LOST A SOCK

Choose Your Own Adventure

 

You'll remember this little gem, yes?

Okay, so it's been a relatively quiet eleven months and if you've not been reading for much longer you maaaaay not know that when we moved?  Back in 2007?  We never sold this little puppy. 

Yep, that was the point in time that our country was calling this Nightmare Economy a "Buyer's Market" and people still had jobs and retirement accounts and one could score an interest only mortgage for as little as twelve cents down happily paid with a MasterCard and three salted french fries.  No shortage of buyers that visited our little place, for sure, and unfortunately, no shortage of deals gone bad when it came to the not-sale of our little house.

At this time last year the house was just to the point of tossing dirt upon our heads as we lay in our deep financial grave, and we were left with no choice other than to foreclose find renters.  Fast. 

I like to call myself a doggone economy-downturn pioneer.  Bitches.

(I don't know.  The title, it didn't seem complete yet.)

So our renters signed a one year contract with us, and they kindly paid on the first of each and every month for a whole year and as far as we are capable of knowing, they've taken care of the house.  And they're nice, too.

I took the year and worked my ass off to dig us back out of credit card debt for the second time (where credit card debt is to nine months of two house payments as vomiting from your toes is to the stomach flu) and I went to great lengths to begin rebuilding our obliterated savings account.  Oh yeah, and I had a baby, too.

You love happy stories, don't you?

So recently, just as we began talking sophomore contract with our totally fabulous renters, we were alerted to the fact that we unknowingly (wherein accidental landlords probably would not know but eventually came to know) did not remove the mortgage and homestead exemptions on our old house when it became --- now say it with me, and annunciate, in a slow whisper -- when it became an "Investment Property."  (In the "Buyers Market.")  (Haaaaaa hahahahahaha.)  

So apparently our county really likes you to live in a house if you're getting a tax exemption for living there, and therefore they estimated the back-tax bill to be rather extremely large, and in the mail. 

I'd like to say something clever here, but only the phrase Beginning of the End comes to mind.

Because then bad-ass Escrow had to get in on the action, causing the payment on this little non-homestead of ours to increase by a couple hundred bucks a month, nevermind the fact that our rent checks already aren't covering what actually gets paid to the bank every month.  (But hot damn!  We have great credit!  We're honest suckers payers and we didn't foreclose with the rest of the free world.)

Now let us pause for a moment and think about Spring tulips and baby chicks.  It is what I tried to do when I heard this news, and also I placed my fingers in my ears and sang loudly until I realized that I just looked like a damn idiot and needed to start making out the check.

 

Who can forget the Knucklehead Smiths next door, eh? 

So after our uber-fabulous renters accidentally disclosed the fact that they were not only fully committed to signing another year contract with us but also are currently house hunting for something later this fall or early winter (thus leaving us high and dry in the snow, oopsie) we sort of wondered with the couple hundred dollar payment shortage, the tax thing, the new renter search, if we shouldn't just try selling again.  Look, I know the market is still shit, but maybe we'll get lucky, right?

Hrrrrmmm...  Did I mention the Knucklehead Smiths next door did foreclose in the past year? 

Ohhh they did, and now the Banklehead Smith property is on the market for approximately HALF of what the Knuckleheads bought it for, capping our available asking price somewhere around the twenty eight dollar marker.  Why buy ours if you can get the house next door with a garage and an extra bathroom for thousands less, eh?

We tried to strike a deal with our renters to purchase our place, though they respectfully declined (though still looking for a new lease for whatever reason?)  We've talked about hanging on to it for another year and bleeding the couple hundred dollars per month, though lets face it, my husband works in the financial sector and jobs are anything but guaranteed and stable anymore.  Last, we've talked about bare asses to the breeze, listing the empty house again and shelling out an ungodly amount of cash from our recently partial rebuild of an emergency fund to cover the difference between the final sales price and what is actually still owed on the mortgage.  If we can sell it this time.

We've got mere weeks left in the safety of paid-up renters, so we're going to have to figure this one out pretty quick, eh?

Am trying

All three of my children simultaneously leapt from their beds at 6am on the head today, for absolutely no reason at all.  It was the, I dunno, seventy bazillionth consecutive day or something.  And I am anything that is not a morning person.  I left the baby to gab in her crib (okay, so there was less leaping from that one) as long as it was just gabbing, and mumbled something to the boys about breakfast in a bit as I stumbled past them in the hall.  I plopped down at the computer to see if you all in blogland could wake me up in some happy way.  And as I sat there completely dazed, child number one joined me, no doubt working the Where is our fooooood angle.  I rubbed my face sleepily and told him, "Mommy's tired today, bud."

To which he responded in his best Penguins of Madagascar voice, "Look alive, Mom.  Look. Alive."

I am so going to apply that to his little butt when he's a teenager, for sure. 

(Is is strange that my mothering mode is beginning to search for down-the-line retaliation, or is this the natural progression of things?)

Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn (that you went to bed tonight smelling like pee).

There's always tomorrow for baths, and then more pee opportunities anyway, right?

I have these blog entries swirling in my head, covering the ins and outs of our homeschool decision and action plan, as well as something or other about grocery bills and finances and the market, oh my.  But alas, my three chidren woke at 5:46am today and wouldn't you know it's Turn Off The TV week for KJ's school, making for a loooong day.  (Seriously, the kid gets a Dairy Queen Blizzard if he clocks no minutes of television in the next five days.  Dare I offer to buy him two blizzards if I can just get one hour of quiet?)

Also something terrible happened to our baby swing early last week, which translates to It No Longer Goes, and therefore my daughter has decided that her only happiness shall henceforth be my arms, swinging her like a worn out mama ape all the livelong day.  And night.

 

We finally made it into nice weather last week, which brought opportunities for a couple outdoor playdates as well as a trip to (say it with me) the zoooo.  Those be my children, absolutely mortified of the roaring Brontosaurus in the background there, as if I don't have to remind them to stop talking about Bionicles and Transformers blasting each others' heads off every five minutes at home.  Needless to say we steered clear of the life sized T-Rex exhibit.

We do well with downed trees, though.

Quick! (Before they dump her!) Baby's first slide!

I keep wondering, with each fun Spring day we conquer, if I will continue to be this tired at the end of each outing.  Running around with three young children is much like the longest roller coaster ride of your life.  Thrilling! Exciting! Totally fun! Sometimes makes you vomit! Aaaaaaand okay that's enough let's take a break from this ride, no?  Everybody wants to go upside down again?  Really?  Eh.

I honestly wouldn't have it any other way, in that being out, happy and free is our way, for sure, but most days the work that goes into occupying, teaching, feeding, bathing and constantly corralling three children continues to slay me.  I have learned to let go of luxuries such as commenting on blogs, leaving the house in spit-up-free clothing and keeping up with housework on floors that are not the main level...for now.  So they'll have the same sets of sheets on their beds until they are twelve, nine and six.  At least they're matchy, no? 

Also, I am learning to let them move at their individual paces during the day, which is how this happens...

The boy woke up twenty minutes into dinner, peed head to toe (and managed to pee on two! stairs,) went straight into pajamas, no bath, but happily ate a pound of broccoli.  Lose, win, yes?  His sister also pooped something fierce moments after the soaking scene, hearing that I didn't really care to eat anyway.  Ask me why I haven't dieted in a month, and why peanut butter slathered kaiser rolls are my late-night companion. 

Rounding out the week, Kevin took KJ and Jack to the annual Notre Dame Blue and Gold Game on Saturday (as well as for a drive into Michigan and then an impromptu trip to the beach, where Jack announced that the best part of the whole day was The Pop! that he drank back at the stadium.) 

This?  Gave Marin and I the day to slip away, ourselves -- for baby day with our Indianapolis pals.

Kara and Marin, sixteen and seven months respectively, are a laugh a minute together.  They squealed at each other, happily rolled around on the floor all afternoon and showed sure signs for being future BFF's. 

I also got in good quality snuggle time with my sweet little godson Nathan, who was both confused and nervous about all of the high-pitched squealing, giggling and baby tackling.  Where were the Bionicle Brothers, he wondered.  (Drinking pop, that's where.)

Spit-up covered roller coaster ride indeed.  But crazy fun, no?

Oh I could write a sonnet about your Easter bonnet...

(It may not be published until mid-next month, but hey, I do what I can.) 

One of my favorite Easter things to do with the kids is the egg dye.  KJ was barely a year old when I plopped him in his high chair and taught him to mix colors, and we've been having a great time with it every year since.  The most fun so far, I must say, is taking on this task with toddlers because, well, they're a freaking blast when it comes to semi-permanant dye and mess making. 

This year was good, with the green hands and the multitude of Optimus Prime-inspired eggs, but nothing ridiculously entertaining with ages six and three.  (This is why I keep having babies.  Next year?  Mwahahaha!  Another toddalah!)

 

Which, I fear the toddalah thing is going to happen sooner than I can wrap my brain around, because look at this one just sitting there with her basket and her brothers like she wasn't just fresh out of the womb yesssssssterday.  (She was, I swear.) 

Also, she is fully prepared to eat the damn Gerber cookie, wrapper and all, if I can't put down the camera and remove the cellophane already.

 

Eastaaaaaah.  (Two outta three non-goofballs aint bad, no?)

 

Strawberry Shortcake and baby sandals, oh my!

 

And she was as excited as I was about them!  Squee!

Then it was off to visit family far and wide, where we infected my sister Sant and her girlfriend Leslie with the stomach flu, and also my brother Jake, and then my mom, and then my dad (you know, as a thank you gift for spending the entire day before Easter helping Kevin construct our new swing set), and last but certainly not least we gave the stomach bug to my mother-in-law who is hospitalized with it as we speak. 

I bet they all can't wait to have us over again next year.

Seriously...

 

Aww, baby sink bath at gramma's house.

 

And all ready for Easter.

(Now, did you catch that?)

Those are two different babies, about the same age.  The first is KJ, the second is Marin.

We've been watching home movies over the last several days and every time I really get into one of KJ's baby videos I forget which baby I'm watching because they look so much alike, and even have so many of the same mannerisms. 

I know these pictures aren't identical, but there was no such thing as a digital camera for me during KJ's babyhood and thus the reason there are so few pictures of him available.  Thankfully what the boy lacks in still photography he makes up for in hours upon hours of video documenting his every little baby move, milestone and little baby farts.

I can't help but wonder, over and over again, what I did with all of my TIME back then.  (Recorded videos, is what.)

Which is exactly the type of thing that wins us all of these parenting awards we have lying around...

Me: I am so beat tonight.

Him: Meeee tooooo.

Me: And I still have to put together Easter baskets before I go to bed.

Him: Oh yeah.

Me: Except we ate half of their Easter candy the other night...

Him: If we were really good parents and truly cared about their teeth we would eat the other half tonight.

***

Hope you all have a Happy Easter! 

(And hope your kids score better than ours!)

Take one down, pass it around

I grew up the oldest sibling of four, and very clearly remember whenever one of us would come home with any virus or the dreaded stomach flu, the sinking feeling I'd have in my gut, knowing for sure it was only a matter of time before I too would fall victim.  I was a sitting duck, bright red target on my back reading, Haven't been here yet, virus! Come and get me!

Little did I know my mother probably felt like the most obvious target of us all, with four little sets of hands picking up germs from four school classrooms and four surfaces of grocery store aisles, all ready to gift her with our next disease...just after she'd finished taking care of all nasty substances which had finally finished evacuating our bodies, now harboring hopeful safety to rise again from laundry baskets, bedding and carpeting alike.  My mom used to joke with the nurses at our pediatrician's office that they needed to put in a revolving door for us because we visited so frequently. 

(I hated that joke, I did.  I could see it coming from a mile away even as young as eight or nine.  Uh-oh, here comes the revolving door line, just after the co-pay!)

(So it should come as no surprise to you now that I am thirty years old, grey black hair with three children of my own, that at our pediatrician appointment this morning, the third multi-kid appointment in as many weeks, as our doctor walked through the office door to greet me with sick, half-naked oozing leaking spewing baby girl in my arms, boys seated quietly in chairs flopping noisily off their chairs, scrubbing the germ-infested floor with their bodies, the words - The Joke - shot right out of my mouth before I could stop it.  I didn't even wait for the co-pay, the nurses, the diagnosis.  I blurted out the bit about the revolving door AS IF I had always been this in-the-trenches mother of many, just like my mom was (right?) and not just yesterday a fun perky college kid still asleep at this ungodly hour.  And the doctor laughed just like she probably does with every mother-in-trenches, because we with The Revolving Door Joke and the co-pays are her Business.  Or possibly, she could have been laughing because clearly in the ruckus that was feeding and dressing everyone, packing the diaper bag, re-dressing the last of the vomiters, and racing out the door for the early appointment, I forgot to brush my teeth and spent the entire forty-minute drive doing the finger brush and glancing in the mirror while sucking down the only thing that could save my up-all-night ass, a monster Diet Coke as we hit the expressway.  At least my children were all wearing the proper sized clothes.  And shoes.)

(You love awful motherhood stories, don't you?  Wait.  I have more.)

So last week it was sinus infections, ear infections, low grade fevers, and upper respiratory crap.  Antibiotics, decongestants, nebulizer treatments, cooooooo-pays for all.

Dear young family,

We do love you so.  Thank you for keeping us in business.

Love,

Walgreens

***

Dear Walgreens,

Thank you for bleeding me.  See you next week.

Love,

A young family

And five days into us passing that around?  KJ began the stomach flu. 

I didn't even know that could happen!  The snotty stuff, the coughs, the ears - and then the vomit train right in the middle of it!?

Sitting.  Duck.

First KJ, then Jack.  (Jack who only hit "the bucket" once out of twenty-two lurches, and that once purely by accident.)  Then myself and Marin on the same day, thankfully saved by my mother who not only happened to have that no good awful day off work, but was willing to enter our nightmare so I could sleep it off in between sprints to the bathroom (gosh I should put in a revolving door for that woman.)  Marin is still hanging on to this stomach bug for dear life, gleefully passing it on to her father (who is at work with it as I type) and vomiting for now three days straight. 

As our doctor listened to her belly gurgle this morning she proclaimed that there is massive diarrhea on its way (Oh really?  Because the three days of up-the-back shit-splosions was the pre-show?  Fabulous!) and that if the vomiting continues through Friday she will need to be catheterized for a urinalysis, seeing as how sometimes urinary tract infections, our old friends, show up with vomiting.  Who knew?

Thankfully I was smart enough to cram in KJ and Marin's ear re-checks at the same time, instead of dragging the crew back on Monday for more vein bleeding co-pays.

I am so stinking glad these children got flu shots (followed by the flu, and then the flu, and then the other flu) last fall.  That was most definitely putting our dollars to good use.

 

We have no idea of which Trenches this woman speaks.

Baby Shan

Once upon a time there was a baby born as Marin Ann.  At some point thereafter her three-year-old brother Jackson began calling her Baby Shawn, for his (shared, with KJ) love of all things Olympic Gymnast Shawn Johnson. 

Except it wasn't exactly Baby Shawn.  It was Baby Shan, rhyming with Don, because that is Jack's way.  Or Shan Baby, at other times.  Sometimes he says it so many times in one hour that I think Baby Shan may haul off and belt him. 

Shan, he says, Shan! Shan!

Shaaaaan Baby! 

Baby Shaaaaaaaaaaannnnn! 

SHAN! 

Shannnnn. 

Oh Shan Baby.

And she smiles and squeals and blows raspberries at him, because at seven months old she has yet to master the phrase ENOUGH ALREADY.

So one day Little Bald Baby Shan noticed a Little Something on her exersaucer (wherein she happily prefers to spend three quarters of her Little Bald Baby Shan Life.) 

It was a little beam of light coming in from the nearby window.

Baby Shan was very interested.

And she tried to catch it. 

She tried to pick it up with her little fingers.

She tried to catch it, and pick it up, and when it would not oblige, she screamed at it in her Little Baby Shan Scream.

And then finally she noticed the clicking paparazzi noise above her head.

Oh!  Uhhh...  Hi, Mama!  Naaaaah, I wasn't trying to catch that sunlight.  Heh heh.

On a side note, besides celebrating her seven month birthday and being re-named last week, Baby Shan also suffered Baby's First Double Ear Infection and learned to...

...sit!

(Soon this house will be mine, all mine!  Mwahahaha!)

The end.

Do Over

I thought for sure on Monday morning, when I finally cut ties with this website, that I would finally feel a great sense of relief - finally, one less thing on my plate.  I had been considering it, honestly, for months already.  I hated the way my kids were put on hold and things around the house were neglected so I could crank out an entry several times a week, and I concluded that if I gave this one thing up it would allow me more time to scrape play-doh from every surface in my kitchen. 

My relief did not come, though. 

Instead, I've been so, so sad.

I have been thinking about it constantly - about how I can do this better, and how I might be able to publish something that I actually have time to proof read.  I've considered a new color scheme or layout, and I've given a lot of thought to how I might work time for this in differently (and the answer is, in between the 2am and 5am feedings, before the kids are up at 6:30 and the race for Not Late To Kindergarten begins, gah gah gah.)  

So instead of giving up blogging, I think now I will just get rid of the kids and the house instead.  For sure, that will solve my conundrum.

This is my Take Me Back, Baby entry.

Maybe what I need to say instead of goodbye, is that, DAMN, motherhood can be really freaking hard sometimes.  I want the absolute best for my kids, and I've figured out that, at least, means more of my time and undivided attention.  I want to live in a house with fairly clean floors and home-cooked nutritious dinners where there is infinitely less television watched than imagination exercised.  I want all of us to be readers and learners and to mostly get along.  I want outdoor time and weekly trips to the zoo and financial security.  And I have almost all of that, because I work really, really, holy crap, reeeeeally hard at it. 

But I also need time to myself and time to rejuvenate, and therein lies the lack.  I need time to write here and elsewhere, and for taking pictures and to pound my feet on the treadmill and to enjoy a book in between all of the laundry folding, bill paying, butt-wiping and grocery shopping. 

Maybe this is something I'll never figure out - how to get it all right.  Maybe what I need to accept is that I can get it mostly right and we'll still be okay.  (Will we?)

There was a good rythm to myself with two children every day.  The naps were figured out, the laundry was less, I had enough hands, eyes and ears, and I was finally returning to nice chunks of night-time sleep with children ages five and two.  We didn't see much of Kevin, but we were doing okay and making what we could of the time we had with him each week, because I could easily keep the nitty gritty under control while he was at work.

Then when Marin came along last September everything with our house sort of flopped on its head.  I tried from the first moment to get a grasp on how I was going to do this, because I had no choice.  And it has gotten easier over time, thankfully, but easier in a way that is not easy, you know?  It's not Marin, God help me don't think I blame my baby.  It's like mountain climbing with three backpacks strapped to you, just when you've built up the muscle required for two. 

Growing pains, right?

So long story short, I have no real plan, still.  (Ta-daa!)  I have concluded, however, that having this thing in my life makes me not sad, and a not sad mom is good for my kids, even if it means they've clocked an extra hour of damn Spongebob Squarepants against my better judgment.  I don't know how I will keep everything going once we begin homeschooling (because ohhh, we're going to!) but that can be a bridge we cross once our toes reach the first wood plank.  Or probably the third.