Category Archives: random

This past weekend took a lot out of all of us.

Friday night we went to the baseball game down town and stayed for the fireworks afterward. The kids had a really good time, but we didn’t get home until after 11PM.

Saturday, we had cake for Cait’s birthday in the afternoon and then later went to the county fair and saw the school bus demolition derby with my MIL. The kids loved it! A few of the busses were painted really well and we rooted for the Spiderman Bus all night long. Our second favorite was the Mickey Mouse Bus that had a Mickey Mouse figure standing on top of it. Unfortunately, after a few hits Mickey fell down which upset Caitlyn quite a bit. Then his head fell off and another bus ran it over which caused her to go in to a fit of hysterics. Ed and I were trying to calm her down telling her it wasn’t the real Mickey and so on when Eddie screams “MICKEY IS DEAD CAIT!!!” and kind of rolled his eyes like “deal with it already”. We couldn’t help but laugh. We aren’t winning any awards for parents of the year, that’s for sure.

We took a lot of photos but I haven’t had the chance to download them yet. We spent the day doing pretty much nothing Sunday and everyone was pretty crabby from lack of sleep.

Yesterday was day one at the new daycare and drop off went well; we spent some time with each of the kids in their new room and they were good. Today, not so much. Eddie was fine, but Caitlyn freaked out. Ed wanted to stay with her until she was calm and I wanted to leave and let her work it out. He stayed, arguing that it was like we were leaving her with strangers, and I left. I see his point and where he is coming from; I do. But I feel like if we baby her she will refuse to get used to it. I know that I’m doing the right thing, but I feel horrible when I leave her.

They really do enjoy the new place so far though. Eddie has a guinea pig named Max in his room and he can bring him home for a weekend if he wants.
(God, please don’t let him want to bring the guinea pig home.) He also enjoyed the hermit crabs in another room. Cait had fun riding tricycles and playing with a little girl named Anna.

I’m still tired from the weekend and from having Eddie in our bed last night, and on top of it, I’m strangely nauseous. I’d really just like to go home to bed, but I have too much to do at work.

Maybe we could start today over……

This started out as a comment on Swistle’s Blog, right here, but it got too long. I love talking about baby clothes though, so here it goes.

Oh boy! Baby clothes is one of my favorite subjects! When Eddie was born in the dead of winter, I had no problem just keeping him in the footed sleepers at home. He stayed warm, and I was sure he was warm. When he started daycare I sent him in a new outfit every day. Sometimes he’d go through 3 outfits a day, but he was always fully clothed.

When Cait was born in the dead heat of summer, I kept her in onsies, but I bought the ones with the little skirt around them so she was a bit dressed up. I had the same policy on her leaving the house though, always dressed.

I openly admit that I am neurotic about my children’s appearance and clothing and I know that this is a direct result of not having a lot of clothes, especially the “cool clothes” while I was growing up. I don’t ever want my kids to feel like I did. EVER. So even though it makes no difference to them right now, it makes a huge difference to me.

We tend to get lucky in the hand me down department as both kids have cousins, a brother/sister pair who are about a year older than them, whose grandma shops at high end stores. They get a lot of high quality never worn stuff as well as winter coats and snow pants—a tremendous help. When it comes to buying clothes, I do a lot of Old Navy and Target clearance, plus the Okee Dokee branch at JC Penny and Sears has a play clothes line that is extremely reasonable $5-$6 per piece, pants and shirts. They usually run a 2 for $9 special at season change and that’s where I get a lot. They get plenty of clothes for gifts as well.

Oh, Swistle, by the way—I am the same way with girly clothes, even if I end up having another girl. Cait has way more than she will ever need or wear and I just.can’t.stop.buying…..

And when they’re done with the clothes, they are stored in labeled bankers boxes categorized by gender and size and stored in age order in my basement so that I’ll know right where they are when the time comes.

Neurotic much?

I remember singing a song in grade school, something along the lines of

“Ketchup is good on most anything! Hot Dogs! Hamburger! Onion Rings!”

I thought about it the other day as I made some wonderfully tender, flavorful breaded turkey cutlets for dinner. They were quite amazing, if I do say so myself. Naturally, I took offense when Ed put ketchup on them. KETCHUP! ON TURKEY!

He said to me at one point during dinner

“The ketchup tastes kind of weird….”

I didn’t even look up from my plate, but replied quite snarkily

“Perhaps it’s because you’re dipping TURKEY in it.”

I was livid, and so offended, and so……like my mother……in that moment.

But seriously, what in the hell would possess you to slather ketchup all over your perfectly good dinner? To be honest with you, I find it to be quite rude.

I blame his mother, who coats my perfect pork chops in the stuff. I know, right!! MY PORK CHOPS! They taste like heaven!

His mother who upon dishing herself a plate of my cheesy Italian goulash this past Saturday, immediately went to the fridge and squeezed ketchup all over it.

I threw her out of my house.

OK, not really, but I sure felt like it.

And what happened when I politely informed her that there was already ketchup in the goulash?

She giggled and took her seat.