What books have you read?

So because I have absolutely nothing at all to say - aside from there is unpacking, organizing, and all that jazz ... I am participating in this:


I found this meme from Bookfoolery and Babble.
If you read it, you are automatically tagged. And I read it, so I am counting myself tagged!
Look at the list of books below:
* Bold the ones you’ve read
* Italicize the ones you want to read
* Leave blank the ones that you aren’t interested in.
* If you are reading this, tag, you’re it!
**If there are any books on this list that I didn't italicize and you think I should read, let me know in comments! Also, what other books do you think belong on this list and why?

I've personalized a bit by highlighting the ones I started and did not finish (either because I just couldn't or didn't want to!).

1. The DaVinci Code (Dan Brown)
2. Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen)
3. To Kill A Mockingbird (Harper Lee)
4. Gone With The Wind (Margaret Mitchell)
5. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (Tolkien)
6. The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring (Tolkien)
7. The Lord of the Rings: Two Towers (Tolkien)
8. Anne of Green Gables (L.M. Montgomery)
9. Outlander (Diana Gabaldon)
10. A Fine Balance (Rohinton Mistry)
11. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Rowling)
12. Angels and Demons (Dan Brown)
13. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Rowling)
14. A Prayer for Owen Meany (John Irving)
15. Memoirs of a Geisha (Arthur Golden)
16. Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (Rowling)
17. Fall on Your Knees (Ann-Marie MacDonald)
18. The Stand (Stephen King)
19. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (Rowling)
20. Jane Eyre (Charlotte Bronte)
21. The Hobbit (Tolkien)
22. The Catcher in the Rye (J.D. Salinger)
23. Little Women (Louisa May Alcott)
24. The Lovely Bones (Alice Sebold)
25. Life of Pi (Yann Martel)
26. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Douglas Adams)
27. Wuthering Heights (Emily Bronte)
28. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (C. S. Lewis)
29. East of Eden (John Steinbeck)
30. Tuesdays with Morrie (Mitch Albom)
31. Dune (Frank Herbert)
32. The Notebook (Nicholas Sparks)
33. Atlas Shrugged (Ayn Rand)
34. 1984 (Orwell)
35. The Mists of Avalon (Marion Zimmer Bradley)
36. The Pillars of the Earth (Ken Follett)
37. The Power of One (Bryce Courtenay)
38. I Know This Much is True (Wally Lamb)
39. The Red Tent (Anita Diamant)
40. The Alchemist (Paulo Coelho)
41. The Clan of the Cave Bear (Jean M. Auel)
42. The Kite Runner (Khaled Hosseini)
43. Confessions of a Shopaholic (Sophie Kinsella)
44. The Five People You Meet In Heaven (Mitch Albom)
45. The Bible
46. Anna Karenina (Tolstoy)
47. The Count of Monte Cristo (Alexandre Dumas)
48. Angela’s Ashes (Frank McCourt)
49. The Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck)
50. She’s Come Undone (Wally Lamb)
51. The Poisonwood Bible (Barbara Kingsolver)
52. A Tale of Two Cities (Dickens)
53. Ender’s Game (Orson Scott Card)
54. Great Expectations (Dickens)
55. The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald)
56. The Stone Angel (Margaret Laurence)
57. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Rowling)
58. The Thorn Birds (Colleen McCullough)
59. The Handmaid’s Tale (Margaret Atwood)
60. The Time Traveller’s Wife (Audrew Niffenegger)
61. Crime and Punishment (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)
62. The Fountainhead (Ayn Rand)
63. War and Peace (Tolstoy)
64. Interview With The Vampire (Anne Rice)
65. Fifth Business (Robertson Davis)
66. One Hundred Years Of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)
67. The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (Ann Brashares)
68. Catch-22 (Joseph Heller)
69. Les Miserables (Hugo)
70. The Little Prince (Antoine de Saint-Exupery)
71. Bridget Jones’ Diary (Fielding)
72. Love in the Time of Cholera (Marquez)
73. Shogun (James Clavell)
74. The English Patient (Michael Ondaatje)
75. The Secret Garden (Frances Hodgson Burnett)
76. The Summer Tree (Guy Gavriel Kay)
77. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (Betty Smith)
78. The World According to Garp (John Irving)
79. The Diviners (Margaret Laurence)
80. Charlotte's Web (E.B. White)
81. Not Wanted On The Voyage (Timothy Findley)
82. Of Mice And Men (Steinbeck)
83. Rebecca (Daphne DuMaurier)
84. Wizard’s First Rule (Terry Goodkind)
85. Emma (Jane Austen)
86. Watership Down(Richard Adams)
87. Brave New World (Aldous Huxley)
88. The Stone Diaries (Carol Shields)
89. Blindness (Jose Saramago)
90. Kane and Abel (Jeffrey Archer)
91. In The Skin Of A Lion (Ondaatje)
92. Lord of the Flies (Golding)
93. The Good Earth (Pearl S. Buck)
94. The Secret Life of Bees (Sue Monk Kidd)
95. The Bourne Identity (Robert Ludlum)
96. The Outsiders (S.E. Hinton)
97. White Oleander (Janet Fitch)
98. A Woman of Substance (Barbara Taylor Bradford)
99. The Celestine Prophecy (James Redfield)
100. Ulysses (James Joyce)


So that is 42 read, 14 want to read and 3 partially read.
Not so bad ...

Another week ....

Another week is starting.
I think I am almost ready for it to start, but ready or not, here it comes!
I shouldn't say that. We have made tremendous progress on our house this weekend and that feels wonderful! The living room is almost clear of boxes and there were plenty here on Friday. Our garage is still a bit of a mess though. But now that the living room is cleared out, we can bring another stack of boxes in the house. Dh will work on organizing the garage as some of the boxes are actually supposed to stay out there (christmas decorations and the like). I am ready to be unpacked and organized and finally into a good schedule with the little ones.
Aside from that, this week should probably prove to be on the boring side. Not too much to do outside of working on the house. And really at this point, enough is done that I probably won't do anything until the weekend when dh can be here and we can tag team with the kids. I do plan on taking one day and just driving around this town. I'd like to find the library, parks, grocery stores, etc, etc.
Nothing to special, although I have to say. I welcome a slow week full of nothing to do! I think it's just what the doctor ordered for me! =)

Breathe

Right now I am just trying to relax and breathe.
The NEW furnace is not working. The furnace I just paid a heck of a lot of money for is NOT WORKING. So they came to look at it today and they say that the problem most certainly is not their furnace, it's our ductwork. Granted the ductwork was fine BEFORE the new furnace was installed and the old furnace was actually a higher BTU furnace.
But it's okay. It's okay. I am going to just relax. And I'm going to breathe. And I'm going to let my dh call and tell them to get out here and fix it.
Anyway, the last few mornings we have woken up to the house being, oh, 58-60 degrees. It's not very warm and I don't appreciate it.
But, I will let my husband deal with it. I have to admit, I'm starting to wonder if the house might just in fact be cursed. I'm trying not to. But our new TV is not working properly. The new furnace is not working. The fridge breaking the other day, the water heater, the dryer, I can't help but wonder what will break next. Despite wondering about it what might break next, I am trying to not make it a thought at the forefront of my mind.

And a few good things have happened to help me not stress too much about all that is not working and breaking around here.
First, neighbors came over today to say hi and introduce themselves! And they were very nice and brought us some very tastey blueberry bread. YUM! It is almost all gone and it was brought over, oh 2 hours ago? The only reason there is any left is because we decided to save some for dh who is out. On an interesting note, my son's name is C---- T---- (and then our last name). The husband's name next door is T----- C-----***. So I won't be forgetting his name anytime soon! LOL!

***Adding to this .. the neighbor's first name is my son's middle name and my neighbor's last name is my son's first name. I commonly call my son by first and middle name as one, so their names are the same, just switched. IE if the neighbor were named John Doe then you can assume my son is Doe John. (obviously I have not used th real name to illustrate this point.)

Also, someone came to look at the water heater today. He says it's fixed. I have no reason to doubt him. So tonight, I am hoping and wishing I can finally try out my whirlpool bathtub. And the timing will be perfect as we are supposed to get a snow/sleet/ice/rain storm starting late this afternoon and continuing through Monday. So, a nice warm bath is exactly what I think I'll need.

And we've unpacked a few more boxes. Dh has lots of plans tomorrow to hang up curtain rods and get curtains up and all kind of fun things like that. It's starting to come together and that's a good feeling for sure!

Retail Therapy ...

Nothing like a bit of retail therapy to cheer up the mood.
And tonight dh and I shopped. And we shopped. We hit one Bed, Bath & Beyond and two different Target stores. Let me just say, I am not really poor. And let me also say that we spent enough that Target called to verify I made the purchases and someone did not steal my credit card and go crazy. But we needed things for this house and so we bought them. And I even liked everything we got! We changed things a bit from the original plan so soon I will need to paint the basement bathroom, but that shouldn't be too bad. For now the items in the bathroom don't match the wall so well, but I'll live with it for now!
And yes, I am feeling a bit better about everything - although the dryer is still broken along with the water heater. But I had a realization today - I had been saying from the time we put in the offer to the closing that getting this house was a miracle. That it was under priced and should it have been priced correctly we wouldn't have been able to get it, that if we had waited just 10 hours to put in our offer, the house would have already been sold. That despite a few set-backs ironing out details, we managed to get passed it and make it to closing. That the interest rates being were they were helped us even look in this price range. Too much should have happened to make us not a)see the house b)be able to afford the house or c)be too late to make an offer on the house. And it didn't happen. And I really felt that all of that meant there was a bit of divine intervention in getting this house and we were supposed to be there.

If I really and truely believe that, then I can't let a few issues with the house make me upset and give me a feeling of buyer's remorse because that would mean one of two things. That I thought God messed up with the divine intervention OR that it was never divine intervention to begin with and instead was just dumb luck.
I agree with neither of those sentiments, so I have to assume that what is happening now is simply all a part of a plan. It will be fixed someday and that my family and I are indeed, supposed to be in this house at this moment and so I should suck it, make the best of it, and relax and enjoy all the things that are not going wrong.

This is what I decided today while showering (in hot water back at our old house I might mention!) And so, I will make an honest effort to stop complaining and whining and just try to deal calmly with all that is happening. However, I will most likely still complain and vent from time to time. It is, afterall, something I am quite good at!

I will relax ...

I will relax.
I will. I will. I will. I will.
I keep telling myself that, over and over and over and over. And yet, I just can't seem to relax. As much as I kind of want to move out of this house right now, well, I don't ever want to move and buy a house again.
It seems that each day brings a discovery of another item broken. Today it was one of the fridge draws. There was a crack in it and it gave way today and it will no longer slide in or out of there. And although it's just a minor, very minor thing, I want to cry over it. And at the same time, I keep telling myself, it was just a drawer - at least we don't have to replace the fridge over something like that!
[Although my 7 year old told me "Oh, it broke. Good. I didn't like that fridge anyway. I want one with the water thing on it." I explained to her although I miss a water dispensor as well, we will not be buying a new fridge. She offered to get a job to help pay for it though, which I did think was sweet!]

Right now they are installing the new furnace, that will run more efficiently and save us lots of money in the long run. But once they are done and I can get into the basement again, I am not going to unpack boxes, I am not going to organize things or clean. I am going to go into my craft room and do something, anything, that will help me to relax a bit. I just need to do something aside from think about the house!

In other disappointing news, our current cable plan doesn't include BRAVO tv, which has several shows I enjoy watching currently running and some shows I like to watch which will be starting soon. I did not realize this fact until I was ready to settle in and watch The Real Housewives of Orange County - which may not be serious television, but is entertaining to me none the less. Tonight I will sadly miss watching Top Design. It's such a stupid thing, to not get this one channel, but man, I am so bummed about it! We can't figure out why Bravo is considered premium cable here, when everywhere else it's just part of the regular cable. But it is. Dh told me to e-mail our cable company every day until they change it. I wonder if it would really work ... but won't bother to try it out. I think instead I'll try to get a business where I can earn the whole 25.00 a month it would be to bump us up to the cable plan that has Bravo on it ROFL!

The Money Pit ...

Well, I'll be honest here.
That is what this house is starting to feel like.
As if needing a new furnace wasn't enough, God decided the water heater should stop working. And when that wasn't enough my son has diarrhea WHILE we have no hot water to wash dirty clothes in (and trust me people, we have a lot of them). And just when the ratings were getting good, someone in charge up there must have said "Boy this show is great. What we need to keep ratings high is something else to happen" and low and behold I have a dryer that doesn't really heat. I have to dry things for quite some time before they are dry!
I. Am. Not. Happy.

I keep wondering what else will go wrong around here. That is honestly what it is starting to feel like.

So now we are broke, need a new furnace, have to pay to get the water heater fixed, need to get the dryer fixed, need to get our bed fixed, buy a bunch of furniture that we don't even own (so it's not like I can wait and just keep the "old"), the dishwasher really should have new trays put in it (okay, really it should be replaced, but putting in trays will do it for now), we need to get a second freezer as the one here is tiny and isn't holding half of what we have (so yes, I have half my frozen goods sitting in the old house 35 minutes away).

So, welcome to home ownership to me and my husband and my family.

On the good news, I managed to unpack about 10 boxes today during little one's nap time which is amazing since I was positive I wouldn't be able to do anything.
And I have managed to use the entire day to dry 2 whole loads of laundry, which I suppose is better than drying no loads of laundry, but still, it should not take from 9am to 4pm to dry TWO loads of laundry! AAARRRRRGGGGHHHHHHH

Thanks ...

thanks for the well wishes and for the suggestions about the water heater.
We know that it is actually truely broken :-( It heats the water part way and then it's all cold. We get about 5 minutes of warmish-to-hot water and then that's it.
We called the company, apparently it's the internal thermometer they believe is broken ... it's reading the temperatures inside as hotter than they truely are.
They sent the part out and told dh it was "easy to fix" and e-mailed him the directions. He doesn't even own tools they say he needs (as they are not common) and he read through it all and said, there's not way he could do it. Sure, it would be easy to a plumber or someone who works with water heaters, but not for him.

Oh well. The furnace is being replaced tomorrow. We will be going from a furnace that was 52% efficient when it was new 20 years ago to a 92% efficient furnace. Too bad we don't have old heat bills ... I wonder if there will be a significant drop in the bill?

I am making little to no progress on unpacking. My littlest one has a stomach virus apparently. Which has resulted in him having no clean pants left, a very horrible case of diaper rash, and just being plain miserable all around. I feel so badly for the little guy - he won't sit down at all. It looks painful. Changing his diaper is pure torture on him. I'm actually letting him go without a diaper as much as possible to let some good air help heal him, but so far it's not doing much to help :(

Hopefully though this will pass quickly and the rash will heal and I can get some order in this home!

We're Here ....

We made it into our new house.
There are still a lot of boxes to put away. There is laundry to do, shopping to do, cleaning to do, arranging to do, furniture to buy, and a million other things I could think of ...but we are here! And it feels very good.
We have now spent two nights here. The girls met some kids today and I was able to briefly say hi to another mother. So that's a good thing!
The children's rooms are in pretty good shape. The kithen is in pretty good shape. The rest of the house, well, it's a toss up! LOL! I figured we'll be unpacked in, oh, I don't know, maybe 5 years? Probably just in time to move again ;-)
For now I am going to look at the bright side of the new house and overlook the negative side of things ... which inlcude that we need a new furnace and the waterheater is not working. And our bed is not working. And we still have no sheets for it. And that we have too many things!!!
But all that side, I am loving our new house and enjoying it so far.
So far now, I'm going to go and unpack and clean and do all that stuff!

Good-bye ...

house.
Today was the last morning I will wake up in this house.
I am sad to leave it, but also happy to move completely into my new house.
As with many things in life, this move is bittersweet. And the houseis kind of torn as well - some parts look empty and bare and very sad. Other parts look as they have always looked - full and happy, just waiting for the grandparents to return from Florida.
Of course, we will back here many times in the future - that I know, still building memories, still having fun times, still laughing and crying, and I'm sure we'll manage to sneak in a few of grannies' yummy homecooked meals .... but it will different as we won't be living here.
Of course, there are some items we are leaving here for the moment - knowing we haven't worked out a spot for them in the new house or not sure if we will need them or not, so we haven't completely emptied this house out of our stuff. A little bit of us remains here and there. And I'm sure we've left some things that I'll miss terribly and think to myself - well why in the world didn't we bring that over here?
But, despite that, we are leaving this house. Moving out, moving on. And I'll miss this house.
So good-bye house. You have served us well the last 2.5 years. And who knows, someday we may just be back again ... the future holds lots of mystery ...

Can I ....

hire somebody to finish packing our stuff up and then unpack all items sitting at the new house?
I go over there with many grand plans and then get almost nothing done. Why? Because I have children, and one of them is quite young and needs mommy. And so I can't get much done.
And also I have trouble lifting boxes because my back and some of them are heavy (well, heavy to me, but not to most of the world). And dh is hardly around so I can't just label boxes with the rooms he can move them to for me.
And of course, room. We apparently have too many things. They will not all fit into this house. Well, okay, they might all fit someday but right now we are severely lacking shelves and cupboards to accomodate all the crap we have. And we are severely lacking the money to buy the shelves and cupboards that we need to accomodate all the stuff we have.
Am I rambling yet? I think I am!
But I want to be moved in. I thought I would get some stuff done tonight with dh's help. He thought differently. His thoughts won.

I believe Saturday we will move everything out of this house once and for all. Which means after that dh should be around to help me much more. And hopefully with all the toys and gates and fun stuff at the new house, the kids should be more self-entertaining and I can actually accomplish something.

However, at the rate I am going, I will have unpacked in the year 2022 and we should be able to afford all the furniture we need by the year 2037. So there is a light at the end of the tunnel! LOL!

Still searching ...

for that feeling of peace and calm over here.
Everything just feels like it's being magnified about 1,345,157,267,262,742,753 times and it isn't making for the best of days.
I am trying to stay calm and cool and not completely lose it.
I still yell too much. I get far too frustrated with the kids. I am very argumentative these days.
I stay up too late trying to pack our things up and then rush around the day trying to straighten out the chaos left behind from packing. I lose 2 hours during the day when I nap with babyboy because I'm just so tired.
I can't pack during the day .. my helper-baby takes out what I'm putting in. Or he rearranges piles of things that have been sorted out. So if I want to get anything done, I have to stay up late. ::sigh:: It's not a good pattern nor a great lifestyle right now.
But despite everything going on around me, I just want to find a bit of peace or a way to bring the edge off. Just even getting rid of that edge would be a very nice thing indeed. If anyone has any ideas to do this, please share. Of if you are the praying sort, please pray that I can find some peace. Thanks

It's contagious!

Apparently, the need to start a business is contagious in my house.
My 7 year old recently came to me and told me she wants to start her own business. What does she want to do? Make lip balms and soap and sell them to her friends. Now, you may be wondering, where on earth did she get that idea?
I will tell you! From the show Creative Juice on diynetwork. She watched them make it one day and decided that would be the perfect thing for her. Why does she think she needs to start a business you may also be wondering ... well, she wants to buy herself Blendy Pens. She is also thinking she might want to get the Bedazzler too, but she's not quite sure about that one.
So today we looked up the cost of supplies. We figured out how much it would be to follow the recipe we have (the only problem is that I am not sure how many tubes of lipbalm the recipe fills ... could be 1, could be 10). We figured it might fill 1 or 2 and did some calculations based on that. We figured what she could sell them for, how much she would have to pay me back for supplies, how much mom would make her save, and then how many she would have to sell to buy her blendy pens.
It is cute. She is so excited. She wanted to buy all the things today. We even talked about how she might not want to use all her money for blendy pens ... she might want to use some to buy some flavorings in case she wants to make more. She wasn't so excited about that idea, but became more excited as we saw we could flavors like root beer and grape and orange and lime and all sorts of fun things to a 7 year old!
I am game. I figure why not allow her to try to make something, to try to earn a little extra money to buy frivilous toys that she'll probably lose interest in a week after they arrive here - better her 20 dollars than my 20 dollars for sure!
The only catch, I told her, was that it had to wait until we were moved, and mostly unpacked and mostly settled into the new house. Which I don't think is an unreasonable request. She didn't agree with me too much, but thankfully didn't whine about it either. I think she is so excited about getting the opportunity to try it out, it's okay that she has to wait a bit.
I am excited to do this as well ... bring it into schooling and give her something good to work on. It will be fabulous I think!

It's snowing.

It was snowing when I woke up at 6am. It was snowing when I woke back up at 8am. It is snowing now and it's 2pm.
The snow just keeps coming and coming.
My driveway was plowed, oh, an hour ago ... there is a very nice layer of snow on it already.
It is white everywhere you look outside. And not only is it snowing, but it's blowing.
A friend came over earlier and left once we realized just how bad it was getting. She made home just fine (thankfully) but she said the roads are not good. It's like the plows can't keep up with all the snow.
Now, we knew it was coming - truth be told I didn't think it would be this bad or last this long - so dh and I planned for me to not have to leave the house with the kids, but he's at work. And he has to drive home. And traffic will not be pretty. And so he will probably leave work extremely late (because if he left at 5, chances are he'd just sit in traffic).
At least I had a friend over for a while today ... that was nice and helped my day seem a little less dreary. As soon as babyboy falls asleep I believe I will curl up on the couch with some knitting and reading and try to make the most of being housebound.

In other news, the original plan was to move a bunch of items to the new house tonight. Yeah, not going to happen. Bummer. Moving in February doesn't seem like such a good idea anymore!

UPDATE: It is now just before 6pm. And guess what? It's still snowing out there! Although it has slowed down a bit. I am in awe ... 12 hours of snow nonstop! Amazing LOL!

Moving, moving

We are in the middle of moving. It's fun, but yet not fun.
Lots of boxes going in and out of both houses. Go to the new house, unpack boxes, put them in the car empty, drive to the old house and repack them.
I have also been cleaning and cleaning. Things that have been in storage for 2.5 years don't come out exactly clean. And basically 99% of my kitchen things were in storage. Now, we have a dishwasher, but I didn't want to wait that long to clean anything, so I did most things by hand (but ran the dishwasher at the same time). I thought I was all done, but dh brought my 2 more kitchen boxes today. ::sigh:: But storage is now cleaned out, so there can't be anymore. It's impossible!
Now this week, I'll be packing up all that is here that hasn't been packed up. At this point we will officially move in next weekend! I am SO excited about it all =) All the cleaning and moving and packing and unpacking will be worth it at that point.

There are other things going on here besides moving. I hesitate to mention it because, well, frankly, if I fail I won't want to talk about it. But, a friend and me are in the planning stages of starting a business. A small one, but a business none-the-less. Like I said, we are in the planning stages, okay, really, the early planning stages, the very early stages - as in we said we would do it and that's about as far as we've come LOL! But it's going forward. It's happening. I'm scared and excited. And I am praying it will be successful. I don't need 6 figures from it, but I would love to see some income from it. I am hoping that things will move quickly now that we've decided to do it. I think the two of us have probably danced around the issue for a bit now, and are just both in a place to take the jump. Our first real "meeting" will be this week and it should be interesting as my three will be her with her one!

Anyway, that's what's going on in my life these days. It is certainly keeping me on my toes and quite busy!

Today ...

First of all, if you haven't read my friend Mel's blog, you should. As a matter of fact, if you had to pick between her blog and my blog, you should definitely without a doubt pick hers!
Which would be had as she actually keeps two blogs, but really they are both good and you should be reading both of them!

Now with that said, the other day I read this and thought that has been me lately.

Anyway, I'm sort of trapped at home during the day. And while I could look at it as being "safe in my cozy home" and all that, sometimes, like on a Friday afternoon, it feels like prison. I just want the doors to open so I can run to freedom without looking back.

The next best thing is to have a snack.

That has been me a lot lately! A whole lot lately actually. More than I care to admit, but yet, the scale is steadily climbing upward and I don't necessarily appreciate it. I do blame a lot of it on this thing called stress eating (which I do not believe I have struggles with prior to recently but since I didn't know it even existed until recently, I could be wrong!)
Anyway, I also read a bit more from Mel:

I have noticed that if I clean instead of having a snack, the uncluttered floors and shining kitchen counters soothe me more than a sugar-free pudding. At least the satisfaction lasts longer.

And today, I had about an hour to spare. I was waiting for my aunt to come pick up my two daughters and my son was sleeping. And so I plopped down at the computer and promptly whipped out a bag of tortilla chips. Mostly because I thought well, I only have an hour and all the things I need to do require more time so I'll just sit and do a whole lot of nothing! And so I did this for about five minutes when I decided to STOP. Just like that. I put away the chips, walked away from the computer and then did the dishes, cleaned the table off, swept the floor, put some other things away, cuddle with babyboy when he woke up, vaccuumed the floor, doled out snacks, put some things in the car so when it was time for me to leave, I'd only need to gather up the son and myself and go, and then the doorbell rang and my aunt was here.

And I thought, holy cow! I did a lot in an hour, and my house looked much much better all picked up like that. And it was better than sitting on the computer and eating chips.

And my motivation didn't end there ... oh no, then babyboy and I went to the new house and opened up quite a few boxes. And we put away almost all the things we opened up. Wonderful! The grand plan is to completely move into the house next weekend. So I am trying to pack up what's left here while unpacking things there so it's kind of put in place when we do move.

So thanks Mel, for the advice and the tip. My children and husband thank you as well ;-)

Feeling better ...

Well, I have to say, tonight I am feeling better about it all.
Today did get a bit better - it's slightly because I made myself get up and stop being full of self-pity. But it's mostly because I talked on the phone to a friend - and not just any friend, but a friend, who bless her heart, has some similar struggles and feelings. A friend who does not try to be perfect because she wants to be real and talk about what's really going on in her life. A friend who vented a bit to me, listened as I vented a bit to her, then vented a bit to me, and listened as I vented. Someone who was not judgemental when I said I was have a few days where I wanted to run as far away from the kids as fast as I possible could, who didn't bat an eye when I told her I was still in my pajamas, despite it being 2 in the afternoon. A friend who understands that even though I complained about my dh, I love him deep down and do appreciate him tremendously. A friend who, had she come to my house, wouldn't have cared that the house was not spotless and there were dishes sitting by the sink.
And bless her heart really because talking with her, did in fact make me feel better. It made me feel less alone and it made me feel grateful that I had her on the phone and able to talk to her about things without fear of judgement. And holy cow, really, thank God for that. I mean, really, does it get any better than to have a friend like that?
And tomorrow we will get together and eat some nice fattening food and talk and laugh and she'll watch as I unpack boxes in my new house and offer to help a million and one times and I'll refuse a million times, since she is pregnant, and then that last time I'll maybe give her towels to fold just to make her stop asking ROFL!!

It also helped that dh came home
(and I have to admit I did wonder if he read my blog today. Not that I would care if he did, but I really didn't think he did so it was interesting to wonder about. And I asked and he said no, but I still kind of wonder a bit .... anyway, back to what I was saying)
and tonight told me lots of really nice things, things that helped me feel better and made me once again think to myself I really do have the greatest husband ever and even if the world did crash down around us and even if things do get tight, and even when I get into my funky moods, as long as he's here as a part of our family, we will get through it and chances are, he'll turn it into some fun game that will make it seem much more pleasant than my mood generally allows me to see things. Which, really, is fabulous. And I should probably focus on thoughts like that more often than on the ones that make me feel a bit depressed and a lot anxious.

Anyway, the point of this rambling is that tonight when I go to sleep, I will be feeling a lot more calm and a lot less anxious than I have for a bit, and it will feel very good. And so I have a great husband and a great friend for helping me reach that place.

I had hoped ...

that today would be a better day.
It however, so far, is not a better day. At least it's not any worse.
Yesterday my son learned how to move the gate from the stairs. Of course the first 2 times he did it, I yelled at my other two kids accussing them of leaving the gate open to begin with. But after the third and fourth time I help my mouth and wondered if he did in fact do it himself and for the next 1000 times after that I decided he could, in fact, do it himself.
He also learned to climb on the kitchen chairs, climb on the table and learned all about dumping out cups (thankfully only of water).
He also learned how to reach the phone and randomly dialed a few people. He also reached my computer (but thankfully did no damage there). He has learned how to scale a big higher in the pantry, he can open the cabinent locks about 50% of the time. Until yesterday, I thought we had all the major areas he shouldn't touching under control. And yesterday was the day he learned to overcome our attempts at controlling them.
All I did was chase him around and keep him out of places and clean up messes and change clothes and diapers. On top of that, my 4 year old had a few accidents of her own, and an extra child we were watching decided to go into our bathroom, try out all our toothbrushes and toothpaste.
It really was not a peaceful day around here, which meant I was not able to find peace. I do not have the ability to step back in chaos, take a few deep breaths and relax. Oh how I pray that I could master that skill, but I can't even start it, let alone master it at this point.

When babyboy went to bed last night for the first time, I tried to regain control of the house so that today would go much smoother. He broke through the first few attempts within 10 minutes of waking up this am. Much to dismay. I think I have finally hit upon the right combination of blockade techniques and he's been locked in one room for several hours straight now. I am praying he doens't figure out how to move our current blocks before moving .... which I might add, when we move we will have the option to use real babyproofing items - the kinds that screw into cabinents to keep them from being opened and gates that are screwed into the wall and not just leaned against the wall or sandwiched between chairs, and that will go leaps and bounds towards containing my very curious, my very gifted climber, my son who wants to touch everything and climb everything and figure out how everything in this world around him works. Because I figure once we get permanent measures put up, it will take him at least 3 months to figure out how to work them.

So yesterday I had all that going on - keeping up with him - which made me feel like a horrible mother. I can't even keep control of my 1 year old. He is 14 months old for goodness sake! You'd think I'd have a bit of control over him. I feel like I have none. And so because I can't keep him on the floor of just one room, I have to give up paying attention to the other two. Whihc makes me feel like an even lesser mother. And then I can't get anything done around the house except just taking care of the major spills/unclean areas as he creates them. So now I feel like a carppy housekeeper, which makes me feel like a crappy wife. And then to top it off, I have to hear from others just how easy it is to take care of all their wonderful children who never misbehave ever and how they would just die if their precious darling husbands had to come home, after working so hard all day long, and ::gasp:: cook their own dinner! And have to help fold laundry! Oh. My. Goodness. That would be Horrible. Just horrible! They would never get over the guilt of doing it to him.

Okay, well, apparently I can't be friends with them. Becuase that happens, roughly twice a week around this house. And sometimes I even count down the minutes untl bedtime. Until they might all be sleeping and I can sit. Just sit for a few minutes. Sit. Sit and think. WTF is wrong with me? Why do some people make it seem so darn easy. Like they have 8 arms and perfect children. Why can't I do that? Why can't my house be spotless all the time? Why can't my kids it still for more than 23 seconds before the wiggling and the bouncing and the rocking and the movements all kick in? Why doens't my one year old sleep through the night yet? Why does the laundry seem to multiply overnight? The dust bunnies also multiply at night? What am I doing wrong that my household is not a smooth running household and my children are not poster kids for how to behave?

These are the feelings I deal with on an almost daily basis. And I have very few places to turn and talk about it, because most people gasp in horror if I even attempt to start to share. Like I am this good-awful mother/wife and my poor family has to deal with me.

I don't know. I need to figure out a way to lessen the chaos here. And I think I need to find a few other people who feel the same way. So that I don't feel so alone in the world. So I don't feel like everyone else is sailing by on a cruise ship full of laughter and happiness, and I'm floating along on a rowboat desperately trying to not lose the oars.

Struggles ...

Lately I've been struggling, mostly with myself. And for the life of me, I can't figure out the cause of this struggle or how to tame it.
It really isn't a fun feeling truth be told. I think that's where a lot of my anxiety, worry, and crabbiness is stemming from. And if I could just get to the root of what's going on, I think I could fix a lot of that.
And I can't figure it out. And really, truth be told, there is a part of me that doesn't want to figure it out. I think there is a lot going on that I need to face, but am terrified to face and so I keep shoving and pushing it back down in the hopes that if I stuff it hard enough and long enough it will disappear. Of course, what happens is it causes more and more trouble and more and more problems and it gets me stuck in these foul moods. Or it causes me anxiety - extreme worry that has me fretting over every single little thing.
My husband is trying to help me with this - he offers advice with a sincere heart. But what he says is all wrong and generally leaves me feeling worse than better! And then I feel bad because he truely and really is trying to help. I don't know who else to turn to. I can't really pick up the phone and call someone else and ramble on about this - I'd probably scare people away very quickly. But yet, I feel like what is going on is eating me alive and pretty soon there won't be much of me left. And I don't want that to happen.
::sigh:: I need to figure this all out. I need to find a way to get through this, to face it head on and just deal with it all and move on with life. I just don't know where to start ...

Holy Cold Batman!

It is COLD here.
It is 4 degrees. Of course that is without windchill, which makes it feel much much colder out there, roughly about 25 degrees colder.
The boiler in this house can not keep up. It is running and running and running and running. Part of my kitchen is sitting at 64 degrees right now.
I do not like the cold. This is not fun.
I'm freezing (and yes, I do have on long johns).
I finally remembered we own a space heater so that's helping now.
But brrrrrr!!!

Reality sets in ...

So, we bought this house. This great house. This house I love. And I'm so excited.
And now reality sets in.
First, let's go back to the house buying process. Dh and I had set a limit on what we were willing to pay. It was x amount of dollars. Then we looked at homes. We decided to bump it up a mere 10,000 dollars (which was saying a lot as the first amount we set was pretty much the top of what we could afford). Locking in a pretty darn good rate helped us feel better about that decision.
Then we found this house. And we went for it. Except it was 10,000 more than the second limit we set, which means 20,000 more than the original plan. Which also meant we no longer had 20% to put down, which meant more money being spent on the mortgage.
And now we own this house, that is 20,000 more than what we planned on owning. And now we have 2 mortgages (in an effort to avoid PMI)
So now we have a house and 2 mortgages. 2 mortgage payments, when combined, are larger than what we had budgeted for when we began house shopping.
To top it off, I assumed my dh would get a raise this year, and that would help un-tighten our financial picture. His bosses recently came to him and said there will be no raises this year.
No raise? Two mortgages? My heart is racing I tell you, pounding and ready to jump out of my chest and explode.
My dh keeps telling me not to worry that we will be okay.
But how can I not worry? We have 3 kids. They happen to enjoy being fed and clothed and have become used to living in a house. We will be fine with all the monthly expenses. But should something happen - a major medical issue, my dh not being able to work, a big expense not in the budget, we will hit some rough waters. And that thought terrifies me.
I have come to the conclusion that I need to earn some income through all of this. Except, really, how can I do that? My dh works very unpredictable hours - I'd need a sitter to work most times. And with three kids, the sitter would probably make more every hour than I would. I could theoretically try to do something from home. But really, what does that leave me? Babysitting. Well, yeah I suppose I could do that, but how do I find someone to watch and a family that trusts me to take care of their children. Dh is encouraging me to try embroidery out. That scares me because what if I mess things up. Right now I enjoy my crafts because they are for me, not for others. Would taking money to do that ruin my enjoyment of them? I don't know.
I have a lot to think about. And I have a lot of worry I need to try to oppress.
I'm still excited about my house and can't wait to actually live there, but I'm also terrified about this whole thing and how it will work out.

::sigh::

First, let me say a big congratulations to the Colts. That team outplayed us today without a doubt. They definitely deserved to win the superbowl.

Second, I am so disappointed! I had hoped for a win from my Bears. I had hoped they would go in there, that both offense and defense would show up for the game, that Grossman wouldn't throw interceptions practically everytime we got the ball, I had hoped we would have gone out there and played our a-game. We didn't. We didn't do that. I don't think we were half way to playing at the top of our game. And so we lost. A loss that we earned.

But still, I'm a bit sad. And of course, getting a touchdown on teh first play - the FIRST play - gave me such hope. But slowly that hope was chipped away until there wasn't much left.

Oh well. Maybe next year? I won't hold my breath though.

And again, my sincerest congratulations to the Colts.

Just saying hi ...

Today we closed on our house. It went very smoothly (thank goodness).
We even managed to move over some boxes to the house. We officially emptied out one storage unit ... only 2 more to go plus everything in this house!
I came home and packed up a few more things.
I was mostly motivated by the a)big mess in the basement area and b)the fact that I'm having a scrapbooking get together tomorrow and the kids will be in the basement playing.
Now, I'm tired. I stayed up way too late. My house isn't nearly clean enough for tomorrow, I have bought food to serve these people lunch, and if anyone complains about anything tomorrow I may just burst into tears - both of being really excited about getting the new house combined with the low I'm feeling about, well, pretty much everything else!
Let's hope no one minds that my house isn't tidy and I have a chance to relax with a scrapbook and some other moms tomorrow!