It's Christmas Eve

And I'm at work. You would think that working for a religious organization would get me some extra time off this time of year. However, that would be a wrong thought.

Just wanted to say hello since it's been over a month since I posted. My time flies when you have seasonal depression issues. ;-)

Anyway...Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, Ho Ho Ho and Bah Humbug. All wrapped up with a pretty shiny bow.

The legacy left to me

My dad delivered me. Oh, there was another plan in place but it did not happen. It was always intended for me to be born at home. My mom enlisted the help of a midwife. She felt pretty good about this decision too...until she went into labor. The midwife lived quite a ways away and, when my parents decide it was time to call her, was on the phone. This was before call waiting. Can you imagine? Sitting there with a busy signal on the other end of the line? Once they finally got through, the midwife took off to get to us. And promptly got pulled over for speeding. "Excuse me officer, I know I was going too fast but I have to deliver a baby." Yeah right. Gee, for some reason, the officer didn't believe her. Can't imagine why. So by the time she got there, I had been born. Luckily, my dad had read a book. So he delivered me. And three hours later, I was grocery shopping with them.

My memories of my dad are all mixed up. I remember always wanting to be with him. To hold his hand. To feel like he was proud of me. To feel important in his life. Unfortunately, those things were not high on his priority list. My dad was an alcoholic. His booze of choice was vodka. To this day, I cannot handle the smell. People who say that it has no scent have not been around it as much as I have. It smells so strongly. It smells of failure. Of fear. Of disappointment and regret.

My parents finally got divorced when I was 12. My dad moved out when I was 6. I can't even begin to tell you how many nights I stood in the kitchen, watching for him out the window. Waiting for him to come and whisk me away to what I was sure was going to be an amazing magic filled weekend with my daddy. More often than not, he failed to appear. I wonder now what was going through his head. Did he really not remember? How do you forget your child? I think about my mom too. How angry she must have been. Watching me hurt...seeing the excitement turn to sorrow...holding me while I cried...

As tends to happen with chronic alcoholism, my dad got sick. He developed Liver Disease. Esophageal Verasy. Hepatitis. It was horrible. I struggled so much with how to handle it. I had two options. 1. Ignore him. Ignore his disease. Ignore the fact that he had no one. Hold on to the hurts of growing up with him as a dad. Remind him of all of the heartache he caused me over the years. Or 2. Drive him to doctor appointments. Make sure he ate. Go to his house (a converted garage studio with concrete floors) and check on him. Tell him I loved him. Do my best to mean it.

I'm ashamed now to tell you how hard that decision was for me. In the end though, I felt like I needed to show him that I could take care of him. I patted his back while he vomited blood. I held his hand while he was in the I.C.U. I sat beside him when he had fluid drained off of his stomach. I told him I loved him. I meant it.

I was able to do for him what he was unable to do for me. He was transitioned to comfort care in a nursing home right after Christmas of 2004. He couldn't talk because he had been on a ventilator for 3 weeks. We (my brother, sister in law and I) made a sign for him that said, "Chocolate Milkshake, Please". He would hold it up for the nurses. We knew that he didn't have much time left. On Saturday January 15, 2005 I went to see him. I told him that Joe and I would be back to hang out with him that night. I told him I loved him. He squeezed my hand. I left. We didn't go that night. We were on a date and ran out of time. The next day I got a phone call from his nurse. He was rapidly going downhill. They had him medicated heavily with morphine and told me that we needed to get there. Joe took the boys home and I went in. My brother and his wife, myself and my dad's best friend pulled chairs up to his bed. He was unconscious but I think he knew that we were there. We started telling stories about him. Laughing and joking. Out of the blue he started to cough up blood. My brother and I went to either side of his head. Matthew grabbed the suction tube and started to suction his mouth. I wiped the blood off of his chin. We looked at each other and both knew. He was gone. The nurse came in and confirmed it. We kissed him and left.

I feel almost like, since that day, something has been broken in my head. I started having insomnia. Going through bouts of severe depression. Attempting to sabotage my life and my relationships. Acting like he did. Drinking a little too much sometimes. Being a little bit too big of a personality to have people feel comfortable around me. I know that if I'm not careful, I could turn out just like him. And sometimes, on the bad days, that seems like it would be easier than fighting the legacy left to me.

When despair for the world grows in me, and I wake in the night at the least sound in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be -- I go and lie down where the wood drake rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds. I come into the peace of wild things who do not tax their lives with forethought or grief. I come into the presence of still water. And I feel above me the day-blind stars waiting with their light. For a time I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
Wendell Berry

I have to put this somewhere because I don't want to lose it. This is how I am feeling right now. Something is coming. Something big. And I am scared. I'm worried that I'm feeling the beginnings of the bad time for me. I want the waves to recede. How do I do that?

It's official, I am lame.

What do you write about when your life never seems like it changes? We spent so much time in the woods this summer, so much time on the lake, so much time just hanging out. Now winter is here. Or fall anyway. Really not much of a difference up here. Autumn still means that it's in the low 30's. Autumn still means that it's stupid hunting season. Autumn still means that there is snow. On my car. Right now.

Little Boy is in kindergarten and doing awesome. We've had some "issues" with his teacher so far. She didn't think that his celiac was a big enough of a deal to tell the lunchroom staff. So the kids were sharing food, as kids do, and he shared some chips. He does not have the maturity to know which chips he can have. He ate Doritos. He got very sick. We also had an issue with some of the kids. He brought his lunch of PB & J on rice cakes. They made fun of him. He cried. I threw a fit. Quite simple really.

Teenage Boy is in high school. He's playing soccer. He's got straight A's. Who is this child? What happened to the problem student? He is quite mouthy with me so I know that he hasn't been replaced by a pod person at least.

Joe and I celebrated our 10th anniversary in September. We had an awesome time. We went to Canada and watched a hockey game. And this could not be more mundane or boring.

Cell phone pictures

The sun is a very intense red color right now.

This fire will be going over the mountaintop within the next 2 days.

On the right is normal clouds. On the left is smoke.

Driving into the smoke. Can you imagine how AWESOME it makes me feel to know that my kids are breathing that in?

I haven't had time to upload the pictures from my camera yet. I took these yesterday of the smoke clouds. Air quality is horrible up here right now. The difference between the blue sky and the black smoke blows me away. It makes me so sad to see...

A whole month later

Well, it didn't sell. And that is the only showing we have had on it. I'm just pretty done with the whole thing, I think. There's just too much else going on right now to be too concerned about it. I'm just annoyed. I'm weepy. Best Friend made a really stupid comment to me last night about Little Boy. She says she was only kidding but it was just one of those comments that make me want to snatch my kids tighter to me and run away from everyone with them. Really dumb. But I'm still reeling from it. I just thought that I could trust that she loved my boys as much as I love her girls. It just sucks.

Not helping is that I'm hormonal. Yeah! (and...sorry to any men that might still be reading this...Hi Slinger!) so I'm way more whiny and sensitive than normal. Gotta love being a girl.

Montana burns. Have you seen that? Where I live is literally surrounded by fires that are all moving very quickly towards my town. Towns have been evacuated as close as 40 miles from us. It seems like a lot but really, it's not. One fire started at 10 acres burned on Friday night and by last night, there were over 18,000 acres burned. It's insane. The air is so smoky up here that you can't see the mountains. I took some pictures last weekend that I'll upload later. It's like watching snow fall with the ash. Air quality stinks. They are getting ready to shut down the woods completely. We were supposed to go camping this weekend but it doesn't look like it's going to happen. We couldn't have a fire but we were still going to go out. We'll see what happens.

So tell me...what do you do when you get sensitive about your kids? Do you avoid the person that made you feel that way? Do you look at your child and start to see them as the other person does? Do you wrap your arms around them and take them far, far away? I need some advice here, people. Unfortunately, this isn't just some random person. This is one of the people that I spend most of my time with.

It only takes One, right???

We've got our first showing this morning! Woot! The market up here has just been very very odd. Summertime is when real estate is supposed to just move in Montana but it hasn't been. And to make it worse, people are listing their houses for way under market because they want to sell quickly. So they're driving the market down.

Could you blame someone if they daydreamed of fire bombing those houses? Not that I have or anything. Nope, not me.

The people that are looking at our house today are from out of state. They are looking at 10 houses today and we are first on the list. I'm hoping that that is good for us. "They" say that you really only remember the first and the last and that by the middle of the day, minds are usually made up. Plus, we are experiencing a freaky heat wave and most homes up do not have central air. Why would they? It's Montana! Right now (at 7:50 am) it's only 68 degrees so by 9:00, I'm hoping our house will still be cool from last night. I made cookies this morning and so the house smells really good. It's clean. I left the cookies on the counter with a sign asking them to please help themselves.

Really good chocolate chip cookies are worth $239,500, right?

Right?

The one where my heart explodes

Hey! How are you? No, not you...You...Yes, you. How have things been? Anything exciting happening lately in your life? Say...you wouldn't happen to want to buy a house would you? It's a nice house in a great neighborhood. No? Oh well. You and nobody else either.

We have had NO showings on our house yet. I'm not quite sure why that is. I'm thinking that it might have something to do with the fact that our realtor is an idiot. A brand new idiot. He's so green that if he were an avocado he would be used as a projectile. He wasn't my pick. I want to fire him. I've wanted to fire him. A month on the market and no showings tells me that he's doing something wrong. But he works for Joe's best friend and so it's Joe's baby. When I decide that I'm going to do something, I want it done right away. I have no patience.

ANYWAY.

It's reached the time of the year where we are spending every weekend out in the woods. We broke down this spring and bought a used camper. It's perfect for us and it is very very nice to have. Now we feel like we have to make it worth our money by using it. All the time. I love to camp and don't mind getting dirty so that's ok. The boys love it too. Little Boy runs free with his friends and Teenage Boy (now AKA Mancub) explores. He's the coolest 14 year old. It's hard to gauge what he's thinking a lot of the time because he doesn't show much emotion. But he gets this twinkle in his green eyes that show how happy he is when things go his way. He's going to be deserting me for a few weeks this summer. He's going to San Diego for 3 weeks with Joe's oldest brother. It's going to be a great experience for him. I'm a little nervous about him flying by himself though. He just doesn't have much common sense it seems. He has an hour and a half layover in Seattle on his way home. I think he'll be smart. I hope.

*Recorded for posterity (and because the baby book is packed away)*
While camping last weekend

Little Boy: Here Mommy (handing me a wildflower), I picked this for you.
Me: Thank you sweetie
Little Boy: A beautiful flower for a beautiful mommy.

And then my heart exploded.

The hair...the song...the clothes (especially the jeans up to his nipples) and the dancing.

I spit water at my monitor. This? This is what I listened to when I was younger?

Where has the time gone?

Wow. It's been over a month since I posted? How did that happen? Where did the time go? All we've been doing is camping, cleaning, de-cluttering our house, landscaping, working, cleaning some more, de-cluttering some more, dealing with family tragedy, playing way too hard with our friends and listing our house to sell.

Oh yeah. So that's where the time has gone! So guess what! You get bullets! Woo-hoo!!

• The house is listed. The sign is going in the ground today. We have de-cluttered, touch up painted and landscaped. Our realtor thinks that it will sell very quickly. We stand to make $75,000.00 profit off of it. In 2 years. Amazing to me.
• We bought a little camper for ourselves. It's old (1986) and 19 foot but it's in great shape, can sleep all 4 of us very comfortably and everything works! We got a killer deal on it. And best of all? When it's raining in Montana and we're camping? Now we're dry! AND I don't have to pee in the woods anymore!
  
• My Uncle Al tragically lost a battle with cancer last Friday. He was my surrogate dad growing up. Since my bio-dad was nowhere around for most of my formative years, if I needed a daddy talk, my mom would call Uncle Al. Even though they lived 1000 miles away, I always knew that he (and my Aunt Gwen (my mom's sister and Al's wife)) would be there in a hearbeat if I needed them. I always knew how proud they were of me. That's a great feeling to have. He was diagnosed at the end of March and went very quickly. Teenage Boy and I leave tomorrow morning and are driving to South Dakota for the funeral. We come home on Monday. It's going to be horribly sad but, through it all, I know there will be lots of laughter. That's just the way my family is. We make sure it's all about the good memories intermingled with the tragedy. And one thing my family knows well is tragedy. My cousin lost her husband 2 years ago. This is her dad. It sucks.
  
• Last but definitely not least, Teenage Boy graduates from 8th grade today. I can't believe it! I just keep remembering him in his little frog shorts and t-shirt on his first day of kindergarten. He was so stinkin' cute and still is. I'm very proud of him! He turns 14 on Saturday and I'll be 31 on Sunday. Amazing how time flies.
  

OK, I've got a ton of stuff to do before I leave. I'll update more from the road, I'm sure.

Hey guess what?

They have worn me down. Joe & Roy have won. The positives outweigh the negatives. It's the right time of year, right market, right everything.

What am I talking about, you ask yourself?

We are selling our house.

We are buying land.

We are moving back into the house we moved out of 2 years ago and going to rent it from my parents.

We are building next spring.

We are completely insane.

We are going to be investing in whiskey very soon.

Ways to pass the time

This is baby crack. The boys and I have been sucked on there for the last few days. We start to play and all of the sudden, it's been 3 hours.

Baby crack, I tell ya. Consider yourselves warned.

FIVE YEARS OLD!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MY SWEET, SWEET BOY.

I AM SO INCREDIBLY LUCKY TO BE YOUR MOM.

No words

Such tragedy. Such heartbreak. Such a waste.

Do you know how hard it is to be taken seriously in a meeting while you're wearing a Scooby Doo bandaid on your finger?

I'm just sayin.

Note to self: Buy grown up bandaids at the store.

Ugh

Too many jelly beans.

Too much egg salad.

Too much ham left over.

But most of all, too many darn jelly beans.

Ugh.

My weekend. IN PICTURES!

Can I get a woo-hoo? This weekend has been interesting, to say the least.

Let's see...how do I begin...I guess Friday is a good enough place to start, huh?





It has been an amazingly beautiful weekend weather wise. We went to the park on Friday afternoon and the boys hung out.

We were with Andrea and the girls (but of course) and then we went to their house for BBQ and bonfire. Spring in Montana!

Can anyone tell me what the heck this is? Roy's mom swears it's a dog but I'm just not too sure.

We got a little bit bored after marshmallows so Roy pulled some fun out of the closet. Oooh, that sounded dirty...

Yesterday was sunny and warm again and off we went to a giant easter egg hunt at some friend's house.


There were 3000 eggs hidden on their land. There were about 200 kids. You do the math. Each kid had an overabundance of eggs. Nothing like spoiling them rotten!



It kind of went downhill from there. Little Boy has been sick off and on for the last 5 weeks. He's had tonsillitis and ear infections two times and two rounds of antibiotics. He started acting a little bit off on Wednesday. Not wanting to play with his friends, whiny, clingy, etc. He seemed to be warm occasionally but I had never actually checked his temperature. After the hunt, he got super tired and really hot. He wouldn't turn his neck and was saying his eyes hurt. When we got home, we took his temp and it was 102.4. We gave him tylenol and put him down for a nap. 45 minutes later Joe checked it again. He was sleeping so Joe used it under his arm (remember, you have to add a degree to the temp you get). He was at 104.9. 106 degrees for a 4 year old is really not a good thing. Joe called his mom (a retired nurse) and, after talking to her, off we went to the E.R. By the time we got there, the tylenol had kicked in and it was down to 103.8.


His eyes still were hurting and they were worried about meningitis because he wouldn't move his neck. Flu test, strep test and a chest x-ray were where we started.


He was perking up little by little. Joe did a great job entertaining him. He's a good dad.


He thought the x-ray machine was fun. This picture cracks me up. After much time and a now very perky boy, we found out he has strep. So this is 3 times in 5 weeks that he's on antibiotic. We have an appointment with his pediatrician on Tuesday. I am thinking we'll be getting tonsils out soon. Poor kid.

We still had a bunch of people over to watch UFC last night.


This is a horrible picture but it shows our evening. Our very very buzzed evening.

Today started early with me singing at church. We had Roy and Andrea over for dinner and did egg hunts in the back yard.

Now I'm sleepy. And you're bored with reading. So I'm done.

Where I've been lately

Impromptu dinner dates with the guy who makes me giggle kinda rock a little bit.

And so did that GIANT bottle of Chimas Ale. Oh so yummy.

I have a post brewing about my bio-dad and how my relationship with him and who he was has affected my entire life. We'll see if I can ever get it down on paper. More ale will help with that, I'm sure.

Stupid Howard Stern

Freak boy isn't in the bottom three.

Voting public of American Idol, I am serving you notice.

The hell? Part two

What happened to Sanjaya's hair??????????????

Now I hate him more.

And Gina rocked again.

And yes, Robin, you were right. Sometimes it takes really bad tv to bring me out of seclusion.

The hell?

Sanjaya is still there? Is America tone deaf?

DUDE!

I loved Phil tonight. Tobacco Road rocked. (In my personal opinion, which I'm sure some will disagree with. Snot.)

Edited to add: Gina rocks. I love her. Her look, her hair, her voice, all of it. I love chicks who can rock.

Still very tired but all done with my long days. I'm going to sleep in tomorrow with sick Little Boy and not go into work until 10. That will absolutely rock. Rock the casbah.

Can you tell I've had wine? I love wine. And to whine. Whining is good too. And I'm tired. Oh so very tired. Too tired to really sleep. And that just sucks. But, on the up side, I'm american idolin' it and going to watch Bad Girls Club next.

Can I get a woot woot? Or whatever.

Stinkin Tired

Worked 13 hours today.
Have to work 13 hours tomorrow.
Slept 4 hours last night.
So stinkin' tired.

I have so much to say! About houseguest moving back to Cali on Thursday...about our weekend plans in Spokane...about St. Patricks Day (with pictures!)

Just too tired to say it.

Be back soon. Hopefully Wednesday???

I just don't know

I feel like I need to write something just to get that last post off of the top of the page. (makes you happy, doesn't it, Robin? I know you had it out against Sundance from the very beginning!

If only I had voted. Perhaps it would have made a difference.

Things are crazy busy at work. I feel like I'm meeting myself coming and going without a break in between ends. It's just going to get busier through the next week though. We have a huge event coming up March 19 and 20 and our secretary is out all of next week. My boss actually pulled me into his office and apologized for approving her vacation today. AND he hired a temp for next week. That was super nice. It's nice to be appreciated where you are, you know?

Joe and I went on a surprise date tonight. The boys didn't want to go to dinner with us so we left them home (oh the joys of them being 10 years apart!) and went by ourselves. It was nice. I had a bottle of wine and he had the huckleberry cheesecake. Priorities, you know.

Spring is springing up all over the place here in Northwest Montana. Everyday I'm more and more blown away by the fact that I get to live in this amazingly beautiful place. I know others would agree with me too. It is astounding and I'm more and more flabbergasted the older I get.

Best friends birthday is coming up in 2 weeks. We have a weekend away planned. In Spokane.
Which is the nearest big city type place we can find. We're not sure what to do over there though. With Joe being an alcoholic, going to a bar or dance club is out. But Andrea, Roy and I all still like to drink. He is ok with it, just not in a setting where that's all anyone does. So I need ideas. What is a good night time grown up without the kids activity that isn't only a bar? Help, please?

Sundance rocks.

It's official. I'm either voting for Sundance, the beebopper (how do you spell that?) or Chris. Or I would...if I actually voted. But I dig Sundance. (hahaha..I just typed "I did Sundance"...which I totally would have before I met Joe...but ANYWAY) Jeremy's spoken? Which Gen X'r doesn't remember that video????

Uncle Al is not doing well. The found out today that the cancer is on both lungs, his liver, his adrenal glands and his brain. It is an aggressive cancer so hopefully it will respond to chemo too. I'm hoping and praying anyway. He's the one, you know? I'm having a harder time with this than with my own bio-dad's death. Maybe because my dad died due to liver failure because of alcoholism and cancer is such an evil disease? I don't know. All I know is that when my dad (who I did love very very much) wasn't there for me, Uncle Al was. Anyway. I've told them how much I love them and how much they mean to me. For now, that's all I can do.

Ooooh, I know...I'll let you in on a little trick...you should buy really big wine glasses. Then, if anyone asks, you can say that you've only had 1 glass. Of course, it was 1/2 bottle but they don't need to know that!!!

And on that note, I'm out. Jessie's got more wine to drink and more photos to edit.

No real words

I just got a phone call. My Uncle Al was admitted to the hospital today. He has been suffering from a cough and, last week, after an xray, they told him he had a spot on his lung. He was scheduled to go in tomorrow for a cat scan. He had leg pain today bad enough that they took him to the hospital. They did the cat scan. He has lung cancer and it has spread to his brain. He has a brain tumor. That's all we know.

He and my grandfather are the only constant father figures I have had in my life. Even though they live 1000 miles away from us, he has always gone out of his way to make me feel special. Important. Loved. He has been married to my mom's oldest sister for almost 50 years. They were high school sweethearts and have one daughter. She lost her husband tragically 1 1/2 years ago. She has 2 sons. My aunt and uncle sold everything they had, my aunt retired from her job and they moved 300 miles to live 1 block away from their daughter. They thought it was important that the boys have their grandfather around and that they be there to help with Janelle. I am heartbroken. We don't know anything else yet. Just that it doesn't look good.

Parenting sucks sometimes.

Teenage Boy has gotten himself into a whole crapload of trouble. EVERYTHING out of his mouth is a lie. He has a 35% in his English class. He has skipped detentions because he didn't tell me he had them.

He has lost his cell phone.

His mp3 player.

His computer.

His swimming lessons.

He is in the process of cleaning out his room. All he will have in there is clothes and his bed. We're hoping that hitting rock bottom will wake him up. This sucks. And he doesn't seem to give a rip. He cried at first but it just seems to annoy him more than anything.

Why am I more affected by this than he is? I want so badly for him to do well. I want so badly for him to feel pride in himself. To be a man of integrity. To have his yes' mean yes and his no's mean no.

When I wake up tomorrow, could they both be happy, well adjusted grown men, please?

Am I a freak?

So how normal is it to have a crush on your children's doctor? I mean, I've heard of other women afflicted but... I never thought I would be one of them. Maybe it's just because they are so good with our kids? So knowledgeable? Can make them feel all better? Who knows. Even though the boys' doctor is NOT my type at all, I find him strangely hot.

Little Boy had his FIVE year well child check up today. Did you hear that? That's the sound of my ovaries exploding. He's almost FIVE years old. What the? Where the? What happened? The good news? He is on the growth chart! For the first time since he was 6 months old, he's on the growth chart! Woo-hoo! Sure, it might only be in the 4th% for weight and 10th% for height but he's on there! That so rocks! Look! Blatant abuse of exclamation points! Get your bad grammar here! Woot! The not so good news is that we are now scheduled for a hearing test on Monday afternoon. Dr. J sat and talked to Little Boy for 20 minutes. Just talked to him and listened to him. (You see why I think he's hot? He wasn't required by blood to listen to a four year old's stories! But he still did!) ANYWAY...redirect... Little Boy had to have ear tubes twice by the time he was two. Part of his Celiac Disease showed up in chronic ear infections and other things. The last time we had his hearing tested (before his 2nd set of tubes was placed) his right eardrum was completely non functioning. After hearing him talk, Dr. J wants to rule out permanent hearing damage. His speaking pattern is indicative of hearing loss. Nothing too major though but it would definitely explain some things! So we'll see on Monday.

Other than that? Not much exciting. He got 3 shots, which sucked. He looked at the nurse and asked her, through tears, why she kept hurting him. He's such a goofball. That made me tear up. He's a goofball, I'm a wuss. Teenage Boy is at a Junior High Boys lock in with our church. Playing in hot tubs and Nintendo all night. Joe is teaching a Taekwondo belt test. He's on his way home now. I'm on my 2nd glass of wine. All is good.

Everyone have exciting plans for the weekend?

Didya miss me?

It seems like I haven't posted in a long, long time. I guess it has been a few days. We've just been so busy with re-entry and stuff. Joe is still unbelievably jetlagged. He's slept maybe 3 hours a night since he got home. It was an amazing experience for him. He's ready to go back today. I've set him up with his own flickr account so if you're interested he's one of my contacts. He hasn't added any descriptions yet but you can kinda tell what you're seeing. Lots of smiling babies faces.

It's actually been really hard having him home. I hadn't realized how used to being alone I had gotten. I feel like the boys and I got into a good pattern and now that dad's home again, it threw a wrench in it. Ah well...we'll get back to where we were. It's been hard for the boys too. More so than I thought it would be. For the first time in their lives, I'm the one they want! Woot! Joe and I are going to go away on Saturday night. Not far, just to the next town. We rented a suite in a hotel and we're going to go out to dinner. It will be nice to have some alone time.

Almost there

2 1/2 hours to go until we head for the airport. To say that I'm excited is an understatement. We were supposed to be picking him up right now but the travel agent screwed up. The itineraries that we have show them confirmed on a flight that only flies during the week. How that happened, we have no idea. And the travel agency is closed on the weekends. Anyway, 2 1/2 hours.

Woo-hoo!!

A little bit hyper today

So I had a HUGE coffee this morning. From Star*bucks. (and I loved it, Slinger!) We just got our first Star*bucks and I'm quite happy with it...

Best friend and I are going out tonight. I am so freakin' excited I can't even see straight. We just have so much fun with our girls nights. And the boys get home tomorrow! Woo-hoo!

That is all.

My pathetic beats your pathetic any day of the week.

So it's Valentine's Day. And here I sit. On my bed with my laptop on my lap. I'm eating the chocolates that I bought for myself and admiring the flowers that my big brother got for me because he felt sorry for me. Yup. Here I am, a woman who has been married for 10 years this year and I'm all by myself. Who cares, right? It's a commercial holiday that is by no means a measure of how much love someone has for you. So why do I give a rip? Why is this hard? I'm sure it has a lot to do with how close we are to the end of their trip. He'll be home on Saturday night. I'm looking forward to seeing him. I'm looking forward to him being safe again. I think I'm just done. My patience with the boys is at an all time low. I want to be a fun mom. I want to make good memories with them but it's just so hard.

I took Little Boy to the dr. last night. He has had a low grade fever for a week and a horrible cough. He complained about his ears once or twice but then he stopped. When I picked him up from preschool yesterday, I realized that he just looked not well. He had sick eyes. When he was a baby, he was sick so often that I learned those eyes very well. We sat in the office for over 2 hours and the whole time we were there he played. He was acting totally fine. Without a care in the world. But when the doctor looked in his ears, she was amazed. Both of his ears are bright red and bulging and looked horribly painful. AND he has tonsillitis too. Poor kid. They put him on a heavy duty antibiotic and gave him tylenol with codeine for his horrible cough and to help him sleep. So I know that he has been so incredibly freakin' whiny because he doesn't feel well but it doesn't make it easier. And I found out tonight that Teenage Boy has a 35% in his English class. And we're only 3 weeks into the quarter. He's missing a TON of assignments but keeps telling me that he doesn't have homework.

Is it Saturday yet? I'm ready to be off duty.

Anyway...sorry I'm such a downer. Just kinda where I am right now, I guess. Best friend and I got a babysitter for all the kids on Friday night and we are going to go play pool before the husband's get home. 48 hours to go. That will be a nice break.

Happy Valentine's Day one and all!

Lots of little updates

It has been 16 days since Joe left the country. Actually, except for a few days (and minutes and hours every day) here and there, we've done remarkably well. It has been odd though. I never really realized how much the hub of our family he really is. Slinger, take note...even if you don't think you're important, you are. I bought a little cassette recorder that Little Boy has been recording into every day. He's putting things on there that he wants to tell Daddy. The night before I bought this (thanks for the idea, Mom!) he woke me up in the middle of the night just sobbing. I asked him what was wrong and he said, "I just can't remember what I want to tell Daddy!" Broke my heart. The recorder was a great idea. Last Thursday, he was being very naughty at bedtime. He wouldn't go to bed. He finally said that he just wanted to talk to Daddy. So I let him record. He put that recorder to his mouth and said, "Daddy, I'm trying to be really good but I'm just so naughty...so very, very naughty..." He cracks me up.

Joe did buy a satellite phone while he was gone. I've talked to him frequently. They have been having an awesome time. They have delivered a ton of shoeboxes for Operation Christmas Child. They were able to go to a children's hospital. Joe was so affected by this. He was telling me about how lucky we are. If the parents didn't have the money up front, their children did not get the medicine. He just text messaged me and told me that one of the baby girl's he saw just died. She had a diaper rash. Her parent's couldn't afford any medicine. A diaper rash. Such a waste.

We are doing better. Maybe it's the wine speaking but we are doing better today. We only have until Saturday and they'll be home. I'm ready to run away!

And I'm done. Too tired to type more. Funny how that is.

Not so cavalier

So remember when I said that we were doing well without Joe? Yeah. That was just yesterday? My how things change. I'm tired. I'm sick. I'm ready to not have to be "on duty" all the time. I do have a renewed respect for single parents though. Who takes care of them when they're sick? I just want homemade chicken noodle soup with the real thick noodles. Unfortunately, nobody to make it for me. Oh my gosh, I am such a whiner.

Amer*can Idol comes on in 1/2 hour. That should be good for some mindless entertainment. I kinda feel bad for the clueless ones. I think that their friends need to be hung up to dry. Putting them out there to be humiliated. What kind of a friend is that?

In other news, a bloggy friend of mine is really hurting right now. Just know, dear one, that if there is anything I can do, you have but to ask. I'm sorry for your pain. I wish I could create a band aid that would be effective. Or that I lived closer so I could help you numb your senses.

Seriously??

Are you freakin' kidding me???

Elmer Fudd is my idol.

We seem to be surviving without Joe. The day to day stuff is going pretty well. I'm exhausted though. I forget just how hard it is to be both mom and dad to two kids when you're used to having a partner. I miss him. I wake up every night 4 or 5 times...just feeling like something is missing. I have gotten to talk to him quite a bit though and he's having a marvelous time. Already planning on when he wants to go back and bring me too. We're looking at 2 years. Oh...here's a funny...he's been working at some orphanages while he's down there. He wants to start looking into adopting a baby. Yep. Adoption is something that has always been on our minds and in our hearts. Obviously. Teenage Boy is adopted but it's a different situation because biologically, he belongs to Joe. But this is something that he really would like to think about together. So...that's a lot to digest. I wouldn't be adverse to it, I don't think. I'm actually kind of excited about talking more to him when he gets home. We'll see.

I have a bad cold. I'm sounding like Elmer Fudd. He totally rocks, by the way. He set the standard for germ ridden disc jockeys everywhere. He pulls off the nasal congestion so well. And I might be a little bit high from the cold medicine, did I mention that?

My baby is officially growing up. Little Boy had his first sleepover at a friend's house last weekend. He did really well! Slept better than he does at home. And later too. Which is stupid. He's supposed to get up really early when he's at someone else's house! But no, he slept until 8:30. I'm glad he had fun. But he's only 4. I'm just not ready for him to grow up yet, I don't think.

Work is super busy. My next scheduled day off is the day that Joe gets home. February 17. That will make 12 days in a row at the station. On the up side, Saturday and Sunday are only a few hours each day. We have an on air auction on Saturday and I work my last Sunday shift this week, which is only 3 hours. But still. Oi. I'm tired already.

I need some advice from y'all. (Really? I just typed that? And I'm leaving it? I am falling into so many Montana stereotypes right now.) I need healthy, EASY meals for my kids and I. I am really quite ready to start forcing them to eat better but I need to have the time to do it. Any suggestions?

Worth it.

Squishy Lips times 2
Originally uploaded by jesslee23.

Happiness is a boy who loves you anyway. Even when you mess up.

Parenting

Do you ever look back at your day and think to yourself, "Crap. I certainly messed my kids up today"?

I feel off. Not sure what's wrong. No patience. No energy. No desire to do much or talk to anyone.

I blew it with Little Boy today. Let's just say that my reaction (or overreaction as the case may be) will be fodder for many a therapy session.


Sometimes I think my kids deserve so much better than me.

Going, going, gone!

I am happy to report that after much drama, Joe is officially out of the country.

A day later than he was supposed to be.

Let's just say that LAX has never seen the likes of the stomach flu that Roy was struck with on Saturday. And that Joe and Roy are now entirely too close of friends. They have seen more of each other than guy friends in their 30's ever should.

Now if I could just figure out the time difference and when he's going to get there exactly, we would be good to go.

Frozen pizza and nachos are healthy, well balanced meals for my children, right??

So Sad. - UPDATED-UPDATED AGAIN!

Loic's body was recovered last night. They are not releasing any more information at this time. Sheriff Mike Meehan will be having a press conference at 3:00 today to give more details.

This heartbreaking story has come to a tragic end. I can only hope...actually, I don't know what to hope for. The worst has happened. Does it really matter how it came to that conclusion? Would it make me feel better to think that he froze because I can't handle the idea of someone intentionally hurting him? But if that was the case, wouldn't they have found him sooner? They had more than 200 people looking for him for the last 3 days. No stone unturned.

His family is having to go through the hardest thing they will ever experience right now. They have my thoughts and my prayers. Please do the same.

UPDATE: I just found out the details. He was found underneath a tarp in a wood pile less than 10 feet from the garage of the house. He was playing hide & seek apparently. With the temperatures the way they were that night, being in the frozen wood and unable to breathe properly under the tarp, they think that he fell asleep within 5 minutes (they originally thought 15 but they've changed that). After that? He just didn't wake up. It's still so horribly sad. Why didn't he answer his daddy???

SECOND UPDATE: The original details that we were given were wrong. The Sheriff's office issued an incorrect press release. (how does that happen? think somebody might be fired on monday?) He was not under a tarp in a wood pile. He was in the septic tank. They are not sure how he got there. Right now it doesn't look like he was placed there by someone else. There is going to be a huge investigation into the sewer cap and how he got there. It's horrible and tragic. They have the same sewer line that we have and the septic caps are not good. We had to have ours replaced last summer because it kept popping open. It was hinged on one side which is a lame design, IMO. If they had the same kind, there is a chance that he opened it up to look inside and fell. Then it would have fallen closed behind him and no one would have seen that it looked different. They have already done the autopsy and the cause of death was drowning.

It's horrible.

Update

He goes by Tank. He is blonde haired with blue eyes. He stands 3 feet tall and weighs 40 pounds. Which is why they call him Tank, I guess. They have now officially issued an Amber Alert. The Police Department do not think he is in the area any longer. The Sheriff did release a statement saying that if he was outside last night, it would have been almost impossible for him to survive the weather. I just keep praying that he is curled up in a shed somewhere. We've got a cool playhouse in our backyard...I so wish he was in it.

There have now been reports of a guy going door to door on that street telling people he was selling Tuperware around the same time. He is now a person of interest. Does Tuperware even get sold door to door anymore???

Heartache

There is a 3 year old little boy missing. He was being babysat by a relative and his dad came to pick him up last night around 6:00. His dad put him in his carseat in the mini-van and then went back inside to get his younger sibling. When the dad came back outside, Loic (Loh-ick) was gone. This all happened less than 1/2 mile away from our home. They called the police right away and, by the time we were notified at 9:00, there were over 50 people + police + firemen + dogs out looking for him. We joined in. There has been no sign of him. There is a creek in the area that leads to an aquifer. We are socked in with incredibly dense freezing fog. It got down to 20 degrees last night. He is wearing a winter coat and hat but has no gloves. There is a huge part of me that doesn't think he wandered off. I think he was snatched.

It's 1/2 mile away from my house. How many times has Little Boy been playing outside and I've run into the house to grab something? Just for a minute? Just turned my back? How must his dad and mom be feeling right now?

I am heartbroken for them. I just want their son happy and safe. The town we live in is still very small town mentality. Bad things are not supposed to happen here. The whole town is rallying. But what can we do? Offer our help searching, of course. Make coffee, absolutely. But how does that truly help them? How does that take away the pit in their stomachs?

I will hold my boys tighter and keep them closer. I will not turn my back. For awhile. And then we will get comfortable again. And forget. Why are there bad people? How can someone look at a 3 year old baby boy and want to hurt them?

I don't understand. I am heartsick.

How to pass the time.

I swear, I have allot of stuff to do at work. But how could I resist becoming an M & M? I mean, please. Check out my hotness! Uncanny resemblance, is it not? From the becoming pear shape, the fashionable elbow length gloves and all the way down to the camera fixed around her neck. She's me, all right.

Give it a try!

*Yes, I am aware that there is a very slight smidgen of a possibility that I am desperately trying to distract myself from the fact that Joe leaves in THREE days. There is a chance that I am starting to freak a little bit out and just trying to focus on something...anything other than that.*

Seriously? I'm not drunk enough to watch A.I.

What the heck is going on? Who are these people? How is it possible that they think they're good? What the? The employee and the boss? Just weird. I'm very close with my boss but...just...ewwww...

I've only had 1 glass of wine. I need more to deal with this. I wanna be drunk like Paula Abdul. Apparently insisted is a hard, hard word. When you're trashed on national t.v. I guess.

Of course, I could just turn the channel. But then I would miss her be-bopping to the California Dreaming guy whose eyebrows are more shaped than mine! Wait...he's only 16? Holy cow. There weren't guys like that when I was younger. He's way too metro for me. And now he's on the phone with his unsupportive mama. "She's proud of me...she's proud of me." OK, buddy. I see a stray hair in your coif, I believe. Better check yo'self.

Commercial break. So all I keep seeing today is people talking about how awesome 24 was last night. I've never watched it. How much am I missing? Is it still possible to get caught up this late in the game? Is it worth the attempt?

T minus 10 days until Joe leaves. I'm feeling much more secure about it. I might be looking for someone to buy my surly teenager before he gets back but, other than that? It's all gravy.

Dain Bramaged

Yeah! I win lamest post title ever! Woot! (that's for you, Robin)

I've had this little block thing going on. I just can't seem to wrap my brain around anything long enough to get a post formulated. It sucks but that's what it is.

In answer to your questions, Joe is going to the Philippines on a build trip. He is going to be hiking in to a tribe (we're not allowed to know which one yet) and building a church. One of the first buildings that this tribe will have with a complete foundation and real walls. Pretty cool. Then he gets to go to all these little villages and deliver shoeboxes. Have you ever heard of Operation Christmas Child? That's what he gets to do. That's going to be the really fun part. He digs kids so much and he's going to give them their first Christmas present ever in some cases. I'm feeling better about him going, mostly because I can't change it. Why fight it? I wouldn't want him to stay here. I know he's supposed to go so I know he'll be safe.

That's all I've got for you today. Joe's brother and his family are in from out of town so we've been swamped with familial duty. We ended up with all the kids at our house on Saturday night because Jason hit his head while we were sledding. He had a Grade 2 concussion and was hospitalized overnight. He's ok now and will have a great story to take back to the firestation in Southern Cali.

And now my brain is done.