The Rat Race

Boy howdy folks - time hasn't been flying for me - it's been moving at warp speed - or so it seems.

Again it's been forever since I have posted and I really miss you all. Honestly I am trying to post more, but finding the time has been hard since I don't have a job where I sit on my arse all day where my main responsibility was to just look busy.

I AM busy in this job....very busy and I love it. At first I have to admit it was very difficult being away from the boys. There were a few times I tried to write a post about what a crappy mother I felt like for going back to work, but I never had time to finish it. Nnow I'm more or less over that feeling. More or less. It also sucked having to be at the gym at 4:45 AM so I could get my workout done and be home in the shower by 6. And it really sucked having to pluck the little guys, all warm and toasty out of their beds at such an early hour and then listen to them whine, argue and complain all through breakfast because they were so tired and cranky. Yes, the first couple of weeks were very lovely.

But as we humans do, we have all adjusted to the new routine of mommy bringing home some bacon too. And things are going well. Little D and Captain Crazy are doing great in school and honestly I think they adjusted faster and easier than I did. (I actually carried one of Little D's socks around in my pocket one day I missed them so much)

I do have lots to write about. Some of the people I work with are crazy, and some are a few fries short of Happy Meal, but they are all really nice and fun to be around. One of the Managers is a nice, tall drink of water and he makes my thighs burn when I look at him. I have justified this in my mind by the fact that he's not my boss so it's okay to get all slobbery when he walks by. But, more about all of that and other things will have to wait for now. I have to hit the shower early this morning.

Thanks for still stopping by and checking to see if I am alive. I do love to see to you here!

Day 3 and the best Christmas gift ever.

So so so much has happened since I last posted what seems like a thousand years ago. The obvious major holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas, and the visits from family, trips out of town, and all the other little ups and downs of life - all stuff that came and went without so much as a whisper about it on my blog.

Why?

I don't know really. It could be that I knew my time at home with the boys was limited and I wanted to spend it as fully engaged with them as possible. Or it could be that they just kept me so busy that even if I had wanted to write, which I did try to do several times, I only got a few lines deep before something blew up, broke, or blood was shed. Hmmm, yeah, I think that was it.

But anyway, today I want to share two big things with you all so here I am - up waaaay before I should be so I can hopefully get this post up before the chaos of the new day begins.

Drumroll please.......I finally found a job - a full time job with nice pay and nice benefits to boot. Yah! I finished day three of orientation last week and my two week training starts Monday.

And while I am quite thankful to have a job now, I have a lot of mixed feelings.
When they offered me the position, part of me was jumping up and down and the other part of me panicked because in just 5 short months my boys and I tossed structure out the window and slipped into some pretty comfortable and relaxed routines like sleeping till 9 (them, not me)and I didn't want anything to change that.

Anyway, I'm back at work now and the first week, which thanks to the New Years holiday, consisted on only three days. The boys seemed just fine but the real test will come next week. When they have to get up at 6:30 am for five days in a row and go to school and daycare all week long - then we'll see how they do.

And selfishly I pray they do fine - I hope they rock the house. It would be so much easier on me because I have some major guilt about going back to work. I just wish I could split myself in two sometimes. I don't have
to work. We could continue living the way we have been these past 5 months - cutting out the fat and living leaner. But I still have professional goals and the longer I stay out of the workforce the harder it will be for me to achieve them. And what happens when the boys are older and in school most of the day? What happens when they want to be with their friends more than they want to be home? What then? So yes, I am trying to put some salve on my guilt by thinking of the future - a future that has me working and earning money and "getting ahead". I just wish I could prolong things a bit.

The second bit of news is that Dane potty trained himself the week before Christmas. I had tried coaxing him into using the potty on several occasions, all with mixed results. He knew exactly what he needed to do but actually told me a couple of times that he just wasn't ready and still wanted to use his diapers. Can't argue with that so I let the issue drop completely. Then one morning I casually asked him if he wanted to try using the potty and he said he didn't like his potty because it hurt his butt and that was why he still liked his diapers. So, we got him a different potty and he never looked back. Problem solved and diapers gone!

I have to hand it to Little D. He knows what he likes and doesn't like and when he's ready to do something, he does it. No wishy-washy crap and no looking back.

Maybe I should take a cue from him.

Happy New Year's everyone.

I'm still here -surprisingly.

Wow it's been a long time since I last posted and it seems to be getting harder and harder to find the time to sit down and write.

It seems like now that I am a full time SAHM I am busier than ever. I have been a SAHM mom before, but back then I only had one kiddo to watch over and I wasn't trying to find a new job on top of everything else. Now I have two kids - not that two is some unmanageable number but it is more than one, and I'm trying to find a new job and juggle about a billion other things at the same time. And the juggling thing - I know why I'm doing it - because I feel like I have to or I should because I'm not working right now. I just can't seem to slooooowww down and enjoy the ride. Crazy, I know.

Anyway, so many fun things have happened that I just haven't had time to write about. The Captain's 5th birthday, waaaaaaaay back in September. (I know, shame on me) A family trip to Colorado - again waaaaaaay back in September. And who could forget the arrival of Autumn with it's pumpkin patches, pumpkin carving and Halloween? And now Thanksgiving is staring me in the face and Christmas is right around the corner. And then there all the funny things I see and hear my kids do on a daily basis - the very reason I wanted to start this blog in the first place. So, so many things to write about and yet I have barely managed to eek out one post a month. I am trying to figure out a way to carve out more time to write because I really do enjoy blogging and visiting other blogs.

But for the immediate future -sporadic posts will have to do for me. So with that in mind I want to make sure I wish all of my bloggy friends who stop by here a "Happy Thanksgiving!"

Now I have to go - Little D is up and he wants his "Bweckfist"

I should be sleeping right now

I have been up since 4:45 this morning.

I am tired. Very tired.

And I am completely pissed off that the ONE freaking day I get to sleep in past 5:30, I wake up at 4:45.

I didn't do it voluntarily. No. I woke up to Little D hacking his head off so of course I got up to take care of him. Except he didn't much feel like going back to sleep after his 45 min. coughing spell. Instead he laid in his bad and called for me non-stop for another hour. When I finally went back into his room to tell him in a nice and loving way to SHUT THE HELL UP ALREADY!, he looked at me and ever so sweetly and said, "Mommy, I need my orange binkie"

For Christ's sake!

After I fished his binkie out from under his bed he was pretty much completely done with the whole going back to bed idea so up we got.

He's currently in his room, making all kinds of noise again when he should be taking his nap. This does not look good.

You're probably wondering why I just don't sneak in a nap while he's in his room, right? Well, I tried but my wacky next door neighbor is in his garage, banging in his drum set and I can hear everything. And he sucks too.

And as I finish writing this, my husband and The Captain are back from running errands, and Little D is now calling for his big brother - hoping that he will rescue him from his naptime hell.

Who is going to rescue me?

DISCLAIMER - I would never actually tell my kids to SHUT THE HELL UP ALREADY
but the thought has run through my mind on more than occasion.

Cumpumbers and Pamatoes and other interesting things

My Little D is a smidgen over two and half and to my delight he still massacres words every now and then. For example, "cumpumber" is his word for cucumber and "pamato" is his word for tamato.

His older brother could pronounce words like "kaleidoscope" "rutabaga" and "trapezoid" perfectly at age 1, which always made people think he was older than he was.

But not Little D. He called grapes "beeps" for a long time. Chicken nuggets were "chicken nugwits" and he replaced every "S' with an "H" so "snack" was instead "hack" and "Santa Claus" was "Hanta Claus".

My husband and I would correct him every now and then, just to make sure he knew the correct way to say such words and then we let him figure it out on his own, which he did. There's only a few words he doesn't get now and it sort of makes me a little sad because it means he's growing up. My last little baby is very quickly becoming a big boy -right before my tired eyes.

Anyway, I have seriously neglected my blog and I haven't been checking in with a lot of you and I feel bad.

But there's only so much a mortal woman can do, you know? And this blessed job search is the pits. So much has happened since I posted last but instead of throw all kinds of crazy at you all at once I thought some pics of our trip to the farm to pick "pamatos" would do nicely....for now.

We are big fans of community supported agriculture. In the summer, we basically buy a "membership" to one of the gobs of small farms around the area and then we get all of our produce from them until the fall. The farm we have "belonged" to the last couple of years does this thing called "salsa time" where it's members can come out to the farm and pick 50lbs of tamatos, peppers, garlic and cilantro to make salsa.

This year we picked the perfect day and the perfect time to visit the farm as the weather was gorgeous and we were the only folks there. It was heaven.

A lot of people tell me that I am very lucky to have little ones that like veggies enough to eat them raw....off of the ground. I would have to agree.

Let the games begin

Oh joy - my job search has started in earnest people and all I can say is.....it blows.

A lot.

Every single minute I have spent on the computer in the past couple of weeks has been dedicated to prowling job boards, placement agency websites, newspaper websites and "how to write a kick-ass cover letter" websites.

No blogging, no Facebook, no Twitter, no email. No nothing.

I feel disconnected. Unplugged.

I did come across a position pretty early on in my search. It happened to be with a past employer - an "esteemed institution of higher learning". I thought I just might luck out and end my job search in short order seeing as how I worked for so-called institution for almost three years, and I did a good job while I was there. I also had every single iota of experience they were calling for so I wasn't surprised when I landed a phone interview. How could I not, really?

I also fully expected to be called back for an on-campus interview.

However, about three days after my phone interview, I received a rejection email from the search committee chair letting me know that they while they appreciated my interest in the position they selected finalists whose experience better suited their needs blah, blah, blah.

Whatever, Cornholio.

I do admit that my telephone interview wasn't stellar. I spent my entire morning running after, cleaning up after, and refereeing my boys. I laid Little D down for his nap and kicked The Captain out the door with the sitter about 5 minutes before the start of the interview. I was prepared, but not ready for it. If that makes any sense?

And it probably didn't help me in any way that the department Vice President is still pissed that I left my job after The Captain was born - after I promised that I was coming back and after he created a new position for me that kept me from traveling so much.

I don't really have much to say about that except 'Sorry dude, but that's how the cookie crumbles. If you didn't have a dick you'd understand'

Sadly, being cast away like a piece of trash by a former employer hasn't been the cherry on top of my delightful job search. I think that might be the numerous rejections I have received for jobs that require nothing but a heartbeat and a will to live to qualify.

This whole job search thing may be harder than I thought.

It was a whopper!

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So we took the boys fishing last weekend. It was The Captain's third or fourth time and as you can see, he already has the ability of a seasoned pro. Just look at the whopper on his line!




But Little D was not to be outdone by his big brother and landed his first catch of the day too.

We took them fishing at some ponds outside of town. I hate fishing in ponds. Actually I just plain hate ponds. Especially the kind that have half weed, half nasty-ass scum-of-some-type covering the surface. These ponds did - as you can see by the picture. Doesn't that look like the perfect pond home for a swamp monster, or a dead body??? Shiver.

I have never been a fan of large, murky bodies of water. I have always had a problem with swimming in them because I'm totally afraid that something could be lurking right below the surface, just waiting to get me. I saw a movie a loooong time ago about a big swamp blob that ate a pack of swimmers after they took an innocent afternoon dip. I was at a very impressionable age so I'm sure that's why I'm such a freak about it.

Anyway, after the boys grew bored with fishing, they ate some watermelon and then went exploring.

Then we drove to a nearby peach orchard and picked some peaches.
Notice Little D going for all the rotten fruit on the ground. But he quickly figured out that the peaches from the tree were much tastier.

After we had eaten/picked our fill we went home. The boys were muddy, tired, sticky and exhausted - a sign of a very good day.

Looking back at this summer, I think we have had quite a few great days and I'm really thankful for that. I have enjoyed being able to spend more time my boys, taking them to the beach, the zoo, and the water parks.

I'm looking for work now and will probably end up going back full-time. Even though I knew this time would come sooner or later, it's still going to be hard, so my plan for now is to enjoy the rest of the time that I have left and really make the most of it. I think I hear the beach calling my name again!