Things heard around the house...

This weekend was pretty much like any other Saturday and Sunday. A bunch of plans crammed into two days! I am going to share some excerpts of of things I heard around here this weekend so you can see how my life is so full of intellectual stimulation!

Dear 6 y.o.Daughter to no one in particular: Brother has a big fat head!
Dear 3 y.o. Son: No! I don't! I don't have a big fat head!
Daughter: (whispering) Yes you do.
Son: (shouting) I DON'T HAVE A BIG FAT HEAD!!!

Ugh, so then I started to get a big, fat headache.

Dear Daughter to me: Mom, you are a fabulous weirdo! (giggles)
Me: (Trying to take a quiz on Facebook) Mmmhmm, that's nice honey.

At night I am lying next to Dear Son trying to get him to sleep. He keeps finding excuses to talk.
Son: Mom! Mom! I want to say something!
Me: Go to sleep.
Son: But please, please I want to say something to you!
Me: Okay! What do you want to say?
Son: (shouting) "You're my boy, Blue!!!" (we both laugh)

At dinner tonight. We are all sitting around the kitchen table. We are all just eating and talking, it's pretty uneventful.
Dear Son to my hubs: Daddy, are you freaking out?
Hubs: Huh? No I am not freaking out.
Son: Oh, Ok, I was seeing if you were freaking out.

He just goes back to eating like it was a totally normal thing to ask.

Earlier today Dear Son is almost bursting with anticipation when he come to get me out of the laundry room.
Son: Mom! Come here, come over here and sit down and rest.
Me: OK, I will sit down and rest. Where do you want me to sit?
Son: (the anticipation is killing him at this point!) Right here! Right here on this chair!
I sit on a strategically placed Whoopie cushion. A loud, flatulent sound emits.

He laughs so hard he can barely breathe! A well spent one dollar, I must say :)


And there you have just a small sliver of what it is like over here on a daily basis. If you have young children you know exactly what I am talking about, and if you don't have any I am sure you can't wait to have these kinds of cerebral discussion in your household!

Blast from the deprived '70's past

So today I was talking with my neighbor about the toys we used to have back in the '7o's. It was one of those kidsthesedaysdon'tknowhowgoodtheyhaveit...conversations.

I thought I would share with you one of the toys I brought up, the Lite Brite! Did we get in new in the box? No way! Not when there was a perfectly good one (with God knows how many of the color pegs missing) available at a garage sale for a fraction of the price! Who cares if the light bulb was missing? You could always find one in the house somewhere.

And the picture templates all used up? No worries, we just tore the pages out of our coloring books and Voila! A new template to plug into!

Oh and don't forget we were not wasteful back in the day, so we had to keep the lightbulb OFF while we were creating our latest design until we were FINISHED with putting all the color pegs into the Lite Brite! Wasting electricity, even if from one light, was forbidden.

So, I want to hear from you, what toys do you remember the most? Which ones were always breaking, or didn't quite work right, or which do you have the most fond memory of?

I need everyone's opinion on this!

About ten years ago a small incident happened that I still wonder about. I will put the situation out there for you, please weigh in on what you think! Here it is:
Scene: Having some friends over to hang out in the backyard on a Sunday afternoon. Friend A is there with her hubs, Friend B is there with her hubs and two young children.
Friend A goes in the house to make an appetizer for us. She decides to use my new crystal serving dish and bowl to bring out said appetizer to the backyard. Here is what happened next. Picture this in slow motion for maximum effect. Friend A starts to walk out of the house into the backyard with the dish when Friend B's daughter runs into her. The dish and bowl and the food all go flying in the air, and my dish and bowl shatter into a million pieces....everyone scrambles to clean up the mess.

My question: Do you think either Friend A or Friend B should have offered to replace my crystal? It was kind of expensive, but I don't remember how much. If either one of them had offered, I would have been happy with that, but neither one of them said anything about it. Should I just have chalked it up as a party foul? Should I have chastized my friend for using my "fancy" dishes, when really she was just trying to make things nice? Should I have said to Friend B that she needs to control her kids better? (ha ha ha! I am just kidding, I have kids). I would love to hear all of your opinions on this riveting social dilemma! Also if either Friend A or Friend B is reading this, please give me your opinion as well. OK, waiting to hear from you now....

Budget cuts, smudget butts

First, I want to say that unfortunately, this is not a Freak Magnet Friday post. Ugh! So today I find out that our district is planning to lay-off all but FOUR counselors in the whole district next year. I am pretty sure that includes me in the layoffs. I have been at my school for five years now and I LOVE it! This is so depressing. The budget is so bad that it doesn't look good outside of the district either. Sigh... On the plus side? Let's see...

I still have a pulse.
I still have full use of all my limbs.
My house has not caught fire.
There have been no hurricanes or flooding to destroy the town I live in.
I can still tolerate lactose.
I am still hot for being almost forty (hee hee).
I am not allergic to red wine (Thank you, God!)

I don't want to count any more blessings in case I have inadvertently jinxed myself by mentioning all of the above. The next time I post it will hopefully include some good news!

Freak Magnet Friday!

Today's story has had some logistics changed as it is a work-related story. Ok, so I used to work at this elementary school, and at this school we have custodians! No surprise there, but one of them is a bit strange, freakish, if you will. He is the kind of person who mumbles underneath his breath to no one in particular. When you walk by him he purposefully looks away even though you are face to face, making too awkward to say hello or anything. Of course, he has chosen ME (and probably others) to exhibit his weirdness. Here are some excerpts from some of our painful but short interactions on campus:

Example a).

Me: Hi, I locked my keys in my office, could you open my door?

Him: Oh, so now you talk to me...when you need something.

Me: What do you mean? You never say anything to me either.

Him: The woman is supposed to be the one to start contact with the man.

Me: huh? (awkward smile/silence)

Example b).

Him: You know Happy Hour starts at four o'clock.

Me: Okayyyy....

Him: (next day) I went to your office, you said you were taking me to Happy Hour but you didn't. I see how you are.

Me: I never said I was taking you to Happy Hour! Happy Hour where?

him: Yes, you did. Remember when I told you about Happy hour yesterday? That's when.

Me: (thinking) "Estas loco!"

Example c).

Him: What do you do in your office all day, sleep? Everyday I wonder what you do in there. I really, really wonder, do you just come in, collect your paycheck and leave? I should have gone to college so I can get a job where I can go in and sleep the whole time. One day I am going to find out what you're doing in there, just wait.

Me: (thinking) Should I get mad or just feel sorry for him? Get a restraining order?

Last example: One time one of our new, very young teachers called him on his walkie and asked him to help her hang something up on her wall. He LITERALLY tripped over things running to get to her classroom, like she said she was on fire or something! This was hilarious! Aaah, puppy love...

And so on! You might read this and think he is just trying to joke around, banter with me, right? I would think so too, but he is not smiling or laughing when he says these things to me, it is very weird. He also told me that the entire staff at one point or another has bought him lunch and that I haven't bought him lunch yet, so....ugh!!!

Who knows what his story is? I know that when I do lock myself out of my office from time to time, that I am going to have a painful weird conversation to go along with it!

Thanks for reading! Happy Friday!

How this year is going so far...

First, again, I am sorry I haven't posted more! It's not like I don't have anything to say that's for sure. Here is an update about how things are going with the kids, me, the hubs, etc.

Dear 3 yo son: He has stopped crying when I drop him him off at preschool! He says he likes it, at one point he was getting rewarded to stop crying, shees. He is currently obsessed with finding (and collecting) rolly-pollies ( I think their real name is sow bug). He still loves to be totally naked and uses any excuse to strip off his clothes. ie. "I am really mad at you so I take off my clothes!" etc. He is still my little mama's boy, though.

Dear 6 yo daughter: She loves her first grade teacher! Everyday I hear something that he did that she just thought was the neatest thing. I am still getting used to what I consider an INSANE amount of homework for a six year old, it takes her well over an hour everyday. We have also hit a record in our house for how many birthday parties we can attend in one month! It is just crazy and hard to keep up with. What's with all these people being born?? :) She currently loves to pretend to be pregnant while carrying a bunch of baby dolls with her. She will go to the "hospital" and have a baby like every ten minutes. If only it was that quick and easy! She is also in gymnastics once a week and I am pretty impressed with what she has learned to far. The gym is owned by some Russians and they don't mess around, which is good for her.

I am back at work and busy as ever! I got a new intern, so hopefully he turns out to be helpful, unlike a few others I have had in the past. Including one who called in sick once "in case" she was going to get sick later, as a flu had been going around. WTF? The student population is the same, lots of trauma and drama. Some of the kids tell me things that still leave me speechless as to what they have been exposed to, it can be so sad. The good news here is that my Principal told my new intern that I was the best school counselor he has ever worked with!!! I was so happy to hear him say that since I really put my heart and soul into the job! I have a crazy drop off and pick up schedule with all the kids, but it somehow manages to work out, thank God. I still try to have GNO's (Girl's Night Out) as much as possible, but sometimes I am just too tired!

The hubs: After working the swing shift and me not seeing him all week for twelve years, he will be going to the day shift in October! I hope this doesn't end our marriage!! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. Oh, was that too many ha's? I do worry about how we will adjust but hopefully we will be able to accomplish more during the week now. I am also hoping it cuts down on the amount of naps he takes, he is like Rip Van Winkle with all the sleeping! Most important, he is not able to help me do anything if he is asleep! I of course, and just worried about how I will be impacted by all this, after all, it's my world and he just lives in it! :) I'm kidding, kind of...anyways! That is us in a nutshell and I am really going to make an effort to post more so thanks for continuing to read my blog!

Strange things that happen to people, a dialogue

So in my job I work with all walks of life. I have come to realize that some people seem to have chronic bad luck, chronic crisis, and a host of other situations. There are many times at work where I just think, "Oh, the humanity!" I had such a strange conversation with someone on the phone while at work, it was so random, that I thought I would try to recreate the phone call for you. By they way, I have no idea why this info was shared with me. Here goes:

Me: Hello?
Her: Hi, Mrs. Counselor, it's *Yolanda.
Me: Hi Yolanda, what's going on?
Her: Oh nothing, just calling to check in.
Me: Oh, anything on your mind?
Her: Did you know that I fell off the city bus three times?
Me: You did?
Her: Yeah, the first time, I was getting off the bus and I tripped and fell and the bus almost ran over my foot.
Me: Oh no!
Her: The second time, I was getting off the bus and the driver closed the door on my foot and started to drive away, everyone on the bus was yelling at the driver to stop.
Me: Wow, that is unbelievable.
Her: Yeah, and the third time I fell off the bus I was pregnant and had the infant carrier with me because I had my baby with me. I tripped, fell into a tree and my groceries went flying everywhere, but we were all ok.
Me: I am so glad you were all ok and no one got hurt! What is going on? Why do you think you keep falling off the bus?
Her: I don't know, it's just me I guess....

She really did not give me any reason for telling me about this, I just think some people have this kind of energy where things like this happen!
So the next time you are having a bad day, remember that someone, somewhere, is probably having a worse day, so count your blessings when you can! Happy Friday!
Thanks for reading!