I sat and waited with Sophia while Chloë danced. She was just as full of excess energy as her big sister, running and tumbling all over the place, while I attempted to read. It wasn't to be, as one of the other moms (of whom I'm not particularly fond) kept chatting me up about her daughter (equally unfond). I'd lift up my mag to read, and she'd bust in on me again. Aack.

 

At last, with 10 minutes to go, the boys returned. Sophia wanted to stay outside and play while we waited. Rob dug around in the dirt with her for a few minutes, and then she was on her own. Her little bum got so dirty, but she wouldn't let me wipe it off.

 

I got notice last night that Jack's first soccer practice would be this night (yeah, thanks for the warning, pal), so here's Rob using Vanna's air compressor to blow up his ball. We were supposed to have a #3 soccer ball, and this is a #5, but maybe we'd have had the right thing with a little more notice!

 

It's hard to capture a baby laughing and tickle her at the same time! (And yes, she is almost four, but she is still my baby!)

 

Jack waited ever so patiently, though quietly excited, to get his shin guards on and get out onto the soccer field. Finally, his turn!

 

Practice was already in full swing by the time we got there. I told Coach Mel that we'd be late pretty much every week because of dance class. The soccer practice is nowhere near the studio, unfortunately - it's in BFE. Jack was quick to jump in with his giant-for-him ball. He got in line to kick toward the little goal stand and was eager to give it a go.

 

He just looked so cute out there, finally doing his own thing, that I took a bajillion pictures and will probably share them all with you! Rob berated me a million times about not putting shorts on him but honestly? I haven't taken the spring/summer clothes out yet, so too bad! He was fine. Really. And we have the soccer socks... somewhere. I'll find 'em for next week.

At last it was Jack's turn to make a goal, and I almost missed it because Sophie was bugging me! You can see the grin on his face, though, even from the back!

 

Yeah! Coach Mel helps him get it into the goal. Way to go, Buddy!

 

For the rest of the hour, they were far off down the field, so I couldn't really tell what they were supposed to be doing other than kicking the ball around. He looked great doing it, though - like a natural! I'm sure some of these boys have been playing soccer since they were four, but hopefully he'll catch up and be an old pro soon.

 

Sophia found a thistle and was very intrigued by it. She and her sister were very antsy throughout the practice. They're used to being the ones rehearsing and having Jack wait for them; now they've got to get used to the other way 'round!

 

My little Beckham

 

This is where the team was, across the field, for much of the practice. I used my zoom a lot. :D

 

Yeah, her undies stuck out of her suddenly-skimpy leotard the whole time. We kept trying to fix it, and she'd shrug it off saying, "Eh, that's okay!" I love her muscular legs and the fact that her hair keeps on growing! (I've probably said that a dozen times, but I'm so excited to be able to put it up again soon!)

 

This picture of Chloë discovering her own thistle is kind of so atrocious that it amuses me. Hence the inclusion.

 

This was supposed to be a picture of the tiny flower she was showing me, but I think it just captures Sophia so sweetly...

 

... and on and on he ran, not even noticing others falling in his wake.

 

Time for a team huddle. Jack's the little shorty on Coach Mel's left.

 

Sophia had to go potty soooo badly. So Rob took her around the school grounds, looking for somewhere to "go." The found nothing. She was in agony! We were right off the highway and not anywhere close to anything we knew, so she was SOL, the poor kid.

 

Coach Mel kept releasing the boys to get their water fixes. Jack would run over so proudly, swig his water, and then take to the field again. He's so big!

 

Soap finally tuckered out, and I snapped this picture of her in my arms. It's supposed to be vertical, but I love it this way. See? She is still a baby.

 

The highlight of the evening, for Chloë, was finding and bringing home this ladybug. She was too thrilled. Any other bug, and there'd be a screaming fest, but ladies are okay.

 

Finally, practice ended, and Coach handed out the kids' home and away t-shirts. Jack was excited to get his, and he kept asking us if he could play soccer again sometime. I don't think he realizes that this time, he gets to stay in it for the whole season! (When he was four, he was signed up, but the coach was an asshole, so we quit after one session.) He was such a happy kid on the field and afterward, and it pleased me deeply. It's great to finally have something for the little guy to do that's "his." (Although Chloë said she wanted to quit dance so she could play soccer, too. Um, I don't think so! Not in the middle of March, anyway!)

We rushed to go get some gas, since the 'empty' light was on and going ding-ding-ding. Then to the grocery store to pick up some side salads for me to take to Bunco. I'd have made hummus, but then I realized we'd be in the car for three-plus hours, and that didn't seem like such a good idear.

I drove to Bunco then, and carried in my case+ of cookies to deliver to the ladies there, the money box in case they needed change (they didn't, of course), the food, and my purse. The fam dropped me off and went home to change clothes and pee before heading out to dinner at IHOP. *sniff* without me, but alas, there's probably not a whole lot I could eat there anymore, anyway!

Bunco was really super fun tonight. I was happy to share my fifty-pound-loss news and was in a really good mood after our fun evening together as a family. I felt "on" and was really silly, making lots of jokes that had us laughing. We all were. It was a good time, good time. And I got the last Bunco, so I got the prize for holding the Bunco Clip at the end. I chose a copper vase/bowl thing, because I lurve copper. One woman called it a "spittoon," which amused me, so when I won I requested the copper spittoon. I told them all to christen it so I could take it home to Rob to drink, and we cracked up.

The only thing missing was Stephanie. You missed a great night, yo!

Well, it's getting late, and I need to get my half-hour of Wii in! Good-night, my babies!

Fin.

 

Moving Right Along

Today was Bunco day, so the kids helped me make cupcakes during the day.  I had camnesia, so no pictures, but they turned out pretty. We made spice cakelets with orange buttercream frosting. As usual, they clamored over who was going to lick the beaters and who would get the bowl (strange - the bowl has a lot more, but no one wants it).  Since they'd each eaten a good PB&J or PB&Nutella lunch, I let them have a frosted cupcake for a snack. Oh, boy. What delight they get from such a simple pleasure!

Shortly afterward, the girls dressed for their respective dance classes, and away we went. Chloë brought in her cookies order form, and each of the three teachers bought a box from her. She was thrilled that they did. Sophia kept insisting, as she always does, that Miss Jessica is her teacher and Chloë can't have her (even though she's Chloë's tap teacher on Mondays), so of course she protested her selling to Miss Jessica. I know the Miss Darlene is a healthnut, so I was surprised she deigned to buy a package, but she's nice like that.

Jack and Sophie played and giggled in the back of the van during Chlo's jazz class, so I was able to read my book most of the time. New Moon is getting better. I don't want to spoil it for anyone, but I reached the sad part in chapter three and was crying my eyes out when Stephanie called. "Ooh, where are you in the book? Tell me exactly what's happening," she wanted to know. So we did our little Twilight chitty-chat. I'm getting into it more. It was the same with the first book; I couldn't get into it at first, but once it picked up, I was hooked.

Back at home, I had little time to do anything but shower and dress for Bunco, so I was glad I had already frosted the cupcakes.  I've been to that house, oh, four times, but was still confused when I got there. I stood on the porch and called the hostess from outside to make sure I was at the right place! How silly.

Soon after the games began, I received a phone call from Chloë's agent in L.A. They wanted her out there tomorrow for a national (SAG) Volkswagen commercial. Sigh. And then, he asked me, "What are we going to do about Miss Chloë?" I asked what  he meant, and he told me that apparently she is getting all kinds of attention, that people are constantly asking for her, and he doesn't let me know because we're so far away. What can we do? Right now, with this surgery, my hands are tied.  It really sucks, after we worked so hard to get her out there and get started, not to be able to actually go now when she is in demand. If there was anything I could do about it, we'd go. But, it is nice to know that the work would be there, if we were!

Somehow, some way...

But I've got to focus on the surgery, now just a week and a half away. I go up there Monday and Tuesday for all kinds of appointments and pre-labs and hospital registration, and then, bam! It'll be the 26th before we know it. I'm getting stoked. Jack is asking a lot of questions about it. He's very curious. Relax, though; he's matter-of-fact about it, not sad or worried or anything.

I think I'm going to go knit and catch up on some DVR'd TV. I finished the back of the roll-edge coat, but I do believe I will run out of yarn before I finish the rest. I thought I had more, but I only have five balls of it, and I'm on the third. Yikes. I hate to leave a project unfinished like that.

We watched the movie 21 last night. It was very good; I suggest you see it. It was fast-paced and kept my interest the whole time, and the ending was great. Good flick!

Chloë was given the book Heidi by my dad for Christmas. She's excited to be on Chapter 21 now! She loves the book and is always carrying it around the house, or having her nose buried in it in the car. I'm glad she's such a reader!

Ta for now.

Fin.

Funeral Homes, Catholic Churches & Treatment Addiction Facilities

And what do these things have in common?

Guess.

Anyone?

They are all places where I've gotten the invitation to do a mystery shop!

Cracks me up.

Anyhoo.

Sometimes I feel less like blogging because I think I'm saying the same ol', same ol'.

Yesterday was less busy than it was supposed to be, just because I was tired and didn't feel like running around. Barbara was supposed to come, but I canceled her due to lack of fundage, for the moment. We did go to the girls' back-to-back dance classes, but rather than finish up my dishcloth crocheting, I slept through them both while the other two poor kids sat buckled in their carseats. At least they brought toys.

I'm exhausted right now. I don't get enough sleep, and the sleep I do get is patchy and fragmented. Wah, wah, poor me, I know.

I'm still waiting on the insurance approval for my surgery. If I don't hear by Friday, I'm calling again. Pins and needles, folks!

I went to Bunco last night. I thought it would suck because I have a lot on my mind and usually Steph makes me laugh and cheers me up, but she wasn't going to be there. (You suck, Ninnie!)

It ended up being a lot of fun, despite being at the home of the woman I loathe and Steph's absence. The food was good, although I didn't eat enough of it. I'm not entirely sure the ziti I ate was meatless, but I was so hungry I scarfed it down anyway. I was supposed to bring cupcakes but felt so little like baking or cooking yesterday that I brought Stove Top stuffing Rob made for me. Hee.

The dice were really in my favor last night. I normally roll jack doody but ended up with three Buncos and three Snake-Eyes! I won... let's see... oh, a bunch of paper goods like note cards, address book, and pad, I think. 

And then we had a White Elephant gift exchange. My gift was very last minute, as I had neither the time nor the money to shop for this. I gave one of my dishcloth and towel sets from the Etsy shop, along with the beautiful notecards my MIL recently sent me (hope that's okay, Mom - I needed something nice!) that she made. The recipient seemed okay with it.

I chose a present that turned out to be very nice: a hot cocoa, mint chocolate cookies and mug set. I liked it. I wanted it. But the person I loathe stole it from me when it was her turn! And you can't steal back! Wah!! I received a very nice earring and necklace set instead - in the Greek gift bag I brought back from Europe this summer - and really like it. I'll wear it when I have somewhere so nice to go that the allergic reaction I'll get won't matter!

 

Another ornament for our exchange arrived - this cute little felt-and-buttons Christmas tree! I love it, the kids loved it, and that's all that matters.  I have yet to go to the post to mail out ours, oopsie. They were due out three days ago. Maybe tomorrow.

Guess that's all I've got to report for now. Stay tuned!

Fin.

You Dipchiller!

Today was hard.

I'm just ever so sleepy! I could hardly stay awake today. The Littles got into the red food coloring while I was chilling, and I thought Sophia had blood all over her. That woke me up, but not for long.

I was too tired to even shower before the girls had dance class. I tried, just couldn't make it. So instead of waiting in the studio while Sophia was in her class, I brought her in, put Chloë in there with her (the teacher had invited her to join last week, to make Sophie more comfortable), and went back out to the car with Jack.

After I talked to my grandfather - who is home from the hospital again, yay! - and called for a bulk pick-up for all the big boxes we have to get rid of, I napped. Jack was so good; he just sat there in silence, holding his truck.

When my alarm went off, I retrieved Soap from her nancy-dancy-prancy class and sent Chloë back in. Again, the children just sat in their seats while I napped. I brought my crocheting but couldn't do it. I had calls to make but couldn't stay awake.

{Apparently Sophie didn't cry and actually danced in her class this week! So we'll try it again next week, this time without her sister in the room. Good stuff.}

And then Rob asked me, when I got home, if I've been taking my iron pills. Um, no, actually, I haven't. Gee, could the two be related?! I guess I'll be popping those again, too. Ugh. I hate them.

I did manage to bake chocolate chip cookies for Bunco tonight. Jack always gets so pissed when I do that, because he doesn't think it's fair I should make any cookies for someone else but him and the girls. But it's what I had signed up to make; I had no choice. Which sucked, because I was out of brown sugar and had to use all white. Those suckers were hard. Not my best work. Oh, well.

Bunco was tons of fun, even though most of us were in a 'blah' mood, maybe because of the seasonal change. I played really well tonight (as if skill were involved!) and won the top prize! I chose a 'circle of friends' statue that's just like the COF candle holder my SIL gave me once. Love it!

So I think I'm burned out on the scrapbooking. I need to finish the Brownies pictures so I can bring the album to the next meeting, but I may take a break on the rest for now and get into something else. I really want to do some more sewing...

 

Here are the five cocooning 'pillars! One fell on the "floor" though. He'll be fine. The others are still crawling around.  I can't wait for butterflies!

And that was our day.

Fin.

NOT Going Back To Cali

Sigh.

It's been a rough couple of days for me. I had to suck it up last night and go see my therapist for the first time in a while, and then go to my monthly Bunco night. I was able to eat a little bit there, and of course I really enjoyed myself as usual. We had several newcomers and lots of 'old' faces, so it was a lot of fun. Unfortunately, the one I can't stand wasn't one of the missing!

Today was worse, though, as I reported earlier. No need to rehash that. I barely made it off the couch before 6 PM. Fortunately, there was lots of fruit in the fridge for the kids to eat, and I just kept sending them in there to get it!

As an aside, I have a problem with that. I like to keep lots of fresh fruit on hand, and many times I want to eat it myself but don't so there is enough for the children. It can be hard to eat healthy myself when there needs to be plenty of good food for them. Do you have a similar struggle? I know I need to be a good food role model for them as well, but it's so expensive these days! Just something we have to work on, I guess. Wish there were one of those wonderful co-op farms around here that we could join.

Anyway.

So I've been getting call after call about taking Chloë to the L.A. Casting Convention that's coming up next weekend. We finally talked about it and agreed to go, but I've just sat here and finished doing the bills and... it's just not possible.  Fortunately I discovered this before plunking any money down for airfare or anything. I just have to cancel our hotel reservation.  I'm disappointed, but that's the way it is right now. Gotta pay it down, gotta pay it down... it would have been a really good opportunity for her, though, to get in front of only casting directors - no managers and agents this time - and I know she would have been well received.

But she'll be doing tap, jazz and ballet, Brownies, and possibly a theater class. That's enough right now. Soon I'll put Sophia in gymnastics, and Jack really wants to do soccer.

I'm totally rambling, I know it.

I did do a lot of knitting tonight while watching the Olympics (Yay, Michael Phelps! Yay Nastia and Shawn!). I'm working on a baby dress in the same multi-colored Noro Kureyon Sock yarn that I made the booties and jester hat out of. It will be for sale on Etsy when it's finished.

Well, I guess I'll wrap it up here. Hopefully I'll have something a bit better and more coherent for you tomorrow.

Fin.