Happy New Year!!!

This morning I started getting some low front ab pains and low back pains that I assumed was contractions. By noon it was pretty hard to walk around without having it happen plus my back and hoo-ha was killing me, I was better sitting. I'd say these pains were attacking me 6-8 times a hour. Then by 3 PM, it was over. All gone. (sigh) I was SO hopeful maybe things were happening. And now I have a husband laughing his ass off because he knew it was a fakeout. I feel like a newbie here since I've only had contractions with Alex, and well I guess when I miscarried. I know today those were contractions but why did it have to just quit??? I WANT THIS GIRL OUT and I think I'll go cry now. Oh yeah and Happy New Year everyone!

Almost To 2007!!

The kids have had a ball the past few days with all these new toys. I'm glad they're happy with them but they need to learn to play with one at a time and put them away. I've been picking up tons of hotwheel cars, trains, and barbie stuff nearly all day. Alex is pretty good about keeping her things in her room since she's in the basement but the boys drag their stuff all over.

I can't believe we're finally down to the final 10 days till she comes out! We're so behind on getting ready her. We got the carseat in yesterday which was comical. First off, this is the first infant seat we've ever bought. The first was bought for us for Alexzandra. It did great for the first 3 kids but then the canopy broke and I wanted a new one. Well this one we bought has all the bells and whistles but we just didn't know it. I was familiar with the LATCH system from Damien's convertible chair but this one actually as a leveler so that the base is level and the head of the baby doesn't tip forward. Finally after about 45 minutes we got the chair in. Afterwards I just laughed because our minivan has went from a pretty spacious 7 passenger vehicle to this.

And if you're about 13 inches wide, I can stick someone between the two older ones in the back seat but your head may be squished.

Next I have to wash these baby clothes I've been putting off week after week. My reason? I'll wash them as soon as I get all of our other clothes washed. Ummm.... well since laundry is neverending here, it's never been done. I'll get down to one load, we'll go to bed and then I'll have a new load to wash in the morning. No more procrastinating though, I'm doing this TODAY.

Merry Christmas for the kids, but Not So Merry For Me.

Oh my. So I've had this feeling the past month that Christmas time and being nearly due is NOT a good thing. I've been a total unmotivated, bitchy, exhausted, complaining mess this past month. Well Christmas day was one of those days where all the aches and pains of pregnancy just had to come about. I had shooting pains into my legs, constant uncomfortable kicks and hiccups all day, the lovely hiney problem causing me to cringe just walking and I just felt all out miserable as you can tell in Dave's lovely picture above. I felt like a horrible parent because here are our 3 kids all excited and I'm just not there. I tried to be all excited too but it was hard. I felt like I complained all day and it made me sad like I was ruining everyone's day.

Christmas started on Christmas Eve when we went to my Mom's house in the evening and the kids got to open gifts. We usually get money from my Mom and Grandmother so no gifts for us. Dominic was just a spoiled brat. He honestly thought everything he was going to get would be Thomas the Train. He'd open a gift and just start bawling. It REALLY made me mad. These were toys he wanted too, atleast he had SAID he wanted them. He got his huge Imaginex Trex with the moving neck, the Imaginex Wolly Mammoth, Pirates of the Carriabean Davy Jones, and a Thomas Carry Case for his trains. Damien was overjoyed with his new Road Rippers Hummer, tractor, hotwheels, Mr Potato Head, and little playskool cars. Alex was happy too and got this cheerleading deal, barbie with outfits, a Dora carriage, bratz doll and a bunch of other junk. This was just a start to a toy nightmare. I didn't think anything till later that night when I looked at our tree and then thought, we still have to go to my Dad's.

We came home around 8ish from Mom's and I got the kids in bed. Dave left and went to my Dad's to get the train table and bring it back to our house since we were stashing it there. After the kids were down, we started trying to prepare for the night. We were NOT VERY SMART and all this stuff I ordered online from Amazon, I didn't read to see if adult assembly was required. Well both metal pedal cars needed assembled, so did Alex's dollhouse. We would have been up till 3-4 AM doing everything so we did Damien's firetruck and Alex's dollhouse. We knew Dominic would be SO happy about the traintable that he probaby wouldn't care about his hot rod. So we finally went to bed around 1:30 AM since we knew we'd be woke at the butt crack of dawn.

We almost forgot to do Alex's cookie plate. Luckily D remembered but neither of us were in the eating mode for Oreos so we poured crumbs on the plate and broke off a piece and threw it on there. 8 AM yesterday morning, she ran in to tell me that Santa had ate her cookies!! I made sure I had the camcorder ready because I love seeing the kids how excited they are when they see the frontroom. I turned it on and put it on D in bed and said in a high kid voice "daddy! Santa came! Santa came!" LOL He didn't find it so amusing and actually told me to "get that thing out of my f'in face" So then I ran in Dominic's room and said basically the same thing. Maybe I should say that when trying to get him out of bed for school in the morning because he sat straight up and jumped down running to the front room. He actually ran right by his train table not even noticing it!! He just went to the tree and stared at all the things there. Then I said "what's this Dominic?" He put his hands on his head and said "wow! It's my train table!" Alex was over checking out her doll house. Then Damien got up and was estatic when he saw the fire truck. He loves it so much especially the bell. After they opened it all, I was freaking out because where the heck were we supposed to put all this stuff!???!! I did get my ring from Dave and it's gorgeous! My first white gold ring actually. I'll have to take a picture sometime. He's such a sweet heart and thankfully he was nice and understanding all day with my crappy mood.


My frontroom pretty much sat a mess all day. With my sore butt, sore legs, and peeing every 30 minutes I wasn't in the mood for cleaning. We headed to my dad's for lunch where I just about died when the kids opened a ton more toys there. I knew a few things they were getting there but not all of it. More action figures, more cars, more Dora, more games. UGH! Then after that we came back to this huge mess of toys in the frontroom and all the stuff from my mom's all over the kitchen table. We still had one more place to go, D's aunt's but I felt so horrible I stayed home with Damien letting him nap and D, Alex, and Dominic went there. I decided to try to get productive. I hate the tree since the boys won't leave it alone so I tore the thing down. That's how grinchy I felt. I actually did it to make room for the rocker I'll use with Mia that I needed to get out of Damien's room to make room for all these new toys.

Today is bit better, I'm not feeling quite so bad so I've been cleaning like crazy to make up for not doing much yesterday. I didn't even go bargain shopping this morning like I usually do the day after Christmas. We finally got the kids big items in their rooms and the house is looking somewhat decent. We have to figure out what to do though with the little playhouse that was in Damien's room, the rocking horse, a little tykes kitchen and Vinnie ended up in the frontroom. We are flat out of space here. These kids have taken every inch of this house over with toys.

2nd Day of Christmas Break

Ummm yeah. If you don't remember, here's a refresher of the other "breaks" in the past have went with Alex.

"Mommy, what can we do today?"

Can you tell how happy she was to do these?? Yesterday I was able to get Dominic and Alex to play for about 2 hours with Playdough, a box from UPS of presents from grandparents, and watch TV. Today's been a totally different story though. I've been asked to scrapbook, make the snowflake Xmas ornaments (which we did), and make cookies and candy for Xmas. I'm sure I'll have some new crafts to post everyday with how she expects to do 20 things a day. Kids!

That's All Folks!

Well yesterday was my last day of daycare. We'll see how long before I'm bored. I'll be going from having around 5-6 kids at a time here to having my 3 plus Mia when she arrives. So like 2 in the morning and 4 in the afternoon afterschool is out. It was a good last day but abit sad too. I'm ready for a break though. There's so much that I'd like to do more with MY KIDS. We go to the waterparks, library, zoo, parks, museum, etc but it's just not as much as I'd like to because I'm hauling around other peoples kids too. I always had to worry about the times I left incase a parent would come by and I didn't get to participate as much as I would liked to in Dominic and Alex's schools. Now though, it should be different after Mia is a bit older.

I do think I'll get back into it but it'll be late 2007 after we work our butts off to sell the house this coming summer. It got so late that we knew the kids were going to have to transfer mid year so we just went lowkey on wanting to sell it. I don't want the kids to transfer midyear, I'd rather them start the year fresh at a new school. Hopefully everything will go as planned.

K and K's mom bought me a sitter gift. I thought that was nice. I've watched her kids now for 2 1/2 years. She bought me a body cream tube and bath gel of Bath and Bodyworks and I know that isn't exactly the cheapest. One parent is coming by with presents for the kids on friday and the remainder of her bill. I bought little Xmas gifts for the kids like I do every year and gave them out yesterday so the kids were all happy except mine since they didn't get to open anything. LOL

And to end this daycare chapter, Dave found out that one of the managers resigned at his office going to another firm (competition) so he will most likely be given his position very soon. This was the same position we were going to be moving to Tulsa for and they've been wanting him to move up for a long time but something or someone always got in the way. I'll post more when I know!

Christmas Is Coming!

Well I emailed my mom, we'll see how she takes it. I emailed her back after she sent me this.

• Sabrina,
  
  Mandi called me back last night and said she will come and stay with the kids when you need her next month. She really felt bad about telling me that she wouldn't do it and she also told me that she loved us all too much to be that inconsiderate. So we can do things as planned.
  
  As far as the other I do not want to discuss any more things about your dad with you. After all this time I would think that you would of seen things with your own eyes. Even my husband has seen how he is. I have always said that to him and his family I died. Mandi gets upset when they say stuff about me to her. And I know that they do because I have had others say things too. You even said that they laugh about me and say stuff. I would just think that my own daughter would stick up for me. It won't stop if you girls don't tell it to stop. It just makes him look bad to others.
  
  Have a good day today.
  
  Love you
  
  Mom

I basically said everything below in my post just in a not so attacking mode. I hope she understands that this is getting old and so are we so maybe she should let us act like adults and take care of our own relationship with our dad instead of butting in thinking she's got to be right there next to my sister with every step of contact she has with him. She thinks I need to see things with my own eyes and well uh, I think the post below reveals that! I'm not some stupid teenager now, believe me after moving out, I see things bright as day! I've got more important things to worry about in life though. I certainly hope my kids don't pick up on my mother and her negativity towards my dad. I mean Dave's heard it for the near 13 years we've been together, you'd figure some time or another they would. People always say "you look just like your mother" I'm SO glad they don't say I act like her.

I'm now under the 20 day mark! This seems to be taking forever but I'm sure after Christmas, D day is going to sneak up really quick. Today I went to Dominic's school since Santa was visiting. He was a real pain in the butt to get out of bed but when I was there and he was sitting and watching Santa, he was so happy. He waited till Santa called his name and ran up there to get his present. It was so so cute.

That's what I love most about Christmas anymore is seeing how excited the kids are about it. Damien this year has been constantly at the tree pointing and saying "dis! dis! dis!!" Dominic constantly talks about Santa bringing him a train table. He's going to flip when he sees he really did!! Even Alex being older talks about Santa writing him new letters almost daily. She even made a Cookies For Santa plate.

We've recorded every year of the kids opening gifts and we all love watching the past years and how much they've grown. Alex especially because she would always get clothes and throw them immediately over her shoulder and go for the next gift. LOL Even though I've been miserable alot lately and not in the spirit this year, I'm excited for having the kids home the next 10 days and seeing their little faces on Christmas Morning.

Divorce- 16 Years Later

Things here have been going pretty good. I'm still pregnant, down to 3 weeks left and still having your normal aches and pains. Mainly peeing all the time and nerve pains shooting in my legs and stomach. Damien's ears must be doing much better because I think we're up to 5 days sleeping thru the night. I felt awful that I waited 4 days before getting him into the Dr to find out he still had them lingering. Usually he's great about pulling his ears infront of me and letting me know. I think I caught his cold and in turn got my own ear infection. Friday night Alex was having a girl Jessica stay the night and it started feeling odd. Then a hour later I was in pain so luckily we had meds on hand that I could start. It's still stuffed up and I've been trying to pop it to get that fluid out. What a pain!

The weekend couldn't end once again without a disfuctional family bang. My mom and my sisters have all lost their minds. I've just started talking to Jill again after that Easter spiff where she got pissed because I let her know that it's not that hard to go shopping with kids at Walmart and she didn't need a babysitter everytime she did it. I'm still not saying I'm sorry because I don't think I should have to say that I was wrong. It's not my fault that I said something so stupid and she flipped out screaming and left. Whatever.

This latest spiff amounts from me trying to help my Dad figure out my sister Mandi's phone number off his answering machine yesterday. Now being helpful in my family folks can really kick you in the ass let me tell you because this got blown up into this MAJOR ORDEAL. My Dad asked me to listen to the message since he had about 10 times and said that Mandi was leaving a "new phone number." He had just called me the other day asking me about a number and if it was hers because he had 3 wrote down. So being nice I went in there to help fetch the number. Either she was drunk, high, or tired but it was a mumbled message going on about who knows what the hell and at the end reports, "you can call me if you want, my new number is........." I listened to it about 6 times. I thought I had it correct so I tried it and all sorts of variations getting different people's voicemail on my cell phone. Finally I called my mom and she gave it to me. My dad, Karen, and I were WAY off. We caught the first 6 numbers but the rest we could have tried all day and never gotten them off of how it sounded on the message.

So later yesterday evening I'm in my normal bedtime routine with the kids. They've all had baths and snacks and I was reading some books to Alex and Dominic. My Mother calls. Dave came downstairs and sitting on the couch I looked up and said "who was it?" He said "your mother." Then did the crazy sign twisting his finger around his ear and shaking his head no. I knew instantly this was going to be about getting that number from Mom and what I needed it for. I finished up with the kids and called Mom. The first words out of her mouth were "so what was going on today where you needed Mandi's number?" So I told her about the answering machine message and how we couldn't understand anything it said. I told her I caught "I got good grades" and then the word "graduation." It was like this timebomb went off that my Dad was trying to call my sister. INSTANT BAD MOUTING BEGAN. See I can't have a conversation EVER without my mom saying something bad about my Dad and I talk to this woman daily or every other day. They've been divorced 16 years now and she goes on like the divorce happened yesterday. She starts up saying that Mandi wants her dad at her graduation but wants to make sure he's civil. CIVIL?????? Obviously Mandi wasn't at the hospital when Alex was born and Mom tried to pop Karen infront of David. She also didn't see when Mom walked up to Karen and said "oh thats a nice watch, I have one just like that." Smarting off and trying to pick a fight. Dave told me everything was fine out in the waiting room because he knew that was the last thing I needed to concentrate on. After I found out about all of what happened being off Demerol and Morphine I was so upset. Now 6 years later and 3 kids a year having birthday parties, they are fine in the same house together. There's not much talking just an occasional acknowledgement such as "Hi Vickie." shakes her head "Kent." My mother though insists that there needs to be MORE acknowledgement and that they should be able to talk about us girls together because they are our parents. WHAT????? What could our mom POSSIBLY need to discuss with him about us?? We are grown adults. If I'm on life support guess who's taking on that responsibility, Dave. If something happens and we need to discuss it with my parents, we'll do it to each. We don't need to tell my mom and have her call my dad. What the hell?? So the phone call gets all out of hand because she's basically pissed that my dad was going to call my sister and she's wanting to talk to my dad about Mandi's graduation but she can't unless she writes him a letter because Dad tries to stay as far away from talking to her as possible. Then I get hung up on.

I called my sister and told her on a message that "I don't know what the hell you told mom but she's flipping out about Dad." So then my sister calls me all pissed off saying how she doesn't need all this crap, yadda yadda. I told her that whatever she discussed with Mom, mom is turning it into a huge fiasco again that Dad is just awful and he needs to talk to her about her upcoming graduation from college. It was almost instantaneous, she goes into this remember this child mode. She instantly turned into the past with my dad. People, my Mother brainwashed us as kids. I finally got Jill to realize his a few years ago when talking to her and she was 7 when they divorced. My sister Mandi remembers all these things because my mom brings them up OVER AND OVER AND OVER. I'm 29 they divorced when I was 12. Mandi was 6. There's no way you can remember that vividly 16 years later. Over the years as a kid, my mom had me say things to my Dad or report things to her when we visited and then would call and go psycho on him. It's no wonder he was constantly changing his number or telling us maybe it wasn't a good idea we came over. He's told me that alot of his actions towards us were a direct result of how Mom would chase him around town or call him. Mandi still remembers that Dad said something about "Karen's going to be first in my life now." I barely even remember that or where and when it happened. How can Mandi? Because she told my mother and she's instilled it in her head over and over the past 16 years for the past 16 years. Mandi remembers all the bad about Dad but she doesn't remember anything that my Mom did.

Here's a few things I remember at my young age of 12-13 years old. I remember my mom shoving around my dad because he didn't want to listen to her bullshit and he'd retreat to the TV in the basement. One day he was on his way to the bedroom and she started pushing him and she almost fell down the stairs. From there she started screaming and bawling saying call 911. Of course as kids we're bawling thinking he's a monster. I remember babysitting my sisters every weekend on friday and saturday nights so she could go to two of her favorite bars and bringing guys home. There was Keiser, 2 different Terry's, Jim, Bontrager, Steve, etc. I remember her having these guys stay the night and me banging on the bedroom door telling her to get them out of the house because I didn't want them there. I remember her not giving a shit about how I felt about that and nearly all those guys moved into our house. I remember her not defending me at all when Steve beat the shit out of me forcing me out our house by social services for 2 weeks and living with my cousin because he was right and I was wrong, Steve was first in her life then. I ended up having a social worker for a year because of that making sure that I was safe. And infact none of us were. I called 911 four times for him beating up on my mom yet she still stayed with him even after he was arrested for stalking a woman at our local grocerry store. I remember her telling to march up to my Dad's house and telling him he's a pussy whooped mother fucker and tell him I never wanted to see him again. And I did it. I remember her taking a bottle of alcohol she found in my room and taking it to his house blaming him for it when infact alot of my teenage actions were from all the shit going on from her and Steve. See in my Mother's eyes, she thinks just because we lived there and she took care of us the rest of our years till we turned 18, that she took care of us and anything wrong that happened was a direct result of my Dad being gone. It was all his fault and with us being so young, she had plenty of time to brainwash it into our heads that "your dad used to do this...." "Your dad left me because he wanted Karen" "Your dad doesn't care about you because he has Karen." "Your dad's a stupid motherfucker." So let's think from age 6 to 24 and my sister hardly ever trying to get close to my dad because mom led her to believe that he's this horrible person, that's ALOT of badmouthing but as I said, Mom can do no wrong. Even when telling her daughter to lie if anyone at school asked where the bruises around my neck came from and the handprints bruised into my arms.

So here's the deal, it happened, it's the past, we need to move on. I have but Mandi can't. She can't because she is still too attached to my Mom and her every word. Mandi says everytime she talks to Dad he and Karen badmouth Mom. I know Dave and I crack jokes about my mom's crazy behavior and they might say something comical in return but they have never just started out saying "your mom's a stupid bitch" or anything like that for that matter. I've heard "your mom tried calling about something to do with Mandi's insurance, have you talked to Mandi lately" They have never badmouthed Mom as she has to them the past 16 years. She's been so bad that alot of their friends when they were together, don't really want to speak to mom, they will but it's mainly out of being nice. I remember growing up when that was the case how she threw a huge fit about "dad telling everyone what a bad person she was." I highly doubt that. I think it was more of the fact that she was telling these people all these awful things he did and them saying I'm keeping out of it.

This leads me to the end of my rant. I cried last night. I bawled and bawled and Dave held onto me like the sweet guy he is and told me it'd be ok and that it's not my fault I always get drug into every little spiff between Mandi, Mom and Dad and he's right. My mom calls me once a month saying something along the lines of "you need to tell your dad this about Mandi." although this time it was me trying to HELP my dad call her. I thought about the past and told him some things I remembered before I started seeing him and said we'd never ever better get a divorce. Just thinking of putting our kids through that gets to me. No Way. He's the ONLY thing that probably kept me from going down the wrong roads in life because we got together so young. We were 16. I clung to him and his family for dear life and they accepted me with loving arms. Of course I didn't know that his dad Tony knew my mom's husband Steve and he knew what a monster he really was. They wanted me to move in and get away from the mess and I pretty much was there everyday afterschool till bedtime and every weekend till my cerfew of 2. I know my sisters didn't have an escape like I did because they were too young and I feel bad for that. After I got the hell out of that house at 18, they still had to sit there for more years of listening to Mom and never even bothering to contact Dad because so much damage had been done.

I'd say Mandi tries contacting Dad maybe every 2 months. It's not often at all and I bet or actually I could probably guarentee that when she doesn't hear back immediately from him, my mom starts in with her "your dad isn't going to call because..." shit. Mandi wrote some harsh letters to my dad (courtesy of Mom's badmouthing of course) If anyone is back in the highschool era, it's my Mom. She just can't leave it. Dad's left it but he'll never escape her hounding him for some kind of relationship. She seriously thinks they should be buddy buddy. I'm sure my parents aren't the only divorced that don't speak. It took me ten years (when I was 22 and pregnant) to realize the important things in life. From 12 to 22 it was on and off that I would talk to my dad. It was when I was pregnant with Alex and I didn't really like the fact that she'd never know my dad because of my stupid behavior that we made a move. Since I didn't have his phone number, Dave and I went to his house. It was ackward at first. I was 7 months pregnant and they had heard it from one of David's friends. He told me he was pretty crushed that we didn't bother to tell him and he had to hear from another source but he was glad that we came by. We talked about things for awhile then went home. For seven years now I've been talking to my Dad, we get along great, and my mother hasn't got in the way. She's always pushing buttons and prying though for information, and I'll never escape that unless I cut her off. Anymore, she can call me I really have no real reasons to call her, she brings too much negativity into my life and too much damn drama. I love the woman but the way she acts scares me. This blog reflects alot of the drama and her pushing my buttons if you've read some of those posts. As for the end of the night I was done with it and refused to pick up the phone and D and I layed on the couch together. Mandi left 2 messages on the cell phone voice mail and my Mom called and Dave couldn't help but to answer the phone and tell her where to go. He basically told her I was done with it, and stop bringing me into Mandi and Dad's relationship and to let Mandi deal with Dad and to stop interfering. He said Mom wasn't quite happy hearing that. lol He's the regular joker always trying to make me laugh though and said to me "I bet Mike (my stepdad now) is at home listening to her drinking down a 12 pack as fast as he can."

Found out yesterday that Damien once again has not fully rid his ear infections so the poor guy is now on another 10 day round with Omnicef. Seems like every ear infection with him we do 10 days Amoxicilin and then 10 days Omnicef to knock them out. The nights for the past week or so with him have been just awful. Last night I was up with him from 1:15- 3:30. He wouldn't even go to bed till after 10 and we had to keep going in there to finally get him just to go to sleep. When he was up from 1-3 I finally asked Dave if he could go talk to him and see if he could coax him back to sleep. Well he must have the magic touch because all he did was turn on some Christmas lights in his room and talk to him for a few minutes and then he came back to bed. That was it out of him till he woke up at 7 AM which I was awake so that was fine. I am beat and hopefully I can make it through the day. I'm wondering if the poor guy has a sore throat from coughing so much and maybe that's why he's moaning more than his ears hurting now. When he woke up at 1, he was coughing and sounded like couldn't breathe sucking in these huge breaths. It freaked me out and I pretty much was afraid to go to sleep after that.

Alex has been really laying on the questions about Santa. I'm wondering if she's starting to get the picture that a fat dude in a red coat couldn't possibly give out millions of toys in 1 night. Last night she told me a friend of hers got a letter from Santa and if that was true that Santa sent letters. She's asked how he gets in the house since we don't have a fireplace, if Santa really ate her cookies last year she left out, and how he knows if they've been bad or good. We've told her all the Santa's around town are the Santa helpers since he can't be everywhere at once because we knew that would be asked sooner or later. I'm hoping she can hold onto the spirit of Santa for atleast one more year. Mainly because if she finds out he isn't real then she'll know the others aren't real either. She still hasn't even lost a tooth for the tooth fairy yet and she loves the Easter Bunny leaving her a big basket of goodies every year. She also has a big mouth and I can see her telling her brother. I remember as a kid I caught on from the handwriting on the tags, very obvious it was my dad who only wrote in caps. It wasn't a big deal to me but for Alex I can see this being like the death of Steve Irwin which she took pretty hard.

I've been trying for awhile to get on here but I never seem to have the time to sit down and write for awhile. First more complaining, I've got 29 days till the C-section and meeting of Mia and I don't think it's coming fast enough. I have a hard time sitting in an upright position because she's always rolling around on my bladder and makes me run to pee plus she's kicking me in the ribs all the time still since she's never going to drop. Dave's a bit frustrated because I'm such a homebody right now. We missed his Christmas party for work because he didn't want to go alone. He wants to go out to eat but I say no way because I have to pee so much and hate sitting up. I need to stand or lay down at all times now. The kids are starting to get the point that this little girl is coming soon. We've tried to lay out a timeline of Christmas, New Years Day then baby and I think Dominic and Alex get it but Damien he still thinks this is all a big joke and my big belly is fun to slap and the protruding belly button is for him to try to push back in like a game. He lifts my shirt all the time to play with my stomach. We got my girlie pink carseat, some pink and purple baby hangers this weekend and now I need to get to washing her clothes.

This past week with Damien has been trying. The poor kid is still battling a cold or something. For the most part he's fine when playing but whenever he goes down for a nap or bedtime he wakes constantly due to coughing or his nose stuffed. I'm wondering if his ear infection hasn't completely cleared. We've been giving him medicine around the clock trying to give him relief. I was using a cool mist humidifier on him that didn't seem to be doing squat so we went last night and bought him a new Vicks steam vaporizer and last night was the first time in a week that I only had to get up with him once or twice. I had been getting up about 6-7 times each night and it starts around 10 PM. I looked at the clock Saturday morning a few times and remember 1, 3, 5, 6:30, 7 AM I finally said screw it and got him out of bed. Hopefully it ends soon.

I've told everyone I'm quitting daycare now except one mom and I'll do that tonight. Since her daughter is 6, I'll probably watch her that last week of December since they'll need someone all day for 3 days and she's pretty low maintenance. Then that's it at least till we move. I know we'll be fine but I can't help but to freak a bit about living on one income (not like my daycare was much of an income but it was money!) I'll have to budget better since my Oprah Debt Diet didn't last very long.

Ok, I'm Done.

Even though I'm only 34 weeks, this kid can come out anytime now for all I care. 35 days is going to be way too long. I am done, had enough, let's get this over with. I think the change from this has been a easy pregnancy to OMG this kid is killing me was last Monday when I had butt issues first time this pregnancy (yeah, what fun) and I'm still not completely normal yet along with the insane kicks in my rib cage. She's just not going to move down at all and my ribs and upper stomach are so sore. Along with these issues, uhhh I got another nice rash all over again. This one is different, not Poison Ivy thank God but it's hives (kinda like mosquito bites) and we're not sure what from. D thinks it's the different laundry soap since I have a reaction to stupid cuddle bear oh what's his name?? Oh yes Snuggle but we're using Purex. I'm pretty sure it's the Hartz 3 application flea junk (like Frontline) I put on Bailey. It's been a very nice itchy week and I look hideous but not as bad as last time. Today my left side of my back is just killing me and I haven't done anything. See the last week I have probably left the house like 5 times. I've been laying around on the couch and just doing a few things around here to make the house look decent. It's not like lifting weights or out doing yard work. I shouldn't have a sore back. The veins are not bothering me much but somedays when I get out of bed, I really feel like my right leg is going to explode with all the pressure. I can barely bend it. Other days it's just fine.

In other news we stuck up the tree this weekend. I was dreading it since the boys are bound to destroy it but so far so good. I've caught them both messing with it but no seems to be somewhat working even though I'm saying it about every minute. Here's some pics.

Day 1 - Damien Touching the Tree- Now he's done it about 500 times.

Day 2- Damien touching the tree, oh wait no this is the ripping off an ornament pic.

The Tree- it looks horrible this year really. I am not in the festive spirit this year. Mainly because I'm fat an uncomfortable so I put very little on the tree since I'll be the one to put all this junk up afterwards. lol

And I believe Alex found some of the Christmas gifts we got the kids by snooping. Those Fur Real animals come in big sized animals and little. She wants the big monkey but we can't see spending $30 so something she'd probably use once so we bought the small one for $12. She was in our room Friday night and I chased her out and then she told me Saturday and it just sounds soooo guilty too "I've never seen the small Fur Reals Monkey before." Sure you haven't Alex. Sure you haven't. I'm going to have to start renting a storage unit for their gifts I guess.

The Break Up

I need to make a friendly split I think with a friend. She called me last night obviously kinda drunk. We just have nothing in common anymore and don't talk much as it is anyways. I was getting the kids ready for bed the first time she called. She asked if I had this old cell phone because hers broke and she wanted mine if I still had it. I told her I'd have to dig it out. Then she calls 15 minutes later while I was reading books to Alex to tell me that her friend can bring her by (she lives in another town) when I find it. It was then that I could tell she was drunk. Her speech was so slurred and I could remember back before Alex was born those days of her sleeping over at our old house from being so wasted. She can drink a pitcher of beer in nothing flat. I remember her tone, the sleepiness of her voice, it all came back to me.

It's sad but I just think we've kinda parted since I've had the kids and she's still leading the single life. I have so many friends with kids and we talk all the time because we have lots in common with the kids. There's just nothing really to talk about with this girl. She'll tell me about her 200th sexual partner that has moved into her place which I don't care to know and I'll tell her about the kids and what they're doing which she doesn't understand what I mean by 6 yr molars or Dominic's facination of Thomas the Train (who's that?).

I never call her anymore, she's the only one that calls. It's not that I don't want to, it's just I don't have the time to or I've forgotten to call back, etc. I don't know if I should just continue this trend of letting her call or just say I'll drop you a Xmas card yearly at your parents house because you move around every 6 months once your lease is up.