Enough With the Snow!

I've never been a huge fan of snow.  Sure it looks pretty, but that's about the only good thing I can say about snow.  It's cold, it's wet, and it makes a mess.  Ever since I got in a car accident on a road covered with just a dusting of snow 13 years ago I have really disliked snow.  I used to have no issues with driving on snow covered roads, but it's something I try to avoid at all costs anymore.

Snow is adding so many additional days to the end of Ellie's school year, too.   This year was the first year since we've moved here that the school district didn't have built in snow days.  Two of them were wasted before Christmas for negligible amounts of snow.  And we've had one snow day called for snow that didn't fall and another snow day for a snowstorm that turned out to be rain.  It's maddening.  Oh, and we've had school on days where there enough snow that we should have had a snow day.  Some area schools have recalled some of the days off that were built into the school calendar, but our's has not.  It's frustrating since I know the entire month of June is going to be a struggle with poor Ellie having to go to school.  Madeline's school year will be finished about four to six weeks before Ellie will be done.  Add to that a newborn and I'm going to be going crazy in June.

It looking like we're going to have another snow day tomorrow.  We're in an area that is projected to get 6-9" of snow.  Argh!  I'm tired of looking outside and seeing white.  Every time the snow starts to melt we get hit with a drop in the temperature and another dose of snow.   I can't recall the last time I looked outside and saw absolutely no snow.  How bad is that?

Ellie is just one more snow day away from being in school until June 30th.  We're told that school won't go past June 30th and at some point the school board will have to either take away scheduled off days or come up with another solution.  I'm not sure if that means they'll lengthen the school day or add in something like school on Saturdays.  I keep telling Bryan that if we pull her out now and do a half year enrollment with Seton she can be done by the first week in June.  We're planning to homeschool her next year so why not just cut to the chase and do it now and salvage some of the summer?

Perhaps one of the most irritating things about all of this snow is the 5AM wake up calls from the school.  Lately we've been getting these calls and minutes later our neighbor from across the street takes that call as his cue to go outside and start shoveling.  There's nothing more irritating than listening to someone scrape the sidewalk with their shovel for forty five minutes at 5AM.  It's more than this cranky sleep starved pregnant mommy can take.

I Guess I'm Just Lucky!

I feel like I'm on a string of miserable ailments as of late.  First it was the bug bite of doom.  Then I had the filling that needed to be drilled out and replaced.  FUN!  After that I caught Ellie's cough, recovered and two days after I finished the antibiotics I was feeling bad again.  This, of course, coincided with our trip to Disney World (I will blog about this soon, I promise!).  By the end of the trip, my legs were killing me and I had several mystery bruises on my legs presumably from the rides.  Last Saturday my knee started to hurt me quite a bit and by Monday I was in a decent amount of pain.  Somehow my the one bruise on my knee had become very sore and was a bit puffy.  I was starting to think I'd need to see a doctor about it when I woke up this morning feeling a lot better than I had in days.  But, my knee feeling better isn't the end of my ailment saga.  Now I have Katie's hand, foot and mouth disease.  I fell victim to it on Thursday morning and now I have the little blisters forming on my hands.  Am I a lucky gal or what?

I'm growing weary of all these little needling ailments.  I would like very much to have a few weeks that are illness and injury free.

While I don't feel great at the moment, I'm not completely miserable.  I am rather annoyed that I will have to stay home from Mass this weekend since what I have is contagious.  I don't want to stay in the house and keep my icky virus to myself, but I will because I wouldn't want to pass this lovely illness on to anyone else.  I'm praying that Madeline and Ellie don't come down with this.

Why, Blogger? Why?

Is anyone else not feeling the love for this new Blogger format?  Maybe I'm just set in my ways, but the new look is a tad too white for me.  It also feels clunky.  I feel lost with the new set up.  It took me a few minutes just to figure out how to create a new blog post, and I'm still not even sure what I clicked on to get to it.

It's changes like this that make me contemplate whether or not I should look into switching over to WordPress.  Bryan has been telling me that I can set everything up exactly the way I want it if I switch over to that.  I just don't know if I want to go through the trouble of moving close to a thousand posts to a new location.

Maybe this new format will grow on me in another few weeks, but for now all this whiteness is hurting my eyes.

Amazon Mom Frustration

This afternoon I got an email from Amazon.com regarding my Amazon Mom membership.  Last March I signed up for their Amazon Mom program which gave me a free Prime membership (Hooray for 2 day free shipping!) for three months and then an additional free month of prime for every $25 I spent on baby products giving me up to 12 months of a free Prime membership.  Since I was ordering baby essentials and diapers from them, I managed to get my free year of 2 day prime shipping rather quickly. The main reason I joined their Amazon Mom program was the deal it offered on diapers.  I was getting 30% off the Amazon price and free shipping.  It cost me about $115 for three months of diapers using this program.  The email I received from Amazon today was alerting me to changes in the program.  Starting on January 24th, they are no longer going to give me 30% off on my diaper subscription.  Instead I'll get my 15% off for the subscribe and save feature and 5% off for being part of Amazon Mom, but the 5% will only last provided I pay $80 for the Prime membership beginning in March.  You could say I was not happy with what I saw in the email.

Being the shrewd bargain hunter that I am, I decided that I would order an extra shipment of the diapers (I had skipped the past 4 months since I had no place to store another 4 months worth of diapers.).  Actually, my plan was to buy another box of size 2 diapers and then order three boxes of size 3 before January 24th.  When I logged into my account to set all of this in motion I found that Amazon had anticipated people doing this and had eliminated the option for an extra delivery.

I decided to contact Amazon's live help to find out why [even though I was pretty sure I already knew the answer] I couldn't place an order for an extra delivery.  Unfortunately, I wasn't given a reason regarding why Amazon won't honor their own promotion even though the item is available to ship for the new higher price.  

I cut and pasted my help conversation so I could share it here with you.  I'm annoyed that they won't just come out and say they were a bit shady in the way they handled the change in the Amazon Mom program.  I changed the rep's name slightly.

You are now connected to Gotham from Amazon.com.

Me:

I'm trying to place an extra shipment order on my subscribe and save list for diapers (I had skipped this months delivery and now need to have the order placed) and I'm being told I don't have that option even though they're showing in stock on the product page.

Gotham:

Hello, my name is Gotham. I'll be glad to help you today.

To create a new order to be shipped right away, visit the Subscribe & Save page in Your Account (http://www.amazon.com/manageyoursubscriptions) and click "Extra delivery" next to the item you want sooner.

Once you click "Confirm" you'll receive an extra order now and the next one on the date you select in the pop-up.

Me:

The extra order button is greyed out and says it's not available at this time. It seems like Amazon doesn't want to honor the 30% off with Amazon mom. Would that be a correct assumption? Looking at the product page it's available for delivery now so I don't see why I can't get an extra shipment with my current subscription.

Looking at the subscribe and save page under my acct. now and my only option is to skip the next delivery.

Gotham:

Please give me a moment while I check the details.

I've checked the details and see this subscription is not eligible for extra delivery.

Me:

ok, thanks

Gotham:

Is there anything else I can help you with today?

Me:

Why am I unable to place the extra delivery? I

The email I got from Amazon today tells me that after the 24th of this month they are no longer honoring the 30% off with Amazon mom. Today is the 12 and it seems like they're refusing to honor my subscribe and save price.

Gotham:

I'm sorry about it, however I see there is no extra delivery option for this order.

Me:

is there a reason

Gotham:

Extra deliveries may not be available on all Subscribe & Save items.

Check your Manage Your Subscribe & Save Items page to determine if it is available for your subscriptions.

Me:

its always been an option in the past. Willing to bet it will be an option if I opt to pay the higher subscribe and save price with only 20% off. Seems very convenient that Amazon revoked the option that has always been there once the email was sent out regarding the changes in the Amazon mom program. Is there a reason you won't just come out and say that Amazon is not allowing it because they want me to pay the 10% more? Perhaps I won't be giving Amazon my business in this area anymore.

Gotham:

I;m sorry for the inconvenience Karen .

Me:

I'll be sure to mention it in my product review as well as my blog.

Gotham:

I understand, However in this case, I do not see any extra delivery option for this .

Me:

Thanks for your time, even if you weren't able to give me a clear answer as to why Amazon decided to not honor their own promotional program. I'm sure you aren't the one to blame for their obviously questionable move.

Gotham:

I'm sorry for the inconvenience caused.

Thank you for contacting Amazon. We hope to see you again.

I'm irritated with Amazon.  Personally, I hate to keep giving them my business for the diapers because of what they have done, but I also don't want to pay even more for the same product somewhere else.  Maybe I shouldn't even be ranting about them in the first place.  Their mom program has given me free Prime 2 day shipping (which is really nice) and their invitation only Vine program has also been very good to me.  Their Vine program alone gave me quite a lot of the items that I needed for Katie.  So really, I can't complain too much.  I'm just tweaked that they're going to get me for an extra $4 or so each month.  

Things You Can't Do With One Hand

Lately Katie has been wanting me to hold her quite a lot and I'm discovering the multitude of things I cannot accomplish with a single hand.  I've had more than a few days in the past week where I wondered how different life would be if I had just one additional arm.  Sure, buying clothes would become a real challenge, but I would be able to get so much accomplished.

Here's my list of things you cannot do with a single hand.
1. Fold laundry
2. Sweep the floors
3. Clean a bathroom
4. Send a text message.  Ok, maybe this one is possible with one hand but not all of us are blessed with great coordination.
5. Blog.  I simply can't type up posts using just five fingers.  My thoughts are far too rapid and fleeting for one hand to keep up, plus I suck at hunting and pecking on a keyboard.
6. Wrap Christmas presents.
7. Cut things out.
8. Operate a hot glue gun.
9. Load and unload the washer/dryer.  Actually, I can do this but it's a painfully slow process and I wind up dropping clean clothes all over the floor as I try to get them into the dryer.
10. Make a bed
11. Wash Ellie's hair
12. Measure out a dose of Katie's Zantac.
13. Take a decent picture with my camera.
14. Fix Ellie's hair for school
15. Comfortably read/hold a book.

Mind you, I'm not constantly holding Katie, but I seem to always have other things I need (or want) to do while I am.  Nine times out of ten I would much rather be holding my chubby little Kitty Katkins in my arms, but for the ten percent of the time that I really need to get things done, I wish she would just be content to veg out next to me in a bouncy seat and be content.  For the most part she's a very laid back baby, but she certainly has had some days where crying seems to be the only thing she has on her agenda.  It's amazing how a crying baby can just sap your energy and at times your spirits.

On the bright side...

Today is one of those days where it's becoming quite evident that I'm simply not meant to get anything done.  Apparently I'm also not suppose to do frivolous things like eating either.  Someone, who shall remain nameless, but not quiet, has been rather needy today.  When that incredibly cute someone finally drifts off to sleep, someone or something always wakes her up within minutes.  It could be the dog who is lucky he's not banished to the back yard to sit in the rain, or the children who had a half day at school today.  No matter what the situation is, something always prevents me from doing any task for longer than 3-5 minutes.

My new boss is wailing for me at the moment and 2/3 of the candy bar I sat down to eat is now sitting on the couch.  And people wonder why I'm so skinny already.  It's hard to keep meat on your bones when you can't get a few minutes here and there to eat.

Thanks, Blogger

Last night in a coffee induced state an effort to get ahead I typed up my Small Successes post for this week.  Being a control freak I decided that the Thursday post wasn't going to be published on Wednesday night so I took advantage of the oh so handy schedule a post option that Blogger offers so that my Small Successes would magically appear at 7:00AM today.  I even confirmed that it was there and that it said it was scheduled on the edit page that shows all the blog posts.  I am not the least bit amused that my post has now vanished.  It's not on the blog and it doesn't show up as anything that I ever wrote up on my edit page.    Grrr...

The Case for Future Baldness

I'm pretty sure that me going bald sometime in the near future is a real possibility.  If this happens it will most certainly be the result of me ripping my hair out by the handful.

I blogged about how Madeline was hit with an umbrella on the school bus yesterday which resulted in her getting a cut near her eye and a pair of badly bent glasses that are pretty new.  I spoke with the principal about this last night and I was happy to hear that she was not only concerned but was going to address the situation today during school.  It turns out her idea of addressing the issue was to ignore it.  Not the brightest thing she could do when the mom of the injured child is overdue.  I called and left her a message this afternoon and have yet to hear back from her.  She clearly has no idea who she is dealing with.  Perhaps she'll move on this issue if I call the superintendent of the school district.

Ellie came home sick from school again today.  She was fine all day yesterday and this morning so we sent her to school today.  At 11:30 I got a call from the school nurse telling me that Ellie threw up at school again.  I seriously can't catch a break here.  So since she was signed out before 1:20 today she's considered absent.  She also can't go to school tomorrow because she vomited during school today.  So she's managed to log three absences in one 3 1/2 day school week.  Awesome.

I walked around the neighborhood for an hour today trying to get contractions going.  As long as I was walking things were picking up, but as soon as I sat down everything stopped.  I was really hoping to have something going by this afternoon so I could head to the hospital tonight.  The midwife who is on call tonight is totally willing to break my water and make sure I have this baby provided I can show  up at the hospital already having contractions.  Obviously this is easier said than done.

I'm on edge right now.  I'm tired of being pregnant and I'm fed up with all the school BS that I have to deal with right now.  It's all very frustrating.  I'm fairly certain that if we had gone forward with homeschooling that I wouldn't be dealing with a sick kid and I certainly wouldn't be having the issue that we have with the bus incident.

I'm hoping that tomorrow will be a better day.  At the very least it would be nice if it were a little less stressful.

40 Weeks 2 Days

If you didn't guess it after reading the title, I'm still pregnant.  I'm actually rather shocked that I have now gone past my due date.  How did this happen?

I'm doing my best to keep busy and trying to stay sane.  Keeping busy is easy enough, but staying sane is the hard part.  For one, I have Madeline driving me crazy.  I received her mid-term grades in my email this morning and went from being incredibly happy to feeling sick.  She currently has all As and an F.  Seriously, an F.  Apparently she bombed a pop quiz in her World Languages class and that is the only recorded grade this teacher has posted on the district's power school site.  If there was a class participation grade or some other quizzes or assignments up there I'm sure she'd have a D or a C, but all we have to go on is one pop quiz and it's an F.  I seriously want to rip out my hair.  Madeline doesn't seem phased by the fact that she's failing the class.  She was more upset that Bryan and I asked her to ask the teacher if there was some sort of extra credit assignment she could do to help raise her grade. (The teachers at the middle school are very big on giving extra credit to help you boost your grades.)  She's scared of the teacher and thinks he's mean so she's very rattled that we told her she needs to ask him how she can pull that F up to an acceptable grade.

I also have a neighbor who thinks nothing of calling my house every 10-15 minutes like a psychotic girlfriend when I don't answer the phone.   She almost never leaves a message.  I assume that most normal people would call once, leave a message if it's important and wait for me to call back.  This person, however, thinks that calling me excessively is the way to go.  I went shopping this morning and when I got home Bryan said she had already called 3 or 4 times.  Then she called another 3 times after I got home.  Calling me excessively makes me not want to answer the phone at all.  I'm tired and quite frankly I don't want to have to field loads of phone calls and IMs these days.

After nearly a month of constant calls, texts and IMs asking me if I've had the baby I really don't feel like communicating with anyone.  Really, would you want to have the same conversation 15 times in a day?  No, the baby's still not here.  No, I really don't know what's taking her so long.  I really have no clue when or if she will be born anytime this month.  And yes, I'm sure my dates aren't off.  Do I really need to tell you why I know I'm not off?  Perhaps you'd like me to fax you a copy of my NFP chart from January.  Oh, and by my calculations, you'll notice that the baby really should have been due on the 8th, not the 9th, thereby making me even more pregnant at this present time.

I have another appointment with the midwife I like the best at this practice this afternoon.  Bryan would like me to ask about being induced, but I'm really not interested.  I'd prefer to get through this labor with no IVs hooked up to me and I'd very much like to avoid those horrid fetal monitors as much as possible. I doubt I'd get to do either of those things while on a pitocin drip.  Last week the midwife mentioned that if I wanted to just be induced they would get it all set up for me, but she cautioned me that I'd have a harder time going without any pain meds.  I'm determined to go completely natural again so I'd like very much to avoid being induced.  Who knows, maybe having my membranes stripped for the fourth time will put me into labor.

I do think it's safe to say that I'm a little grumpy.  I feel like I'm in a holding pattern at the moment.  I have prepared multiple times for the arrival of the baby only to have to repeat the process.  I'm tired of cleaning the house thinking that it will be nice and clean for me when I get home from the hospital only to find it a mess three days later.  Every day I'm washing all of the laundry and putting it away so I can avoid a massive backlog when I get home from the hospital.  Foods I have made for myself because I was craving them are now gone (let's just say I had a lot of help with the pumpkin cheesecake) and I have no motivation to make more only to have others gobble it.  Oh, and I've come to the conclusion that the baby is not going to come when it would be convenient for the rest of us.  We've had several weeks pass by where her arrival would have been perfect timing.  This weekend is a prime example.  It was a weekend with not obligations and the midwife I like was even on call.  It couldn't have been timed better save for the fact that the baby wasn't feeling it.

Small Successes-September 29th

Celebrating the little things in life that add up...

Major FAIL edition
I know that Small Successes is supposed to list some of my small accomplishments from the past week, but I'm not exactly feeling it today.  Instead, I'm going to list some of the week's failures.  Excuse me while I whine.

1. Last Thursday the plan one of the midwives and I had to strip my membranes, drink castor oil (did this 2Xs) and walk myself into labor didn't go as planed.  Apparently, when there are snowstorms many couples find ways to occupy their time and the maternity floor where I will deliver was jumping.  That meant that when I did go in late Thursday night with contractions 2 1/2 minutes apart for several hours they were in no rush to break my water and hasten the arrival of our little one.  Since my cervix doesn't want to progress past 2 or 3 (depending on which midwife you talk to) I'm pretty much stuck.

2. I have spent the past week resting, making sure I'm eating plenty so I have lots of energy if I ever go into labor and trying just about everything to get this little one to come out.  The stubborn baby has no intentions of coming out despite the fact that I have spent the past week having loads of contractions, many of them pretty regularly spaced, but not painful enough (because my water hasn't broken) for me to head to the hospital.

3. Finally on Thursday night last week I got my bag for the hospital packed.  Because of this I've been down several key items from my wardrobe.  Add this tidbit of information to the fact that I can no longer get food in my mouth without some of it hitting and staining my shirt and you can probably begin to imagine my frustration.

4. My appointment with the earthy crunchy midwife this Tuesday was a catastrophic fail.  She isn't the least bit concerned that I want this baby to arrive by October 1st at the very latest.  In NJ the school cut off date is October 1st.  If the baby is born on October 2nd or after she won't start school until she's 5, almost 6.  I don't buy any of the crap that redshirting a child for school puts that child at an academic advantage.  There are plenty of articles that back up my line of thinking that holding kids back is actually to their detriment.  I don't want my baby to have to spend a year in high school when she's a legal adult.  I'd rather her be in college at that age.  Bryan is telling me that we will find a way around the cut off date if she isn't here by Saturday.

Anyway, back to the appointment.  This midwife is against intervening and breaking the bag of water.  So if I go into labor and she's on call, she won't break my water which means I won't have the baby.  I've never progressed past 3cm on my own.  I'm currently 3, or 2 or a stretchy 2 or a good 2 1/2 depending on who you talk to.  I also have a baby who's "really low, -2 station or -3 station" depending once again on who you talk to.  Mind you all of these assessments were made within less than a week and some of the less promising ones were the more recent assessments.  Can your cervix close up after dilating?  If that's the case then we've taken a step back.

5. In an act of desperation, I tried to once again drink castor oil to see if we could get things moving.  This time I failed horribly.  Not only did I not get it down (it was cut with a 3:1 ratio of concentrate lime juice to the most vile oil on God's green earth) I also lost my breakfast on the kitchen floor.  So much for not throwing up the entire pregnancy.  Sigh.

I think it goes without saying that I'm pretty bummed that the baby hasn't made her appearance yet.  I'm uncomfortable, I'm not sleeping well, and I'm growing increasingly more anxious about having her by the cut off date.  Obviously my pleading prayers begging that I have this baby before October 1st are either not being granted or God's playing with me and is going to make me wait until 11:59PM on October 1st to actually have the baby who I suspect will probably be 15lbs by the time she arrives.

Really Blogger?

Did you seriously have to eat two of my most recent posts?  Very uncool.  Because of my inability to think straight these days there's really no way I'll be able to replicate what I had even posted.  Thanks a lot blogger.  Why don't you come over and drain all the water from my pool while I'm sleeping while you're at it.

Irony

or just another way God decides to test my sanity and or sense of humor.

Several weeks ago in one of my frenzied cleaning sprees, I came across the warranty information for the new shower Bryan and my father-in-law installed almost two years ago and I threw it away (It was installed on July 13th 2009 if you want specifics).  The shower was replaced because the previous owners weren't familiar with these things called cleaning products (Yes, I know, I'm being mean and gossipy, but I'm going to confession tomorrow.  Humor the acne ridden pregnant woman, will ya?).  Now we had used the old shower (It's amazing what liquid draino, several gallons of straight bleach and 24 combined hours of elbow grease will do.)  but it had a leaking issue that had to be addressed frequently.

So we replaced the shower with a nice looking acrylic one that we hoped would last us five to ten years.  We figured by the time we needed or wanted a new shower we would be in a position to put in something nice, like a tile or solid surface one.  You know, something that would cost some money but would likely see us through to the end of our lives.

Last week I was taking a shower and I heard a loud crack sound when I stepped on the area where my father in law had decided to not only remove part of the floor support, but also the styrofoam support for the shower floor.  It's an area of the shower we try to avoid but sometimes it can't be helped.  I thought I felt a crack but I didn't see anything.  A few days later Bryan noticed that the family room ceiling was wet.  Fun!

For part of last week we had to use the kids' bathroom for showers.  After living for ten years with 2 1/2 baths, it's kind of rough losing full functionality of one bathroom.  I know some people have to make due with one and a half or just one bathroom so this probably seems like ungrateful whining on some level.  I don't mean it to be.  It's just not fun to have to wait to take a shower while your nine year old is busy singing in the shower and using all the hot water.  Have I mentioned our hot water heater is in dire need of replacement?  That's another story, but until we can replace it, we'll continue to keep a frying pan under the pipe that happily leaks water.

On Sunday, Bryan was pretty sure the shower was fixed.  He was convinced it was a drain issue and he replaced the drain, tested it and was satisfied that the problem was solved.  Since Monday he's been checking the ceiling after every shower.  Up until today things were looking pretty good.  That was until I took a shower.  Once again I stepped in the area which must not be stood upon and I heard a crack.  So I made a mental note to tell Bryan.  Then hours later I noticed that the family room ceiling was not only wet but had two new, huge, water stains.  Great!  I told Bryan what I saw and he said he'd take a look at it tonight.

Before we put the kids to bed we were talking about the shower issue and decided to take a look at it.  Sure enough there's a nice crack right where I thought I felt one.  So I apparently broke the shower.  Sigh.

This means that we will not have a shower for a while, and even worse, I'm going to have to endure a construction project while pregnant.  I'm trying my best to not be Massive Mood Swing Karen this pregnancy, but things like this are going to do nothing but test my limits.  Here's hoping we can get the shower replaced without me losing my sanity or breaking the bank.

I suppose I should tell Bryan I also sent the warranty info to the recycle bin a few weeks ago.  Awesome!

Paper Infestation

Where does all of this paper that is taking over my house come from?  For the past several days I've been on a cleaning kick and day after day I'm finding that I'm mostly tossing paper.  It's pure insanity.  I've got tons of paper everywhere and this isn't counting the books.

My recycle trash can is filled with paper.  My garage has several boxes of paper that needs to be recycled (but won't fit in the can).  And, of course, as I try to get the house ready for Easter (I'd like a clean house by Thursday.) I generate even more paper trash.  Gaaa!  It's never going to go away.

Next year when we homeschool I'm looking forward to discarding paper as soon as it's graded.  Let's hope I can get away with that.  Maybe I'll get a binder for each of the girls that can hold prized work.

I think it's time we ditch paper and go digital.  How great would it be if my girls could have all their curriculum on an e-reader or an iPad?  Maybe someday that will be our reality. It certainly would be sweet.

It's Obviously One of Those Days

Sigh.  Today is just one of those things where things simply aren't going my way.  

I went to Target today to buy the food items that we've run out of and while I was there I forgot what it was that I "NEEDED" for me.  I got the bagels for Madeline's lunch and the Cheerios that the girls needed, but it wasn't until my craving for pizza Combos kicked in that I remembered what I forgot.  Ordinarily, I'd just go back to the store and get what I need, but it's pouring here and I'm not going out in the rain.  I'll just have to deal.

Then I set to work getting organized for my class tonight.  Two weeks ago I put in a copy order for my class and forgot that Lent was approaching.  I remedied this by lumping some of what I needed into my Kindergarten copy order the following Sunday.  I didn't think to count the copies and make sure I had 30 of the Catholic Icing Lent calendar til this morning.  Much to my dismay, I found that I have 12 copies of the calendar.  I need 16 for the third grade class alone.  To top it off, this was my only Lent printable for the third graders.  Since it's pouring, I'm not going to the parish office to get additional copies.  I'll have to see what I can can do at home.

I gave up Facebook for Lent.  Really, I can live without it.  What I didn't give up was my main AOL email account.  Sadly, AOL decided around 3PM yesterday that I was going to fast from that, too.  Bryan called last night and found that my email address goes to a server that is having issues, but that it would be up and running soon.  Fast forward to now and my email is still down.  I'm beyond cranky about this.  I want access to my email.

In an effort to straighten the main level of the house I started putting things back where they belong.  On a trip downstairs I discovered that the basement is a total atrocity.  Yay!  Then I went upstairs to put several stray toys in Ellie's room only to find that her room must have been hit by a tornado or something of that nature.  I know a couple little girls who will be cleaning this evening.

On the bright side, the laundry is moving along one load at a time.  It's possible that I may have everything washed before the end of the day.  I suspect tomorrow will be filled with me folding until my fingers fall off.

So I'm tired, things aren't going my way, the house is a mess and Madeline's friend is sleeping over in two days.  I need a cleaning crew to come over and make my house shine.  Any takers?

Use your best Napoleon Dynamite......

To fully understand my totally useless post, you will need to imagine my words as spoken by Napoleon Dynamite.

My lips hurt real bad.

It's been quite cold here lately.  The air is rather dry, and my poor lips are very chapped despite the fact that I have been doing my best to keep them moisturized with copious amounts of chap stick.  The girls are also in a similar state of misery.  Poor Ellie's bottom lip is cracked in two places.

I'd like some warmer weather and a bit of humidity.

Useless whining is concluded.

Is this the magic time slot?

It's fall and that means that life is a bit hectic these days.  School is in session, soccer season is in full swing and CCD has resumed.  All of that is fine, but I'm getting grumpier with each birthday invitation that has darkened our doorstep over the past few weeks.  The problem?  It seems that everyone loves having a birthday party between the hours of 4-6PM on Saturday night.  I could not dislike the timing of these parties more.  It requires me to miss Mass at our usual time (4PM) and prevents us from attending Mass at our second time preference (5:30PM), as well.  Even worse, it requires me to wake up at 6AM the following morning so I can take the girls to 7:30AM Mass so that I can make it to my 9AM CCD class on time.  I could go at another time on Sunday, but that requires me to either starve my kids before a soccer game or rush to get them washed and dressed for Mass at 6PM on Sunday evening.  There's no happy medium.

If my kids were so intent on going to these birthday parties I'd love to say "Sorry, we can't come, we have a prior engagement." (Which in all honesty we do, attending Mass.)  I know if I decline party invitations to take the girls to Mass that they will be miserable, and so I will need to reshuffle once again next weekend.  I hope my girls appreciate what I do for them.

Pre-dinner Invasion

I'm not a fan of drop in play dates.  I went out to the garage to get a lollipop from the van swagger wagon (the one Ellie got as a reward from the deacon for mortifying me earlier today) and I came into a chaotic house.

I was only in the van for a few minutes.  I discovered that the potty seat needed to be put away in the back of the van and the toilet paper roll needed to be stashed in it's compartment.  Then, I noticed that the section of the rear bench that was up wasn't latched in properly so I had to fix that too.

I now want to go back out to the garage and hide.  Madeline's classmate was standing at the door while the kids and dog were running around like wild because the doorbell must have been rung by her friend.  Have I ever mentioned how much I hate the doorbell?  I grew up in a house with a doorbell that didn't work and I often wish that I could also have a non-working doorbell.  When the doorbell rings I instantly feel on edge.  The sound startles me in a way that few other things do.  Not only do I feel completely ill at ease when the bell rings, but my kids and the dog go insane.  I've tried to teach the kids to freeze and be quiet when they hear the bell ring, but that tactic has failed.  I've even suggested that we all move to an area of the house where no one can see us and that has not caught on either.

Both of my girls act like excited puppies when the doorbell rings, and that excitement does not die down if there's a visitor on the other side of the door.  If it's a delivery or a solicitor they go back to normal pretty fast.

I'm irritated that Madeline still hasn't learned to ask if she can have a friend over before inviting them in to play.  I was supposed to be on my way to McDonald's to get the girls the Happy Meals I promised them on Saturday.  Instead I'm listening to the dog bark incessantly and the girls playing upstairs.

Whatever happened to the days where kids would knock on the door and ask if you could come out and play?  And why oh why does it sound like the girls are playing in their bathroom?  Dear God, please help me to not go insane this evening.  I'm afraid to go upstairs and investigate.  If anyone needs me I'll be out in the garage hiding in the back of my van.

Precisely why I don't like libraries

I took two books out from our local library thirteen days ago.  One was for me and the other was for Madeline.  I haven't actually borrowed a book from the library for myself in nearly ten years.  I'm a book snob and I like to read brand new books that haven't been touched by others.  It's just one of my quirks.

I read the book I took out for myself and got it back to the library within a week.  Not trusting the outside return bin, I walked the book inside and placed it in the return bin that goes behind the circulation desk.  Today I call to renew Madeline's book and I'm told that I still have two books out.  And to top if off, they're not going to look and see if the book is back on the shelf until I come in to return the other book.  Is this not insanity?  So it looks like I'll be heading over to the library to see if I can find the book on the shelf.  This is one of the many reasons I don't like using the library and yet another reason why I don't usually trust others when it comes to anything of importance. Grrr.

Grinding Halt

My day was going well enough.  I did some grocery shopping. (Gasp!)  I went to the library and took out a book Madeline has been wanting to read and another that I wanted to read instead of buying them on Amazon.com. (Double gasp!)  I even did the laundry and some workbook pages with Ellie.  Then, my day came to a grinding halt when I stumbled upon an email from Madeline's teacher.  Four kids have accused her of rummaging through the book bags during reading time and a cell phone and key are now missing.  My child was accused after dismissal.  Madeline doesn't have the missing items and she's claiming innocence.  Looks like I have a sleepless night ahead of me, unless the teacher decides to call me tonight per my request.  Ugh!  I would not have these problems if I home schooled my children.

Responsible Sword Fighting

The practice of responsible sword fighting cannot be observed when persons who do not reside in my house partake in this activity in my home.  Sadly, I have seen the effects of outsider sword fighting in my home twice this past weekend.  Unspoken rules such as not near Mom and Dad's wedding portrait and never near open containers of liquid are not known by the outside world.

Saturday's instance wasn't too horrible.  The palms from Passion Sunday  that were over the wedding portrait were knocked on the ground and likely trampled [by the looks of them] by 3-5 girls ranging in age from 3 to 9.   That was an easily fixed mess, if we can even call it that.  Normal people would think nothing of it, but I'm a perfectionist who gets upset when temporary bedlam ensues in her home.

Sunday's incident is something I'm still dealing with.  I'm not sure what exactly happened since I've yet to get the full truth.  But, my home was invaded by two unexpected pairs of girls last night.  The first set was two of Madeline's class mates who dropped by in the evening while Bryan and I were trying to relax after a weekend that was simply too long.  This visit consisted of a small herd of third grade elephant stompers running up the stairs to the bedrooms that may or may not have been clean. (I really don't want to think about it.)  Then they thundered down the steps to check out Madeline's Webkin online.  That was followed by a stampede to the basement where one of the girls loudly expressed shock at the pile of dirty laundry at the bottom of the basement steps. I was beginning to think that I could use a little mortification to round out the weekend, and there it was!  Just as I was pleading with Bryan to please spare me and move the laundry to the laundry room, the doorbell rang.  I was not to be spared.  Unsure of whether I should offer it up or wallow in my misery, I decided to grumble under my coffee bean throw and continue reading my book.  Then the sword fighting began.  I have no idea if I was in the house or if the juice casualty happened while I was on the front porch talking to my neighbor from around the corner, but a cranberry juice (and possibly a Sprite or apple juice) was knocked over.  Madeline must have tried to clean up the mess knowing that I would freak.  For my patience, I was rewarded with a sticky floor and I have just discovered that her chair is covered in red juice splatter.  It's going to be a long day and knowing that we have another long weekend coming up in 4, yes 4 days makes me want to cry.  Dear Lord, please have mercy on me.  I'd like my house to stay clean  and my life to be boring for a little bit.

Last night a new sword fighting rule was instituted.  Sword fighting with people who don't live in this house is strictly prohibited.  Sorry outside world, I simply don't trust that you have the proper credentials or fear of me to wield a foam sword responsibly in my home.  Your apparent lack of sword fighting savvy has destroyed any tolerance I have previously had in you and has created a mess in my kitchen that I simply don't want to clean this morning.