Odd thing happened at the store today....

So C3 and I were at Hobby Lobby today. I was on the phone with my mom when C3 accidently dropped and broke a Christmas ornament. yes, mom that is why I said bye so quickly.

He broke into tears and I surprised myself by not getting angry. I told him that he would have to pay for the damages and say he was sorry.

So, we picked up the piece that had the tag on it, and started towards the register. We ran into our good friend Lynn who we became friends with because she works there and we are there a lot. So..I explained that c3 accidentally broke this and he had to pay for it now. He was crying softly and said he was sorry that he broke it.

She gave me a look and was about to say, that is ok, because I know they simply write these things off, but my look beat her to it. Mine said, dont argue with me. He has to fix this. I am glad that she is our friends, because a stranger might have given him a hug and said that it was ok!

So, we walked over to a register and I paid for it and we were on our way to puchase what we originally paid for.

C3 and I had a talk after we paid for it and I explained to him that eveyone makes mistakes and accidents happen, but it takes a big man to admit his mistake and fix it.

So, on our way out of the store, my purhcases costing less than the silly ornament, C3 wanted to find Lynn again, so we did and he gave her a big hug and said he was sorry again. As C3 wandered out of earshot after this, but still withing eyesight, mom, Lynn congradulates me. Tells me that she has never seen a parent do that before!

WHAT?

If you have ever been in Hobby Lobby, you know how dangerous it is for any parent with kids, young or older. Everything is made of glass, and everything is in the way! Scares the heck out of me, I'm always afraid I'll be the one to brush the giant platter with a fat white chef on it and it WONT be on sale.

Once, when we were grocery shopping C3 ate a piece of candy out of the bulk bin. I make him pay for it. So He gave the woman a quarter and said he was sorry. SHE GAVE HIM CHANGE. He was thrilled. Totally defeated my point!

So, even though I know that they dont make people pay for accidents, thank you Lynn. Thank you for allowing me to parent my child in your store. For understanding what I was trying to do and playing along with me.

And for the record, C3 had to bring in all the garbage cans from out front. There are 5 of them and they are taller and heavier than he is!

Dear Mr. Superintendent

Letter 2

So...as we keep reading in the paper, Dist # is looking to close a school or converge grades or something like that in order to balance or fix the budget.

Ok...Heres a good idea. Stop wasting paper! MY GOD!

Today K1 brings home a piece of paper that has the month of October on it. Listed are a couple of test dates, days off of school and stuff like that. Oh..and I have to sign it and he has to return it or he cannot participate in freaky friday, whatever that is. are you freaking kidding me!

Its a lousy piece of paper with a calendar printed on it. Why do I have to sign this? I already know when they have off this month, the test listed on there are school wide map tests and you will send home tons and tons of paperwork on picture day. Why are you wasting my money.

Oh...did I mention, that at the beginning of the year we are forced to buy an assignment notebook. The kind with days of the weeks and months in it. Wait, in other words a CALENDAR!

Hey teacher....you know that big slate looking thing behind all of the colorful laminated posterboards of stuff. Its called a chalkboard. You write things on it and students copy it into the assignment notebooks/CALENDARS!

So, I wrote on this stupid waste of my money and time piece of paper, WHY DO I HAVE TO SIGN THIS. sending my son into hysterics because he has to have that taped to his desk for the entire month of October? WHY?

So, Mr Superintendent, tell the teachers to stop photocopying and start writing, and having the students copy. I'll be glad to buy you some chalk.

What is that smell.....

Ok...I was going to write about that odd smell coming from the first floor. That was ten minutes ago..

So, I went to my blog page and when to login where I couldn't remember my login and pw. I know, hush..So I was sure I knew my login, my email address, even though I have like a dozen of them, I use basically one for all of my crap. So, i enter that in and then the most logical pw. wrong.
I have a bunch of pw's that I use over and over again with different sites. Gasp..I know..the experts tell us not to do that. to use a unique pw for every site. These are the same experts that also tell us to NEVER write down our logins and pws. WTF! Like, I can remember all of the places I have a login and pw to

Lets look at the list
kids school
amazon
work
fb
twitter
blogger
half a dozen shopping sites that I bought one thing on
goggle
email (dozen different accounts)
yahoo
Adwords
Dashbord Analytical crap
httH pool website
at least a dozen forums for both work and personal
bank1
bank2
all of my bills and each of their websites.
freecycle



so lets say about 50 average website...oh wait...with bills, probably 75. So...I am supposed to create unique logins and id's for each and everyone one of them cause if I dont and i get stolen, its my own fault. Please shoot me now. I walk upstairs intending to get something and by the time I have gone up 9 steps, I have forgotten what it was I was after. The pool website, like why do I need to have a login and pw to that?????, I only use each summer. So I'm supposed to remember that after 6 months or so of down time?

So...I have some of them written down...ok no, typed up in a file on my computer. And...if you are thief, there are more computes than people in this house, so good luck finding which one...oh well, ok, its this one...like I would put it on a computer I would have to get up and go to!

I only have some of them written down. And...I was smart...I wrote them down but didn't write next to them what they were for! HA. which of course has its own problems.

Click here to reset my password, yet again.

I still dont know where the smell is coming from?

I try to be a good mom, but.....

Lordy! What a night..

I figure myself to be a good mother. Not perfect, but good. I dont coddle, ok fine, maybe I coddle K3 a little, but he is my youngest, and I have backed off of that cause he is ticking me off lately. But, I dont coddle to much, I give my kids their freedom, to a degree. I dont entertain them, I force them to play and do things for themselves. (I just stared a new pair of socks afterall) I dont buy them everything they want no matter how much the beg and plead.

When they get hurt, I take care of them, but still force them to take care of themselves to a degree. Yes, when K2 had a broken leg, I made her get her own drink when she was able. But I see that along the lines of good parenting. When they get sick, I show the appropriate amount of concern and sympathy depending on the illness. High fevers, get hugs and tylenol, blankets, cool washcloths on their foreheads. (my mom used to do that...the washcloth...still remember how good it felt)

But, oh but, I cannot handle the wailing. K2 was sick all afternoon and all evening last night. Both end kind of sick. Serious stomach cramps kinda sick. Dry heaving kinda sick. So, I put my good mom hat on, got her a small garbage can, a heating pad for the stomach cramps, put a book on cd on her computer and tucked her into bed, cooing the words of caring and sympathy. And then...annoyed mom walked into the picture.

Ok, I get you are sick. I get it! We all get it. but really, every time you go into the bathroom, please stop whining my name, getting louder and louder. I go in there, you say your stomach hurts, I say I'm sorry..and then two minutes later you are yelling my name. This went on starting at about 3:30pm until well past 3am. and I do mean every 5 minutes. I was ready to strangle you, not literally please. I mean come on! I get it! I know you feel like crap. I KNOW. But please, please stop screaming my name every five minutes to tell me you dont feel good. Its not what you want. You dont want annoyed mom standing there, you want good mom, but you decided that you need annoyed mom to stand there and say, I know you are sick, what do you want me to do, I cannot be sick for you(althought I could do it alot quieter)I cannot do anything for you, go back to bed.

So...sigh...K2 was able to take good caring mom and turn me into annoyed please shut up and dont say my name again mom. I actually told K2, after I got her a warm blanket and set her up on the couch with the tv on her favorite show and a garbage can in front of her this morning , to please not say my name for a while.

How quick they are able to turn us from loving and caring and feeling oh so bad for them, to dear god just shut up moms.

A note to my husband....

Dear Honey,

It has been a long tough rode. But we have traveled through it together, hand in hand, standing with our faces towards the wind, daring it to push us back. We refused to back down, refused to feel sorry for ourselves. We worked together, and stood firm. You worked hard, achieved the near impossible, and I am very proud of you for that.

So....perhaps you are thinking that you are back in the office already? See, in the office, they have people to do things for you. They have things to take in and out the garbage...so, I am thinking you are daydreaming ahead..as you have walked past our 6 garbage cans three times today and not brought them back from the curb. We do not have a janitoral staff to do this, and I dont do garbage.

So, my darling, get off your lazy ass and quit walking past the damn garbage cans! They will not make it back into the house by themselves!

Dear Mr. Superintendent

Dear Mr. Superintendent

(wow...that is a tough word to spell)

our district is all out of money. You are grasping at straws.
There is talk about closing yet another school. You have canceled most fun after school activities.
You are now charging the groups that function for the school and around the school for use of the school. I guess you think that cub and girl scouts are just rolling in the dough?

Well...I have a couple of ideas for saving money.

First, crap...forgot my train of thought....

Ok...wait., I got it...

Why do the kids use throw away textbooks? Every year the district has to spend money on textbooks. Why? When we were kids we received TEXT books. That is hard cover books. The night before school, we would, ok our parents would be cussing late into the night trying to read the instructions on how to take a brown grocery bag and turn it into a book cover. Who in the world came up with those instructions anyway. So we had hard cover books..and lined paper and pencils. Someone tell me why my sixth grader needs crayons? REALLY????

We copied problems down out of the book, or off the board, wrote our names on them and turned them in. And if we destroyed or damaged a book in any way, our parents had to then pay for it and we caught hell for it. Why is this no longer sufficient? (OMG, K3 just mooned K1)...
So...get rid of the damn throw away workbooks that you have to buy every year! To me this seems like a no brainer.

Second...I now have all three of my kids in school. Why do they send home the same paperwork with each kid. Why do I have to sign three different pieces of paper telling me and them the classroom rules? Why do I have to sign three different pieces of paper first explaining about the computer lab and then giving my kids permission to use said computer lab.

Classroom rules. Why? Why in gods name must I sign a piece of paper agreeing that my kid will not be a shit, and if they are a shit they will get in trouble. Isn't that a given. Do we not know what the rules are in school by now. Do we have to be reminded each and every year. Like, what, they have changed from year to year? Why do we need a piece of paper that none of us really reads, to talk bout positive attitude and and good character. WOW...wait a minute...maybe this is what society as a whole needs. The Dist is actually ahead of the game here.....our little town is perfect because I have signed three different pieces of paper reminding me and my children how to be of good moral character. Phew...crisis avoided. So wait a minute..if one of my kids should *gasp* forget they they signed this little piece of paper promising to be a *good noodle* and gets in trouble...do they bring this little piece of paper out and wave it in our faces screaming.....BUT YOU SIGNED THIS PAPER...YOU SIGNED YOU SIGNED! Oddly enough, I know they dont do this as my perfect little children have gotten in trouble in school and I never ever saw this paper again.

I wonder if I can have the teachers sign a piece of paper promising to be of good moral character, to be nice to my kids, to teach them tons, make them all get along and be friends with everyone, to not have clicks, to not be mean, or to steal or to bully, or to name call... and if one of my kids comes home with a problem, I can go to them and scream....BUT YOU SIGNED THIS PAPER, YOU SIGNED YOU SIGNED!

I wonder if I would get a phone call from a teacher if instead of signing them, I just wrote MAKE ME!

ROFLMAO! Damn....I already signed them and turned them in. That would have been funny!!!!!

Dear Honey....

It has been a rough couple of months for us that is for sure. I am not sure that most couples would have been able to make it through. You have learned from your mistakes, listened to advice and taken some of it to heart.
I know that you figured 13 years of marriage was enough for you to be able to be home 24x7 and know what was going on and what to do with the children etc etc. Weren't you surprised.

I have another piece of advice for you, My Darling....
Once every 4-6 months, that lovely time of the month is really really bad. Well...more of, I am really really really really cranky the first day. Now, you haven't seen this before because you are usually at work and by the time you come home, I have hit the end of cranky stage called EXHAUSTION and am on the couch telling you to go get dinner. You were fortunate enough not to have been home all day to witness the carnage that was abound.
Our children, be it young, have learned what to do when I suddenly explode because they have once again assumed that Mom is a synonym for Maid and left their crap all over the kitchen. They quickly and very very Quietly clean it up and run for cover.

Oh...I dont even want to hear from anyone...how could you yell at the kids when its your problem kinda crap. Welcome to life, baby. I can so remember, and I can say this because my mom just left for vacation for two weeks and will not read this and call me horrified that I posted this where other people, people who know her can read this. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA, and my brother and sister can testify to this...my mom would come out of her room with a bubshka on her head (bandana) white t-shirt and black shorts.....this meant trouble with a capital T. Course back then, we just knew when she came out dressed like this it was day of hell and cleaning! As we got older, we understood that if we just shut up and cleaned we would be able to escape, or run and hide later in the day. Now of course, we understand that it was that time of the month, and we tease her about it on occassion!

where was i....oh yes

My Darling.....if you suddenly see me explode and start yelling like a mad woman and the kids start scrambling around and over furniture with sponges in hand or dustbusters or vacuums, do not and I repeat do NOT say,

• what is your problem
• why are you yelling
• why are you so cranky
• why dont you go somewhere

etc etc....cause really dude, I could kill you with my bare hands and no jury with one woman on it would convict me!