Oh my crazy life (or, Just another day for Tammy)

My kids make life very difficult for me at times. Usually those times are in the morning (and in the afternoon and in the evening....haha). This morning was no exception. They were driving me crazy. By crazy I mean that I was ready to walk out the door and not come back.

Mike had to work a double shift so he was gone before 6 this morning. That meant that I had to wake Reece up and get him ready to go with me to drop Alicia off at school. This is never a fun time. That child, Reece, does not like to wake up. He likes to sleep in. He's a night owl, and even the 7 am wake-up call was too early for his liking.

I managed to get both kids up and moving. I put food in front of them. It didn't really get eaten. Reece's was mostly eaten, but Alicia hates to eat in the morning. She must take after me. I got Reece dressed after a lot of tickling and playing around. Alicia was a different story. She did not want to get dressed. At. All.

Lately she hasn't been wanting to go to school. I don't know why, because she seems perfectly fine once she's there and she's perfectly fine when I pick her up. She complains that she doesn't have friends, but I see little girls giving her hugs goodbye, hugs that they initiate.

This morning she did not want to go to school. I finally managed to get her dressed and then I set about to brushing her hair. She really needs to just cut it, to around her shoulders, but there is no way that she is going to do that. In the meantime, I fight and fight with her to let me brush the tangles out of it. Tangled it was. Very tangled. I finally made my way through the jungle of her hair.

I fought with her to get her new pink cowgirl boots on.

I made sure that everything was packed into her backpack and we were getting ready to walk out the door. I had no time to spare; the kids had managed to use up every spare minute I'd allowed.

I should have allowed an extra half an hour because Reece had spotted his sister's backpack. He wanted his Spiderman backpack. I didn't know where it was and we were now running late. His solution? What else but to throw a major fit, to have a massive meltdown, complete with screaming, crying and rigidly standing his ground? There was no other option - I went back into the house and found his backpack in record time in the mess that is their playroom.

I loaded the kids into the van. I started the van and turned on the defroster. The windows were iced over with the lacy crystals that are pretty look at, yet very hard to get off. I grabbed the hose and turned on the water and...

The pipes were frozen, or at least, the hose was frozen.

I got my keys, went back into the house for some water and wasted yet more time. I poured a large bowl of water (a Tupperware Thatsa Bowl, for those in the know) on the windshield and got it cleared. We were finally on our way - at a time that we should have been pulling into the school parking lot.

Once we finally got to the school I took her into the office and got her tardy slip. For the first time ever, I didn't walk her to class. I didn't have time; I had class shortly myself. The look on her face when she realized I wasn't going with her was heartbreaking.

I love walking her to class, taking the time to help her put away her backpack and watch her sign in. Watching her greet her friends with smiles and hugs and stories. It's special to me, because I know that if I stop watching and walking her to class she's going to grow up before I know it and she won't want me to walk her to class - or anywhere for that matter.

I headed out to the van with Reece. My next planned stop was in Riverbank at my friend Dawn's house. Mike usually stays home with Reece on the mornings I have school, but he had to work so Dawn agreed to watch Reece. It works out well since she is the mommy to Reece's best friend, David. By the time I reached their house, Reece was sound asleep. I unloaded him from the van and started to carry him up to her house. From my shoulder, where his soft cheek was resting, I heard, "Brrrr. It's cold out here." He was awake and ready to go play with his friend.

At this point I needed coffee. I ran out the door (practically, I didn't want Dawn to feel badly) and drove straight for Starbucks. I got a white chocolate mocha and a reduced fat blueberry coffee cake and headed for school - across the city of Modesto. Traffic wasn't exactly flowing the way I felt it should, but I wasn't too horribly late.

I walked into class about 5 minutes late, which was just in time to miss the professor's lecture to the class about not missing class and showing up on time. Oops!! That's okay. It was the first class I was late to, excluding the first class. I was only late to that one because it took me 45 minutes to find a parking spot.

Class was fine; we got a lot done.

I headed straight for Dawn's house after school. When I got there, Lo was there with her lovely Emma. Emma and the boys (and Ariana, we can't forget Ariana!) were running around wreaking havoc as usual. Dawn and Lo were sitting at the table eating breakfast foods. They offered me banana bread. I said, "Sure, I'll take a little."

Dawn cut out a piece that constituted 1/4 of the baking dish and set it in front of me! I protested, "That's way too big!"

You'd think I cursed their children. Jaws dropped. Lo's eyebrow went up. "Whaddaya mean it's too big?! We just ate the whole rest of that by ourselves!"

I grabbed a knife and cut it in half, a more decent sized portion, and smeared some margarine on it. Then I ate and we all talked and giggled. Lo said that she was distracted by my chest and Dawn agreed. I blushed, I'm sure, and we talked and laughed some more.

I told Lo that I just knew that she was going to go home and blog about my distracting boobs and how I insulted them by not eating very much banana bread. She insisted that she was nicer than that and would not do it. She's staying true to her word. I love that about her. She's so honest about everything. If she's going to blog about me, she usually lets me know to expect word bubbles with things I would never say coming out of my mouth, and I love it!! I love that she's honest enough to let me know it's going to happen and I even love that she has me saying strange things.

Lo gathered up Emma and went home for a nap. Dawn and I hung out on her sofa and looked at catalogs. I told her I love her for the fact that her house was messy. It makes me feel better about my own messy house and I love that she doesn't think she has to clean it up just because I'm coming over. It's nice to know I'm not the only one who can't keep up with life.

When I left Dawn's house I felt so peaceful. Reece was so happy to see me. He even stopped playing enough to give me kisses and hugs when I got there. When I picked Alicia up from school, she ran to me with her arms outstretched, hugging me from 20 feet away with a huge bear hug that I could practically feel for the seconds it took for her to reach me.

No matter how the days start and end, those kids are my life. Every fiber of me is so in love with them that I will never take that walk out the door and not come back.

Awww, there's a windowbox of flowers. 

The door. Spiderman is a must. 

Look at the printer!! 

Can you read the "screens"? 

 

All those plugs must go somewhere... 

Replicate everything - down to the pictures!! 

What do you figure the weight limit is on that chair? 

A mini fridge is always important 

This is too funny

What do you do to your co-worker when they are out of the country for a while? You put your work time to good use and switch out all their office products to be replaced with cardboard look-alikes.

I thought that this was just too funny not to share.

If you were...

If you were the folder that has all of my syllabus papers, my test grades, my essays, my study sheets.....basically all of my stuff for my political science class, where would you be?

I'll tell you where you aren't: not with the other school stuff, not with the magazines, not mixed into the newspapers, not in the van, not in my room, the kids' rooms, with the bills, under beds, under sofas, in sofas, in the bookcases, in the cupboards, in the indoor garbage cans, in the outdoor garbage cans, in the bathroom, on the computer desk, with Alicia's school work, with my BeautiControl stuff...is there anything I've left out?

This sucks. At least I have my notes from the last class, because we're doing a city council simulation and I'm the City Clerk. I was able to write up the minutes, which is a very good thing, but my agenda is sorely lacking. It doesn't help that the City Manager I have to sit next to during our City Council meetings walked off with my book last class, either.

Perhaps I'm too old for school.

Scooby Dooby Doo!!

Today was Alicia's party with her friends from school. I feel as if my poor little girl gets cheated every year in the birthday party department. It's hard when your birthday is the same week as a holiday, even the same day at times. This year it falls the day after Thanksgiving. I know that throwing a party the the weekend after Thanksgiving is virtually guaranteeing that no one will show, so I planned this one for the weekend before.

Apparently, this does not make much difference.

I gave out 24 invitations, one to each of her classmates. I got two responses saying they could not attend as they would be out of town and I got six saying they would make it. Of the six, four actually came. I don't know what happened to the other two. One of the attendees also came with his two siblings, who went to the same preschool as Alicia, so I guess you can say that they made up for the MIA's.

Alicia wanted a Scooby Doo themed party, but I hate getting all of the themed stuff to go with it. We always have leftover supplies and I end up serving things on My Little Pony or Strawberry Shortcake paper plates for ages. This year I only got the invitations. I got a lime green tablecloth, purple napkins and orange plates. I served the chips and dog bone shaped graham crackers in dog bone shaped doggie dishes I picked up at the 99 Cent store. It all looked very Scooby Doo-ish, but was a lot cheaper!

When I asked what kind of cake she wanted she first said white. That is her favorite kind. Later she asked if she could have white and chocolate, "because some kids do like chocolate." Isn't she just the sweetest thing? I didn't want to make her a cake shaped like Scooby Doo, partly because I'm tired of buying specialty pans and only using them once. I decided I would do the Mystery Machine and make it all myself. I did the bottom layer chocolate and the top white and then trimmed the ends to the shape of the van and decorated it free-hand. Normally my frosting turns out nice and stiff, but for some reason today it was on the runny side. As a result, the cake doesn't look as good as it usually would, but it sure was yummy!




When the guests arrived, they sort of ran around wildly and played. I settled them down to color pages of Scooby Doo pictures. This was, of course, mainly so that I could have some breathing time.



After a little bit more playing and snacking on the chips and my mah-ve-lous guacamole, we sang Happy Birthday to Alicia and had our cake. It was very yummy (thank you, Betty Crocker!). I let the kids play some of the sugar high off and then it was time to open the presents. She made out like the girly-girl she is. She got a princess castle play tent, a My Little Pony, Monopoly Jr. and Yahtzee Jr. and (horror of horrors) her first Barbie, with a change of clothes and a swimming pool. I'm not crazy about the pool because all of that water can really damage the laminate flooring. I'm not crazy about Barbie because I hate the self-image she portrays. Oh well, it was bound to happen sooner or later. After her guests left I gave her a gift from us, which was the cartoon movie "Thumbelina", one that she has been asking for lately.




After gifts, I sat the kids back at the table for another activity. This time they decorated their own goody bags with Scooby Doo stickers and markers. I also let them fill the bags themselves. Hey, it was less work for me!!



Before everyone went home I assembled them for a group picture. They are just so cute at this age!! From left to right we have: Timmy, Alicia, Mica, Reece, Dennise, Jonathon and Jacob