6 years since it was Positive

Today, provided I'm reading the calendar correctly is the 6th anniversary of my last positive pregnancy test :) Well, ok, not the last, I peed on the other 5 or 6 that I bought because 'omg no way, really?' She was finally coming, 4 cycles after a miscarriage I was 'finally' pregnant again!

Now, she's 5..and she's playing her "Tinkerbelle" Leapster 2 game, and tomorrow she goes back to ballet classes.

This is one of those "significant anniversary years" ... you know the big ones...Yesterday marked the 10 year anniversary of moving in with my fiance....today, as I said above...in a few days I will have been married for 10 years! That also means my son will turn 10. *gulp* Back to the wedding anniversary.
 
Back then we had said we were going to have a big 10 year "party" of sorts. We were going all out, I wanted a dress, and I wanted the kids to stand up with us, a the whole 9 yards....well, it's not happening this year. It's just not really something we *can* do...not that we don't want to do it anymore. The good news is, I'll only be 38 when we celebrate 20 years...


The last few days have been a positive flurry of memories from that "magic" number of 10 years ago. The last time I was in school....how long I've been someone's wife....when I became a mother....


and I think it will be another 10 years before I finish a blog post ;)  I have several drafts sitting, waiting to be discarded or finished. But every time I sit down to them....just like every time I try to sit down and work on my CBE exam....the kid come in with their distractions..I try not to get to frustrated, before long it will be the reverse, every time the think they've gotten away from me for a minute I'll call, text or knock on their door. *sigh* they grow up too fast.


Lesse, a quick little personal update:

I have started using supplements to treat PMDD almost 2 weeks ago. I am hoping the improvements are obvious, and I will continue on. I have started working out again, and trying *very* hard to eat better. I hope that also helps improve my moods....and of course my body ;)

I am almost half way through my Childbirth Educator Exam...and only about 3 weeks behind when I wanted to be finished with it all so I could start teaching soon. I am also lacking a teaching location, since I have been severely
 lacking in any "alone" time for marketing. Somethings I hope are also nearing a time of improvement...

I bought a new book yesterday, practically jumped off the shelf at me. It's a "practical magic" book, and so far (all 5 paragraphs I've read) seem right up my alley....hopefully I'll manage to make it through this book soon :) I am longing for that spiritual connection.

Happy New Year!! Welcome 2011!

Wow, 1-1-11....though I'm looking forward to wishing my cousin a Happy Birthday on 1-11-11...and maybe we'll have a "number party" on 11-11-11 lol


(Every time I have sat down to blog in the last week, my kids have come in the room and basically demanded my attention...so I'm going to go ahead and apologize for any bits that don't exactly flow, or make any sense, ok? Cool.)



It's a little after 11 am, and I am enjoying the sounds of a Winter Thunderstorm...New Year's noise makers, my daughter's sing-song voice and my son working on building a 'tent' using his loftbed and all the blankets he can drag in there.

Scratch that, now my son is sitting in the middle of his floor full pout because I wouldn't let them drag the tent building in here. Sorry kid, I'm working on Christmas Clean Up...there's no room at the Inn!

I'll blog later I guess, so that I can stop being the cause of the Moodies. After all if I'm just sitting here blogging, there is no reason he shouldn't be able to cram his tent in here wherever he can! And if I'm up cleaning, there really is no room!!


I hope everyone had a safe and Happy New Year's Eve, and a relaxing day today!

how does it happen so quickly?

My house is a disaster!!! (and my font is huge, wtf?, bah, I'll edit it later if I need to)

So, my husband was away for a week, and upon his return my kitchen was pretty and clean, the living room was mostly neat an organized, and even the bathrooms were in better shape.

Of course, yesterday my son had a pretty violent food poisoning incident. The poor boy :(  and that pretty much put a stop to everything that was going on. A little laundry got washed, and the dishwasher ran, but little else happened. My husband even came home early to be with his son (because when you're little boy says "I want my daddy" daddy came home)

OH, and then the school program we are working with sent us a computer since mine died (I am currently using an old computer with a Live CD, and it doesn't support flash, which means no school, and this computer isn't functional enough to install an operating system on :/ lol) Anyway, that means there are boxes and computer components on the kitchen table.

Bah, anyway, the point is my house was getting very near a point where I was excited I was making great progress, and now it's "omg please no one ring my doorbell!"

Tomorrow, I'm letting the kids have a free day. The boy can either continue to laze about and recover or he can play (hopefully calmly) and the girl will hopefully still be bouncing around. Setting up a computer, dishes, cleaning the table, the kitchen counters, the stuff I pulled out of the van so I could FINALLY replace the back seat. I'm glad to have the seat out of here, that means I can prepare to move the snake. He needs a slightly warmer spot in the house now that it's gotten cooler (or as it was in the beginning of the week, down right frigid!). My daughter is ready for me to make Santa's cookies. I, however, am ready for a clean house for a day or two before I do that. Not to mention I don't want everything to go back to this state in time for Christmas Eve...No Way. I need time to wrap the gifts! At least one kid is still awake, which makes wrapping risky. There is also no space to wrap. Must. Clean.

I'm still not sure about that Turkey dinner. Though now I am wishing I had thought to do it for Yule. :/ Maybe I will manage something special that day :)

Ok, enough mindless rambling, I am tired, and likely not making sense. So...Good night!!

Oops, forgot about that

Inspiration from my friend Lisa in her recent "Deck the Hall's" post...I just took pictures of all our Christmas Decorations. Well, most of them. For somethings, like my wreath, it was the first time I'd ever taken a picture of it. Anyway....then I remembered, I can't get them off the camera. At least not until tomorrow when I can get my husband to put them on HIS computer. Gah. >pout<

You see I had been running one computer, since April. A hand-me-down machine, but it worked great....until last Friday when the video card decided NOT to wake up. And still hasn't. Crap. So I'm using my old computer, that prior to April was the main machine I used. It had/has a nasty habit of overheating even though both fans spin freely, and from what we can tell at the proper RPM. No idea. It eventually crashed (shortly after the hand-me-down machine was brought home), so it's using a Live CD version of Ubuntu. Sometimes I can access the harddrive, sometimes I can not. No matter because I don't have the permissions to save anything to that HD. Go figure.

So I talked my kids into cleaning up their rooms, took pictures of their trees and of course them. Looking so cute in their pj's and bed-head. And then to the living room to capture our tree, my beautiful stocking, our "Santa Table", and the kids stockings. Plenty more I could snap pictures of but not with out cleaning up *everything* and it's clean enough for this morning. At least until the coffee kicks in and the headache goes away!

Hopefully I can get those pictures off the camera (and any others that might bring life to my posts) and get them shared, sometime BEFORE the holiday!

I'm also trying to plan a few things for Yule. I want to celebrate it with my kids at least. I would like to make some Sun Bread, and hopefully cut out some snowflakes with the kids, or something else crafty. Of course we will be getting ready to bake our cookies for Santa. (It's interesting being a "new Pagan" in a house hold that celebrates Christmas. My kids enjoy it, so I'll continue, but I want to add to their holiday experience with a bit of my own "stuff")

Ah well, time to end this, I need to get ready to head out for our Saturday errands :D Hope you all have a great weekend!

Thanksgiving Dinner for NYE?

I want to roast a turkey. Or a chicken.  And I want it to come out right.  I'm torturing myself sitting here thinking about the two turkeys I got to enjoy this Thanksgiving....and I am drooling. They were very different, and both so good.

I'm sure my husband wouldn't turn down the idea. The frozen birds are out for Christmas...and if I wait a bit I could get a good deal! Then I could do it for New Years. Crazy? We need to make room in our freezer for sure lol

I'm not sure if I want to tackle a lot of sides. But I can't just stuff the bird. I should totally make a pie! What kind of pie....probably apple pie. And...hmm green bean casserole? I'll have to get Hubby's opinion on that one.  He's working that day, but if I time it going in the oven right, it can be done an hour or two after he gets home....the kids get to stay up late anyway ;)

It sounds like fun, which is weird to say, but it does. It also sounds a little stressful because I wouldn't want it to be under cooked. Then what would I serve?? I'd have no room for frozen pizza, and you'll wait 3 hours on NYE to get delivery.

there is also the whole...I don't have a roasting pan...thing.

So, should I buy the roasting pan and roast a turkey? or chicken?

I am not one to have many 'creative' or 'original' ideas....which you get used to eventually. Business name ideas, using "old" names for your kids thinking the trends are still edging toward new more "trendy" names....and then running in to no fewer than 8 little boys with the same nickname. And one with the same first & middle. Yeah. Well, at least I know it's a good name, right?

This is a common theme in my life...and it extends to the kitchen. I cook what I know...and I don't know squat! But, I love watching 'cooking shows'. Master Chef, Hell's Kitchen, Iron Chef these are some of my favorites. Probably because the only time I get to watch Food Network or Food TV, whatever it's called now, is when Paula Dean is on. Now, there is nothing wrong with Paula Dean, but, we can't eat "southern style" all the time with out greatly increasing our pants sizes. And quite frankly, I'd like mine to get SMALLER!! Not that my idea will actually achieve that goal either.

Last night as I was cleaning up the kitchen I opened that cabinet over the fridge (you know the one you can't reach so the stuff you never use gets shoved in there when you unpack?...yeah that one) and I pulled out a book my grandmother sent me when I got married. Every time I had attempted to use the book before I either didn't have the proper equipment, or couldn't find enough of the ingredients, or both. Well, now there are still a lot of things I don't have, and probably a lot of things I can't find, but now I know I can find substitutions by doing a Google search.

So I went through the cookbook, and I cut apart post-it notes (I have an over-abundance of regular post it notes) and marked roughly 72 NEW things to try to cook, or to draw inspiration from. This is also in an effort to learn how to cook, so I can come up with some things of my own. Sometime I would really love is a great cookbook for veggies, mostly as sides, but as the main dish would be ok...I just don't know how to cook veggies and they're ALWAYS gross. Overcooked, undercooked, or just, yucky.

So, in a perfect world I would cook 4 new things a week, but if I go by budget it will probably just be 1 or two. I *have* to have a 'back up' I do have kids to feed!! The next step in this task will be deciding when to cook what. I need to look at ingredients and see what I can get and what I'll need to wait for....AND what I can plan to GROW! YAY! Garden ideas!! Another thing I needed. Too bad it's fracking December and the ground is nearly rock hard and I did zero prepping.

Well, I should get back to the cookbook, and my menu planning :D

Beat it back!!! Beat it back!!!!!

The laundry monster dropped 2 more loads of clean crap on my couch. Ugh. As if today wasn't fun enough, a SNAFU from our insurance company leaving us driving illegally.....It's being resolved by switching to another company!! This was the last FU!! Along with a few other issues that totally sucked up my morning in to waiting around and driving around, getting VERY little accomplished.

My deadline of 8pm on Saturday to get this stuff all folded and put away is rushing forward like a freight train and some how, my clean kitchen, and dining area is messy again!! So, I NEED to do that (yes, I do) and I NEED to clean the kids bathroom..but oh yeah....I forgot to mention my spray bottle the other day. You see, I prefer to use my own cleaners, especially in my small, difficult to vent bathrooms....And I was mid-bathtub-scrub when my spray bottle decided to shit parts. It was great. I haven't yet been to the store for ANYTHING much less a bottle replacement.

I am trying to eat something before Insurance Man calls me back to give me the quotes and then take my money. I have a strong feeling that when I pull my leftovers out of the toaster oven, my phone will ring. Oh, it went *ding*...yes, my toaster oven goes *ding!*

Make that, my slightly crispy, leftovers....and the phone didn't ring........yet. Of course it's BLAZING hot and a bite or two to calm the noises in my stomach would just lead to a lovely tongue scalding, and a string of explicatives.

So....while I wait on my food to cool to edible temperatures, I will continue to shoot myself in the foot by moving laundry and collecting laundry from around the house. Then HOPEFULLY I'll eat. Do something with the dishes in the dishwasher and the sink. Sweep the floor, send the kids outside with a snack, clean up the table, start dinner, get the kids clean, and ready for bed, find everything for the LAST GAME OF THE SEASON!!!, and then put the kids to bed, sit down with my bottle'o'Stoli and fold laundry. (Don't worry, I'm a light weight, I'll likely mix 2 shots in something fruity or bubbly (soda) and sip it over the course of 3 hours while mindlessly staring at the tube and folding things)

Well, here's to hoping you're all having a lovely Friday, and have a great weekend!!

SEVEN DAYS UNTIL HARRY POTTER AND THE DEATHLY HALLOWS!!! (this and my children are the only things bringing smiles to my face right now)

WHY?!

Sometimes, you have to just wonder "wtf were they thinking"...especially when it comes to previous home owners....You know what I'm talking about.

You move in to a new place and it's great, everything is wonderful because NOTHING has to stay the same. Then life happens, and all those changes you wanted to make are still a list in a drawer. No, I'm not digging out my list and making those home improvements, life is still to busy happening. But what I am doing is cleaning. And this is not a new occurrence, but after 6 years in the same house I find myself wondering again and again "wtf were they thinking?!"

For instance. Why did you tile the bathroom counter tops? I know it's pretty, I KNOW it's hard to stain. Ok, so maybe I understand why you tiled the counter tops. But WHY ARE THEY WHITE?! You had children when you lived here, they were young, much like mine are. Which means...well, those of you with kids know what it means. It means that white grout, is no longer white. Hasn't been in years. And not for lack of trying!! While those pretty white tiles remain stain free, that white grout has taken on many colors. Blue for instance. That tooth paste can sometimes leave quite the stubborn stain. It will take a few sessions of scrubbing to get that out. Orangey brown is another. I have no idea what this came from....soap residue?? Either way, it too stains like the dickens. Maybe it's because I don't use bleach? Maybe I don't let my baking soda paste sit long enough. Maybe I am just *that* bad of a house keeper?

But I noticed this week, while in an attempt to not fold and put away the laundry, as I was cleaning the bathroom, just how much of a bad choice the white on white was. The floor tiles (yep, tile there too!!!) are not white, they're a very, very light grey. The grout.....was white. *sigh* I took out the old tooth brush and set to scrubbing the counters while glancing down at the floor every few minutes. You see I clean the bathroom from the top down...which you'll see was a mistake this week! Anyway, I'm scrubbing the counter tops and finally making a difference on the grout and I am wondering how in the hell I am going to manage enough elbow grease to do this to the floor. You see, I was in my bathroom, which is no where near as stained as the kids. The grout in there is like a battle ground for cleaning products, natural and chemical alike. And no one wins. When I was finished scrubbing the counter and wiped away all the spray (clorox green works...rather diluted) with water and a cleaning rag I looked at my counter and said "WHY, WHY must they be WHITE!!" and then I remembered. Her kids weren't little when they re-did the bathroom counters and floors. Oh no. They were 13 and 8. Yeah. That's why they're white...



SO a plea to all of you childless homeowners. Do yourselves, and future owners with kids a HUGE favor. Do not use your floor or counter tops to "brighten" the bathroom with tile and WHITE grout. Please.....PLEASE.....PLEEEAAAASSE!!!

The Red Tent has gone live :)

I was to excited, and wasn't getting any submissions with out stories already on The Red Tent, so I decided to go live, I added my children's birth stories first, and I have a few set up in the schedule to be posted over the next few days.

I would LOVE more stories, ANY birth story you have, PLEASE share it! And birth art, and book/website recommendations!

http://redtenttopics.blogspot.com/

My apologies...

As the Summer wanes to Fall my attentions turn inward toward the self and home. I am mentally preparing for my next blogging journey and finding it more and more difficult to tend to this one. My mind just isn't here. I am excited to start collecting stories from my friends, and anticipate having much to share regarding my thoughts on pregnancy, birth and mothering. I hope that it will be "easier" to come up with subject matter, and I'm sure I won't be lacking the content to publish something at least every other day.

Soccer is in 'full swing' with practice on Tuesday evening and a game on Saturday afternoon. He is enjoying it, but boy is he the awkward child. He is not as physically capable as many of the other boys on his team. His body does not seem to move his mind thinks it does. Maybe next year we'll try something different? I would like them each to have a physical activity.

Schooling has taken a new turn, we are currently writing the first of 3 papers that need to be turned in to the state to asses how he is doing in school. I hate it. They didn't give us our topic until the 7th of October and it's due on the 15th of October. Now, I love to write, especially if I have a topic given to me. (as long as I know a little about it). His topic is "a wish he would like to have granted" his paper mentions NOTHING of the topic for starters. Most of it is incomplete sentences, sentence fragments, and none of it follows the "thesis statement" or "topic sentence"

My attention has also turned to the house, I spent several hours last Tuesday throwing away 2 bags of trash, and several boxes that had been broken down and saved, cut apart and saved, or given to the children as "toys" and therefore destroyed. All out of my bedroom! I was planning on getting in there and doing it again yesterday but as I said in a facebook status "Tuesday stole Monday's name tag". We couldn't find the girl's leotard before ballet, managed to forget her ballet and tap shoes, AND she peed in her pull up on the way to ballet. Which of course I didn't remember to bring another.

This weekend I will be attending a childbirth educator teacher training, and I am every excited and looking forward to jumping in and trying to absorb everything! I am eager to begin teaching, but first I need to find a place to teach!!! I talked briefly with my chiropractor, and he agreed to sit down and talk with me, and said as long as my classes were during "operating hours" that would be fine. And then, I went outside....into their nightmare of a parking lot. I love our the group, and I love their office, but their parking lot is too small for a class of 3-5 or hopefully as many as 8-10 couples, PLUS their regular Saturday appointments and walk-ins. That's ok though! I had been talking to a friend of mine that works at the library, so I'll just have to go talk to her about it again...and ask my chiropractors to come and talk on the days I cover chiropractic care in pregnancy.