After a perspective of a few years, I realize what I have said in those few post pretty much made sense.

A Quick overview.......

Child 1 is headed for College (HOLY CRAP!!) in just a few months. I swing between intense pride and absolute terror. She's chosen a school only an hour or so away. MMM maybe too close, I worry. She has a "boyfriend". OY! Truthfully, he's a sweet kid and she's known him forever. He's going to school in another part of the state, so this will probably take it's natural course sometime this fall. Talk about fallout! I can't wait for that.

Child 2 heads for puberty and adolescence at an alarming speed. Mr "low maintenance" and under the radar child is slamming into being absolutely age appropriate. In other words, he's an over grown Toddler. Think about it. Toddlers want to eat, wear and sleep when they want. They are oppositional and defiant and want to be their own person. Sounds like a teen ager, huh? Anyway, at 11, he has decided to become a jock. I'm not sure if this is something he really wants to do or is just something peer pressure in a jock town is pushing him toward. Lacrosse and football are the starting points. I have a feeling I will be buying a lot of equipment over the next few years. On a happy note, he is in the jazz band at his elementary school. I realize that's a group of words you never should see together. But knock my socks off, at the spring concert, they were GOOD! I mean the kind of good at one of these concerts where everyone is stunned and actually entertained! Believe me, THAT is a rarity!

Child 3 lives on her own planet and always will. She has a few friends, thank God. Somehow, she just lets the world come to her in her own way, and it does. I'm not sure how, but it does. She loved cheerleading and gymnastics.

Summer looms. Only the mother of children with an outside job sees Summer loom. It does. Every parent spends April and May saying "what are you doing with them over the Summer?" I really wish they could have the kind of summers we did. We took off as soon as our chores were done and came home only to refuel. So few people let their kids just go out to play anymore.

I toy with the idea of writing again.

I'm not sure if I want to write a trashy romance, or a book on parenting. LOL, both marketplaces are seriously saturated.

Maybe I'll start a separate writing blog, for my story ideas....Watch this space for future announcements.


I can NOT believe I had 285 or so visitors to this site? Who are you people?? Please comment!

Why doesn't it surprise me that the new cat is neurotic? If she thinks she's alone, she walks around the house cying...really! Geez, even at 2, my kids were never this needy and clingy!!

I guess the new year makes ya kind of pensive. I've been thinking a lot about how old I am, and what I have accomplished. I know I have a good life, and that raising 3 kids to not be serial killers (or,as neurotic as the kitten) is good and important. Somehow, I guess I just thought I would have done something AMAZING by now!! Maybe it's looking middle age straight in the face, (and by the way, it's not nearly as attractive on me as it is on say, Susan Sarandon or Goldie Hawn....you're shocked, I know!)
I still keep waiting to see what I will look like as an adult!! It's not until I see the Christmas pix of myself and my sister, that I realize we ARE the grown ups!!

LOL...ya have to keep laughing at yourself, huh?

Happy Freeking New Year!! (OK Brian?? stop nagging...i'm back!)
the short version? Survived Halloween, or how much leftover chocolate CAN I stuff into myself. Survived getting a new kitten, (why YES!! I am allergic!! thank you for asking!). Thanksgiving was a Treat. A weekend in Philadelphia for Regional Irish Dancing. Yes, I know, I know!!

Christmas..SIGH..The motherload of ALL overdone Holidays! It was crazed and never the same. Isn't it funny how you expect EVERY Christmas to be exactly like the idealized one you have in your head??

Because my birthday, and that of child 2, (the little prince....see Bambi...the reference makes sense then).....come just 2 and 1 DAY before Christmas, it just adds the general insanity.

On the up side, got some REALLY great jewelry!!

They've gone back to school and work, except the little one. She has been spiking all kinds of scary fevers. The cool thing about kids? They listen to their bodies. When they're hungry, they eat, (Or let you know they need to), drink whenever they need, hit a bathroom at the EXACT moment, (unfortunately, listening for that signal in advance takes a few years!). Right now, she's tired and not feeling to good. Her Kelly dolls and Leap pad get pushed to the side of the bed and she just huddles under and sleeps. Wouldn't it be really cool if adults did that too??

On a scary note, my oldest is about to attend the send off of the SECOND of her friends to the military. In peace time, I'd say it's probably good for most of the young people of this country to have had that experience. To understand what it REALLY means when you pledge allegiance. RIght now, I'm a mom, and it's getting scary out there. How many more will she see go?

Well, it happened, i went over the edge. Maybe all the screaming and yelling isn't completely healthy for you, but hot damn! it felt good!!

I have this theory on being a parent. It goes something like this. You either parent BECAUSE OF or IN SPITE of your parents.

Think about it. Most of us do something inbetween and manage to make some of our parents mistakes. To those we usually add some whoppers of our own. I think I'm guilty of both lately.
Despite being a really "out there" kind of person, I have very little self confidence. NO!! GASP!! You, kind reader, are shocked. I never wanted my kids to think they didn't matter. Being the youngest, it was kind of hard to feel like ya did sometimes. It had all been done before ya see, usually better, if my siblings were to be believed. And I did...believe them, my fault I know!
ANYWAY....i've spent the last 2 months chasing my own tale trying to be the kind of mother *I* always wanted, and have turned into the one child 1 would like to see parenting anyone else!
OK....lesson learned. Stop trying to please everyone and anyone, especially a teenager, because THAT's mission impossible.
(side note here...wouldn;t ya LOVE to see a big budget version of Tom Cruise trying THAT ONE? C'mom Tom, careening down the side of mountain AIN'T nothing till you've tried to figure out what the hell a teenager wants....)

just checking.....

I hate third grade. Back in the dark ages, when I did it myself, my teacher was hideously mean, and it was the year my older brother JOINED the freeking Marine Corps at a time when everyone else was burning draft cards. My mother and dad had grim faces and I was trying to make it better by writing him letters.

ANYWAY....I sufferd through the 3rd grade seven years ago with child 1. She had the queen of all battle axes, and being a first timer through the school mill as a mom, I didn't step in when I should have. I've gotten a LOT tougher on teachers since!

So, child 2 has a book report due. A mystery book, because it's October, and teachers always think kids will WANT to read a mystery in October. HA! All they want in October is to score as much proccessed sugar as is humanly possible. Of course the book report is in the form of a "clever little haunted house". Teachers LOVE clever formats for book reports. grrrrrrrrrr I don't!

I'm thinking he's done almost all the scrap work. All we have to do is some quick editing and copy it to the aforementioned "clever little haunted house" HA! This would be really easy IF HE HAD ACTUALLY READ THE FREAKING BOOK! And yes of course it's due TOMORROW!! grrrrrrrrr

Ok, I know I could skim the book and help him fill in the haunted house, but will he have learned anything? No! And because I have use everyone of those annoying 'teachable moments"......

The good news? child 1 has now SEEN how stupid and pointless NOT doing an assignment properly is from a whole new perspective.

OR MAYBE I'M JUST REALLY CRABBY BECAUSE I'M MISSNG MY ADULT TAP CLASS!! shuffle hop shuffle hop shuffle hop ball change!!

Today is a perfect example of why I need a nanny, and a house keeper. First of all, you need to understand that I have 3 children, (that in the interest of shorter typing and safety, I will refer to as 1, 2, and 3). Their activities and how I handle being a grown up and manage my sanity, wil be the stuff of this blog and (If the network PTB have ANY smarts) a sitcom!

I'll 'splain more. yet another homework crisis errupts!