Did Someone Say Chocolate?

Moving Day!

Feel free to follow me over to my new spot. Registration is required, but it's not moderated, anyone can sign up and you only have to do it once, I promise! Be sure to use a valid email please. It may be necessary to contact you regarding password protected entries. The email address will not appear on posts, so please don't worry about getting spammed.

Life Happens


I decided to move this blog for numerous reasons, but mostly I needed some private entries. Please respect that and don't get all offended when you can't read some posts. Trust me, it's not about you! =) I think Word Press will work good for me, I even managed to add a few plugins on my own! This blog will stay up and accessible for archive purposes and if things don't work out over at Life Happens, then I can always come back here.

Remember to fix your links and thanks for following me around!

ETA - I've turned off comments on this blog to avoid spam. I figure no one will be needing to comment on these older posts anyway. Please visit me at my new blog. My email is fel726 AT charter DOT net.

Comments Fixed

Comments have been fixed, but it still isn't clear whether the problem will be avoidable in the future. MT is apparently too easy to spam, and it bogs down the server even when we successfully deny 100% of it.

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Comments Broken

We're not sure why, but the comment system isn't working right now. We'll post again when it is fixed.

This day last year...

in pictures.


Aww fond memories of the jolly jumper! God we missed that thing when he outgrew it. Daniel used to love jumping around watching the dogs and he'd always laugh at them anytime they started to play around him. He thought that was just hilarious! Look at last night's picture of Isabella compared to this one. She has grayed a lot, poor girl! This was also before we painted and tore that awful wallpaper down too! This place looks totally different now. =)

Happy Anniversary to getting a life

Today is one of the most important anniversaries in my life...of course meeting Doug almost tops it. Almost you say?! Please it's not an insult to my husband or anything because without this particular day happening, I would never EVER have met Doug. On February 16th, 1997, eight years ago, I left my ex and landed myself, my three children (2, 4 and 7) and our cat in a safe house for battered women. This whole experience means a lot to me. As the years go by, I view it as one of the biggest things I've ever done. Obviously moving to Texas was another big thing, but without having went through that experience I probably would never have had the courage to do something that extreme. I learned some pretty valuable life lessons that year, particularly that day. No one else is going to make your life better, ONLY YOU can do that. Obviously we can have happiness and joys with others in our lives, but if life is miserable, we can't sit around waiting to be rescued or hoping and wishing it would change. It's just not going to happen. You need to make the choice, get the courage and then just do it. Period. No looking back.

That's exactly what I did. Made the choice, then did it. I gave up everything and everyone I knew and started over. That was my choice, I made it and did it and wow has life ever been fulfilling since. I shudder to think of my kids and where they'd be had I not left. Especially considering all of Justin and Sarah's difficulties. Imagine how suppressed they'd be right now? Justin would probably be totally dysfunctional under the paws of my ex. Oh the guilt I have is still haunting, but at least I don't have to live with the reality anymore. I wonder if he acknowledges or remembers this day at all? He never saw the kids again. I doubt he has any guilt or remorse at all. I'm sure all the days he landed in jail are far more important to him. It's more about revenge than I'm sorry's with him. That's one of the reasons he's so dangerous.

I remember where I come from often. It keeps me grounded (and probably depressed too). I won't take what I have for granted. I realize it's a gift every time I look at Daniel or watch Doug play games with the kids or help them with their homework...It's all the little things ya know...the things you just don't get from people like my ex. A Life.

Back to normal, I hope

Well so far so good with Daniel. He slept in until 8:30 this morning which was heaven! He's now eating breakfast and seems to be pretty happy today. Gosh I hope he's getting well.

I didn't see Cody when he got up, but he's not here so I guess he felt well enough to go to school. I hope I didn't make him nervous by telling him he was going to see the doctor if he was still sick in the morning. Overall I trust my kids not to fake it, they're just not sick often enough, this was Justin's and Cody's first time being sick in over a year...so really when they say they're sick, they're sick. But a trip to the doctor certainly wards off any possible chance they're faking it. Heh Gosh I'm mean. =) The day's not over yet, we could end up with a call home from the nurse. He did look like crap yesterday and slept for over an hour...that's not a typicl ten year old's behavior.

Well I have some work to do that I brought home, might as well get busy on it seeing as Daniel is amused.

This day last year...

in pictures...


Awww he was just a baby! Looks like Doug was teaching him how to play the gameboy already. It's probably Yu-Gi-Oh too!

As I was uploading Isabella's picture, I caught a glimpse of this one under 2/15/04, so I thought it might be fun to yank a picture from last year on the same day once in awhile.

You can peek in the extended entry to see what I got on Valentine's Day! Who the heck wants flowers when these are an option:

Oh yeah, now that's what I'm talking about! I had so much fun last night scratching my ass off! I only won $5, but who cares, I just enjoy getting set and scratching even faster!

Doug and I really don't "recognize" Valentine's Day as a special day. I don't like foofy holidays like that. Too much pressure for it to be perfect, I'd rather have him surprise me like he does throughout the year! Much better and it means more!

Well hubby is home from lab, gonna run!

Miss Isabella

Well the crazy pug doesn't have worms, thank heavens! It was her ANAL GLANDS that were clogged and causing her to itch! How funny. Sarah says "what's anal?" Doug explains "Another word for your ass". Heh, that caused many outbursts of giggles from the table as you can imagine from kids their age. Well heck even I giggled. Well for $237.07, Isabella had a full blood profile, all her shots, anal sacs expressed (yum), city registration, examination, toe nail trim and last but not least a fecal flotation exam (yum again). We also bought a year's supply of heartguard medicine. She's 18 pounds of chunky cuteness!


She is pretty uneffected by the whole ordeal. Dexter's turn in a couple of weeks. Fun!

Daniel woke up this morning pretty upset and cranky. I had to leave for work and it wasn't easy. Doug emailed by 10:00 saying Daniel fell asleep. He's up half the night coughing so it's no wonder he was tired. Now tonight he seemed much better mood wise. I cooked a turkey supper and yum on that gravy tonight. Doug took him outside for a bit before supper (in between all the running around to pick up kids here and there, store and vet appt.). By 7 p.m. , Daniel was asking for bed routine again. Right to sleep. I'm betting by tomorrow, he's gonna feel brand new again. A couple days of medicine always helps.

Cody is sick again. That's twice in one week and we're not sure if he'll make it to school tomorrow. Bad headache (two days now), he looks all flushed, so he slept for about an hour and half before supper. If he ends up home tomorrow, he's going to the doctor. I dread that, but he needs it. I finally reached the occupational therapist at the children's hospital today and made the appointment for Sarah. Feb. 24th. I'm happy we don't have to wait a long time! I'm very anxious to hear what they have to say because I'm sure they see more children with this problem then the doctor we saw does or at least more of the therapy end of it. Well gotta run, Cody's asking for tylenol.

Mr. Daniel

I stayed home from work today to take him to the doctor. Fifty minutes of waiting time, three minutes of doctor time, sure enough a right ear infection. We knew he wasn't right and after yesterday basically holding him all day, it had to be something. I have found him to be quite baffling to watch today. He sat playing with his flash cards for thirty minutes, than trantrumed for no apparent reason, then played again for ten minutes, tantrumed for no apparent reason. If I even tried to hold him or talk to him today, he acts really pissed off at me. The only thing I can figure is he's extremely mad at me for taking him to the doctor because let’s face it, he screamed when we got there and didn’t stop until well after we got home and he's just acting out on that every few minutes OR he's unhappy so he's taking it out on the closest thing to him....me. Oh well he'll be back to normal in a few days or so.

In other news, Bella has been scratching her ass on the carpet, so we pushed her annual checkup ahead a couple of weeks so Doug could take her to see the vet tomorrow. Nothing worse than an itchy ass ya know!

The co-worker/friend I mentioned the other day in a post about her mother being ill...well she passed away yesterday. Sad. Her mother was very young...my mother's age as a matter of fact. Scary.

We are having junky French fries and nuggets for supper while Doug continues to consume leftovers. LOL Poor guy. Between spaghetti, hamburgers, barbeque ribs and sweet and sour meatballs, I think we've ate leftovers for darn near a week. Tomorrow is turkey supper! YUM!

This time last year on Valentine's Day, TX had a huge snow storm (well huge to them Texans lol). Today it is 72, NUTS! Hot in here, we had the A/C on. I also noticed some things in my garden are coming up already. That’s' what you get for living in the south ya know. Doug has labs all this week, so he'll be away in the evenings. I wish I had some shit to watch on tv. I got desperate today and watched Oprah. I guess I shouldn't say that like that, I've always liked her show and just basically forgot it existed, so I've set my DVR to record every episode. I'll pick through the ones I want to see. Supper buzzer is ringing. Later dudes.

Sarah's evaluation results (long)

I guess I've avoided this long enough and some of you have expressed concern. I went in to this appointment feeling pretty ready for anything, I even had it in my head that I knew what he was going to say. I was right, so it shouldn't have surprised me any. I guess what upset me so much was I just didn't view this as something that would effect her life in the future as an adult. Somehow with these childhood disabilities, you convince yourself that they will grow up and out of them and become productive, independent people of society. When you have someone sitting across from you telling you that your child may never live on her own, or drive a car or attend college, it's a real slap.

To be fair to this doctor, he was very quick to reassure me not to lose hope and that anything is possible all depending on how Sarah's responds to therapy. She certainly has the right mindset to do or be anything she wants, it just all depends, ya know.

Sarah's formal diagnosis is as follows:
Developmental Coordination Disorder
Communication Disorder, NOS
Better known as "Developmental Dyspraxia" (both motor and speech). Sometimes the speech realm is known as childhood Apraxia (absence of speech) or developmental verbal dyspraxia.

I first researched Dyspraxia when a commenter on my blog mentioned that her daughter has it. The more I read about it, the more it fit Sarah's symptoms. During the initial exam, I told the doctor what I thought it was, but also told him I'm not the doctor, so who knows. Well that's what it turned out to be. I should have been prepared for it right? ha. I guess I didn't realize how severe it was. As I explained to the psychologist, I don't have a "normal, average" older child to compare her to. Justin has always functioned below his age, so what happens is you're able to recognize that your child is different, but on some level you become accustomed to the behavior and don't realize it's as abnormal as it is.

Sarah's IQ tests within average range. She also does not meet the autistic spectrum cut off score which means she's not autistic (which we knew anyway, she's too different than Justin). Sarah had many tests done which indicate she's complex, it's not as easy as just saying, she's THIS or THAT. The Beery VMI tests visual and motor abilities. Sarah separately scores adequate visual-perception skills and adequate motor coordination skills, however is impaired in her ability to coordinate the two.

There was one part of the diagnoses that I must have confused when discussing with the doctor, the part of "elevated depression". The report says the scores do not indicate a significant level of depressive symptoms/feelings, however, the same paragraph talks of another level of the test for Interpersonal Problems scale and the Ineffectiveness Scale indicate Sarah is experiencing symptoms of sadness related to feelings of the inability to measure up to peers as well as getting along with others. His recommendations even call it "elevated depression". He quotes Sarah here as saying "I am not sure if things will work out for me; Many bad things are my fault; I have to push myself many times to do my schoolwork; I have fun at school only once in awhile; I have some friends but I wish I had more; I can never be as good as other kids." She knows she's different and is reminded of that every day she goes to school with her peers. Anyway, I may have misunderstood what he was talking about in the office, he indicated to me that she has "elevated depression" and that it's something we only need to watch and that if her moods or feelings become more of a concern to me then it may need to be addressed with some counseling. His full report indicates more along the lines that she does experience a higher level of sadness than others her age, but scores within average range for depressive symptoms/feelings. I may need to call him for clarification of this.

Of course coming from our background of domestic violence, I raised the question of how much of this can be tied in to that environment. Thankfully he specialized in family violence and childhood trauma, so he specifically watched for those sorts of symptoms knowing our background. He saw nothing of concern and no relationship between what's going on with Sarah now and what happened years ago. Her symptoms of sadness relate to her current condition of being different and not liked by others, not of something that happened years ago. He also reassured me that children do recover from childhood trauma and family violence which was a huge relief to me. I carry around so much guilt and negative feelings around my ability to parent...even so, I'll probably never be able to shake those feelings regardless of what some psychologist says.

We did talk about what causes Dyspraxia and it seems to be genetic as is Asperger's. He did bring up the fact that during my pregnancy with Sarah she stopped growing at 32 wks gestation indicating there the possible onset of Dyspraxia. I spent a good part of that pregnancy getting slapped around and asked him if it was possibly caused by injury? Unfortunately, there's no clear answer there. He couldn't say yes, couldn't say no. There is a lot unknown about Dyspraxia and I certainly haven't finished all of my research yet.

Asperger's and Dyspraxia do share common traits, such as social interaction and adaptive functioning. Sarah functions as young as a 5-6 year old in motor skills and social interaction/communication and as young as a 6-8 year old in broad independence and personal/community living skills. That's pretty significant and is much younger than I imagined. The age equivalent is much lower on the test results that I filled out for Sarah. He notes that sometimes those test scores do no match other tests and it's important that the results from that particular test (SIB-R) be interpreted along with other assessments. (simply put, the idea of Sarah being an age equivalent of 2-5 years for Fine Motor, Gross Motor, Social Interaction/communication and Community Living is pretty severe, so we have to take into consideration other test scores!) It's sad to hear the word "handicap" and your daughter in the same sentence. It's probably important to note here one of the main differences between Dyspraxia and Asperger's is obsessive behaviors. Sarah exhibits no symptoms of obsessiveness where as Justin will talk weather all day if you let him.

Not sure if I covered everything or not, it's a long report and this entry is already too long. Basically the recommendations are as follows:
Keep current with the school, update and maintain an IEP.
Comprehensive speech/language evaluation
Comprehensive occupational therapy evaluation
Participation in a social skills group
Close monitoring of Sarah's emotional and behavioral functioning, possible follow up of counseling
Continued participation in extracurricular/sports activities that Sarah enjoys to increase experiences of success
Begin focus on transition beyond high school.

Mind you his recommendations don't come summarized like that, they are more detailed, but that sums it up.

We were always prepared to support and guide Justin more than your average kid that's left home, it just surprised me to find Sarah's condition could effect her independent living more than Justin's. Her social and motor skill impairment is pretty significant and if occupational therapy doesn't help her in the coming years, there is that possibility...well, I need to just stay positive. I've seen how far Justin has come and that's encouraging. The psychologist did say based on Sarah's scores and family history, he would expect a much lower functioning child than what he saw in Sarah and he can only credit her current family environment for those successes. That's nice to hear sometimes because when are the parent of children with disabilities, you often spend your time trying to figure out what the heck you are doing so wrong. Whey can't your kids be like other kids?!

I think it'll be an adjustment period for me because I've spent the past few years determined to make Sarah "normal" and to fit in with her peers and family. I just want her to have friends and as close to normal childhood as possible. I think most of the problem is probably me. I just need to accept Sarah and help her as I can, maybe once I can let go of that way of thinking, Sarah will be able to relax a little more and accept herself. We all have our work cut out for us, day by day, we'll see. I'm still playing phone tag with the occupational therapist and the school is on hold until that evaluation is complete. We're unsure as to how much Sarah's speech therapy needs to increase. It's been established that twice a week is not enough.

Also, in case any of you are doing the math...yes that's two children out of four that have disabilities. Genetics appear to have a factor. Both dads have their own issues and the only thing that I can figure is between my family history (some of which is unknown) and their issues, it was enough to cause these problems in the kids. We are going forward with testing on Cody. He appears to have no disability aside from emotional ups and downs, but we're testing anyway. Having two older siblings with such significant problems has to effect the younger child in someway, so we'll see what happens there. I'll worry about Daniel for the next twelve years no matter what anyone says. The idea of another baby at this point...I doubt it. Doug says it doesn't matter to him, he thinks Daniel is fine and that more than likely the genetic issue was mostly with the paternal side, but geesh, who knows, ya know. It's just all depressing.

Anyway, if you made it this far, /good karma to you.

Sick?

Here's my sick little guy having some snuggle time with Dexter today.


I ended up having to give Daniel some tylenol earlier for his fever. He's not really acting all that sick though, he had a long nap, woke up pretty happy and is now playing with his toys in his room. I hope he feels better tomorrow, I'm sure he's just coming down with whatever it was everyone had this week.

Not again

So I arrive to get my hair done...right away I notice my hair dresser is just starting someone else's foils. It's 10:30 my appointment time. I quickly call Doug so I can vent off some instant anger. Three appointments with this girl and all three times I've got to sit and watch her do numerous other people during my appointment time. Worse than a freakin' doctor she is! She had five of us going this time. We were just getting rotated around from station to station...I got out of there at 12:45...again a 10:30 appointment. Gah. I got my hair short again with lighter blonde highlights. I'm in a total funk, so I felt I needed a lift. I've been so disgusted with myself lately I could barely stand looking in the mirror. You know it's time to get off your fat lazy ass when...*you fill in the blank*. Sigh. Oh well, it's a good cut, we'll see tomorrow if I can make it do anything. It's nice having clean eyebrows again. The last girl apparently took off my ends, so my girl this time said we need to give it time to grow back and she'll fix them up. I really think I've learned my lesson ya know? I should just go where I trust and stop trying to save ten minutes driving time.

Daniel went down for a nap today around 2 and he's still asleep. I'm amazed at his age what a great nap’er he is still! Do you know that child asked to go to bed last night?! I was poking around on blogs and he started fussing a bit for me and pulled on my hand, so I got up to see what he wanted...I figured a snack or something...nope right to the tub for bath time. It was only 7 p.m., we normally do bath time around 7:30-7:45...crazy kid. Oh well, we did the bath, milk/snuggle and teeth routine and off to bed he went. Can't complain. Although bath time is starting to get old and boring. He's been bathed every night since he was born. We need new fun bath things. His foam letters are great right now, but I'm always looking for something else! He can recognize and say a lot of his letters now, it's cute.

Cody has a friend overnight tonight. I can't wait to see how this bedtime goes. Justin of course will be envious of Cody having a friend, so he'll be super cranky, PLUS Cody will go out of his way to ignore and exclude his brother...we'll try our best to find that happy balance for the two of them without spending too much time refereeing between them.

Shitty ole spaghetti for supper tonight. That meal just plain gets on my nerves. I'm sick of store bought sauce and have been experimenting with Homemade Gourmet's sauce but still ain't luvin' it. The idea of eating that crap tonight just turns my stomach. Oh well maybe I can kill it with cheese! Anything is good killed with cheese. I hope Daniel will eat it tonight, he usually doesn't, but let's hope he branches out. He's just like his father is...he'll eat the same thing over and over again.

I'll leave you with an annoyance...don't you just hate answering a wrong number on your cell phone?! I have very few people that even have my number so most times I don't answer it if I don't recognize it, but lately I've given my number out to quite a few hospital related professionals regarding Sarah that I'm compelled to answer it just in case. Bah.

Life

Somehow I think this is going to be a long year. "nuff said.

Sadly I read all of your suggestions for Justin's class project, but never got to use any of them. Justin woke up sick and stayed home. Something is picking off the kids this week. Cody was home sick for two days, at times today, Daniel even seemed iffy. We'll see tomorrow.

I'm having a bad hair week. Don't you just hate when your cut grows out just enough that it just looks like trash. Curl won't stay, flips won't stay...bangs are too long...what's even worse is my eye brows are LONG overdue and any time those suckers go unkept for more than a month I usually start feeling like shit. I have a hair appointment on Saturday to get my eyes and foils done and a trim, it can't come soon enough!

I also need to shit or get off the pot with my eating habits lately. I can't stand how I've been feeling, yet I keep stuffing my face with yummy goodness. Today we went to eat at Red, Hot & Blue. Doug always gets a fried catfish sandwich with corn on the cob and I always get their Burnin' Luv Chili potato. Well I knew it'd be packed when we arrived, we had Daniel with us, so I refused to wait around for a table. The waitress says "we have tables available in our smoking area". I looked at her like she was stupid "I have a baby with me". She says "no one is smoking in there right now". I chuckled probably appearing quite rude "I've made that mistake before and no sooner did we get seated and we were surrounded with people smoking, no thanks, not with our baby". Poor Doug dragged ass out of there looking pretty beaten down. Heh. I suggested we get some To Go from the restaurant and just take it back to work to eat it, so that's what we did and it worked out great. Daniel got to run around in the kitchen at work and eat at a table with us as we sat and enjoyed our meals.

Daniel and Cody both have Valentine's parties tomorrow. I got them both some valentines, Cody got some candy valentines to hand out and Daniel got some animal baby valentines that are cute...I guess I better go fill those out for tomorrow. Valentine's day is overrated. Doug and I don't normally acknowledge Valentine's Day in the way a lot of couples do. I think it's just one of those pressure holidays that suck. I have a much better day coming up...February 16th will mark the 8th anniversary to leaving my ex. THAT is a day to celebrate. A lot has happened to me in 8 short years...I moved to a new town, I went back to school, I graduated, I got a full time job working in law and accounting, I fell in love, I moved to a different country, I got married, I got a new job, bought a new house, had another baby...my previous life sometimes seems so far in my past and other times it feels like yesterday. Eight years is just nothing in the big picture ya know, but I'm so glad I have those eight years under my belt separating me from the horror that once was.

Mom gave me some rotten news the other night...my best friend from highschool (7th, 8th, 9th, 9th and even later) apparently is going through some tragic life events...her husband shot himself and was found a week or so ago. I've heard some rumors about the why's, but geesh, who really knows why but him, ya know? I just feel awful for her and unfortunately, I don't have a way to contact her yet, but I'll find a way. Also, a friend at work is going through a tough time, her Mom has been put under hospice care, still in a coma. Liver shut down. Not good.

I'm blessed that I haven't had such tragedy in my life...sometimes I feel like I'm sitting waiting for it though. Well ER is calling me...Anyone else a sucker for this season's American Idol? We just can't help ourselves, it's quite pathetic...oooo the drama!

Just a thought

We're having sweet and sour meatballs with rice/corn tonight. Couldn't I call them Swedish meatballs and send those to class with Justin? *snicker*

I some how got Daniel obsessed with sitting on my lap while I'm at the computer. He is determined to look at pictures EVERY single moment I'm at the computer. It was fun the first 100 times... I have no peace anymore at my desk unless he's in bed. Sadly I'm on a swivel chair and he just PULLLLLs until I can't hold on any longer, then I spin around to face him...and he climbs and pulls his way up. Heh. Gah what have I done!!!

Help

Justin's world geography teacher has requested that all of the students bring in a dish from some other country, can't be North or South America (stupid if you ask me). I have to prepare this by Wednesday night (of course he'll need to help). Something simple would be nice and something that is sharable between him and his classmates. I'm thinking cookies or something. Any thoughts?

BTW

Remember yesterday when I mentioned how much Daniel loved eating out of my old french fry box and how he had hauled it out of our computer room garbage can and how I figured I'd be picking it up off the floor shortly....well...


Figures eh? I told Doug it took me longer just picking up the clutter than it did to actually clean up. It's no wonder other things around the house don't get finished...I'm too damn busy cleaning up trails of mess. We're all guilty of doing it, even Doug and myself. Mind you the kids are by far WORSE, although Doug is awful about shelves and he will admit it. Why is it so easy just to lay something down, up out of reach instead of actually putting it away immediately? I find everything all over the damn place. I spend an hour just lugging everything back to where it goes. Oh well I'm preaching to the choir now, you all know what I'm bitching about.

Home today

I'm home from work today with a sick ten year old. He's still in bed and hopefully the tylenol will break his fever soon. I haven't seen one of the older kids this sick in a very long time. I hope it doesn't spread throughout the house. Yikes.

I gave Daniel his second haircut yesterday afternoon. It's cute. There's only one small spot by his ear that is cut shorter than the other side, but geesh, toddlers do NOT stay still when you cut their hair, heck when do toddlers stay still period? When I cut by his ear, it tickles him so he usually moves even more. =)

Sarah picked out some blonde color the other day for her hair. I've put in highlights before, but they didn't turn out well at all. I used the plastic streaking tool and it was a disaster, so maybe a whole over all color will be okay. I don't know yet. Cody wants the leftover color put in his hair like I did last time. I'm trying to make a deal...color for cut, but he's not biting.

What are ya'll having for supper tonight? We had hamburgers last night. Mind you I was lazy about cooking them, Doug didn't want to drag out the barbeque, so I threw the patties in the oven to avoid the whole frying mess, they were okay, but not great. We've got lots of choices for supper, I just have no motivation.

I've been playing Daniel's Einstein DVD's on the laptop lately. Have you ever checked out the special features on those DVD's? Daniel loves them. We play the interactive flash cards and he gets the biggest kick out of them. Of course they match his Einstein flash cards that he already has, but the ones of the DVD make sounds. He mimics a lot of animal sounds now. It's cute. We just discovered mini puppet shows on this DVD and he's cracking up at them. This little fish is jumping out of the "water" and is squirting the monkey and he's laughing so hard. I love seeing his sense of humor develop. He actually gets it ya know! Right now he's growling along with the tiger. ARggggrrrrhhhhh! Be scared everyone!

Literally, my floors are cluttered. I get so tired of picking up the same shit day after day. Daniel drags stuff around with him all day long, he drops it here and there and all of us in the house walk over it like it's not there. Once every couple of days through the week, I ask the kids to each pick up five things off the floor and put it where it goes. I even resort to paying them to clean up Daniel's toys. On the weekends, I clean my ass off, dust, tidy up clutter, dishes, laundry, sweep, scrub, bathrooms, toys etc and what happens? By the end of the very same day, it looks as if I did nothing. Amazing really.

It started out dark and rainy today. Sun is shining now. Typical for TX weather I find. Kids are out with Doug today. They went yesterday too, but I didn't get a chance to clean because I had Sarah out getting her hair done and some shopping for her first dance. She ended up with a stacked bob, not what I asked for, but Sarah wanted short hair and she likes it and that's all that matters. I've got some pictures from last night...let me go grab the camera.





Something Doug discovered today that Daniel loves to play with...milk carton with a screw lid. Daniel lugged that thing around all morning. He also dug out of the computer room garbage the carton that held my dairy queen french fries from last night. He brought that to me asking for some. I thought Oh shit, here comes a tantrum when I can't produce his FAV fries...well I threw in some gold fish and he was a happy clam carrying that little snack box around. How funny the things that amuse them. I'm sure it'll be something I pick up in twenty minutes when I start my cleaning. I am my own worse clutter bug. Geesh.

Here's Daniel being silly with Cody's shoes.

Better times, I suppose

Okay so the week got better. I was merely having a cranky moment. We went to Sarah's appointment on Thursday. It was pretty upsetting and I'll talk about it here when I actually get around to telling family and friends. Yesterday I could barely open my mouth to talk about it without the tears flowing, so I just decided that I needed more time to digest it and set a plan in motion to get help. Once that all happens, I'll explain it.

Doug just left to go get Justin from track practice. You know it really annoys us when the coach keeps exactly long enough to miss the bus, then lets them go. We end up driving through twenty minutes of heavy traffic all because he missed the bus by three minutes. This happens every freaking day. Doug's going to mention this to the coach because the only thing I can guess is Justin practices with highschool boys and maybe a lot of them drive themselves to school, so the coach probably doesn't consider missing the bus as an issue. We don't care if he wants to keep them for an extra thirty minutes or an hour...but three minutes past bus time? Come on! KWIM?

Doug informed me he'd luv to have bacon/eggs/hashbrowns for supper tonight. We have that at least once or twice a month, but UGH I hate cooking it. It's not hard, just dirties up a lot of dishes and the bacon always burns me at some point. Oh well, I guess if my hubby wishes it, I'll grant it (then of course, I'll soak a back rub out of him later for it). =) Last night we had roast beef in the slow cooker which I make a lot. I'll use the leftover beef to make vegetable beef soup from Homemade Gourmet. Yum. Daniel will really like that soup I hope. He's been using a spoon more and more to eat with we're noticing. He's a shy boy, but such a sweetie!

Sarah apparently is having an issue with some girl at school. I still don't know details about that, but I'll be asking her about it tonight during supper. Her first school dance is tomorrow night!! Do you remember your first dance? I remember mine, it was for Halloween. 6th grade. I dressed up as a punk (basically a hooker!) LOL. Oh well it got me attention from the most popular boy in school and he even asked me to "go with him". Remember that? "Will you go with me?" "circle one" "yes..." "no..." God that is so funny. It lasted a whole week LOL!! However it's partly his fault I never felt adequate enough, his fault I still wear makeup. I never got any attention without makeup, the boys all flocked to me as soon as I put it on. During a snow fight in 7th grade, I had gotten all wet and some of my makeup started running off and I heard one of the smart mouthed boys laugh it up with his buddy commenting "she's a dog without her makeup". I've never quite been able to just let that go. Since I was 12 years old, I've never left the house without makeup. Pathetic eh? Bastard, I outta write that pussy a letter and give him a piece of my mind LOL! Not. Oh well to be young again ya know!

Rant

Warning: cursing ahead

Can I just say "fuck off!"? I can? Why thank you. Fuck off.

So many things just got under my skin today. If you really love me, why not just chop off my head and shit down my throat eh? I am not in the mood to be nice. A few people found that out today. I guess I should fix that tomorrow. Maybe. I'm tired of having that constant weight on my head. I saw today that no matter what I do or how much I accomplish, it's never going to be enough. More is expected. Why fucking bother?

Insert blah blah blah.