Times Like These

Happy Friday Everyone!

Well, I am actually writing this on Saturday, but don't tell anyone, ok? I started to write this post last night (Friday), and my computer started wigging out on me! I made several attempts to write a post - but my cursor kept jumping around and messing everything up. I think the touch pad is about to go out on my laptop and it is making everything screwy.

In the past two weeks I have had so much trouble with this laptop. I suppose it is about time for it to be retired. I've had many a "tech" person tell me that most laptops (that are heavily used) only last about 2 years. This one is nearing the 3 year mark. Unfortunately, I can't afford to replace it. Hubby's laptop is about 5 years old and it is LITERALLY being held together with rubber bands! lol!

So anyway, I was hoping to write my coffee post from the brand new Starbucks that opened up (on my birthday!) right up the street from my house! I am sooooo excited about this Starbucks being so close. I am already envisioning running away in the evenings for a few minutes of coffee shop quiet with a steaming cup after a long hard day with the kiddos. I am hoping to be a "regular" and get to know the baristas. Yes, I lead an exciting life! *wink*

Well, we are a week into the sleep training and I think it is going pretty well. Port is now sleeping from about 8pm to almost 8am every night. He goes down and cries for about a minute now. Naps, well those are all messed up, but I am confident we will figure it out. He really needs 2 a day, but he is very resistant to the morning nap.

The biggest problem I am having is that when I put him down at night he makes me feel terribly guilty. He starts screaming now before we even get in his room; he's so tired he knows he needs to go to bed but he doesn't want to be put in the crib. We have quiet time in the chair next to the crib and he almost always falls asleep in my arms while I am giving him his bottle. If I make the slightest motion like I am about to stand up and put him in the crib, he immediately starts wailing. It is so sad and makes me feel absolutely awful. I wonder how long it is going to take for him to get used to and accept the idea that this is how it's going to go; or if he is always going to react this way.

I suppose only time will tell. :)

Well, I hope you all are having a wonderful weekend! If you are bored, the post below is about my birthday - I turned 35 this year. woo hoo! lol!

Thanks for stopping by!
Until,
D :)

Good Day

I woke up way too early this morning to the sound of Kiddo talking. Loudly. Way too early. Talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk....who the heck was he talking too?? After about 30 minutes of trying to tune him out I staggered into the kitchen to find him on the floor with his arms wrapped around the dog's neck and he was just telling her all sorts of interesting stuff.

geeze.

I asked him to please be quiet because Mommy and Port were still trying to sleep - he grumbled and fussed a bit and I staggered back to bed. A few minutes of sleep later and I hear Port crying in his room. Figuring I wasn't going to get any more sleep I got him up and we played for a few minutes quietly in my bed. Once Kiddo discovered us it was too loud for me to endure without coffee so I herded the wee ones to the kitchen.

I asked Kiddo if he knew what day it was; of course he said no. I told him it was my birthday.

Kiddo: "It is? So it's March? We can flip up my calendar!!!"
Me:"Oh yes, we can flip up your calendar. So aren't you glad it's Mommy's birthday?"
Kiddo: "yes, let's go flip it! I want to see Eve!"

So we go flip the calendar and I ask him "so what else should you do on Mommy's birthday?"
Kiddo: "I don't know"
Me: "Don't you want to wish Mommy a happy birthday?"
Kiddo: "yeah."
~pause~ ~pause~ ~pause~
Me: "you can say it now if you want."
Kiddo: "happy birthday Mommy"

[like pulling teeth I tell ya!]

So the day started out pretty nice; the kids played well together, Port was being super cute and walking a lot. People called and emailed and wrote on my Facebook wall - it was all good.

I even got a call from one of my old high school friends; we share a birthday, and it was such a pleasant shock and surprise to hear his voice after oh, gosh, I think it's been about 10 years??? It was great talking to him again!

While Port was taking a "nap" (re: screaming in the crib) I managed my yearly birthday photos.

I like the second one, but the background was pretty ugly so I tried a texture on it. I am not very good with textures!

Anyway, I decided that it might be ok to venture out into the world - my fear of something bad happening was still there, but I figured a trip to Sonic would be ok.

Warning - this story is about to get dreadfully scary. I apologize in advance for the frightening things I am about to tell you. If you do not want to read of my tragedy, please click over to the next blog.

I'll give you a moment to ready yourself.

...

...

...


I KNEW the day was going to be horrible. I just knew it.

I got us all dressed and ready to go, and just before we left I remembered that I had left my auto insurance card mixed in all the paperwork from the van registration. If there was any day that I might get pulled over, this would be it; so I was glad I had remembered to get the insurance card. Crisis averted, I drove over to the Sonic nearest to me.

It took some time to figure out what we wanted, and while I was waiting for Kiddo to decide I glanced around the parking lot. It seemed pretty empty for the lunch rush, but I figured maybe we were a little early or something. Finally Kiddo made up his mind and I pushed the red button. After what seemed like forever, the order taker asked me for my order. After rattling off everything we wanted, there was a long pause.

"uh, ma'am? I'm so sorry but...

our soda machine is not working. Can I get you a water or an Iced Tea?"

*blink* *blink*

wwaaaahHHH!!?!

NOOOOOOOOO!!!!

OH the horrors!!!!!!
...
...
...

Sorry, I needed a moment. It still gives me shivers to think about it.

I canceled our order and drove away. {sadness}

THANKFULLY - there are about 5 Sonics within a 5 mile radius.

HOORAY for development!!!

I headed to the next nearest Sonic, but on my way I discovered something terrible!

When Hubby had put on my new TX license plates, he forgot to affix the registration sticker to the windshield!!!!

eeeek!!

I did a power slide across 2 lanes of road to make a right turn back toward my house and called Hubby to fuss at him.

[ok, so I didn't really power slide. Is it even possible to do that in a big ol' van?]

[and yes, I did call Hubby to fuss - wouldn't you?]

I drove back to the house and found the sticker and put it on the windshield. Yet another crisis averted, we headed out again to the Sonic.

{Mercy this is exhausting.}

Lunch was great - we even scored an extra stick of string cheese (free!) for Port because the server forgot to put Kiddo's in the bag. Everyone was happy and full and we made a quick stop in Target for some booty cream for little Port. He had poopied the night before and slept in the dirty diaper {I KNOW! I felt SO bad!!} so he had a terribly burned bottom that morning.

Target was fairly uneventful and we made it home safely. After the Sonic fiasco and the sticker near tragedy I decided it best we stay in for the rest of the afternoon.

Hubby got home from work early, just as I was getting Port down for a much needed afternoon nap (around 4ish; we still haven't worked out regular nap times). We decided to let him sleep for an hour and then head to dinner early. Now that we have done this sleep training thing, dinner has to happen before 7:30 or our schedule gets completely thrown off.

Thanks to a timely gift card from my parents (thanks again Mom and Dad) we dined at Olive Garden. The food was great as usual (except the bread sticks were a bit overdone) and the service, as usual, sucked. When we walked in there was no wait - thank goodness - but at first they tried to seat us at their overflow tables right in the middle of the isle. We've had to endure those tables twice before, and with empty tables in other sections I was not about to sit there on my birthday. I asked the hostess if we could be seated somewhere else, and so she took us to a bigger table in a different section.

Our server was bad, bad, bad. We couldn't hear her when she spoke. She forgot things we asked for more than once, she had no personality whatsoever. When she would bring something, she would just dump it in the middle of the table. When she cleared our plates she didn't ask if we wanted dessert or anything. (and the reality was, I wanted to order a couple of desserts and get them to go because I hadn't made a cake for myself) The manager brought us the check while I was looking at the dessert menu! They are promoting some feedback survey so the manager brings all the checks to the table and explains the survey. After going through his spiel, he then asked me if I was interested in dessert. By then I was just annoyed and Port was extremely antsy - I think I mumbled something and he said to "let him know". Hubby and I both had taken turns walking Port around the restaurant so I was no longer in the mood to wait for anything else. I was very annoyed that the server didn't even ask us if we wanted anything else, so I scrapped the idea of dessert and paid the check.

I decided to stop at the HEB on the way home and pick up one of their yummy cream cakes (one of my PMS TOTM features way back in the day) as my birthday dessert and so we stopped at the one on the way home (the same one I went to the other day - ugh). I left the boys in the car (the big one too - don't go calling CPS on me) and ran in to pick one up right quick.

Now, HEB always has Cream Cakes. And they always have Chocolate.

Well, not always I guess.

*sigh*

I settled on a Pina Colada version and we took it home. It was ok, but not exactly what I was looking for.

So my day was horrible, tragic, disaster-ific....yeah no it was great really! I was so blessed by all the warm well wishes, the phone calls (I may never get the sound of my inlaws serenading me out of my head) the emails and sweet notes, the IMs and the wall postings. Never have so many people remembered (thank you Facebook reminders!) and never have I heard from so many people on one day. And the minor catastrophes, er, uh, annoyances were nothing in the overall day. They just made it that much more interesting.

Interesting I can handle. ;-)

Until,
D :)

Shattered

{no, I did not take this picture. I just thought it was neat}

Last night as I was cleaning things up and winding down in preparation for bed, I noticed that one of the socks I was wearing had something sticky on it. I kept sticking to the floor in various places. I took the sock off and inspected it and saw nothing that would indicate there was anything sticky. I checked the floor and saw nothing as well. Our kitchen floor is still torn up in certain places, so my feeble mind chalked it up to the sock catching on the rough spots. I took the socks off, put them in the hamper and went to bed.

~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~

Yesterday we had to go register the van and do a title transfer and licensing as well. I gathered all the paperwork I needed and loaded the kids up. After finding the building and taking a number in the waiting area, I thought we were in for the dreaded government building wait. Surprisingly though, the whole process took only about 15 minutes (wait and all) and we were happily on our way. I decided to stop at the nearest HEB (grocery) to pick up a few much needed items.

[why is it that even when I go in with a list of only a few things, I still end up spending 50-100 dollars?]

The HEB was not one that I normally shop at because it is very old and small and dingy. Directly across from a WalMart, it is usually pretty crowded as well. I don't like the parking, the smaller shopping carts or the arrangement of the isles, so I only go to it when absolutely necessary. Or in this case when going to one of the other locations was ridiculously out of my way.

So we went, and I squeezed my poor Kiddo in the basket behind Port and hoped the few items I needed would fit in there with him.

As usual, the people were cranky, the shelves were a mess and they were out of a couple of things that I needed. We got into the shortest check out line I could find and I was pleased when the cashier started playing peekaboo with Port while she was checking out the lady in front of me. When we got up to the front of the line, she gave Kiddo a Buddy Buck (it's a little fake dollar that the kids can use to play one of those annoying grabber games) and then pulled out her cash drawer. Her shift was over. The kid that replaced her was nice too (unusual for this location) so I didn't mind; though Kiddo was sad that she left. Generally if someone engages him in conversation he is in love with them. When we were almost done, she suddenly appeared with two red balloons for the kids. It was very sweet.

[of course, Kiddo instantly remembered what happened the last time he had a red balloon from HEB]

When you get a balloon at HEB, it is weighted at the bottom of the string with a sucker. When we got home, I let Kiddo eat his sucker and I popped the balloon it was attached to and threw it in the trash. Kiddo got upset that I tossed the balloon, so I told him he could play with Port's balloon instead. He proceeded throughout the evening to use the balloon as a punching bag; beating it all over the living and dining room of the house.

**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**

This morning I was sitting on the floor with Port and in front of me I noticed a little purple shard of something glistening in the morning sunlight. Several inches from that, another, bigger shard glistened and sparkled as well. I moved closer to inspect these foreign objects, and the aroma of grape sugar teased my nose. I touched one of them, finding it stuck to my still somewhat new wood floor. I pried it up with my fingernail and figured out what it was.

HEB grape sucker.

The sucker I gave Kiddo the day before was green. I quickly turned to inspect the anchor still holding the now semi deflated balloon that Kiddo punched around yesterday and my heart sank when I saw it. The purple sucker that once held weight in it's plastic bag was nothing more than a stick and a few chunks of hardened sugar. I lowered my gaze and my head level with the floor and what laid before me were thousands of microscopic shards of shattered sucker.

Stuck.

All

Over

My

Floor

*sigh*

Parenting tip for today. Do not ever allow your child to bat around a balloon from the grocery store on a hard floor if the said balloon is attached to a cheap piece of candy.

Aren't you glad I'm here to help you learn from my mistakes?!

Until,
D ;)

Cut My Life Into Pieces

Freekin' Fabulous.

So Hubby just informed me that his company did another round of layoffs (that's round 5 people) and a pay cut across the board (5% Joy). Thankfully Hubby still has a job, but a pay cut??!? Lord, I don't know what we are going to do now. We are barely making it as it is and we are still $300 in the hole each month when I factor in our annual property taxes (no, we do not have escrow on our mortgage account).

So a lot of you know that my birthday is coming up on Thursday, and I have a very strong feeling it's going to be absolutely horrible in some way. Call me psychic, call me psychotic, whatever, but I do not want to even acknowledge it. I have a feeling it is going to be something like my 30th - if any of you recall, I got fired from my job a few days before my 30th birthday because they found out I was pregnant with Kiddo, and therefore was "not a team player". uh huh.

So anyway, I really don't want to "celebrate" my birthday - it's not the age or anything, it's just our circumstances. I don't want to get my hopes up daydreaming about any kind of celebrating or dinner out or pampering of any sort because it just isn't going to happen. I'm not trying to throw a pity party either - I am just trying to be practical. If I treat it like any other day then I won't be tempted to spend any money. Right? Right.

So yeah, I am going to be 35 - it doesn't seem real. I think part of my problem is that I've been on Facebook so much lately, talking to "old" friends and thinking about things that happened 15-20 years ago...I am back in that young adult mind frame again (sort of). Then I look at pictures of my family and I think, "how the heck did that happen? Look what I did!" lol. It's a strange feeling for sure. Even more strange is seeing people I went to high school with that have kids that are or are almost teenagers! My boys are still so young, and some of my friends are preparing their kids for the high school years already (and a couple for college! yikes!). I just can't imagine it.

I still feel like in many ways I am just starting out. Like this is just the beginning. When will I feel like I am in the middle of it?

When will this headache go away?

Until,
D :/

Peace Train

I think what I am going to do is just start opening the "create a new post" window every day and see if it gets me to blog more. Then I pretty much have to put something down, right?!?

Well the sleep training is going as expected I guess. As I said, the first night; 30 minutes of crying then pretty much nothing for the rest of the night. He was not very pleased with me when I rescued him at 7:45 the next morning, but boy was I a happy, well rested momma! We debated on whether or not Port needs two naps and determined that it would probably be best to try to do just one - especially since the "morning" nap (if there was one) would fall right in the middle of the time we go to church each Sunday. Now, I suppose we could try to go to the early service, but if you know anything about me and my brood...well you would know we don't do early morning very well. So, we decided to put him down awake for the nap time, and he cried for about 10 minutes before going to sleep. He only slept about an hour, maybe an hour and a half, and then was a happy guy. However, he was sleepy again at about 4:00 - really too late for another nap before bed time. We went out to dinner that night (early) and Port of course fell asleep as soon as we put him in the car seat. *sigh* His 20 minute power nap on the way to the restaurant made for a nice dinner, but I thought for sure it was going to wreck our night time routine.

That night, he started whimpering and fussing before I even got him in the crib. He knew what was coming. However, he only cried for about 10 minutes. I told Hubby that it was too easy; the other shoe was going to drop. Boy, did it ever.

Even though he was out at 8:30, he woke back up at about 11:30. And the screaming began. He screamed and screamed and screamed for about 10-20 minutes at a time just about every 30-45 minutes ALL. NIGHT. LONG.

It was brutal. Hubby and I both were concerned. I fretted, my stomach in knots. I stared at the ceiling and lay in the dark worried about my poor baby. Hubby even got up once to check on him just to make sure he was ok. When he went in the room he accidentally woke Port up and the screaming began again. The next morning I picked him up out of the crib; his eyes were puffy and red from all the crying. He didn't have a smile for me, but gave Daddy all kinds of grins and giggles. We played in the bed for a while before we got up.

He fell asleep on the way to church, and then again on the way home. When we got home I just transferred him from the car to our bed and he slept for almost 3 hours. I definitely think he needs two naps still. Especially after a night like that!

Last night (night #3) he fell asleep in my arms during our quiet time before bed. I put him in the crib and he curled up on his pillow, but then just a few seconds later realized that he was in the crib and quickly tried to stand up and reach for me. I told him I loved him, kissed the top of his head and said good night. As I walked out he screamed for me as loud as he could. It was heart wrenching. But, he only cried this time for about 5 minutes and then was out. I didn't hear another peep from him until almost 8 this morning. By 9:30 though, he was already showing signs of being tired, so I tried to feed him a bottle in our quiet spot and sure enough he was very sleepy. I tried to let him nap in our bed but he just wanted to play so I put him in the crib. He cried for about 10 minutes then took and hour and a half long nap. Later this afternoon he fell asleep in my arms at about 2:00 so I let him sleep in our bed. I know he naps better there.

I guess the "training" is working - at least we are getting some sleep where before we were not. I am going to have to retrain myself not to wake up every couple of hours though - my body is still going through the motions of having to be awake all through the night. And now of course I also have to get used to the idea of being home at 2 certain times a day for his naps - not that I go a lot of places, but I like to have some flexibility when I do.

Hopefully tonight will be even better.

Until,
D :)