Happy Birthday Alyssa!

Well, her birthday was yesterday.  She woke up, staggered to where I was and said, "Mom?  Is it my birthday?"  As soon as I answered yes, she was dancing, haha.  She received a beautiful new dress for her birthday, which she wore to school – what a cutie!!  We had a couple little parties for her – we have a big one for all three kids, coming up November 12th. 

She received the dress, the highlight for her, as well as some cute little gifts from her brother.  Her friend gave her a barbie, she received a bundle load of hand made cards from her class, and before she went to bed last night I gave her my gift.   http://www.paintedponiescollectibles.com/figurines/crystal-figurine.htm  She was awe struck and very delighted.  She has been begging for one from the local store here, and swoons over the one I have sitting on my mantle.  She definitely was the envy of those in the house at that point.  This morning she was touching Crystal and talking sweet things.  She’s too cute.

Here are some pictures I took of her early in the morning before she headed off to school.  Sorry for the size, they’re huge!!  But, for her dad, uncle, aunt, and a few others who read, they can be saved to their computer by right clicking.

Oh what else here….

As I am busting my backside to pull myself out of debt and become completely debt free, I found this wonderful link full of many ideas and suggestions, as well as an online program (that I’ll be paying for), where you list all your debt, payment amounts, interest, etc and it calculates it for you into payments.  It lists what you will have paid in interest in the end for everything, if you stick to the minimum schedule.  It’s actually quite the eye opener.  I don’t feel I have THAT much in debt, roughly $18,000, and although my income is quite small I am able to pinch and take care of things that are needed.  My  hard part is going to be NOT going to the movies (well, maybe after this weekends movie "Flicka", lol), and not going out to eat (I hear IHOP calling!), leaving Starbucks and Jamba Juice alone, no McDonalds, etc.  Yep, those are the hardest ones, but it is so worth it.  I figure two years…. I want to have no debt in two years.  After that, and I work on raising my credit score, I want to finally look at purchasing a house,  I figure that will be 3-4 years from now, if not five.

http://www.cheapskatemonthly.com/

I enjoy having a plan for my life.  First a foremost my priority is raising my children to be happy, healthy, secure, and successful in this life – whichever direction they choose to go.  I have seen too many people who are adults, who are left to deal with the after effects of their parents being gone when they were children, who were left feeling "alone" or "shuffled around".  Who haven’t found the strength yet to make their life NOW rather then remaining lost and living in the past. There’s more thoughts to this, maybe I’ll talk about it later.

I am exhausted.  Yesterday completely whiped me out.  The kids were cranky, had multiple melt downs, the house did not stay clean as it was suppose to, I was done before the day ended, but I couldn’t stop.  I craved the idea of soaking in a hot bath, but by the time the last child was picked up and his mom went home (11pm), I was way too beat.  I could barely hold my eyes open, my body was quitting on me before I was ready.

I am heading over to the store shortly for a few cleaning supplies that I’ve ran out of.  It seems I clean and clean and don’t get anywhere, or atleast not for very long, because the kids are right behind me messing it back up.  I suppose as parents we never stop trying to figure out how to make it all work, how to make everything as simple and as organized as possible. I continue to search.</p