12/26/08

So today was just an awful lot of running around here and there.  When the alarm went off at 5:15 this morning, I thought, to hell with it, and went back to sleep.  We went at 10, and guess what?  There were PLENTY of bath sets and kid’s stuff left, so each of the girls got a bath set (Shabree’s was just soap) and Shabree got a High School Musical hair set for 5 dollars.  The SAME one I bought Sydni (albiet it was Hannah Montana) for 10 dollars two days before Christmas, which they also had leftovers of… sigh.  Oh well.  Then we went to try to buy some food, and the EBT card failed… so I ran to the DHA, and sat there, and sat there, and sat there, until they said, it’s noon, so unless you want to sit here until 1, call and come back later.  The kids were just being AWFUL.  So I left, and we came home and got lunch.  Oh, the card had demagnitized, that was the problem… and the problem with the kids was low blood sugar from only having a toaster strudel for breakfast, and Syd was handing out candy to everyone.  Oh God… WHY did I buy so much damn candy for them?  WHAT was I thinking?  So I hung around the house, talked to Linda, nursed Alex to sleep, put Sammi down for a nap, and left for the DHA to pick up the new card.  When I got there, it had JUST dropped… 3 o’clock… okay fine, just glad I didn’t come back at 1.  They’d told me to call anyway, to make sure the card had dropped.  I didn’t do that because I figured 3 hours was enough time for this to happen, and I guess it was.  They told me it literally drops… interesting, huh?  So I’d called my SIL on the way there, and she was telling me about all the issues with my brother, and I could SEE if, you know?  I grew up wtih the guy, probably know him better than just about anyone other than my mother and father, and in ways, perhaps better, because there are things he told me he did as a teenager he never told them.  The biggest problem with my brother is that he doesn’t think he HAS any flaws.  He doesn’t see where HE needs to change.  And he’s always been like that.  I’m not going to go into a long rant about growing up, there were things I know he was taught, and yet, I do know the damage that was done to me… but I did go through therapy to help me get through it…. anyway, she’s not sure what she wants to do.  I talked to her for the better part of an hour, while I walked through Raley’s (local area supermarket/grocery store)  I finished the call just before I went to check out, and forgot the doggone milk, eggs and cheese were supposed to be gotten w/ a WIC check, and the guy forgot a coupon I had gotten for some yogurt…so we had to correct both of those problems, and it took awhile.  I was embarrassed.  I HATE it when people in front of me do that kind of stuff, so I always feel for the people behind me…. though it does make me more tolerant when people in front of me do it.  Just hopefully I haven’t got anywhere pressing I need to be… you know?

Oh… almost forgot, and maybe I should.  The first time we were at the DHA, I told Sydni she had to pay me back for the bath set when she got her gift card from her grandma, and good Lord, she had herself a FIT.  She got really snotty with me and said she would take her bath set back.  Well, then Becca offered to buy it, and Sydni was like "Okay, great!"  Except that Becca meant she wanted to buy it for herself, and Sydni was NOT happy about that.  Then, after she ate, she declared she wanted the bath set after all, and then it was Becca’s turn to have a fit.  Sigh.  I just LOVE it (NOT) when my kids argue and fight, which it feels like they do ALL the time.  Anyway, they finally came to some convulted agreement with Becca buying the bath set, but giving Sydni half of it or something… what’s probably going to end up happening is that *I* will end up buying the bath set, because I won’t be able to get the accounting right… and that’s what I get for trying to get these girls a cheap bath set!  I told Jerry "I should have just stayed home!"  However, I needed diapers and trash bags… though I gotta take those CHEAP CRAP trash bags back.  And the shoes I got Bec for Christmas are being returned and a slightly more expensive pair is being bought.  It’s a 2 dollar difference.  Oh, and we’re taking 10 dollars, and matching them to go to a thrift store for pants.  Shabree and Becca have both outgrown their pants, and Sydni just doesn’t seem to have a lot of pants…skirts and dresses, but not pants and jeans (I include jeans in the pants category)  So they’ll have 20 dollars for pants.  And ONLY pants.  Sigh.  I’m glad I’ve got  younger kids, because they have a ton of clothes, but somehow we end up buying more…so I shouldn’t have to buy a THING when Sammi and Alex get older…. crossing my fingers on that one.  Shabree, she has a ton of size 6 jeans, but she’s thick through the middle, not quite fat, but not skinny, so the size 8s will have to be hemmed up to fit correctly.  She can’t button the size 6 jeans.  Those, however, have already been through Sydni.  I suspect that Syd has plenty of pants, but I gotta do laundry, and then go through her drawers and figure out just how many she actually has.  The thing is though… you buy one kid something, you almost have to buy EVERY kid the same thing.  Sydni especially has a strong "fair meter" which drives me nuts. 

Oh yea… the gift cards didn’t arrive today, and I wonder if that was part of the reason Syd changed her mind… no going back to Wal mart to exchange the bath set for something "better"  Though I really think it’s because she realized it was coming out of "her" money, not mom’s and dad’s.  Yea… we need the bath sets like a hole in the head.  That stuff will be gone in days, the way they over-use it.  Oh well, the deal she worked out with Becca was pretty good for her, and evidently okay for Bec too… hopefully.  I will say this.  Sydni will NOT get to take her walmart card to the store by herself again, I will hang on to it and oversee every purchase made with it.  I am not having a repeat of the birthday card being used to buy junk.

I gotta get off that topic. 

Actually, I hear Alex "talking" so I should go check on her.  As the New Year approaches…. well, I’m not sure.  I do know ONE thing… it MUST be better than this last year.  And things being cyclical, I’m sure it will be, just not sure how that’s going to "go down" if you know what I mean.  How will it be better, different?  One thing I do know… with people around me having relationship troubles, I am sure as HECK grateful for Jerry. 

But, should I bother making up a resolution list?  Or maybe just a kind of "Here’s what I’d like to see happen" ?   One good thing about doing something like that is that it puts into words what you want from the Universe.  That might be a very good thing for me/us.  The thing that strikes me about this last year is that what I felt like I REALLY needed, I got.  So yea.

I’m definitely ready fo

r things to be different/better though.  That’s a biggie for me.  I want it to be a GOOD different though…. I want for Jerry to be happy.  Me too, for that matter.  Well… I am happy for the most part.  These are obviously not the best of times, but I will always have to look at the self-inflicted part of that and be grateful that we were able to have our needs met.  "Real" jobs were always a possibility, just not what either of us wanted for ourselves or each other, so we chose to live like we did.  So we’ll see what this next year brings.

Got to go already!