Nanny, Work and Costumes

Tomorrow is my first official day as a working mama. I somehow have to manage to be up, dressed, fed and out the door at 7:30, which seems kind of early considering we usually don't wake up until about 7 around here. I'm excited though because the 3 times I was there last week were so much fun and I love the group of kiddos I have.

I also found a great nanny for my own kids that will be coming here every afternoon until Matt gets off work. They love her and I love her so it's a total win. I think the transition will be much easier on the kids since Miss A is so sweet and fun and a lot like me as far as discipline and personality.

I don't have any pictures of the kids in costumes uploaded yet but Matt and I went with some friends to a costume party Saturday night and this is one of my costumes this year. I dressed up 3 times this year. I'm sure that's a new record for me. I love not being fat at Halloween. Fat girl costumes suck. This costume certainly did not suck.

My Newest Addition

I LOVE this tattoo! It hurt like a bitch to get done (and took almost 2 hours) and I must admit it's hard to wear pants. Especially dress pants like I had to wear today. With my other tattoo I had problems with my bra strap rubbing it but pants are a much bigger problem. I'm so in love with it though. And I'm going to have my other one colored in ASAP. We picked out colors and stuff yesterday and he offered to do it then but I was all tattooed out at that point. I just couldn't sit through another one.

I have a lot of great things to post about, including some great job news and the amazing nanny I found for the kids but I'm rushing around today trying to get things done before Monday. I'll try to post an update later today on everything.

Craziness

So apparently I'm officially crazy. I took on a job teaching pre-k Monday-Friday 7:30-5:30 and I'll have class Mon-Thurs from 5:50-10:15. Yeah. Essentially that means I'll be non-existant around here Mon-Thurs and the time I am here Fri-Sun will be spent doing homework and working on lesson plans. I'm extremely stressed out about this whole process but excited too. This week I'm running around like crazy trying to get everything ready before Monday. I have someone I'm interviewing tomorrow to watch the kids in the afternoons so Matt can work, I got my flu shot and TB test, need to get the kids in for flu shots, I need to get some new shirts to wear to work and the list goes on and on. So I'm really not dead or anything. Just up to my eyes in chaos.

Yeah...Not So Much

You know that post I did about how running makes me feel great? Screw it because I now have an injured foot and back. I can barely move and it's almost torturous to sit for any amount of time. That just seems to be how things are going these days. One step forward and two steps back.

The kids both got to go to the pumpkin patch with their schools so we have a couple more pumpkins sitting on the porch. Every morning they go running downstairs to make sure nobody stole them. Isn't that sad? Two years ago someone took their pumpkins and I don't think they'll ever get over it. As soon as the pumpkins hit the porch this year they started worrying about them being taken. It just breaks my heart that they've already had some little bit of innocence taken from them by some stupid teenage brats.

J is having some serious behavioral issues again. We're going to have to really team up on him and get him back in line. A lot of it is coming from his frustrations at school and he constantly thinks he isn't good enough. I feel bad for the little guy because I know he's just having trouble venting his frustrations.

M is doing fantastic as long as you don't count the 30 minutes in the morning where she has to decide what shoes to wear and how she wants her hair done. Other than that she's been mostly pleasant lately. I think I'll keep her after all. :)

No Clever Title, Just an Update

I always forget how good running makes me feel. This morning I helped out in M's classroom so I had a very limited amount of time to spend at the gym before I had to pick up J. I jumped on the treadmill without hesitation and started running. I don't run often anymore simply because if I run for more than a couple days in a row my foot starts hurting and I end up starting all over again with the healing process. I've tried different shoes, ankle braces, stretching and anything else the doctor recommended but in the end it still hurts so I just don't do it much. That first mile is always the hardest for me. I made it past the first mile and felt ok so I pushed on to mile 2. Somewhere between 3 and 4 my foot started hurting so I gave up. It didn't matter that I couldn't run as far as I used to. I didn't care that as far as calories burned it probably wasn't a great workout. I felt fantastic! I came home to throw lunch in the oven real fast, picked up J from school, did some grocery shopping for some new Healthy Mama's recipes, finished up the paperwork for my school stuff and then went back to the gym to finish my workout. All in all I think it was a rather successful day.

A New Project

What do you do when you feel like your life is all chaos and you need to have control over something? Well, I don't know what you do, but I paint. Thank God I live like 2 minutes from Lowes because last week I up and decided I'm completely re-decorating my entire house. Yes it's a bit insane but I need a project and I need a change of scenery. Today was the dining room. The picture kind of sucks but you get the idea.

Next up is the basement bedroom. The paint is bought and I hope to have it done by the end of the week. I'm also going to re-paint our kitchen and living room myself in the coming weeks. A friend's husband is hopefully going to be helping us out and I hope by the first of the year to have the entry way, upstairs hallway, basement family room and basement bathroom completely re-done. The tile on our fireplace needs to be replaced (because it's some weird ass color that just doesn't work with anything) and I want to go through all the crap we have stored in the basement and get rid of a lot of things. I'm hoping it's therapeutic. I figure it can't hurt.

An Update and Some Good News!

Things are still kind of rough around here right now and I hesitate to do a post explaining where things are and what's going on and I'm not sure why. Everyone who is close to me knows at least part of what's happening around here so it shouldn't be a big deal to just lay it all out there, right? But it still feels just a little too close to home to put out there for everyone to read. I'll just sum it up and say Matt and I have been going through a rough time in our marriage. We've been struggling with some things and we are both at fault. We don't communicate very well with each other and it's just been hard for me to have completely changed as a person when he hasn't changed. I really like to go out and hang out with my friends to sing karaoke, have a drink or two and hit the dance floor. Matt would much rather stay home and watch a movie. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that, but it gets to the point that we spend a lot of time apart simply because we don't have the same interests. It's really hard to put into words everything that's happening right now so I'm not even going to try. It would just end up being a long rambling post and I'm sure it wouldn't be much fun to read. I am going to counseling by myself to try to work through some of the issues I have regarding the weight loss and new interests in my life. We're going to try marriage counseling again and see where it gets us. Hopefully it goes better than last time. That lady was CRAZY! She needs to be in therapy instead of doing it for others.

But onto the good news! I went and signed up to do a medical assistant program this week! It starts at the end of November and lasts just over a year. I'm really excited about it and I look forward to something new to challenge me in my life. I need something to focus on right now and I think this is just what I need. Not to mention it means I can have a full time career soon! I applaud anyone who can be a stay-at-home parent the whole time their child is living at home. It's not for me. I love my children but it's definitely an absence makes the heart grow fonder kind of thing. We are all together way too much in this house.

There Really Are No Words

Life is complicated. In fact, sometimes life is so complicated I can't even begin to put into words how and why things are happening. Things aren't all doom and gloom around here or anything but man I'm physically, mentally and emotionally exhausted right now. Both kids are happy and healthy (well technically I think M has the stomach bug that I had yesterday only hers came with a nice high fever and chills...ugh) so I'm thankful for that. I have some amazing friends (both old and new) that have been so very supportive and understanding lately. I'm learning more and more about myself every day and I'm holding onto some hope that somewhere deep down in me I have the ability to get through this and end up on the other side in one piece. If only I knew what the other side was it would be helpful.