Christmas is Coming

Christmas is coming. The goose is getting fat.  Please do put a penny in the old man's hat.

Yes indeedy, Christmas is upon us.

Do you love Christmas?  If you're Jewish, do you love Hanukkah? Or do you just pray that the time from Thanksgiving to Christmas moves quickly by without incident?  Do you get hung up on presents, or do you just enjoy the time spent with people?  Do you miss someone so deeply that the holiday season is like a dagger in your heart?

I love this season.  I don't really care for the materialism of the season.  But I do my best to find a balance for our family.  I miss my parents.  I miss my dad especially because 1. he was my dad and 2. his birthday was in December.  I find a strange solace and gratitude, that while I don't get to see my parents watch my children grow, I had the mercy of having small children when I lost them both.  I grieved, but I was distracted at the same time.  The joy in my children balanced out the grief, no, actually, it outweighed the grief.  I look at my children and my husband and they carry me through when I miss my parents.  I remember how my son giggled with uncertainty at seeing me crying because he had no idea what I was doing (I tend to avoid crying if at all possible), and how that made me laugh on what was the most devastating day in my life.

There are moments when the grief overcomes me and it's at times when they should be here to see what's going on.  My nephew's graduation, my son playing Carol of the Bells as a piano solo at the Mall before his school chorus sang. It's moments when I know he would be proud, but I know he's here, because I can actually hear his voice.

So, do I wish the season to zip by?  No, because my boys love it so, I would never take it away from them.  Do I miss someone so deeply it's like a dagger in my heart?  Yes, but the boys outweigh that.  I miss that I will never make another memory with my father or mother.  But I cherish the ones I have, and I know what Dad and Mom would contribute to new ones.

I hope you have a wonderful Christmas.  I hope you don't let the hectic world get in the way of Joy and Peace.  I hope if you are missing someone, you can find peace and still enjoy the beauty of the season.

Merry Christmas

More Leaf Pile

Playing with the leaf pile

One of Brian's big wishes this year was a great big leaf pile to play in.  Daddy was able to make his wish come true.

Success!! And many yummy results!

A lovely friend of mine hosts a kick butt cookie swap every year.  I love attending and getting lots of yummy treats, but I come home with a lot of peanut filled cookies.  This is an issue because one of our boys is allergic to peanuts.  I have a number of friends now that have children with allergies, or they themselves have allergies, so I thought maybe a nut free cookie swap would be a nice idea.  It made me very sad to not go to my friend's swap, I do enjoy a peanut blossom ( or twelve), but I am thrilled to say that the swap here went very well.

I was a little nervous, because the first swap I hosted did not go as well.  People really didn't understand the concept and refused to bring the requested amount of cookies, so that one fell flat and left me disheartened.  How can I be as awesome as my friend if people won't follow the rules?!  Thanks to awesome neighborhood friends, my swap went very well.  We had two extra trays of cookies, one for the teachers at the neighborhood school and one for a needy family.  I was going to bring the last tray to work, but really, we eat enough treats every day, so it should go to someone who needs it.  The best part?  It's all nut free, so Thing 2 is free to try whatever he wants.  I may be crazy next year and do both swaps.  I really missed spending the time with my friend!

ummmmmm....Wait, it's what time???

I'm sitting here trying to figure out what to write about.  My new morning routine is to grab a cuppa and sit down and check email and check in with my favorite bloggers.  My two daily reads wrote about things which tied into some recent posts of mine.  Something Small Today wrote about stress and little things that make things not so bad.  I agree with him, that chocolate milk will fix almost everything.  Single Dad Laughing talked about facebook.  We all know how I feel about that and he goes into some other complaints and realizations about facebook.

So since we overslept and I seem to be running extremely late, I direct you to my fellow bloggers...they've said it all today.

Wow....really?

Regarding my job, I had someone ask me the other day, if I have children of my own.  I guardedly answered "yes, two", because I couldn't quite read where this was going.  I tend to answer some general personal questions in my job because it is a very personal thing we do, going into people's homes and invading their lives.  So if it makes them more comfortable with me, I answer some simple, general questions. What typically follows that question is, "how old are they?", "boys or girls?" or something along those lines.  What I got was the following, with venom and what seemed like hatred, "How can you stand to do this all day?".

Now, granted, working with two year olds is not always the most relaxing job, especially when I am trying to force them to talk. Some kids respond very well to me, some don't, some try very hard and have a tough time. I'm on their turf, and they typically rule the roost.  They eventually learn that I am in charge and go along for the ride, but some kids never relent and I have to figure out how to work it out.  I play with potato heads and bubbles, what's so awful about that?

This person's child is a doll.  This child does basically anything I ask, and does so happily, so when this question was asked, I think my jaw may have dropped.  I answered with as much energy as I could, "I love my job, what's better than this job?", but her question deflated me, and as I walked away from the home, and got into my car, all I could think about was, does this person hate her life? I felt bad for her, I've had people ask me that question with incredulity, with admiration or just amazement, it's not their cup of tea, but they can appreciate that I like my job.  But this person, the venom with which she asked the question, what must her everyday life be like, for her to ask this in such a way.

So yet again,  I am reminded of how lucky I am.  I have a great job, a nice house, and a nice family.  I can definitely stand to do all of it, all day, every day.

Come on!  Potato head all day? What could possibly be bad about that?

Our First Gingerbread House

We made our very first gingerbread house last night.  I had the genius idea to use a kit that I bought at Target.  It was not as easy as it was explained on the box of said kit.  Lots of mental notes were taken to make next year an easier experience.  First:  We will wait for the roof to be firmly glued on top before trying to add any decorations. Perhaps maybe we won't need to add the plastic cups to serve as support beams to keep it on top.  Second : I will buy frosting as opposed to using the crazy stuff they put it the kit.  We managed to make the white icing work, but the green and red icing were like cement.  I pulled some red icing out of the pantry to help make Santa.  It was kind of old, so what ended up happening was a stream of liquid came out before the frosting. Alas,  Santa looks like he was shot and is now bleeding out.  BUT!  we made a gingerbread house and only one of us cried briefly in the process.  

our house looks like it may be in foreclosure

Santa should have stayed away from this house...someone call 911

All that free time is paying off

Modern Cranberry Noir Christmas

Get custom photo Christmas cards online at Shutterfly.com.

View the entire collection of cards.

and the beat goes on

So it's been two days since I have perused Facebook.  Well, if I am going to be honest, I activated yesterday to find a friend's email address, purged about 100 people off my friend list and then I deactivated again.  You know what?  I'm doing just fine.  I did start looking at Twitter, which, frankly, I don't really understand, so I can't see that being as much as a time sucker as Facebook is.  Am I off forever?  We'll see.  My goal is to revisit the thought again after the holidays.  I did use it to create and easy contact thread for my family.  Then again, an email thread is just as useful.

What have I done with my extra time?  I've been playing with my blog set up.  I loaded all of my 2010 pictures to Shutterfly so I can start working on my photo album.  I sat and made a great healthy menu for our week's meals.  Very excited about grilling tuna tomorrow.  I've done some little housekeeping things, but mostly, I haven't been looking at people's status and thinking, "yup, no one cares".  Now I did not feel that way about every status.  I have my core group of people of which I will miss their wittiness and fun.  I can only hope that they will follow me here and comment on posts so I can still enjoy their silliness and, sometimes, seriousness.  I need to start spending time at Running to the Big Yellow Tent as well, I see some quality time happening there.  I see myself being ok after I get through the minor shakes I've been having occasionally.  Christmas is coming, the goose is getting fat, and I have other things to worry about.

That's it?!

I've been tired for about two years.  I have a history of hypothyroidism, so when my primary Dr wasn't addressing that like I thought it needed to be, I went to an endocrinologist.  My levels kind of fluctuate, but no matter how good my levels looked I was consistently exhausted.  When I woke up in the morning I couldn't wait to go back to bed.  I couldn't focus on anything.  I had the attention span of a gnat.  I let my primary doctor know all of this.  She referred me to a neurologist to rule out ADD.  I didn't go to find out, I knew that wasn't the problem.  It was then I called the endocrinologist.

Here are some symptoms of hypothyroidism. Fatigue (yes) weakness (yes) weight gain or difficulty losing weight (sometimes) hair loss (yes) gi issues (yes) depression (yes) memory issues (yes) decreased libido (none of your business).  There are other symptoms which don't really affect me, but yup, most of them do.  Even when my blood levels are good, so something isn't right.  Even after seeing the specialist for two years, it's not getting better. He's stymied.  Why do I need such a high dose of synthroid?  You're the bleepin' Dr, you tell me.

So I'm beginning to think I'm crazy or lazy or both.  Immediately after I put the boys to bed, I go to bed.  This is at 7:30.  Sometimes I stay up until 9 or 10, but it's rare.  My sanity is suffering, my marriage is dented and bruised, but good nonetheless.  Needless to say, I have a good guy taking care of me.

This spring, I notice that I am not sleeping well.  I'm waking up a lot in the night.  My handsome husband tells me that I snore quite a bit.

I look like this

When I sleep, you'd think I look like this

Needless to say.  This is disturbing to me.  So I tell my Dr that I am concerned about my sleep, maybe I have sleep apnea because I am just exhausted all the time.  She refers me to a sleep Dr and gives me a rx for Ambien, which I don't fill. 

As you can see form the above picture, I fancy myself a runner.  I also take Tae Kwon Do.  Over the past two years, I have noticed my endurance getting worse and worse.   I can't do less than an 11:30 minute mile.  I can't keep up in class.  I am sucking wind and it's awful.  Is it asthma?  I don't know, all I know is that it sucks.   I did complete a half marathon, which is important because the training will come into the story here.  

Long story as short as I can make it, I go to the sleep doctor who sends me for a sleep study, a breathing study and blood work.  What she gathers from that info is that I have low iron, I'm anemic.  This is causing restless legs, which may be affecting my sleeping.  The anemia is affecting apparently every aspect of my life.

Let's look at what else iron deficiency causes.  Tired or weak (yes and yes), breathlessness (yes), hair loss (yes),  heavy periods (hey, none of your business), brittle nails, (yes),  irritable (yes) trouble concentrating (yup), the libido thing (myob).  Now lets look at anemia and runners.  Training stimulates a need for iron.  Anemia causes decreased endurance and power, fatigue and injuries. Which lead to a wanna be runner feeling like shit and useless.    

umm  HELLO?!  Where along this path should one of my other doctors have checked my iron?   The good news is, I feel so much better.  I can think, I can function, I can run.  I was irritated, my husband was irritated and my marriage, if not for an awesome husband, could have suffered horribly.  I'm thankful that this problem was found, but I am a little put off that my doctors did not find this.  

I can't say that I have stopped snoring, but for the most part, I'm sleeping better.  I'm functioning better, and I'm feeling fortunate that this was an easy fix.  I will be giving my doctor a piece of my mind next week.  But for now, I'm going with the grateful thing. 

"What's That Smell?"

Shane D's post at Something Small Today reminded me of this awesome song. We used to sing this to the boys all the time. Although we haven't watched these videos in about 5 years, I still hear this song when someone asks, "what's that smell?"!

"Having a vodka on the rocks while I write an IEP"

This is the status that chased me off of facebook. This is the status that was the proverbial last straw. Here are a few reasons why this status (and facebook in general) infuriates me.

1. Teachers get enough crap and disrespect just for being teachers. Do you know how many people complain about teachers' statuses? I support teachers all the way. My husband is a teacher. But you don't bitch about having to go back to work after having summer vacation. You don't do it. Ignorant people don't get that teacher's are being ironic, or funny. They just think that teachers are spoiled jerks. They aren't, I know for a fact that they aren't. Teachers are hard working people and deserve that summer vacation. They go above and beyond the call of duty. People who don't know teachers don't understand that. Dammit, as a teacher how can you not censor yourself and realize that people are going to be angry? How do you not see that you are fueling the "teachers do nothing" fire.

2. My child has an IEP. I would like to think that the person writing his IEP did so in a sober state of mind. Now I know that this person who wrote that status was not drunk and writing this, but oh my God, how unprofessional can you be? It is not a moral gray area. It's wrong to drink while you are preparing what is a legal and binding document. You have a child's education in your hands. What on Earth are you thinking and what are you thinking proclaiming this proudly.

3. People actually liked this status. People commented positively.

4. I don't care what your daily errands are. I don't care about a lot of things on facebook.

5. Facebook creates a false sense of friendship. We are all in this together, right? We are all on the same page, right? Wrong.

If you are my friend, you know how to contact me beyond facebook. I'm done, and you know what? I feel pretty damn good.