So it’s Monday.  Again.  The bright side is that it’s the last day of August.  Don’t let the door hit you in the rear on your way out, August.  I’m onto to bigger and better (and cooler) things.

Still, as happy as I am to see August end, I wouldn’t have minded another day or two of weekend.  It was a busy one around here and busy weekends always seem to be over way too soon.

Kile got paid on Friday night and since he gets paid once a month (the joys of being a state employee), we do the bulk of our shopping for the month when he gets paid.  Unfortunately, this stresses Kile out since he doesn’t like to spend money, no matter how necessary, and when he gets stressed he gets crabby.  And when he gets crabby, it rubs off on me.   Still, I did a pretty good job of deflecting his crabbiness all weekend.  And if I had remembered to take my thyroid pills yesterday, I probably would have been able to deflect it yesterday as well.

Alas, I did not take my pill and alas, I did not deflect.  By the end of the day, I was tired and I just absorbed it.  And when I absorb a bad mood off of someone… well it ain’t pretty.  And it’s not fun.  But the upshot is that I took my pill FIRST THING this morning.  I wasn’t interested in having another down day today.  It’s a Monday and I need all the help I can get!

ANYHOW… Saturday was our monthly B.O.O.S.T. (Big Ol’ Obnoxious Shopping Trip) at Walmart.  We actually went to Kohl’s first to look for shoes for Harry.  That child’s feet are growing at alarming rates.  He’s almost out of kid sizes!  We weren’t able to find anything though and as Kile was crabby, we decided it was best to just move on.  We had lunch at Chili’s before heading over to Walmart and that was nice.  We don’t eat out at sit down restaurants that much anymore.

The grocery shopping went pretty well and I think we remembered almost everything on our list.  Which is impressive because we had a LOT of stuff on our list.  We chinzed on our shopping last month because of the trip to Florida, so we were pretty much out of pretty much everything.  It was not a small trip and it was not cheap.  But at least now we have everything we need for the month, for the most part.  Perhaps maybe now lunchtime won’t be a source of stress around here!  It’s hard to find food to give the little ones when you have just graham crackers and granola bars.  Even moreso when one of your wee ones is as picky as Liam is.

Believe it or not, this all took up the better part of the day on Saturday.  We were wiped out come Saturday night!

Sunday brought more shopping through.  We headed over to Legends to do some more shopping for shoes.  On the way, Kile stopped at In n’ Out and we grabbed some burgers and fries to go.  We ate at one of the picnic tables at Legends which was really a fabulous idea.   Or it would have been fabulous if it hadn’t been so windy.  Until Subway opens up over there, there just aren’t a lot of options for quick, cheap dining.  That would be my only complaint about it.   Otherwise, Legends is awesome.

We finally found Harry some shoes at the Sketchers store there.  We also got the little ones some croc-style shoes that were on a fantastic sale.  After that we checked out the Carter’s outlet store.  We were hoping to find some clothes for Liam since we never seem to have enough clothes for the poor kid these days.  But we did get him and Evie their Christmas jammies.  So one present down, many to go!

But our shopping was not done there!  We headed over to Michael’s where I had some specific things to look for: a container for my cloth diaper laundry detergent, some knitting notions, and a scrapbook for our Disney vacation memorabilia.  Sam’s Club was next and we had some very specific things to get there.  Including chips and snacks for Harry’s lunches, frozen stuff for the deep freeze, etc and so forth.  Luckily, we thought ahead and had a cooler in the back of the van.  We packed the frozen stuff in there before heading over to Whole Foods.

Yep, we weren’t done yet.  We ALWAYS have to go to Whole Foods!   We got some fruit, some cheese, some laundry stuff for me… and we got a pizza for dinner!  Which meant:  it was time to go home.  At last.

The pizza was awesome.  But of course it was!  And it was the perfect dinner because were all beyond tired.

Like I said, last night was kind of hard emotionally for me and I entirely blame the lack of thyroid medication yesterday.  I really do need to stay on top of taking those pills.  At the very least.

And now I feel like I need another weekend to recover from my weekend.  OY.

So what did you do this weekend? Did you spend as much money as we did?  Because I’m starting to see why Kile was so crabby about it.  UGH.

It’s been a few days longer than I would like since I’ve posted.  But as the title to this post indicates, I have a good excuse.  Or rather, a couple good excuses.  Or maybe they’re only good excuses to me because I feel like I need an excuse.  Which may not even be the case because the two people who read this site might not even care that I haven’t posted in two days.  In which case, these aren’t excuses but rather that annoying buzz in your head, like a bad fluorescent bulb or something.

Anyhow.  Where was I?

Oh yeah!  My excuse(s):

1) The internet was kaput on Wednesday.  HIGHLY frustrating.  Apparently Charter (I love them so) (not) was upgrading their equipment or something on Wednesday morning.  The only thing is that once they were done fixing their stuff, I still had no internet because something or other had to be fiddled with on our cable modem.  And I’m pretty stupid when it comes that sort of thing.  So I had my phone.  And my knitting.  I could check email and do basic internet functions.  And YES, I suppose I could have written a post from my phone about how I had no internet or something.  But no one likes to read about people who have no internet.  It’s boring.

Oh… wait…

Ooops.

2) Wednesday night, once Kile was home and fixed the internet, was busy, busy.  We went to the drive-in to see Transformers (at last).  It was a great night ot go and we all had a good time, even though Evie went thermonuclear midway through.  She’s officially reached that age where not being in bed at bedtime is a criminal offense.  Still, I got her knocked out eventually.  And the movie was a lot of fun.

What would I do without the drive-in? I ask you!  Oh and I also did some knitting.

3)  I’ve been knitting a lot.  Surprise, surprise.  I’m going to be a “guest vendor” at CongFu on this next coming Wednesday and that means having a few items (like the one in the picture above) to stock.  I’m kinda excited about it but not really expecting anyone to want my stuff all at the same time.  Anyhow, it means I’ve been knitting any chance I get for the last several days.   Let me just say:  This is going to be some CUTE stuff.  I won’t be entirely heartbroken if they don’t sell because that means I can keep them for my own.  Muahaha!

4) Thursday was a busy day as Kile took the day off (hurray for a four day weekend!) and we got some shopping done and just basically had a good time.  It meant not a lot of time spent at home though.  I did take my knitting with me so I could work feverishly in the car.  But we went and spent the rest of one of Kile’s gift cards, raided the Carter’s outlet store, bummed around Target (I seriously want to live there), went to Kohl’s and finally found Liam some sandles, had dinner at Texas Roadhouse which I’ve decided is my new BFF and then finished up our monthly grocery shopping trip (the one I started on Tuesday) at Walmart.  WHEW.  All that and we were able to get the kids home and in bed on time.  I think that deserves a medal.

So those are my excuses and I’m sticking to it.  Now if you’ll excuse me, I have some knitting to do.

Dear lady working the counter McDonald’s inside the Walmart Supercenter in Northwest Reno:

I need to give you a little background before I discuss what went down between us this afternoon.  See, I was at the store alone with my three kids.  This isn’t probably a big deal to a lot of moms, but it’s a HUGE deal to me.  I hate leaving the house with the kids by myself.  But we’re out of food at home and I pretty much had to go.  I timed the trip specifically.  So that we could be home by lunch and the kids could then get their naps.  I also timed it so I could easily grab lunch at McDonald’s before going out to the car.  We could take it home and eat it there.  Easy peasy!  This works for us because for whatever reason, the drivers-side window on our minivan won’t roll down.  So drive thru’s are difficult and there’s just no way that I’m getting all three out of the van to go into some joint just to order lunch.  I’m not THAT crazy.

That’s the beauty of a McDonald’s inside Walmart.  I can swing by on my way out to the car and grab lunch to take with us, easy.  This was my plan.

Of course, my youngest was rather unhappy.  She was tired and hungry and thirsty and just plain tired of shopping.  I was looking forward to getting her a sippy cup full of lemonade to keep her happy for the drive home.  Maybe a fry or two to tide her over.  So yes.  She was crying.  Loudly.  She was past being humored.  I had done that moments before while in the checkoutline.  We just needed to grab our lunch and go.

But it wasn’t that simple.  Becasue apparently your card swiping machine was on the fritz.  And whomever you were yelling at in the back didn’t care enough to come to the front to help you out.  And I think you got flustered.  And you asked if I had cash.  No, if I had had cash, I would have paid with that upfront.  I don’t carry cash.   I don’t like to carry cash.  It makes me feel itchy.  I prefer to deal with debit cards.  And you had several of these swipers.  But I guess if one goes down, they all go down.

Did you say nicely and apologetically to me, “I’m sorry, but I’ll have to cancel your order then”?  Nope!  You chose to holler out to whomever is in the back, “Cancel that order! She doesn’t have cash!”  This was for the benefit of everyone in the line too, who was now staring at me and my crying child.  My oldest had already taken his cup over to the fountain to get his soda and you snapped (yes, SNAPPED), “I need to have that cup back now.”  This was while I was already telling him to bring the cup up.   He got flustered and confused and started to cry.  Becasue I had promised McDonald’s as a reward for making it through shopping without makingme want to slit my wrists.  And now he had done something wrong?

Nope, but he got snapped at anyhow.  At this point, I was so angry, I didn’t stay and tell you what I wanted to say.  I left as quickly as I could, all the eyes in the vincinity upon me and my kids as we hurried, shoulders hunched, out of the store.  I wanted to ask you, “Can you please be a little nicer?  I’m just a mom.  And I’ve got my hands full.  I’m sorry I don’t have cash on me, but a LOT of people don’t have cash on them these days.  You don’t have to announce my business to a restaurant full of people.  You don’t have to snap at me and my son.  I understand if you’re feeling pressured, but that’s no excuse for losing your manners.  You are PAID to provide a service to customers.  And today, you just lost one.”

Next time, put yourself in your customers shoes.  Maybe stop for a second and see that the mom with the three kids is just trying to hold things together and maybe give her a little consideration.  Just because we’re busy doesn’t mean we need to lose our humanity.

And I will be hard pressed to step foot in that McDonald’s again.  Not as long as you’re working there (and you have been there quite a while… I see you there almost every time we’re at the store).   There are plenty of other fast food restaurants nearby that I would rather go to now.   I was HUMILIATED and shamed and I did not a damned thing wrong.  My kids were upset that they weren’t getting McDonald’s for lunch and they didn’t do a damned thing wrong either.  Thankfully, there is another McDonald’s located just across the street and we were able to go over there.  I made do with the broken window by opening the car door.  Not ideal but at that point, I had promised my kids and I was going to live up to it.  Even though all I wanted to do was go home and crawl under a rock and die.

Oh, and thanks for reinforcing why I don’t like to leave the house with the kids alone anymore.   I was starting to think my mistrust of people in general was misplaced.  Guess not!

Love and Kisses,
Marilyn

Mother’s Day is always a strange holiday for me.  I feel hesitant to make any sort of plans or have any input because it’s supposed to be about me and other than my birthday, there isn’t any other day quite like it.  And even a birthday isn’t quite the same because you can celebrate yourself on your birthday.  But I just don’t feel right celebrating myself on Mother’s Day.  In essence, it’s a day where it’s up to others to celebrate you, if they so choose.

I always feel bad for those who kind of get the shaft on Mother’s Day.  Not necessarily those who are sick or have spouses traveling or unavailable those days, or whatever.  Though yes, that does suck too.  But the ones who’s husbands just completely drop the ball.  Don’t recognize the holiday at all, or just don’t have a proper grasp of just how to celebrate it.  That make their wives get up at the crack of dawn with the kids, make breakfast/lunch/dinner for everyone, do bathtime, bedtime, etc.  You know, like any average day.  But they’ll give her a card and expect that to be good enough.  Give the poor woman a DAY OFF.  That doesn’t mean she should have to seclude herself entirely from her family.  Some women dig that, I know, but I do like to spend some nice, quality time with my family on Mother’s Day.  And it doesn’t mean I don’t expect to change a diaper here and there, wipe a nose, put a child to bed, etc and so on.  But at the same time, it’s nice to know that if I didn’t really want to?  That I wouldn’t have to.

Anyhow.  That totally wasn’t the point of this post.  I just got completely off track.  SNORT.

Yesterday was great for me.  I was woken up after a nice, leisurely morning of sleeping in, by Harry and Kile bringing me breakfast in bed.  Kile had made me Eggs Benedict, with his famous hollandaise sauce which I SWEAR is the best I’ve ever tasted.  Thinking about it now makes my mouth water.  I had nice, strong coffee and sweet, pulpy orange juice to go with it.  It was perfect.  Harry bestowed me with several homemade gifts and a very sweet card he had made.  Kile got the little ones up out of bed and I was presented with THREE gift cards to the Apple Store!  Just perfect, as I had a few things on my shopping list that I wanted to get from there.

I was then left alone and normally I would be tempted to go downstairs and hang out with the family.  But instead I chose to just embrace the time alone.  I turned the TV on and watched a movie on HBO while I finished up my breakfast, played on my iPhone, checked my email.  I took a nice, hot shower and got myself ready for the day at a leisurely pace.  It was basically unlike any other morning I generally have and that was totally the point.  It was a nice departure from the norm.  I was so glad to have that opportunity.

I went downstairs to relieve Kile while he went up to take his own shower and get ready.  Then he got the little ones ready, even though I was fully prepared to get one, if not both, ready myself.  So that was nice too.  We headed out and had lunch at the Macaroni Grill.  We haven’t eaten there a lot lately, we used to eat there all the time.  They’d raised their prices, which made me cringe, but we sat out on the patio to enjoy the nice warm day and that was great.  We didn’t have to worry as much about the little ones making a lot of noise and throwing food on the ground and we got to enjoy the breeze and the sights.

After that, we stopped by Old Navy, mostly because I had to use the restroom and we knew there was a bathroom there.  But while we were in there, I couldn’t help but notice they were having a major winter clearance sale.  I got a couple of shirts for under $2 apiece!  So I guess I take back what I said about Old Navy a couple weeks ago.  I figure I got my due out of them with that awesome sale.  Kile even got another pair of swim trunks for our vacation this summer and he’s really psyched cuz they have a skull on them and we figure that’s very “pirate-y” which should fit in well with the whole Disney vibe.

We went to the Apple Store next and I had a heck of a time picking out what I wanted to get.  I really wanted another USB charger for my iPhone.  The one that came with it was looking very beat up and sad, plus I wanted to have one that I could use at night to keep my phone plugged in on my nightstand and then one to keep down with the laptop.  I also wanted a case for my MacBook to protect it from the elements (read: Liam and Evie).  They also had a keyboard cover that I thought would be a good idea (and still do) and a trackpad protector (also need this pretty badly).  BUT, I ended up going with a new case for my iPhone.  The old one was torn on one corner and I wanted something see-through and perhaps with a screen protector.  I’m VERY happy with the case I picked, it’s perfect and it honestly feels like having a new phone.  I’m thrilled with it, to say the least, so I think I made the right choice.

I still have a little money left on my gift cards so maybe after I make some money I’ll go back down and get the keyboard cover or something.

We stopped to pick up a few groceries for dinner and some Rockstars to get me through the week (I am seriously addicted to this stuff).  I also got a prescription refill.  Fun stuff!  When we got home, we watching “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” that Kile had rented off RedBox.  It was good, but nothing spectacular, as far as we were concerned.  It was a  long movie and considering we were trying to watch it in the afternoon/evening with kids running around, probably not the best decision.  But oh well.  The effects were great and it was a fascinating story so I’ll give it that.

After dinner (steak and potatoes), we had a heck of a time getting the little ones to bed.  Or at least I did.  Evie was very resistant to going to sleep, being very crabby and clingy.  But I finally did get her down and we tried to watch “The Fifth Element” (one of our longtime favorites) downstairs.  Of course, we were both EXHAUSTED by that point and were in bed by 10pm.  WOW.  That just NEVER happens these days.  But dang, it sure felt good.

So how was everyone else’s Mother’s Day?  Did you do any celebrating?  Did you get celebrated?  Was it a nice day for you?  I think that’s all I can really ask for: a nice day.  And it was definitely that!

I’m currently stranded at Kohl’s and I literally don’t know what to do with myself. Kile dumped me off here and took the kids with him to go do Super Sekrit Mother’s Day Shopping.

I know most women would killfor tgiskind of opportunity to shop, sans kids. But I’m kind of an odd duck. Plus, I don’t really think I can spend any money so that makes looking at stuff kinda pointless.

I did find some cheap, cute, and comfy (the three c’s!) pajama/lounge capris. And some ccc girly pajamas for Evie too. I also looked high and low for a shirt she could wear under one of her swing dresses but had no luck. Though, looking back, I probably should have looked for a shirt in red too, cuz she needs one of those too. Oh well, I don’t think they would have had one.

So right now, I’m sitting down in the shoe department (the only place I could find to sit). And thank GOD for the iPhone or I’d probably totally be beside myself.

So what is everyone else up to today? We’re hoping to go see “Star Trek” at the drive-in tonight. I have my doubts as to how smoothly THAT will go. But it’s worth a shot.

Okay, I’m getting strange looks from the sales people so I better mosey on. Later, peeps!