So much has changed...

So much has changed in life. We ended up having to move out of my high school friend's house shortly after I wrote the last post because she chose to invite her husband back home. They didn't kick us out. I chose to move quickly since I wasn't going to be living in a house with someone who I was told used drugs. I have no first hand knowledge if he does or doesn't but I wasn't going to sit around and hope for the best. I chose to move out quickly and let her have her life with her husband that she took back. It has pretty much ruined all the years of friendship that we did have since I couldn't trust her not to lie to me any more. She had told me not even two days prior she wasn't talking to him at all and had no way to contact him. That was a lie when she could manage to show up on the porch with him so quickly after. Any way it is over and after a short stint borrowing the basement of a friend of a friend we finally have our own apartment.

It isn't exactly how I had pictured my life but we needed a roof over our head and a place that would allow our oversized dog. We have a little 3 bedroom apartment with a patio. The patio area even has a small place where the dogs can relieve themselves without doing so on the patio. It has been hard trying to fit our stuff in the apartment because we had a much bigger place in England and The Man seems to lean toward hoarder tendencies. We are happy to at least have a place to call our own after this time.

The Man is still unemployed and my trying to find a minimum wage job after this time hasn't proven to be successful either. When I interviewed at a local fast food restaurant the woman conducting the interview asked me why I would want a job there when I was so educated. I haven't worked since 2006 and when I did I was a hairstylist. I would like to get back into hairstyling if I can manage to find a place to take me with the gap in work. I do and have a license to do hair since 1999. It has taken me 3 months to get the reciprocity process done to get my license in Washington again. 3 months sure feels like a really long time when you are waiting on something so important. It finally arrived today.

The Man has an interview tomorrow. It is for a company that one of the other apartment people told him about. He had a phone interview with the company on Monday and tomorrow a face to face interview. I am really hoping he gets this job and that it will have hours that I am still able to do hair around. Being out of the comfort of the military paycheck is very stressful because we have bills to pay. Unemployment had kept us afloat until this point  but a job would help even more. I think that we are both going to have to work for a while if we can swing it to continue to pay the debt we have.

Now, that I have rambled on for a while I will let you be for today.

Talk to you soon

Have a super fabulous wonderful day !!

Life in Limbo... Still

Life is still in limbo. The Man is home from over there. It is nice to have him home because we are all together as a family. I love my little (or big) family. We are still staying with my friend from high school. This is still not an ideal situation but we have a roof over our heads and we are all together right now and safe. Life threw us some curve balls and we are trying our best to work with those.

The Man made it home almost two weeks ago. He is now out of the military. They were not nice and gave him less than a week notice to get the house stuff and vehicle shipped because some computer stuff was getting shut down or some other line of b.s. It also ended up costing us our final paycheck because he wasn't able to get the house cleaned properly to turn over to the housing people so it gave us less money to live on while he is unemployed. Yippee! Things don't ever seem to work out how I plan but they always seem to work out somehow in the end.

He has applied for a bunch of jobs and we are waiting to hear back from unemployment and the food stamps office. I am hoping that unemployment and food stamps can help get us through for the month or so til we can get back on our feet hopefully. I am also going to send out my papers to get my cosmetology license up here so that I can get work up here too if need be. I just didn't want to get a hair job and then quit because I loved doing hair so much before and I wont want to give up my independence again to stay at home again and The Man has the ability to make so much more money with better benefits. Once he does get a job though I will possibly see if there is some way that I can work part time around his schedule though because I would like to get back out there and do something for myself and feel like I am contributing more than just housework to the house.

The job loss hasn't affected the kids yet as they really haven't noticed anything other than their dad is home, which is exactly what I had hoped for when I moved them back. S's grades are improving and he is doing better in school. T is still doing amazing in school. The two little ones are working at potty training. It would be a miracle if I could stop buying diapers and pull ups (the lady I live with will not let me wash cloth ones in her washer).

Update on Me

Well life is in limbo at the moment. The kids and I are in the states. The Man is still over there finishing up his time. He is being booted, for lack of a better word. He was originally going to be booted for not making his rank but he is now being booted for failing his PT test. He had surgery and couldn't pass a PT test 6 weeks after and couldn't pass. This isn't the first time this has happened to him. This is the third or fourth time this has happened. His body is falling apart. So after 15 years of serving for the military he is going to be out on his butt and in the real world. I am trying to see this as a blessing in disguise. Really, it scares the crap out of me!

Currently, the kids and I are staying at a friends house. This has been a nightmare. She has not grown up at all and acts like she is still a carefree teenager, even though she is in her 30s and has children of her own. I came here to try to help her out of a bad relationship and to try to help my kids transition into the real world before The Man lost his job. I feel like I have done a huge disservice to my oldest boy. She will not get a job or even make a good effort at putting in applications. She will not discipline her oldest child and he is mean, mouthy, and a bully to my oldest. She sleeps all day if I do not wake her up and make her get out of bed. She seems to think this world owes her something. I know I should not complain about her like this. She is my friend and has been my friend since high school but I really do not know how to help her. I really would like to see her succeed at life. I would like to see her be able to take care of herself and her children without depending on everybody else around her to do everything for her. Everybody around her tries to help her just to try to help her get a leg up in life but it seems she has come to expect it at this point.

I was started on Topamax for my health problems and have been stepping up to the full dose for the past several weeks. It has been helping my migraines. They don't come on nearly as often as they were or as strong which is good. I have lost about 10ish pounds since starting it. I cant be certain if this is from the medicine or from all the stress I have been under but weight loss is part of what the doctors wanted. I do have the tingling in the hands and feet which is very irritating. I was hoping to be able to go back doing hair when The Man came back but I cannot do that if my hands are tingling. I am hoping once I am on the full dose for a while it will start going away. Also, I have noticed that my face will start twitching occasionally. It must not be too bad because I asked my friend if she could see it and she couldn't and I asked The Man if he could see it and he couldn't. I can see it in the mirror if I remember to try to look but of course I am more judgmental of myself probably.

The three little kids are doing great. They did awesome on the airplane over here and they adjusted to the time difference within the first week pretty well. My oldest is still struggling a bit. He is having a hard time fitting in at school. I knew this was going to be the case because I have personal experience at this exact thing. Going from being a military dependent child, going to a DOD school, with other military dependent children, then moving to a town where most of the children have lived and gone to school with the same children their whole lives is very hard. These children have had the same friends their whole lives, their parents already know one another and it is very hard to fit into a clique. I was the same age as my oldest son is now when we moved to this very same school district when my dad retired from the military. It took me until I was in 9th grade (2 whole years) and joined the dance team until I really felt like I fit in somewhere. It also doesn't help that my friend's son is being a bit of a bully at school to my son. I have tried to talk to her and she blows it off. It is very frustrating. My son has three F's right now. This is heart breaking to me. This is from a kid who normally has all A's and B's. We did come part way through a quarter so that counts into it so in a couple weeks it will wipe clean and he will be able to start over and try again but it is still frustrating.

If you made it this far. Wow!  Thanks for reading. I hope you have a super fabulous wonderful day.

Dear Life

Dear Life,
      I love you! I would, though, like you to please stop working against the well laid plans that I have. I have been working my butt off to make sure everything works the best I can but you are throwing a few too many curve balls at me. Please if you would take a break on the surprises and let everything run a bit smoother for the next little bit I would be eternally grateful.
                                                                               Yours Truly,
                                                                                The crazy lady trying to catch your curve balls

Donation Box

It is getting to be that time of year again when the boxes are out to donate food or toys for less fortunate people. Today while picking up a few groceries for ourselves we also picked up a handful of shelf stable items for The Man to take to his work donation box. K and I also picked up a donation list when we walked into one of the stores and decided to pick up a few of the items for their donation box as well. It isn't much, but I figure if everybody just dug the change out of their car and donated whatever they could buy with it then the boxes would fill quite quickly.

I also took the opportunity to teach K that giving to others was a good thing to do. I explained that certain items that went into our cart were for ourselves and then certain items were for daddy to take to the work donation box and certain items were to drop off with the lady by the big box who gave us a piece of paper. When we checked out I put all of those items in a bag and had him hand them to the lady as we walked out. I am not sure if he totally understands at the age of three but it is definitely not too early to start trying to teach compassion and giving.

We don't have a lot of extras, but I feel it is important to give if I can because at one time or another we all hit rough spots. I have been there and had help. I am glad that I had that help at the time and feel like if I can help even in the slightest way, I should try. I am not perfect, nor would I recommend giving to the point it makes your own life harder, but I think helping out others is important. It also makes you feel pretty darn good that you could be a part of the good that is left in the world.

There are many ways to donate especially at this time of year. The local food pantries are always in need of donations. Most accept money as well as food. The McDonald's has coin boxes to drop your change in to help out families who need to use the Ronald McDonald House. Stores will start having boxes for food or toys to help over the holidays. Usually right before school starts, places will take donations of school supplies. Charity shops like Goodwill or The Salvation Army take donations and use the proceeds of the sales to help out people in need. Not all donations must me monetary either, time is just as valuable. Animal shelters generally have volunteers to help train and walk animals so they can be re homed. Soup kitchens have volunteers to serve up meals to the people who come to eat a nice meal.

Currently we donate food, toys, or clothes the most, but as my children age I hope to find more opportunities to teach them about donating. It makes me feel good for being able to help out and also makes me stop and be thankful for the wonderful things that we do have in our life even if we don't have the best or newest.

Just Some Updates

I am finally feeling mostly better. It got colder here and we turned on the heat and my head got all stuffy and I got a bit of a cough. It hasn't been good because I have felt drained but today I am feeling much better.

The Man has been working days now for about 3 weeks. WOOHOO! I can't tell you how happy this makes me. I love having him home at night. We haven't slept in bed at the same time much our whole marriage due to his work schedules. This has also been awesome for him because he hasn't been as tired and his body has been feeling better. I tried to convince him that nights was rough on a person but he didn't believe me. He is just hoping that he can convince the higher powers that this is a good change and that he can keep this schedule for a while.

I have weaned my last breast fed baby now. It is a sad and a happy time for me. It is sad that I will not ever have another tiny baby of my own but I am happy that life is progressing. It has also been nice because she is now sleeping through the night most nights. I love my sleep. Even though I have a rough time falling asleep, it is nice to be able to stay asleep after I do actually fall asleep.

T is doing wonderful in kindergarten. He likes being able to go and play and hang out with other kids his age. I think he is a bit of a busy body but the teacher hasn't complained as of yet.

S is doing good in school too. He started playing the clarinet last year and is taking intermediate band this year. I love listening to him play his music. I never learned to play any instruments so I think it s wonderful that he has picked it up and progressed so well. He is also doing awesome in math as usual. He struggles a bit in social studies but I cant complain too much as he still has pretty great grades.

K does so much better now that T is in school. Our only struggle with him at the moment is that he doesn't like waking up from bed or nap to have to get ready and walk to the school to drop off or pick up T. I think he gets this from me. He is much nicer and calmer since T started school too. I think maybe T's craziness affects the kids a bit too.

H is now 18 months and wow she is quite different than any of the boys. She is smart and loves to help me with my housework. The boys never quite wanted to help and still don't like when they have to help. She is picking up many words and has some great baby dance moves. She dances all the time when I put the music on while I do housework. She is growing like a weed. I think someone forgot to tell these kids that I wasn't ready for them to all grow up so fast.

I think The Man and I have figured out where we want to move. I think we are going to go to Washington. I lived there as a teen and went through junior high, high school, and beauty school there. It is a lot like here as far as the weather goes. I like the weather here. It isn't crazy high heats or lots of feet of snow. I will be near some of my friends that I have kept in touch with. My dad's side of the family is also there, except for him. It is also isn't much difference in driving time from Arizona to The Man's family so that will be nice too. I am going to go back early with the kids to get a job and get set up for when he is released from the military. We both wish he could just go the extra 4.5 years to retire but the odds are not in his favor for that.

I am having a lot of stress over life in general but things are pretty good too. I have to keep reminding myself of that.

Have a great day!

Moms need sick days too

I am not feeling well today. My head hurts and my sinuses are stuffed up. I really wish I could have a sick day to drink hot tea and lay in bed all day. Unfortunately, that isn't going to happen. I had to be up at the crack of dawn to get two of my kids off to school and stay up to take care of the other two. Wouldn't it be nice if being a stay at home mommy came with a couple sick days too?

I hope everyone has a great day!

Stress is not good for me

I failed at getting all the laundry done this week. The past two weeks I have been caught up by Friday. This week I only got about half done. I did get other things in the house done and cleaned the van which is a whole task on its own. I have been feeling very stressed and down trying to figure out what to do about the future since The Man didn't make his rank and most likely wont have a job come next year.

I am scared! I do not want to think that after all these years that we can just up and be left without a place to live or any income. It is sad to know that you are just a number and can be replaced at the drop of a hat. I keep trying to think of new plans or ideas. I keep running into road blocks due to the fact we are stationed overseas until the end. It makes me sick to my stomach. It gives me headaches. I cant sleep. It is terrible. I am going to have to go to the doctor and see if they can give me something to help calm me. It is ruining my life. I don't want to stress and be miserable.

I don't know how people make it when they lose their jobs. We wont have a place to live since we have been living in base housing our whole marriage and we are supposed to be stuck here til the end. Then we have no where. Military life while a tough one has been good to us. We have had medical insurance and dental insurance. We have had a roof over our head and a steady pay check. The Man has been in the military his whole adult life. He does not have any other kind of job experience. I have been a stay at home mom for almost 6 years now since I was put on bed rest with T. I was a hairstylist. I haven't been working so I am a little out of the loop. I am sure they have changed or improved techniques since I started staying home. I am not up on current trends or hairstyles either. I was and am still good at doing hair cuts and colors. I have been cutting my family's hair and coloring friends' hair since I have been home but I haven't had any salon experience. The only other job I have had was working fast food. I am not even sure how easy getting a job in fast food is in this day in age. I read the news about how many, many people are jobless but I have not been living in the USA for over 3 years now. I have not seen it first hand. I am scared to be thrown out on our behinds and then not be able to find jobs as well. This is the scariest time in my life. I do not like it one bit and I am not handling it well. I need some answers and soon or I will probably go loony.

Anybody Out There??

Does anybody actually read my blog? If so would you please leave a comment and say hi?

I keep checking my page counts and it appears that there a few people who read it but I don't know how to tell if the page counts are me coming to find the blogs I follow. I do have it clicked so that it isn't supposed to count me but I don't know if that works or not.

Anyway, if there are people reading......HHHHHEEELLLLLLOOOOOOOOOO!!!!! And, I hope you have a fabulous day!!

Whew, more done

I didn't know that when Child #2, T, went off to kindergarten this year that my life while a lot busier surely seems a lot easier. The two kids at home with me all day are much calmer and more willing to do whatever I need to do without fuss. T is a high energy kid who needs to be entertained at every given moment. I thought it was just me being a lazy person when I couldn't keep my housework caught up. It probably was partly my fault, but I now know that I was spending a good portion of my day running behind T dealing with his fighting with his siblings or making more messes. I have been caught up on my laundry and dishes for the whole two weeks since T started kindergarten. It feels so great to see the bottom of the laundry closet or walk into my kitchen and not see a whole sink full of dishes. I love T with all my heart but I really didn't realize what  handful he was. I really cross my fingers that he is being much better behaved at school. I did ask his teacher and she said he was doing great.

Do you have a high needs child? How do you deal with the needs while getting everything else in your life done?

Getting off WIC

Originally, I was going to get off WIC when The Man made got a promotion and a raise. The promotion and raise didn't happen, but after a few months I have decided I am going to give it a go and try to go without it anyway. I was supposed to go in and do my recertification this week and I didn't feel good about having to go in and get WIC again so I cancelled my appointment. Could we use it? Sure we could, it is a big help when money is tight. Do we need it? I don't *think* so. I really feel that we in our house should change our priorities and try to go without it. I dont like depending on others when it is not a need. In a year, if things are worse than they are now, since The Man probably wont have a job, we will reconsider our options. I am hoping that things will get better even with the chance of The Man losing his job. Our priorities in life have changed quite a bit from even a few years ago and we are going to do our best to keep our heads up even in the rough times and try to get through it in one piece.

I am in no way bashing WIC or anybody who receives it. It is an AWESOME program that provides food for women, infants, and children. It has been a great help for us during our times of need. I am just hoping for my family to try to become a little more self sufficient and for me sometimes it takes just jumping in feet first.

Good Week but Dealing with Jealousy

We are on our second week of school for T and third week for S. It seems to be going well. I feel like last week just flew by. I had been spoiled by the fact that S had been old enough to walk to the bus stop by himself for the past couple of years and that I didnt have to get up and get dressed. This year, we all have to get up and dressed every weekday. S still walks himself to the bus stop since he has to be on the bus and gone before we pass his stop. The three littlest and I get ready and have walked every day so far to take T to kindergarten. It has been a bit hectic getting everyone ready and out the door but found that me getting up and getting dressed to walk him to school has made my day start earlier even though I was waking up the same time last year. I didn't have to actually get up and get people ready or lunch made or do any exercise. My legs actually hurt last week from the walking.

Once the two littlest and I get home from taking T to school, I let them watch a few minutes of TV and start a load of dishes and laundry. I even managed to get all the laundry done for the past two weeks in a row. This is a big feat for me. I am going to make sure to do it again this week. It felt so good to get to the end of the pile before Friday and not have to do laundry on the weekend, other than helping S with his laundry.

I found out this past week that I have a bit of an issue with jealousy. I never thought I could or would be a jealous person. I have been a stay at home mom for 6 years now and been living here with no friends around for the past 2 years. I never paid much attention to the people when I went shopping or out and about. Well, last week when T started kindergarten The Man went with us the first day and found out that one of his coworkers children was in T's class. He introduced me to his coworker and his coworker's wife. She is beautiful! Tall and thin and has a great tan and name brand clothes. Remember, I am fat and frumpy and don't really have any kind of fashion sense. Her children were both decked out in Gymboree clothes, shoes, and accessories from head to toe. I love the clothes and things her little girl was wearing. I haven't bought my daughter many clothes since she has been born because my mom has sent a huge wardrobe and I don't see much sense in spending more money when she has perfectly fine clothes. But man! I really long to be able to dress her in fancy, expensive, matchy-matchy clothes, shoes, and accessories. I also wish I could be tall and skinny and tan. How did this jealousy come over me? It bothers me because I do not want to be a jealous person. I was perfectly fine with the things we have until last week. I am not sure what came over me. It is terrible.

Do you have an issue with jealousy? How do you combat it without trying to keep up with the Jones'?

School Again :)

Here in a couple weeks 2 of our 4 kids will be off to school. S will be going into 7th grade. I am so happy for him as he has done well in school up to this point and should continue to do well this next school year. He has been an A and B student all the way through. He is friendly and outgoing which helps him to meet and get to know lots of people as well.

 T is going to be starting kindergarten. I am a bit nervous for him. He has not been in any kind of structured care since he was born. He has been home with me and his siblings. I am a bit nervous that he will get in trouble for speaking out, or walking around, or not being polite enough. I have worked with him up to this point but he doesn't have much real world experience in this. He is a smart kid, though, so he should pick it up pretty quickly.

I will be home with just the two little ones during the days while the older two are at school. I am not sure what I will do all day since those two don't seem to fight like the bigger ones do. They are also the two who like to help me when I am trying to do laundry, dishes, or other housework. They are much quieter and like to play by themselves a bit more than the bigger ones do too.

The best thing about the school year is the structure. I like when we have a routine and while I do try to keep one up during the summer, it seems everybody else works against me having a set routine. It does make adding some extra things in a bit harder but I do better when things are more structured.

Where to live?

For the past 7+ years I have been married to The Man and his career. The military has moved us where they needed us to be and it wasn't much of a choice to us. We have lived in military housing for most of this as well. We are faced with the real possibility that his career could end as early as next year. It could also extend out for about 5 more years if things fall into place and he is able to retire. Retirement from the military has always our plan. That was our plan til they changed the rules.

We are now in the discussions of where to live. He has been in the military almost 15 years and prior to that always lived in California. I on the other hand was raised a in a military family and moved every couple years til I was going into junior high school when my dad retired and we moved to Washington. When I as a senior in high school my mom's job moved her to Arizona. I never wanted to live in Arizona. It was hot most of the year and nothing to do. I did end up living in Arizona for almost 10 years. That is where The Man and I met and married.

We keep looking at our possibilities. Almost anything is possible but we don't really want to pick something and make a huge mistake. I would love to be able to have a house on several acres so that we can have a large garden and raise a few chickens and possibly goats or a cow. The Man seems to like this idea. We know that depending on where we choose to live this will not be a possibility due to finances. We would ideally like to be close to some friends or family as living here in the UK for three years so far with no friends or family around has been very hard on me. The problem is that when we look at places near family and friends there are a lot of negatives about the places except for the people themselves. We have looked at more ideal places that would be a day or two drive from these people and some of these places seem to be more in the ideal of costs and options that we would like.

How do you pick a place to live and settle down? Do you live near family? Do you like where you live? I really wish I had a magic crystal ball right now. We are both so confused as what to do and will have to make some concrete decisions sooner or later.

Long Time

It has been a long time since I posted. I am sorry. I got really busy and well, the blog just wasn't on the high priority list. So I guess it is time for an update.

I didn't hit my weight loss goal. I went back up to about 205 lbs. I was doing good then got busy and slacked off and ate lots of junk. I have had some health problems that the Dr has now put me on a diet. They are expecting me to be 150 lbs by mid October. I am scared. I am down to 196.something today from the 205 on 16 April. I am using myfitnesspal.com and logging all my food. Some days it is really easy, others like today are not. I am also trying to get The Man on board to lose some weight with me. I am hoping that with both of us doing it together we can challenge and inspire the other. He has been using myfitnesspal too.

I have re registered my oldest son for school for next year. He will be going into 7th grade as long as he keeps up his good grades. I cant believe it, a 7th grader! He will turn 12 this summer and we will sign him up to take the babysitting class. I don't think he will be ready to babysit yet but it will be nice to know he took the class anyway.

I had to register my second son to start kindergarten in the fall. I think he is ready to go but I am nervous for him. He is loud and moves a lot and I am afraid he will struggle with the sitting and being quiet thing. Maybe though he will surprise me because it will be someone else telling him what to do.

My littlest son well he is just darn cute and rotten to the core. I am debating whether to try to enroll him into a preschool in the fall. They have preschool that is free for 15 hours a week here. I am going to have to check a couple of the schools out and see what they are like.

My princess turned one in March. She is crazy and I think going to give the boys a run for their money. She learned to walk around 10-11 months and now refuses to sit still ever. She is in a horrible climbing stage right now where I am constantly after her and taking her off the couch, recliners, coffee table, dining chairs, and dining table. It is crazy. I turn my back and she is up on something. I told my mom I think she is part goat. LOL

We are getting ready to do a challenge in our house with www.livebelowtheline.com. I will post more about it this week and let you see the grocery list of food that we have bought to try this. I am including my children even though they recommend that nobody under 15 attempt it. I think that I have been able to buy a sufficient enough food to feed all of us . It isn't the quality that we are used to eating but it is food.

Til next time
Andrea

Back To Basics

I love to cook and so does The Man. It is no wonder we are overweight. :) I have started to notice that every time we wanted a new recipe we would head on to the internet to look for a recipe while my beautiful cookbooks just sat on the shelf. I wondered if the types of recipes we were looking for were in the cookbooks or not so I have decided to try to look in the cookbooks first and if I cannot find the recipe I need then I will head on over to food.com. I have been getting pretty lucky that a lot of the recipes in the cookbooks are made from staples we keep regularly in our house.

I was looking for a recipe for a pumpkin pie to make homemade for Thanksgiving and of course it is in there. Homemade pie crust and filling. I am super excited to try this.

We decided to try spaghetti squash for the first time but had no idea how to cook it and there is a recipe for that. We will be trying it for dinner tonight so I hope it turns out yummy.

I have pumpkin bread in the oven right now and that recipe came from the cook book.

The book I have been using most is a Better Homes and Gardens cookbook that my mom bought for me several years back. It is similar to the book below but I am not sure that mine is this most current one.

Do you use cookbooks any more or do you find your recipes online?

Bill Paying Day

I do not work outside of the home and The Man is in the military so we get a paycheck twice a month. I am the one responsible for making sure everything to do with the finances is taken care of. On paydays I feel like a chicken with my head cut off. I have to do my normal household and motherly duties and then during nap time get all the online bills paid so that I can wake The Man up and leave to go to the bank, check the mail, fill the cars up with gas, and go grocery shopping. I know that I could stretch this out over several days but keeping it to the actual day of payday doesn't let me get a chance to slip up and forget something. It also doesn't interrupt The Man's sleep that much. While I do feel like a crazy person on paydays, I do love that The Man trusts that I do a good job at keeping the household bills paid on time and food in the house.

Today, I am thankful for a steady paycheck and the means to pay our bills. I am also thankful for The Man who willingly gets up and takes care of all of the kids while I do the payday errands so I do not have to drag all of the kids with me. (Although today K gets to go shopping with me so he can pick out his birthday cake mix and frosting for his birthday this weekend.) I love my family!

I have a headache, I am tired, and my feet hurt....

I have a headache, I am tired, and my feet hurt. Why? Because I spent a good while today deep cleaning parts of the house and shampooing some carpets and rearranging the living room furniture. I also started on a Halloween craft and rode my bike to the store and around the base with S. I feel like I got a lot accomplished today but I still have more I need to do. I have a ton of laundry to do tomorrow. I am hoping to make a huge dent in it so that the rest of the week will run a lot more smoothly.

Life

Life has just gotten away from me recently. I have lost track of time. The Man had surgery on his wrist so he has been home for over a week and we have just been enjoying having him around. Due to his work schedule he is usually sleeping and grumpy during the normal daytime waking hours. He has gone back to work but hopefully he will be able to take some vacation time soon so that we can get a few projects around the house done. I mainly want him to help me sand and paint some furniture. I have fallen in love with shabby chic, shabby cottage, vintage, and antique styling. My goal is to start with my bedroom and make it pretty and frilly and girly. I have lived with the boy colors for far too long and The Man agreed that making our bedroom a sanctuary for me would be great. I am so excited.

I have been half hearted attempting to lose weight. Of course it is much easier when The Man is not home creating gourmet yumminess. I swear he loves me fat. LOL! He does love me fat. He loves me just the way I am but I swear I mention losing weight and he starts baking. I am sure I have gained a few pounds back. Hopefully after the next couple of weeks when school is back in and The Man has gone back to a normal work schedule things will be easier for me to work on.

I am super excited to let you know that I am going to take the motorcycle riding class and get my motorcycle license. I have always wanted to learn but I am now getting the opportunity to do so soon. I am nervous and really wish I had done this when I was a bit younger but I will do it anyway. I have never been in control of a motorcycle so I am hoping the instructor can teach me without me feeling like a complete idiot. I shall update how that goes after I take the class.

Thanks for reading I hope you have a fabulous day!

The Not So Good Very Bad Day

I had a really rough day yesterday. I was trying to get my house cleaned in between feeding the kids and trying to detour the fights between them. For some reason K decided that he was going to be rotten. I would be in the kitchen trying to get lunch and he was in the bathroom trying to flood it. I was trying to feed H and he was getting into the diaper cream, painting himself as well as the house. I turned my back and he had removed his clothes and thrown his diaper across the room. He would not even take a nap. I normally have nap/quiet time in this house after lunch and I just could not get any of my kids to settle down to be quiet or read or nap. The kids not behaving on top of the stress about trying to get H's passport stuff taken care of when someone seems to have lost The Man's passport had me in tears before 3pm. After The Man got home from work and dinner was served and all the kids were in their jammies, I went to the commissary. Everything there went fine but I was off in la la land driving home. I was driving 25 mph in what I thought to be a 25 mph zone only to get pulled over and ticketed for the first time in my life (it was a 20 mph zone). I was devastated and humiliated. It was horrible. Not only did I get a ticket for the first time, I got a ticket on base which means that The Man had to go to his boss and tell him that I had messed up. I spent a good hour bawling my eyes out last night. I ended up going to bed early with a headache just to end the day and start a new better day.

Today was a better day!

I am quite nervous about tomorrow's weigh in. I did really good during the week but this past weekend was hard on the diet. We did go out and do some active things as a family but we ate out twice.