One of those days....

Today has just not been fun. Seriously.


It took me a while to even get motivated, but once I did I finally started working on my shower some more. Luckily, the tile on this wall doesn't have to be cut to size at all, so it went fairly fast once I got started. But, getting all of the tile work done is going to take forever and at this point, I just want it to be done. I want my shower back. But of course, once I get the shower done, we have to redo the floor - it's a neverending battle at this point.

(And in case you're wondering about the crazy tile - the light blue tile is what was in there originally. I pulled that off, and I'm putting it back. However, some broke in the process and we couldn't find the same lovely shade of baby blue. So we bought a couple of boxes of white to mix in with the blue. Rather than try to make a perfect pattern, I just opted to go with a random one.)

Once I decided I was done working on the shower for the day (as in - once I ran out of the mortar I had mixed) it was time to run to the grocery store for a few things. Right about then my phone rang, and I had to run and pick up a "sick" kid from school. I say "sick" - I think I got snowed on that one. Live and learn. We went to the grocery store, got what we needed, ran through the carwash and came home.

Once the other kids got home, the chaos just escalated - and boy, did it escalate.

Crappy attitudes. Temper tantrums. Whining. Fighting. Arguing. Slamming doors. Neighbor kids coming over to play and doing stupid stuff so that I had to yell at them too. Constant yells of "Mom!! I need _____!!" or "Mom! He said _____!" or "Mom! She _______!" One kid flipping another kid the bird. One falling off of a bed (after jumping on it) and getting hurt. Vomit. Weird bug crawling across the dining room floor.

Nights like this get to me. I know that they happen, and I know that they're inevitable, but holy crap do they make me feel completely and totally inadequate. I count down the minutes until bedtime, and I feel guilty because I'm not all mushy-gushy and "oh I love my kids so much and every minute is precious and rainbows and unicorns and happy happy yay!!"

Instead, it's "holy hell it's only 30 minutes until bedtime and then it'll be quiet and then all I have to do is get through the morning and get them to school and then I can get stuff done".

A big part of it is stress. The next few days are absolutely jam-packed with stuff, from track meets to a field trip to choir concerts to baseball practice to The Great Strides Walk for Cystic Fibrosis to the half-marathon, and I have no adult backup at all because The Dude is going to be out of town. I'm worried about making it to everything and attempting to stay sane, and then worrying about whether or not the house is still going to be standing if I leave the kids on their own Sunday morning while I go to my race.

For now though, I'm just going to chill. It's been a crappy night, yes. But it's not the end of the world. It happens. Instead of freaking out, I'm going to enjoy a glass of wine and some "baby oranges" (in a very worn and nasty looking - but clean - bowl) and listen to some music and play around online, and then I'm going to go to bed knowing that tomorrow is another day. And with any luck, it'll go smoother than today did.

Lots of -ations today

Today was a day full of -ations.

Information.

I spent the morning and early afternoon at an information fair in town today, handing out flyers and talking to people about Cub Scouts as we try to round up more boys to join our pack. I ran into some people who I haven't seen in a very long time (and The Dude ran into a buddy from his youth who now lives in Florida and was just "passing through" the area - weird) and met new people and talked until I couldn't talk anymore - which is a huge feat for me because believe it or not, I don't like to talk to people.

Celebration.

We went to a barbecue today to celebrate the life of Jared's classmate who passed away 2 weeks ago from brain cancer. The food was wonderful, lots of money was raised, and there were so many people there to celebrate and honor the life of a little boy who touched so many in his 9 short years of life.

Someone asked me how the kids were handling his death. Honestly, they seem to be handling it better than I am. Jared doesn't say much about it, other than asking an occasional question or two. I've tried to talk to him about it, especially in the days leading up to and right after Sam's death, and I've explained a lot to him. I think that he understands it, but he's still young enough that it doesn't consume him. But as a mother, I just can't even imagine how his family feels. I just can't. It tears my heart to shreds if I think about it too much, especially when I realize that it could easily be one of my kids.

They even had a pink fire truck there.

Frustration.

Just trying to get everything done that needs to be done before I start my crazy work schedule on Monday. I have so many things that I need to do, and I'm quickly running out of time. I feel like I have to have the house clean and the laundry done and put away and the meal planning completed and and and and and........ My inner control freak is coming out in a really big way, and it's driving me insane because I know in my heart that everyone will survive even if the house is a mess - but that's not how I want it to be.

Inspiration.

Along with trying to get household stuff done, I'm also trying to finish up some craft projects. After the barbecue, The Dude and the boys and I went fabric shopping (ok, I shopped while they walked the mall to stay out of my way), and just the simple act of picking out the fabrics that I need got my mind spinning and I was able to sit down tonight and design the quilt squares that I need to make to finish one project.

So for now, I'm going to go cut fabric into pieces and sew it back together again and maybe get one thing crossed off of the to-do list.

Just one. That's all I need before I go to bed.

Perspective. It's a beautiful thing.

I don't even know where to start on this one. Seriously. It's been bouncing around in my head since about 7:30 this morning when some idiot in the drive-thru at work really pushed my buttons - and not in a good way.

Let me explain what happened.

We all know that I work in fast food, and most of the time I work in the drive-thru. There are things that people do that thoroughly annoy me, and I wrote about some of them a few days ago. This guy...... yeah. He was right up there with some of the worst offenders.

We were out of large coffee cups today. They had been ordered, but they didn't come on the previous truck. It happens sometimes - we can't control it. So this guy came to the drive-thru and he ordered a large coffee. Our conversation went something like this:

Mr. Grouch: Gimme a (whatever food he ordered) and a large coffee.
Me: I'm very sorry, sir, but we are out of large coffee cups today. Can I get you a medium coffee instead?
Mr. Grouch: (snaps) Well I guess I don't have much of a choice, do I?
Me: I apologize, and.....
Mr. Grouch: (interrupts) Well, I just can't believe this. I mean, really? No cups? I should just go to (insert name of other restaurant). Fine, whatever.
Me: Again, I'm very sorry sir. Can I get you anything else today?
Mr. Grouch: No. I just want my damned large coffee.
Me: Is everything on your screen correct?
Mr. Grouch: Except for the coffee, yes.
Me: Your total is (whatever it was) at the first window, please. Thank you.

He pulled up to the window and started on his tirade again, but to my face this time. I kept apologizing and explained that the cups had been ordered, but they simply were not on the truck and it was out of our control. He just kept at it and muttered under his breath as he paid for his stuff, then pulled to the second window where he continued his tirade until he left.

At first, I was really mad at the guy. I mean seriously, who gets that bent out of shape about a cup of coffee?

There are so many more important things in this world today. So many more. But yet, this guy.... this nicely dressed, handsome man driving a shiny new SUV, was totally losing his cool over something as simple as a cup of coffee.

So many people today have such an entitlement attitude, and it drives me insane. Yes, we're a business and yes, we're supposed to have large cups - but you know what? Sometimes we don't. We aren't required to have them, and even if we did have them, we're not required to serve you. If you want to make sure that you get the cup of coffee that you want - then get it yourself. Buy a coffee pot and make it yourself at home. It's that simple.

And if you make the choice to depend on someone else to provide it for you, then you need to understand that you might not always get what you want. 

Throwing a temper tantrum isn't going to help.

Hosting your own pity party isn't going to help.

If you want something to happen, then make it happen. Don't waste your energy blaming others when you have the power to do it yourself.

I really wanted to tell this guy that if getting a different sized cup of coffee was the worst thing that was going to happen to him today, he should feel lucky. At least he had the ability to get up, get dressed, get in his fancy SUV, and drive somewhere to pay someone to make him a cup of coffee. So many people today don't have that.

I honestly want to thank this jerk. He made me look at some of the things that have been weighing on my mind lately and realize that they really aren't that big of a deal, and they're not worth a temper tantrum or a pity party. Instead, I will make my own cup of coffee and handle them like an adult.

Thank you, Mr. Grouch. I needed that reality check.

More plum picking. And a vent.

The kids and I went out yesterday to pick more sand plums. It's rare that I can get them to agree to go - they don't like to do it, but yesterday, they were willing so I jumped at the chance! They actually did seem to enjoy it, although there was some whining and complaining by the end of it. But in their defense, it was hot, and we did a lot of walking and exploring.

One patch that we found was a little bit trickier to access - and this is just one of the reasons why long sleeves and long pants are mandatory attire for sand plum picking!!!

I think we spent about 2 hours out there, and we ended up with just shy of 18 pounds of fruit this time. There is still a ton out there to be picked, but I think we're going to wait another 1-2 weeks before we go out again to give more of it a chance to ripen.

I'm planning on doing an entire blog with the step-by-step directions on how to make the jelly - I tried to take pictures the other night when I was making the juice but I'm having issues since my real camera died. My phone takes great pictures outside, but in inside light it just plain sucks. The Dude and I priced cameras today, but I just can't justify spending the money on one right now so I'm going to hold off on that purchase for a bit.

Which leads me to this....

I've debated saying something. Then I talked myself out of it. But at the same time, I feel like I need to just say it and get it out of my system.

I'm just having a hard time right now. The stress of trying to get my van fixed is really getting to me, and I'm really frustrated. After getting a second opinion on it, it was determined that it is indeed the transmission, and about the only way to fix it is to replace it.

Yes, we could get a junkyard transmission, but that might only last a month and then I could be back in the same boat again. There are no guarantees with those, but I agree that the prices can't be beat. So we are pricing new ones so that there is at least a fighting chance that it'll last a few years, plus it'll have a warranty in case something goes south again.

We're looking at $3000-3500 to get it replaced. I still owe on the van, so I pretty much *have* to fix it.

I tried to get the warranty people to work with me, since it's only 609 miles out of warranty - they refused.
I looked into refinancing it to get the money for the repair, and was shot down.
I talked to the dealership about working out financing or payment plans there - no luck.
I applied for a loan at my bank - denied.
I bought a lottery ticket - just one - and yeah, well, we all know how that worked out.

I'm in a weird place with my credit. It is way better than it was a couple of years ago, but it's not good enough to qualify for much of anything. A cosigner won't help either - I already looked into that option.

So needless to say, I'm frustrated. I'm angry.

I'm depressed. There. I said it.

I just want to get someone to watch the kids for a day or two so I can go and curl up in the fetal position on my bed and cry and get it out of my system and get over it. But of course, that's not an option. Life must go on, van or not.

Instead, I will work my ass off to get things done around the house, and I will get all of these sand plums turned into jelly, and I will get all of the laundry and cleaning done and I will take care of my kids.

I'm not posting about this to get pity. I'm not looking for a handout or for atta-girls. I just need to get it out somewhere before I lose what little bit is left of my mind. I know that it's all going to work out at some point, and I know that there's some sort of big life lesson to be learned here. I just haven't figured out what it is yet. I'm trying to be patient and I'm trying to remain optimistic, but sometimes it's really hard to do.

So for now, I think I'm going to go figure out something for supper for the kids, and then I'm going to attempt to relax.

We'll see how that goes.

Frustration

I've been having some issues with Alex. My darling little redhead. The only way that I can describe this kid is that he is what you would end up with if the Tazmanian Devil and the Energizer Bunny had a child - he never stops moving and he leaves a path of destruction everywhere he goes. He wakes up at 90mph and doesn't stop until he goes to bed at night. His mouth runs constantly as well as his body.

He is super smart and he has a memory that stuns me at times. We can go somewhere that we've never been before - like to a friend's house - and if we go back a year later, he remembers how to get there, can describe every room in the house, and will tell me what everyone was wearing during the first visit. He's amazing like that (and certainly doesn't get that trait from me).

Anyway, along with his energy comes a definite lack of impulse control. He does whatever he wants to whenever he wants to do it and doesn't think about the consequences. This is something that we have been working on for what seems like forever. Lately the big thing has been stealing food. Now, the kid is not starving by any stretch of the imagination. He's a big boy, yes, but he's built just like his father. He's active and his doctor has no concern about his weight - she feels that he'll grow into his body as he gets older. But I do make an effort to watch what he eats without making a big deal out of it. I try to limit all of the junk food that the kids eat but I'm far from being a health nut.

He has also been having toileting issues for as long as I can remember - something else that the doctor thought that he would eventually grow out of, but so far no luck. He's been having accidents both here and at school almost daily. I've talked to his teacher (who is wonderful) and we have both stressed to him that if he feels like he has to go, he doesn't even have to ask permission - he can just get up and go regardless of what the class is doing. He says that he understands, yet it still happens.

So, after a particularly trying couple of days with him, I decided that I was going to start with him writing sentences. Yesterday, he got to sit at the kitchen table with a spiral notebook and write a page full of "I will not steal food."....and a page full of "I will not touch other people's stuff."....and a page full of "I will not poop my pants."

And then he stole a container full of muffins that I had made yesterday - I found them under his bed this morning. Apparently, he didn't like them because he only ate half of one instead of all 6 this time. *sigh*

I talked to his teacher today when I picked him up from school and she has been noticing that he has been acting out a little more over the past few weeks. She can't really pinpoint anything "major", just little stuff that she has been having to warn him about more than she has before. So, she and I are going to put our heads together and try to come up with *something* that we can both do with him - some kind of a reward system - at home and at school to give him as much consistency as possible. And I am going to call his pediatrician tomorrow and see if we can come up with some explanation for the toileting problems.

I've had him in counseling before too. He went for a year or so, maybe more. The counselor couldn't come up with anything other than "he's just an active boy" and let it go at that. Not that I want him to be diagnosed with anything, but I need something to go on before I lose what's left of my mind. About the only thing that is saving me right now is knowing that even with the issues that he's having, he's still doing great in school - he's ahead of the class in just about every area (which I know, could be leading to some of the problems) and he loves to go to school.

So hopefully, in the next few weeks, after talking to his doctor and working out some kind of system with his teacher, I'll start to see some improvements in his behavior. Otherwise, I might need a vacation....in a padded room.

Craptastic day

I knew that it wasn't going to be a stellar day from the beginning...but wow, I was not expecting it to be quite as brutal as it turned out to be.

It started out with getting up late. Not terribly late, but late enough that we didn't have time to mess around for very long. Ms. Emily refused to get out of bed, and ended up finally getting up about 10 minutes before we had to leave. I was not impressed.

Somehow, I still managed to get all of the kids to their assorted schools on time, and at least had a pretty sunrise to look at, until I started heading the opposite direction and had it right in the face. But still....it was gorgeous.

I got Alex to his school before we realized that he had left his backpack at home - you know, the one that I reminded him to pick up on the way out of the house. He started to pitch a fit before he got out of the van and I gave him the look and sent him on his way.

Daniel and I came home and I did some cleaning and stuff around the house, but I just wasn't in the mood to do anything. Honestly, I was just in a crappy mood. Mother Nature is not being kind to me, and as I just explained to The Dude, I really have just been a stark raving lunatic all day today.

I got a bill from the hospital for my emergency room visit a couple of weeks ago, and I called them to work out payments and stuff - and it got ugly. Without going into details, they made an error, I told them to correct it, and they told me that I'd have to correct it. Uh, sorry - I don't correct other people's errors. You people made the mistake, you fix it. After getting into a rather heated discussion screaming match, she supposedly fixed it. But it was a stupid frustrating couple of phone calls and did absolutely nothing except make me extremely angry.

The kids have been all sorts of hyped-up ever since they got home from school. We had to go to the store to get some stuff, and while they weren't their usual psycho-selves in the store, they sure didn't act like angels. By this time, I didn't care. I was tired, cranky, sore, and more than a little bit irritable so I broke my No Fast Food rule and we stopped at Wendy's to grab food for supper. I just didn't care at that point.

There was drama over missing and horribly overdue library books - which were thankfully located at Ex1's house, after the offender insisted that (1) she never signed them out (2) someone must have stolen them (3) maybe she returned them to the wrong library (4) suddenly remembered exactly where they were.

An empty chocolate chip bag was found in the boys' room - that offender immediately confessed, knowing that lying at that point was futile. He went to bed at 6:30 and hasn't been heard from since.

Emily was sent to bed at 8:00 after her refusal to get up this morning - I told her on the way to school that she was going to bed early so she was prepared for it, but of course at 8:05 she came back out of her room to inform me that she had to study for a math test. *growl*

The rest of the kids have exactly 4 minutes to get to bed - and I swear at this point I had better not hear a single complaint because I am not in the mood. I'm not staying up late tonight - I'm going to bed and hopefully sleeping off this mood and waking up tomorrow all sorts of chipper and cheerful feeling somewhat rational again.

On the plus side, I did sign up for another race - I am determined to stick to my goal of doing one race per month for the year, so this will take care of February. It's a 5 mile race on February 11 - which is also the day that the girls have an honor band thing. Needless to say that's going to be a crazy day, but I wouldn't know what to do if I didn't have a crazy day.

On that note, I'm dangerously close to calling it a night. I will attempt to be nicer tomorrow. But I'm not promising anything.

Tired of the mess

It is a constant battle with the girls. I want them to clean their room, and they don't want to do it. Should be easy to deal with, shouldn't it?

Yeah. It should be. But it's not.

I hear it all the time from so many people - "You just need to make them do it."

Yeah, right. How?

If I tell them to do it, they'll start, get distracted, and quit.
If I stand over them and supervise, the boys will get into trouble behind my back - I'm only one person and I can't be everywhere in the house at the same time.
If I try to force the issue, it gets ugly, and drama ensues - not just normal drama, but custody-jeopardizing drama (yes, I'm serious).

They are only here half of the time. And realistically, they're not even here that much because of church (with their father) and basketball. Do I want to spend the little bit of time that I have with them trying to get them to clean their room? No. I want to spend time as a family.

Quite frankly, the bedroom situation sucks. I try to get them to do it, and they don't. There are many other reasons other than the ones listed above, but those are the basics. The Dude has tried to help, but he's not here all of the time and even if he was - it's not his responsibility to make sure that the kids clean their rooms. I appreciate that he helps, but I don't expect him to do it.

I warned the girls for the past week or so - I told them that if they didn't clean it up, I was going to do it for them. They know that when I say "do it for them" that it means that things will disappear. I don't clean to be nice - I clean to get rid of crap.

This is what I started out with today.

I also wanted to strip their beds, and when I did, I was disgusted by the amount of bedding that they had. Their room is not cold at night - there is no excuse for this. I found blankets that I know that I've washed lately, but they were balled up on the floor or on the bed and I couldn't tell if they were still clean or not, so guess what? Yep. I had to wash it all.

And the laundry. I just did their laundry, but this is what I found in various places around their room - but none of it was actually IN their laundry basket to start with.

So. The laundry is being done. The bedding is being washed. All of the crap that was on the floor has been sorted - the trash is in a trash bag and the rest of it is going out into the garage. It's going to disappear. They may or may not get it back at some point in time. I didn't get rid of anything important, like library books or things for school. But all of the random crap - markers, pencils, notebooks, journals, magazines, beading kits...things like that are all going away. The extra blankets are being put away. If they don't have a bunch of crap to spread out all over the place, then they can't make that much of a mess again, right?

The beds aren't completely made yet, but this is what I ended up with (I still have to finish laundry).

Now, I get to wait until Wednesday to see just how mad they are when they see that I did it.

They'll get over it.