Ok Friday... You win.

Today.

Today has just plain ole sucked. And it's not even 1:00pm yet! There are times when I try to find more eloquent words to use in describing things, but for today, November 14, 2014 ... this word just fits the best.

It started out fairly fine. Woke up at my new usual early time. My Honey made my coffee, I watched the news, played my games, and even got an early morning snuggle from the boy-child when he came down early. 

Then there were minimal fights with clothing choices for both kids before school, and things seemed to be going fairly well.

I even had GREAT hair. I even went so far as to smear on a swipe of eyeshadow on each lid/crease before going downstairs. I do my eyeliner and mascara standing in the hall while the kids are putting on shoes and coats and backpacks, so I'll smooth out my shadow and blend it in evenly while I'm standing at the hall mirror.

So, we head to the bus stop. Conner almost forgot his book bag because he was so excited about his new gigantic arctic coat, but we got it in time, and headed to the bus stop.

And we waited.

And waited.

And waited.

In the cold.

I called the school to see why the bus was now 10 minutes late. She puts me on hold to check with the transportation department and comes back on the line to tell me that the bus is late, but is in route. 

Ok. 

Now... The delima of "how long do I keep waiting" kicks in. As soon as we head home, the bus will come. I need to get the girl to preschool, and don't want the boy to be late either. GG, bless her heart, had given up trying to run around and play. She was over it and just sat down trying to get warm inside her gigantic arctic coat.

Screw it, we're going. Come on kids, we're going home so I can drive you to school.

Half way home, I hear the bus. 

Keep walking, we're driving. At this point, I'm set on driving, so we hustle home to get to school.

We get in the car, I crank up Amelia, and she tells me that one of her tires is low on air.

CRAP! Really?!?

I get out and look at the suspect tire, and it just looks a little low, so we head on out.

I don't really fully breath the whole trip. Should I stop at 7-11 to put air in the tire, making us even LATER, or just go on, figuring it's just low because of the cold.

I go on to school. 

On the way to K, I call Preschool to be sure it's ok if I drop of GG late. I had the feeling there was a strict no-late policy, so I wanted to double check. I was wrong, it was/is fine to be a little late, so we're all set.

Drop off the boy, and tell him a few times to remember to take the bus home. We do car pool on Tuesdays and Thursdays and he takes the bus every other day. He's very routine based, and no one likes it when his routine is messed with. No. One. 

So, he's in school, he's not late, and we head off to Genna's school.  She's 16 minutes late. We take off her coat, I get my kisses and say bye. Then I see a mom with her tuition check. Oh yeah! It's due, let me go grab my checkbook. Head back up to the school with my check, and I pass another mom with her sons homework bag. Bugger! Genna's homework is still in my purse. Back to the car for her homework. Ok. Whew. All children are where they should be, with what they should have, and everything is paid for. Double whew!

Let's get some air in this tire now, because the light keeps coming on and going off telling me she's not happy.

I pull into the gas station, go to the air machine, insert my $.75 in quarters ... and silence. Noing. Well, maybe it's one that is already "charged" and will whir and come to life when I push the button. Nothing. Ok then... Maybe it's super smart and will only pouf it's super air when it's on a tire spout. Ppppffffsssstttt. Silence. Damnit! That's $.75 that I want back. So I walk into the gas station to ask what the trick is for getting air to come out of the air machine. The token male on staff got himself 3 quarters from the register and came with me to help. Because I'm a girl. You know. I can't, like, put, like, air or whatever in like my own car, or wheel, or tire, or whatever. As we walked, he asked me again if I put in 3 quarters. I guess and truely believe this is a valid question, as there are several ways to get to $.75, but yes, I assured him I did put in 3 quarters. 

He inspects the machine. He then hits the machine. He looks closely at the "In Service" light. He then shakes the machine. He then proclaims "It's too full". Um... What? Yes, he agrees with himself. It's too full of coins. He'll have to dump it. He then apologizes, hands me the 3 quarters he took from the register, and we say goodbye.

I drove to the BJ's gas station, and there's an air pump there.

And not just any air pump, but the MackDaddy of ALL air pumps. The only thing that would have made this air pump any better would have been if it came with free liposuction and Jason Statham as a helper. First of all, it's free. Second, you tell it your desired PSI, and then you put air in your tire. It then beeps to tell you you've reached your desired PSI. 

Love!

I'm so happy, after I put the tire spout cap back on, and put the exceptionally clean air hose back into it's fantastic holder, I pat the sweet machine on it's head and thank it out loud.

I then look up and see a couple in a car behind me. Laughing. Because I just thanked and patted the air machine.

I just smiled and got back in the car. 

The low air indicator light didn't go off. But I was too embarrassed to get back out and try again, so I figured I go on to the next gas station and try again. But low and behold the light goes off after a few rotations, so it's all good under the hood.

I contemplate my late breakfast choices on the way home. Due to my horribly unlucky day, I'm slightly and understandably worried about cooking anything at this point. There's no telling what could go wrong. So I have leftover cold pork tenderloin dipped in a cold sauce. 

I sit down on the sofa to have my lunch, watch a little junk daytime TV, and check in on Facebook and twitter. As I'm starting to breath and realize nothing else bad is happening, I realize I never finished my makeup.

So all day, in addition to the crap listed above, I have been walking around, interacting with, and talking to people ALL MORNING with 2 very random brown smears on my eyelids that look like my dog did my makeup.

And now, if you'll excuse me, I am due to volunteer at our son's Kindergarten "50 Day" sock hop, in honor of the 50th day of school, and I need to even out my makeup before I go. 

Cheers, y'all.

Letting Go

Yesterday I let go of a lot of grudges. Most of which no one even knew I was harboring. Even myself.

I was hurt by several people in many of my circles whom I felt had wronged me in some way. And some of those ways were simply because they were happy. Some were in a better financial place than we were so they were able to do things that we couldn't do and I didn't want to see their happy escapades. Some were able to go to the gym that we can't afford, or they got personal trainers which we can't afford, and I didn't want to see my friends working out, sweating, smiling, having a great time, and doing these things both together and solo and without me. Some were friends with people whom I am not friends with and I didn't want to see these people out and about having fun, again ... WITHOUT ME.

Jealousy is an issue I've dealt with my entire life in some form or another. I have always wanted to be the best, or I didn't want to play. I'm not your BEST friend, then I'm not your friend at all. If I'm not the favorite, the immediate blue-ribbon-winner and the best at whatever I try, I give up. No practice for this chick. Nope. If I can't run a marathon at 240 pounds after 6+ years of sedimentary life, then I'm not even going to put on a pair of tennis shoes.

So, by simply clicking the "unfollow" button on Facebook, I was able to sweep all the joys and successes of my friends under the rug. Out of sight, out of mind. But then I realized that's not what friendship is. 

When a good friend's son became very ill, I wasn't "following" her on Facebook, so I didn't know about it. I wasn't there to support her and tell her that I was thinking about her and hoping he got better. When a friend was in a motorcycle wreck, I wasn't there to tell him that I would bring over a huge dish of cheesy meaty goodness with zero vegetables to make him feel better. These are just a few of the things that I missed out on. Thing that FRIENDS need to be there for each other to support one another.

Instead of being able to be a friend, I was shutting the door so I couldn't see what was going on in their lives. But in that time, I became slowly more bitter, even sadder, more introverted, and more of a loner. I don't want to even leave my house, y'all. And I don't want to be in my house either because I feel like the walls are closing in on me. I've created this little cocoon to protect myself from seeing other people happy because I am not.

You know what else I noticed? The more I ignored them, the more they ignored me. But wait ... why aren't they contacting me and saying, "Ahem .. Um ... Carter Ann ... where are you? What's wrong? Why aren't you telling me how awesome my vacation pictures are, why aren't you telling me you're thinking about my sick kid, why aren't you cheering me on during my latest 5K?" Nope. None of that. What happened was simply ... they stopped paying attention to me to. You know why? Because all relationships take work. They take a door that swings both ways.

So I just went through Facebook yesterday and I "Followed" all of the people that I had unfollowed. I then went back several posts into people feeds and liked or commented on things that I had missed over my pouting stint, and realized that I was breathing so much better. It was like I had lifted a shroud around my head that was doing nothing but keeping me inside. The joys, accomplishments, fears, tragedies, and celebrations hadn't stopped. I had just missed them. Me. By myself. Without them. Not them without me. It was me without them. 

So, to YOU ... 
I forgive you for having fun without me.
I forgive you for having more money than me.
I forgive you for having opinions different than mine.
I forgive you for staying friends with the person who hurt me.
I forgive you for having a life that revolves around your family and not mine.
I forgive you for needing time to figure things out.
I forgive you for having a "group" that I'm not a member of.
I forgive you for hurting me.
I forgive you for lying to me.
I forgive you for being thinner than me.
I forgive you for having the things that I can't have.
I forgive you for turning your back.
I forgive you for trying too hard.
I forgive you for having no clue that I was so sad, lost, hurt, and scared.
I forgive you for carrying on when I stopped.

And I hope that one day you can forgive me too.

And to YOU, who DID step forward and ask me out of the blue one day what was wrong. To YOU ... I can't thank you enough. I still have the email you sent me, and I still look at it. YOU helped get me out of this. YOU saw that something was wrong, when I didn't even know that I was in such a bad place, and YOU took the time to reach out. THANK YOU.

Evil Mommy Monster

OMG, I am so tired of this bug! Everything in the world tells us that we can't get The Flu from the Flu Shot, but I received the Flu Mist this year, and I've been sick ever since.

The flu shot is a dead strain of the bug, while the mist is a "weakend" live version. I think the live bug that was squirted up my nose wasn't so weakened, but I'm no scientist and I don't claim to know anything other than what the manufacturers and doctors tell me. 

All of the side effects of the mist are also flu symptoms. Fever, cough, runny/stuffy nose, aches and pains, head ache, etc. And all the info I found on the internet says that it can take up to 2 weeks for the flu vaccine to work in your system to fight a flu bug that you may catch. 

So, if it could take up to 2 weeks for the vaccine to work, then you could still catch the flu right after getting the shot. Especially if you go to your doctors office to get it. 

So, if all the side effects are also symptoms of the flu, then why the hell go through the torture of getting the damn shot/mist? 

Because it's our civic duty to make sure we don't catch it and spread it. I'm a big advocate for all vaccines. 

But this is getting on my nerves and making me Evil Mommy Monster. 

Timeline: 

Thursday the kids and I got the mist.

Thursday night I started to get a little horse.

Friday I spent the morning on a farm with my son's Kindergarten class as a chaperon.

Saturday I started feeling bad. Headache, congested, grumpy.

Sunday morning i woke up feeling really bad. A lot more congested, stuffy, sore throat, sore ears, head ache.

We had our end of year T-Ball party on Sunday, and I didn't want to cancel for a little cold, so the party went on. With the adrenaline of the party and the awesome friends and energy that was all around, I didn't notice until everyone left that I was worn out. I think I sat on the sofa for a few minutes, then went to bed and CRASHED.

Sunday night the nausea and fever hit.

Monday, Mr. Saucy stayed home and I stayed in bed.

Tuesday, Mr. Saucy had to go to work, so I was up and about with the kids. It was a teacher conference day, so the kids were home with me and not in school. This is when I lost my cool and became that horrible Mommy that I always feared I would be.

In addition to throwing a spoon at the floor by my sons feet because he decided after 3 times of asking him if he wanted his own bowl and him saying NO each time, he decided to sit down an eat my bowl and then spanking the girls hand 3 times in a row instead of just once after she knocked my HUGE glass of ice water with crushed ice (so it was wicked hard to clean up) on the carpet, lets just say it wasn't my finest hour. Kids were sent to their rooms, timeout, and even sent outside to play in order to get them away from me. In addition to the soup fiasco and the water spil, they broke an antique in the front room while both running and throwing things in the house, which they have been told at least 5 times every day of their lives not to do.

But, by the time Daddy got home on Tuesday, both kids had figured out it wasn't the best day to test Mommy, and I had figured out it wasn't a good time to try to act as if it was a normal day and we had come to a mutual understanding of "Chill The Hell Out" status. The kids had even taken showers and were in their jammies and Martial Arts clothes in time for Daddy to take him to practice. GG snuggles with me on the sofa and we both apologized to each other for being pills. 

No one likes being sick. And I honestly believe its especially hard on the loved ones of the sick person. My poor angels just wanted Mommy to be Mommy. But Mommy couldn't do that. The most I had in me was to just keep everyone alive. And some days, that's really all we can do. 

Last night I went to bed early again, and my AMAZING Honey came and gave me a kiss as he tucked the kids into bed. I apologized for being sick. "Mommy's aren't supposed to get sick", I said. Then he became even more magnificent than he was 30 seconds prior when he said, "Perhaps if you were a single mommy, then I could agree with you. But you're not a single mommy. You're not alone. You have me, and I'm here to help you and take care of you when you need it."

My LORD, I love that man!!

So ... Evil Mommy Monster has been put into storage where I hope she'll stay for another year or two. But she'll never go away away. She'll be just a bug away and I'm sure we'll see her again. 

But not too soon, I hope.

Nina Needs to GO!

Let me explain to you why "Nina Needs To Go", the "short" on Disney Channel and Disney Jr that airs between programs, itself, Needs To Go!

In case you are not in the know, Nina is a little girl who realizes at the last minute that she "HAS TO GO, RIGHT NOW" and therefore needs a family members to help rush to a bathroom RIGHT NOW because she wasn't listening to her body. 

This family member is either her mom, dad, or big brother who all try to help in some normal human way. Then at the last minute her Nana comes to the rescue with jet powered roller skates or a submarine or a Mary Popins style umbrella that allows her to fly just to name a few of her fantastic gadgets.

Nana is a Super Hero GrandMa with all the latests super hero gadgets to get the little girl to the potty in any circumstance from a swim-park to a busy shopping mall to a ski slope, etc. 

Little girls like to emulate the cartoon girls they see on TV. Let's be honest. It's just the way it is. Therefore, the issue I have is that I have a little girl who thinks Nina and Nana are AWESOME. So my little angel-face thinks it's really cool to hold it as long as she can so she can "play" Nina having to go. Or better yet, she just lies and says she has to go RIGHT NOW making everyone around her slip into freak out panic mode so we can get her to a potty.

Disney! THIS. IS. NOT. COOL. 

Especially when she's out with her Grandmother who does not have rocket powered roller skates or a submarine, and who freaks the Hell out when her only granddaughter starts whining that "she doesn't think she can hold it much longer", sending my poor Mother In Law into sound barrier breaking speeding attempts to save her sofa's upholstery, or some other private or public property from the inevitable explosion of pee-water that's about to spew from our Nina-emulating little angel. 

In the Disney "short" Nina always makes it to the bathroom in time and ends each episode with, "That'll NEVER happen again, because now I know, DON'T WAIT TO GO."

Cool. Awesome. It'll never happen again. But it DOES HAPPEN! It happens every damn day Nina! 

Disney, please take his short out of rotation. Or just pick one episode ONLY to air. Because with there being multiple times she says that it'll "never happen again", it becomes very frustrating as a parent trying to teach children not to lie and not to repeat mistakes. 

There are annoying cartoons and kid programs, but this one needs to go because it's not teaching the lesson you think it's teaching. It's a good concept, but it's. It working, and it Needs To Go.

A Shake For Breakfast...

Remember the old add for that diet shake? A shake for breakfast, a shake for lunch, a shake for a snack, and a sensible dinner? I did that yesterday with my Shakeology and I really did feel great all day.

I had another shake this morning too, but I just made my daughter mac-n-cheese for her lunch, and I saw the sour cream in the fridge, and I know we still have chips in the pantry, and I SOOOOO BADLY WANT CHIPS AND SOUR CREAM RIGHT NOW!

Ugh!

I have my sugar free pumpkin spice coffee here with me at my desk as I'm typing, but it's not chips and sour cream. It's not crunchy, salty, and creamy like chips and sour cream, that's for damn sure.

I could portion out a small amount, but I'd just go back for more.

And my desk is in the kitchen. Right next to the girl who's blowing on her hot mac-n-cheese and happily munching away. Yes, my back is to her, but I can hear every delightfully delicious mouthful. I can hear the squish of the pasta and the cheese sauce as she chews. I can smell the butter and cheese. 

I'm in agony.

A G O N Y

Ummmmmm... luke-warm coffee. You're so satisfying and such a fair and equal replacement for the fat-filled, salt-filled lunch I really want. I hate you coffee!

No I don't. I'm sorry. I take it back. Please don't believe anything I say when I'm in the throws of a food-craving depravity-stricken state. I'm not myself.

Coffee ... I love you almost as much as wine and vodka.

I thought I was going to be able to do a little organizing today, so I brought down the file cabinet drawers from the master bedroom to the basement only to discover that the "new" file cabinet is a legal sized drawer and our old file cabinet is a letter size. So, I'll need to get legal sized file folders from BJ's the next time I'm there. (Someone remind me please. I'll forget.)

The kids bring home at least one piece of paper a day, and yes, I'm sorry, but I'm that mom that is keeping them all. I am for now. I don't know if I'll continue to do this through middle and high school, but for now, I'm excited about my babies being in school and having a good time and being proud of their drawings and writings. 

I bought 3-ring binders for their work, but they were jammed pack full within the first month of school, so they are now going to get their own drawer in the new family file cabinet. I'm sure the papers will pile up on the kitchen island until I freak out about it being too crowded, then I'll just go jam them all into a folder without sorting. 

OR, I can be a little proactive about it and buy an set of uber cute hanging folders from my girl at Moore Magnets and then wait until they are jammed pack and take them downstairs. Yeah ... that sounds like a good plan. I like that. I get to buy something new and pretty and functional. All of those things make my soul happy.

Speaking of a happy soul, I think I've made it through my clawing screaming chip craving. I'm going to have another Shakeology creation for my lunch, and either find a book to read, or do research on adhesives that will stick the pennies to the back-splash of my kitchen counter and to the floor where I removed the half wall. 

I don't sit still, who are we kidding. I'll research adhesives. And go hunt for pennies.

Choices

Sorry Autumn, I just can't seem to find a way to adhere to your 21-Day Fix rules. Yes, you've made it very easy with the color coded boxes for portioning but I have a hard time with this little thing called hunger.

Hunger and Carter Ann DO. NOT. MIX. 

When I get hungry I make bad choices. It's part of that broken brain I was blessed with at birth. 

Not sure where this fear of hunger comes from, I'm sure a psychologist could enlighten me and I'm sure it's my parents fault, but I'm not interested in blaming others for my feelings and actions. I know! I know! That's so un-American of me isn't it? Someone who wants to take responsibility for her SELF?!? Unheard of! 

The truth is, all parents struggle. And we're all going to screw up our kids. No matter what we do, we're going to mess them up in some way. We're going to over-protect, under-protect. Do too much, or not do enough. We'll let them have too much independence or we'll do everything for them until they're 35. Regardless of our best intentions we're going to screw up. So all we can do is try to make the best choices every day for our little ones.

And my parents did what they felt was right at the time. We didn't have "junk" food in the house as kids. So when my sister and I were old enough to make our own grocery shopping choices we ate our weight in Pringles and PopTarts. If we had these options at home as kids, would we have not craved them and devoured them like a hiker across the Sahara would attack a fresh water spring? I have no idea. My crystal ball is in the shop this week, so I can't look back and see what those choices would have changed in today's time. 

We had family meals, as far as I remember. I mean, I think we did. I don't really remember. I remember holiday meals and specific dishes my mom made, but when I was very young my mom went back to work full time, and I don't remember much of my family time as an adolescent. I remember my friends, my bike, the pool, and my room, but it don't remember much about family time. 

I guess we ate because it was time to eat. Breakfast before school. Lunch at school. Dinner before bed. It was just a thing that happened in the day. Nothing special, no fanfare, no thought as to what was happening other than whether or not it was something I wanted to eat or not. 

And I had very little say in it. Meals were put down in front of me and I ate them or not. Seasonings, ingredients, and taste profiles were never discussed or mentioned. We ate meatloaf or spaghetti or tuna burgers and I don't remember there ever being a choice of things available to individualize them. No red pepper flakes to make it spicy, no extra garlic to make it more garlicky, no A1 sauce or anything other than ketchup for meatloaf. We did have spicy mustard, but that was the extent of the "crazy" side of our pantry. Oh, Daddy had canned sardines. So I guess THOSE are more exotic than spicy mustard, but only because it's a food product that I have yet to find the desire to attempt to try.

So who knows if my attempt to teach my kids about foods will help or not. 

This past Sunday was an awesome day because my football team played at 1:00pm, then Mr. Saucy's team played at 4:00pm, so we planned on junk food for lunch and spaghetti for supper. I went to the store for tortilla chips and ingredients to make queso. I let Conner pick out a snack too. He originally wanted Cheetos, his favorite, but then chose Pringles. 

When we got home, he was so excited to kick off his shoes, open his container of chips and sit on the sofa. Because this is not something we do around here very often. Again, you'll look at pictures of Mr. Saucy and myself and think, "There is no way in hell you aren't eating chips and ice cream all day", but we really don't. We just eat twice as much real food as we should. Again... Back to that hunger issue that started today's rambling.

So... Who knows.  Choices are made. We feel we're doing what's best, but we never really know. We just have to do what our hearts and souls tell us is right and hopefully when the kids are in therapy in their 20's they'll find a way to forgive us for wanting only the best for out little parasites.