Major Snafu

So it is almost 12:30AM and we have been cleaning and packing up all day and doing all of the crazy things that goes along with the packers coming the next day to pack us up. It was on the calendar that on May 28th and 29th the movers would be here. My house is pretty torn apart and I am almost packed to go on leave for a long time and then head to TX. Tim asked me if I had the paperwork for the packers ready and I got them off the kitchen counter. As we were discussing them, he looked down and made mention that the lady who helped him out process had put down the wrong pack time of July 28th and 29th and he had had to change it to June. You mean May, right?, I asked. He looked down and suddenly realized that the pack date on his orders was for June 28th and 29th. Talk about a major mess up. A few choice words flew around the room and we both had a moment of stress until I realized that there wasn't a whole lot that I could do tonight about it. I am just trying to see the silver lining in all of this and am trying to reason out that this must have happened for a reason. It may all work out for the best but whatever that may be, I have a messy house now and a more stressed out husband for now.

You Know it's Time, When......

Okay, I give in and will start to do something to lose the weight I know I should. The other day while I was standing and watching TV for a brief moment, Laurel came up to me and laid her hands on my stomach. "Mommy, you have a big tummy....do you have a baby in there?" "Nope, I just have fat in there". That alone should be enough to make me want to lose weight. We all know that kids can be brutally honest and so when my 4 year old tells me I am fat, I am pretty sure that I am not hiding it too well anymore. But the clincher to making my self esteem plummet even more and know that now is the time for action is when I overheard her telling her friend in excitement,"my mommy has a big tummy with fat in it!" I still can't figure out why that would be cause for excitement. Ha.

Bathing Beauty

Here is Laurel's personal swimming pool aka the sled.

Funny of the week

While I was busy in the living room, Connor was on the computer. The computer is right next to the back door and you have a wide open view of what is going on outside. Connor suddenly pipes up,"umm, mom, Laurel is outside naked...." What?! I go to the window and there she is in ALL her glory. She had pulled a sled up onto our deck and filled it with water and was laying in it completely nude with all her clothes scattered on the deck. Ah, the freedom of being 4 in the summer time. I just wish that I had had my camera handy. What a great black mail picture for the teen years to come. Ha.

Decisions, decisions

Tim came home from being TDY in TX at some conference on Thursday night. And then spent all of Friday fishing with Laurel.....well, not all day. He did come home and manage to go out to dinner with me because the Blau's were doing their "free babysitting for anyone who wants it" thing that they do. So we went out to dinner at the Mediterranean Grill. Their Chicken Marsala is horrible-FYI. While there, he dropped a bomb on me. Tim told me that he will be deploying for Iraq in January instead of a year after getting to TX like we thought. Yea, I knew another deployment was imminent, but it will be upon us in 6 months. He then asks me if I would rather stay here in MO while he goes ahead to TX and we would just end up being apart for about 18 months. The catch was that I needed to pretty much make up my mind on the whole issue by Monday morning cause that is when he goes in to start out processing. Nothing like getting prayers answered under time constraints. Heavenly Father, I need a reply but could you hurry, I am on a schedule......Yea, right. Anyhow, so the whole deal consumes my every waking moment like you could not believe and I start going through the pros and cons of should I stay or should I go(cue bad 80's song here, ha)... And after much agonizing I feel like the pros outweigh the cons on my staying in MO with the kids while Tim goes to TX and then to Iraq. So I approach Tim on Sunday night to talk about the logistics and finances and the "how to go about doing this" thing: I mean, can Tim live in the barracks or can he rent a room from a member of the church around there? I may need to make some money to offset cost during the 6 month period of time he isn't deployed, what things from our house would he want to take with him, ect.....My husband looks at me and says, I don't know that you should stay here. You should just go with me now and we will rent the house if is doesn't sell, but I'm not sure, let me talk to someone tomorrow when I out process. AAAAAAAARRRGH!!! Are you trying to send me to a nice padded room on a funny farm or what?! So, now I have to go back to all those people that I talked to and told that I may be staying here and say scratch that please, I don't know what got into me. Should I even pray about it at this point? I feel like I am crazy times 10. Oh well, I guess I should be used to this kind of thing since I have been a military spouse for 15 plus years......

Inspired

Clara was taking pictures of the girls that she tends and I was helping out.....We snapped a few of Laurel and it inspired me to get my own camera out and take a few of my kids. It has been a while since I have had any good pictures of them taken. Anyhow, this is the results:

quick funny

Lately, whenever I ask Laurel to do something, she salutes me and in a stereotypical military fashion, barks "yes, Sir!" I thought it was funny, but that I should probably teach her to be polite in the right way. So, the next time she did it, I pointed out that boys were sir's and girls were ma'am's. I went further and told her that daddy was a sir, I was a ma'am and so was she. She looked at me and responded," I am not a ma'am, I am a lady." She sure told me.......

tending children and a dead sqirrel

So we are still in "please buy my house" mode. Except on top of that, I have added to my stress level. A good friend of mine had to have an operation and she happens to tend 3 little girls every day. Since I really love this friend and knew that she needed help. I volunteered to tend her day care kids for a 10 day period. I have come to the conclusion that I am just too nice. Ha. They aren't bad kids at all and for the most part aren't too hard to handle, but taking care of a 4 yr old, a 3yr old and two 2 yr olds can really be exhausting. And I have found in myself that I am not daycare provider material. Although I have been kind and attentive to all the kids( mine included), I don't enjoy doing this and I count down minutes to things like nap time and time to drive in the car and when their parents will come and get them. I feel guilty for feeling that way but I do.....I am now stressed out to the max. Poor Laurel is acting out a bit since her space and regular routine has been turned upside down. I am also dealing with trying to keep a constantly clean house(even with all the kids), end of school year activities, Tim's military functions and Hail and Farewells, and now I added this to the mix. Calgon take me away. I even began to toss the idea around about becoming a Pampered Chef Consultant at a party the other night. This month is a really good deal where if you do 4 successful parties this month, your starter kit is free. It may be too good an offer for me to pass up. Tim got mad when I suggested it though since that could be the straw that breaks the camel's back. I keep thinking of all the things that I didn't get to chance to do or see here in MO now and am trying to think of ways to try to fit it. It is obviously not going to happen though. I can't believe that they will be here on May 28th to pack us up. I hope that we can sell our house before then.....with nothing in the house, you can see it flaws clearer. I just need to start having some more faith that it will happen. We just can't afford NOT to sell this place.

In other news, the kids found a squirrel stuck in our chain link fence. Most of it's body was on our side of the fence and the other half was in our neighbors side. Laurel came in yelling excitedly about it and Gavin was hot on her trail to explain the excitement. "We found a Squirrel stuck in the fence, Mom!" "Is it still alive?" "Nope, I hit it with a stick really hard to check to see if it was still alive and it didn't move" Translation: If it was alive, it isn't anymore cause I hit it pretty hard with a stick..... I went to look at it and find it hanging like you see above. I found out that when jumping through our fence, he grabbed the electric wire that the neighbors have set up to deter their dogs from escaping the yard and wouldn't let go until he was dead. I know it is not funny, but I kept picturing a cartoon version of it happening and started to laugh. Now we know that I have lost it if I think that is funny. Oh well. Tim was kind enough to don gloves and remove it to the trash. I am so glad that I didn't have to do that dirty job....