1-31-11
How is it that January is already over?
Uber yawns this morning. I didn’t get my standard 2 days of sleep in time. I crawled out of bed at 5:30 yesterday and into my car at 5:45 to take Miss Luna to Pedro. It was nice, though, as it isn’t often that she and I get a private outing. She was so freaking nervous. She knew something was up. It probably didn’t help to smell thousands of dogs, all with pee that smelled of impending doom.
On the plus side, we were first down there which meant even though the entire process still took about an hour, she didn’t have to sit in the waiting room for too long. She also was really good. I had several compliments on her behavior. She was good, but a lot of it was out of sheer terror. My poor pup. She specifically did not care for the gobs of boy puppies checking out her back side. People, on the other hand, she adored.
We were able to pick her up way earlier than I expected, so I was quite pleased. She was ready at 1. It dawned on me that the shelter is right next to the hazardous waste drop off place, so we took the time to load up the car with our E-Waste and other hazardous stuff we had piled up in our backyard cleanings.
Friday night, Stephanie and I headed over to So Cal Tattoo. We thumbed through the artists’ portfolios, hoping to decide on the best one for her design choice. It looks like Tom is the man, and I am anxious to see his creation from what she asks for. She has a consultation this afternoon. I wonder if he will draw something up today.
It was cool, too, to go since I found these wonderful, whimsical skull designs that would be perfect for me. They are tiny, but so me. Terri had these in hers, so I may need to give some thought to ways to make these happen on me. I also need to take Ken down to look at them so he can have some time to prep for the inevitable.
Saturday morning, we went with my folks and brother over to RPV near the old Marineland. There is some resort there that also has a decent trail along the coast. It was gorgeous out, and it was a pretty good little walk. The boys alternated between excited and annoyed, but that seems to be their demeanor in general these days. Especially Dax. He is struggling with this whole being 4 thing. He has the grownupness of getting to go to school, yet still has to do things like daycare. He also wants to be such a big boy, but doesn’t quite grasp that he is still little and it means he doesn’t get everything he asks for. He also has given up on naps (insert a mommy whimper here), despite the fact that there are days in which he would benefit. On top of that, he gets up at the crack of dawn, no matter what time he goes to sleep. I think he needs more sleep, but just short of drugging him, I don’t know what we can do for now.
With the recent Bobby freakout, I at least have gotten some good feedback on that. I spent about a half an hour with Mrs. Fasheh on Friday afternoon. She showed me Bobby’s class work. It was so odd since he could do a worksheet in the morning, and the writing is hieroglyphics at best. He could do the exact same sheet in the afternoon, with no further instruction, and his font looks typed. It is crazy.
She also clarified his wall words dilemma. His rainbow isn’t colored fully because if you miss just one word in each color stripe when she tests you, you don’t get the row. Plus, you cannot sound these words out. You cannot hesitate. You have to just know them. These are pure memorization words.
She stressed that she wouldn’t be worried about him if it wasn’t for the fact that she knows he is super bright, and even has him in the top group. She also apologized profusely for spooking me. She appreciated that Ken and I are taking such an active role in getting him back on track. She was incredibly kind and supportive. She and I also went over some words and penmanship with Bobby while we were there. It was very cute at one point when we were showing him one sheet he had done and he tells us, “Don’t you just love how I wrote ‘Robert” here?” We both loved his pride and encouraged him to keep it up. It was cool.
Since we do need to get these words in his head, I took a very aggressive approach. Not mean, mind you. I just want to make sure Bobby knows we are all on his side with this, and I want to make these words super accessible. I brought home some post it notes that were very brightly colored, and we put all of his wall words up on our wall. We also put the numbers 1 through 30 on there. He has been very excited about testing himself on them. Each time he gets on, we put a star on it. Once he gets a word 5 times, we will take it down. I figure words like ‘the’ he knows really well will come down quickly, which is fine. But the ones he still struggles with, like ‘what’ or ‘done” will take some time. I also put up the words that the class hasn’t even gone over.
I also took some post its to my mom so that I can keep her up to date on which words he needs to work on, so that every time we go over there, she can have some post its up there so he can practice. He loved this.
I have put in the bribes, too. Once he colors the next line at school, he has a tiger Lego figure that will be in his possession. He keeps looking at it on my desk, getting all excited. I also told him once he colors the whole rainbow, he gets a tiger Pillow Pet. Seriously, this kid has asked me about this promise like 50 times since I mentioned it. He is so pumped!!
In addition to this wonderful new plan, I have noticed that the lines I had him do did help him in memorizing the ‘wh’ words. So I may have him do lines during homework time. Plus, we have some new coloring books and I told Ken that after dinner tonight I want to do family coloring hour. We can each take one page, and we all sit down together and color. That way both boys get practice, and it isn’t like they are racing to do something else since we are all together.
Ken was kind enough to be my personal salon this weekend. He colored my hair for me and then proceeded to give me a top notch pedicure. I feel all pretty this morning. Silly me, I am wearing my new knee high socks so no one can see my toes, but that was only because I knew it would be brisk today, whereas the rest of the week is supposed to be hot, so I can show of my piggies this week.
I really need a nap.
I think this is the week we need to call for bulk pick up. I figure we have whittled the pile down to a manageable size in which we can bring it all out in not too much time. This will then complete the driveway cleaning project which will be great for our birthday party that is fast approaching. I need to get some invites. I am having Bobby write their names on the envelopes. I figure it is his party, and it is another excuse for practicing.
In my randomness, I have decided to do something with my department at work that I have done before. I get little odd things at the Dollar Tree or 99 Cent store, and anonymously place them on everyone’s desk, including my own. I then pretend I have no idea. It is weird, I know, but for some reason it makes me smile when everyone is confused but happy. This weeks’ treat is a finger trap.
The finger trap is nice because it isn’t uber interesting, but it is a good slow way into this project. I steer clear of holiday specific. Random is also good. Unisex, and small.
Going into a store with Ken and the boys is a real act of patience on my part. We went into Lowe’s yesterday, and I really wanted to scream. Ken wanders around, in his own quest of finding the right item. The boys, drag their feet or feel the need to touch everything in sight. They also get bored, or annoyed, or chatty. I feel like I am herding talking cats when I go into a store like this. They all talk to me at once, all of them don’t listen to my response, and all of them seem to be oblivious of one another. Boy are they lucky I adore them.
It is good that Ken goes with me to the shelter. There was a dachshund beagle mix that for some reason I was incredibly smitten with. I do not care for little rat dogs, but this one was a doll.
Poor Dax got scared at the shelter when he approached a cage with a barky Chow mix. Ken had to pull him back suddenly since it didn’t appear to be safe. The boys know to never put their fingers in a cage, and to always put out their hand in the shape of a paw. But even that would not have been good with this dog. Poor kid, but I am glad Ken pulled him back.
I was pleased that there were so few cats, but worried that the reason for this was that they had already been euthanized. The kitties they had were all so incredibly sweet. The good news, too, is that most of them looked very adoptable.
Man, there are a lot of Pit Bulls and Chihuahuas. LOL! We certainly seem like a very Hispanic community. LOL!!
I like the coverage and how well the dye I used turned out. I would have liked for a slightly different red, but that can be revisited when I do the next round. This brand was awesome and I am quite pleased with it. Plus, the stuff smelled almost like grapes or strawberries. A very pleasant odor compared to many of the other dyes.
The boys are styling this morning in their brand new light up Sketchers. Bobby’s shoes had essentially died. He is a boy, almost 6, and in school, so the lifespan of a sneaker he owns is short. We headed out to get new shoes, and he mentioned the idea of Sketchers. We figured we could go and check out the clearance items at the outlet store. Not only did we find a pair of the light up variety, it was only $20. This seemed ok, and Dax pitched a ginormous fit that he wasn’t going to be groovin with the same shoes. Ken managed to find another pair, got them both to the front, and with sales and some sneaky price tagging on our part, we got both pair for $15 each. WOO HOO! These are shoes that are normally $50. YAY US!!
Is it wrong to have the Find A Death calendar next to the one Bobby made for me?
I am rockin my accounts this morning. I suppose I should close this out and post it so I can kick some collecting ass. WOO HOO!
Monday, January 31, 2011
Friday, January 28, 2011
Mommy blues
1-28-11
I am in recovery mode this morning. I had not one, but two anxiety attacks last night, both triggered by the same event, but caused by different aspects. I am tired and worn.
After a truly fun day filled with parenting class and a lunch date with Dax, we went to pick up Bobby from school. Once again, I was called over by Mrs. Fasheh, who wanted to inform me of a problem.
Bobby is not remembering all of his wall words. He is coloring badly and his penmanship is horrid. He rushes in class, and she is concerned he is falling farther and farther behind the class. His wall word rainbow has only one bar colored, when he should have 3 or 4.
My first reaction was confusion. I had spent this week, really working hard with Bobby on the words. Ken had even written him a computer program with all the words, and he was practicing for 30 minutes at a time.
He also had taken great pride in his coloring on his homework packet this week. One of the pictures he colored looked amazing, and he even asked me to take a picture of it so he could show Gramma.
When he would write out his letters, and work on letter sounds, I made him re do anything that was sloppy and when one worksheet called for only writing out the letter sounds under pictures that were H, I had him do them all just for practice. He was doing well.
So I didn’t understand how he was struggling so hard in class. I agreed to work harder with him, explaining to her that he has spent extra time as recently as the night before on words. I knew he was having the most difficulty with the word “where”, and only just now starting to remember “who” and “what”. She seemed indifferent to this and I told her to make sure to get on him when he was being sloppy. She kind of laughed, as did I, but really, I was starting to freak out.
I gathered the boys and we walked home quickly. I wanted Bobby to practice, but honestly, I was at a loss of how to pound this stuff into his head. I settled in on lines. I figured I would get some lined notebook paper, have him write out all the wall words.
I first started saying words to him and making him write them from memory. He struggled, so I thought I should start slower. I took the “wh” words and wrote them at the top of the sheet. I then indicated where he needed to write out the word, several times down the sheet of paper. After he wrote a word, I asked him to tell me the word.
He wrote maybe 10 lines worth. He actually wrote them pretty well. I only had to erase a couple of letters from time to time. He also got down “who” and “what”, yet still struggled with “where”.
It was at this point that while he was writing, I decided to go through his backpack to see what school work he had brought home. In the folder was some coloring, some numbers and writing. I was shocked at what I saw.
The coloring was some of the best I had seen from him. He had to color multiple hats the color they said on them. Most of the crayon, if not all on some, was inside the lines. It looked 100% better to coloring even brought home last week.
His letters on the next sheet were not horrible, either. I could see there was some rushing involved, but overall, you could see improvement.
His number, I will be honest, still struggle. However, it occurred to me that his numbers are written out in a more free form layout. With letters and words, including the notebook I had him writing in, he did better. He used the guidelines of the rows and knew where to stop with the top and bottoms of the lines that made up the letters of the alphabet. When he didn’t have a top line in which to determine sizing, you could see his writing suffer.
Either way, it didn’t appear to me that he was as crappy a student as her ominous warning indicated. My mind was exploding as I started cursing the teacher. I wondered if perhaps Maria had in fact been right in that she picks on students that came from her daycare. I then hated myself for this thought. I second guessed my feelings and then second thought those. I was a wreck.
Stephanie and Sabrina came over and I was in the midst of this crazy. I showed Stephanie his class work, knowing she could be objective. She assured me that in fact it looked pretty damn good for his age. She also said the lines he had been working on were quite good for a kid in Kinder. I was relieved, but I still knew it was something that would have to be addressed.
Ken got home and I started explaining to him what had occurred. The emotions got the better of me, and a panic attack was looming. I could feel how tense I had become and I am sure my explanation of the fact was fuzzy.
I was pushed over the edge with one simple word. Misread. Ken suggested that perhaps I had misread Mrs. Fasheh’s warning, and that in fact she was just saying we needed to be aware. I lost it.
My original calmed down mindset was shattered and I spiraled down quickly. I felt as though Ken had been siding with the instructor as opposed to with me or our son. My thoughts went to, “Ken thinks Bobby is stupid. Ken thinks I am over protective and that I don’t see the facts right in front of me.” I freaked.
I busied myself with dinner preparation, hoping that I didn’t melt down. I considered a Xanax. I considered the bottle of wine in the fridge. I opted against both, and instead took out the crazy as I chopped up the meat for our tacos.
Ken and I had another opportunity to talk about an hour later as the boys watched their show. Although I had calmed down to begin this talk, it was not chemically altered, so it was short lived.
I finally was able to get across to Ken what had set me off. He had been using the word miscommunication interchangeably with the word misread. I was able to explain that it is one thing to think your kid is an idiot. It is another when you start to place all of the blame on yourself for this.
It has actually been some time since I had such a crazy crying fit. It felt good afterwards, as clearly there was a lot built up in there.
Ken and I agreed that what needs to be done is first and foremost, we need to practice with Bobby. It means more lines, taping up post its with the words all over our house, and just being super diligent on getting those words in his brain.
Second, we are going to set up a conference with Mrs. Fasheh in order to find out what he is doing wrong, and to have some kind of gage as to what she is looking for. Is he struggling with saying the words, or is he just writing them badly. What is the full extent in which he is having problems so that we can target those trouble areas at home in our practice.
It scares me greatly that Bobby will have problems in academics. I know there were subjects and things that I had a hard time with, and I hate to see him go through the same problems. I take comfort in the fact that he makes friends very easily, as that was another one of my issues. At least I didn’t pass down all my crap DNA.
Of course, the irony in all of this is the juxtaposition of parenting classes. They are supposed to be targeting my relationship with my pre-K student, but I can assure you, Dax is not struggling in the same ways Bobby is. Perhaps the lessons and discussions in these classes would in fact benefit my relationship with Bobby more than I would have planned.
I could easily criticize the classes, btw. I agree with Stephanie in the idea that we are in a budget crisis and yet here were are, spending money on mandatory classes on how to be a parent, when a good chunk of the parents in the class have 3 or more children who have done just fine without mom and dad taking a class.
But that being said, I have decided to embrace the experience. Originally, I had planned on making Ken take the hit, but actually, I feel as though I would be missing out on a crucial part of my children’s schooling experience. I currently have subscriptions to two parenting magazines, with a third just ordered. I read articles on line and try to keep up on all of the latest information concerning mommyhood. Why stop there?
This class also couples me with parents of kids that I am sure I will get to know over the next 6 years. They are kids that Dax will be at birthday parties with. They are kids that may play at my house and call me Mama Brenan. They are parents of kids in the same school as my kids and they can help me with struggles with teachers or the bureaucracy of the system. They come from various backgrounds and perhaps seeing them struggle with different problems will put mine in better perspective. It is a parenting community that I have searched for and it is something I think I need to give a real chance to.
I am guessing the emotional roller coaster that was my day is what led to my funky dreams. I was in a strange, yet comfy bed that was low to the ground and took up a whole room. I looked outside, which was easy to do since my room was missing an entire wall. I had an amazing and lush backyard which was huge. It was 2 or 3 in the morning, and I noted a bag of dog food on the outskirts of the property. It wasn’t just a bag mind you. It was the size of a car. The bag was open, with some of the kibble spilling from it. The kibble was the size of bowling balls. I was confused, but laid in bed for a while, looking out at how the light bounced off the trees and what appeared to be a moat that separated my yard from my back neighbors.
I looked back in my room for a moment and my attention was brought back to the outside where my neighbor was cutting trees, and appeared to be tossing them into my yard. I was annoyed until I realized it was an illusion and in fact the trees were still in his yard.
He noticed me watching him and he walked over. He was a rugged looking gentleman. He even had dark blue jeans and a red and black flannel shirt with suspenders. You would have thought the Brawny man was living next to me.
He stood outside my room as we talked. It then occurred to me how incredibly naked I was. I was covered with tons of sheer white sheets. But I didn’t seem to care. I also was incredibly thin and fit. I actually remember thinking how good my ass looked. I was lying on my stomach, my torso propped up on my arms as I talked with the man about our yards.
Then, he asked me what I thought of the job he had done on Bobby’s bedroom. He motioned to my left where I then noted the shaping of my house. It was a giant U, with my room on one end and Bobby’s on the other, also lacking in an exterior wall. I explained that I had not had a chance to really look into it. He seemed a little hurt, so I assured him that I would go and admire his handiwork. He laughed and went back to his wood cutting.
I sat up, and wrapped myself up in the sheets, loosely collecting fabric in order to bunch it up over the correct spots. I tiptoed around the house and into Bobby’s room. It was gorgeous.
Inside the deep blue room, was a giant pretend tree in the corner that looked as though it had grownup through the floor boards and had then branched out through the roof and walls. Inside the tree was his bed, looking incredibly comfortable. There was dark green furniture and a deep red rug on the floor. The walls also had very tiny and delicate white painted flowers in vines coming up from the dresser.
I stood and looked at it for a while when my dad came in and told me it was time to get ready to go. I didn’t understand but went and got dressed.
I woke up at this point, sad that I didn’t get to see where we were going. I fell back asleep and know that I was at Waller Stadium getting a slushie at one point. I had yet another dream in which I was in some kind of warehouse.
I wish I could say they were Xanax induced, but I never took any. Maybe they came from the Vicks that I used last night. Hmmm…
This evening I am hoping to find some inspiration in the portfolios. Stephanie and I are going to the Tattoo place so she can have a consultation regarding some ink she is getting done. Although I have already settled in on one of the designs I will get at some point, I am looking forward to using the portfolios to perhaps come up with some ideas to get me started on the other one I intend to get. See, I know that the skeleanimal of Dax is a given. I also still really want my self affirmation rock star. On this one, I go back and forth between star designs, so perhaps I will see something that makes me see the star in my head that should be on me. Lastly, I do want something to symbolize Bobby. This one is tough since nothing has been quite right. The good thing, though, is that this kid is going nowhere, so I have plenty of time to come up with something perfect.
Ken spoke with Mrs. Fasheh this morning and she explained that in fact it was not that he is an idiot. More specifically, he is not progressing as much as he should. In fact, Dimitri’s mom was there for the same reason this morning. The kids should have more wall words memorized. Bobby currently is hesitating too much on them and making little mistakes on the rainbow of words, which has kept him from coloring the entire rainbow. He has only the first bar colored, whereas most kids have 3. Some have even moved on to the 1st grade level.
She said he also tends to rush, which Ken pointed out he was doing with him last night on his homework. I know he rushes with me, but I go all Catholic school on him and stop just short of smacking his knuckles with a ruler. Mrs. Fasheh has indicated she will be tougher on them. She just happened to note that they are half way through the year and she would like to see them further along.
In addition to this, he used to do better about staying in the lines on writing. Now, he tends to be all over the place. Ken told her about the lines we had him do, and she was glad to hear that he was in fact doing it correctly somewhere, but he needs to buckle down in class.
I am going to bring those in, and go talk with her this afternoon. My objective is to see the work he is doing poorly on. I also want to get a copy of this rainbow. I have in my bag a pack of multicolored post its at the ready to make a giant wall words rainbow for him. Rewards system ideas are getting clear. We are going to have him practice coloring in the lines more with coloring books. He will do lines every day. He will get this down if I have to go all tiger mom on his ass.
I am not thrilled, but I know that if I want my kid to succeed, I have to be an important part of this. His distractions seem to be keeping him back. I have to call our doc anyways for his yearly appointment, and I need to mention all of this to her as well. He still is having difficulty staying dry at night, so perhaps there is something more that I have not been able to identify. This has become my main focus right now.
It is a sobering piece of information when you start to wonder about your kid’s intelligence. I have to admit, I have taken it all for granted. Especially when I have been told so many times how smart my boys are. Yet at the same time, in the back of my head, I still have some words my mother said to me once when I was talking about getting a permit to go to a different school. She said that the problem with a permit is that if the kid ended up needing special ed services, he would end up being bumped from the permitted school, which would suck, especially if it happened in the middle of a school year.
These words have haunted me.
Why would she bring this up? Of course, the obvious answer was that my mother in fact works with the kids that do end up needing special education. It would just be a random footnote in terms of things to worry about if you had a permit. In my uber crazed hypochondriac induced thought process, I assumed of course that she was implying that my kid was a tard. Mind you, my mother would NEVER say, hint, consider or even care if Bobby somehow was slow. She thinks he is perfect in every way. I love the bias of a grandmother. She has told me that it is a perk of that status since she never has to worry about the boys doing well in school like she did with Matt and I since she just gets to love them and be enamored by their innocence. She knows that as a parent, we have to go beyond the thought process of “my kid is perfect” to the realism that kids are not perfect, which is still ok, but that it is our job to worry about how to help them through whatever diagnosis might come up.
Now that I may actually have to consider the possibility that my kid may not have this school stuff come easy to him, I am nervous. Am I equipped to help him through this? Is it a phase he will outgrow? Can I keep my crazy to a minimum in order to be a good parent during this?
As I had him do lines last night, I stopped him at one point and grabbed and hugged him tight. He laughed, especially since I may have been crushing him. I knew in that instant that he knew he was loved. It was comforting, but at the same time, I worried about when the day came that he would possibly second guess this.
I am in recovery mode this morning. I had not one, but two anxiety attacks last night, both triggered by the same event, but caused by different aspects. I am tired and worn.
After a truly fun day filled with parenting class and a lunch date with Dax, we went to pick up Bobby from school. Once again, I was called over by Mrs. Fasheh, who wanted to inform me of a problem.
Bobby is not remembering all of his wall words. He is coloring badly and his penmanship is horrid. He rushes in class, and she is concerned he is falling farther and farther behind the class. His wall word rainbow has only one bar colored, when he should have 3 or 4.
My first reaction was confusion. I had spent this week, really working hard with Bobby on the words. Ken had even written him a computer program with all the words, and he was practicing for 30 minutes at a time.
He also had taken great pride in his coloring on his homework packet this week. One of the pictures he colored looked amazing, and he even asked me to take a picture of it so he could show Gramma.
When he would write out his letters, and work on letter sounds, I made him re do anything that was sloppy and when one worksheet called for only writing out the letter sounds under pictures that were H, I had him do them all just for practice. He was doing well.
So I didn’t understand how he was struggling so hard in class. I agreed to work harder with him, explaining to her that he has spent extra time as recently as the night before on words. I knew he was having the most difficulty with the word “where”, and only just now starting to remember “who” and “what”. She seemed indifferent to this and I told her to make sure to get on him when he was being sloppy. She kind of laughed, as did I, but really, I was starting to freak out.
I gathered the boys and we walked home quickly. I wanted Bobby to practice, but honestly, I was at a loss of how to pound this stuff into his head. I settled in on lines. I figured I would get some lined notebook paper, have him write out all the wall words.
I first started saying words to him and making him write them from memory. He struggled, so I thought I should start slower. I took the “wh” words and wrote them at the top of the sheet. I then indicated where he needed to write out the word, several times down the sheet of paper. After he wrote a word, I asked him to tell me the word.
He wrote maybe 10 lines worth. He actually wrote them pretty well. I only had to erase a couple of letters from time to time. He also got down “who” and “what”, yet still struggled with “where”.
It was at this point that while he was writing, I decided to go through his backpack to see what school work he had brought home. In the folder was some coloring, some numbers and writing. I was shocked at what I saw.
The coloring was some of the best I had seen from him. He had to color multiple hats the color they said on them. Most of the crayon, if not all on some, was inside the lines. It looked 100% better to coloring even brought home last week.
His letters on the next sheet were not horrible, either. I could see there was some rushing involved, but overall, you could see improvement.
His number, I will be honest, still struggle. However, it occurred to me that his numbers are written out in a more free form layout. With letters and words, including the notebook I had him writing in, he did better. He used the guidelines of the rows and knew where to stop with the top and bottoms of the lines that made up the letters of the alphabet. When he didn’t have a top line in which to determine sizing, you could see his writing suffer.
Either way, it didn’t appear to me that he was as crappy a student as her ominous warning indicated. My mind was exploding as I started cursing the teacher. I wondered if perhaps Maria had in fact been right in that she picks on students that came from her daycare. I then hated myself for this thought. I second guessed my feelings and then second thought those. I was a wreck.
Stephanie and Sabrina came over and I was in the midst of this crazy. I showed Stephanie his class work, knowing she could be objective. She assured me that in fact it looked pretty damn good for his age. She also said the lines he had been working on were quite good for a kid in Kinder. I was relieved, but I still knew it was something that would have to be addressed.
Ken got home and I started explaining to him what had occurred. The emotions got the better of me, and a panic attack was looming. I could feel how tense I had become and I am sure my explanation of the fact was fuzzy.
I was pushed over the edge with one simple word. Misread. Ken suggested that perhaps I had misread Mrs. Fasheh’s warning, and that in fact she was just saying we needed to be aware. I lost it.
My original calmed down mindset was shattered and I spiraled down quickly. I felt as though Ken had been siding with the instructor as opposed to with me or our son. My thoughts went to, “Ken thinks Bobby is stupid. Ken thinks I am over protective and that I don’t see the facts right in front of me.” I freaked.
I busied myself with dinner preparation, hoping that I didn’t melt down. I considered a Xanax. I considered the bottle of wine in the fridge. I opted against both, and instead took out the crazy as I chopped up the meat for our tacos.
Ken and I had another opportunity to talk about an hour later as the boys watched their show. Although I had calmed down to begin this talk, it was not chemically altered, so it was short lived.
I finally was able to get across to Ken what had set me off. He had been using the word miscommunication interchangeably with the word misread. I was able to explain that it is one thing to think your kid is an idiot. It is another when you start to place all of the blame on yourself for this.
It has actually been some time since I had such a crazy crying fit. It felt good afterwards, as clearly there was a lot built up in there.
Ken and I agreed that what needs to be done is first and foremost, we need to practice with Bobby. It means more lines, taping up post its with the words all over our house, and just being super diligent on getting those words in his brain.
Second, we are going to set up a conference with Mrs. Fasheh in order to find out what he is doing wrong, and to have some kind of gage as to what she is looking for. Is he struggling with saying the words, or is he just writing them badly. What is the full extent in which he is having problems so that we can target those trouble areas at home in our practice.
It scares me greatly that Bobby will have problems in academics. I know there were subjects and things that I had a hard time with, and I hate to see him go through the same problems. I take comfort in the fact that he makes friends very easily, as that was another one of my issues. At least I didn’t pass down all my crap DNA.
Of course, the irony in all of this is the juxtaposition of parenting classes. They are supposed to be targeting my relationship with my pre-K student, but I can assure you, Dax is not struggling in the same ways Bobby is. Perhaps the lessons and discussions in these classes would in fact benefit my relationship with Bobby more than I would have planned.
I could easily criticize the classes, btw. I agree with Stephanie in the idea that we are in a budget crisis and yet here were are, spending money on mandatory classes on how to be a parent, when a good chunk of the parents in the class have 3 or more children who have done just fine without mom and dad taking a class.
But that being said, I have decided to embrace the experience. Originally, I had planned on making Ken take the hit, but actually, I feel as though I would be missing out on a crucial part of my children’s schooling experience. I currently have subscriptions to two parenting magazines, with a third just ordered. I read articles on line and try to keep up on all of the latest information concerning mommyhood. Why stop there?
This class also couples me with parents of kids that I am sure I will get to know over the next 6 years. They are kids that Dax will be at birthday parties with. They are kids that may play at my house and call me Mama Brenan. They are parents of kids in the same school as my kids and they can help me with struggles with teachers or the bureaucracy of the system. They come from various backgrounds and perhaps seeing them struggle with different problems will put mine in better perspective. It is a parenting community that I have searched for and it is something I think I need to give a real chance to.
I am guessing the emotional roller coaster that was my day is what led to my funky dreams. I was in a strange, yet comfy bed that was low to the ground and took up a whole room. I looked outside, which was easy to do since my room was missing an entire wall. I had an amazing and lush backyard which was huge. It was 2 or 3 in the morning, and I noted a bag of dog food on the outskirts of the property. It wasn’t just a bag mind you. It was the size of a car. The bag was open, with some of the kibble spilling from it. The kibble was the size of bowling balls. I was confused, but laid in bed for a while, looking out at how the light bounced off the trees and what appeared to be a moat that separated my yard from my back neighbors.
I looked back in my room for a moment and my attention was brought back to the outside where my neighbor was cutting trees, and appeared to be tossing them into my yard. I was annoyed until I realized it was an illusion and in fact the trees were still in his yard.
He noticed me watching him and he walked over. He was a rugged looking gentleman. He even had dark blue jeans and a red and black flannel shirt with suspenders. You would have thought the Brawny man was living next to me.
He stood outside my room as we talked. It then occurred to me how incredibly naked I was. I was covered with tons of sheer white sheets. But I didn’t seem to care. I also was incredibly thin and fit. I actually remember thinking how good my ass looked. I was lying on my stomach, my torso propped up on my arms as I talked with the man about our yards.
Then, he asked me what I thought of the job he had done on Bobby’s bedroom. He motioned to my left where I then noted the shaping of my house. It was a giant U, with my room on one end and Bobby’s on the other, also lacking in an exterior wall. I explained that I had not had a chance to really look into it. He seemed a little hurt, so I assured him that I would go and admire his handiwork. He laughed and went back to his wood cutting.
I sat up, and wrapped myself up in the sheets, loosely collecting fabric in order to bunch it up over the correct spots. I tiptoed around the house and into Bobby’s room. It was gorgeous.
Inside the deep blue room, was a giant pretend tree in the corner that looked as though it had grownup through the floor boards and had then branched out through the roof and walls. Inside the tree was his bed, looking incredibly comfortable. There was dark green furniture and a deep red rug on the floor. The walls also had very tiny and delicate white painted flowers in vines coming up from the dresser.
I stood and looked at it for a while when my dad came in and told me it was time to get ready to go. I didn’t understand but went and got dressed.
I woke up at this point, sad that I didn’t get to see where we were going. I fell back asleep and know that I was at Waller Stadium getting a slushie at one point. I had yet another dream in which I was in some kind of warehouse.
I wish I could say they were Xanax induced, but I never took any. Maybe they came from the Vicks that I used last night. Hmmm…
This evening I am hoping to find some inspiration in the portfolios. Stephanie and I are going to the Tattoo place so she can have a consultation regarding some ink she is getting done. Although I have already settled in on one of the designs I will get at some point, I am looking forward to using the portfolios to perhaps come up with some ideas to get me started on the other one I intend to get. See, I know that the skeleanimal of Dax is a given. I also still really want my self affirmation rock star. On this one, I go back and forth between star designs, so perhaps I will see something that makes me see the star in my head that should be on me. Lastly, I do want something to symbolize Bobby. This one is tough since nothing has been quite right. The good thing, though, is that this kid is going nowhere, so I have plenty of time to come up with something perfect.
Ken spoke with Mrs. Fasheh this morning and she explained that in fact it was not that he is an idiot. More specifically, he is not progressing as much as he should. In fact, Dimitri’s mom was there for the same reason this morning. The kids should have more wall words memorized. Bobby currently is hesitating too much on them and making little mistakes on the rainbow of words, which has kept him from coloring the entire rainbow. He has only the first bar colored, whereas most kids have 3. Some have even moved on to the 1st grade level.
She said he also tends to rush, which Ken pointed out he was doing with him last night on his homework. I know he rushes with me, but I go all Catholic school on him and stop just short of smacking his knuckles with a ruler. Mrs. Fasheh has indicated she will be tougher on them. She just happened to note that they are half way through the year and she would like to see them further along.
In addition to this, he used to do better about staying in the lines on writing. Now, he tends to be all over the place. Ken told her about the lines we had him do, and she was glad to hear that he was in fact doing it correctly somewhere, but he needs to buckle down in class.
I am going to bring those in, and go talk with her this afternoon. My objective is to see the work he is doing poorly on. I also want to get a copy of this rainbow. I have in my bag a pack of multicolored post its at the ready to make a giant wall words rainbow for him. Rewards system ideas are getting clear. We are going to have him practice coloring in the lines more with coloring books. He will do lines every day. He will get this down if I have to go all tiger mom on his ass.
I am not thrilled, but I know that if I want my kid to succeed, I have to be an important part of this. His distractions seem to be keeping him back. I have to call our doc anyways for his yearly appointment, and I need to mention all of this to her as well. He still is having difficulty staying dry at night, so perhaps there is something more that I have not been able to identify. This has become my main focus right now.
It is a sobering piece of information when you start to wonder about your kid’s intelligence. I have to admit, I have taken it all for granted. Especially when I have been told so many times how smart my boys are. Yet at the same time, in the back of my head, I still have some words my mother said to me once when I was talking about getting a permit to go to a different school. She said that the problem with a permit is that if the kid ended up needing special ed services, he would end up being bumped from the permitted school, which would suck, especially if it happened in the middle of a school year.
These words have haunted me.
Why would she bring this up? Of course, the obvious answer was that my mother in fact works with the kids that do end up needing special education. It would just be a random footnote in terms of things to worry about if you had a permit. In my uber crazed hypochondriac induced thought process, I assumed of course that she was implying that my kid was a tard. Mind you, my mother would NEVER say, hint, consider or even care if Bobby somehow was slow. She thinks he is perfect in every way. I love the bias of a grandmother. She has told me that it is a perk of that status since she never has to worry about the boys doing well in school like she did with Matt and I since she just gets to love them and be enamored by their innocence. She knows that as a parent, we have to go beyond the thought process of “my kid is perfect” to the realism that kids are not perfect, which is still ok, but that it is our job to worry about how to help them through whatever diagnosis might come up.
Now that I may actually have to consider the possibility that my kid may not have this school stuff come easy to him, I am nervous. Am I equipped to help him through this? Is it a phase he will outgrow? Can I keep my crazy to a minimum in order to be a good parent during this?
As I had him do lines last night, I stopped him at one point and grabbed and hugged him tight. He laughed, especially since I may have been crushing him. I knew in that instant that he knew he was loved. It was comforting, but at the same time, I worried about when the day came that he would possibly second guess this.
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Stupid meeting-I so forgot to post this!
1-26-11
Good morning world! I am feeling positive. Not that I am trying to be happy in order to forget something bad. I just am really feeling like I need to celebrate the good more than whining about the bad. It seems like way more fun. LOL!!
Tonight I get to go see Clerks on the big screen. Not the first time, but it is always a good thing. I am hoping that Randal inspired me to be less Dante like.
I got to be a part of a search and rescue yesterday. I arrived home to find many of my neighbors out in their yards. My boys and Ken were out, too. Bobby runs up to the car and tells me we are looking for Saturn Bitch’s kid. Mind you, he didn’t tell me it was Saturn Bitch. Ken filled me in when Bobby pretty much just told me we were looking for Chelsea. LOL!
Chelsea is 2. She had been in the front yard and then seemed to wander off. Her father was starting to panic as they had been looking for her for the past 20 minutes or so. I quickly ran in and changed shoes so I could help in the search.
Bobby and I walked across the street in front of their house, yelling out to her when I looked over towards their house to see this little girl deep in their driveway in a red dress. I didn’t think it possible that I had been looking for all of 2 minutes when I would actually find her, so my shout to the others was simply, “Is that her?” I was a little concerned that I sounded like an asshole in my inquiry. Ken assured me if anything I only sounded confused. Thankfully, it was in fact her. She had been in their own back yard, which looked like a junk yard from our angle. I am guessing she simply was in a spot where she did not hear her father’s frantic cries, or perhaps she did hear then and chose to hide from him until she heard other people call out to her. No matter, really, since she was safe and sound.
Her mother pulled up in the car seconds later, yelling out to the searchers to see if we had found her. I guess she had been called at work. When we let her know she was found, she was reduced to a sobbing mess. Poor thing. I mean, I am glad the kid was safe, but man, what a stressful time span for her parents.
I am crazy sleepy this morning. I didn’t sleep well. Ken was up ordering Lego for this project, and I found myself tossing and turning with him not in bed with me. Then I just couldn’t get comfortable for some reason. Super frustrating since I had made the room an optimal temperature, which has not been the case lately.
I am really just dinking around this morning. I have two reports to finish. One will only take a bit. The other, also easy, but will probably require a smidge more concentration. I just don’t feel it.
I have decided I like the name Quorra Jayde.
I have some marathon cleaning to do this afternoon since the babysitter will actually be at the house with the boys. On the plus side, she doesn’t tend to do much more than just play on the computer while the kids are asleep, so it isn’t like she will be wandering my house.
I seriously want to call out tomorrow, but I will not. I am so curious about this parenting class. Plus, I want to help prep Dax for dinosaur day in the morning. I am not going to, but damn, it is tempting.
My mom didn’t remember that I have an IUD. My dad remembers. I think it is funny. I mentioned to my mom the idea of the name Quorra and she liked it. But her first response was (with quite of bit of giddy), “Are you pregnant??” My mother is really wanting me to have one more. I am shocked. It is so unlike her to be that kind of encouraging when it comes to practicality. I kind of like this side of her. She just loves those boys so much, and she tells me I am such a good mom that I could totally handle it. I am super flattered.
Mind you, my dad is not on board with this. He still doesn’t understand why I have an IUD. He thinks Ken should be snipped since 2 kids is plenty. Sigh.
Kevin Smith was talking about a friend of his who wrote this Winnie the Pooh episode in which only one joke was taken out. The set up was Tigger saying something to Pooh that was silly, and Pooh responds with, “Tigger, please.” Seriously, I am still laughing.
Good morning world! I am feeling positive. Not that I am trying to be happy in order to forget something bad. I just am really feeling like I need to celebrate the good more than whining about the bad. It seems like way more fun. LOL!!
Tonight I get to go see Clerks on the big screen. Not the first time, but it is always a good thing. I am hoping that Randal inspired me to be less Dante like.
I got to be a part of a search and rescue yesterday. I arrived home to find many of my neighbors out in their yards. My boys and Ken were out, too. Bobby runs up to the car and tells me we are looking for Saturn Bitch’s kid. Mind you, he didn’t tell me it was Saturn Bitch. Ken filled me in when Bobby pretty much just told me we were looking for Chelsea. LOL!
Chelsea is 2. She had been in the front yard and then seemed to wander off. Her father was starting to panic as they had been looking for her for the past 20 minutes or so. I quickly ran in and changed shoes so I could help in the search.
Bobby and I walked across the street in front of their house, yelling out to her when I looked over towards their house to see this little girl deep in their driveway in a red dress. I didn’t think it possible that I had been looking for all of 2 minutes when I would actually find her, so my shout to the others was simply, “Is that her?” I was a little concerned that I sounded like an asshole in my inquiry. Ken assured me if anything I only sounded confused. Thankfully, it was in fact her. She had been in their own back yard, which looked like a junk yard from our angle. I am guessing she simply was in a spot where she did not hear her father’s frantic cries, or perhaps she did hear then and chose to hide from him until she heard other people call out to her. No matter, really, since she was safe and sound.
Her mother pulled up in the car seconds later, yelling out to the searchers to see if we had found her. I guess she had been called at work. When we let her know she was found, she was reduced to a sobbing mess. Poor thing. I mean, I am glad the kid was safe, but man, what a stressful time span for her parents.
I am crazy sleepy this morning. I didn’t sleep well. Ken was up ordering Lego for this project, and I found myself tossing and turning with him not in bed with me. Then I just couldn’t get comfortable for some reason. Super frustrating since I had made the room an optimal temperature, which has not been the case lately.
I am really just dinking around this morning. I have two reports to finish. One will only take a bit. The other, also easy, but will probably require a smidge more concentration. I just don’t feel it.
I have decided I like the name Quorra Jayde.
I have some marathon cleaning to do this afternoon since the babysitter will actually be at the house with the boys. On the plus side, she doesn’t tend to do much more than just play on the computer while the kids are asleep, so it isn’t like she will be wandering my house.
I seriously want to call out tomorrow, but I will not. I am so curious about this parenting class. Plus, I want to help prep Dax for dinosaur day in the morning. I am not going to, but damn, it is tempting.
My mom didn’t remember that I have an IUD. My dad remembers. I think it is funny. I mentioned to my mom the idea of the name Quorra and she liked it. But her first response was (with quite of bit of giddy), “Are you pregnant??” My mother is really wanting me to have one more. I am shocked. It is so unlike her to be that kind of encouraging when it comes to practicality. I kind of like this side of her. She just loves those boys so much, and she tells me I am such a good mom that I could totally handle it. I am super flattered.
Mind you, my dad is not on board with this. He still doesn’t understand why I have an IUD. He thinks Ken should be snipped since 2 kids is plenty. Sigh.
Kevin Smith was talking about a friend of his who wrote this Winnie the Pooh episode in which only one joke was taken out. The set up was Tigger saying something to Pooh that was silly, and Pooh responds with, “Tigger, please.” Seriously, I am still laughing.
Monday, January 24, 2011
Yay
1-24-11
Weekends are too damn short. Either that or I just wasted too much time.
In all fairness, I feel as though I accomplished a lot. I also feel as though I could have done more.
My mom joined the boys and I for the library book sale. It was awesome since we got there at the perfect time to allow us a minimal wait, and got us first in line. We stormed the kids section and gathered as many cool books as we could carry, which was a lot. In fact, I wished that I had more arms! We focused on books that were for a younger age group. The plan was to donate to both of the classrooms, not the library this time. The books ranged in marked prices of 25 cents to a dollar.
We took our piles up to the register, and found out the marked price was actually being split in half! My pile of books came to $12 and my mom’s was $7. I wish we had got more! The good news is there is another sale in June. My mom and I decided we would hit it up then, and leave the kids at home. We would also fill up our bags first as we shopped and pretty much just grab everything and I could then give everything straight to the school library. At those rates, if I spent $50 I would be getting something like 150 books! Maybe more!
I also picked up some books for us for later. I found the first two books in the Bunicula series. I picked up a copy of a Wrinkle in Time and Trumpet of the Swan. I also noted that the library has a little store there all the time! I need to go back. I also need to check to see when the Torrance library does their sales.
The rest of Saturday was spent doing work around the house. Ken worked on Lego organization. I bathed the dogs. I also did some housework.
Ken had gotten something in his eye on Friday which irritated him all day. I finally convinced him to go to Urgent Care. The wait was long, so we hit up Costco, first. Then after that we went back. Turned out, he had a good sized scratch on his eyeball. My poor wussy man had to have eye drops. There are only two things that fuck with Ken when it comes to medical shit. Needles and eyeball issues. On the plus side, the doc was cool and even showed the boys the scratch. It was cool, also, to see Ken with the black light and special drops since it looked like he was bleeding green. The kids thought that was awesome.
Sunday was a little more leisurely. Ken went out to see a movie with Aaron, and the boys and I went shopping and then did crafts with clay. We had a lot of fun with that. Carol had given us like 7 boxes of craft stuff, and there was a lot of clay that had been opened. So we played with that stuff since really, it would need to be thrown away since it had mostly dried out. It was perfect for us.
We had to take Ken back to Urgent Care for a follow up. Thankfully, the boys entertained themselves and even found a little friend. They did get a little crazy and loud, but I suppose they were cooped up. We were probably a little hard on them. Luckily, Ken’s eye was healing, but it is going to be a couple more days is my guess.
I am rockin my new Sketchers this morning. I got those Shape Ups. I had been eyeing them for a while, and when Costco had them for half the cost, I was more than a little intrigued. Then on Saturday, I noted not only did they have my size, but they had them in black with little sparklies. Seriously, I had no choice.
So far, they are comfy. I needed walking shoes anyway, so I am ok with this. I also have noticed that my calves feel it. I think most of it is because I feel like I am walking with purpose. I am walking with my heel first and rolling my whole foot with the rounded shoe. It is cool, actually. I of course got myself an outfit together to make them look good today. Tomorrow I don’t intend on this only because I also got a pair of cute heels that were $6 at Target. But my hopes is to wear them as much as possible, and at the very least I will wear them when I get Bobby each day.
I think that this week is finally a get back to normal kind of week. I am jazzed. I am looking forward to having time to cook dinner and to work on things around the house. It has been really nice not having plans the last couple weekends. I think today when I get home I will help Ken with the laundry and get some other things in order. I also need to call and make my appt for Luna.
Hee hee! The president of our company has emailed me and asked me for permission to use the picture I took of a piece of MQ equipment for a magazine that is published in Japan that advertises the equipment. YAY!!!!
Luna has an appt for Sunday. My pup is getting cut open that morning. This is perfect since it means I don’t have to take off from work. Woo hoo! I have to be down there by 6:30, which means my ass is going to be down there at 6. I figure I will leave Ken and the boys at home while she and I go down. We pick her up at 3. Yay!
Poor Luna. She is so going to have to wear the cone of shame.
Weekends are too damn short. Either that or I just wasted too much time.
In all fairness, I feel as though I accomplished a lot. I also feel as though I could have done more.
My mom joined the boys and I for the library book sale. It was awesome since we got there at the perfect time to allow us a minimal wait, and got us first in line. We stormed the kids section and gathered as many cool books as we could carry, which was a lot. In fact, I wished that I had more arms! We focused on books that were for a younger age group. The plan was to donate to both of the classrooms, not the library this time. The books ranged in marked prices of 25 cents to a dollar.
We took our piles up to the register, and found out the marked price was actually being split in half! My pile of books came to $12 and my mom’s was $7. I wish we had got more! The good news is there is another sale in June. My mom and I decided we would hit it up then, and leave the kids at home. We would also fill up our bags first as we shopped and pretty much just grab everything and I could then give everything straight to the school library. At those rates, if I spent $50 I would be getting something like 150 books! Maybe more!
I also picked up some books for us for later. I found the first two books in the Bunicula series. I picked up a copy of a Wrinkle in Time and Trumpet of the Swan. I also noted that the library has a little store there all the time! I need to go back. I also need to check to see when the Torrance library does their sales.
The rest of Saturday was spent doing work around the house. Ken worked on Lego organization. I bathed the dogs. I also did some housework.
Ken had gotten something in his eye on Friday which irritated him all day. I finally convinced him to go to Urgent Care. The wait was long, so we hit up Costco, first. Then after that we went back. Turned out, he had a good sized scratch on his eyeball. My poor wussy man had to have eye drops. There are only two things that fuck with Ken when it comes to medical shit. Needles and eyeball issues. On the plus side, the doc was cool and even showed the boys the scratch. It was cool, also, to see Ken with the black light and special drops since it looked like he was bleeding green. The kids thought that was awesome.
Sunday was a little more leisurely. Ken went out to see a movie with Aaron, and the boys and I went shopping and then did crafts with clay. We had a lot of fun with that. Carol had given us like 7 boxes of craft stuff, and there was a lot of clay that had been opened. So we played with that stuff since really, it would need to be thrown away since it had mostly dried out. It was perfect for us.
We had to take Ken back to Urgent Care for a follow up. Thankfully, the boys entertained themselves and even found a little friend. They did get a little crazy and loud, but I suppose they were cooped up. We were probably a little hard on them. Luckily, Ken’s eye was healing, but it is going to be a couple more days is my guess.
I am rockin my new Sketchers this morning. I got those Shape Ups. I had been eyeing them for a while, and when Costco had them for half the cost, I was more than a little intrigued. Then on Saturday, I noted not only did they have my size, but they had them in black with little sparklies. Seriously, I had no choice.
So far, they are comfy. I needed walking shoes anyway, so I am ok with this. I also have noticed that my calves feel it. I think most of it is because I feel like I am walking with purpose. I am walking with my heel first and rolling my whole foot with the rounded shoe. It is cool, actually. I of course got myself an outfit together to make them look good today. Tomorrow I don’t intend on this only because I also got a pair of cute heels that were $6 at Target. But my hopes is to wear them as much as possible, and at the very least I will wear them when I get Bobby each day.
I think that this week is finally a get back to normal kind of week. I am jazzed. I am looking forward to having time to cook dinner and to work on things around the house. It has been really nice not having plans the last couple weekends. I think today when I get home I will help Ken with the laundry and get some other things in order. I also need to call and make my appt for Luna.
Hee hee! The president of our company has emailed me and asked me for permission to use the picture I took of a piece of MQ equipment for a magazine that is published in Japan that advertises the equipment. YAY!!!!
Luna has an appt for Sunday. My pup is getting cut open that morning. This is perfect since it means I don’t have to take off from work. Woo hoo! I have to be down there by 6:30, which means my ass is going to be down there at 6. I figure I will leave Ken and the boys at home while she and I go down. We pick her up at 3. Yay!
Poor Luna. She is so going to have to wear the cone of shame.
Friday, January 21, 2011
What, no pictures?
1-21-11
What an eventful day yesterday. You would think the fact that we got Barnum back up and running would be cool enough, but in reality, Barnum was only the carrier of the really cool stuff, which included Dax’s leg, and in a much welcomed return, Granddaddy’s ashes!
My hopes is to give him a better container, and if possible, find some of his word working either in the garage or at my parents’ house to put him in. If not, I will find something more appropriate than the Tupperware he is in now. At this point, he has a nice location in the Brenan family mausoleum.
I may have creeped out the FB community by posting his remains, but I am ok with this.
Celebration of these things was had in the form of salsa from Cozymel’s which is super happy making.
I am excited today since I get a bonus today, which has been ear marked to finally get Miss Luna cut open and altered for no baby Luna’s to ever be created. I don’t have anything against puppies, mind you, but really, it is hard enough to find homes for kittens. LOL!
I will need to find a place to do it as we owe way too much to Dr. Steinam for me to not be embarrassed about going there. I also will probably need to go to work late that day since I am guessing drop off times are right when Ken takes the boys to school so it would be hard to have him do it.
I am guessing she is the kind of dog that will need to rock the cone of shame. My poor Luna Belle.
I am feeling so positive this morning. I love this feeling.
We have a work party at 11:30. A kind of thank you to our boss for approving our bonus checks and a get well soon to his boss who is battling cancer. I am glad we could do this as it is nice to be in a tight knit department again. It has been far too long for me.
Why is it that I can’t seem to manage to unlock the bathroom stall door before I slam into it?
I get to sleep in a bit tomorrow, but I also want to get up in time to head to the Redondo Beach library in order to get some choice books. They are selling books for cheap, and if at all possible, I want to pick up all the kids books and donate them to the school. They always need new books, even if they are old. I just think it would be cool if they could get a bunch. I have not decided if I will just hand them over to our teachers or direct to the library. We will see. They said they are going for like a quarter each, so I am stocking up!
Crap. I have the munchies. I wish I had brought an apple.
Dax faced Darth Vader yesterday. Ken was so proud.
Holy fuck! My bonus was way more than I realized. Woo hoo!
Why do random people, sometimes people I haven’t even known for more than a couple days, feel that I am the person to vent to? My temporary bunk mate (I don’t remember her name) came to me a bit ago and asked if she could vent with me. I didn’t mind, but I just don’t get it. Do I look like the kind of person you can open up to like that? I really am curious?
Party time soon. I am glad since I am starving.
What an eventful day yesterday. You would think the fact that we got Barnum back up and running would be cool enough, but in reality, Barnum was only the carrier of the really cool stuff, which included Dax’s leg, and in a much welcomed return, Granddaddy’s ashes!
My hopes is to give him a better container, and if possible, find some of his word working either in the garage or at my parents’ house to put him in. If not, I will find something more appropriate than the Tupperware he is in now. At this point, he has a nice location in the Brenan family mausoleum.
I may have creeped out the FB community by posting his remains, but I am ok with this.
Celebration of these things was had in the form of salsa from Cozymel’s which is super happy making.
I am excited today since I get a bonus today, which has been ear marked to finally get Miss Luna cut open and altered for no baby Luna’s to ever be created. I don’t have anything against puppies, mind you, but really, it is hard enough to find homes for kittens. LOL!
I will need to find a place to do it as we owe way too much to Dr. Steinam for me to not be embarrassed about going there. I also will probably need to go to work late that day since I am guessing drop off times are right when Ken takes the boys to school so it would be hard to have him do it.
I am guessing she is the kind of dog that will need to rock the cone of shame. My poor Luna Belle.
I am feeling so positive this morning. I love this feeling.
We have a work party at 11:30. A kind of thank you to our boss for approving our bonus checks and a get well soon to his boss who is battling cancer. I am glad we could do this as it is nice to be in a tight knit department again. It has been far too long for me.
Why is it that I can’t seem to manage to unlock the bathroom stall door before I slam into it?
I get to sleep in a bit tomorrow, but I also want to get up in time to head to the Redondo Beach library in order to get some choice books. They are selling books for cheap, and if at all possible, I want to pick up all the kids books and donate them to the school. They always need new books, even if they are old. I just think it would be cool if they could get a bunch. I have not decided if I will just hand them over to our teachers or direct to the library. We will see. They said they are going for like a quarter each, so I am stocking up!
Crap. I have the munchies. I wish I had brought an apple.
Dax faced Darth Vader yesterday. Ken was so proud.
Holy fuck! My bonus was way more than I realized. Woo hoo!
Why do random people, sometimes people I haven’t even known for more than a couple days, feel that I am the person to vent to? My temporary bunk mate (I don’t remember her name) came to me a bit ago and asked if she could vent with me. I didn’t mind, but I just don’t get it. Do I look like the kind of person you can open up to like that? I really am curious?
Party time soon. I am glad since I am starving.
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
The Jury is Still Out
I am heading back to the courthouse here in a bit to sit on my panel. There are 12 folks from my group in the box, awaiting to be questioned by attorneys. They said they think a jury should be approved today, with the case going till Friday, so if I am not chosen, I am home free. I wouldn't mind being on a jury, but I really don't want to be this behind on work. I also would have rather done the murder trial.
I was pretty miserable yesterday, what with the air conditioning being out, and then not getting much of a lunch. My plan had been to go home for lunch. But when you only end up with about 20 minutes, home is just not quite close enough.
Today I am not taking 100 things. Yesterday I brought my book, bItty, iTty, and my phone. I was with too much stuff. My book was too big for this setting. I may take a smaller one today, but really, I am assuming I will be in the courtroom all day, so I don't think there will be much in the way of free time.
I am also all kinds of relieved since I just looked at my Clerks tickets and realize the evening is NEXT week, not tonight. Phew! It means Ken still can make arrangements with his contact for babysitting. Woo Hoo!
Random kid quotes:
Kids are whining, and I am frustrated with. I told the boys (we were in the car) that I think punishment may have to be kicking them out of the car and make them walk a block every time they whine. Bobby was shocked and says to me, "You would do this to your own children?"
Yesterday I was annoyed at something and I declared a hearty "Dammit!". Dax looks and me and says, "Hey! You said 'dammit' like I say dammit!" Neat.
I was pretty miserable yesterday, what with the air conditioning being out, and then not getting much of a lunch. My plan had been to go home for lunch. But when you only end up with about 20 minutes, home is just not quite close enough.
Today I am not taking 100 things. Yesterday I brought my book, bItty, iTty, and my phone. I was with too much stuff. My book was too big for this setting. I may take a smaller one today, but really, I am assuming I will be in the courtroom all day, so I don't think there will be much in the way of free time.
I am also all kinds of relieved since I just looked at my Clerks tickets and realize the evening is NEXT week, not tonight. Phew! It means Ken still can make arrangements with his contact for babysitting. Woo Hoo!
Random kid quotes:
Kids are whining, and I am frustrated with. I told the boys (we were in the car) that I think punishment may have to be kicking them out of the car and make them walk a block every time they whine. Bobby was shocked and says to me, "You would do this to your own children?"
Yesterday I was annoyed at something and I declared a hearty "Dammit!". Dax looks and me and says, "Hey! You said 'dammit' like I say dammit!" Neat.
Monday, January 17, 2011
Awesome Weekend
1-17-11
Yay for a great weekend!
Although I would gladly go back to bed this morning, I am awake enough to know that the weekend was filled with good. Not only did I manage to accomplish a ton, I also had some incredible down time. How often does that happen?
On Friday night, Stephanie I and I went out for bad Chinese food and then to a local brewery for good beer. Yes, that’s right, I had beer! It was a little strong for me, but for a beer, not too shabby! I figured that it was a fun thing to try.
This was the first weekend in a while where we had no family obligations or work related activities. It was refreshing. We ran a couple of quick errands and then hung out at the house.
Ken ended up spending a bunch of time next door since our neighbor was re-doing his driveway. It was pretty basic until they ran over a water pipe. Yie! Thankfully, our neighborhood is filled with good people. Ken and Tony helped Mike out and the boys played up front.
I took the time to work on the house. I put up some screws in the living room in order to properly hang pictures. I also put one in the hallway to hang up my clock. I cleaned house, but at a pretty leisurely pace so as not to get burned out. What it produced was a super shiny house, and a really content, but not exhausted resident.
That night Ken and I finally got to watch Inception. Thank goodness for Netflix. That flick was really amazing. I did go into it expecting that all the hype was too much. I was blown away. It was a tremendous cast, and the music was awesome. It was nice to see Ellen Page being wonderful since she was so great in Juno and I would have hated to see her be only a one hit wonder.
The only issue with watching Inception before bedtime was that all my dreams were Inception based.
Sunday morning kept the Brenans in jammies until almost 10. So cool!
The rest of the day had us doing a bunch of work on the driveway in order to prep for both the arrival of Barnum and the birthday party for Bobby next month. We got so much done! We have to call for a bulk pick up, but that will be a good thing since it will mean that we will be able to rid ourselves of quite a bit of crap in one visit.
I cleaned out my car, and even took possession of the guyly box that had been residing in the driveway. It is awesome since the tools and other items in the back of my car now can be placed nicely in a closed container that looks good. After we did this, we took the car to the Elmo car wash and vacuumed and scrubbed. My car looks new!
Bobby says to me on Friday, completely out of the blue, that he wanted to talk to his Great Great Grandfather. I was surprised since it isn’t like we talk about any relatives that far back. He asked me how to talk to dead people and really wanted to visit the grave of his long since deceased grandfather. I explained that I didn’t know where he was buried or else we could go. It dawned on me that we were going to visit the grave of Ken’s sister this week being that her birthday is today. I told this to Bobby, and he was thrilled. It also dawned on me later how freaky it was that the Great Great Grandfather would have been a Robert Brenan, too.
My temporary bunk mate is here today. She is supposed to be here for something like 2 months. She looks nice, but I am sure I have terrified her already with the odd combination of pink skulls and kid pics. Hopefully she isn’t offended easily what with my music selections today.
She hasn’t heard me chattering to myself yet, either. LOL!!
Ken got me tickets for Clerks on Wednesday at Archlight. Anyone want to watch the boys for a couple hours?
Yes, I know, my blog seems uninspired this morning, but I don’t care. LOL!
It is hot in here.
Challenge Accepted! Last Sunday, I tried several dishes at Brandy’s brunch. This included a quiche with broccoli in it! Yesterday, I had this chicken salad at CJ’s that had tons of super green veggies and low calorie. Stephanie suggested that I try at least one new veggie dish a week. I think I can manage this.
I am so pleased that I am so close with Ken’s sibs. I have been emailing with Holly all morning, which is freaking awesome.
Bunk mate just informed me her daughter’s name is Jenna. She is named after the porn star. Awesome!
My right arm is sore. I don’t know if it is cleaning related or computer related. I also have been feeling a little light headed off and on today. I am sure it is nothing, but that doesn’t make it less annoying.
Yay for a great weekend!
Although I would gladly go back to bed this morning, I am awake enough to know that the weekend was filled with good. Not only did I manage to accomplish a ton, I also had some incredible down time. How often does that happen?
On Friday night, Stephanie I and I went out for bad Chinese food and then to a local brewery for good beer. Yes, that’s right, I had beer! It was a little strong for me, but for a beer, not too shabby! I figured that it was a fun thing to try.
This was the first weekend in a while where we had no family obligations or work related activities. It was refreshing. We ran a couple of quick errands and then hung out at the house.
Ken ended up spending a bunch of time next door since our neighbor was re-doing his driveway. It was pretty basic until they ran over a water pipe. Yie! Thankfully, our neighborhood is filled with good people. Ken and Tony helped Mike out and the boys played up front.
I took the time to work on the house. I put up some screws in the living room in order to properly hang pictures. I also put one in the hallway to hang up my clock. I cleaned house, but at a pretty leisurely pace so as not to get burned out. What it produced was a super shiny house, and a really content, but not exhausted resident.
That night Ken and I finally got to watch Inception. Thank goodness for Netflix. That flick was really amazing. I did go into it expecting that all the hype was too much. I was blown away. It was a tremendous cast, and the music was awesome. It was nice to see Ellen Page being wonderful since she was so great in Juno and I would have hated to see her be only a one hit wonder.
The only issue with watching Inception before bedtime was that all my dreams were Inception based.
Sunday morning kept the Brenans in jammies until almost 10. So cool!
The rest of the day had us doing a bunch of work on the driveway in order to prep for both the arrival of Barnum and the birthday party for Bobby next month. We got so much done! We have to call for a bulk pick up, but that will be a good thing since it will mean that we will be able to rid ourselves of quite a bit of crap in one visit.
I cleaned out my car, and even took possession of the guyly box that had been residing in the driveway. It is awesome since the tools and other items in the back of my car now can be placed nicely in a closed container that looks good. After we did this, we took the car to the Elmo car wash and vacuumed and scrubbed. My car looks new!
We watched the truly wonderful Chris Colter take home the Golden Globe for his portrayal of Kurt on Glee. I almost cried I was so happy about this.
Bobby says to me on Friday, completely out of the blue, that he wanted to talk to his Great Great Grandfather. I was surprised since it isn’t like we talk about any relatives that far back. He asked me how to talk to dead people and really wanted to visit the grave of his long since deceased grandfather. I explained that I didn’t know where he was buried or else we could go. It dawned on me that we were going to visit the grave of Ken’s sister this week being that her birthday is today. I told this to Bobby, and he was thrilled. It also dawned on me later how freaky it was that the Great Great Grandfather would have been a Robert Brenan, too.
My temporary bunk mate is here today. She is supposed to be here for something like 2 months. She looks nice, but I am sure I have terrified her already with the odd combination of pink skulls and kid pics. Hopefully she isn’t offended easily what with my music selections today.
She hasn’t heard me chattering to myself yet, either. LOL!!
Ken got me tickets for Clerks on Wednesday at Archlight. Anyone want to watch the boys for a couple hours?
Yes, I know, my blog seems uninspired this morning, but I don’t care. LOL!
It is hot in here.
Challenge Accepted! Last Sunday, I tried several dishes at Brandy’s brunch. This included a quiche with broccoli in it! Yesterday, I had this chicken salad at CJ’s that had tons of super green veggies and low calorie. Stephanie suggested that I try at least one new veggie dish a week. I think I can manage this.
I am so pleased that I am so close with Ken’s sibs. I have been emailing with Holly all morning, which is freaking awesome.
Bunk mate just informed me her daughter’s name is Jenna. She is named after the porn star. Awesome!
My right arm is sore. I don’t know if it is cleaning related or computer related. I also have been feeling a little light headed off and on today. I am sure it is nothing, but that doesn’t make it less annoying.
Thursday, January 13, 2011
Dreamy
1-13-11
I had strange dreams last night. I wish I could remember more, but I do know that at one point I was in some random dinner in which I was drinking coffee with Greg and discussing life. At one point, he asks me if there is anything he can do to fix things. I was quiet for a minute. I finally answered, very quietly that what I needed was something he could not do. He hung his head down and around this time I woke up.
I wish I knew what it all meant. Hell, I would be ok with knowing what was the thing he couldn’t do was. Instead, I am left still trying to determine what the symbols mean.
My dreams are very important to me. They sometimes provide me with needed insight to my brain. Other times, they are just like watching a movie. One of my recent dreams was a movie in which Colin Firth was in it. He was in a relationship in which the two of them were heavy drug users. Colin kept trying to quit, but his partner kept pulling him back into the lifestyle he loathed. At the climax of the movie, Colin’s partner lay dying on the floor, Colin ignoring his gasps for air if only in an attempt to save himself rather than his lover. It was a beautiful, haunting story. I enjoyed it greatly and it was a nice change up to my recent string of more meaningful nightly visions.
I am just pleased that I was able to sleep before Ken arrived home. My fear of Stabby Joe has decreased, especially with two dogs now on my side and the need to be brave mommy to the boys. Dax’s nose was a bit stuffy and therefore sore, so he was crying a bit while trying to get to sleep. At one point he came out and whimpered about the pain and I explained some of it was due to crying. He was appalled that I would suggest that he was crying. Apparently this was a sign of weakness. I calmly told him that I am a bigger cry baby than he could ever be. He looked worried about this admission, so came to terms with it by simply telling me,
My son is so wise.
So despite my weary eyes, I will drink some more coffee and power through today. I am jealous of Ken as he gets to attend the first of I believe 12 mandatory parenting classes which are part of Dax’s enrollment in Pre-K. It may turn out to be boring as really, I think I have read more parenting material than any instructor in this class could possibly know, but it always feels good to be a part of the school.
I made some copies for Ms. Lira and when I picked up Bobby yesterday I took them to her. Her gratefulness was so wonderful. Not that I did it for that reason, but it is a nice change to have people so incredibly pleased when they get some help on things. So many people these days feel they are entitled to the moon and when they get it, there isn’t even a moment of thanks. It bums me out that our school is so poor that they run out of paper. Making a few copies for them seems like the least I can do.
Bruno, my coffee maker, is informing me my cup is ready. Time to get to work.
I had strange dreams last night. I wish I could remember more, but I do know that at one point I was in some random dinner in which I was drinking coffee with Greg and discussing life. At one point, he asks me if there is anything he can do to fix things. I was quiet for a minute. I finally answered, very quietly that what I needed was something he could not do. He hung his head down and around this time I woke up.
I wish I knew what it all meant. Hell, I would be ok with knowing what was the thing he couldn’t do was. Instead, I am left still trying to determine what the symbols mean.
My dreams are very important to me. They sometimes provide me with needed insight to my brain. Other times, they are just like watching a movie. One of my recent dreams was a movie in which Colin Firth was in it. He was in a relationship in which the two of them were heavy drug users. Colin kept trying to quit, but his partner kept pulling him back into the lifestyle he loathed. At the climax of the movie, Colin’s partner lay dying on the floor, Colin ignoring his gasps for air if only in an attempt to save himself rather than his lover. It was a beautiful, haunting story. I enjoyed it greatly and it was a nice change up to my recent string of more meaningful nightly visions.
I am just pleased that I was able to sleep before Ken arrived home. My fear of Stabby Joe has decreased, especially with two dogs now on my side and the need to be brave mommy to the boys. Dax’s nose was a bit stuffy and therefore sore, so he was crying a bit while trying to get to sleep. At one point he came out and whimpered about the pain and I explained some of it was due to crying. He was appalled that I would suggest that he was crying. Apparently this was a sign of weakness. I calmly told him that I am a bigger cry baby than he could ever be. He looked worried about this admission, so came to terms with it by simply telling me, “No mom, you can’t be. Cry babies are babies!”
My son is so wise.
So despite my weary eyes, I will drink some more coffee and power through today. I am jealous of Ken as he gets to attend the first of I believe 12 mandatory parenting classes which are part of Dax’s enrollment in Pre-K. It may turn out to be boring as really, I think I have read more parenting material than any instructor in this class could possibly know, but it always feels good to be a part of the school.
I made some copies for Ms. Lira and when I picked up Bobby yesterday I took them to her. Her gratefulness was so wonderful. Not that I did it for that reason, but it is a nice change to have people so incredibly pleased when they get some help on things. So many people these days feel they are entitled to the moon and when they get it, there isn’t even a moment of thanks. It bums me out that our school is so poor that they run out of paper. Making a few copies for them seems like the least I can do.
Bruno, my coffee maker, is informing me my cup is ready. Time to get to work.
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
1-11-11
I think New Years Resolutions are cliché.
We make these grand statements of how we are going to change and we then go gung ho into the year, hoping to better ourselves. The idea is sound, but the results are never what they should be. You end up eating the whole cake instead of politely declining a piece. Your new exercise regimen gets side tracked because you pull a muscle that never seems to feel quite right again where you can start up where you left off. You still end up spending too much money and yet not enough time on that new hobby. You basically go back to being the same you, but just with good intentions that will fade by the time March comes around.
It doesn’t stop us from trying, though. I should mock the process, but instead, each year I try something different in order to hopefully get my plans to stick. If we don’t try, then we have decided that being just ok is good enough.
I have several grand plans for this next year. Some of them I have already implemented with positive results. One plan was almost derailed until my subconscious kicked me square in the ass and inspired me like a talking bush on fire. Other plans are still being worked out, slowly, so that I don’t burn out.
The best thing I can do this year is to know, not just think, but to truly know with all my being, that I freaking rock. We are almost to that point. I say we because I don’t only have to convince myself. Those pesky inner demons that reside in my head also need to know it. They can still fuck with me, but they will know that they are fucking with a rock star.
So here is to 2011. May it be filled with laugher and inspiration, and yet still have enough hurt and pain to teach lessons. I will not just make it out alive, I will make it out on top.
We make these grand statements of how we are going to change and we then go gung ho into the year, hoping to better ourselves. The idea is sound, but the results are never what they should be. You end up eating the whole cake instead of politely declining a piece. Your new exercise regimen gets side tracked because you pull a muscle that never seems to feel quite right again where you can start up where you left off. You still end up spending too much money and yet not enough time on that new hobby. You basically go back to being the same you, but just with good intentions that will fade by the time March comes around.
It doesn’t stop us from trying, though. I should mock the process, but instead, each year I try something different in order to hopefully get my plans to stick. If we don’t try, then we have decided that being just ok is good enough.
I have several grand plans for this next year. Some of them I have already implemented with positive results. One plan was almost derailed until my subconscious kicked me square in the ass and inspired me like a talking bush on fire. Other plans are still being worked out, slowly, so that I don’t burn out.
The best thing I can do this year is to know, not just think, but to truly know with all my being, that I freaking rock. We are almost to that point. I say we because I don’t only have to convince myself. Those pesky inner demons that reside in my head also need to know it. They can still fuck with me, but they will know that they are fucking with a rock star.
So here is to 2011. May it be filled with laugher and inspiration, and yet still have enough hurt and pain to teach lessons. I will not just make it out alive, I will make it out on top.
 |
| Rock Star Bear |
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
2011
1-4-11
My plan is to re-vamp my blog in the coming weeks. I don’t think that a daily post is going to happen anymore. I am hoping for a weekly blog that covers more of the larger events as opposed to the mundane. I also want to put more effort into the look of it and really make it something great.
I also have some topics I would like to tackle in the coming months. They will be separate posts that will be opinion pieces that I would guess will get some hate. But I want to tackle some topics that are very controversial so that I can practice being able to see both sides.
So don’t think I have given up on blogging. I just wanted to regroup.
My plan is to re-vamp my blog in the coming weeks. I don’t think that a daily post is going to happen anymore. I am hoping for a weekly blog that covers more of the larger events as opposed to the mundane. I also want to put more effort into the look of it and really make it something great.
I also have some topics I would like to tackle in the coming months. They will be separate posts that will be opinion pieces that I would guess will get some hate. But I want to tackle some topics that are very controversial so that I can practice being able to see both sides.
So don’t think I have given up on blogging. I just wanted to regroup.
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