*** This post was originally written in March of 2011. It’s been sitting in my drafts as I decided just how personal to get… I’m publishing it only because I’m sure there are others who feel similarly. I’d love to discuss with anyone… and now… on with the post…

If the title of this post is making you think that you may hate me after reading it… then don’t. I highly suggest closing your browser and checking out the cool reviews on Mommy Brain Reports… and coming back in another month or so… this is a long one.. You have been warned…

I remember that song from REM way back in the day… Sometime the words can be so fitting for how I feel in life. Is this a call out for help? Not so much, and a way to get some questions I have out in the open, and invite true and logical answers… I’m not looking for anyone to criticize me, or my thoughts.. altho I’m sure that will happen.. Go ahead.. Leave your thoughts in the comments…

So, my deal is this… Why am I still Catholic? Why am I not Lutheran, or Baptist, or Whatever? Why must I go to a certain building to worship God. Why is the Catholic Church, the Church I grew up in, and believed everything that was put in front of me… so … hard to leave?

Let’s start there. I’ll start with what I know. I was baptized Catholic when I was a little baby. I wasn’t given the choice, it was made for me. No biggie. I grew up and went to Catholic school, learned the Catholic prayers, and read Catholic scripture… I went to church every week, without question. I got married in the Catholic church, and baptized my babies Catholic… only for the cycle to start all over again. Sorta.. Is my hubby Catholic? No. He’s Lutheran… but it’s close enough… LOL. Maybe if I would’ve married a Catholic guy I wouldn’t have these issues… but I didn’t fall in love with his religion, I fell in love with him… so pttthhht.

So, anyway. Back to Catholic stuff. Like I said, I was born into a Catholic family, and thus baptized and raised Catholic. Sure. I still go to Catholic Mass once in a while, but I don’t feel at home there. I have the prayers and songs more than memorized, but it’s like I’m reciting something… lines from a play or something. I’m just not feeling it anymore. I guess the question is.. Did I really ever? Seriously?

Ok.. moving on… Buildings.. Why is it that when you go to church, there is so much shiny stuff decorating the place? Why do people think that the shinier and more golden the place is, the better it is for the people? Um, No. That money we donate to the Church.. Sure I guess you use it to pay your bills, but why waste it on such elaborate decorations. Did anyone see Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom??? The Holy Grail was NOT the one adorned in jewels, but the cup of a carpenter..

Moving on… Why do I believe what I believe, and why am I so scared to leave my religion? I believe what I believe because it’s all that I know. I’ve only ever experienced a different church a handful of times, and each time it was “weird” for me. Not in a bad way.. just that it was different than what I was used to. The Stand up, sit down, readings, stand up, sit down, kneel, prayers, sit down, stand up, over, etc of the Catholic Mass makes any other service seem strange to me. Don’t tell me that things that are out of the norm are not strange to you. If the prayers and songs are different, than I’m totally out of my element. I’m grateful that hubby’s Lutheran church is very similar, and I don’t feel weird when I go there. Something else I noticed… I went to both the Lutheran church and the Catholic church… and had two extremely different experiences. We went to the Catholic church and everyone pretty much kept to themselves. No eye contact, no smiles, not a Hello or Welcome… We even went to the meet & greet afterwards and were completely ignored. People kept to their own groups, and it was just… well.. snobbish.. but we’ve continued to go there because the girls like their little class they get to go to during the first part of mass. We went to the Lutheran church and we couldn’t go a few steps without people saying Hi, and shaking hands, and commenting on the girls, and… well.. Welcoming us… Why haven’t we gone back more often? I don’t know.

The girls are getting to the age where they are asking a lot of questions about God, and Jesus, and religion. We take them to church whenever they ask to go, but, in all honesty, I feel like they’d get more out of a bible and me and daddy explaining things to them than they would sitting in a chair in a church for an hour. I don’t know.. I hate that I feel this way.. that I don’t feel at home in my own church.. I would love to find a place that I wanted to go to.. every Sunday, but I haven’t yet. Would I leave the Catholic Church? I don’t know. My girls are baptized Catholic, (yes the cycle has already started again) and I want them to learn more about it… but I’m not sure if I should remain there, or let them explore various churches and religions… Would it confuse the hell out of them? I don’t know. After all, aren’t we all Christian, and believe in the same God???

OK.. I think I’m done venting. For now. Please don’t judge. Please don’t hate me… I’m struggling… I love God, and I love that I have Faith… I just need to find a place I’m comfortable with… Thanks for listening.

or some other long distance relative….

Did you know that you don’t need a gun to hunt for deer??? Apparently all it takes is a super dark night and your vehicle…. Don’t believe me? Read on.

This is what I get for moving out of the big city… You know, what I used to call “The Concrete Jungle”… Here I am, driving home from TaeKwonDo… Everything is going normally. I turn onto the last main road home. It’s dark, but I had a bunch of cars with me, so all of our headlights lit up the road pretty well. I’m just starting to pick up speed as I come around the corner… No I wasn’t speeding.. I was just getting up to 45mph, and “oh shit!… BAM”. Bambi’s cousin, or whatever effin’ decided to jump out onto the road right effin’ in front of me… SERIOUSLY??? I had yet to see a deer out here, and now I’ve ran over one… Just lovely. I have no idea what the protocol is when you run over a deer. Am I suppose to stop, check for breathing, stop the bleeding and treat for shock? Or do I just keep going like it never happened? I have no idea! I’m a freakin’ city girl!

I pulled off the road into a church’s parking lot to check out the damage… I didn’t see anything immediately… I did notice that there weren’t any major dents or cracks, and that made me happy. I got back onto the road to the house so I could see the girls before they went to bed. I was a little shook up, but knowing the van wasn’t damaged too terribly bad made me feel a lot better.

I got home, parked outside and ran into the house. Hubby checked the front, and noticed just a couple of minor things, but nothing that makes the car worth putting in a shop. Seriously though… a deer? Tonight? At All? LOL. I guess it happens a lot out here, but why me? I really could’ve done without that.

To that deer: You effin’ deserved it . That’ll teach your friends not to jump out in front of a moving car. Or probably not.

To God: I’m super sorry I killed one of your creatures… but it shouldn’t have jumped out in front of me.

To my van: I’m sorry you hit that deer. It could’ve been worse. You held up really well… I’m proud of you. It could’ve been worse. If I had slammed on the brakes your rear end would’ve gotten smushed by the cars behind us.

To my hubby: Thanks for checking for guts & damage. I’ll take it to the car wash tomorrow.

I think I’m done. This has been a crazy last few days… I hope things come back to semi-normal this week.. really. I need normal.

So… the past two weeks have been super difficult for us here… If you saw my twitter & facebook updates, you saw why…  Long story short, Hubby works for a government contractor… Said contractor was outbid on a particular contract (the one containing hubby’s job)… Said contractor gave hubby 9 days notice that he would be out of a job due to the contract buy out.. errrr. CRAP. or… as my Tweet/Facebook update said… “WELL, SHIT”….

Sooooo this past weekend and every day thereafter has been job searching, application filling, resume updating and lots and lots of praying.

Why, you ask, am I sharing this personal information with the world? Well… because I believe in the power of prayer… and that if anyone that has any connections sees this (due to aforementioned prayer) and can help get hubby (or me) a permanent job… It would all be worth it!

It’s part of life, and it proves that no one is immune to the shitty economy that we are living in right now. I used to think that jobs were so easy to get, and that there would never be a time that I had to worry about where we’d get money to pay bills, etc. Yeah… That was a long long time ago… I’ve seen so many friends and even some family members struggle with being laid off, or on disability, etc… I’ve learned that the only sure thing is to own your own business… and even that’s not a 100% failsafe…

Ugh… Till we get this whole thing figured out, I WE totally appreciate your prayers and thoughts…

Well this was the first time since moving to NC that we had any threat of a hurricane… Hurricane Earl headed straight for the NC coast and thankfully turned N-NE just before reaching us.

The local news had updates constantly through the day on Thursday. The girls had a normal day at school but came home with a note saying there would be a 2 hr delay on Friday. Daddy came home 2 hrs early and was told he’d have a 2 hr delay on Friday. Me, well, I’m just adjusting my schedule with everyone else’s.
So according to the news, Hurricane Earl was supposed to be its closest overnight, reaching about 50mi off the NC shore. The islands on the Outer Banks were evacuated as were the islands on the Crystal Coast. We just prepared here buying water, emergency night lights that turn into flashlights when the power goes out, making sure we had everything important together. It was a prepare for the worst and pray for the best kinda thing.
Thursday evening was normal enough. Dinner, bath for the kids, bed.. Every once in a while, I ran outside to check on the weather, and there wasn’t much to speak of. Barely a breeze to fly a kite in and maybe a light sprinkle ever showed up here in Jacksonville.

According to friends and family elsewhere though, the entire state of NC was being slammed..

I was getting phone calls and text messages from people late into the night asking us if we had evacuated yet, or if the winds were getting us too badly, how would we leave… They kept telling me that the news was saying that NC was being battered by Hurricane Earl.. That the images they were showing had severe weather all across the Eastern Coast… I had to giggle. Luckily, we were perfectly safe. The part of NC that was being most affected by the storm was the outer islands. These islands are a tiny, thin band of islands that actually stick out into the Atlantic. They’re about a 3hr drive from us. When they said the eye of the storm was going to pass 50mi off shore… They meant 50mi from those islands…

Now, don’t get me wrong.. Hurricane Earl was a decent storm… and it was pretty strong out there on the islands.. People out there boarded up homes, brought in their boats and got out of there. I pray that the damage, if any, is minimal for those folks. Both of those island chains are absolutely beautiful places, and we can’t wait to visit them again. BUT… Just because a certain place is getting hit with a storm, doesn’t mean the entire state is….

PS.. Thanks to all who checked up on us… I really do appreciate it… I am more ranting about the media making it seem like the storm was a lot more extreme that it really was…

Well, this week the girls were supposed to start school… It didn’t happen. Oh yes, school started, but the girls didn’t get to go. Instead, we’ve been cooped up in the house just about all week. Why ?? you ask?? Well.. here’s the story…

Last week, Monkey Do came down with a decent fever. 102ish.. It wasn’t fun. We gave her ibuprofen, acetaminophen, and cold meds.. cool baths, etc.. Just anything to make her more comfortable. It lasted 2 days, and just vanished. Awesome.. The next day was perfect! No one was sick, we went out to eat, we had a great day! The next day, Monkey See woke up with a fever. Ok, no biggie. It’ll probably last a couple of days and she’ll be fine by Monday.. Monday was open house and orientation at their school. She was fine by Monday too! I went to orientation meetings in the morning, came back home, gave them lunch, and the whole family went over to the school to find their classroom, and meet their teacher. We found their seats, and giggled about the teacher putting them across the room from each other, with their backs to each other!!! *smart teacher* LOL.. and then we went home. The evening went on as normal, nothing major happened, until we were getting the girls ready for bed.

We noticed some yucky blisters on Monkey See.. They just showed up out of nowhere. We started looking her over and found more rash on her hands and feet.. We got worried and called my parents who could only offer a sudden/strange allergy as an answer. We decided I was going to call the pediatrician first thing in the morning.

The next morning brought more blisters, small ones around her mouth and on her fingers. It was so weird! I got her into the dr first thing that morning, and after waiting about an hour, we were given the diagnosis of Hand/Foot/Mouth virus. Yeah.. I know.. It’s typically called Hand Foot Mouth Disease, but that word scares me… and it is a virus after all..  Anyway… we were advised not to bring either of the girls to school until this thing ran through them… I agreed, and here we are. It’s Thursday, and the girls have yet to start school.. I have NO idea where they caught it, or what it’s all about.. but hey.. we’re getting through it.

The good news is, her blisters are starting to go away. There’s no fever left in the house, and they are excited as ever to start school.. I’m still excited, scared, sad, etc…  but hey… What do you expect? Now, I’m going to spend the weekend making sure we have everything for the girls. They’ll go pick out their first lunch boxes, and their favorite snacks for school. I’m sure they’ll be ok…

It’s times like right now when I wished I had a crystal ball… You know.. one where I could really see the future based on a variety of life decisions… BEFORE the decisions are finalized…
I’m awake.. it’s 1:30am…. I’m going through the myriad of options in front of us, and really praying that the one we are most considering is the right one.

You’re probably wondering what the h-e-double hockey sticks I’m talking about… Well, until we have a final answer, I can’t really say… All I can say right now is… I wish I could be a kid again.. to see everything through rose colored glasses and have the responsibility of school, homework and play… Being an adult sucks right now…

So, July is here already. The girls turn FIVE in 6 days… *sniffle* I can’t believe it! I really have no idea where the last 6 years have gone.. yes 6… I was pregnant for a bit of that time

Well, the month of July started as well as it could. We’re getting ready for a visit with Meemaw & Peepaw (my parents) and the girls are super excited. I’m stressing a little. The house is a little bit of a mess.. We’ve been clearing clutter and just getting rid of junk that we’ve collected over the years… and boy do we need to do a Yard Sale!!! Anyway.. I’m getting the rooms together upstairs, hoping to get vacuumed, dusted, etc all out of the way before they get here on Wednesday.

The 4th of July weekend, we went up to Raleigh for a quick visit with friends. We lit up some fireworks, and smoked some awesome beef, pork, and veggies. It was an awesome weekend. Well.. mostly. I woke up Sunday morning with major back pain. I was hurting a little bit when I went to bed Saturday, but it was crazy when I woke up… I had a hard time standing up, bending down, lifting anything. I have NO idea what I did to hurt so badly! The crappy part… it’s been hurting ever since. I’ve sat in a hot tub, I’ve iced, heated, massaged, you name it… I’ve taken acetaminophen, naproxen, muscle relaxers, anti-inflammatories, and pain killers. Not all at once mind you.. but nothing is seeming to help! I’ve missed one day of TaeKwonDo, and I’m more than likely going to miss Friday as well.

Top all of this off with two sick little girls. Both of them have had a fever of over 100F. I don’t know where this came from either, but I’m hoping it’s gone before their birthday! I can’t imagine being sick, in the middle of summer, on your birthday That would kinda bite… ok, it would REALLY bite.. Anyway… If you haven’t seen me online much lately.. this is why. I’m sorry! I’m just exhausted from the week.

I promise, once my back heals and I’m able to sit at the computer for longer, I’ll be online a little more. Yes, I have a laptop, but it still hurts… I’ve spent a lot of time with the girls watching movies on the couch, or setting them up to color or write, and laying down behind them until they need help witch something.

I’m just hoping that everything calms down soon, my girls feel better fast, and my back quits hurting like NOW!

So a few months ago… I think it was August to be exact… we had a major pest control issue on our hands. We live on a golf course (though neither of us golfs) and we get a lot of bugs and other icky things around here…  We were pretty tired of it, and of course, I had forgotten to call around. Well, one weekend, we decided to go with a big name company…. We saw the commercials, showing the guy in the white outfit with the red diamond on his hardhat inspecting houses… We thought.. “Wow.. they really take a look around!” and with our house having a crawlspace underneath, we figured there had to be some spooky things under there.  Who knows right???

Anyway… We set up an appointment, and our local Orkin guy came out to our house a couple of days later. He walked around the house, took his flashlight to the pantry, and said… well… Here’s what we can do… We can spray, I can give you traps, and we can do it every couple of months… and it’s going to be $71 each time I come out here… He didn’t exactly do the thorough inspection that they advertise on the commercials, but since when did a Burger actually LOOK like it does on the TV? We kinda thought about it a sec, and thinking this was a good deal, and we needed something fast, we signed on… We told him that we needed to know before hand when he was coming, so I could take care of the dog, unlock the gates, and most of all, make sure someone would be home… Well…. he walked away with our contract in hand… and we were left hoping the following services were going to be better than this first one. Yeah.. Not so much..

The next services were less than desirable. I never got a call to let me know when our service was happening, resulting in me being gone from the house. Which in turn, meant that the dog was still out back, the back yard couldn’t get serviced, and neither could the inside. The last time they called me to tell me my credit card wasn’t being charged any more… I had canceled that card because it was stolen… He told me I could just pay by check when he came… I asked when he was coming… he literally said “I don’t know. They just give me a list to call.” Are you serious??? I was not going to just stick a check out there every day hoping that would be the correct day…

I finally had enough… I called customer service to cancel our service. I didn’t want to deal with them any more… I just had it… After talking to oohhh.. 4 different people… I finally got the confirmation that they were closing the account. I was offered A free service… I was given an apology… Thanks.. but I’m good… I just wanted to cancel. We had ended up taking care of most of our own issues since then anyway… It’ll save us money in the long run right?

Well fast forward 2 weeks later… to today.. I’ve got the girls in the tub, and I’m getting ready for my dental appointment… The door rings.. Well, I can’t exactly answer the door… It rings again.. I finally peek through the blinds in my room, and see an Orkin truck in my driveway, and the dog is going nuts! I got the dog upstairs, but could smell the bug spray… I called Orkin, and asked them why there was an Orkin guy here spraying… after I already canceled the service… and WHY was he in my backyard… All the lady says to me is.. “Oh.. it looks like you get a free service today”… Really??? The guy just jumped my back fence.. It’s Locked FOR A REASON…. Don’t'cha think??? Maybe if I still had an active contract, and the dog was inside… but no.. I canceled it… They have no business on my property…

Needless to say… I’m less than impressed with this company… and the only reason I’m writing this now, is because I’m super angry that they didn’t even seem to care when I called today… I didn’t complain until today… at least not in public…

I called around, and other companies in my area cost waaaay less.. and they seem very genuine when I talk to them. I’m going to end up going with them …

..and now if you’ll excuse me… I have a root canal that needs to be done… you know.. because that’s something fun that everyone should do… NOT…

Ok, so I pretty much didn’t like Barbie or her knock offs for most of my childhood life. I knew that someday, having girls, I would eventually have to give in and let the girls play with Barbie or others like her… but this… this is crazy… Do you remember the Bratz dolls? The controversy behind them, the controversy OF them? They were scantily dressed “Bad Girls” dolls.Apparently, the guy who created these, did so while working for Mattel, which somehow gave them rights to the intellectual property. Bratz didn’t come out until after he left his job at Mattel, but the company still felt like they owned his ideas. A court agreed, and he was ordered to stop making Bratz dolls. Luckily, we weren’t at that stage yet, so the girls didn’t even miss them.

Well, now there are these new dolls called Moxie, and my hubby thinks they are Bratz reinvented by the same guy… No, we haven’t done any research on them, so he could be waaaaay off… but they look eerily familiar. Same overdone makeup, same too short, too tight, or too..ummm… not enough clothing… Seriously.. Why would I buy something like these for my girls who are all of 4 years old? They see them in the stores and want them… I say no..

Well, they got one as a gift a little while back… and I’m none too thrilled. Sorry to the person that sent it, but after looking at it, in it’s box for several months, trying to decide if I was going to actually open it or not… Well, I finally gave in… Only because there was another item in the box that I was ok with them playing with.. I totally didn’t want them playing with the doll itself… but alas… It was found.. and now they have been pretending she’s a rock star… yipes…

I’ve been trying to think of ways this doll could mysteriously disappear… but I’m wondering if I’m totally overreacting… Should I hold on to them until they’re a little more age appropriate?  What do you think? Should I let them play with this doll? Am I just a dork for even thinking the doll is bad to begin with?? Leave me a comment with your thoughts!!!

Don’t worry… I won’t get angry, or laugh at you…

PS.. At least Barbie is now totally geeking out! I’m totally buying the girls a couple of these!

**Note: I started this post on Friday Jan 15th…

So, this morning was a shitty morning. I’m not going to lie. Hubby got up and went to work as usual, waking me up just before he went downstairs to warn me that the girls were already awake.

I didn’t think this morning would be so much trouble, but it was… and here’s how I handled it.. Tell me if you could do better.. really.

So as I got out of bed, out of my warm electric blanketed bed, my girls asked if they could have my iPhone. Typically it’s not an issue. But this morning, it changed everything.

I let Monkey Do play with it for a bit as long as she promised to share it with Monkey See. I told them to sit tight, and let me take a very quick shower… Usually my showers are very quick… I’m all about water conservation ya know! Anyhow, I get into the shower, start washing my hair, and the I hear fighting. I told Monkey Do to put my iPhone on the bathroom counter. Little did I know that that request was going to change the course of my morning. Monkey Do didn’t have my phone, so in order to get it from her sister, instead of asking for it, like any normal person, I hear this wailing cry. I jump out of the shower, soap still in my hair, and Monkey See is walking towards me crying.

“Sister bit me” she tells me..

I flip.

“Where did she bite you?”

Monkey See lifts up her shirt to reveal a nasty bite mark just below her chest.

wow.

I yelled for Monkey Do, who conveniently took off for her bedroom… I showed her Monkey See’s chest, and just couldn’t really hold back. I got angry, I yelled, and I sent her to her room. Oh she knew I was mad. She knew I was very mad. I let her sit in her room for a while and think about it. I finished my shower, dried off, and got dressed. Monkey See was laying in my bed, still sniffling, so I checked on her. Yup, her chest was definitely going to bruise. I asked her why her sister bit her..> She told me it was because she wouldn’t give back the iPhone… Oh great.. so I indirectly caused this?? UGH! I called Monkey Do back to my room… more like yelling at her, but that’s beside the point… I showed her what she did to her sister and asked her if she would like it if her sister did that back to her. Of course the answer was no… I sent her back to her room, told her to sit on her bed and plan on staying there most of the day…. Oh the flood gates opened. Sure I didn’t mean that she’d really stay there all day, but she didn’t know that.

I sat with Monkey See for a while, talking to her about all the great things having a sister means, and having a TWIN sister to boot! I explained how I didn’t like seeing them fight, and how biting is always a no-no, etc etc etc… After  few minutes of talking I took her into her bedroom to sit with Monkey Do and gave her the same speech. As I talked to her, I mentioned the time when she was bit in the arm by another girl at the gym, and told her to remember how badly that hurt. I showed her Monkey See’s chest, and told her to think about it happening to her all over again… That’s what her sister felt… Finally, I had her look her sister in the eye, and apologize. They gave each other the biggest hug.. Ah to be young and sisters…

And they never fought again… yeah right…