Before I was a Mom...
1) Getting my hair done did not need to be planned and executed like the invasion of Iraq.
2) My boobs didn't look like a pair of pantyhose with potatoes in them.
3) I didn't really believe that love and hate were opposite sides of the same coin.
4) I had two nickels to rub together.
5) I'd never had someone else's pee and/or poop on my hand.
6) I didn't constantly feel guilty about every little thing I've ever done wrong.
7) I didn't try to stop reduce my yelling. When I wanted to yell, I yelled.
8) I didn't care much about the kind of person I was. I did what I wanted, and to hell with the consequences.
9) I didn't walk around with my heart outside of my body (I know that is someone's quote, but I love it and it fits).


If you can dredge up the energy after a day with your kids to play along, visit Mama Kat and pick your prompt!

Madhouse

***In the second picture, I told Brittany to make a normal face because she kept doing silly things (as you can clearly see). That was her "normal" face, she said.

Waiting For the Tide to Turn

Newton tells us what goes up must come down. What I want to know is if the opposite is true. What goes down must come up? Will our recent run of bad luck eventually hit rock bottom and start heading up? On the way home from dropping Taylor off at the YMCA (which will be a whole other post, because the experience today has left a bad taste in my mouth), we had a flat tire. It's getting to where I'm afraid to leave my house.

*** Please excuse me, I'm going to go get out my violin....

Keepin' em Busy

I picked up these really cool flat foam pieces that fit together with letters and numbers on them. The constant picking up of the cut-outs is not so much fun, but seeing Taylor's creations grow from a simple cube to this (see below) is definately worth the trouble! You can't really tell from this picture, but the top is angled just like a roof.

Taylor starts Mother's Day Out at the YMCA tomorrow. Wish her (and me, cause despite it all I'll miss her) luck!

A Little Bit of Payback

I believe in karma. I believe what goes around comes around. I believe that when you do something wrong (you know, like leave a cart in parking lot instead of returning it to the cart thing and it starts rolling and slams into someone's car), something equally frustrating will happen to you. I have been driving around with an expired inspection sticker since February. I don't have an excuse, really it was just laziness. I didn't relish the idea of sitting in the tiny, airless waiting room with two restless little girls. Part of it also was that we knew we were going to try to trade it in soon, and I wanted to save that lousy $35 bucks. Well. I got away with it until the day we went to the car lot (last Saturday). We pulled out of our garage, and a cop was driving down our street. So we were given a $147 fine, because he didn't buy our excuse. I think he even said "I don't buy it". Irony? Karma? I had high hopes that when I took the paperwork showing we had it inspected quickly, the court would dismiss the fine. Well. Today Corey took the car to be inspected, and now it will not even pass inspection.


I knew I should have put that cart away.........

I've Created A Monster

So, I've said many times here that I will not (nor have I ever with any of my children) let Madison cry herself to sleep. I know some parents use that strategy and are successful with it. I can't bear the thought of her crying so hard that she finally just gives up out of sheer exhaustion. I can't bear the the thought that her last waking thought of the day is "I need my mommy, I'm calling to her, and she doesn't care enough to come". In the good old days, I would lay her down at 7 pm and she would put herself to sleep within 15 minutes with no crying at all. The past two weeks, that routine no longer flies. We've already moved her bedtime back to 7:45 or so, thinking she cries when I try to put her down because she's just not ready for bed so early anymore. After all, my baby is no longer a baby :(
As soon as I (or Corey) lay her down, she sits up and starts crying. I give her about 5 minutes and then go in and get her back up. 10 minutes later, I lay her down again. Repeat process 3 or 4 times. It's supremely frustrating, especially because she has always been such an easy baby regarding sleep/bedtime. Last night I actually had to rock her to sleep. I won't lie, I kinda loved it because I have been missing having a baby lately. But still. And so, in repeatedly getting her back up when she cries, I have created a monster. I'm not sure how to remedy the situation, because I still will not let her cry herself to sleep.

Wish List Wednesday

I'm not going to be very original here, because I have "wished" for this item before. We could really use a minivan right about now.
When my older two children from my first marriage are staying with us, we used to solve the problem of space in my car by just taking two cars. A pain in the butt, yes. But doable. Now that I can't drive for 6 months, that solution doesn't work. So we can't go anywhere as a family. We had a deal in the works but it fell apart. Now I can't go anywhere during the week or on the weekends. #!@^#@!!