Traditions and Elves

For my own sanity, this will be quick. I've had many emails and texts from folks checking in to see if I was still holding my own. Of course, my answer has been, "Things are fine. I'm doing alright." That's what I'm supposed to say. The truth of the situation looks a whole lot different.

Christmas is my favorite holiday of the year for so many reasons. But, this Season is also wrapped in layers of memories. Decorations, activities, traditions. They all are bubble wrapped in memories.

At this point in the game, I've managed to get the Christmas tree up (lights but no ornaments) and get the lights across the hedges. Neither of these tasks was easy - physically or emotionally. However, there are three kids residing in this house that take a great amount of comfort from "normal" right now so that's what I'm trying to give them. The tree, the lights, the promise of a trip to see the lights at Life College. It all just makes my stomach churn but brings them joy.

However, I'm also trying to do a few "different" things this year simply because it is different. We've never had an elf visit us at Christmas. I've heard about the elves that visit and cause untold damage to homes and then report back to Santa about the behavior of the kids. Well, I'm sure not about to purposefully let something into my house that is going to cause any more chaos. So, I hand picked an elf from the... where do elves come from? Maybe they come from the far corner of the Cabbage Patch. Who knows... Anyway, I chose an elf with a quiet demeanor that is not given to being overly mischievous. He and I have a deal. If he sits quietly and lets the kids hold him gently, then we'll give Santa a good report. If not, he knows that I'll leave him sitting where the cat can cuddle up with him and do whatever she likes with him.

Elliot the Elf arrived tonight since it's the first night of Advent. I'm doing my best to keep things centered around here and not let the real meaning of this Season get shoved to the wayside. Anyway, he'll meet the kids in the morning. Here's to new traditions...

I'll post more about my struggles with this holiday later. For now, I'm trying to psyche myself up for the next three weeks of school. I'm a huge proponent of teachers getting combat pay for the month of December. I think some parents decide to give their kids Pop Tarts and Mountain Dew every morning and then put their darlings on the bus headed directly toward me. When you enter an elementary classroom in the month of December, you can literally feel the air vibrating with the excitement oozing out of the kids. Yes, there are moments that you want to savor and make last forever when you get a glimpse of the excitement through the eyes of a child. However, there are many other moments when you want to just close your eyes, ball up into the fetal position, suck your thumb, and keep saying, "Find a happy place. Find a happy place. Find a happy place." The minute I did that, though, I'd find a child standing over me asking, "Can I go to the bathroom?" Whew!

So, the short answer to your emails would be that I'm struggling but it's an inner struggle that hurts in a way that no physical pain could ever cause. Wading through the holidays seems like walking through a mine field. In fact, I guess I sort of feel like a mine sweeper. Some of the mines I run over are duds and don't inflict any damage. However, others that I thought were duds blow up in my face and leave me with shrapnel sticking here and there and take quite a while to recover from. But, I'll press onward because I know that there's something bigger and better on this journey for me and the kids. I'm not sure what the timing looks like on that "bigger and better thing" but I know it's out there and it gives me reason to keep moving.

Philippians 3:13-16

Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. All of us who are mature should take such a view of things. And if on some point you think differently, that too God will make clear to you. Only let us live up to what we have already attained.

Good night, all.

So much to be thankful for... (Take 2)

OK. So, it's pretty obvious that You Tube and I aren't the best of friends. Navigating all of their legalities makes me nuts. Anyway, here's my tribute to today. I do have so many things to be thankful for.

(Hey, K.H., you'd better do wonderful on finals no matter what I post here)! :)

Failed Santa Attempt, Leaf Pile Demolition, and Potty Training Stand-off

An hour into the wait to see Santa and his reindeer, Annie decided that she'd rather play a game. She can unlock my phone, scroll through the apps to find what she wants, and launch her games. Disturbing doesn't even begin to cover her techie intuition. She can also open iTunes and find her videos. The girl needs her own devices but I'm just not ready to hand over an iTouch to a 2 year old. It's SO wrong on SO many levels.

We forfeited our spot in line and just went to sneak a peak of Santa and his reindeer. My butt was frozen and numb so hers had to be, too! However, I had to promise her that we'd visit him later so she could tell him to make her a pink bike and a drum with sticks.

Destroying Papa's leaf piles was much more entertaining.

Definitely nap time!

The girls analyzed and sorted acorns into different groups. The last sorting consisted of which acorns were pizza and which were smoothies.

The girls decided that the pile of leaves was their car and they went for a drive. (Papa and Grant gave up on raking a LONG time ago)!

She said she found the prize leaf! Her imagination borders on neurotic sometimes!

So, that was the excitement for day one of my Thanksgiving break beyond a trip to Target to buy Annie some real panties. She chose Dora and Littlest Pet Shop. I'm so over this potty training thing! I gave in and bought a bag of M&Ms, too, to bribe her with. However, when we got back to the van, she started screaming for the M&Ms. I told her that she had to tinkle in the potty first. The little crumb-snatcher looked me dead in the eye and said, "I don't have a potty here, Mama. We're in the car. Give me some now and I'll tinkle at home later." When I told her that she'd have to wait, she let out a blood curdling scream and started calling for Grandma. Hmmm.... She's not even three and knows that Grandma would've ripped that bag of M&Ms open in a heart beat and hand fed them to her to keep her from screaming like a wild animal. Me? Nope. I crawled into the driver's seat, turned up the radio, and pulled away from Target looking a lot more calm than I felt.

Here's to an uneventful Thanksgiving break.

Good night, all.

Life's Temptations

Here the facts are. I won't mix emotions and facts. It's a toxic mix this week and I don't want to have regrets.

1. She's eating weird things again. Last night, she licked dinner plates clean that had been sitting in the sink since Sunday night. This morning, it was random trash from the floor of the van. Tonight, it was another pencil. She's taking the mega-vitamins as the doctor ordered but it's not helping.

2. She's stealing again. I just found a pencil in her agenda that I knew didn't belong to her. She admitted to taking it from the teacher's desk while the teacher was in the hallway. When I asked her if she would have stolen something from the teacher's purse, she said, "I couldn't find her purse."

3. She has a new binder in her bag that I didn't buy her. She said that she ask her teacher for it because I wouldn't buy her a new one.

4. Her social studies test says across the bottom, "I love Mrs. Zomer." When I asked her how that got there, she said that she and another student were talking about who they would marry when they got in high school.

My sense of humor has been sapped dry. My best attempt at parenting tonight came when I served her a bowl of pencils for a bedtime snack. As soon as I did it, I felt miserable. How old am I? That's something one of my students would do! Frustration simply overwhelmed my senses. I simply don't know what to do with her. If she clearly shows that she's hiding something, doesn't that indicate that she knows that it is wrong? If she has the ability to discern right and wrong and understands that wrong choices hold consequences, why does she keep doing the same darn wrong things? Doctors don't offer many suggestions beyond removing things from her environment that might tempt her to make wrong choices. Um? Let's see. How in the world would I do that? Reality is filled with temptations. In fact, without temptations, how would we ever develop the ability to choose between right and wrong? Temptations are a daily part of life whether you're talking about eating an entire bag of Oreos or stealing a pencil. There comes a point of accountability when you have to assume responsibility for your actions - good or bad.

So, as we get closer to Thanksgiving, I will continue to be very thankful that Dasha has a stomach of steel that can tolerate staples, graphite, erasers, and petrified crumbs. I will also be very thankful that she has a pencil fetish and not a jewelry one. I will also continue to count the many blessing that come with having next week off! Whew!

Good night, all.

Googling at the Randolph Mental Facility

I know that there are some folks that believe that the majority of the antecedotal stories I post here are figments of my imagination. Come with me on a little trip (yeah, a four hour tour...) through my day and you'll see that no one in their right mind would make this stuff up!

Annie doesn't understand the idea of having a day off or of this "time change" thing. So, she woke me up this morning by standing next to my bed and saying, "Mama, mama. You sleeping?" The clock clearly read 5:23. I pulled her in bed with me and handed her my phone so she could watch a video. That lasted for about 20 minutes. (Dear Nick Jr., you need to make a feature length Fresh Beat Band episode, please, that lasts longer than 20 minutes). So, at 5:45, I crawled out of bed and started a load of laundry. By 7:00, Annie and I had eaten breakfast and she had drawn me a "map" of what she wanted to do for the day. She thinks that she is Dora and loves maps. I can't even think about taking her into a store without giving her an index card with some things for her to check off and a silly "map." 

We planned to MAKE play dough using a new recipe I found on Pinterest which used Jello. The only stores open at 7:00 a.m. are WalMart and Kroger so we opted for WalMart. We picked out grape, strawberry, orange, and blue explosion Jello and cream of tartar and headed back home.

Then, the real mess started.

At first, she didn't understand why the Jello boxes didn't have play dough in them. I guess she didn't understand that we had to cook it. (That was a very frustrating conversation). So, in the end, the dough was cooked and Annie went off to happily play with it.

By this time, Grant had crawled out from his lair. His list for today included cleaning his room and working on his science project. The room cleaning part of his list went as normal. There was lots of huffing, lots of procrastinating, and way too many things getting crammed into the closet and the hamper. But, he managed to finish and then we started the process of figuring out how to actually DO the science project that he'd dreamed up.

He wanted to test the bacteria levels in tea from different restaurants. Ok. That's a great idea. But, how in the world do you do that? Thanks to Google and You Tube, we found out that you have to use something called agar in a petri dish to grow the bacteria. Yeah. Let me just run to the cabinet and pull out some agar from my stock pile. Huh? Where do you even buy this stuff? Once again, back to Google we went. As usual, we've cut the time limits pretty close on this project so we didn't have time to order anything (let me clarify - I didn't want to PAY to have something express mailed). I started calling lots of really weird and shady places asking if they stocked agar. I even called the pediatrician's office. (They got quite a laugh out of that). On a last ditch effort, I called the school supply store about ten minutes down the road and they had one vial left of the stuff. Geez. So, we loaded up and went to get this weirdness - plus petri dishes.

It's a powdery mess that you have to mix with distilled water, boil it, let it cool, and then pour it into the petri dishes to solidify. Yeah. Once again, why couldn't my child just want to test how much liquid different brands of diapers hold?

So, I guess we'll just watch and see over the next few days which tea had the most bacteria in it. We're going to get two more batches of tea from each place to make sure that we have solid data. Don't we sound scientific?

And then, there was Dasha's report. I saw the instruction sheet last night and it is due tomorrow. Yeah, me! The topic of this report... Day of the Dead. It's an official holiday for some cultures. Believe me. I had to Google that too! For this report, you were supposed to pick a dead relative, pet, or other person and basically create a shrine for them. Now, you have to understand that my "Are You Kidding Me?" filter kicked in the minute I saw the information sheet. When I asked Dasha about it, she said, "I'll just do a box about Ansley." Oh boy. Grant went nuts. Grant is very guarded about his memories of Ansley and doesn't like Dasha to even talk about her. (Add this to the therapy list, yeah, yeah, yeah). So, who else could we do? She named off two other people that she's known of that have died and neither was a good fit for this project. (I tried to convince her to do it on Grant's guinea pig that kicked the bucket last year but she wanted to do it about a PERSON). Geez. Once again, I did a Google search for "dead famous people." Really. That's what I typed. My choices were either Michael Jackson or Steve Jobs. I persuaded Dasha to go with Mr. Jobs.

We Googled more about Jobs to complete the report. (Yeah, there was a written report, too. See? The guinea pig report would have been much easier and no one would have known if it was true or not - like the part about me putting the dead creature in a Rubbermaid box and putting it in the big freezer because the ground was too hard for me to dig a hole in)! Although, I guess I'll have to admit that Steve Jobs was a very different person. Dasha immediately zeroed in on the fact that he was adopted and didn't go to college. Oh well. Never mind the stuff about Apple and Pixar.

So, the project is now complete and ready for school. I wonder what other parents thought about this project? Couldn't they have simply said something like, do research on a deceased person and create a collage or media product to show their life? Nope. Much more creepy to do it this way.

So, in one day, I made play dough, created a warm cozy environment to grow tea bacteria, and created a shrine to Steve Jobs. And you people think I make this mess up! I haven't even gotten to the good stuff yet.

About 9:00, I was sitting at the desk working on school papers when I heard a dripping sound. I thought it was the cat doing something weird. (I didn't even bother to go check). But, suddenly the dripping turned into more of a pouring sound. I walked out of the office and into the kitchen to see a waterfall coming out of the air vent in the ceiling. There was a puddle on the floor that spanned most of the kitchen. My first thought was, "At least this isn't poo water like last week AND it's on the tile and not the wood floor." My second thought was a bit less positive. It was something like, "Oh, crap. The ceiling is going to fall in and then what am I going to do?"

My adreline kicked in and I started yelling for the big kids to bring me towels and garbage cans like I was some rock star surgeon in the ER. They are lucky I wasn't saying things like, "Stat! Stand back! I'm not gonna lose this one!" Anyway, we dried up the small lake and stood back and just watched the waterfall. At one point, Dasha looked at me with her face squished up and said, "What is going on?" I couldn't help myself at that point. I looked her back without a smile and said, "Well, maybe you should find an umbrella because we have ourselves a kitchen storm and it looks like it might just go on all night long!" She didn't laugh. I think part of her thought I was serious. She proceeded to go look out the window and tell me that it wasn't raining outside. Ugh.

I called my dad. He analyzed the situation. By the time he left, we'd come to no conclusions. The water was coming from the general vicinity of my bathroom. There's still no conclusion at this hour (2 hours later). However, the rain has stopped now and I'm just left with a floor full of wet towels and a garbage can full of water. Who knows when the rain will start again. Eric reminded me that we do have home owner's insurance for things like this. Oh, yeah. I kind of forgot about that. I'm terrified to know what the deductible is, though. Oh well. The joys of home ownership.

So, this is the sort of fun we have at the Randolph Mental Facility on a day "off." Jello dough, growing bacteria, honoring dead people, and having inside rain showers. In what other house could you do all of that in one day? No where that I know of unless you're wearing a straight jacket! And, heck, I don't even enforce that our guests wear straight jackets! Half of the time, someone is running around naked (not me).

This is where I find myself at 10:55 on Tuesday night. I'm really trying to stay focused and see this new turn of events as merely a distraction from the journey I'm on. But, I'm telling you, this distraction is like one of those darn gnats at the beach that you just want to zap.

Good night, all.

Sewage leaks and Lurking Monsters

OK. I'm still alive. I'm still amazed at the emails and messages that overflowed from my boxes to make sure I hadn't committed myself to some asylum or been locked up at the Sheriff's Office. It's nice to feel loved! :)

If I didn't completely turn the lights off, shut the elevator down, and loose all of my marbles today, it won't happen.

Here's a quick recap before I crash into bed.

1) 6:00 a.m. - I got up early to shower and try to make myself semi-presentable for the conference this afternoon. Thinking that I had somewhat accomplished that feat, I headed downstairs. However, when I stepped off of the bottom step this morning, I found myself standing in water. Someone (I'm thinking the only male in the house) stopped up the toilet last night but didn't bother to tell me and for some reason, the water had seeped out of the bathroom, into the foyer, and stunk up the entire downstairs. This was NOT a job for a towel. I can't quite remember the exact number of new expletives my children learned from me this morning. I absolutely have to get a rein on my tongue. I'm convinced that my temper is directly tied to my tongue. Whew. However, due to the minor flooding of sewage, breakfast became a second thought. I hustled the kids out of the door. By this time, I was crying (the expletives had ceased spilling forth), the kids were scared that I was really losing it, and it was stinking cold!

2) Did I mention that I was still wide awake at 3:30 this morning? Sleep just would not claim me. I even took a swig of NyQuil at 1:00 a.m. When I'm sleepy, nothing is right. So, about 6:45, I called my teammate and made a plea for her to call me a sub for a 1/2 day. I was on the edge of a real breakdown and I had poo water to clean up before it seeped underneath the flooring and caused even more damage.

3) 7:00 a.m. - Chick-fil-A drive through. I can get away with not feeding Annie breakfast. She eats at Fatima's every morning despite what I might feed her. However, Grant and Dasha aren't so keen on starving. So, I ordered their breakfasts and my diet lemonade and headed for school. Somehow, I got behind every single Cherokee County bus. I didn't get to school until 7:20 this morning. That's the latest I've gotten to school in years! I hate to be late!

4) 11:15 a.m. - I handed my class off to a lady name Mrs. D with an island accent and made a run for the van. The van has become my safe-house. I sat in the van and simply cried. No hysterics. Just crying. I'm not even sure what I was crying about. I finally collected my remaining senses and drove home. It took the next hour and a half to clean up the now congealed sewage from the floor. I mopped the floor about 3 times with new water every time just because I didn't even want to believe that poo germs were stuck in the wood. Ugh. My naked feet walk on that floor. Annie wallows around on that floor. Gross. Then, I decided to put the last coat of spray paint on my Goodwill find of an end table. I felt a moderate amount of success upon the completion of that job. However, stupid me left the table on the patio when I went back to school and it got rained (poured) on and warped. Yip. That would be my luck. If you're wondering, the table is still sitting on the patio. I didn't even bother to try bringing it in.

5) 2:00 - I finished up sewing a bag I'd started for Annie only to realize that I snipped the seams too close and cut through the sides of the bag. Okeedokee then.... I crossed that off of my "to do" list. My list didn't say anything about making a bag with a solid structure. Deconstructed is the new look for jeans. Maybe I'll start a trend in toddler bags, too.

6) 3:00 - Headed for the middle school. I knew I'd be a little bit early so I ended up parking in the church parking lot and crying some more. For real? Where are these tears coming from? You'd think I was PMSy or something. I was worried about what Eric would say. I was worried about having to sit in his general vicinity for more than two seconds. Could I hold it together? I was lucky enough that some old employees from Little River saw me along the way and I was able to chat with them when I arrived at the school and had to sit in the cold lobby where the potential for awkward moments was maximized.

7) The conference was just fine. We learned that Dasha had made a name for herself with other guy teachers and seems to have quite a few crushes. Nice. I'll add this to my list of concerns with her. It seems that one teacher had to threaten to "sign her agenda" if she didn't stop hugging on him. Ugh. There weren't any surprises beyond that, though. And, I have to admit that I wasn't really surprised. She just wants attention from males. She always has.

8) Left the middle school. Went to mom's house. Picked the three tornadoes up. Took them home and delivered them to Eric. He wanted to take them to eat. Ok. So, they left and I was lost. I know, I know. I say I want to get rid of them for a while and then I say that I want them back. The grass is always greener on the other side. So, I sat and ate a bowl of Cheerios while the power blinked off for a while. Then, I graded math tests, watched two episodes of Sister Wives, and finished off the Snickers from Halloween. Nice compliment to the Cheerios! I'm sure my blood sugar will be out of whack in the morning. But, my biggest monsters of the night showed up while I was curled up on the sofa with my math tests and the cat. For some reason, I thought the kids would be back around 6:15. Now, I can't trust that I heard that correctly because any direct verbal communication between us seems to get garbled somewhere between his mouth and my ears. But, I started wondering if maybe he would actually take the kids and leave. ??? I don't think he would but... So, those "what if monsters" danced in my head for over an hour. Should I text Grant? No. I don't want Eric to think I'm checking up on them. But, what if they're headed for the state line? I seriously never even fathomed that this would be a monster that would lurk in my mind. Trusting someone with your kids is a big deal especially when that trust has been so badly broken. Back when all of this first happened, I used to have these very vivid dreams that Eric and his friend would swoop in and take the kids and disappear forever. I still get teary eyed thinking of that vision of Annie screaming out for me. Maybe that's why I got so crazy tonight. That whole dream was just so persistent and so dang real. Night after night, I'd wake up crying and be left with nothing but the vision of Annie reaching out for me and me feeling helpless. Blah. I'd like to put a permanent lock on the box that contains that stupid dream.

Ok, ok, ok. We've already had this discussion before and I said I wasn't even going to post anything this week. However, I'm hoping that by purging my thoughts here, they won't follow me to bed tonight. I'm stinking exhausted. I need to leave the monsters behind on this screen and not under the covers with me.

So, I'm heading to bed knowing that the alarm will go off way too early in the morning. I'm also going to make sure that all toilets are flushed and all children are really tucked (glued) into their beds so I'm not greeted with another sewage leak in the morning. I'd threaten to put everyone back in diapers if this happens again but that would be way too expensive!

Good night, all.