Simplification.

Last night was pretty awful. I had parent-teacher conferences, which is it's own brand of awful (for the record, I had good parents and they were very appreciative of what I do, so I'm not complaining too much about it). After parent-teacher conferences, I went back to my room where my students were still feverishly working to complete the Crier. We finished (amazingly enough) at 7:59, which was ONE MINUTE early. That has never happened before. I got in my car, and drove home. I nursed Finn and then got a phone call. From our printer. There was a problem. I had to go BACK to school.

While driving back to school I thought to myself, "I can't remember the last time I gave Finn a bath, but I'm pretty sure it's been close to a week." After coming to this disturbing realization, I've come to the following conclusion: I do too much. I need to simplify my life.

- NO more elaborate Christmas presents. Yes, Christmas is my favorite time of the year, and I love doing nice things for people, but it's just too much. If I've done something elaborate for you in the past, I'm sorry but it's over.

- No more making my own baby food and cloth diapering. It's too time consuming--and screw trying to do my best to better my child's life. Also, I am done researching milestones, vaccines, and everything else child-related. Let the cards fall where they will. And that ENT--no time for that either.

- That flabby gut I'm holding onto--I'm leaving it there, no need to worry about eating right or working out. Being healthy is just silly.

- Speaking of health--that pain in my wrist that's been there for months, it's staying there. The mole on my arm that I'm pretty sure is pre-cancerous that I haven't had time to go to the doctor for--it's staying too. The tooth that hurts, I can't take off work so I'll wait until my appointment on December 10, SIMPLIFY!

- Oh yeah, and Finn you don't need a baby book, or an elaborate first birthday party that will cost a lot of money--birthday, schmirthday. Also, those letters I started writing you to read when you are older--unnecessary; totally unnecessary.

- The house, I can't remember the last time I cleaned it anyways, so it'll just stay dirty.

- Oh, and my job, I need to stop planning lessons, and loving my students, and trying to help them because that's just too much.

Are you catching my drift yet? I take on too much, I get that; but, what do I cut out? All of these things are important. The things that are suffering are the ones that matter--the little things that make memories. I don't half-ass things, that's not me. Lately, I have been half-assing everything and anything. I hate it. I don't know what to do.

Sorry for the crabbiness, and self-loathing today guys. I know you've gotta be getting sick of it.

Just took a good 5 minutes trying to think of a title...no luck.

Yeah, so I just left the doctor AGAIN, and Finn has a double ear infection (one is "REALLY" infected) AGAIN. I feel so discouraged. I feel like I am doing something wrong, and I even said, in a voice that was dangerously close to tears, "Is there something that we SHOULD be doing?"

The doctor that I've been seeing said, "no" and left the room.

And I came back to school.

Does that seem odd to you?

Me too.

I am irate about the fact that I called up that bitch on Saturday and told her that he was sick, and that I thought he had an ear infection and she said "Is he running a fever?" That is my least favorite question on the planet....because unless he just got shots, he NEVER runs a fever. I never ran a fever as a child either, so WHY IS THE FEVER THE END-ALL, BE-ALL OF SICKNESS?

So when she looks in his ear and says "Oh this one is bulging and really infected" and I want to deck her in her effing face because I KNEW IT and she should have done something on Saturday, because my angel has been in pain for two days because of her dumbass.

So this has swirled into a full out depression, and feeling very sorry for myself. I feel like there are very few people who understand me, and one of them is thousands of miles away. I am lucky that the others are here, but I'm lonely.

I am feeling very alone, and very misunderstood. I feel like everyone thinks I'm nuts, and people think I'm some crazy hippie (merging several topics at the moment...and p.s. I'm calling this a freewrite, because I don't care and will not edit or reread in any way, shape or form).

So I'm sitting here listening to John Lennon & Dave Matthews, because at least they are hippies too.

I don't know what my problem is, but it pisses me off that I had to come back to school tonight, and that I have to leave Finn again tomorrow, and that I feel like I'm doing something wrong when all I ever try to do is the best that I can for him, and I feel like everyone thinks I'm nuts, and don't know what I'm talking about.

So I'm done, and here's some John Lennon for ya.

"People say I'm crazy doing what I'm doing
Well they give me all kinds of warnings to save me from ruin
When I say that I'm o.k. well they look at me kind of strange
Surely you're not happy now you no longer play the game

People say I'm lazy dreaming my life away
Well they give me all kinds of advice designed to enlighten me
When I tell them that I'm doing fine watching shadows on the wall
Don't you miss the big time boy you're no longer on the ball

I'm just sitting here watching the wheels go round and round
I really love to watch them roll
No longer riding on the merry-go-round
I just had to let it go."

Pumpkin Patch

Those eyes, those eyes!



This weekend was so great :) We went over to Betty and Mike's house on Friday night; the pumpkin patch on Saturday morning, my parents house to carve pumpkins on Saturday night, and then shopping and co-op with Betty on Sunday. It was so good. It made coming back to work today really hard. :(

BUT, I'm being positive, and sharing some of our fun at the pumpkin patch. Oh, and did I mention I bought my new, totally awesome, best-camera-on-the-planet camera...and it's BA. LOVE IT!
Finn was tuckered out by the time we were done picking pumpkins, and fell asleep with Daddy in the Ergo. Sweetest boy ever. He woke up again for pumpkin carving later that night :)

This will be over too soon.

A lot of my friends have been posting recently about their babies sleeping through the night lately, and it was starting to get to me. Not in an, "I wish their babies wouldn't sleep" way; but, in a "what am I doing wrong?" kind of way.

So, on Tuesday night Randy went to a dinner for work, and Finn and I were on our own. I put him down to sleep (in our bed...I know, he STILL sleeps in our bed, and I don't care) around 8:15 and spent some time editing pictures and taking a shower. It has not been a good week for sleeping, so I crawled into bed around 9:00 and by 9:15 my little one had plastered his entire body against me.

I felt his breathing, and listed to him for a few minutes. For a split second, I thought "here's to another great night's sleep" (sarcastically, in case it wasn't obvious).

Then, it happened, he sighed and smiled in his sleep, and his sweet little arm moved, and his soft skin brushed against mine. I thought, ' this will be over too soon.' There will come a time where he will want to be away from me--when he won't even let me hug him, let alone rub his back, pat his little tush, or kiss him all over...and I"ll miss it so much more than I can even imagine.

So I snuggled close to my angel, and sighed...and smiled right along with him; and I fell right to sleep. It wasn't a great night's sleep, it wasn't even good, but I can tell you, I wasn't complaining.

The illness that wouldn't die.

So, at my house...we have been sick for 3 (almost 4) weeks straight.

I am not exaggerating. At all.

First, Finn started feeling icky and got a "croupy" cough. I took him to the doctor. He was diagnosed with a double ear infection and "mild" croup. He was given 10 days of antibiotic. He loved the first antibiotic, but it gave him serious diarrea. Nothing but fun for ten days, but he got better and it seemed to be gone. He got off the medication on a Monday, and started up with the "croup" cough on the Sunday night BEFORE he stopped the antibiotic.

So, he went to daycare, was super crabby on Monday, and when I picked him up Laura said, you need to take him in again. I called the doctor right away, called off for Tuesday and brought him in. That night was awful, he was wheezing and coughing. Croup sounds (pretty much) like the worst thing on the planet. He had to get a breathing treatment the next day (which is the worst thing ever, and completely heart breaking).

So now he had "Moderate" croup. And was given steroid treatment for 4 days, the croup seemed to be easing up, but the cough was getting worse, as did the crabbiness and the runny nose.

Randy took off Thursday and made a doctor's appointment for him again. He was diagnosed with his SECOND double ear infection, and given a different antibiotic.

It terrifies me that this child doesn't act differently when he has ear infections. It's not that I want him to scream, but I want to know what is wrong. Now, I'll bring him in for any tiny little thing that goes wrong :(

So, we thought maybe we were out of the woods this Monday, when we decided that Finn was okay to go back to daycare on Tuesday. But then, Randy seemed to get a flu-like thing on Monday night, and then I ended up going to the Minute Clinic on Tuesday and they put me on an antibiotic for a sinus infection, except my throat keeps getting worse. Today is the first day that it feels even slightly better.

Yesterday I thought I was going to cry whenever I swallowed because it hurt so bad.

So, apparently our house is a death trap. Do not come over, do not even get CLOSE because you don't want what we got.

I have two photo shoots this weekend, one is a senior shoot so I think I'll be okay for that one, but tomorrow morning I have a huge family shoot, and I can't shoot a family without my voice. Grrr.

Being sick is annoying.


**I apologize for all the spelling errors, and lack of proofreading, and lack of attention to any sort of detail in this post (even moreso than others), because I just can't bring myself to give a fuck today.

Excuse the language...

whatever.