Anger Management

I'm really tired.
For the last three nights my kids have succeeded in keeping me up at least most of the night.
I just want to get some sleep.
Last night my husband decides to give me the long narrative of his day at 11pm when I've finally gotten everyone in bed.
I did mention once or twice that I was completely worn out and wanted to just sleep.
Apparently a couple of his friends are considering changing jobs and I needed to know all about it.
When he was finished, an hour later, he rolled over and started to snore.
The baby started to cry within seconds of my husband falling asleep.
About four hours later I crawled into bed.
My husband got up at 6:30 and took a long hot shower for more than an hour.
The baby woke up at 6:45.

I am sure, that not once - during his long hot shower - did my husband ever consider, for even a moment, taking a five minute shower and then keeping the baby busy so that I could sleep for an hour.

So if anyone out there is thinking hey, she got two hours and forty-five minutes of sleep, she will be just fine! Maybe you should go find another blog to read.

For those of you thinking, she should have just asked her husband to watch the baby, I was too tired to deal with his eye-rolling 'why me' attitude without losing it and screaming like a banshee (would have woken up other kids) or bursting into tears (I can never sleep when I'm crying).

And so; I blog.

No. Ummm... DOUGHNUTS!

I was getting ready to make dinner for my family so I asked them, "Would you rather have baked potatoes or spaghetti?" Both options being quick and cheap, I figured I couldn't lose. We had complete agreement on spaghetti (miracle in itself) when we got to the last voter, my two year-old. So I asked her, "Do you want spaghetti too?" Her answer was priceless.
"No. Ummm... DOUGHNUTS!"

So I'm standing there thinking to myself, yeah, me too, and trying not to laugh.

Even greater irony came the next evening when a scheduling conflict meant I had hungry cranky kids in my car and another hour before I could get them all home for dinner. I gave in and stopped at a grocery store where I bought a dozen doughnuts so the kids could survive until dinner time.

So, ummm... yeah, doughnuts.

This Diet Really Works!

I find it amusing that when I have a baby I can laugh at those ads that say you will lose 2o lbs in a month or whatever because I lose about 20 lbs in a week. The problem being that I gain about 4o with each pregnancy and the other 20 lbs is much harder to get rid of.

I am very pleased to say that since having my fourth baby I have lost more than 60 lbs and am now able to get into jeans I wore back in the high school/college days. *Doing little happy dance*

So it's a very noticeable weight loss and people have been asking me how I have done it. Here you go, the blog entry on how I have done it.

Ummmm.... I'm not completely sure.

Huge credit has to be given to nursing my baby for almost a year now. Burns calories like no nothing. Then there's the 'no time to eat' factor that comes in when you have four children. I also love the contribution of the part when I fix myself something to eat, a small person with large puppy dog eyes will show up and circle like a vulture asking in a small sad voice if they can please "have just a little" of whatever I made. During meals I make the food, feed small people the food, and then clean up the food. Notice, I don't so much get to eat the food. I do end up scraping whatever was left on my kids plates into my mouth instead of the garbage can or the disposal because I wouldn't want to 'waste the food' and besides that, I'm hungry enough to eat whatever they left half chewed, due to the reasons listed above.

The only real changes to my diet that have occurred are not being able to eat chocolate (it makes the baby terribly gassy and fussy) and drinking A LOT more water. The baby takes it out on me during what little time I have for sleep (that's a whole nother posting right there) if I am so cruel as to serve him "chocolate milk" so I've given it up. Great personal sacrifice that I'll be sure and remind him of frequently as he gets older. The water thing I've been consciously trying to do, but I can't attribute the loss of more than 60 lbs to just drinking more water even though it's the only thing I'm really working at in the weight loss effort.

I walk and ride my exercise bicycle but I've done those things in years past with nowhere near the kind of results I'm having this time. So there you have it. I've lost a lot of weight and I'm happy about that, but I'm really not sure if I get to be proud of myself for having done it because I'm not really sure what I did.

Anger Management

These are the things I would like to be screaming at my husband right now but I'm not because I'm trying to control my temper.

-THANK YOU for showing up an hour late so that I completely missed the baby shower I was planning on attending today.
I REALIZE that my options include a) take the kids with me, b) find a sitter, or c) skip the party. I would like to point out that a) if I take the kids with me I don't enjoy the adult time and it ruins the entire point, b) I have no job and no money and calling my mother every time I need an hour isn't an option because she kind of has a life, c) well, GREAT I get to choose option c again.-

So mostly I'm mad at myself. How stupid is that? Yeah, when I get angry I feel guilty and get even more disgusted and angry with myself because I shouldn't get angry, right? It's wrong to feel that way so it really sucks that I feel that way a lot. Also, I get all 'you should have planned it better' on myself because I could have figured out another way to get someone to watch my kids or something, like it's COMPLETELY my fault every time. I tell myself that I know my husband well enough by now to know that he has complete disregard for what I want to do. His time is so much more valuable than mine and my lack of planning is actually the problem. I should know better by now than to count on him for something like this...

So now I feel guilty, angry, and frustrated and I could have avoided it all by simply letting them know I wouldn't make it in the first place because now I look like the slacker who spaced it or something. Again, my fault, my guilt, my marriage.

Vampires

Love them or hate them, the vampires are everywhere. I actually get a kick out of the stuff. I went through an Anne Rice phase years ago and made it through a few of the books before starting to get a bit paranoid and giving it up. I'm a complete lightweight when it comes to the horror stuff. Couldn't sleep for weeks after watching The 6th Sense and that one isn't even that bad. So, yeah, Anne Rice was a bit much for me.

Twilight on the other hand.... Let's just say I really like Twilight.

I found a publishing company that was having a contest to promote their new book, Defining Twilight, a review for the verbal and language portions of college prep tests like the ACT and SAT using vocab from Twilight. First prize was a signed cast photo from the movie. I entered. I won. Just not first prize; second prize actually. That would be a copy of the new review guide signed by the author. I was still completely excited over this. I get feeling like I'm just "the mom" around here a lot and it's nice to know I still have it in me if you know what I mean.

The downer in all of this is that no one wanted to read my entry before I won. I actually sent it to people who just didn't read it or didn't have time or whatever. Not a single one of them read it, so I did it myself. *Little Red Hen Voice* I wrote it myself. I edited it myself. I revised it myself. I sent it in with only one opinion - the one from myself. Yeah, so maybe you can understand why I felt even more thrilled when I won. Also, maybe you can understand why I won't force anyone to read it by posting it here, I figure if people only want to read it because it won then why bother. Let me know if you want the link to it, or check my facebook, it's on there somewhere.

I did have an inspiration for this post. Also from facebook (I spend way too much time on there) where a friend of mine had this video posted. I thought it was great. Funny, pretty well edited for the random kind of piece it is. Buffy meets Edward, maybe you've seen it. Here's the link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZwM3GvaTRM

I still really like Twilight even though I thought this video was funny. Also, I really respect Stephenie Meyer, we've got a lot in common and I am amazed that she was able to write all her books and do so well with all the demands on her time and the sheer insanity that is motherhood taking up most of her life. Maybe one day I'll have a book out and write her a note to say how much I respect what she's accomplished.

PIZZADILLA

Yeah, wow, two posts in one day. Have I done that before? I'm not even sure.

I think I'm in one of those moods where I've been the mom for too long without a break again and I just need to reassure myself that I can still speak English with a basic level of fluency without using the words potty, wubby, Elmo, num-num, or boo-boo. I rarely use boo-boo, not because we don't have the occasional injury but more because I'm usually in high rant about the time one shows up, as in "WHY were you using that stick to keep your brother from getting into your dollhouse!" or "I told you NOT to jump off of the 5th step, even if it does make your skirt puff out big on the way down!" These, sadly, are things I have actually said to my children pretty much verbatim.

Okay, well, the larger point of this posting was that I wanted to see if I could figure out how to add a picture. Haven't done that yet, thought I would try.

As I was making lunch for the kids I had one of those sleep deprived/manic/really random moments where I thought to myself look how pretty that turned out as I handed food to a child who in no way would express appreciation for the loveliness of the food or any effort I put into it. I learned a long time ago they would express the same appreciation for little or no effort as they would for hours of intensive labor so my standards have fallen. Anyway, I'm lucky if we squeeze in a prayer with every ones mouths already half-full.



So here it is. The last piece of the pizzadilla (cross between pizza and quesadilla) that I saved and artistically (I made an effort - notice the cellery garnish) arranged to take pictures of. If it doesn't appear, well, then you'll know I didn't figure out the add an image thing then won't you.

Pizzadilla
1 flour tortilla
2 tblsp spaghetti sauce
1/2 cup grated cheese

You can top it with other things but be warned that multiple toppings affect the "doneness" of the tortilla. It's sort of a less is more thing. Place on a baking sheet in center of oven bake at 35o for about 8 minutes. Remove, slice, let cool and serve.

This is one of those great snack items that you can make pretty fast and serve for lunch or dinner. Today we had kiwi and oranges on the side. You get the idea...