Stop the Bus

The L's are stressed. Super Stressed...... I don't know quite what to tell the kids. It's one thing for me to be stressed and reactive, but M and the kids are the dots of glue that hold me together. If they are breathing hard, you can imagine my state of mind.

S is stressed about math for one thing. We've tried a bunch of things to help her out. It's almost all anxiety. She has so much math fear and anxiety that the least little sign of trouble shuts her down. She has trouble with simple addition and subtraction. As a 3rd grader moving on to more difficult concepts, her struggles are disconcerting to her and to me. M spent an hour with her tonight working with her on her worksheet tonight. Her eyes became glazed, her ears buzzed, and her anxiety grew. My solution to everything is practice, but of course she doesn't want to hear that.

It didn't help her situation that she was late to soccer practice this afternoon. She spent the afterschool time with her friend working on a poster for school and thought to zip home quickly for soccer gear. Her shin guards went missing so her friend left for practice without her as I suggested and she freaked out. Certainly didn't want to hear from mom, "Why don't you put your stuff away so you can find it when you need it?"

C had a rescheduled soccer game this afternoon across town. She came home crying. Her team lost. The crying was about more than the loss and not playing the defensive position she prefers. She reassured me that no one on her team was mean to her. She just said that her whole body hurt, she was tired, she hates losing, and didn't feel good. I offered to let her stay home tomorrow for a break, but she refused. She's my trooper! Play practice tomorrow morning and a track meet after school. I'm hoping she's not overextended and isn't setting herself up for a crash and burn.

Notice I didn't mention my sons. I haven't given up on Z.... I constantly remind myself to take a chill pill. I don't know what to do about him. His soul focus recently has been how he's going to celebrate his 12th b'day this weekend and how not to do anything until after I've asked him to do something at least three times. A is on constant BM watch. Let's not mention homework for either of them, chores, T.V. and computer time, or hygiene.

What Will it Take?

My somewhat daily ode to Oh, Woe is ME!

What will it take to motivate my family, especially my husband, to get with the program?

Get your mind out of the gutter for a second as far as M is concerned and help me come up with another way..... I would need a shot of something to give him what would really get him motivated--for all of second. So far crying, nagging, and angry temper tantrums haven't worked. Should I just give in?

The kids, too. Nothing works. I've tried the Carrot and the Stick--shiny new toys and mommy strikes where I don't do laundry or cook dinner.

I guess I'm on my own.

I Went a Little Crazy this Weekend....

Did that post get you visiting and reading? Probably not because what else is new?

I did go a little crazy this weekend shopping, cleaning, giving things away, and throwing things away.

I also went a little bit crazy driving my family crazy and unhappy as me, nagging them without much result. M is out right now shopping Costco and taking C to get a haircut after spending half the day at my parents helping my dad snake a sewer line. Maybe she'll come home scalped?! If he thinks I'm trying to torture him, then he's probably right. How else do I get back at him? Maybe next time they should all appeal to my better humor, be busy, and know that if they help around the house I'll feel all warm, gooey, and guilty afterwards indulging them with lasagna, a blind eye to inactivity, and other gifts? Not my family....they would rather spend half the day in their jammies, ignoring the dishes and laundry, and watching T.V. or playing computer games. It's not their fault that I want to get things done around this hell hole we call a house.

I can only hope to believe that it's laziness that afflicts my family and not that they're being spiteful.

I was in the basement today cleaning. I didn't think that there was THAT much junk down there?! I actually had some old craft magazines in a box to be given away before I retrieved half of them. Hey, I might get to some of the projects someday! I think I took more stuff down there than I threw away unfortunately. I vow to paint SOMETHING in the very near future! (Thanks Dianne for the words of encouragement. I hear what you are saying....tough thing for a entrenched perfectionist such as me, but you are so right. It's not the Sistine Chapel.) I'm totally bothered by all the fabric I have in totes. Fabric that I got such a rush buying, but now is an rarely used stash. I want to use it! I want to make quilts!

The other thing M and I are at war over is church. He thinks it's good enough to go every other week. He also doesn't mind sending the kids to Sunday school and not go to church. He told the kids they didn't have to go to school today. I got annoyed. It's hard for me to get in the spirit of religion if I'm not consistent. What you say? I could have gone by myself. Yes, but then I would have had to answer all the questions about where everyone else was. So WHAT you say? Yeah, I know.....

So I made myself feel better by buying S a Barbie and A some Legos. I may or may not have purchased Nancy Halvorsen's new book Garden Song. I also drooled over this Twilight-y fabric.

Not a Good Idea

I promise this will pertain to my quilting!

Tension is once again the name of the game at my house. I was given a small reprieve for a couple of days last week probably because of my birthday. The kids are back to talking back and thinking that they can kill each other even in my presence. M is as M does.....

I needed a favor yesterday. To my way of thinking, the response I was looking for was "How can I help?" not 1) roll eyes 2) sigh 3) "It depends on where it is"

I immediately became annoyed. I was pretty sure I knew based upon my memory of the address that it was close to M's work. (I'm too much of a chicken to drive downtown and I didn't want to spend the money to park for five minutes even if I'd have talked myself into braving the drive.) I didn't know the exact address but I knew it was on 17th St and M's home building is on 17th St. I also knew that the place I needed him to go pick the something up at was downtown and not in BFE.

My answer to #3 above was "I'm pretty sure it's on 17th and I only need you to run in an pick a packet of paperwork up for me."

M, "You don't know the exact address?! It makes a big difference, you know. 17th runs all the way into Aurora."

By now, I'M annoyed. I told him just to forget it!!!!!!!!!!!! I would figure it out on my own. He tried to smoothe things over, but I wasn't having any of it.


I would have liked to say:

"Pretend I'm your daughter for a minute"

(He will do anything for her lately, including leaving earlier so he can take her to play practice, turn a blind eye to her attitude toward me and the talking back, and assorted other discretions.)

"Forget that you ate almost all of my birthday cake, including the last piece without asking me if I wanted any of it."

I didn't say any of these things or any of the other things that ran through my head. I shut up and shut down.

I left work at 1:00 and parked at a Light Rail station and took a train back into the city. $4. I ran my errand and then caught a train at a station across from his building home. This amounted to two hours out of my day that I will not get paid for and plus I left work undone.

It would have cost him 15 minutes at the most since the building was one block down from his.

I got home in time to take Z to his ortho appointment. I came home to C doing the dishes. Her greeting? "Your welcome...." Me? "Your welcome for what?" C? "You should be thanking me for loading the dishwasher. What is your problem?" Me? "You're my problem." C? "Well, you should just get over it."

I ignored her for the rest of the afternoon.

M had a late meeting. I got pizza for the kids. I didn't eat enough because he had a couple of slices to eat. Then again, he would have expected me to make him dinner.

I finished watching The Jane Austen Book Club movie on Lifetime and then went to bed wishing I had friends like the women in the movie.

Oh, I did....but I ran them all off.

Here's the quilting:

I made two more Log Cabin blocks and got two more ready. I would have gotten more done, but all this bad blood is interfering with my MOJO.

I Spoke Too Soon

Right when I get all mopey and down about my family, they surprise me.

I can't say that it's all chuckles and grins here today, but my bathroom is getting clean. M and C are at odds about it because C is becoming wise to her dad's ways. From what I can glean in response to my "all I want for my birthday is a clean bathroom" wish, they agreed to get it done. I don't know how much they agreed that it was going to be a group effort, but there seems to be a big disagreement about the division of labor. C must have thought her dad was going to do more because she is in a very pissy mood since M has managed to bail on her more often than not. He at the rec center right now with A for the swimming b'day party. (Yay, Walmart had their swimsuits out!!) He leisurely drank his coffee this morning, took his shower late, and volunteered to spend his money on b'day giftcards earlier by venturing out to Target for the purchase.

M has a habit of looking at the kids as a source of slave labor. I can honestly admit that I've been waiting for them to get old enough to do more work around the house, especially since they make most of the mess. I see the kids more as partners, though, and not laborers that will take over my work load.

S and I tidied up the kitchen today. I even let her mop. I think she' all over the novelty of THAT job. I'm happy that we've kept up with it. I still need to get in the cupboards to clean and organize, but that's doable. M hasn't bowed to the pressure of cleaning off his junk counter, yet, but I'll keep working on him. I really broke in the oven the other day by almost dumping some chicken breasts into the bottom of the oven. I made a huge mess that still hasn't been cleaned on the inside of the door since the glazed breasts landed there and slid down. Ugh!

A cleaned all the dog snot off the windows with my help. Better to see the dirt between the inside and outside pains..... The novelty of cleaning the windows hasn't worn off for him. He likes to spray things. I even got Z to vacuum out the couch without too much fuss. (C thinks Z is woefully underworked, though.)

I've been doing laundry and supervising. LOL I'm looking forward to the day when I won't have to answer "Mommy is this clean enough?

I may get to sew this weekend afterall!

The Queen of My Castle in February

February is my birthday month. I like to pretend that I'm the Queen of the Castle in February, my birthday month, but then reality quickly sets in. The biggest problem is that no one but me thinks I'm Queen material. My kids probably see me more as the Wicked Stepmother....

Working full-time has its ups and downs. I like the extra money, but not the hours when I'm not busy enough at work. I've not had one day when the kids haven't called me. Yesterday, my mom called me because S wasn't where she was supposed to be and didn't meet up with A and come to her car right away. She was off with a friend buying something. Z called me shortly after they arrived home to protest that S was eating one of his egg sandwiches. I got home and was immediately met with complaints from C that Z refused to unload the dishwasher until he was darn good and ready. M came home to my demand for a family meeting where I learned that Z has five missing math assignments since the beginning of the quarter in January.

Everyone spends so much energy fighting with each other and finding ways to get out of doing things. I wish I could bottle that energy or somehow refocus it to attack the housework and repairs.

They think I'm kidding when I asked for the bathroom to be cleaned for my birthday mid-month. Well, I know M knows that I'm serious. I'll have to buy my own crown, though.