The joys of parenthood

Most days I love being a mom.

Wednesday I had to be the mom that most children don't like, especially my children: The Mean Mom.

You know the Mean Mom.  The one who makes their child's life miserable.  Yep that was me.

My kids have had it really nice when it comes to cleaning and picking up after themselves, but there comes a time when it's their turn to pick up and clean. 

Let's start with Tuesday.  They both had off school for their Easter/Spring break.  I gave each a specific chore to do in relation to their bedroom and their playroom.  They were given a time limit because let's face it, they do dawdle and take their time otherwise.  They each came to me and told me their chore was completed.  So like a good mom, I stopped working, got up and went to check.  Nope not done.  Told them what still needed to be done and left them to do it.  They both came to me, told me it was done.  Again I stopped working, went to check, still not done.  Gave them one last chance to finish it.  Yet again it still wasn't done. 

So frustrated me said, fine, either this all gets done by you or mom will do it and you won't have any toys to play with.  You would think that would get them moving.  Nope, they chose to play instead.

This leads to Wednesday, the day they both go back to school and my day off.  I chose to clean their playroom.  Took trash bags with me and filled 4 of them full of trash, Kids meal toys, broken toys and food wrappers.  I separated all their toys according to what they are: cars, soldiers, blocks, Mr. Potato Head, etc.  I went to pick up Levi at preschool and off to Kmart we went for totes.

After getting the totes and the few other items we needed, we head home and I got all the toys into the totes and to the attic and it was time to tackle the food stains on the floor.  For two little boys that are not allowed food in their playroom, I sure found enough banana peels and apples cores laying around as well as smooshed bananas and a rotten apple on the floor.  I got those cleaned up and their playroom is now done.

They were allowed 5 toys each to be left out to play with.  Everything else is now up in the attic waiting to be earned back.  I have a feeling quite a few will be sent to Goodwill or another thrift store. 

We are now on the 'Listen to Mom and Dad or lose privileges' system.  I will only speak once (twice if I honestly believe they didn't hear me the first time) and if they don't do as I ask, they lose the wii, tv, their power wheels, bikes, or outside time.  So far neither are allowed wii or power wheels until maybe tomorrow.

They do have the option of earning back their privileges the day if they listen and do as I ask.  I think it's only fair that they are rewarded for their good behavior but it has to be exceptional.

Now to get daddy to understand and get on board all the way with this :)

A forecast of the summer to come?

Right now the sun is shining and it's a beautiful 73 degrees out with a slight breeze.  If it weren't for the fact that I'm working I'd be outside planting, cleaning up flower beds, riding bike or just enjoying the sun.

I offered to sit in the utility room to work so that the boys could enjoy the sun and play outside.  I even gave them part of the garden that's not planted yet to dig in.  They were outside for maybe 20 minutes before the bees got them.  Ya know, when the bees fly around looking for flowers or searching to find their new home, not minding anyone around them, just flying.  I don't even think they were that close to the boys either.  From the looks of it, they were at least 5+ feet away but apparently that was too close.

So now they are in the house bored out of their minds, and trying to make me yell.  They're mad because they're not allowed TV or WII.  Afterall, why should you be stuck in the house playing video games and watching TV if it's so nice out?

This is only day 2 of the 6 days of spring vacation and already, they're driving me batty.  I sure hope this isn't the forecast for what it will be like come summertime.  I may need a padded room if it is.

Catching up

It appears that I have been slacking again :(

Things have been pretty crazy around here.  I've been busy with work.  We had some warm weather causing me to be outside more and away from the computer, but I'm not complaining.  The warm weather was good for me.  Now we are getting some more beautiful weather which I am doubly thankful for. 

The kids started their spring break today at 3:05 pm.  They're excited, me not so much.  They get break and I still have to work.  I do want to find some things for them to do while they are off.  I know I have some crafts they can work on and the weather should be good for the first half of it, so they can play outside.

Work has started on our utility room.  I'm really excited about that.  Seems like we've been waiting for that to happen forever, though we've only been in this house for 2 1/2 years.  The floor is almost all the way framed out.  Saturday he will be putting insulation into the floor, the heat vents and I'm assuming the water and rain pipes and then he can lay the wood down to give us a floor.  I'm really excited about it and cannot wait for the finished product :)

Life is good :)

What's happened since I last wrote

A lot of things have happened since I last wrote.  Some weeks I feel like I live a soap opera but at least I can turn that off.

My gram (mom's mom) died the end of January.  I was sad but because I was never really close to her and had only seen her a handful of times in the almost 11 years that I've been married, I wasn't devastated.  She was cremated so we had a small memorial at her house which was packed, but the Pastor that was chosen to lead it didn't know Gram and you could tell.  I grew up believing and still believe you need a personal relationship with God to get to Heaven.  Anyone can believe in him but if you don't really know him you are out of luck.  Well that Pastor told a different story.  Was not thrilled with his little speel.

I thought things would be over with that side of the family but I was wrong.  My mom discovered that not only did my Uncle, her brother, take Gram to redo her will but he had her write mom and her sister out of the will.  So Mom got nothing including the Dumbo cookie jar she hasn't wanted for a long, long, long time that used to be her grandmothers.  It's the only thing she wanted and she didn't get it.

As if that wasn't enough mom had a blow up with her step-dad and my Uncle called my dad and left a horrible, horrible message on his phone threatening my dad's life and also my brother in law's life (not sure why got drug into it but whatever).  Mom's step dad decided to send her all the photos we've ever given to them including the great-grandkids photos.  It's so sad that grown men have to act like children.

My husband's grandfather died on Tuesday evening.  It was such a sad day for us but such a blessing too.  It was 3 years ago when we got the call that he may not pull through after surgery and we took time off to be sure to visit him.  He managed to pull through and we got the last 3 years with him.  We did manage to see him on Tuesday.  Matter of fact most of the family was able to be there at some point on Tuesday including my in laws pastor who wasn't going to make until Wednesday.

Today at two is the family viewing, the public viewing is tonight from 6-8 and tomorrow is the funeral at 10 followed by full military honors at the burial. 

It will be such an emotional two days and I'm not really looking forward to them.

Life is good

Life has been fairly busy here.  After folding laundry Sunday, Monday and again Tuesday you would think it was all caught up right?  Nope.  I have two loads waiting for me to fold them.  I'll do that in a bit after the kiddos go to sleep. 

I finally have my office/craft room cleaned up.  It looks so much better now.  Well better than it did.  I still have to finish going through things.  I have a box of stuff that needs to be filed and I know there is stuff in the filing cabinet that needs shredded.  I also just brought another box upstairs that needs to be gone through but I can see a floor or I could be Levi dumped toys, blankets and pillows in there earlier today.  Which reminds me he'll need to clean them up then.

We are planning on heading to Red Lobster tomorrow after I get done working.  My company gave everyone gift cards that couldn't make the company Christmas party and I chose RL for mine.  I had really wanted to go with just D but the kids really want to go or at least Benjamin does.   We need to drop off the Dyson on the way there though.  The darn thing isn't working right and this is the first chance we've gotten to drop it off.  The place is almost 45 minutes from our house.  D got us a Bissell to use in the meantime.  Well that thing went back after it refused to suck up the needles from the Christmas Tree.  The Dyson, whose beater brush doesn't work, sucked up the needles a lot better.  We did pick up the Shark though and so far it seems to be working really well. 

I swear when I vacuumed my room today, I sucked up a whole dog.  How is that possible?  You'd think the dogs would be bald by now with as much hair as they lose. 

We are hoping to make it to the Farm Show next weekend.  It runs from tomorrow until next Sat.  We went for the first time last year and the kids had a ball.  It was so much fun.  They enjoyed seeing cows up close and personal and all the other animals.  I don't ever remember going when I was a kid, so I'm happy that we can take the boys.

Life has been good so far this week.  :-)

Friendships

I have to admit, I've not had a real life friend, someone that lives near me in a very long time.  I've yearned for one but because we moved so often and because of our jobs and hours, I just haven't had one.

Well now I have one and I don't know how to treat her nor do I remember to call her and ask her to do anything.

Today I went to Kmart for some Christmas bargains and mentioned it to my friend and she said, why didn't you call me.  Um cause I didn't even think to. 

Guess it's like being in elementary school again and learning how to be a friend all over.

It appears that it will be cold for some time to come.  I know that 15 day forecasts are not the most accurate, however at this point I'm not holding out hope that we'll get any warmer weather any time soon.
Today it's barely in the 20s with windchill factors in the single digits, even lower when there are gusts.

To make the cold even worst, our dryer is located in the uninsulated, unheated utility room while our washer is in the kitchen.  Talk about a shock to your system when doing laundry.  In the summer it's not quite as bad unless it's humid, which is about three quarters of the time, but I've learned to deal with it.  Afterall, I only had our AC on for a few short weeks this past summer.

I could just go on strike until it gets warmer but we'd run out of laundry really quickly and I could not imagine the amount of laundry there would be to do if I did go on strike for longer than a week.  Winter is always the worst too for laundry because you are wearing layers and longer clothing.  I swear no one but me can wear their sweatshirts and jeans longer than a couple of hours before putting new ones on.  I figure if they're not dirty and your not going anywhere why bother washing them after each wear.  Yes, I know some find it to be gross, but I don't have a ton of jeans to be able to wear new ones every day, but really I sit at home most days anyway.