Lots of Milestones

It was a big weekend for Hayleigh:

She found her feet and likes to play with them. She also like to be naked. Apparently this is soothing to her. Her brothers seem to think so also. Yesterday Trisha had a friend over all day and when she left, Jonathan and Ryan said "Finally!". I thought they were just sick of having a girl around. NOPE! They were sick of wearing clothes. Off came the shirts and pants. You don't want to stop by here unexpectedly!!



And, we had our first cereal. Trisha got to feed her and of course, Hayleigh is wearing her "I love my Big Sister" bib.



And then here she is rolling over. Actually, she's been doing that for about a month, but I just now got it on tape. Excuse me cheering for her. I'm loud, I know. Jonathan tells me this all of the time after his soccer games :)




She's also using the exersaucer now. Does this seem to be going fast to anyone else??

Black Friday

I did a little shopping yesterday. Several stores in my area were opening at 4am. I had to laugh at the JCPenney ad which said it was opening at 4am, except where prohibited by law. Evidentally, getting up at 4 am to go shopping is so obscene some places have outlawed it. I did not get up that early, but I did go before it was light out and I noticed while waiting in line at Toys R Us that there are a few different types of shoppers out early in the morning on Black Friday.

First, there's Jolly Joe. Joe is just loud and happy and who really knows why. Joe is always cracking some sort of stupid joke about how cold it is outside or how early it is while jingling change in his pocket. Joe even started whistling a little Christmas Carol while he's at it. I just smile and nod at Jolly Joe.

Then, there's the cranky grandma. I always seem to fall in line behind cranky Grandma. She complains that the line is too slow or that they need more workers or how her daughter had to go and have five kids and now she has to shop for them! Her life just sucks so bad, because not only is it Christmas, she has three birthdays to buy for too.

There's also Pete the Pervert. I don't really think that Pete is a pervert, it's just that he's only buying one gift, and well, who gets up at ungoldy hours just to buy one gift? Just to make sure no one really thinks he's a pervert, he's telling everyone who makes eye contact that the toy he has if for his nephew.

Then there is Molly Mom. Molly Mom has a Starbucks half the size of her head and a list half as long as she is. She is dressed so nicely for such an hour and her hair looks as id she actually combed it before she left. She has a plan and she is sticking to it. I'm hating Molly Mom, but it's only because I'm sort of envious of her.

Finally, there's Hurry-Up Henry. Hurry-Up Henry is literally running through the store to get what he needs. He runs to line and then tells his wife to wait there and pay while he goes to get the car. There is no time to waste for Hurry-Up Henry. He has many more stops to make before the sun comes up.

There's also me. But, I'm totally normal!

Grab youself a hunk of cheese...

...because here comes a whole lotta whine!

Ok, so I was cleaning out the closets this past weekend, when I came across THAT section in my closet. I'm sure you have THAT section also. It's clothes that used to fit me, but no longer do. I have kept them because they used to be sort of a reminder of what I once was and what I could once again achieve. I was most fond of this plum colored suit. The plum colored suit was in a size 10 and looked oh so good on me. Last time I wore that was before I got pg with Ryan. Which is sad. It has been 8 years since I've looked in a mirror and thought "Dang, Girl...you got it goin on!". 8 years. Now the suit is just depressing to me. It doesn't encourage me to do anything, except maybe emotionally eat over the fact that I used to be thin* and now I am not.

* Sidebar: I realize that to some people size 10 seems huge. In fact, I have a friend who has borrowed a lot of my size 10 clothes to be her post-pregnancy fat clothes. So, my skinny clothes are someone else's fat clothes...pathetic!!

Anyway, to continue whining, I never, ever, ever, thought I would ever weigh as much as I do. 40 extra pounds from Ryan, 20 from Hayleigh and there you have it. I told my fat rolls to go away but they seem to like it here. I suppose I could make myself feel better by thinking of all of the wonderful growth and positive character qualities I have obtained in these 8 years. From being more patient, to being able to multitask, to being less selfish, etc, etc. Right now, though, I'd give my left a** cheek to fit in that plum suit again...and, in fact, I'd have to.

Hand Turkeys

I'm sure you've seen these things. You know, when you put your hand on a piece of paper and trace your fingers to make the wings of a turkey. I have many, many, many of these in scrapbooks and safe places. They are neat because, if nothing else, they note the size of the kids' hands when they were such-and-such an age. Today I have received, from Ryan, a picture with a brand new twist on the hand turkey. Oh sure, there's the hand in the middle of the picture with the fingers brightly colored to represent feathers. And, then, well, there's a picture of a gun with brown bullets headed toward the turkey. Jaden says it's a very good drawing of a gun. I'm so proud :)

Oh yeah, I've got my s*** together!

As you can see, I've made lots of progress on my "profanity problem".

Here is a list of all of the things that I have forgotten lately, telling more and more people all over town, that I do, in fact, not have my s*** together:

Notes to school telling the teachers that someone is coming home with us or one of my kids is going somewhere. Three times in the past two weeks School Secretary has had to call me to see if I had forgotten a note. "Mrs. K, this is school secretary. Valerie has a note here that Trisha is supposed to come home with her." "Oh, yeah. Ha, ha, I forgot my note again, sorry." Big long sigh from school secretary.

Then, I got two collection notices today on medical bills. You know it's not that we don't have the money. We have plenty of money (by plenty, I mean NOT plenty). I just can't ever remember to pay the darn things.

Similarly, Ryan has a -$8.75 balance on his lunch card. Again, it's not that we don't have the money. It's that I don't have any checks. I keep forgetting to order them.

I've no-showed to 2, count them, 2 doctors appointments recently.

I totally skipped a therapy appointment. Jaden's physical therapy that is, not psycho-therapy for me, although, sure thanks, I'll take some.

Library books. These suckers were due in July. Nice. At least I know that I am personally building a wing of the new community library with my overdue fees.

I keep forgetting to buy dishwashing soap. I've been to the store four times for it. I buy lots of other things, but I still don't have the dishwasher soap. Side note: the huge piles of bubbles on my floor tells me that it is not a good idea to substitute liquid hand soap for dishwashing soap.

I'm sure there are more, but I can't remember what they are!

All of this irresponsibility is frustrating. ROb says I just have too many balls in the air. Yeah, well, that's what she said.

Aqua Dots

Another China recall. This one has a substance in it that metabolizes into the "date rape" drug. I do think China is trying to kill us by poisoning our toys. I will not buy anything made in China anymore. Which basically means, I won't be buying anything anymore.

Tales from my job

The following is an actual series of events that occurred at my job last week:

Brrrrring! Brrrring!
"Hello Dr. Dentist's Dental Office, how can I help you?"
"Hi there. This is Ms. Patient. I am trying to figure out how much money to put in my pretax account for next year and I think I am supposed to have a crown done, do you know how much that will be?"
I figure it out. "About $325 just to be safe.""OK. Thanks. Bye."

5 minutes later...

Brrrring! Brrrrrrring!
"Hello Dr. Dentist's Dental Office, how can I help you?"
"This is Ms. Patient again. Why do you sound like Alaina?" (A former hygienist).
"Oh. Do I?? That's funny."
"Yeah. Why do you sound like her?"
"Hmmm. I'm not sure, how can I help you?"
"Well, I forgot to ask if my husband needs to have any work done."
So I check. "The Doctor does not have any work indicated at this time."
"Seriously you sound like Alaina. Why do you sound like Alaina?"
"I guess we must have similar vocal cords. Is there anything else?"
"No. thank you. bye"

5 minutes later....

Brrrrring! Brrrrrrring!
"Hello Dr. Dentist's Dental Office, how may I help you?"
"This is Ms. Patient again. Do you know how many cavities I'll have this year?"
I laugh. Like ha-ha "It would be nice if we could predict that, huh?"
"No. I need to know how many cavities I am going to have next year. Me and my whole family."
"Well, there are lots of variables involved like genetics, oral hygiene, diet. It's really hard to predict."
"You have my chart, can't you just look at that and guess how many cavities I'll have."
"No, not really. I can't".
"Alaina would have."

hmmmmm.....

This is Halloween!

I have to say I love. love. love that we change our clocks back after Halloween now...I didn't have to worry once about anyone getting run over!!








The lady playing Dorothy is Miss Pop. She was Jaden's teacher last year.



I was Ryan's party mom, so I got to get this pic of him playing the toilet paper game.

Everyone loves a baby!

I had forgotten about this part. The part where everyone and their germ-infested brother wants to come up and breathe/touch your baby. And, Hayleigh, who is very, very social with her smiling and cooing and trying to sit up to see them better, just prolongs the contact. I think my favorite people have to be the ones who feel that they have to give advice. "It's chilly out, shouldn't she have a hat on?" Of course, I need to be light and love and represent Jesus, so I hold in what I really want to say and go for a Fantasy Island type script: "Smiles, everyone, smiles."

In addition to this, or perhaps, because of this I am developing what I like to call a "profanity problem". This is not good. Here are a few examples. Today, at Walmart when I was putting Hayleigh and her carseat into the shopping cart, I somehow managed to smash my boob in between the cart and the carseat. Don't ask. Suffice it to say, they're droopy. I actually needed to release the carseat in order to free my boob. This was painful and I muttered a short string of profanities. Of course someone was walking up beside their car and heard me. And, then there was the time a few days ago when I smashed my finger in Jaden's wheelchair. This time a loud string of profanities. If it wasn't bad enough that my children heard this, the front door was open and, since the bus stop is in our driveway, other people's children also got to hear this. So much for the light, love and representing! I'm going to work on my "profanity problem" and I'm going to work on walking faster through stores and not stopping to let people see my baby. That ought to work!

Trying something new

Due to the sheer volume of requests coming into my brain at one time, I will now have to install an automatic phone system for my children to use. I imagine it will go something like this:

"Thank you for calling Mom's brain, please listen carefully to the following menu options. Para espanol, esquedar numero uno. For help with homework, please press 2. To summon the taxi service, please press 3. For the chef, please press 4. If you'd like poop cleaned out from your diaper, please press 5. If you need help finding some lost item, please press 6. For money, please press 7. For more money, please hang up and try a different number. If this is a life threatening medical emergency please bypass the phone system by screaming really loud. All other callers please remain on the line until the next available brain cell can answer your call. Thank you."

The Wild, Wild World of Sports

I've been wanting to post for some time now about the crazy world of little league sports. The problem is: I'm not really sure what I want to say, I have so many mixed feelings regarding it. It used to be that I loved watching my boys play, win or lose. I loved watching them get better at skills and the pride on their faces as they achieved certain things. Sure, they would mess up and make mistakes, but that was part of it too and it was OK. But, as I sit at baseball games where grown men fight over where to put chalk lines, I can't help but wonder what we are even doing being involved. Rob even overheard two coached talking about parents who ask why their kid never gets to play such and such a position. The coach says, "I think to myself, your kid is never going to be a 1st baseman, so why should I put him in 1st base". He's talking about 7 & 8 year olds of course.

Ryan plays on a team that is undefeated. He will most likely win the championship this weekend without ever once losing a game. Great, right? The only problem is that the coach is so focused on winning, that Ryan isn't given a chance to try out new positions and he's so nervous up to bat, he can hardly hit the ball. I like Ryan's coach, really. But, I think it's so unfortunate. This is only his second season of ever playing baseball, and his confidence is shot. He doesn't even really look forward to going. And, inside my heart breaks for him. He's 7 years old for heaven's sake! Taking this thing too seriously is terrible. Listen, maybe 1 or 2 of these kids will get a baseball scholarship to college. Maybe. But, the self esteem blows to the others, who are told at 7, "you'll never be a first baseman" will last much, much longer.

Jonathan moved up to a travel soccer league this year. For the past several seasons, Jonathan has been one of the most valuable players on his in-house team and has gotten a lot of playing time. It has made him a better player. In travel, everyone is good, so he subs like everyone else. That was an adjustment for me, but it's OK now. Jonathan's team is 1-3-1. Probably not going to win any championships, but his coaches are committed to player development and realize that these kids are 10, and have lots of growth ahead of them. Jonathan's skills have improved alot. But, some parents wonder why we don't win more games and are starting to flap their gums a little bit about what should be done differently. Like Jonathan's coach said, "It shouldn't be that way [competitive to the point of leaving players behind], but parents want to win."

I don't know I guess I'd rather just have my boys learn some new skills, learn sportsmanship, have fun, make friends, learn to work as a team, learn to hang in there and work hard despite the score, learn to do your best, and then, maybe after all of that, win some games. I would rather have my son feel good about himself on a losing team, then feel stressed out on a winning team. I know I sound like a softie, afterall as men they will have to learn to compete and win in the business world, right? Maybe...but, I guess at 10 and 7, I'm leaning more toward letting them be boys, then making them be men. My sons are more than the sum total of their athletic abilities. I'll close with this poem:

He pulls on a helmet, picks up the bat,
and walks to the plate, "gotta hit and that's that."
The crowd starts to yell, the game's on the line,
last inning, two outs, the score's nine to nine.

Dad yells, "Go get it," Mom wrings her hands,
coach hollers, "hit it," but alone there he stands.

Heros are made in seconds such as this,
but he's just a little boy, what if he should miss?
Years after this game's ended and he's little no more,
will he remember the outcome or even the score?

No he'll have forgotten if he was out, hit, or a run,
he'll only look back on his friends and, hopefully, the fun.

So cheer this boy on, alone with his fate;
help him remember with fondness this stand at the plate.
And when the game's over, this boy can stand tall,
for you've helped him prepare to give it his all!

3 months old

Already...it's so sad!



Here she is showing us this new thing she found in her mouth.



Showing off her great neck strength.



Sucking her thumb. Yes, another one we'll have to get orthodontia for.



Smily Girl!



Just a cute, chubby little baby :)

She's smiling, laughing, squealing, cooing, sleeping through the night. Like Ryan said, "It's like she's finally growing some brains!"

McDonald's

I have two things I want to say about McDonald's:
1. Their iced coffee is very good. For about $2.25 you can get a huge cup of coffee that is actually pretty good. If you got that size of coffee at Starbucks, you would need a second mortgage on your home. Downside: It's 6 WW points :(.

2. Have you seen this thing about the McDonald's worker who was "forced" into taking off all of her clothes. Apparently, some man called claiming to be a police officer and told the manager to bring her into the office because some customers had filed a complaint that she had stolen from them. SO, to prove it, the manager had to have the girl take off all of her clothes. That is somewhat bizarre, but it didn't stop there. Throughout the course of several hours, the girl was "forced" to perform sex acts on herself and on the manager's fiance. This was all through the "direction" of some man on the phone claiming to be a police officer. Anyway, teh girl sued McDonald's of all things, and won $5 million.

I think two things about this. One is that this illustrates clearly to me why parents can not and should not in this day and age teach our children a blanket philosophy of obeying authority no matter what. It would be a much easier job if we could do that, but instead we have to teach them how to discern when to obey and when not. I find this to be much trickier. The other thing I think is that just when I think maybe, as a society, we are turning away from ridiculous lawsuits, this girls wins $5 million from McDonald's...please! BTW, when I say girl, I mean woman...she was 18. It's a bizarre, bizarre case.

Oh, and the other thing I think is that I wish Rob would stop walking around with a phone pretending like there is an officer on the other end wondering what I've done with someone's money!

What I'm thinking about today

Hannah Montana. If you do not know who this is, then you obviously don't have a tweenaged daughter. Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus is just about the biggest thing around if you are of a certain age, and it just so happens she is coming to my town right after Christmas. I remember that desperate time I once had, being in 8th grade when Michael Jackson came to town. We didn't or couldn't get tickets, I don't know. I can't even remember how many times I tried to be "Caller #12" into WDRQ. No luck. So, I decide that I will try my hardest to get tickets to this concert of a lifetime for my daughter. Except...

Except, that there happens to be a software company that sells software that makes it easy for scalpers to bypass the internet line and scoop up all the tickets. And, then these scalpers, after getting the tickets, sell them for an astronomical amount of money, and this seriously pisses me off.

I know there are grave atrocities that happen in this world. Babies are starving, left orphaned, forced into sex-slavery rings. I realize that this does not rank up there with that, but to purposefully buy up tickets and then sell them for over 5-6x the face value is wrong. They know they can do it because there will always be a silly parent willing to pay this amount of money to try and make their child's dream come true. I am seriously tempted myself. Town after town, concert after concert, this is what is happening. Anyone who does this simply does not have one shred of decency or morality in them...I'm sorry.

And, that's what I'm thinking about today.

Eddie Cohorst

I'm sure that most of you right now are saying "Who?".

I know that you do not know who Eddie Cohorst is, but I know that all of you went to school with a kid like Eddie. He was the kid that always got into trouble. Was just always doing something bad. Teachers rolled their eyes when they found out Eddie was going to be in their class, and so did we students. Eddie's antics started out in grade school innocently enough. I remember in middle school shop class, he laid himself on his stomach on top of a table and proceeding to roll himself back and forth on the table yelling "rollerballs!" I had no idea what that meant, but I could only assume it was some sort of reference to his testicles. As Eddie grew, his antics which started out as social became more and more anti-social. I guess since Eddie had heard so many times that he was bad and was a trouble maker, he decided to be bad and be a trouble maker.

I've been thinking alot about Eddie Cohorst lately. Or rather, I've been thinking alot about Mrs. Cohorst. What did she think about all of this? Did she try her hardest to work with Eddie or did she just not care? Did it break her heart that he was sort of an outcast and that teachers gave him a hard time or did she just decide to throw her hands up in exasperation? Did the fact that Eddie couldn't behave in school keep her up at night? Did she fight with school authorities for people to let up on him? Did she have him medicated?

I wonder because Ryan has been getting into trouble at school. And, the last thing I want is for him to be an Eddie. He's smart. It seems like it would be such a waste f he were to end up hating school because he's always in trouble. He's social. It would be a shame if he were to end up being anti-social because he's sick of people telling him he's bad. That's why I want to know about Mrs. Cohorst...I want a different result than with Eddie. Sometimes there is a very thin line between the class clown that becomes president and turns out to be CEO of this and that company and the class weirdo who ends up dealing drugs and in jail. I would obviously prefer the CEO scenario. We've been working with his teacher and with Ryan and I think things are improving. Good thing he's cute...

I think I'm going to google Eddie Cohorst to see if I can ever find out what happened to that kid...I hope, for my own sanity's sake, that I find something good!

It's the little things...(Part 2)

That make everything worth it.

We had open house tonight. The 4th graders wrote up a little newspaper thing-y. Trisha wrote her main article about Hayleigh and her thoughts and feelings about her birth. SHe said she was nervous because she didn't know what it would be like to have a baby around. She said she was excited because she was waiting her whole life for a sister. She said I was her hero because I always listened to her and helped her. The last line in her Hayleigh story was that she looked at Hayleigh and I said "She loves you" and Trisha said "I know". It was just beautiful...not only what she said, but the eloquance with which she said it. She may one day have a blog herself.

As it turned out, Trisha wasn't the only one who said I was their hero. Jaden also said I was his hero because I got married and if I didn't get married, he wouldn't be born. Rob got some props as he was Jonathan's hero.

There's not a lot of immediate gratification in being a parent. It's not like at work when I work really hard on the receivables and the next week, I see percentages go where I want them to go. Often times, I don't see the effects of my work as a mother....or, instead I should say I only seem to see the bad effects. Like, so-and-so is doing that thing again...must be because I'm not doing this-and-that. That's what makes nights like tonight so special. I guess the work that I, and all of us parents are doing does pay have its rewards. In the hallway of an elementary school hangs at least some validation and the stamina to keep giving this motherhood thing my best shot.

It's the little things...

That can really drive a person to drink. Let's just take yesterday for an example.

Annoyance #1 For the sake of complete accuracy, I will start yesterday at 12:00 am meaning midnight. Hayleigh awakens at her usual time between 3 and 4 am. I do not know what actual time it is because I am 75% asleep. I trip over my breast pump, the laundry basket, and two pairs of shoes on my way out the bedroom door. Feed Hayleigh as usual. Rock her to sleep. Put her in crib. She wakes up. Repeat. 3 times.

Annoyance #2 Jonathan has decided to play the drum this year. I think that's all I need to say about that.

Annoyance #3 Work. My job is to handle all of the billing. I was off for two months and now upon my return there are patients whose accounts have gone into arrears and are in danger of being turned over to collections. I try to be nice and call these people. Here's a conversation I had: "Hi, I'm going to turn you over to collections." "OK". "OK? I mean if you can pay anything today, I will not turn you over." "No, you can just turn me over." What?!?!? I made her wish come true later that day.

Annoyance #4 My cat. We still for some reason (well because Rob keeps feeding the darn thing!) have Kosmo the cat. He (Kosmo) left me a little present yesterday of a dead chipmunk right on the welcome mat. What made this particular gift so unusual was that it was decapitated. Thanks, Kosmo. Why, oh why must I live with this cat. I swept it( the chipmunk) into the bushes where it will begin to reek to high heaven in just a few days...goodie!

Annoyance #5 Insomnia. Yes, folks if it wasn't bad enough that I have to get up to feed Hayleigh, I can't sleep. Last night I couldn't fall asleep because my feet were itchy. Why you might ask? Because I made the mistake of going to a bonfire wearing Crocs. Everywhere there is a hole in the croc, there is some sort of bug bite on my foot. It literally matches up hole for bite. If it were on someone else's feet I would find it amusing.

It's days like this that I understand what Jesus meant when he said not to worry about tomorrow because today has enough trouble of it's own. Amen! Today, so far, the only annoying thing is that I stayed the same at my weigh-in. 6.2 pounds lost though. Take that, fat rolls!

2 months old

Late again! But, I'm having a hard time finding time to even go to the bathroom, so I feel like one week late is pretty good!!

The Breakup

Dear Fat Rolls,

I have decided that it is time for us to take a break from each other. I know it's sudden, but I have decided that I no longer like you hanging around. Sure, we've had some good times. Like the time I laid down on my bed to get my zipper all the way up. But then you got the last laugh because when I stood up you sort of flopped over the top like a mushroom. Oh, we laughed and laughed over that one. I think I will miss the way you always said "hello" to me everytime I lifted my shirt to feed Hayleigh. That was nice to know I wasn't alone in the middle of the night. With you, I have been so lucky. Most women only have one set of boobs, but because of you, fat rolls, I have two, one in the front and one in the back. I'll miss my back boobs. Despite all of these good times, I think I need to let you go. I hope that losing you will be quick and painless. Besides, I know that you will move on and find some other woman to hang out with. If you get lonely, try the OB office. I know I've picked up several of you there over the years myself. I wish you well, fat rolls. Goodbye~

Me

Back to School (already)

So, the kids are back at school. It seems like maybe they had a month off. It went quick. To the kids, this will probably be known as the most boring summer ever, and I do feel bad for them. In June, they pretty much sat around and watched me be miserable adn pregnant and then after July 10th, they pretty much sat around and watched me nurse. Not too exciting. Case in point: Jaden was asked to bring in something to share with his classmates that would be symbolic of something he did over summer vacation. He wanted to bring in a baseball bat. Why?? To tell everyone about how he got in the head with it. That, apparently was the most exciting thing about the summer. Thankfully, I remembered that that actually happened at the end of last year, and thus, does not count. I think he ended up bringing in a Webkinz because that was his favorite thing that he got from his summer birthday.

Something exciting did happen this summer though for the older kids. Since we didn't go anywhere or do anything, the kids were forced to pay with each other. And, they did. During the school year when they are each running to soccer or baseball or basketball or drama, they really don't spend much time together. There were actually times this summer when I heard them laughing and playing together. It was nice. Of course, this changed during the last few weeks of vacation when it was all I could do to kick them out for fighting so much! But, for awhile there, it was nice.

It is always hard to say goodbye to them and it always seems like the house is a little bit too quiet without them around. Surprisingly, even having a baby didn't change that. But, I think they are each going to have a great year.