Ramblings of a SAHM

Sunday, April 30, 2006

Tips and Tricks for Sewing on Boy and Girl Scout patches

The easiest one being: convince someone else to do it for you. *winks*

If you don't have a sewing machine, go back to the last statement. The embroidery and gunk that supposedly make the patches "iron-on" (Girl Scouts) are very difficult to hand sew through. Save yourself the frustration and try a dry cleaning shop that offers tailoring, it'll be cheaper than you think.

Still with me? Good. Now look at all your patches. Do you have matching thread for all of the different colors of edge embroidery? No? Here's the trick, you don't need a bazillion colors! All you need is a thread to match the clothing piece (brown for Brownies, navy blue for Cub Scouts, etc) and "invisible" thread. It's nylon instead of cotton and is pretty much thin plastic fishing line wound on a thread holder. Check the quilting department of your fabric store. Use the colored thread for the bobbin and the invisible thread for the top stitching. This saves you so much time because you don't have to keep switching out thread colors as you sew on all the patches.

Next tip: buy some double sided tape. Again it's hard to pin through all the embroidery and iron-on gunk so to keep the patches in place while you sew them, use a little piece of double sided tape. Don't even worry about removing it, it's not going to hurt anything.

For Boy Scouts: those Wolf/Tiger/Bear/etc patches that go over the pocket of the shirt? Just sew through the darn pocket. They never use that pocket anyways.

For Girl Scouts: I know the patches are suppose to be iron-on. And I've actually had pretty good luck with the Brownie Try-It badges staying put. But... Be careful with the iron because repeated ironing in the same section will burn the fabric to a crispy black and create a hole. Course if it's small enough, you can always cover it up later with another Try-It patch. Not that I'd know from experience or anything...

Happy Scouting!

Katie at 9:50 AM

Friday, April 28, 2006

136.5

A pound a week, I suppose I can live with this. And my regular jeans are finally feeling loose. I haven't tried on my "tight" jeans yet but they should fit now since I bought them when I weighed between 133-137. The thing that sucks is that I really like The Limited jeans and wanted to buy more now that I've lost several pounds. For some reason they don't have any in their stores at the moment (Greg and I were at the mall last Friday). People don't need jeans in the spring/summer?

On today's to do list: clean out the pantry, laundry, sewing, and enter receipts into Microsoft Money. And since the weather is really nice, work on my freckles. (I don't tan, I burn and peel and freckle. Darn Irish ancestors.)

Have a lovely Friday!

Quote of the Day: "A face without freckles is like a sky without stars." -Stephen Majercik

Katie at 8:23 AM

Thursday, April 27, 2006

Um, where was I? Oh yeah, yesterday. Kelly and I took a nice two hour nap on Greg's leather recliner (I secretly really like the chair but out loud pretend I think it's too big and tacky, hehe). And I finished recovering the kids' chairs (6)! The tricky part is that they have a fabric seat and back. I have a big bruise on the palm of my right hand and a half inch gash on my left hand from using a screw driver to pry out all the staples. Ow...

Today, I need to clean a bit and run a ton of errands that I've been putting off. I'm conserving gas! (That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it.) The list? Is long and ugly and probably won't be finished today:

Auto Zone: air filter and wiper blades (I need to look all cute so I can get them to replace them for me)

oil change: I should just let Jiffy Lube replace the air filter but they charge way too much

gas: ugh, we're below a quarter of a tank and with prices around $3.15 a gallon, I just hope it doesn't cost $90

bank: need one dollar bills for lunch money

Blockbuster: Must Love Dogs was light and cute and funny (I really like John Cusak) and Memoirs of a Geisha is so beautifully filmed, it's like sensual massage for the eyes

yarn shop: they supposedly have Brown Sheep cotton fleece in stock for this sweater pattern

post office: need to ship books back to Steph

library: 2 weeks overdue, eek!

JoAnn Fabrics: um... My sister-in-law is a wonderful nurse at a children's hospital and asked ever so nicely for me to make her some scrubs. She even provided the fabric and pattern! But I goofed. You see I never ever work with patterned fabric (not that I go out of my way to avoid it, I just never seem to buy it) so I accidentally cut a piece out upside down. Doh...

Target: a few returns then I need to buy a new coffee maker (the dishwasher melted a piece of our current one) and pencils. And whatever else cute new Target stuff I see that I must have

mall: a return but I'm betting this trip doesn't happen today because the mall is in the exact opposite direction from everywhere else

grocery store: cereal, milk, bread, M&M's, you know general grocery stuff

I can only run 3 errands a day with all 5 children, I've never really counted how many Kelly and Kyle will tolerate (we average 5 a lot). 12 may just be too many for me! (13 if you count stopping for lunch somewhere.) Yes, there will be cookies and candy and Mountain Dew at the end for all who survive, anyone want to join me?

Katie at 9:08 AM

Wednesday, April 26, 2006

I have found more hours in the day! I can't believe I hadn't figured this out before. It's so simple, you can do it too. What's your regular bedtime? Mine's 11:30pm. When bedtime rolls around, simply do not go to bed. Genius!

Okay I really didn't mean to stay up until 5:30 this morning. You read that right, 5 freaking 30 this morning, today, Wednesday, April 26th. I actually went to bed at 9:30 last night. But Greg called around 10pm (he's in New Jersey *waves*) and then I couldn't get back to sleep. I had rented a few movies earlier (Must Love Dogs and Memoirs of a Geisha) and I needed to recover the kids' toy room chairs. So I figured I'd watch a movie and recover a few chairs until I felt sleepy again.

Well I ended up putting in the second movie after the first since I was in the middle of chair recovering when the first ended. Emily wandered down at 1am and complained about the stapling noise. Since I was in the middle of Memoirs, I decided to just pull the staples out of the remaining chairs to finish in the morning. And then it was like 4am and I realized I hadn't folded the laundry. Or moved the towels into the dryer. And I needed to run the dishwasher. And then all of a sudden it was 5 freaking 30 in the morning.

As awesome as it was to have an extra 7 hours, I'm thinking this may not be the best way to find more hours in the day. Cause I'm just a wee bit tired now. Just a wee bit... Really. I'm fine... *yawns*

Katie at 12:34 PM

Tuesday, April 25, 2006

Only I can turn ordering knitting needles into four 911 phone calls.

A few weeks ago, I placed an online order for $55 worth of knitting needles. I know that sounds like a lot but knitting needles are forever so it's really an investment. I did shop around and found a place that has really good prices for the brand I like. Although $8.50 for shipping sounded a bit high but whatever, here's my VISA number, send them to me!

I received my confirmation email and everything looked great. So I waited. And waited. And waited... About 10 days later I was worried, where's my package? So I looked up my order on their website and it said "pending". Pending what? I sent them an email asking why and where and when and darnit, I want my knitting needles!

Then I was back to waiting. I hadn't heard anything at all back from them after another week. So finally yesterday I decided I should call. The business is in New York so I grabbed the phone and dialed 9-1, oh wait I forgot to dial the 1 first, hit 1 again, doh that's not right, the next number is 4 not 1... So I hung up to start over. And then the phone rang. "This is 911, what is your emergency?" Huh?

I had just dialed 9-1-1.

I am such a dork. I explained to the operator that I was trying to call a New York store, area code 914, and hit the wrong number. I apologized like a dozen times. So then I hung up. And the phone rang again.

"911, don't hang up yet, it rings back until I clear your call out of the system." Oh...

And then a few minutes later, the phone rang again. "*Local County* Police Department, we received a notice of a 911 call from your line." Ugh!

Finally I stopped receiving 911 calls and correctly dialed the New York telephone number. To which I received no answer. I tried the number 3 times, very carefully dialing as to not bother the poor 911 operator anymore.

Has anyone ever ordered from Lee's Yarn before? Their site seems legit and it's linked from other knitting websites. I just want my knitting needles, damnit!

Maybe I should call New York's 911 to send someone over to the yarn shop's address to check where my order is...

Katie at 8:14 AM

Monday, April 24, 2006

Crap, MeMe time. Thanks, Ben! (I think...)

Four Jobs I Have Ever Had:
1) Hardee's fast food employee
2) secretary's assistant
3) restaurant hostess
4) flower shop employee
(It's good thing that this is a list of only 4 because I've only ever had 4 jobs in my life.)

Four Movies I Can Watch Over And Over:
1) Pirates of the Caribbean
2) Shrek
3) Toy Story
4) Casablanca

Four TV Shows I Love To Watch:
1) Good Eats
2) American Idol
3) um...
4) um...

Four Places I've Been On Vacation:
1) Bahamas
2) Colorado Springs, CO
3) New York, NY
4) Orlando, FL

Four Tunes That Play In My Head:
1) If I had a Million Dollars (BNL)
2) A Long December (Counting Crows)
3) Twinkle Twinkle Little Star
4) Pinch Me (BNL)

Four Favorite Dishes:
1) General Tso's Chicken with fried rice and egg roll
2) snow crab legs
3) chocolate anything
4) Chicago deep dish pizza

Four Websites I Visit Daily:
1) here (to get to everyone on my blogroll)
2) MSN Hotmail
3) Club Pogo
4) Weather Underground

Four Books I Really Love:
1) Where the Wild Things Are
2) Where the Red Fern Grows
3) (hmph, can't think of any other book titles that begin with "Where...")
4) the Harry Potter series

Four Places I'd Rather Be:
1) in bed
2) on a beach
3) with friends and family
4) in the shower

Um, now I'm suppose to tag 4 people but I think I'm the last person on the planet to do this thing. If you have somehow escaped this long (I almost did!), you're it.

Katie at 11:52 AM

Friday, April 21, 2006

137.5

I think I'm retaining water today. Seriously! That time of the month is due in a few days and I always feel really off during the week before. TMI so we're moving on...

Someone suggested I do measurements since I'm not really feeling the weight loss difference. I guess 6 pounds isn't really that much anyways. I bet I'll notice a bigger difference when I lose the next six pounds. Although at the rate I'm going that will take another 2 months. *sigh*

Measurements (in inches, red was taken on Feb 26th, black is today's, green is the difference):
Bicep 11.5 11 .5
Chest 36 36 0 (ha!)
Waist 32 30 2
Hips 41 39 2
Thigh 22.5 20 2.5
Calf 15 14 1

So I've lost 8 inches. I suppose that's not too shabby. But darn it, what's it going to take to be 135 pounds so I can buy my freaking iPod?

Katie at 8:44 AM

Thursday, April 20, 2006

Can a book make you sick?

And it wasn't even that kind of book. Steph and I have been exchanging books and she recently sent me Confessions of a Shopaholic. I've read other Brit Chick Lit books (I think that's a genre) like Can You Keep a Secret? which is really cute. But Confessions is making me sick.

And I have the dumbest reason ever. I could not stand reading about the main character spending money and putting herself way over her head in debt like, well a shopaholic. The TV show My Super Sweet 16 gives me the same knot in my stomach feeling. Which for the record I don't really watch, I just happened to catch 10 minutes of the show twice. At least the book is fiction...

I'm not sure where I'm going with this post. Other than I hate to spend money on frivolous items and I hate debt. I hope to make it through Confessions anyways. But while we're on the subject of books, another cute one is A Total Waste of Makeup, similar "funny single girl trying to make it through life" premise except this main character is in LA and an assistant to an actor. Don't pick on me too much for my fluff books, War and Peace isn't exactly treadmill walking reading matter.

So read any good books lately?

Quote of the Day: "Always read something that will make you look good if you die in the middle of it." -P.J. O'Rourke

Katie at 10:01 AM

Wednesday, April 19, 2006

I'd really like to be anywhere but here. Well not anywhere but you know what I mean.

Still have the head cold. I'm tired, stuffed up, achey, and in a fog.

We have a Brownie meeting after school and then Market Day and then Zach's batting cage practice. I thought I was prepared for the Brownie meeting but I was 6 inches short on the fabric (foggy head cold brains should not try to do complicated inches into yards fabric math) and no one dropped off empty 2 liter bottles as I requested (we're making sit-upons and bird feeders). So back to the fabric store and the grocery to dump out 50 cent bottles of store brand cola. I should be there right now instead of typing if I have any hope of getting all the cleaning done today.

The cleaning. Argh... Not something you can do ahead of time as anyone with children will tell you. Well you can do it a couple days ahead of time if you want to redo it right before the event you wanted the house clean for. I busted my butt (okay, really my shoulder) steam cleaning the carpet the weekend before last and now? There are spots again and it looks like I didn't spend several hours with the damn steam cleaner over two days. Bitter? Just a little bit.

It's like this stupid weight loss thing. A bunch of hard work to get to 136 (as I was over the weekend) and one bad day and I'm 138 again. A ton of cleaning and less than 24 hours later, everything looks exactly as it did before. Just call me Sisyphus but please make sure my hill is child and spot free.

Pity party over, go back to your cubicles or stop hiding from the children. 11 more hours until bedtime...

Katie at 9:26 AM

Tuesday, April 18, 2006

Cliff Notes

Greg, his sister, one of his co-workers, and I went to the Billy Joel concert in DC on Friday. It was awesome!

Dyeing eggs with the kids was fun and I didn't even end up with odd colored hands afterwards.

Our plain boring flat yard with very little landscaping is not so great for hiding Easter eggs.

I love having company.

But not having a head cold like I do today.

I have sent 2 of the 3 emails on my to do list.

But folded only 1 of the 5 loads of laundry.

I love my kids to pieces and even though we had a very nice relaxing Spring Break, I was just a wee bit happy to send the Big 3 back to school today.

I have to go to Wal-Mart (I HATE Wal-Mart) as well as Staples and JoAnn Fabrics.

And vacuum, I really need to vacuum.

Happy ~~Monday~~ Tuesday!

Katie at 9:24 AM

Sunday, April 16, 2006

Happy Easter!

Yoda Egg and Kyle

Zach, Emily, Kelly, Ally (in pink), Kyle

The girls comparing baskets during the egg hunt

Zach and his bubble gun

Katie at 5:45 PM

Friday, April 14, 2006

138

Hmm, do you notice a plateau here?

This week I think I can actually blame gaining muscle. Because I'm finally feeling thinner. It only took 7 weeks of working out at the gym. *sigh* And that eDiets promise of being 128 on April 20th? ha! Slow and steady wins the race right? I just really want my iPod though.

We're dyeing Easter eggs this afternoon, I'll post pictures tomorrow!

Katie at 11:07 AM

Thursday, April 13, 2006

Beautiful, beautiful day here. I really wish I had a hammock and a laptop.

Quote of the Day: "Science has never drummed up quite as effective a tranquilizing agent as a sunny spring day." -W. Earl Hall

Katie at 2:36 PM

Wednesday, April 12, 2006

Spring break is going pretty well so far. We haven't done a whole lot but after reading Chris's post I'm feeling okay with that.

Ally's appointment with the ENT yesterday went as I suspected. Half an hour of driving and a 45 minute wait to see the doctor (we were 5 minutes early for our appointment so make that 50 minutes) for 2 minutes of the doctor looking at Ally's cheek and declaring her fine. Then a 10 minute wait to check out (receptionist was yapping on the phone) and half an hour drive back home. 117 minutes of my life gone forever. *sigh*

Tonight I need to go shopping for the Easter Bunny and tomorrow I'm going to make sure the guest room is free of Cheez-it crumbs because Greg's sister is flying in for the weekend. I am so excited! Course this means I need to plan an Easter dinner, something I've never had to do because we've always gone to Greg's parents' house. Anyone want to give me a refresher course on hiding Easter eggs? (Greg's brother has always done that part too.) You may have noticed I haven't bitched about sewing Easter dresses. Because I'm not! Good old Target to the rescue this year.

Now then there's a comfy leather recliner and a snuggly 3 year old calling me to watch Little Bear.

Katie at 9:58 AM

Tuesday, April 11, 2006

I forgot what a earful 5 kids can be:

"What's for lunch?"
"Can I play on the computer?"
"Can we go outside?"
"Can we go to IKEA for lunch?"
"Where's my soccer ball?"
"Can we go to Burger King for lunch?"
"What's for snack?"
"Can I wear this?"
"Are we going to the gym today?"
"Where's the remote?"
"What does 'eventually' mean?"
"Can I play dress-up?"
"Where are the crayons?"
"Can I watch TV upstairs?"
"Can I have paper?"
"Where are you?"
"Can you tie this?"
"Can I give the guinea pig carrots?"
"Can I watch a movie?"
"Can you print some coloring pages?"
"Can I have a banana?"
"Can we have popcorn with our movie?"
"Why does Kyle have a banana?"
"Is the mail here?"
"When's it going to be the end of the world?"
"How do you spell 'holiday'?"
"Where's my gameboy?"
"What's this word?"
"Where are the scissors?"
"Can you open this?"
"Can I play on the computer?"
"What's for dinner?"
"When's Jeopardy on?"
"Can we have dessert?"
"Where's my blanket?"

...

Katie at 12:14 AM

Monday, April 10, 2006

I suppose everyone has something about themselves that they wish they could change. Like straight hair to curly and vice versa. Or to be taller/shorter/skinnier/fattier and so on. In general I'm pretty happy with myself, I've made peace with being short and my sticky-out elf ears. But the one thing that has always really bugged me... I wish I could sing.

I think about this way more than I should. Especially after seeing a musical (Broadway or high school or whatever). I don't really have any desire to be on American Idol (go Chris!). But to be in a musical? I would seriously give up um, well a lot just to be able to sing well enough to have made it into the chorus line.

This isn't something I tell a lot of people. Very few people (until now) know of my super secret desire to have been one of the drama/musical kids. I went to a small high school so we didn't have a drama club, only an annual musical. And even though there were usually a few speaking only parts, you had to sing at the audition. And since the musicals were directed by the chorus teacher, she always picked people who could sing. (I think the stage hands had to be able to sing too.) And I can't sing. I could act, I could dance, I could play a musical instrument, I could hold a 3.92 grade point average without breaking a sweat but I couldn't sing.

Even though I'm way past high school and don't plan on leaving my family for a chance at Broadway, it would still be nice to be able to sing. Then I wouldn't have to lip sync the hymns at mass or turn the radio up louder so my kids don't tell me not to sing along. (Seriously at least once a day, the kids tell me to stop singing. *sigh*) It would be nice to sing Happy Birthday a little more loudly or confidently lead the Brownies in the "Brownie Smile Song". I wish I could sing.

I know I'm blessed with all sorts of other random talents but I could make it through life without ~~all~~ ~~half~~ some of them just be able to sing. Do people who can sing realize how lucky they are? Not to get odd looks during the National Anthem or feel embarrassed when asked to sing a few lines of a song being discussed? I don't need the range of Mariah Carey or the soul of Aretha Franklin. I just want to sing "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" with my kids at the grocery store without giving other people apologetic looks because they have to listen to my terrible singing voice.

You don't believe me? Well then here you go (don't say I didn't warn you):

It's okay, you can laugh. Just don't ask how the weather is down here or if Dumbo is missing a sister...

Katie at 9:09 AM

Sunday, April 09, 2006

I've been working on these all weekend:

My youngest sister is getting married in July and since I'm the matron of honor (woohoo!), I'm in charge of the bridal shower. We throwing her a "recipe shower" so the invites are aprons with a blank recipe card for the guests to fill out and give to her. The blue card seen above is the actual invite, "Recipe: Sarah's Bridal Shower". It has the date, place, etc under "Ingredients" and the "Directions" are "Combine all of the ingredients with friends and family to make an afternoon of fun!" A wee bit cheesy but cute, I think.

Katie at 10:51 AM

Saturday, April 08, 2006

Yesterday was better. Greg didn't work late after all and all the cosmic forces aligned and we were able to get the babysitter on short notice so we went to see the local high's school's musical last night. (And I really need to work on my run-on sentences...)

Today's baseball practice has already been canceled and I'm waiting for them to call off the twins' soccer game. If it's canceled, I could be a mean mommy and not mention that part, saying instead we're not going because of Emily's rotten behavior on Thursday. But it's kinda peaceful right now and I don't really want Emily wailing and screaming at me today. Which brings me to the Quote of the Day so you all have a lovely weekend!

Quote of the Day: "Parents are not interested in justice, they're interested in peace and quiet." -Bill Cosby

Katie at 9:33 AM

Friday, April 07, 2006

138

It was actually 137.5 yesterday but I had like a 800 calorie amaretto sour last night after the kids went to bed. Yesterday was bad.

It's been a long time since we've had such an awful day. It all started with crumbs in my bed. The kids had bags of Cheez-its upstairs during Tuesday's Cub Scout meeting so I'm guessing that's how they got there. So yesterday afternoon I finally remembered to pull off the sheets to wash them. When I went to the laundry room, Kelly had dumped the entire *new* box of Tide all over the floor and was spreading it everywhere. grrr... So I stripped her down and cleaned up the mess.

To then find her peeing on the family room floor. Bad puppy! Cleaned up that mess too. Since I was in such a great mood anyways I figured I might as well try to balance the checkbook. Which hasn't been balanced since we opened it in September. So you can imagine how fun that was.

The kids came home from school and Emily was in a mood. She asked "what's that word?" every other word on her reading assignment. She wouldn't sound anything out or would guess "best" for "both" and so forth. Pretty much she wanted me to do her homework for her and started screaming at me when I told her she could read it herself. Did I mention I was still trying to balance the checking account at this point?

I didn't have anything quick to make for dinner so I told the kids we'd go through a fast food place. Em and Ally took forever getting out the door and then began arguing over which carseat they wanted to sit it. grrr... And with 5 kids, there's five different opinions on where to eat. Arby's was the closest to Zach's ball field but no, they wanted Burger King or McDonald's way on the other end. This is the point where I told them they were "ungrateful little brats and some kids only have one meal of water and bread every day." Proud mommy moment there. *sigh*

Greg had to work late so I had to take all the kids to Zach's baseball game and the twins' soccer practice. Which were at 5:30 and 6pm. See the nice overlap there? I swear Greg and I discussed this and he said he did not want the kids alone without me at either place (obviously with another parent watching them). So we stayed at Zach's game until 6:30pm, he played 3 innings and batted a nice line drive but ended up being a forced out at 3rd. We loaded up in the van and drove over to soccer practice. Later Greg said he would have asked another parent to watch Zach if he had known I was going to pull him early. One of me, 5 of them, I'm doing the best I can here. The girls had already missed soccer practice last week because we were late getting back from DC so it seemed to me that missing one inning of Zach's game was worth half an hour of soccer practice.

And this is where it gets bad. (Or worse, maybe.) Zach was pouting because he had to leave his game and also because he didn't have his glove to play catch during soccer practice. Greg bought like half a dozen baseball bags so when I told Zach to grab his earlier, I just assumed his glove would be in there. He had borrowed one from another player for the game. (Greg had taken Zach's glove out for some reason and hadn't put it back.) Em and Ally had all their soccer gear thankfully since I had packed their bag after last week's "where's my shin guard? where's my cleats?" ten minutes before their game started.

So we're at the school and the girls were playing soccer to my right and Kyle and Kelly were playing at the playground on my left and Zach pouting beside me. All was fine and dandy for about 15 minutes until I noticed Emily sitting all crossed up (crossed arms over her chest, crossed legs on the ground) behind the goal. And she's crying about something. So I called the other kids over and went to see what was wrong with her. And she screamed at me "I'm not crying!" Um... I told her to calm down and she could go back out. And she screams at me again. So I pulled her off the field and took her several yards away and told her she was done for the night. Ally was doing well so I wanted to let her finish practice.

And then Kyle and Zach tormented Emily about being the "Whiny Queen" and she kicked Zach hard in the shin. All the parents are watching this and I just wanted to disappear. Practice was pretty much over so I grabbed Ally and we left with Emily wailing the entire way "I want to play soccer, I'm not crying!"

At home Em was first through the shower and she was sent straight to bed. I let the other kids go back downstairs after their showers to play except they wouldn't go back downstairs and decided they still had enough energy to run through the house yelling at each other. I don't think so! I sent them up to bed which pissed them all off and Kelly threw a fit and tore one of the boys posters off their wall and into pieces. I gritted my teeth, rubbed the pulsing vein in my temple, ignored my twitchy eyes, and reminded myself that I can't kill them because I wouldn't look good in prison issued orange jumpsuits.

Man, now I need another drink. Spring Break starts after the end of school today and Greg's working late tonight and will also be out of town this weekend. So I either need to find a lower calorie alcoholic beverage or sell the children to the gypsies.

Katie at 9:03 AM

Thursday, April 06, 2006

Thank Goodness it's Fri...

Oh drat, it's only Thursday.

It has been a long week. I'm really not used to being around other adults. It's a funny thing that happens to stay at home parents. At first, it drives you insane to be home with the kids with very little adult interaction. So you make a point to get out of the house. But after awhile you realize that very few people really want to talk to you while you are wiping baby snot and trying to keep your toddler from climbing the walls at Starbucks. And it's so much of a hassle getting out of the house in the first place, why not just stay home? After all "stay at home" is in the job title.

So you become hermit-like, going out only when necessary and praying for some fairy god-babysitter to give you a break from the house and the children (and if you still think that magical person is your spouse, don't mind me laughing my ass off over here). I've heard other stay at home parents complain about becoming invisible to the rest of the world but I kinda like it. My own little happy bubble where my children are safe and content and I don't have to think about tricky things like the cost of crude oil and Jessica Simpson's latest boyfriend.

But there comes a time, usually when the kids begin school, where you are forced to interact with adults more often again. And I've been out of practice for 7 or so years now. The results are not pretty and I worry that people may think I have a disability. Hey now, I was a bio-chem major in college! I used to know the chemical reaction to make cocaine and be able to name all the bones in the body (now I know how to mix vinegar and baking soda to entertain children and sing "the knee bone is connected to the thigh bone"). It's tricky proving to people that I am actually an intelligent person when I answer "umm..." to the question "what do you think about immigration legislation?" Or more likely "how about this weather?" Umm...

So Monday it was Emily's tutor. "Em's doing really well with Saxon, synthetic phonics seems to work better for her than systematic phonics." Um...

And Tuesday it was the Cub Scout meeting. Which seems to be a Dad only thing around here. So me, 8 boys, and 7 dads. Way too much testerone. The science experiments went off without a hitch (seriously go put cut raisins in 7-Up, it fascinated both age groups of males for about 10 minutes). But then the dads started talking about AM radio and commute times on I95 and Barry Bonds. Um...

Wednesday was Girl Scouts. I'm finally very comfortable with the Brownie Troop. And it's funny because the girls themselves never bothered me, it was the helper mom as required by Girl Scout rules. The helper mom always wants to chit chat about the neighborhood (brand new, don't know any of these people she's gossiping about) or the PTA (see last set of parenthesis) or the fabulous restaurant she and her husband ate at last week (she has one child and like 4 sets of grandparents, I'm still asking "do you know any good babysitters?" and going through the Burger King drive-thru). I've learned to just let the mom talk and add in the appropriate "really?" or "wow!" or "sounds like fun!" Much better than "um..." right?

Tonight we have a baseball game for Zach and soccer practice for the twins. I have not met anyone on the baseball team yet so I hope I don't embarrass myself. The soccer coach understands my "I'm a stay home mom of 5 kids so please don't ask me anything tricky like how was our weekend?" issue. Which is very sweet of him considering he's a rocket scientist at NASA (seriously!) and could probably mess with my feeble Dora-rotted mind if he really wanted to. Bueno!

So tomorrow is Friday. I plan to not talk to anyone over the age of 8 until Greg returns home from work. He already knows better than to ask any questions other than "where do you want to order pizza from?"

Um...

Katie at 10:01 AM

Wednesday, April 05, 2006

I am seriously going to fall asleep over the keyboard right now.

Yesterday went something like this: plan scout meetings, clean, clean, clean, shower, CVS for pictures for Emily's Star Student project, Burger King for lunch, work out at the gym (to make up for Burger King for lunch), high school for child development (I volunteered Kyle and Kelly, they needed kids between 2-5 years), grocery store for items for scout meeting, twins home from school, clean, pick Zach up from Chess Club at school, clean, make/eat/clean up dinner, go to ped's for Ally's face (explain in a minute), Cub Scout meeting at 7pm, school papers and miscellaneous other stuff the kids needed done immediately before bedtime which didn't happen until after 9pm. Oh and then I tried to stay up for Greg returning home but I fell asleep at midnight and then he walked in at 1:30 (?) and then Kelly decided she needed me to find her blankets at 2 and again at 2:30am. zzzzzzz...

Last Saturday (March 25th) Ally slipped and fell in the bathroom and hit her cheek on the toilet seat. Now with five kids someone is always getting bumped and bruised so we really didn't think much of it after putting ice on it and watching one side of her face turn a lovely shade of purple. But a week later the swelling hasn't gone down so last night I took her into the ped's to look at it. This morning we had x-rays done and I'm waiting for the ENT to call and schedule a follow up appointment. I have no clue if she'd chipped a bone or even what they would do about it (her jaw seems fine, it's more her cheek bone area).

Never a dull moment around here. Although I could really use one so I could catch up on my sleep.

Katie at 10:24 AM

Tuesday, April 04, 2006

Doh!

Nothing like finding out at 11:30 on a Monday night that you are planning and hosting the Cub Scout den meeting on Tuesday. Did I mention Greg is in Phoenix until Wednesday? Do you think anyone will notice if we do Brownie Try-It activities? Except I haven't exactly planned tomorrow's Brownie meeting yet either...

Is this the part where I panic and run around like a chicken with its head cut off?

I thought so.

*panics*

Katie at 7:57 AM

Monday, April 03, 2006

It's Spring!

I am loving the warmer weather. I don't care if it's only 50 degrees, it's not freezing and it's Spring! And the funny thing is that we do have daffodils in the yard here. Although they are in desperate need of splitting so I'm thrilled that I will be able to get my hands dirty soon. I should look into ~~killing~~ growing some annuals by seed too.

So in the spirit of Spring cleaning, I'm washing and putting away all the winter coats, gloves, hats, etc and straightening the front closet today. And then I'm going to pull some of the winter clothes out of the kids' drawers and put in what still fits from last summer. Everyone but Kyle (he has hand-me-downs out the wazoo from Zach) outgrew nearly all their stuff from last year so there's not much. Which means shopping! *checks Sunday paper for weekly sales*

Have a lovely Spring Monday!

Katie at 10:16 AM

Saturday, April 01, 2006

Okay so I have no where near the amount of yarn as some of the bloggers also flashing their stashes today. All my yarn fits nicely in this bookshelf drawer shown below in our family room.

1. Lion Brand Wool-Ease in Chunky (2), leftover from the first shrug attempt. I have learned my lesson with acrylic.

2. Lion Brand Fun Fur (4), originally bought to edge a different shrug pattern but I decided I didn't like that pattern and now I'm not sure what I'm going to do with it.

3. Random left over fuzzy stuff from making the kids' scarves.

4. Lion Brand Homespun (2), left over from the girls' ponchos. I hate it when I only need a few yards from a whole new skein.

5. Classic Elite Inca Alpaca, my first yarn shop purchase! There's a scarf in the plastic bag but I'm still not thrilled with the bind off (it was knitted longways).

6. White crochet thread used to bind a quilt and leftover Cascade Eco-Wool from my shrug (again with needing a few yards from a new skein).

7. Cascade 220 wool (from top to bottom, 4 burgundy, 4 cream, and 5 green). I'm using this stuff to knit everyone Christmas stockings.

8. Cascade 220 wool (4 red). I labeled this separately because this was purchased online along with the white and green for the Christmas stockings. I thought it was a deeper red than what I ended up receiving so I bought the burgundy at the local yarn store instead. So I don't know what I'll use this for (mittens?).

9. Cascade Sierra Quatro (green ball, pink ball, blue skein), I use this stuff to knit up quick chemo caps for my local yarn store (they donate them to hospitals).

10. Noro Kureyon (2 and a small left over ball), used to make the Booga Bag, I'm going to knit another sometime. Not that I found a use for the first Booga Bag yet but I really like this project.

Now if we were comparing scrapbooking stashes, I'd definitely have a lot more to show!

Katie at 12:09 AM

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