She's Ba-ack.....

I try really hard to be an understanding and supportive wife...I really do....but every now and then I get so damn irritated with my husband that my inner bitch must poke her nasty little head out and show her presence. In my husband's defense, this inner bitch usually emerges once a month and her level of nastiness is directly related to the level of hormones flowing. With that said.....Do I get angry when he says he'll be home by 6:30 for dinner and doesn't show up till 8?....no.....irritated would be a better word. Do I get angry when he's putting in 12-14 hours days....every....single.....day?......no...I understand that his success comes at a price...it's hard work...I get that. Do I get angry when on the rare occasion that he DOES get home at a relatively decent hour (maybe so we can actually eat dinner as a family) he'll be in the home office working half the rest of the night....no, I don't. I try to be supportive. But Friday he played poker with the guys and so of COURSE he was home early....Last night he went out to dinner with the guys and so of COURSE he was home early. He spared me a 3 minute phone call earlier in the day to tell me he'd be home to change his clothes. How kind of him. I hear every day about how busy he is, how he can't get out of the office because he has meetings scheduled till 7pm, how he can't get his actual work done because of the meetings, his to-do list is growing....but MAN it's amazing that when he has something planned with the guys he somehow MAKES it happen. K....I'm done....I'm laying the inner bitch to rest for now.

The itch is back...

We had a fabulously boring weekend over here. We don't get many of these in the winter with the competition season in full swing....so we enjoy them when they come. Saturday, I got a work out in...I'm getting into a routine of 30-40 minutes of cardio and 45 minutes of resistance training. Smurfette had a birthday party to go to...one of her friends from school. Sleeping Beauty visited the party...and "it was the REAL sleeping beauty"! LOL! & the boys had a friend from gymnastics spend the night.

Sunday I did a little cleaning, a little laundry, and a little scrapbooking...first time I've touched my stuff since the weekend scrapping slumber party like 6 weeks ago. Papa Smurf took the boys bowling and my SIL picked Smurfette up to take her with them to the Palace for the High School Musical on ice. So I had a couple hours to myself.

Papa smurf & I had decided to wait another year or so before trying to move to see if the economy picks up a bit...we're worried about trying to sell our house among other things. BUT...every now and then I get the itch. So I went on line Saturday night to check and see if a house we fell in love with last summer was still for sale...it's a model home in a perfect location and just beautiful...but they were asking a ridiculous price for it and we just couldn't do it. So I was very excited to find what I think is the same house...not only is it still for sale (if it's the same house) but the price has dropped by $150,000. So yesterday while Papa Smurf was at the bowling alley and Smurfette with my SIL I called my mom to see if she wanted to drive over there with me to take a look at this house....I was dieing to see if it was the same house. I picked her up and drove up there to read the sign that said "closed till 3/13"....UGH! Maybe it's a sign. It wasn't meant to be. To be honest, I was kinda hoping I'd drive out there and find out it wasn't the same house...one that I wouldn't like as much....that way I could get this itch out of my system without being disappointed. But I'm still not sure if it's the same house....there are 3 of them next to each other that look very similar...I just can't tell. I can't stop thinking about it. The house is still over priced. After looking at other listings on line with the same square footage...same location....same home features...some with MORE features...that were asking another $50,000 less than this guy. The trouble will be convincing Papa Smurf. He still wants to wait another year. OMG. He's killing me.

Crying over spilled milk

Went to Aunt Mary's funeral this morning. Sad. I'll always remember her as being a very eccentric, lively, enthusiastic, and active person. She was 85 years old when she passed but didn't look more than 65. We had my cousins' wedding last September and she was out on the dance floor jamming all night long. Truly incredible.

The boys got contacts yesterday. I woke them up early this morning so they had time before school to put them in. LOL! Yeah RIGHT! They haven't quite gotten the hang of it yet so I ended up putting them in. Dreamy came home from school and told me that his eye was itching him during class...so, in the midst of scratching the itch one of his contacts "popped out". He says that his teacher walked him to the teachers' lounge where they luckily found another teacher with contact solution...only he couldn't put it in himself so the teachers had to put it in for him. The teacher apparently told Dreamy to kindly ask me to put solution and contact cases in his backpack. oops. So I did overkill....they now each have baggies full of contact supplies in both their school bags and gymnastics bags...just in case. Hopefully they'll get the hang of this soon....I'm starting to wonder if this whole contacts thing wasn't a HUGE mistake.

Papa Smurf's out playing poker tonight...the kids are all in bed....TV is off....dog is sleeping....total silence! Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh..... Of course 2 hours ago it wasn't so quiet. Dreamy Smurf and Smurfette decided when we returned home from gymnastics that they wanted a bowl of cereal....they were both hungry. So....They're playing at the table and after yelling for the 10th time for Dreamy to "sit down and eat and quit goofing around so you can get in the shower"....he decides to tickle Smurfette and somehow during this "tickle torture" (as my kids like to call it) Smurfette ended up dumping her entire bowl of cereal ...which, by the way, Dreamy had poured for her and so the cereal was overflowing and the milk was to the brim of the bowl.....it was EVERYwhere....it somehow managed to spray from one end of my kitchen to the other...up the walls, up the cupboards, down the legs of the kitchen chairs, the milk covered half the kitchen floor, and Smurfette had frosted flakes hanging from her ears and dripping from every piece of clothing....O.....M.....G!!!!!!!!!!

It IS my life!

I found out yesterday (from a fellow parent and friend) that Brendan's picture is on the school hallway wall for success skills "personal best"...It's a thing the school does...the teachers pick a few kids from each grade and award them for doing good at certain things...this time it was "personal best" but they also have things like "respect", "positive communication",....etc. and then once each month the principle picks 4 kids from that group to take them out to lunch. Anyway, apparently his photo has been on the wall for quite some time but of course I knew nothing about it because my kids don't tell me ANYthing! When I ask them how their day was they say "fine"....when I ask if anything exciting happened I get "yeah, recess"....so then something like this comes along that makes me especially proud and I can't even give him the pat on the back that he deserves! .....AND..... then I look like a total SCHMUCK for not having a CLUE what's going on in my kids' lives.....DRIVES ME CRAZY!

I'm reading the new Oprah book..."A New Earth: Awakening to your life's purpose"...trying to anyway. I'm having difficulties getting through it. I like it. I like the message. The truth in the message is enlightening...that is, when I actually "get" the message..... But I'm thinking it's just a little too intellectual for me. Too many big words...LOL! Reading this book is exhausting. I have to share a rather lengthy excerpt from the book...it made me laugh...I'll tell you why after I type it...although, I doubt you'll need my explanation!

"Ego comes about through a split in the human psyche in which identity
separates into two parts that we could call "I" and "me" or "me" and
"myself". Every ego is therefore schizophrenic, to use the word in its
popular meaning of split personality. You live with a mental image of
yourself, a conceptual self that you have a relationship with. Life itself
becomes conceptualized and separated from who you are when you speak of "my life." The moment you say or think "my life" and believe in what you are saying (rather than it just being a linguistic convention), you have entered the realm of delusion. If there is such a thing as "my life," it follows that I and life are two separate things, and so I can also lose
my life, my imaginary treasured possession. Death becomes a seeming
reality and a threat. Words and concepts split life into separate
segments that have no reality in themselves. We could even say that
the notion "my life" is the original delusion of separateness, the
source of ego"....blah blah blah....."So there is no such thing as "my
life"....

I think I should change the name of my blog. According to Eckhart Tolle I must have titled my blog "My Life" because I'm both schizophrenic and delusional....and the contents of this blog truely don't exist because there is no such thing as "my life". I don't think I'm getting it. He wrote in the beginning "It can only awaken those who are ready"....I don't think I'm ready....

Its my hair and I'll cut it if I want to!

Dreamy Smurf has made it through a major childhood rite of passage....he is now a man (in his eyes anyway).... I forgot to mention this last week. We were in our hotel room and I kept trying to fix his hair...only it wouldn't fix....I couldn't figure out why half his forehead was higher than the other...It almost looks like there's a chunk of hair missing....odd....that's very unlike Kelly to cut his hair so crooked....ahhhhh....that's because it WASN'T KELLY....my son felt the overwhelming desire to take a chunk out of his hair. I finally weaseled the truth out of him. Apparently, he took the scissors out of his desk at school and decided he needed a hair cut. Why do all kids do this...I did it as a kid...Hefty has already done this...now Dreamy....I'm sure Smurfette will eventually....why??

Smurfette's short pixie hair cut is growing out so we are back to the battles with the tangles...every morning is a fight to brush her hair. So, I asked her if she wanted it cut again so it wouldn't get so knotted and she said "no, because haircuts make me itch"...LOL...

Found out yesterday that Dreamy doesn't have any broken bones. Doc thinks he just hyperextended his toe. Told him to stay off it for a week...lol....yeah right...and told me to give him an anti-inflammatory.

Let the training begin!

Getting back into the swing of being back home. Spent the last 2 days getting caught up on laundry and Oprah! LOL! Also getting back into the workouts...ran a little over 2 miles this morning on the treadmill and followed it up with 45 minutes of resistance training. Felt great! I actually think I have Papa smurf talked into training with me. HE brought it up...not me! Good sign! He won't commit to the full marathon and unfortunately the 1/2 marathon isn't an option at Chicago...so he's just going to train with me...as much as he can....it's not easy with his work schedule so he'll just do what he has time for. I'm excited! Now if I can just get Tom out there with me too....

I'm sad to say that my Great Aunt Mary (my grandma's sister) lost her battle with Leukemia this past Sunday. Her enthusiasm for life and bright spirit will be missed. Papa Smurf also recently found out that a good friend of his and former employee from his MSX days was recently diagnosed with Leukemia. She's young...in her 40s...i think....not that her age matters in the least but just showing how this disease does not discriminate. When I decided to run another marathon I decided not to sign up through TNT this time around....didn't want to commit to raising a specific amount...which for the Chicago marathon would have been significantly higher minimum donation than the Detroit marathon was. I felt funny hitting up family and friends 2 years in a row...I think though that I will set my own goal for raising donations on my own for the Leukemia and Lymphoma society....not the TNT group....this way I know that 100% of the donations will benefit the society. We'll do the same thing we did last year and match donations up to $1000.00.

It seems we can't get enough of Dr. Basch (the foot doctor)....had to make an appointment for this afternoon for Dreamy Smurf...his big toe hurts...lol....his big toe has been hurting him for over a week now...hopefully it's nothing!

We're back. So sad. Vacation is over. Have I mentioned I hate Michigan? So I'll recap our last couple days....

Thursday.....The second day at the Kids Escape went pretty much as expected...they hated it...to be honest I think they kinda enjoyed it but at this point there was no way in hell we'd get them to admit it. Smurfette admitted to making a couple friends...and Hefty Smurf was able to get on a computer...& Dreamy Smurf was just too tired to comment. BUT....Papa Smurf & I had a great time! We went straight to the casino...1st stop...the slots! I put a 20 into the same machine that hubby hit on the previous night and won $155!!! Yeah! Took that $155 and played all night long (well, for 4 hours anyway....because at 10pm we turn into pumpkins) on the black jack table! Even walked away with $75 of it! It was a great night for us.

Friday....Anthony's Grill for breakfast...again....Then we came back and did a little packing and a little bit of relaxing until it was time for the Dolphin Swim. Which really was more of a Dolphin "pet" than a Dolphin "swim"...but the kids had fun and enjoyed it. Smurfette was afraid to kiss the dolphin. But she participated in the rest of it. Papa Smurf stood on the side lines and took pictures. We got to meet the 8 month old dolphin baby...Smurfette enjoyed that. When it was over we took a taxi to the fish fry. My only complaint about this trip is the food. It's just not that good. And for what we're paying for it...I guess I was at least hoping to enjoy it....not so much. Even the food at the fish fry was a bit of a disappointment. After our dinner we went into town to do some shopping only to discover that all the shops close up by 5:30. We walked through the "straw market" as they were closing up to get some t-shirts and hats for the kids.

And that was it. We came back to the hotel and packed. Anticlimactic end to a fabulous vacation. Papa smurf and I spent a good part of the evening on the balcony soaking in the heat and the background tropic sounds of the ocean and reggae music...ho hum. This is the first vacation that we've ever taken that I wasn't ready at the end of the trip to come home. We've all decided we're gonna move there...Papa Smurf's gonna quit his job and we'll move into a little shack on the water...just kidding. As fabulous as the trip was...I don't think I could live there...my allergies were horrible all week. I guess that's my 2nd complaint about the trip. The rooms were not very impressive. You already heard about our first room. They must have prepared our new room with air fresheners before we got there because by the end of the next day it started smelling just as bad as the first one. The kids' room had a leaky air conditioner that dripped all night long...I'm wondering if the damp carpet from the leaky air conditioner wasn't the cause of the musty odor. Anyway...the mustiness of the rooms killed me...next time we take this trip we'll be sleeping in better rooms. I unpacked the suitcases last night to get started on the laundry and that same musty odor has infiltrated all our clothes.

So back to reality. We've decided that the reason this vacation was so incredible is because it's the 1st vacation we've taken in the middle of our winter. Our 1st February vacation. So, we've decided to repeat this trip yearly...not necessarily to the Bahamas but at least a warm destination. We've already decided on the Disney Cruise for next February.