Another Eve

It's not New Year's Eve...it's Idyllwild vacation Eve.  This time of the year flies by so quickly.  It seems like once Halloween hits, it's a race to the end of the end.  First Halloween, then I.'s birthday, followed by Thanksgiving and then soon after Christmas and our annual New Year's vacation.  Thank goodness D. was born in the summer.

Christmas was relaxed since we didn't have to go anywhere.  We just enjoyed watching the kids opening their presents and later played with them before my parents arrived close to noon.  We had a good time opening presents and dinner went well except for feeling as though we were cooking in a boat.  But my metaphor or analogy (it's too late to look up the correct definition) diffused any stress and my Christmas table turned out well.

Tomorrow we leave for Idyllwild.  With my lists and packing ahead of time I feel like I'm in a good place.  We'll see how I feel tomorrow at 11am, if I'm in as good of shape.  Fingers crossed that things will go somewhat smoothly and at a low stress level.

Also, we have no WiFi at our cabin so I may be incommunicado until we get back.  Seeing that I have 3 months of magazines to get caught up on and many books to read, I'll be just fine.  I'm hoping for a really great vacation getaway with my family.  V. has been home quite a bit from Christmas Eve on so I'm hoping that our vacation will be a continuation of this downtime.

One big thing that came to pass, both a big positive and a somewhat negative, has been that V. made all of his annual goals and thus has made it to the "President's Club" this year.  Meaning that we have an all expense paid and loaded up with all sorts of activities' trip to Puerto Rico February 28-March 3rd, 2013.  I'm excited yes but I have to admit when I saw the email, my first response was to tear up thinking that I had to get D. weaned by then.  It's doable but since he's sick now, it's going to require an accelerated schedule since I'm not eliminating feedings when he's sick.

I have to admit that as I see all the activities we have to choose from and I recognize that this is truly good timing, I'm getting really excited.  V. and I haven't been away by ourselves since March 2011 (and that was with D. in my tummy) and I have read that 18 months is the "perfect" time to wean which would be February 6th. I think it's especially opportune time that this year happens to be the year they have this celebration in Puerto Rico.  The heritage of V. and the site of our honeymoon... very fitting.

Still, I'm feeling grief and wondering if there's a way to continue nursing D. after a 5-6 day vacation.  I don't want to wean him based on our needs, I'd like to wean D. based on his needs but I'm not sure that's going to work.

Christmas Eve Firsts

I can't believe it's Christmas Eve already....I can remember last Christmas Eve like it was last week.  When you're an adult, life goes fast but when you're a parent it just races by.

A pleasant surprise was that V. was downstairs working instead of going into the office like he said he was. That gives us 5 days with him (well, I. 4 days since she'll be at my parents' house after Christmas).  It's a treat.

I. is so excited but thankfully her 4:18 am wake-up time caused her to be asleep by 5:30. As I braided her hair tonight, I remembered how excited I was on Christmas Eve though I had a much harder time falling asleep.  This will be the first year that she will have her brother in the room to hang out on Christmas morning.

Tonight I set up our table which was a last minute compilation of a non-creative person but I think it's going to look really nice.  I didn't finish it in case D. decided to pull the tablecloth in one fatal swoop.  I also filled 3 stockings, put the Santa presents out and wrote the Santa letter.  Oh and before I forget, I. lost ANOTHER tooth (she lost one 3 days ago) so not only am I Santa tonight, I'm the Tooth Fairy too!

No wonder I"m tired and ready for bed.  I hope for a good Christmas.  I know we'll have one tomorrow morning with our kids but I also hope for a smooth, relaxed one for the rest of the day including my parents.  Sometimes it's time to take the stress off the parents and shift it onto the kids.  Unfortunately in my case, it's the KID but I have hope for my brother.

Surprise Christmas Celebration

The second part of my conversation with my mom yesterday was finding out that my brother would not be around for Christmas which added to my parents' depression.  So I jumped into ad-lib mode and invited my parents over for Christmas Day.  This is huge, I've never had any major holiday at my home, whatever home I've had.  My mom didn't think that my dad would go for it but lo and behold, I talk to them this morning and they're all for it.  Waking up to no tree, no decorations or lights, and no kids until lunchtime is too much to handle and I understand that, thus the invitation for a different Christmas this year.

It's a different Christmas for us as well.  Until last year, Christmas morning was us opening gifts (excluding V.'s and mine) quickly so that V. could hit the road for the 3 hour round trip taking the girls back home.  Last year, the girls came down on Christmas Eve afternoon and drove themselves home Christmas morning. This year will be the first year that I. does not have her sisters here for Christmas morning, well excluding the year V. was in Saudi Arabia and no one was here for Christmas.  But this will be the first year that we get to stay at home all Christmas Day.  What a treat...except

For the fact that now I had to go into overdrive mode trying to provide a nice Christmas table.  This is not completely me putting the stress on me.  My father resisted a less stress Christmas dinner when I suggested it for my mother's sake citing childhood trauma and memories so I know I need to provide a sort of special ambiance for the dinner.  Luckily my mom and I discussed the itinerary of the Christmas dinner so I think we're in sync there and thank goodness for Amazon, I was able to put together a pretty Christmas table (I hope) most of which will arrive on Christmas Eve afternoon.

It's a mixture of emotions.  I'm happy for my little family because this is the first one that we celebrate just us Christmas morning.  It's not that I want to exclude the girls because that's not it.  It's having Daddy, Mommy, and 2 excited, young, Santa believing kids in the home that morning that is a first for us.  I'm also happy that V. doesn't have to drive 3 hours on Christmas morning and meet us at my parents' home separate from us.  It's looking forward to having some time to explore and play with the toys that we give them instead of having to get ready and head over to my parents' house in the morning.

Yet I feel a responsibility to make this Christmas a happy one for my parents.  As a parent and adult I can understand it's a tough one.  They had to make cutbacks (at least I hope they did) on the presents due to their financial situation.  And two out of three of their kids are not here for Christmas.  It leaves pressure on the remaining kid to make it a good one.  I thank God for my kids, their grandkids, because I think they are what will make this Christmas a joyous one for all of us.

And This Is How It Happens

The country is wondering how in the world someone could be living with a kid who is obviously mentally ill and out of control and not get help for them?  Here's how.

I called my mom for our weekly phone call and she sounded depressed which is not like my mom.  I won't go into all the details of that except for the one which pertains to this subject.  My sister, who is a narcissistic jerk when she's on her meds, decided three months ago that she would stop her meds and weekly appointments to her psychiatrist and psychologist as well as Narconon meetings resulting in my mom getting a phone call this week that my sister was getting kicked out of the house she was renting a room from by this weekend.  Let me clarify...she's not renting it, my unemployed with unemployment-benefits-being-terminated-this-month parents are paying for as well as her weekly groceries.  She was getting kicked out because she was acting crazy, the woman was afraid of her and if that wasn't enough, these people left for the weekend and while they were gone, my fucking loon of a sister threw their belongings into a dumpster.

My mother calls my sister's psychiatrist that SHE pays for and asks him what she can do.  He can't speak to her because my sister's an adult, actually tells her "good luck", and hangs up on my mother.

This is why we have theater killings and school shootings.  Something needs to be done to get over 18's mental help.  Why can't the sane people prevail?

Catching Up & Project Management

Yes I know it's been almost 2 weeks since my last post.  It's been busy, project kind of busy.  I had to get the annual photo albums done for the grandparents in time for the 50% off sale.  I couldn't miss that sale and sleep well, well as well as I even typically sleep at night.  I planned on getting these photo books done ahead of time and but being sick for 2 weeks took care of that.  This led to finishing the book up at 11:45 pm, a whole 15 minutes ahead of the midnight sale deadline.

As soon as I was done with the photo book, it was onto project number 2 - online Christmas shopping.  That took about 4-5 nights.  Purchasing a gift is easy online, it's the finding the right gifts for people that takes so long.

Next nighttime project was going through I.'s clothes for a big donation by the end of the year.  Since I've saved all her clothes for the past 7 years and my parents were well financed at that time and big shoppers ta boo, there were a lot of clothes to go through and decide what to keep and what to give away.  At times it was painfully sentimental and I would find myself crying as I remembered I. wearing certain items and what she and I had been doing at the time.  Sometimes I feel like we are far from that place and it makes me sad.  But I'm working on that and I'm helping I. work on it too and the last couple of days, it has been better so there is hope.

My current nighttime project is Christmas present wrapping which surprisingly takes awhile and usually involves back pain and my last project that I hope to take care of before New Year's is baby equipment donation to help clear out the garage even further.

This is the most boring post I've ever read but I have to admit, it helped to mentally clear things out of my head and helps me to acknowledge that I've gotten quite a bit done the last couple of months, all of it after my 2 full-time jobs aka the kids have gone to bed and V.'s been on travel.  I think I'll give myself a pat on the back.

Snuggle Day

I'm not sure what was going on today but D. was on high stranger alert today and additionally wanted snuggle time.  I have to say that there were no complaints from me.  Any day that includes extra loving, snuggle, and feeling safe time is a great day for me.

Having my baby boy run to me with his outstretched arms and then rest his head against my chest to snuggle when I picked him up was wonderful.  I'm teaching him how to hug, one step up from "giving love" which is more of a head butt, and now he's learning how to blow kisses, mostly to I. when she's walking into class but sometimes when we're driving in the car too.  He's really an affectionate child and I love it.

While we were snuggling, I told D. that Dada would be home later to rub a dub dub with D. and D. could kick kick kick with Dada.  The kids haven't seen V. since Sunday.  After I said this, D. quietly said, "Dada, yeah."  It was so sweet and made my heart melt.  The rest of his waking hours, he was shrieking or saying "Dada" and when V. arrived, D. was so excited, kicking and shrieking like crazy.  I know it made V. feel happy.