Was Not Bad at All

**Warning: Boring post ahead, it is about cleaning my house, cake, and how to make toddlers run around the yard shrieking for under 3$, and birthday stuff**

I started the day with less than four hours sleep and that was with a toddler who insisted on taking as much possible space as she could. Not to mention not being able to shove my husband over.

**We have a small two bedroom house, allot of people tell me that I need to kick my stepson out of his room so my daughter can have her own room. I do not buy into that thinking. Lets look at this from a somewhat intelligent angle. He is sixteen, already gone thru enough emotional crap to make him have a few neuroticisms and here comes a baby to either make a tumultuous life worse or better. I decided that she was going to stay in our room. DJ may not be here 100% of the time but he is still our family. And being our family you do not purposely make them even more neurotic at a shitty, hormonal, cutting the apron strings time of life.

Nikki has her own bed and she does use it until about 2 am when her light sleep cycle kicks in and she wakes up and migrates to me. Kinda like a homing pigeon.**

Now with that cleared-- I still had a house to clean, and cake type thing to cook, and stuff to lay out. After I cheated my way thru breakfast (scrambled eggs with cheese, sausage,bacon and boudain) I say cheated because I lay everything out on a cookie sheet and broil it for about 6 min. It takes a total of 15 min to cook a breakfast for four. Everyone can get 1 boudain, 2 patties, 2 pieces of bacon and a scoop of eggs. Except for nikki, she just eats the eggs. Then they had to clear out of my way. I had three rooms to clean from top to bottom and 2 hours in which to finish.

I just knew I was going to have to fight with Donald today but he did not say a word about me blasting music all morning. Usually he gripes because my music is too loud.
He was trying to make up for the day before when Evil Bastard lived in my house for about 45 min. Just long enough to do damage and then scuttle back under his rock.

I cooked a Chocolate caramel bar cake today. It is a giant oatmeal cookie with one layer of oat mixture, then melted chocolate, then pecans, then carmel sauce, then another layer of oatmixture. and it is soft. Omigod, my ass would be the size of the house if I made this all the time. It is beyond good.

I whipped up store bought cream cheese icing and drew a (messed up) cow on Nikki's "cake". I tried really hard tho and dammit!! it counts more than anything!! I kept trying to fix it and starsha finally had to tell me that it was ok to just walk away. But everyone liked it.


Nikki got three bathing suits today. My grandfather got her one that was zebra striped with pink accents. I was shocked when I helped her open the gift, it was soooo her!! Starsha gave her a pink dragon( it really completes the set), crazy techno socks which is a funny inside joke. Starsha matches her stuff and her kids always have on matching socks. I am almost polar opposite, and I never have Nikki's socks matching each other. Starsha finally told me to buy a set of white socks. "They come in a huge bag, that way you don't have to worry about them matching!!" So now I have wonderful funny socks for Nikki and I can mix them up to my hearts content and it won't matter.
Hunter gave Nikki a butterfly and flower fuzzy coloring page. All three of them worked on it. Nikki was still playing with the balloons that Starsha had tied around her gift.
Our neighbors Brenda and Jeff (decoration suppliers) got Nikki a swimming pool that has a canopy, a Dora bathtub toy castle, a little mermaid bathing suit and a HUGE thing of bubbles.

My mom is taking Nikki and I to Galveston to the butterfly garden and aquarium this week for Nikki's birthday. She also got Nikki washable markers,crayons, a fake cell phone, an bright green bathing suite, costume jewelry, and a notebook to scribble in.

Jennifer did make it which I was surprised,the day before she said it was too early for her to be in town so she wasn't going to come. She gave Nikki a Dora pop up tent. Nikki has already gathered toys to it. And a pillow is in there. Some clothes.

When for obvious reasons the conversation turned to stripping and cover fees etc. I decided that the kids needed to go outside. With the bubbles. Before Hunter got an education that he did not need.
I bought a little fan thing that blows bubbles. I learned two things today, children love bubbles, and children eat bubbles. Colton had a bubble blowing out of his nose. It was too funny. They ran around screaming chasing these bubbles for 30 min before I got the bright idea to fill up a cooler and make a big bubble bath.
Chaos ensued. The toddlers were covered in bubbles from head to toe and then both climbed into the cooler. Still dressed.


Donald got out his mini aircompressor (never ever buy one-- they suck) and I sat forever trying to get this damn pool inflated. Jeff and DJ took Jeff's fourwheeler and they went down to his house to inflate it in less than five min.
I think Nikki and Colton played in the pool for two hours. They played so much that they popped it and it slowly deflated.

Nikki screamed for 20 min after I brought her inside. My mom keeps telling me how proud she is that I am not losing my temper with Nikki, it is surprising and wonderful that I am keeping so calm when she is flipping out. I used to have a reallly bad temper, so I know where she is getting the DNA code for this particular quirk. I do not want my baby scared of me. She is frustrated because she cannot talk clear enough for us to understand her so she screams and sobs. She will grow out of it and until then I am on xanex as of Tuesday. My nerves are shot in all reality. I don't know how I am not flipping out on her or Donald or DJ or......

After everyone left, Nikki settled down and took a nap. I cooked homemade pizza in which I burnt one and did not cook the other one enough. They ate it anyway because "we did not have to cook it and anything is good as long as we did not have to cook" I could take that as an insult but I have really screwed up dinner before to where I would not even touch it.

It was a great day. Because I am not good at social stuff I was really nervous but everyone seemed to have fun time just watching the kids play and chitchatting.

Fun Day Planned Tomarrow

I can write this due to the knowledge that 90% of the people I know do not know I have this blog. So ha ha.

Nikki's birthday party is tomarrow. I would be happy not having ten extra people in my house but appearently only men can get away with not inviting people for anything. As a mom I must know exactly what to tell everyone to get my child. You have known her for two years please do not make me spell this out in crayon. I do have some guidelines- No puppies, no caffine, no breakable parts, and no porn. She is two, how hard can this be? Get her a box of kleenex, she will be annoyingly happy for 20 min.

I am not serving lunch. Do you really think I want all of you in my house for more than an hour? Noooooooo. No, I am not decorating. No, there is not a theme. Yes, bring napkins. As a matter of fact bring your own plate and fork and cup and take them home with you.

I stood staring at my plates wondering if I had enough and wondering if I really wanted to wash them when DJ walked up and told me to say " why yes, please bring some paper plates" when the next phone call asked if they could bring anything. ooooooooohhhh. As another Blogger(mj) put it-- mild social retardation. A 16 year old boy knows more of what to do than I do. And he has no problem giving me hell about it.

My neighbor decided the theme for me. She came in this evening with tinkerbell plates,cups, and napkins. I was astounded. And grateful, because I have no idea on what to do for this stuff. And at the very least I have another 10 years of this. We got lucky with DJ- he hates parties so we never had to throw one for him. But he knows what to do and how to respond to people's questions. Bizarre.

I have retyped this last paragraph four times. I finally gave up and just deleted it. Finally my meds have worn off and I can go to sleep. At two a.m.

ugh.

Pics of our Walk in the Woods

Wildflower

We go for walks in the woods behind my house. I will be posting pics of flowers because I am a wildflower geek. I would LOVE to get permission to toss wildflower seeds on the sides of the highways around here.

Bag O Shirts

My friend gave a bag of clothes, "if you can fit into some of them- great! if not then just donate them"
After going through all of them I learned two things. She did not think ahead that she is a size B and I am a size D. Her tween size large shirts will not look cute on me. I will look like the neighborhood desperate hooker wannabe.

So I picked a few out and cut them up to make Nikki some new summer clothes. I did not even have to sew anything just snip to tie knots in them. No, the dresses are not the most stylish or cutest things around, but I also did not spend 80 some odd on clothes that she is going to get paint all over. Tempra paint does not come out of clothes as I found out this weekend. I cut up cereal boxes, side dish boxes, basically any box that I get my hands on and that is what she draws and paints on.




And yes that is still the new carpet but with the realism of scattered crap. This was the best picture I could get, Nikki will not stay still or stay away from me. She is needy today.

POS Dresser Remade

This was the dresser that my mom gave me out of spite for her husband. I merrily took it home because 1) I needed an art stuff storage that was a touch more organized 2) I needed another project before it got too hot to work outside
The drawers were falling apart and some of the guides were gone. This was part of my learning to use the skill saw. Which is simple and hard at the same time. I really want a table saw. That way I can build whatever I want without consulting, nagging, begging my husband to build it for me. Bite my ass, I can make it.






This is the after. The knobs are porcelain (gag me) with tiny little roses on them( ewwwwwwww) so they will have to wait for me to make new ones out of plaster and sculpty clay.
Liquid nails smells awful but it glued the joints back together to incredible strength. The wood was so thin that nailing some parts was out of the question. To make the new guides I measured( wrong several times) and then smeared the glue, and glued the guides to their spots. Let it dry overnight and BAM new solid guides.

It took several days because I am taking care of a house, a teenager who needs attention because god forbid I act like a normal step mom and ignore him. No, I actually listen to his thought process without yelling at him. AND I am taking care of my two year old. So yes, my dear personality flipping husband, it is going to take more than a few days. Idiot.
So it is not done to my satisfaction but it will work for now. I still have somoe tweaking to do and shelves to add above it but my kitchen/art room is slowly becomming what I want it to be. And no, I do not plan any of this out, it just happens as I go.

Possessed Vaccum Cleaner

araarararararararararararchhhhhaaaararararclanclangclangclunkclangarararararra

This is not the way a vacuum cleaner is supposed to sound. It is not right.When you turn it on it has to warm up for a few min. When the clanking sound stops,and it is the deep roaring sound that warms your down to your toes starts up and does not stop.

Why I do not get another one is beyond me, but when I am in any store that sells vacuum cleaners that hums instead a growling and clanking noise ,I cannot buy one. Not because of monetary ( about 75% of the time that is why) I stand and stare at the new shiny mentally healthy, physically able to suck the paint out of my carpet( that sounds kinda bad) and then I walk away.

Why you ask?

It is because the damn thing is possessed. It works when it wants to, and usually only when you are sucking up a sock or a cord is when it hums happily like a normal machine. But when you pull it out it goes right bad to borderline shrieking at you. And I am convinced it is fine when I am in the store.

Never mind the burning rubber smell. We cover that up with the smelly powder. Which is flammable BTW.

Never mind it skips around the actual sucking bits of flotsam from the carpet and you have to go over the same area three times to get that stupid piece of lint up.

I have friends that are screaming at me to buy new *insert half ass broken thing here* but until it is actually broken I just cannot justify buying something to replace the one that just doesn't run as fast or well or good.

Some days I would love to open up wide to a therapist and figure out exactly what is going on in my head. Maybe that is what make this OK; I acknowledge that I am nuts.

Ants

This teeming white and red pile of insects was a fire any colony that moved in my truck. It started out with one or two, then I opened the passenger door and the floor was crawling. On one hand they were cleaning up every single cracker crumb my child has dropped, one the other hand they are known to swarm.
Allot of poison and the comfortable feeling that all the evil bugs living in the panels of my truck were dead.

I was so wrong. They moved under the driver seat into a shoe.My daughter's shoe. I need that shoe!!

I don't want to drive my truck.

My Garden Pictures

Before and After Livingroom

I should have taken a picture of nikki throwing her toys everywhere. It would add to the realism considering I really try to keep things picked up but my mind ignores things on its own. I really did not see the *insert whatever I forgot here*
It's a self defense so I do not wind up in jail for maiming my family members. But they are actually not walking on it with their nasty boots, I was shocked.

Carpet!!!

I finally got new carpet!!! Well, new to me but not new to the planet. I was not under any circumstances paying $800 to carpet 250 square feet and it would be another month before it could be installed. One small living room and a tiny hallway and I did not even pick out the carpet that I wanted. Kiss my ass, I will paint the plywood floors before I cough up that money.

I randomly checked the want ads over the last three months and found two incredible deals. The first one was a solid oak futon with the mattress and a cover for $200. I priced them in April. The frame alone would have been four hundred and another three to four hundred for the mattress. Now I have a place to sleep when Nikki is needy and I actually have room to breathe.

Then I found the ad for carpet and padding for $150. The carpet needed some cleaning, according to the seller. So I went to check it out and it was in a NICE neighborhood. The carpet was the REAL cotton/mix thread and soft and plush and in incredible shape. The padding was not even dusty. Oh yeah buddy, this is coming home with me. We loaded on the truck, it hung over the cab and off the tailgate and I drove 25 mph home with my hazards on. I was not going to risk anything flying out and the carpet ran the gas mileage down that it would be pointless to hurry home.

So we got it in today, we rented a stretcher, bought the tack strips.
I think the hardest part was making sure threshold plates gripped the carpet. But we saved $600. I looked at independents that will install carpet and they all wanted $500 or more. Nope nope nope.

It was hard and hot and god awful tiring. But now I know how to install carpet, so that adds to one more thing on my " I must learn" list.

***********************

Update on the kitchen-- Plaster of Paris sucks up paint. Where one quart would have painted three walls, one plaster of Paris textured wall will use the entire quart. I bought the paint before I saw the h*me Depot commercial with the primer mixed in with the paint.

Garden Update-- So far we have picked 23 freezer quart bags of green beans. I have another 10 bags waiting to be picked. This will practically cover our green beans intake for the year. I just need someone to teach me how to can the things and I will be so much better off. And spiced peaches.

Tomorrow I am going to learn to use the arc welder so I can make my silverware people!!

Nikki is doing really good. She has weaned herself from milk. She gets very agitated when you try and make her drink it. She knows the letter A and O on sight and can make the sounds. She tries to dress herself. Can open and get into the car by herself. Feeds the cat and puts her bowl where it belongs. Opens the fridge to get her yogurt out and then gets a spoon out of the drawer and sits down with it with her little box I made her.
When she is done eating she tells you she is done, goes to the garbage can, scraps her plate off and then puts it in the sink. She is not even two yet!!
My family is pushing me to have another child and I know I will go from being a mom to a crazy lady. So aside from her older brother and a hell of an accident, she will be the only child Donald and I have together. Which on some levels is disappointing but on a practical (money. clothes, food, SANITY) level, it is a good thing.
Having a child almost destroyed us, having another one will obliterate this relationship.

Swirlie

My swirls needed poka dots. I am having a hard time finishing the cabinets on the top because he is nagging me to finish them.

Female thinking right?...hahaha

The beginning of a fun filled week....

For the first time in ten years DJ calls for me to pick him up from his mothers at nine pm. No matter what drinking, drama, fighting, or cops have been there he has never called. EVER.

I go get him(20 miles one way), now I am geared up for a fight because she has been known to fly off the handle and knocked the crap out of someone but I have about four inches and 30 pounds on her. 10 years ago I would have fought her but I have learned in a decade to think first and then respond. Starsha calls it 10,10,10 thinking. 10 min, 10 months, 10 years. Basically is jail worth it? Nope. No matter what jail is not worth one hit (or several) I can get my point across other ways.

She is railing on him on the porch. I walked up, and ask what is going on. She tells me that DJ's girlfriend has not left yet and he wanted to spend the evening at her house (20 feet away) but DJ did not wash and flea dip the dogs earlier that day. So he was not allowed to go back and see her before she left for seven weeks.

History: He has been in love with her since he was nine and she finally agreed to date him. Seven years later. She is very very shy. Very. So they have been dating for three weeks and since his mother found out they were dating he has a curfew even though they were at her house with both her parents up. Before they dated, DJ would come home at 11pm, midnight, 230am and his mom never said a word.

So DJ is at a breaking point because he tried to asked (beg) his mom to give him just another hour, 30 min, 10 min. She told him flat out "I don't give a f*** how you feel"
That is worse than hitting him. Or grounding him for a month. To completely disreguard his feelings will break him faster than anything and he takes forever to recover from it.

She told me that she felt he was running from his responsibilities, I agreed but I made sure she understood two things. 1) This was not going to happen again. 2) We are not stealing your son, you will come get him tomarrow when you get off. You will talk to him. You will take him home with you.

They needed a cooling off period before DJ told her that he did not want to live with her anymore. He would regret the words and we would wind up in court (for the 28th time) I know she raised her other two, but they did not have the choice to call the other parent because they both told Donald that they did not want to live here anymore or see him. So no, the other two had to learn to live with their mom without another parent they might be able to go to when things got bad. So she could say whatever she wanted to them.

DJ has that option but we will not be abused anymore. He wants to live with her and by god, he is going to live with her. Until he tells us that he wants to live here then he is going to have deal with his choice.

Tonight should be fun, either she will not show up, or she will show up and say the wrong thing and Donald will fly off the handle. I have a feeling that he is going to be inside while we are outside talking...yelling.

What she doesn't get is that DJ actually loves this girl. He has not spoke of any other girl but her since she moved next door. It is poetic sad. And I know that you must never ever say anything bad about her and don't try and keep them separated.

DJ's mom told me a month ago that he is her baby and she will not have any girl in his life because she will be a complete bitch to her. I knew once she said that, that things would go downhill for her and her son. People have tried telling her to back off and she won't.

I am going to sit back and watch the show.