I went to the mall on Black Friday and all I got were crappy pictures

Sometimes I do really stupid shit. For example, I scheduled an appointment to have Christmas pictures taken on Black Friday. Why would any sane and reasonable person do that? I have no logical explanation to justify my stupidity.

My appointment was at 10am. I left the house at 9:30, giving us plenty of time to get to the mall. Although the traffic was CRAZY, we pulled into the parking lot with ten minutes to spare. But I couldn't find a fucking parking spot. I drove around and around the mall. There were no spots. None. Finally, I ended up parking approximately 300 miles away from the main entrance of the mall. And it was pure luck that I got that spot 300 miles away from the mall. I was actually thankful when I found it.

I bundled up the kids, put them in the stroller, and started walking toward the mall. It was cold out. Really cold. Porgie started crying for her gloves, which I had left at home. The wind was whipping around us, our hair was blowing every which way, and when we arrived at the main entrance, we looked like shit. We entered the front doors and were greeted by thousands of shoppers. It was so ridiculously busy, that I had an incredible hard time pushing my stroller through the crowds without bumping into someone. About half way to the portrait studio, I reconsidered my plans and thought about turning around and going home. But the kids looked so darn cute in their Christmas outfits, that I decided to keep going.

When we finally arrived, the studio was fairly calm. We were taken back almost immediately, which was awesome. But then we had a major setback. Izzy wouldn't smile. The kid was miserable. I snorted like a pig, walked like monkey, jumped like a kangaroo, did cartwheels, and jumped through a ring of fire, but he wouldn't smile. Porgie was great, but Izzy was entirely unamused. After 30 minutes of pure torture, I ended up with these photos...




I hate these photos. In addition to Izzy's refusal to smile, the backgrounds look cheesy and lame. When I sat down to order photos, I didn't want to purchase any of them. I did like the one of Porgie giving Izzy a kiss, but you can't see her face. So I said fuck it, and made another appointment to have their pictures taken again.

Now I have to go back to that godforsaken mall. With my uncooperative children. Life is unfair.

Adding a little ethnic diversity to our Christmas...

One year John and I were shopping for Christmas decorations, and we stumbled upon some awesome decorations - a black Santa and a black angel. Of course we purchased them, and proudly displayed them on our front porch. One year my MIL commented that "Santa has a tan." I had to correct her, "No, he is black."

We are adding some ethnic diversity to our boring, lower middle class, predominantly white neighborhood.

Happy Goat

Porgie has an imaginary friend. Her name is Happy Goat. As you might have guessed, she is a goat, who happens to be very happy. Sometimes the goat is blue. Sometimes she is green. She sleeps in a goat bed in Porgie's room. It is extremely funny to hear her talk about Happy Goat. Just today, the goat was wearing a bathing suit and was swimming in the "ocean" with the kids...

In case you were wondering, Happy Goat is standing on the right:)

Foolish Frog

Did you know that Scholastic has a DVD series? My kids really love the Chicka Chicka Boom Boom DVD. Honestly, I have kind of fallen in love with the DVD too. Especially this song..



I love it! I actually listen to it on YouTube when my kids are sleeping. Watch it a few times, and you'll be hooked too:)

The sweetest boy

I Took His Hand and Followed

By Mrs. Roy L. Peifer

My dishes went unwashed today,

I didn't make the bed,

I took his hand and followed

Where his eager footsteps led.

Oh yes, we went adventuring,

My little son and I...

Exploring all the great outdoors

Beneath the summer sky

We waded in a crystal stream,

We wandered through a wood...

My kitchen wasn't swept today

But life was gay and good.

We found a cool, sun-dappled glade

And now my small son knows

How Mother Bunny hides her nest,

Where jack-in-the-pulpit grows.

We watched a robin feed her young,

We climbed a sunlit hill...

Saw cloud-sheep scamper through the sky,

We plucked a daffodil.

That my house was neglected,

That I didn't brush the stairs,

In twenty years, no one on earth

Will know, or even care.

But that I've helped my little boy

To noble manhood grow,

In twenty years, the whole wide world

May look and see and know.

Everyday, I try to be more like the mother in this poem. And everyday, you grow stronger and smarter and braver. I am amazed by your zest for life. I've never met a happier baby boy. I love you with all of my heart. Happy 2nd birthday little guy!

Suck it Martha Stewart

Chase Credit Cards SUCK ASS

I am sure you have heard this song and dance on fifty other blogs, and now you are going to have to listen to it one more time. Credit card companies are the devil. The American people are being screwed over by the banking industry. More specifically, my family is being screwed over.

Remember when I told you about the credit card we are currently trying to pay off? Well, it is a Chase card. My husband has had this card for about 5 years. He has never missed a payment. He has never even made a payment late. He always pays his bill on time, and he pays more than the minimum balance. He is a great customer and has an excellent credit score.

My husband's card had an 8% interest rate. When I opened his credit card bill yesterday, I noticed that the finance charge was almost double what it normally is. I glanced down at the APR and noticed that it wasn't 8%. No, it was 13.42% What the fuck? I called John at work to tell him, and he called Chase. They basically said, "sorry about your luck." When congress passed the Credit Card Act of 2009, Chase decided that they wanted to cash in before the law took effect. Since they will no longer be able to arbitrarily raise interest rates, they have decided to do away with their low interest rate cards. Everyone's rate is on the rise. If you have a low interest rate credit card with Chase, be expecting a notice in the mail. The law goes into effect in February 2010, so I am sure your rate will increase before that date.

I am so fucking angry I could scream. WE FUCKING BAILED THEM OUT WITH OUR TAX MONEY! And this is how we are repaid? FUCK YOU JP MORGAN CHASE!

Say it ain't so

Naps have been kicking my ass lately. Izzy has decided that sleeping is for suckers. Instead, he likes to whine "Mommmmmyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy" over and over again. I have heard him call my name at least 600 times in the past 30 minutes. When this horrible trend first started, I would go into his bedroom and give him another drink of water or cuddle with him in the rocking chair for a few minutes. But that grew old really fast, so now I just listen to him whine for an hour everyday.

I know that lots of 2 year-olds don't nap, but my child cannot be on of them. NO! I refuse to even consider the idea. Did you know that my three and a half year-old still naps almost everyday? Yet somehow, my two year-old doesn't seem to want or need to nap. What the hell is up with that?

The world is a cruel, cruel place. I need quiet time during the day. Blogging time. Reading time. TV time. Sitting and staring into space without a thought in my head time. PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE be an annoying phase and not my new reality.

Go to sleep baby boy. And for the love of God, stop yelling my name!

My so called life

My cousin is coming to NJ to visit this weekend. She is flying in on Friday and is leaving on Sunday. I have been trying to organize and clean the house for her arrival, but I have made very little progress. I still need to clean the living room & kitchen, wash the kitchen curtains & rugs, finish the laundry, go to the grocery store, bake & decorate Izzy's birthday cupcakes, and sew two sets of curtains. Additionally, I have to go to the craft store to buy some goofy foam hats that I promised Porgie I would buy for Izzy's birthday. GAH!

In other news, my dentist appointment went well on Saturday. I spent almost an hour talking to the doctor. It was a very informative session. I learned that some of the things I wanted to have done might not be possible, which was disappointing. I know that I am vague about some of these dental issues, but it is only because I have several underlying problems that would take entirely too much time to explain. And really - do you even care? Probably not.

I have almost finished my Christmas shopping, which is a relief. I love Christmas, but it is really a strain on our budget. And I feel guilty every time I buy something for my side of the family, which is just silly. John has decided not to buy presents for his side of the family. He is an old Scrooge. We are putting up our Christmas tree next week, and I am super excited. SUPER DUPER EXCITED!

I have updated you on my boring life. You are welcome.

The botox queen

After I finished putting away some laundry this morning, Porgie and Izzy ran off with the laundry baskets. They dragged them into the living room and climbed inside to play. I headed down to the basement to throw in another load of laundry. In the middle of loading the washing machine, I heard a blood curdling scream. I ran up the stairs and found Porgie covered in blood. I scooped her up and raced to the bathroom. A large amount of blood was coming from her mouth. Honestly, I thought that she had knocked her front teeth loose. After she calmed down, I examined her mouth. All of her teeth appeared to be fine - THANK GOD. It was her lip. Her front teeth gouged her upper lip pretty badly. As a result, Porgie now looks like the botox queen...When I asked her what happened, she told me that she fell out of the laundry basket and hit her face against the front door. My poor baby girl:(

Being a Jerk

So, Izzy's birthday is fast approaching. I have been slacking off and put off sending out his party invitations until earlier this week. Trying to save money, I decided to print the invitations from our home computer. Izzy's party theme is "balls." My baby boy loves balls - big balls, little balls, basketballs, footballs, tennis balls. If it is round and can roll, my son will squeal with joy. So naturally, I wanted the invitations to have balls on them.

We already had Avery postcards, so I went on their website to find a template for the invitations. Unfortunately, I was having trouble opening their templates in my word processor. John told me that he could print them without the template in a photo program on his computer. So, I relinquished the birthday invitations over to my husband. An hour later, he handed me an invitation that wasn't anything like what I had envisioned. I wanted a postcard with a picture of balls on the front. On the back, I wanted all the party information typed on the left hand side and the recipient's address on the right hand side. Instead, I got a black and white fox kicking a soccer ball on the front and a blank slant on the back. But my husband seemed pretty proud of his accomplishment, so I thanked him and started hand writing in all the party information.

When I finished, I decided that I hated the invitations. I didn't particularly like the picture on the front, and the hand written party information just looked sloppy. By this time my husband had gone to bed, so I got back on Avery's website and found a template that worked great. I imported the perfect picture of balls...And I typed in all of the party information. My new and improved invitations looked AWESOME. So, I hurried downstairs and printed them out. Of course, I am a jackass and I didn't put the paper in the right way the first time, so it printed wrong. But I got it right on the second attempt. I slapped some stamps on those suckers and put them in the mail box.

I had absolutely no intentions of telling my husband about the new and improved party invitations. But as I stated above, I am a jackass. Remember my first failed attempt at printing the invitations? Well, I may have accidentally left the defective invitations on his desk. Oops. My husband came upstairs this morning and demanded to know why I had reprinted his invitations. My only reply was, "Because I am a jerk."

Seriously, I am the world's biggest jerk. Why does everything have to be done my way? I am a control freak. I think I hurt John's feelings. I suck.

Jackass

I am a complete jackass. Last week, I blogged about my aching back. I was unable to walk for almost two days. The pain was intense. Then, I suddenly felt better. My back was still a little sore, but it was 100 times better than it had been mid-week. When Saturday rolled around, I decided that I wanted to start painting the bathroom. I went to Lowe's, bought all of my supplies, and got started.

I decided to start the project by using a brush to cut in around the baseboards of the bathroom. When I went to kneel down on the tile, my knee hit against the floor at a weird angle. I was in agony. It felt like I had shattered my freaking knee cap. I laid on the bathroom floor cursing for 5 minutes. When the pain eventually started to fade, I try to get back on my knees. Bad idea. If I put any pressure on my knee, the pain was overwhelming. So, I decided to sit Indian-style instead. You'll be happy to know that despite my pain, I painted the entire bathroom.

On Sunday morning, I woke up with lots of knee pain. It was a continuous dull ache, that lasted most of the day. On Monday, I woke up with a slight backache, but my knee felt a little better. On Tuesday, it was becoming increasingly difficult to lift my children without doubling over in pain. On Wednesday, my back hurt so bad it was almost unbearable. I literally could not stand upright - much too painful. And today, I haven't moved from my couch all morning.

The good news is that my knee feels better. The bad news is that I am a jackass, who doesn't know when to take it easy. And now I am paying the price. Next time you go out - look for me. I'll be the hunched over 90 year old woman chasing after 2 toddlers.

Dentist Stuff

I know this sounds bizarre, but I think having dental work done was causing me to slip into a depression. I wasn't sleeping well at night. I would wake up in the middle of the night and start thinking about my teeth. Usually these thoughts revolved around money. Dental work is EXPENSIVE. I literally went weeks without a decent night's sleep. I was crying a lot too, which is completely out of character. I was feeling sad about everything - my childhood, my appearance, my finances, blah, blah, blah.

I decided that part of my anxiety was related to the fact that I didn't particularly like my dentist. So, I switched practices. My new dentist is only open late one night per week. Additionally, his office is only open one Saturday morning per month. This is tough, because I can't go during the day and the evening hours fill up super quick. So, I have been waiting for a month to see my new doctor. At first, I was pissed and thought about finding another doctor. But honestly, I think I needed that break. I have stopped worrying about all of my problems, and I can actually fall asleep at night without a thought in my head. It is amazing!

My 1st appointment is scheduled for Saturday. I am dreading the experience, but I am also excited to be moving forward again. Wish me luck!

Promoting shit to save you money.

So, I have started reading lots of coupon blogs. These women know about every deal. It is impressive. In the past few weeks, I have read numerous things about swagbucks...

After all the ranting and raving, I decided to sign up too. Basically, this website give you different ways to earn "swagbucks." And these swagbucks can be used to purchase prizes - like gift cards to Target! Although you can earn swagbucks by signing up for different online promotions, shopping online, and recycling your cell phone, I have been earning swagbucks by simply using their toolbar for all my internet searches. If I am going to be searching the web anyways, I might as well earn some extra cash - right?

The good news is that the program seems to be legit. The bad news is that it is incredible hard to rack up swagbucks by simply searching the web. I signed up on Saturday, and as of today, I have 12 swagbucks. I need 220 swagbucks to earn a $20 gift card to Target. But, I am going to stick with it because it is a simple and easy way to earn free money. Yes, it will probably take me at least 6 months to earn enough swagbucks for a gift card, but once again - it is FREE! You can't beat that!

Christmas

First off, let me say that we are not very religious. Okay, we are not religious at all. Christmas always has been, and continues to be mainly about getting and receiving gifts in my family. It is a time to tell your loved ones how important they are and to try to make them happy by picking out the perfect gift. I know that this post is all about the commercialism of Christmas, and not about the true meaning of Christmas at all. You don't have to tell me - I KNOW.

My mother loves buying stuff for Christmas. She always has. When I was a kid, we didn't have much money, but we always had a great Christmas. ALWAYS. You might not have gotten exactly what you wanted, but you got lots and lots of stuff. And on years when my mother couldn't afford much, she would enter our family in one of those programs where a local business would "adopt" our family and buy us gifts. We always had an amazing Christmas.

As an adult, I still love Christmas. Except now I love buying gifts for my own babies, instead of receiving them. The problem stems from the fact that I am having a hard time reining myself in. I want to buy my kids lots of stuff - just like my mother used to when I was growing up. Every time I go to the store, I see something that Porgie would love for Christmas, so I purchase it. But then I don't want Porgie to have more than Izzy, so I go back and buy Izzy something. Rinse and repeat.

My kids already have enough toys for Christmas, and I know that my family will be sending then even more stuff, yet I am constantly wanting to buy just one more thing. I guess I just want them to have a magical Christmas - the Christmas that I remember from my childhood. Yet at the same time, I don't want to break the bank buying gifts. I mean, let's be realistic - they won't even remember this Christmas when they grow up. But this is the first year when both kids will be old enough to enjoy Christmas. I am eagerly anticipating the giggles and squeals of joy on Christmas morning.

Crush

I have fallen in love with The Happy Housewife. Really, she is the exact opposite of me in most ways, but I still love her. She is very passionate about living a frugal life. She has seven kids and zero debt. That is impressive. She home schools all of her kids, while still making homemade meals for breakfast, lunch, and dinner (she even makes her own bread!). I have no idea how she finds the time or the energy. And finally she seems so content and happy with life. On the other hand, I am constantly bitching about something.

Regardless of our differences, I think she is great. She is an inspiration really. I wish I could be that good at everything. And she comes up with these really clever ideas - like reusable fabric gift bags. I never would have thought of that, but it is a great idea. We could reuse these bags every year and eliminate all of the mess and expense of wrapping paper. Now I just need to buy some fabric and learn how to sew!

Also, one day I was reading through her comments, and noticed that someone mentioned using cloth menstruation pads, like these. I think this is another great idea. I like the idea of saving money and helping the planet at the same time. But alas, I am much too lazy to actually use this product. However, I still think it is a great idea. I know that you guys love using cloth diapers for your babies, but do any of you use cloth "diapers" for yourself? If so, are you happy with them?

In summary, The Happy Housewife has lots of great ideas on her blog. Too bad that I am too incompetent and lazy to utilize those ideas.

Eating

Izzy loves food. Seriously, he will eat almost anything. There is no poking or prodding to encourage him to eat - he devours everything we offer him. Oddly enough, Izzy really enjoys snacking on frozen foods - frozen peas, frozen tater tots, frozen soy beans, and last, but certainly not least, frozen blueberries...




But Porgie? That child will not willingly eat anything. She needs to take a few lessons from her awesome baby brother.

Help me!

On Sunday, both of my kids woke up with a runny nose and watery eyes. I was fearing the worst, but they both seem to be fine. The runny noses have persisted for several days, but otherwise they have been happy as clams.

Yesterday my husband started getting sick. He is a complete wreck. He has the same symptoms as the kids, but he looks like hell. And he is not happy as a clam. I am sitting here praying that I don't get sick too. Can you imagine? Coughing would probably kill me. My back is really fucked up. I have to hunch over when I walk, otherwise the pain in unbearable. I have shooting pain down my left leg that radiate around my knee cap. Sometimes, it literally hurts to laugh. Yes, coughing would kill me.

So, my family is sick and I am broken. My house is a disaster. I have made no progress on painting the bathroom. I have very little patience with my children. And finally, I am having trouble sleeping - what with all the back pain and my husband's snoring. Blah. I need a stiff drink and a bottle of Percocet.

Being Old: Part 2

I am starting to suffer from lots of aliments, which usually don't plaque young people.

1. I am having some tummy troubles. After I eat a meal, I urgently have to go to the bathroom within minutes. I did some googling and discovered that this can be a side effect of having your gallbladder removed. Awesome.

2. I have been getting some pretty intense headaches at night. The pain starts in my temples and radiates around my head. The headaches usually start around 9 or 10 at night, making it virtually impossible to fall asleep.

3. I have had a twitching sensation between my index finger and thumb for about two weeks.

4. Sometimes I get a flash of light across my vision. It has only happened a few times, but it is alarming nonetheless.

5. I threw my back out the other day. I can barely move, without being in excruciating pain. It is awful.

In summary, getting older sucks.

Parenting FAIL

In my defense, she was using the lollipop as a spoon to eat yogurt. And yogurt is healthy, so I only half failed - right?