Crazy at Kmart

Saturday was Charlie's birthday. He turned 5 and is thrilled about it. We decided not to have a party since we just returned home from Disney. We figured that was enough craziness for one month. So instead, we took him to Kmart. Under normal circumstances, this would be a lame gift. However, on this particular day, the store was having a CARS event. We'd never been to one of these events, but we read that there was a chance to be able to buy a few CARS cars that were not out in stores yet. That made Charlie ecstatic. He talked about it for a month. We didn't know what to expect, but were hoping, for Charlie's sake, that it wasn't some impossible feat.

Not knowing what to expect, we showed up an hour early for the event. Doug, being the smartie that he is, went straight to Customer Service. I'm not sure I would have thought about that right away, but luckily he did. We had to get tickets, 1 per person, which my husband, in another smart move, got 1 for each of us, so 4 tickets in all. Not sure I would have thought about that either. Then they sent us to the Toys Department. So straight to Toys we went. We figured we would be among the first people there. There were these 2 grown men standing there, tickets in hand. No biggie; I figured there would be collectors. But these guys were hardcore. You could tell they didn't like that there were kids there as competition. For the entire hour long wait, they were talking about CARS and Hot Wheels like they were gold. One was worse than the other, who at least one had a kid with him. But they were both salivating once the staff brought out the boxes.

The rules were then explained. They would call a ticket and whoever won got to go up and look through the cases for 5 minutes and could pick any 5 CARS they wanted. Then they would cal another ticket, etc. I heard that they would only be calling 6 tickets and then it would be a free for all. The collectors were almost on top of the tables. They called the first number and this woman won who did have a kid with her, but the kid didn't even go up to the table. She had this list of numbers and was looking for the numbers. She didn't even know their names. This made the collectors really mad! Then another kid won, which made me happy. Then no one claimed the 3rd ticket number. So we were the 4th ticket called and Charlie's face made it so worth while! He was so excited!! He picked out the CARS he wanted. There were others up there that he didn't have, but I convinced him to give his remaining tickets to another kid. It wouldn't be right for us to go up more than once if another kid didn't get to go up at all. And that kid got to go up next! I felt really good that we helped another kid get some of them too. We left after that because the kids were getting antsy. I really wanted to stick around to see those collectors get nothing.

What an interesting "event". Apparently they have these events for Hot Wheels all the time, so the collectors knew what to expect. It was funny because they were actually mad that they had to let kids go first. It probably really chokes their chains that these kids are going to take the CARS home, open the packages, and probably beat them up from playing with them so much. That makes me laugh. We've already seen a bunch of these on EBay selling for much more than we paid. That is just so sad.

That was our experience at a CARS event. It made Charlie's year to be able to get some new CARS that are not even out in stores yet. It made my day to see the collectors get so bent!

My turn to be sick

So as I sat at work on Wednesday, I began feeling sick. My muscles started aching and I was a little lightheaded. I went home that night and the symptoms got worse. I couldn't clean up from dinner at all and I didn't even have it in me to get the kids to clean up (which, believe me, is a tough job). I almost let them go to bed without baths, but I really didn't want to do that. They had been playing in dirt that day and when Elizabeth doesn't get a bath daily, she tends to smell bad. So I enlisted Charlie's help. I gave them a bath together, but he cleaned himself, got himself dry, dressed himself, and brushed and flossed his teeth himself. So I only had to worry about Elizabeth. They let me slide on the story, too, so I only had to read a page or 2. Once I got them to bed, I went straight to mine.

When the alarm went off at 5:30am on Thursday, I automatically knew I wasn't going to make it to work. When I stood up, the whole room was spinning and my head was pounding. I emailed the office to let them know I wouldn't be in (nice thing about my office is they rely heavily on email, so a simple email is all they need) and went right back to bed. I slept until about 10 and then got up and took something for my headache. I'm not kidding when I say it was literally the worst headache I've ever had. I felt like I had a really bad hangover, but that couldn't be, could it? Definitely not. I went back to bed for most of the day. I did come down among the living for a little bit. I knew if I didn't get out of bed for a bit, I wouldn't be able to sleep that night.

When I woke up this morning, I felt much better. Still a little lingering dizziness, but nothing to call off work for. Besides, it's Friday. Jeans day. Not a day to be off if you don't really need it.

It was really nice to be able to be sick. That's not to say I enjoy being sick, but I do get sick from time to time. What was nice about it was that I actually got to take care of myself by staying in bed this time. I did hear some things from downstairs I didn't particularly like, but I wasn't budging this time.

Here's to being sick and actually getting to be sick!

A good night

I had a great night last night. I got more accomplished in 1 night than I have in the last month it seems. First, I took the kids out front to pull some weeds. They think this is the coolest thing. Charlie actually helps with the weeding, while Elizabeth "pulls" tanbark and puts that into the trash bag. She thinks she's helping, so it doesn't bother me. Charlie thinks it's cool to wear a gardening glove, which is way too big for him by the way. We were smiling and singing and it was really fun. So not only were we getting a household chore done, we were spending quality time together. No one was fighting and the kids really felt important.

Then, we came in and I had to vacuum the house. It really needed it. Normally, when I vacuum, the kids feel that it's open season for fighting because I can't hear them real well. But last night was different. Maybe it was the fresh air they just got or the feeling of importance, but they actually were getting ready for their baths by themselves while I was vacuuming. It was the cutest thing! Charlie was helping Elizabeth get her pajamas picked out and then he helped her use the potty! The fact that they were getting along made the night go very smoothly. And I got some things done to boot.

After I got them to bed, I was able to prepare food for my lunches this week, write instructions for Elizabeth's doctor appt. today for Doug, made little lunches for the kids to eat in the car today since they will be running errands with Doug over lunch, and did a few other things. I don't know where I found the energy to do all of this, but I'm glad I did. I feel better knowing I was able to get some things done.

So, what did you accomplish today?

Job Description: MOM

When I was pregnant with my 5-year-old, I had wonderful dreams of toting the baby around to stores, showing him off to anyone who would look, and singing him to sleep. For a while, that is how it was. No one warned me, however, that there would come a time when that dream would no longer be my reality.

Let me give you an example of what I mean. I finally took some vacation from work. Aaahh...wonderful vacation. So, I have been off work since the 2nd of October. We were away from the 3rd to the 9th and I tacked on a few extra vacation days at the end to just relax. Since we've been home from our trip, I have not stopped. Not even for a second. All 3 of the children (OK, 2 kids and 1 childlike husband) have been sick. The 2-year-old had a fever for 2 days and was miserable. Then my husband starts throwing up for 2 days straight. Then my 5-year-old catches that. He's a great sick person, never complains. But he's the "silent attacker". He woke us up in the middle of the night telling us that he was going to use the bathroom. OK, he never does that, so I knew something was up right there, but I stayed in bed anyway. Then he comes in to tell me that he wanted to sleep with us. Why, you may ask? Well, so did I and the answer was because he threw up in his bed. And ATTACK! So now I'm worried the rest of the night that he's going to throw up on me or in my bed, which will, in turn, cause me to start hurling. And I keep thinking about how I now have to strip his bed in the morning, on top of the mile long list of other things I have to do on my last day of "vacation". No sleep for me. So what else is new?

So today, my husband still cannot muster enough strength to do anything, really. It is day number 4 of this "illness" and he can still do nothing but sit on the couch watching TV. I can honestly say that in the last year I have literally taken 1 day off work for actually being sick, and I was in bed only a few of those hours. The remaining time I spent tending to the kids and the house because somehow me just being home is some sort of signal to him that he can do nothing. But I digress. I did 5 loads of laundry and put it all away, ran a bunch of errands, made lunch and dinner, played with the kids outside, emptied all the garbage cans (which were disgustingly full), vacuumed, talked to our insurance guy for a half hour, pulled together a week's worth of snacks for preschool this week, and straightened out our daughters Dr. appt. for which my darling husband wrote the wrong time in the calendar. Whew! So much for a vacation day!

Unfortunately, this type of chaos occurs any day I have off work. If I stayed home with the kids, these things would be done throughout the week, but since I can't be here, I have to do them when I am. I guess my job away from home is my second job, really. My first job is here, at night and on the weekends (and sick and vacation days, too). Not exactly what I dreamt about as a new mom all those years ago!

Vacations are supposed to be fun, aren't they?

So we're finally back from our vacation. I want to preface this recount by saying that I love my family and had a great time with them. That being said, here are the highlights:

We had to stay at a hotel in Baltimore on Thursday night because we had to be at the airport at 5am on Friday. We picked this particular hotel on the recommendation of my mother-in-law and because we could park both cars for free all week (worked into the price of the rooms, I'm sure). So the hotel was definitely not the best hotel (probably the worst I've ever stayed at, but you can't go by me because I very rarely travel). I didn't get a wink of sleep the whole night because I was convinced there were bedbugs. I kept feeling biting sensations all over my body, but no one else did, so I guess I was just being my psychotic self. They did take us to the airport and pick us up, so that was nice.

When we go to check our bags, they informed us that our smallest bag was over sized by 1.5" and we had to pay $39 for that. Umm...it's our smallest bag...what? I was a little PO'd because our travel agent should have gone over the size/weight requirements with us (isn't this one of the reasons we would go through a travel agent in the first place?) OK, so we paid the damn $39 and were bound and determined to have a good trip. My exact words, which I don't think have ever come out of my mouth, were, "it's only money". The kids did GREAT on the plane. I was nervous that one or the other would scream the whole way there, the way I did when I was little, but they were totally fine. I think I was more freaked out than they were.

So we get there and we use the Disney Dining Plan to buy a counter service lunch. When we looked at the receipt, the remaining counter service lunches seemed to be short a few. So Doug went to the front desk to ask. Come to find out that our 2-year-old isn't included on the meal plan, so we have to pay outright for all of her meals. I was doubly PO'd that our travel agent failed to relay this information to us as well. But I was tired and just figured we'd deal with it. Until we went to our first table service meal. We didn't order her a dinner, instead, she shared off of the rest of our plates. But they included her as part of the party of 6 (there would be only 5 not including her) that is required to pay the 18% gratuity that is automatically added to the bill! Excuse me? So she doesn't exist in the eyes of Disney when it comes to the meal plan and we don't order her a meal at all, so no extra work for the server, but she magically appears when it's time to add that automatic 18% gratuity?? How wrong!! They justified this by saying that we didn't pay for her to get into the parks, so we're saving there. I don't think so! If she doesn't exist on the meal plan and doesn't exist in the parks, then she shouldn't exist for gratuity's sake! Most nights, I wouldn't have minded. But 1 night in particular, we had a horrible waitress and we never would have paid an 18% gratuity to her. But we were forced to.

Some other highlights included my mother-in-law deciding that flip flops were the way to go for footwear when walking 5-10 miles a day. She proceeded to blow out her knee on day #2 and had to be wheeled around in a wheelchair the rest of the week. This made most rides great because we got to get in the front of the line, but the buses on the other hand, took forever. Oh well, not the end of the world.

We arrived home on Thursday night and quickly got the kids to bed. The next day, we go out to lunch because we have very little in the way of food at the house. So Doug eats a salad and then gets food poisoning. He was throwing up all night Friday night and it was coming out the other end all day Saturday. By today, he was feeling a little better, but not 100%. Elizabeth spiked a fever on Thursday during travel that lasted until Saturday. Charlie spiked one today.

And I decided to see an endocrinologist to get my dosage increased since my other doctor (who was not an endocrinologist) had left the practice. The endocrinologist told me that she doesn't think I even have any thyroid problems. She said my thyroid is normal size and she can't imagine why my other doctor said the things she said. Of course she can't explain why I feel the way I feel. Now what do I do? I'm pretty much back at square one. I'll probably get fired from my job because I can't concentrate or remember anything and have to call off because I'm too tired to get out of bed.

Anyway, I did have a nice time on vacation. I know, though, that our next vacation will be very relaxing instead of chaotic. I'm thinking beach chair, book, sounds of the ocean, glass of wine in hand. Aaahhh...