Craziness is starting again!

Well, kids are back in school and now my life is no longer my own again. Take this week for example. Tonight I have a board meeting at school, tomorrow Melissa has dance, Wednesday is open for right now. Thursday--right after school there is a PTO meeting, then there is a 2hr meeting at church starting at 6:30. I also have the auditors coming that day at work, so that will be a total day from hell. Then Saturday I need to go to my mom's real estate company for some training--I keep waiting for my first listing. She may have one, I have to wait and see. Then next Monday we have a girl scout meeting at school, then dance, then yada yada yada. I know it sounds like I'm complaining, but I'm not. One of my major goals with my kids is that I will not be the reason they can't be involved in extracurricular activities. My mom was never able to pick me up after school (too busy working) so it was hard for me to do anything. I remember sitting in front of school for 2 hrs in my cheerleading uniform waiting to be picked up after a game. I will NOT do that to my kids. So I'm happy to have them involved in things, it's just hard organizing all of it and keeping track!

I spent 3 hrs cleaning my master bathroom on Saturday. Do you think it was that disgusting? Not really, but I was pretty anal this time. It was really bothering me. My hair is falling out like crazy, so I have these long wanna-be-blonde hairs on the counter, sink, floor, and everywhere and I got sick of it! Mike was impressed.

Thanks to the support of Autumn, we have now been kid-free in our bed for 4 nights and counting. She made me think I could get Nathan out of my bed, and he's been sleeping in his own bed (which is right next to mine, so not all that impressive) and I have slept so much better--and so has he! Thanks, Autumn--I can always count on you for advice and support!

Ok, that's enough chatter for today. Back to my Monday!

Woes from the PTO

Well, it's been a few years since I was involved in the PTO (with Stephen) but I thought I'd jump back in with Melissa starting kindergarten this year. OH MY GOD!! What was I thinking??? On Saturday, we spent about 12 hrs painting the United States on the playground at school, and it was like 100 degrees outside and I'm not the world's best painter, and today I can hardly walk. I think I aged about 20 yrs in that one day. The school has 900 children, but there were 3 parents who volunteered to help, and one of them had the flu so we got her to go home and rest. Luckily, our husbands came up to help us, or we would have been there all night. So, I got to bed at about midnight Friday, got up at 6am Saturday, got to bed at about midnight Saturday and got up at 6 Sunday, got to bed at about midnight last night and got up at 5 today. I NEED SLEEP!!!! I think I'm gonna fall over if I don't get a solid 8 hrs of sleep tonight. Could someone tell my kids to cooperate so that I can get to bed early? How do other parents handle this no sleep thing?

Honestly--I'm happy to help out at school. I think it's very important to stay visible with the teachers, make sure they know who you are and that you are involved with your child's education. But, why don't other parents feel this way? School starts this Thursday, maybe things will change and more parents will get involved. If not, someone shoot me before I volunteer again.

Melissa's Birthday

Well, today is Melissa's 6th birthday. I was supposed to be off today, but had to take off yesterday instead. She was upset that I was leaving her with grandma, but I'll make it up to her over the weekend. I feel bad--her bday is before school starts and before dance starts, so it's hard to invite a bunch of her little friends to her party, which is what she wants to do. The dance girls she hasn't seen for 2 months or so, and I feel weird having our first interaction in months as an invitation to her bday party. So, it's just family tonight, and we're going to Cracker Barrel to eat and then going to swim at her grandparent's house. She'll be happy when it's all said and done. I'm more nervous about the fact that the class lists will be posted at school today at 4:00, so that's when I find out FOR SURE who her teacher is and who else is in her class. That is so scary! Anyone else obsess about their kid's teachers? I think I'm the worst. I'm eating banana bread while I'm pondering this, I wonder if that grosses Autumn out? I know she has a thing about bananas.

I've never had such a stressful vacation in my life, even though there were some good points--it was WAY too much driving for me. We left St Louis at 8am on Saturday 7/29 and checked into a hotel in New Jersey at 4:00 am 7/30. It doesn't take that long to drive to NJ, but if Mike is behind the wheel it does. He didn't make any reservations anywhere, I don't think he even knew exactly where he wanted to stay. We drove around for like 3hrs cuz every hotel room was booked, there was a convention of some sort there. We got a room FINALLY with one bed, which Mike, Melissa, Nathan and I all slept in. Stephen had to sleep on the floor. I got 4 hrs of sleep, then we got up to head to NYC. It was nice, if you can stomach the subway and the guy with the gun 5 ft away from us at Ground Zero. I would like to return someday without the kids. On Monday we went to Six Flags in NJ with a lovely family and we had lots of fun, even though it was pretty hot. I wish this family lived closer to us--they were so great!!! I joked around with the lovely mom and said "maybe we'll get to our hotel tonight before 4 am!!!". I should have kept my mouth shut--we left NJ Six Flags at like 8 pm and didn't check in the hotel in DC until 2 am. It was a SCARY hotel also, so we left there and went to the lovely Holiday Inn in Virginia--we paid a lot more, but it was SOOOO nice. Plus the restaurant had kids eat free, so it was well worth it. We stayed in Zanesville, Ohio on Wednesday night, and it was the nicest place we stayed the whole time. We swam in the indoor pool and the kids had fun--next year they want to go to Ohio for vacation.

Back to my stress--we went to DC on Tuesday, and we missed getting into the Capitol Bldg just barely--they had just given out the last passes. That's a bunch of crap--I pay so much in taxes, I should have my own room in the Capitol Bldg. We couldn't get into the Washington Monument either--same damn problem. They need to change a lot of things in DC. It was like 150 degrees outside and the kids all had red faces and Nathan had another heat rash, but at least I got to see the Hope Diamond!!!

OK, I'm done complaining for now. At least I got a week away from work. Now I'm back with deadlines and stress and worrying about the kids starting school next week and all the other crap. Aren't you glad you read this?