Girlymama

So, despite my earlier post (about not eating when I’m stressed out), I do occasionally fall victim to stress eating.

Ugh. At least I took the plastic wrap off.

My kids are driving me completely crazy. I am about 3 minutes away from locking them in their rooms while I sit on the floor and drink tequila directly from the bottle.  I’m quite sure that despite being in separate rooms, they would manage to find something to fight about that will end in screaming and tears. (Theirs and mine.)

Pretty much the only reason this has not happened yet is that Husband just called from the airport. Something is terribly wrong with his car. I’m seeing dollar signs, but that’s just our car experiences the past few months speaking.  He’s going to try and make it to a garage and then give me a call when it dies completely.

If I swore, this would be an opportune time.

Grace is being so annoying. She has discovered how to drive her big sister crazy and she is doing a darn good job of it. While driving me nuts in the process. She has discovered such Little Sibling classics as:
*repeating everything Ellie says. For seemingly days at at time. “Stop it.” “Stop it!” Stop it!” Stop it!” “I mean it!” “I mean it!!” “Moooommmm!!” “MOMMMMMM!”
*standing in front of Ellie while she is trying to watch a video or read or whatever. And not moving, while talking loudly right in her face. Until Ellie loses her temper. Usually saying something like: “My name is Cinderella. You have to call me Cinderella, not Gracie. Let’s go to the ball. ELLLLIIIEEEE! You’re late for the ball! Come on! Let’s go!! Ellie!?! ELLIE?! ELLIE!?!?!“
*Insisting that things that are Ellie’s, have always been stored in Ellie’s room, have been Ellie’s forever are – in fact – hers. “Mommy! Ellie took mine!!!!” “That’s Ellie’s. It has her name on it. She made it in school.” “No its mine now. She has to give it to me.” “Sorry, Gracie, it doesn’t work that way.” Follow with a nice, loud fit.
Poor Ellie.
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Tomorrow we’re going to buy our new shed. Which will hopefully be delivered sometime before my in-laws move all of their earthly belongings into our house. Did I mention that was happening in June? Cause it is. Prepare for some interesting rants reading material. My husband’s tendency to “save” things was learned somewhere, folks. I’m going along to prevent my MIL from buying a shed bigger than our home to store her gobbs of stuff in.

And I am going to prevent my husband and his father from deciding – on impulse – that the “build-your-own-shed” kit can’t be nearly as complicated as it looks and deciding to give it a go since they both have extensive construction experience engineering degrees, which totally qualifies you to build stuff (even if your degree is technically in chemical engineering). And its not like my FIL didn’t already almost chop off his finger with a circular saw once already this year. (Seriously.) Because they would totally do that. And then not understand why I’m killing them.

These are the reasons I am going with them. The fact that we will be mere minutes away from the Pottery Barn Outlet has nothing to do with it. Purely coincidence.
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I hosted a Mexican Fiesta last night for a friend’s birthday. It was very fun. Lots of guacamole and margaritas and Coronas. Ole! Happy birthday, Bekah!
We’re all super excited because in exactly 26 days, we will all be flying to Hilton Head Island.
To a house on the beach.
With no kids and no husbands.
For a whole freakin’ WEEK!!!!!
My kids are going to grandma’s for ten days. Seriously. I admit will probably miss them a little, but this is a sacrifice I am willing to make.

So I’m feeling mildly confident about the bathing-suit-wearing-thing being 4 weeks away. Mainly because I now weigh less than I have all year. I mean, I did exercise one day this week. I’m sure that’s what did it. I’m going to write a book. Lose Weight Only Exercising One Day A Week While Eating Things Like Cookie Dough. I’d buy it.
Actually, more likely it is because, like  my sister, when I’m stressed I don’t eat. My system does not take stress well. I get really tense in my shoulders and my stomach gets queasy. So, because I’m a bit queasy, I am not hungry, so I don’t eat much. I also haven’t really sat down since the water came into the house on Sunday afternoon. I’ve been mostly cleaning up the mess and killing ants. And this crazy week is just getting crazier now that Husband is off to Seattle for a few days.

Oh well. If I keep this up, I should look great in that bikini. Or I’ll be dead. One of the two.

Its really hard to figure out what to write about today. I’m inclined to whine about the water damage. Or complain about the ants who, apparently fleeing from the lake in the crawl space, are invading the rest of our house. Or laugh about how this is all, naturally, happening when I’m having a party Thursday night. (“What are these little black things on the chips?” “Uh… Pepper! That’s it! Pepper. Let me refill your margarita!”)

But instead I’m sitting here thinking of senseless violence. And flooding. And sickness. And Darfur. And Iraq. And, while thanking God that our lives are so sheltered from such things, I’m feeling helpless as I look at the world around me.  Thinking of my children always makes me want to save the planet and recycle and all that so they can have a better world to live in. But what about things like this? What natural disasters will my girls face? What wars?  Will they be victims of violence?  Will they be okay when it looks like the world is spiraling out of control? It seems like just when you think it can’t get worse… it somehow does.  And that scares me.

All I can do is pray. Pray for the victims who I do not know. Pray for the families who are grieving. Pray for wars to end. Pray for healing and comfort. Pray for my children – while reminding myself that they do not belong to me. They are God’s. So I have to trust Him with their futures and pray that “Thy will be done” in their lives. But that prayer seems to be getting scarier as the world gets messier.

A flashing red light means you are to stop at the intersection. Not go speeding through, without slowing down even a smidgen, while blowing your horn.

In April? Seriously?

This Nor’easter hit us hard. Remember how we redid the family room and mud room? To get rid of the water damage and mold? Yeah.

Here’s my family room now. Again.

Mud Room – more flooding. Glad I never got around to painting those moldings, since we’ll be starting over. Husband wants to tile the mud room this weekend. May have some fun blog posts about that!

On the bright side, this is supposedly the worst rain in like 25 years or something. It is astounding how much water is coming into our crawl space right now — its like there is a faucet on down there! Gah!

Ellie: “Mama, ice cream isn’t candy. Its a food.”
Well, in that case, why don’t you have ice cream for breakfast? She truly thinks she is smarter than me.

Husband: “You are not allowed to go on WebMD anymore.”
After checking my symptoms, I become convinced that I am going to need surgery for a minor problem…

Okay! I won’t post everything, because that would take forever. I seriously spent $100. On consignment. So I got a TON of clothes. (But $10 was on clothes for me (Maternity. Again: not pregnant. Just couldn’t pass up such a great deal. Heck, I’ll give them away if I don’t need them!) And I got a bunk bed.  For $15. Seriously. Oak, dark stained, beautiful wood, included two underbed storage drawers… just needs the metal frames. Yup. I rock.) Here are some highlights.

Three Ralph Lauren shirts for Ellie – $2 each.
Ellie’s pants – Gap, Talbots, Old Navy for $1 each
My favorite outfits for Gracie – a capri set and an adorable dress. I think they were around $3 each. Zoom in on these — and see why I cannot wait for spring!!
Two dresses for Ellie (next year). Pink is Ralph Lauren, other is Strasburg. $4 each.
Cute Cute BabyGap sweatsuits (Blue for Ellie, Green for Gracie) $2.50 each
My splurge. For Ellie. A whopping $7. Its waaay to big, but I could just see her in this dress!! With her big blue eyes and curly hair.

By the way, I was getting SERIOUSLY depressed at how big the clothes are that I was buying. I sold so many itty-bitty baby clothes and came home with clothes that were huge! I was passing the baby clothes tables and sighing…. Why is this going by so fast?!?!?!

First, please notice how holy my child is, as she falls asleep reading the Bible.

Second, I bought this shirt today and now I don’t think I like it. It has a weird cowl neck thing going on. What do you think? Return it? (If it matters, it was only $6! Clearance!)

Third, just look what I bought tonight. Jack. Pot. Ellie got 7 pairs of pants for $1 each. Gap and Talbots Kids. And some really, really adorable dresses from Gap and Ralph Lauren. Gracie got some totally adorable dresses, summer outfits, a beach coverup, pajamas, and a few pairs of really cute pants. I got 2 maternity quilted jackets for me and my sister-in-law for $5 each. (Not pregnant. Not this sister-in-law.) Even found a princess dress from the Disney store for $2. Score. Here’s the haul. I’ll highlight some of my favorite finds later!