Finishing up the school year (still about 6 weeks away)
"Why Just Survive" email that won't work
Finding a daytime sitter so I can have a WJS meeting with another coach who wants to refer clients to me.
First Communion practices and choir practices
Putting the house on the market
Getting the house ready to go on the market
Noelle's First Confession
Naughty boys who won't stop playing in my potting soil
Naughty boys who won't stop picking the neighbors' flowers (though they are kind enough/confused to pick a different neighbor's flowers each time
Hormonal twelve year old daughters
Hormonal issues myself
Making my disorganized child redo her work when it's beautiful outside (most days lately)
Cold/gray days outside when it's supposed to be spring, but at least we got work done for a change.
Files that are too big to upload and require re-scanning. Ugh!
Which curriculum/curricula to use next year
How the HELL I'm going to show this house with seven kids in it
Potty training my boys
My stress. Yes, I'm stressing about my stress because it's a little early to be PMS'ing, and yet here it is. Does this mean that it's going to start earlier as I get older? Lord help me.
But it's not what you're thinking! At about 5:30AM Matt and I both sat upright and kinda freaked out because not only was our bed shaking, but so was the whole house. At first, I thought it was a tornado, and went to grab the kids, as Matt went downstairs to look out the windows and see what he could see. It was over almost as soon as it started (though I would say it lasted a good minute or so), and we quickly came to the conclusion that it had been an earthquake, or at least an aftershock of someone else's earthquake. We could hardly believe it, and it felt like we were coming to crazy, sleepless conclusions. But with no wind outside, and no bulldozers pushing our house over (as Matt initially imagined in his grogginess), we had no other possible conclusions to draw. We lay in bed, unable to go back to sleep for a while, and every once in a while one of us would get freaked out all over again.
This is possibly the craziest thing that has ever happened to me!
Did you feel anything?
Here is a funny email I got from a friend. I just want to say that these might seem like an exaggeration ... I assure you they are not. Mostly they are accurate, with only a few things being avoided due to good training. Lessons 3 (every part) 4, 6 (every part!), 10, 11, and 12 -- NO EXAGGERATION. None. I have lived that many times over to a T. I'm not kidding. Come look at our cars.
Can I get a shout out from other parents that this is real?
Thinking of Having Kids? Do this 12 step program first!
Lesson 1
1. Go to the grocery store.
2. Arrange to have your salary paid directly to their head office.
3. Go home.
4. Pick up the paper.
5. Read it for the last time.
Lesson 2
Before you finally go ahead and have children, find a couple who already
are parents and berate them about their...
1. Methods of discipline.
2. Lack of patience.
3. Appallingly low tolerance levels.
4. Allowing their children to run wild.
5. Suggest ways in which they might improve their child's breastfeeding,
sleep habits, toilet training, table manners, and overall behavior.Enjoy
it because it will be the last time in your life you will have all the
answers.
Lesson 3
A really good way to discover how the nights might feel...
1. Get home from work and immediately begin walking around the living
room from 5PM to 10PM carrying a wet bag weighing approximately 8-12
pounds, with a radio turned to static (or some other obnoxious sound)
playing loudly. (Eat cold food with one hand for dinner)
2. At 10PM, put the bag gently down, set the alarm for midnight, and go
to sleep.
3. Get up at 12 and walk around the living room again, with the bag,
until 1AM.
4. Set the alarm for 3AM.
5. As you can't get back to sleep, get up at 2AM and make a drink and
watch an infomercial.
6. Go to bed at 2:45AM.
7. Get up at 3AM when the alarm goes off.
8. Sing songs quietly in the dark until 4AM.
9. Get up. Make breakfast. Get ready for work and go to work (work hard
and be productive)
Repeat steps 1-9 each night. Keep this up for 3-5 years. Look cheerful
and together.
Lesson 4
Can you stand the mess children make? T o find out...
1. Smear peanut butter onto the sofa and jam onto the curtains.
2. Hide a piece of raw chicken behind the stereo and leave it there all
summer.
3. Stick your fingers in the flower bed.
4. Then rub them on the clean walls.
5. Take your favorite book, photo album, etc. Wreck it.
6. Spill milk on your new pillows. Cover the stains with crayons. How does that look?
Lesson 5
Dressing small children is not as easy as it seems.
1. Buy an octopus and a small bag made out of loose mesh.
2. Attempt to put the octopus into the bag so that none of the arms hang
out.
Time allowed for this - all morning.
Lesson 6
Forget the BMW and buy a mini-van. And don't think that you can leave it
out in the driveway spotless and shining. Family cars don't look like
that.
1. Buy a chocolate ice cream cone and put it in the glove compartment.
Leave it there.
2. Get a dime. Stick it in the CD player.
3. Take a family size package of chocolate cookies. Mash them into the
back seat. Sprinkle cheerios all over the floor, then smash them with
your foot.
4. Run a garden rake along both sides of the car.
Lesson 7
Go to the local grocery store. Take with you the closest thing you can
find to a pre-school child. (A full-grown goat is an excellent choice).
If you intend to have more than one child, then definitely take more
than one goat. Buy your week's groceries without letting the goats out
of your sight. Pay for everything the goat eats or destroys. Until you can easily accomplish this, do not even contemplate having children.
Lesson 8
1. Hollow out a melon.
2. Make a small hole in the side.
3. Suspend it from the ceiling and swing it from side to side.
4. Now get a bowl of soggy Cheerios and attempt to spoon them into the
swaying melon by pretending to be an airplane.
5. Continue until half the Cheerios are gone.
6. Tip half into your lap. The other half, just throw up in the air.
You are now ready to feed a nine- month-old baby.
Lesson 9
Learn the names of every character from Sesame Street , Barney, Disney,
the Teletubbies, and Pokemon. Watch nothing else on TV but PBS, the
Disney channel or Noggin for at least five years. (I know, you're
thinking What's 'Noggin'?) Exactly the point.
Lesson 10
Make a recording of Fran Drescher saying 'mommy' repeatedly. (Important:
no more than a four second delay between each 'mommy'; occasional
crescendo to the level of a supersonic jet is required). Play this tape
in your car everywhere you go for the next four years. You are now ready
to take a long trip with a toddler.
Lesson 11
Start talking to an adult of your choice. Have someone else continually
tug on your skirt hem, shirt- sleeve, or elbow while playing the 'mommy'
tape made from Lesson 10 above. You are now ready to have a conversation with an adult while there is a child in the room.
Lesson 12
Learn how to type on a computer while balancing a 10 lb bowling ball.
If you attempt hands-free typing the ball will certainly fall so type
with one hand.
Master that.
Now try breastfeeding the bowling ball while you type...
You are now ready to conduct "business" while taking care of your baby.
I've got a million things going on and to do in my life, some of which are important, and some of which ... not so much. But in spite of it all, or maybe because of it all (hello, procrastination? my best friend.) I lay out in the sun today for over an hour.
OK, in my defense, the first 20 minutes of it we did school, until we all got sleepy. Then some of the perkier girls started playing Spa and I was the lucky recipient of some free foot massages. Mia, who is no bigger than a minute, was putting lotion on my legs while I was lying on my stomach. She was feeling quite the part and as she squirted some lotion into her hand and rubbed them together, she surprised me a little when she said, "Now I'n gonna rub some here, (slap!) on this big, fat part.
My upper thigh. Greaaaat. Thanks, Mia, for the little boost I needed to get back to good eating habits. And I think I'll add one extra day at the gym. No more bikinis around that girl. Too hard on my ego.
It's all gonna be OK. As you can see from this photo, the boo-boo is healing nicely and might be unnoticeable in a mere few weeks. Just thought you needed to know I cancelled my appointment with the plastic surgeon (kidding).
On a side note, if someone copies your hairstyle, are you flattered or insulted? Check into the poll below?
 I wanted to post this picture because I was so impressed with Julia's color choices. I bough her this clay colored dress/shirt that she was wearing over jeans, and she paired it with her Panama-inspired necklace, which she picked herself. I don't know if the photo gives it justice, but the colors, shades, tints all worked great together ... and she is only 11. Almost twelve. Can't forget that part.
Plus, isn't she getting beautiful?
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