going down

Ever have those moments when you think you have it all together than BAM! You get the wind knocked out of you? You get up, dust yourself off, think to yourself, "wow that sucked." and move on. right?

well for the past three months I have been getting the wind knocked out of me on a daily basis. everyday, no matter how hard i try to keep things working, keep the kids up on homework, keep my house together, do my callings, and be there for friends and family by the end of the day I am five steps farther behind than what I was when I woke up that morning.

The first few times I bounced back up, dusted myself off and tackled the problem. Sat down, came up with a solution and a plan to reach that solution and put it into action because that is what you do. It does not solve anything to sit around and mope and watch the house and children fall down around you.

Each time you get knocked down, no matter how resolved you are, it gets harder and harder to get back up. You get physically tired, you are emotionally drained and yet before you can get all the way up, the next hit comes and BAM! you are back on your back again. Does not matter that you are not up, children gather around you asking you to fix things, find things, feed them, resolve fights, then there are things outside the home, sports, church, scouts, activities all that need your attention. So you struggle to get up on your knees, thinking to yourself, "I have to do this. It must be done." Then BAM! You get knocked back down again. What is the point of getting up anymore. I cannot win. I cannot do it anymore. I have no more fight left in me. I don't want to care anymore. I don't want to plan anymore, I don't want to find solutions because guess what? It is all a load of crap. It doesn't matter what I do. I will never get ahead. I will never solve it all, IT WILL NEVER STOP COMING.

so I surrender. I am not strong. I cannot handle this. And I AM DONE.

A huge milestone!

I have struggled for sometime finding a healthy routine for myself and my family. Thanks to the wonders of Celexia it is getting better. I did not mop my floors yesterday! AT ALL!! this is huge you see, because it has been months since i have been able to not do that. i wrapped myself up in the comfort of housework until i was suffocating and others around me were struggling because of the stress i had put on myself and the un-realistic expectations i had for those around me.

i have found myself becoming un-wound. we hung out around the fire the other night for no reason at all. yesterday we went downtown and went to Brittles, fancy candy shoppe. (you can tell it is fancy because of the extra "pe" in it's name.) then we went and rode the carousel in Riverfront Park and walked over to the library after that. It was a fantastic afternoon and i did not have the stressful thoughts of all the housework that i should be doing and that i am getting behind on by not being on schedule. the house did not collapse, the children did not suffer, and i still had time to go hang out at Hobby Lobby with my BFF in the evening.

i must say, i am loving this whole new schedule!!

a morning at the Ruff and Fluff

The gas station down at Fred Meyers has a doggie washing station. My mother in law Barb (see, now your name is featured on my blog!) and I took Raquel down there because she was gettting a tad bit ripe. (I can say that because she does not read my blog) I can sum up the experience in one word. AMAZING!! they have a tub with a ramp and flexable spray nozzle that warm water, soap, or conditioner comes out of. It all depends on your selection on the handy dandy selection menu! We scrubbed her up really good. I may or may not have also hosed down my mother in law,but since there are no witnesses i am going to deny any accusations coming from her. She took the back end and I took the front end. Ya, I totally won out on that deal. Then after all the rinsing, soaping, rinsing, conditioning, and rinsing yet again....we got to blow her dry. I won the toss on that job. It is a "high pressure" air hose. it was shooting Raquel hair all the way out the door. In fact we left a fine layer of Raquel hair all over the tub, walls, floors, my mouth, my face, my apron (yes, they provide a rubber apron!) my mother in law's face, clothes and mouth. basically everything else we ate or touched that day had a bit of Raquel's hair on it. it was totally disgusting. It totally poofed her out! she looks like a sheep wondering around in my backyard.

But look how pretty she is now! We took the shop vac to her, yes, you read that right, and vaccumed up alot of the loose hair. Raquel loved it. If i was more organized i would make that a daily chore for me to get caught up on all her shedding. I do know that we will definatly be back to the Ruff and Fluff again. I am thinking once a month. The vaccuming did not help with the "foofie" look she has going on right now. but that is okay because she looks so darn stinkin' adorable!

the tradition continues.

There was a small situation a while back that involved me, and elderly woman, and 1/2 off maple bars.

Now before you "TSK,TSK,TSK." I want you to know that I mowed her down as gently as possible. I mean as gently as I could with 1/2 off maple bars being offered for a short time in the Safeway at Newport where I grew up. (well, sorta grew up. At this time I obviously had not grown all the way up. I would like to think if I were put in the situation now I would lift and move the kind woman out of my way. Now that I am grown up and all.) This story has gotten completely blown out of proportion because of my older sister, Regina, who was witness to this massacre, er, I mean, misunderstanding. I did not knock the woman down. I think she only stumbled. I say I think because I did not look back. I was a woman on a mission. It was after cross country practice and I was hungry. Really hungry. Is that a good excuse? No, it is not. But I never said anywhere in this story that I had a good excuse.

I bring my shady past up for a reason.....

Last Friday, Sept 3, 2010 at 7:45am, Daniel ran over an old lady and her toy poodle on his bike. He was biking half asleep and he said the sun was in his eyes at the time. The lady was jogging with ,"*Bitsy" when they came to the crest of the hill to see a sleepy fourteen year old lummox on a bike toting a 30lb back back. I don't know why she stayed the course, maybe she was Republican, but it resulted in her and Bitsy getting mowed down. Daniel also fell off his bike in this skirmish. He quickly scrambled back on and took off, never looking back for fear the woman would attack him. We live in a pretty rough neighborhood. The senior citizens rule the streets from 4am to 4pm. It is best to carry mace with you.

And so the tradition continues, not quite Fiddler on the Roof, but you get the idea.

*Bitsy's name has been changed to protect her identity.

My Son's Soap

So I buy Daniel and Ike body wash just for them. I understand the they don't want to use the girls shampoo/body wash that smells like strawberries, and Jakey is just fine with a bar of soap but to entice the older two to wash I try to carry stuff just for them.

This time I bought ZEST Ocean Breeze. I laughed out loud in the checkout line as I read the back of the bottle.

"Zest Ocean Breeze gives you and your family an unforgettable scent that is released during the shower and lasts for hours. Inspired by the memorable moments in life, you can carry those aromas with you every day."

Now I am not sure why this tickles me so, but I have three thoughts....

1. I don't want my son's aromas to be memorable. EVER.

2. Somewhere a group of people with room temperature water and a bowl of jellybeans had to sit around a conference table and think this up.

3. And how pathetic is your life if showering with Zest counts as a memorable moment?

Sept 2,1994

Dan and I were married in the Portland Temple. It is a beautiful temple and my favorite one by far.

Today would have been our 16th anniversary. It is sorta of funny that I remember this because we rarely did before. Dan's tabs for his favorite car in the whole wide world, he reason for living, his youth all wrapped up in shiny black sports car-ness were due on Sept 4th. So he always got the two dates mixed up. In all sincerity we should have just gotten married two days later. Would have made it so much easier on the poor man. Usually we would remember sometime during the day and do the forehead "Duh slap" and then wait for the kids to go to bed and get some take out to eat. As Daniel got older we would then put the kids to bed, leave him in charge and go out to eat. Problem is if you don't want to eat at Applebees, there are not a whole lot of options for places open that late on a weeknight so we spent a few anniversaries at a local bar. (GASP!) Sometimes I would get a bouquet of grocery store flowers, you know the ones husbands get when they have done something stupid like forget there wives birthdays or anniversary, or I would grab his favorite candy bar or snack while out running errands. We did do big things ou our 5th. We went to a B&B for one night in Courdlane, ID. And on our 10th we did the B&B thing for two nights in Leavenworth, WA. Both lots and lots of fun. So we would have prolly done 3 nights somewhere for our 20th. Ya, we were big spenders like that. =)

This year I am doing something special. I am going to pay off our house. Dan and I both dreamed of one day owning our house outright and therefore not having to be in debt to anyone. Something we both could not stand. So I know he would be so proud of our owning our own house and that his kids will always have a roof over their heads.

Today is going to be hard. I just don't know how hard. People ask what they can do? What do I need? The answer is, "I just don't know." I have not figured that part out yet. I will let you know if I ever do."