Weasel Of Doom

• Pick up all three kids from daycare – check
• Feed kids cereal for dinner – check
• Unload and reload the dishwasher – check
• Get YoungestOne to gymnastics only 15 minutes late – check
• Force OldestOne to read during YoungestOne’s class- check
• Give all three kids haircuts – check
• Herd kids upstairs to take a bath – check
• (start drinking Seagram’s Escapes “Wild Berries” malt beverage with natural & artificial flavors and certified colors)
• Hang up kids clothes while they are fighting each other in the tub – check
• Wash kids – check
• Get kids into their beds an hour AFTER their bed time – check
• Unload and reload the dishwasher again – check
• (finish drinking Seagram’s Escapes)
• Take lights and decorations off the Christmas tree and drag Christmas tree outside – check
• Go through kids’ toys and decide which ones get banished to the basement – check
• Organize remaining toys and vacuum great room – check
• Shower – check
• Get to bed before midnight – total fail

Somebody searched my blog for this. Also for “god i need a job that pays good or i need to win the lottery.”

To my unknown depressed and poor brethren and sistren – hang in there…

From a conversation with my cousin this morning:

HER: Is your Christmas tree up yet?
ME: Nope.
HER: Christmas is in like two weeks!
ME: On the 25th. Today is the 4th. So, three weeks.
HER: Well, when do you usually put you tree up?
ME: One year, it was on January 1st.
HER: …That’s pretty much all I needed to know. Please say no more…

I have tried filing our 2010 tax return w/out logging in. It told me to create an account, and then wigged out. I have tried filing with logging in. It keeps wanting to charge me $10. GRRRR! What happened to “free e-file for everyone”?) Sent a message to support, asking how do I switch my account from Deluxe to Free. This is now 4 hours of my life that I am not getting back… *sigh* (Good thing I have an alternative – HR Block software from Shannon. Thank you, Shannon! Tomorrow shall be Attempt To File Taxes, Take 3.)

But on the plus side, I did manage to go through all the mail. Found a bill for OldestOne’s 5K registration fee. Which was supposed to have been paid a year ago. Oops.

Other things that got done:

• Filed Dependent Care and Health Care reimbursement forms.
• Paid OldestOne’s 5K registration fee (just in time for 1st grade).
• Registered MiddleOne for 5K.
• Finalized YoungestOne’s registration for daycare.
• We went to IKEA, got a bunk bed and mattresses, and Bill put the bed together already.
• Bought school supplies.
• Transferred my 403b contributions to a different plan.
• Paid the bills.
• Mowed the lawn.
• Did laundry.
• Went to State Fair with Karen. Thanks to me, she is no longer a cream puff virgin.

Short-term goals for this week:

• File the stupid taxes.
• Buy small gifts for Russian relatives.
• Not forget to pack anything for my flight to Russia on Friday.

And now that I have bored everybody senseless, time to catch on my Go Fug Yourself reading :)

Apparently, it was Rita Mae Brown who said “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again but expecting different results.” She also said, “Good judgment comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgment.” Rita Mae Brown is wise. I, on the other hand, am a poster child for her definition of insanity, with a bonus helping of adult onset of Attention Deficit Disorder thrown in.

Back when I was a teenager, once every few months I would try to “Start A New Life.” That consisted of writing out a set of goals (be polite to parents, develop strong willpower, do homework early, clean house, get up early and exercise – you get the idea), sticking with them for a few weeks, then derailing, waving hands in despair, and returning to my Old Life ways. Since I am also a poster child for failing to learn from experience, a few months later I would give New Life another try. Rinse, repeat.

The reason for my continuing attempts at New Life is that writing out “to do” lists IS the best way for me to get things done. I am REALLY GOOD at writing “to do” lists and sticking with them for a week or two. Unfortunately, I am REALLY BAD at going the distance. I get distracted. I get discouraged. I look for excuses. I fail, and I quit.

The point of this rambling post is that August is a new month, and I am going to make another attempt at Starting A New Life. This time, the theme is “Baby Steps.” Here’s my list; some items are pretty specific, some very generic:

• Try to get to work between 8 am and 8:30 am
• Write down everything I do at work
• Only check Google Reader and Facebook before 8:30 am, during lunch, and after 5 pm
• Keep tracking food and exercise on LoseIt
• Write down short-term goals for things to do at home that week, and do them
• Try to waste less time online
• Be a better parent to my kids and a better wife to my husband
• Try to keep up with my blog, book blog, and photo gallery
• Try to go to bed before midnight
• If everything is going well at work, not buy cigarettes

Short-term goals for week of August 1-7:

• Go through mail
• File taxes

Wish me luck!

We were THOSE parents this February 14th. Too bad the teachers know we do not belong to a Valentine’s-Day-shunning cult, because our actions certainly seem to imply it:

• MiddleOne did not bring a Valentine for every one of the 35 kids in his daycare room
• we forgot about the empty kleenex box to hold the Valentines he received
• did not turn in a decorated giant red heart for family homework for OldestOne
• OldestOne did not bring 19 Valentines for the classmates
• I am sure I will find out more things we missed once I actually go through two boxes of mail that’s accumulated on my washer and dryer

I feel guilty and glad that the kids seem unscathed by our multiple failures this day.

When Bill took the kids to Russia last summer, I got more done in two weeks than I had in the previous 6 months: took down outside Christmas decorations (in June… the neighbors cheered); washed windows and dusted blinds, cleaned the fridge and the stove; organized baby clothes and kids toys; washed and vacuumed both cars; planted flowers; lost almost 10 pounds; washed great room curtains; went through months’ worth of mail — all that while working full time. And then Bill got back early, and my accomplishments ground to a screeching halt. In the six months since, I still haven’t hung the curtains back up, the mail pile is overflowing, the cars get washed by rain and snow, bins of clothes and toys are still sitting in the guest bedroom, the study is an “enter at your own risk” zone, we still have the (live, now pretty much dead) Christmas tree up, and my Christmas wreaths are doubling up as Valentine’s Day wreaths.

I am beginning to suspect that the only way I can get anything done is when I am alone and not distracted. This have worked well through childhood, high school, college, and before-children married years, and somewhat well through one-child and two-children years. It is so not working now, in the three-children years. I feel like I am slowly drowning under all the things I should be doing but am not. I am past “overwhelmed” and firmly into “if I just ignore my problems, they will all go away,” aka The Ostrich Approach. As a coping method, it leaves a lot to be desired, especially since I know that sticking my head in the sand is only making things worse (though the thought of getting in the car and driving into the sunset has great appeal).

It’s time for some attitude adjustments. I am going to try and focus on putting out fires one at a time, ignoring the fact that Rome is burning all around, since focusing on the whole city just paralyzes me. (OK, going to stop torturing that metaphor now.) I pray this approach works, because it truly is my last hope.

1. I have sick days at work
2. Sleeping until 2 pm, and then reading in bed until it was time to go get the kids
3. Karen Moning’s “Fever” series – it’s good to have something engrossing to read when you are not feeling well
4. Sergey had a good time at gymnastics, and I caught up on my emails while he was in class
5. Mel brought over some chili yesterday, and it was yummy

Today a subject of my church affiliation came up in conversation with a member of a different department. (We were talking about daycare, and how expensive it is. She asked if the church we go to have a school attached to it. I admitted that we currently don’t go to church, and that I feel it is wrong to join a church just to take advantage of the (virtually) free daycare.) The guys in my department all know about my currently unchurched state, but it is not something that is widely known outside of my circle of work friends. For those of you who know where I work, I am sure you can understand why.

I will not lie about my church attendance (or lack thereof) if asked about it. Still, I wonder if my honesty will come back to bite me in the butt, as just about everything else I do does.

And on this appropriately gloomy note, NaBloPoMo is over.

Just signed up OldestOne and MiddleOne for Snow Plow Sam I classes at the Pettit on Sunday nights (January 9 to February 13). We’ll see if they like it. I am (as usual) not holding my breath, but I think it will be good for them to get out of the house on weekends.

It’s only 6 classes, so I am pretty sure we will all survive the experience.

The children are in rare form these days. In case of fire, please save them in this order: YoungestOne, OldestOne, and if there is time, MiddleOne. Though if YoungestOne doesn’t knock it off soon, OldestOne is going to move to the top of the list.

I used to like long weekends. Now I dread them.

[this post has been back-dated]

Husband is asking the boys who their favorite Star Wars character is.

OldestOne: “Luke Skywalker!”

MiddleOne: “Darth Vader!”

We are so doomed.

[this post has been back-dated]

Thanksgiving recap:

We are hosting. There are going to be 6 adults and 4 children, total. People are planning to arrive at 1:30 pm.

Wednesday night I feel horrible, and crawl into bed at 7:30 am. The house is thoroughly trashed, but I am too sick to care.

Thursday morning. Bill is supposed to take the kids to his Mom’s, so I can clean in peace. They don’t leave until 10 am. The house is even more trashed than it was on Wednesday night.

11:30 am. The dishwasher is running, and the kitchen counters are clean. I have two diaper boxes of various junk for my efforts.

12:00 pm. Bill calls to let me know his aunt will be running late. Good thing, since by that time only half of the great room is cleaned up.

1:30 pm. I have started washing the kitchen floor. Glad the arrival time has been pushed back!

2:30 pm. Declare house clean. Start peeling potatoes.

3 pm. Company arrives.

The company was good, turkey was good, the stuffing was good, my mashed potatoes were declared a success, and kids returned the house back to its trashed state by next morning.

[this post has been back-dated]

Tuesday night did not go as planned. Mel became the latest victim of the plague Xavier has been spreading, so it was just me and the kids. Oh, and my bottle of 24% proof brandy cordial. I was taking a sip here and there while kid-wrangling, and once they were all in bed, I finished my glass, poured another, and decided to bake some cookies. Apparently being slightly inebriated makes me think I can bake. Considering that prior to Tuesday night I have made only two kinds of desserts (apple crisp in the slow cooker OR apple crisp in the oven), you can see that alcohol gave me delusions of competence.

For my first foray into baking, I chose Oatmeal Chocolate Cookies from Baking Bites. Because, you know, a recipe from the oatmeal container is not good enough for us baking goddesses. No, I needed to bake BEST OATMEAL COOKIES EVAR! Cue the ominous music.

Step 1. In a large bowl, cream together the butter and the sugars until mixture is light in color. Hmmm? How do I cream the butter? It sounds vaguely sexual and naughty. Some frantic googling later, it appears a mixer is involved. Except we don’t own one. More frantic googling later, eHow.com has a solution.

Step 1a. Beat the butter with a wooden spoon… Like how? Just whack it with the flat part? It is not impressed. I end up stabbing butter with the edge of a spoon. Stab stabbity stab. Take another sip of cordial. Stab butter some more. Declare it beaten into submission.

Step 1b. …use the bottom of a fork’s tines to gently mash [butter and sugars] together… Gently? It’s butter and sugar, not Waterford crystal. What’s going to happen? Screw gentle. Mash mash mash. Drink some more cordial. Declare it mashed, though since I can’t judge volumes I have no idea if the mix had doubled in volume or not.

Step 2. Beat in the eggs one at a time. This is where I realize that we have jumbo eggs, and the recipe calls for large. Is jumbo bigger than large, or smaller? Decide not to bother googling, since I am not about to divide raw eggs into fractions.

The rest of the process goes OK. By the time the oats and chocolate chips are stirred in, I can barely move the wooden spoon. Who’d have thought cookie dough is so dense?

Step Whatever. Drop 1-inch balls of dough onto the cookie sheet. How do you make a one-inch ball of dough, anyway? I try the ice cream scooper. We have the wrong kind, and the dough clings to it like a lover. Switching to spoon. Anticipating severely deformed cookies.

11 minutes later, the first batch of cookies is out. They have a death grip on the parchment paper, and refuse to let go. I drink more cordial and scrape them off with a metal scraper. This is when Bill comes home from work, and I inform him that baking while drunk-ish was probably a dumb idea.

Surprisingly, the cookies turn out edible. I make a few more batches before the alcohol catches up with me, and I am too tired to stay awake. The remainder of the dough survives three nights in the freezer, and my experiment is officially over as of Friday morning, when I bake the rest of the cookies.

Yup, it’s haircut time for the menfolk!

Armed with my trusty Wahl trimmer with attachments #4 (for the boys) and #6 (for the Husband), I have commenced the shearing.

There was a distinct lack of enthusiasm, but once candy was mentioned as potential reward, MiddleOne and OldestOne started to fight who’ll get to sit on the chair of torture first.

I opted for MiddleOne. He has such fine thin hair, I am not even sure why we bother trying to cut it. Still, he did his best to sit still, and was done in five minutes or so.

OldestOne was next. He has the best hair in our family – thick and fast growing, and it is always noticeable when he gets a cut. Unfortunately, sitting still is not his strong point, but after ten or so minutes, he too was done.

YoungestOne has not been having a good day so far (he boycotted the new coat; was cool to me, cried at every opportunity and made more opportunities to cry), and a haircut was the last straw. He wept through it all, eventually ending up with a mouth full of hair. We felt bad, but the raspberry noises he made trying to clean his tongue very too funny.

After YoungestOne took his injured dignity away, it was Husband’s turn. I am sure he is freaking out inside every time I attack him with a trimmer, but he was a good example to the boys and manfully kept still and silent.

Now if only someone would give me a haircut…