Time flies

How can it possibly be November already??  Earlier this year I thought the year would never go by.  But now here we are in November already and it doesn’t seem possible.

I know I don’t write often anymore.  I thought more time would be in the cards for me once school started, but I thought wrong.  lol  I can’t believe that my ‘baby’ has been in school for 2 months already.  But he LOVES it and can’t wait every day to get on the bus and go to school.  They just had their first official days off this year.  It was hard to get the little ones to understand why they couldn’t go to school for two days.  lol  But it was really nice to have K home for more than just a weekend.  I’m really looking forward to Thanksgiving and Christmas breaks so I can spend more time with him at home.

It’s been pretty busy the past two months.  Like I said, I thought with only two kids at home I thought I would have more time during the day.  But there seems to always be something to do that keeps me on the move.  And there is always plenty of school related things that seem to be going on that keeps us going too.

This past week I had a chance to go to my son’s school for the very first time to volunteer in his class.  They were having a Halloween party and festivities.  K has been asking since school started when I was going to come and spend time in his class like the other Mom’s do.  He made me feel so bad that I always have to say no and I felt bad that I always have to miss out on that experience too.  But it worked out that DH was able to take that day off so I went.  But I didn’t tell K ahead of time that I was coming.  I talked to his teacher the night before and found out when to be there.  I showed up while he was on recess, put my stuff in his locker and was waiting in his room when he came in.  He saw my stuff in his locker, he came to the door of the classroom with wide eyed anticipation and a smile on his face.  I’m not sure he thought I was REALLY there.  lol  Once he saw me he ran into the room and gave me the biggest hug and told me he loved me, then went about what he was supposed to do.  That moment made it all worth it.

I had the chance to see all 80 (yes 80 Kindergarteners in 4 classes!) in their costumes.  Helped take them on a little parade around the school, then back to their rooms.  Hung out in the class after the parade until lunchtime.  Went to lunch with K, then helped him get ready for recess and I headed out once he was outside.  It was the best 2 hours I have spent in a long time!  It was awesome to see him in his element there, doing what he’s supposed to do, and being able to be a part of his ‘normal’ day for a change.

Yesterday was Halloween, of course.  K had been anticipating that day for soooo long that he could hardly believe it had finally come.  lol  I found out that Toys R Us was having a little Trick or Treat event at their store so we took the kids there.  Geoffrey the GIGANTIC giraffe led the kids around the store in a parade, they had stations set up throughout and they gave the kids candy, sticker packs and a bunch of other stuff.  And to start it off they gave each kid a reusable shopping bag to collect stuff in.  At the end they each got a certificate to pledge to have a safe trick or treat, etc.  And they got to collect posters and coloring pages and stuff like that.  A kid’s dream!  lol  Once that was over we caught some lunch and headed home.

Around 5 the kids just couldn’t take it anymore watching a few other kids wandering the street so we got everyone ready so we could join the wandering masses.  lol  DH didn’t think that J would want to really do anything, but it didn’t take much convincing for him to get in the swing of things and he was running full speed ahead to the doors and back.  It was super cute.  K was a pumpkin, J was Scooby Doo, and E was a lion.  They were all so super cute.

Going around our neighborhood from our house back is a mile walk.  That’s just the outside loop, not taking into consideration taking the one cul-de-sac area that goes off of the main road and the other cross streets.  We made it about 3/4 of the way around the outside loop and completely through the cul-de-sac loop before J was ready to go home and E was sound asleep in the stroller.  So DH took the two youngest boys home and I continued on with K.  I thought we would simply just finish off the last little bit on the way to our house.  Oooooohhhh no!  Of course not.  lol  He wanted to go on the other side streets because "Mom there are a TON of lights on houses on this street!"  So off we went.  It should be noted, this is heading BACK towards where we just came from but it was all good.    lol   But it was getting pretty dark, the temp had dropped down into the 30’s and the wind was picking up pretty good.  A little over half way back down the streets K decides he just wants to be done. Which was fine, except for now we are about a 1/2 mile from home yet!  I finally did convince him to put his coat and stuff on.  He was getting so tired and I could tell it but there wasn’t much I could do at that point but just urge him to keep going so we could get home.  He must have been getting tired and cold, he wanted to know if we could go home and turn on the fireplace to warm up by and get comfy warm under blankets.  We made one last stop at the older couple across the street from us since we hadn’t stopped there when we started because their grandson was hiding in a box trying to scare people and we didn’t want the kids to get freaked out at the 2nd house they went to.  Talked to her a few mintues and saw DH drive in the driveway just as we were gettign ready to cross the street to our house.  He had taken the other two boys and went and picked up pizza for dinner.  Got in, made K some yummy hot chocolate to warm him up, ate some nice hot pizza and he seemed to warm up nicely.  Even called Grandma so he could wish her a Happy Halloween and talk to her about all the fun he had.  lol  Surprisingly, they didn’t want to gorge on candy.  They each ate a couple of pieces and called it good at that.  I think I "shared" more of their candy than they actually ate!  lol   It was alot of fun, they had a ton of fun and were excited about running around to get treats, but when it was done everyone seemed to be just gald it was over with too.  It was nice to come home, get comfy again and just hang out and stay warm.  Two hours of walking at least two miles or so, 30 degree weather, wind, and no mittens for Mommy or K and it was time to go home!  But now that Halloween is over they are getting excited about Christmas.  Oye!  lol

In other news, still dealing with the estate tax issue that reared it’s ugly head this past March.  My attorney thought it would be a simple thing to remedy when I first retained him.  But alas, here we are like 6 months later and still plugging along with no real progress.  After multiple requests M’s

family ignored the fact they were supposed to submit money to the State and Feds.  then just recently I get a call from my attorney saying that one of M’s sisters (the one that has bucked me every step of the way anyway) had hired an attorney.  The first call stated that he understood the situation better after talking to my attorney about it and agreed that yes, in fact, they all owed this money no question.  Next thing I know he gets another call after a month or so passes and her attorney had called him and was demanding all sorts of documents to be provided to "prove" that I wasn’t responsible for all fo this.  So I sifted through each.and.every piece of paper I had during that loooonnnng 18 month process to begin with.  Copied every thing I needed to ‘prove’ that it was my old attorney would was an idiot, I did my part and the numbers did exist on paper at all of the important points in time.  Now we just wait and see what other crap they try and pull  on me to drag this out further.  What they fail to realize is that every single day that passes is only costing them more and more money.  If they would just give in and realize they owed this money anyway back in the day then we could jsut move on and put this all behind us.  But no, they can’t seem to just let anything go by easily it seems.  18 months to close out a cut and dried estate, now 6 months so far on this ‘new’ issue and counting.  When will this end already???????  I’ll keep fighting and keep plugging away on this becuase that’s what needs to be done.  But I’ve done my time, I just want to be able to put this all behind me and move on in life.  Ya know?  I want to be able to put his memory to rest and not have to keep hashing through this day after day.

Other than that, nothing new going on.  Kids are all doing great.  We’ve had our bouts with illness so far in the past couple of months, nothing to major.  Not sure, but think it’s possible that our kids have already gone through H1N1 and we didn’t know it since we didn’t take them in so obviously didn’t get a diagnosis as such.  The one we are still dealing with the worst with residiual symptoms from something is E.  Poor little guy.  🙁   He snorks and snarfles so badly trying to breathe because he’s so congested.  Everything we’ve tried is only just so much help for him.  And he has  pretty nasty cough to go along with it.  He keeps us on our toes and paying close attention to him so we can determine whether or not he’s got to be taken in.  But he’s such a trooper, he takes it all in stride with a smile on his chubby cute little face.  I love my boys.  Best thing that ever happened to me and the sunshine to my days.  🙂

Well, I’m off.  Time to go to bed and try to adjust to this wonderful new daylight savings time change.  Not liking it so far.  I thought it was bad enough when I looked at the clock this morning when the kiddos came a creepin’ into my bed and it said 8:30.  In my still half asleep stupor I had forgotten it was supposed to have changed.  When i finally became coherent enough to realize that it was actually 7:30 I could have pulled the covers over my head and hid!  lol  Apparently the kids didn’t get the memo.  lol  Oye.