Busy Me
Obviously, there is only so much time in the day. And while I feel like my ability to goof off is limitless, apparently even I have made some compromises in my life. So I’ve been trying to get into Facebook since buying my IPhone (the greatest invention EVER), and have obviously been ignoring my blog. Suffice it to say, my kids are still cute, but I’ve been overwhelmed with work and a wedding to stress out over. Plus, no offense to my few remaining readers, but there’s minimal interest from the greater world for my blog, so there’s not a huge motivation to please my huge audience. But I will try to keep up better. Its all about balance, right?
Right now, I’m stressing out over what to have my ring bearer Hubba wear for a beach wedding in February. It might be hot, it might be cold. I have no idea what the groom is wearing. Everyone else will be in “resort casual” which apparently excludes flip flops. But the bride and flowerGirly will be wearing fancy white dresses. So a shorty tux? A guayabere (or alternatively a cheap white shirt) and khakis? I don’t know!!!!
Ebay Addiction
So I’ve only bought a few things off Ebay in my life. Including a few pairs of those soft baby shoes, some painted letters for Girly’s wall, a couple specific toys I couldn’t find at Target. But lately I’m a little worried – I’ve delved into the world of used childrens clothes. I’ve decided I can’t deal with buying expensive clothes for Girly and then watch as she doesn’t wear them. And she’s been into pink and always wants to wear a dress. So last week I bought 3 cute pink dresses for her, each between $5 and $15. I tell you, it is soooo addictive. I love out-bidding someone – it really brings out the competitor in me. This girl is going to be wearing pink dresses to school every day this year!
Nanny Update
So, you all remember the most recent nanny crisis – that my nanny was (is?) looking for a job? Well, I just thought I’d give a little update. We never confronted the nanny about it. More on that later.
We tried to call our old nanny to see if she would come back, but she wouldn’t call us back. Why? Well, we can only assume, but she had filed for unemployment insurance from us. And we thought she had figured she shouldn’t talk to us – either based on someone’s advice or her own judgement I don’t know. Or maybe she was just mad at us. Anyway, we got the unemployment notice in the mail, and discussed it with some friends who had dealt with unemployment claims before. Basically, as you all know, you only get unemployment payments if you are fired without cause. Its not that DH and I really had much to lose, but we filled out the form saying she quit. Because her leaving for a month without a return date, knowing we would replace her, didn’t really make it us firing her without cause in our minds. So there was a phone call with the state mediator, and DH and the nanny both were on the call but didn’t talk to one another, and explained the situation. And long story short, the guy agreed with us that we didn’t have much choice, and therefore the nanny isn’t getting her unemployment pay from the state. And we assume this all means that she doesn’t have another job, by the way, since you can’t get unemployment insurance if you’ve found another job. We feel bad for her – we would’ve liked for it to end differently. And now we really don’t expect to hear from her again – because she probably has decided that we are evil people. So much for that route.
Back to our existing nanny. She told me that her house is going into foreclosure. Ack, I had suspected her credit was going to be iffy when we hired her. Both her and her husband had been out of work for about six months. Many people on the lower end of the payscale around here can’t afford that. Anyway, she told me about it, and now she is trying to get some help. Personally, I think her husband is a deadbeat loser if he isn’t at least calling the bank himself or working as a bagger at the grocery store to make some money. But I’m sure he’s very nice. But whatever. She told me today that a non-profit is going to help her re-work her loan, so they can lower the interest rate and add the missing payment to the end of the loan. That would be great if it would work out. She seems to like working for us, so I hope that she isn’t looking for another job anymore. Now I just hope that her husband gets a job soon.
Little Things
Girly cries on my shoulder at night when she gets tired. The other night she cried because her feet hurt. Then she cried because I had given her a cookie for dessert instead of ice cream. Then she cried because she wanted pink jammies instead of purple ones on. But she is also so helpful lately. She really tries to help Hubba get things and play. The only problem is she calls herself Mommy while doing it and usually ends up pissing him off with her help. Then the crying begins – either she steals his toys and he cries or he smacks her for stealing his toys and she cries.
Hubba is still a little trouble maker. I wake up every morning to the sound of doors slamming. I guess he can finally reach the door knobs. He also likes to turn the lights on and off. He’s not very environmentally friendly, and its not my favorite wake-up method. He has recently been given some Thomas the Trains and he just loves this set. He goes down to our basement by himself, turns on the light, and plays with his trains some days before we even wake up. I guess its the only time he can guarantee that his sister won’t be bossy around his toys.
Dead Deer Free
So on Thursday, the kids and nanny are playing on our playset in the back yard. And the nanny hears a noise in the woods behind us. A deer comes nearby in the woods, looks at the nanny, and then falls over and twitches, and yes, dies. So she calls me, and tells me that there is now a dead deer in our backyard. Note that it was 95 degrees yesterday, so this dead deer would definitely be noticeable in the near future if we had chosen to ignore it. So after calling around, DH finds a friend of a friend who owns a pickup and a farm who offers to haul it away somewhere for $100. So $100 and 24 hours later, we are dead deer free.
We attempted to not share this find with the kids – you know how I like to shelter my kids from the facts of life and death. It was pretty hard for Girly not to notice DH and this guy dragging a deer to a pickup truck in the backyard though. DH was glad it was gone, because he could definitely smell it already. He thought it looked to be about a year old.
So goodbye, little deer. We never figured out what was wrong with you or why you died, but I hope you are now dancing in a flowering meadow heaven just like Laura Ingalls on Little House on the Prairie.
Done (Sorta)
Yesterday I sent off my report. And on Saturday I sent off my final level experience application. So now I have to wait for 6-8 weeks before things are done. Nothing I can do now except cross my fingers and hope the graders are drinking wine when they read my report. I will have an interview at some point, but probably not for 6 weeks. But come mid-September or so, I do hope to finally get my MAI designation. That will be so nice. Although probably not worth all the hassle and stress. Last night I had a nice big glass of wine and felt much better about things. Now I just need to work on all the stuff I’ve been ignoring for a week.
Good night
The last two weeks or so, Hubba has been missing me more than usual. Maybe because I’ve been trying to work more on my demo than normal, or maybe its because he got used to me being around at the beach last month and now notices when I’m gone. He’s been wanting me to put him to bed most nights, and I’m cool with that even though Girly usually isn’t. It could be the thunder storms we’ve been having, which freaked him out a bit. Or maybe he just knows I’m a sucker, because I always lay down with him while he falls asleep, and he really likes snuggling up against me at night. In fact, he’s been waking in the middle of the night and I’ve been having to crawl in bed with him more. It means I get a bit less rest than normal these days. But the truth is, I kinda love it. How much longer am I going to be able to snuggle with a baby in bed? Girly surely doesn’t want me much. She says she does, but then she usually rolls around so much and says there isn’t room for me in addition to Bee, Baby Bee, Giraffe, Pink Bear, and anyone else in there with her. No, there definitely doesn’t seem to be much need for me there. So its nice to cuddle up with my baby boy while he still kinda qualifies as a baby in my eyes. I mean, the nanny is putting him in underwear this week(probably not successfully) and I have to start thinking about applying for preschool once Fall rolls around, so truly, any resemblance to babyness is dwindling pretty quickly.
But in the middle of the night, he snuggles up against me, holds his octopus blanket and looks at me with his sleepy eyes and puts his little feet against my legs, and I can’t think of much more perfection ever coming around in my life.
Plugging Along
I’ve been working on my demo report for my MAI (you all know that). I’m happy to say its really starting to come along – I may actually finish it soon. I’m actually working on the last part now. A little voice in my head is saying almost almost almost done – maybe in the next two weeks if I keep at it. Real work may get in the way, which would delay me, but I would soooo love to wrap this thing up. That way I could send it off, and maybe even get my MAI in the next few months. That would be so awesome. Of course, this assumes it passes grading, but I am going on the fact that it will. Otherwise, I will have to kill myself after all this work. Another guy in my office has been working on his for a few weeks and thinks he’s almost done. I’m impressed that he has been so fast – I’ve been working on it since February. I hope I turn mine in first, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he beats me to the MAI. Since two other people in my office have gotten it in the last month though, its not like anyone else will be that thrilled about it, except me and DH. And my paycheck and my title. I told DH if I can get everything done before September, maybe we could go on vacation for another week. He is all for that. His first paycheck arrives on Friday. Yes, after about a year, he will finally get paid. Not that its a ton of cash, but at least it will offset my own income losses from the economy and demo writing.
Hitting
I need Hubba to stop hitting. I don’t know what is up with him. He hits his sister for no reason – he’ll just be near her and whap her head for fun (I guess fun is a reason?). And she won’t stay away from him either. Every time they get within two feet of each other, one of them gets hurt, and yet for some reason they still seem to want to be near each other. They really don’t make sense. If my sibling was hitting me all the time, I think I’d try to play in a different room all the time, but they don’t seem to get that logic.
Stop Growing!
My little boy, my Hubba Hubba, is peeing on the potty like he’s at least 30 months old. Aren’t boys supposed to wait to potty train until their like 3 1/2? At this rate, I’ll have to buy him underwear soon (he would just love Spiderman underwear)! Ok, this isn’t something to be complaining about. But seriously, he’s only 24 pounds – he can’t even climb on the potty by himself and he usually needs help getting his pants down – it just doesn’t seem right. I haven’t even been giving him candy or anything – he just seems to like doing it. Maybe he just likes to be able to touch the pee as it comes out – he’s such a curious little booger.
Girly, on the other hand, had a 30 minute crying jag on Thursday because she missed her friend GG and wanted to go see her. She was sitting on the kitchen floor crying and it reminded me of “STELLA!!!! STELLA!!!!”. By the way, she’d seen this girl 2 hours earlier. It was sad but funny at the same time. OMG what a drama queen I have on my hands.
My crazy mommy life 