Ugh will this cold ever go away?

 

I tried to get an appointment to see the doctor today but they didn't have any one in who sees adults today.  :(  Oh well, hopefully I will be feeling better and won't need to go tomorrow.

 

I need to start feeling better soon, the house hasn't been maintained since Saturday afternoon and it is showing big time.  I just hope no one stops by because I have fallen off the clean house wagon disgracefully.

 

Everyone else seems to be on the mend, I am happy for them but it is hard to watch two energetic kids when you are limp as a noodle.

 

Can't think of much else to report.  Shawn's work is having a big party today, I have to rest up for that.  The kids are really looking forward to it, they are going to have fireworks and launch rockets.  Shawn has a rocket in the competition, we hope it wins the decorating contest.

 

I'm off to lay on the couch and wallow in my self pity and used kleenexes (ewww, what a thought! LOL)

 

Sniffles,

Jen

Blah.  Stupid head cold.  All four of us.

 

Hope it goes away soon, this is NO FUN.

 

blah

Hello, everyone.

 

All's well in my little world again.  Thank you to all who chimed in on my dilemma.  I have thought of little else all day.  In the end I went with my gut feeling (and as it happens, my two must trusted advisors - you know who you are!).  I invited my friend over tonight and voiced unspecific concerns about the situation.  The friend told me not to worry about it, that they knew what they were doing and that they felt peaceful over it.  They told me not to lose sleep over it, because they didn't. 

 

I felt so lighthearted after the conversation.  I smiled my first real smile in over 24 hours (a very long time for me) and laughed my first real laugh.  I danced around the living room with Colleen to the music at the end of Barbie and the Twelve Dancing Princesses.  She demands that I dance with her, because she needs me for the supported lifts.  Amazingly, that girl gets the leg positioning almost exactly right.  She is a natural at ballet, which thrills me to no end.  Finding a class for her in our new neighborhood is going to be a priority once we are down there.

 

I have gotten really good at the waterski portion of Dead or Alive Extreme 2.  I can make serious money on the courses now, upwards of 300k a run.  Enough to buy Christie all of her bathing suits (I believe, but there might be one more lurking out there.  I will have to double check because Shawn said that if I had all of the suits that I would have gotten a pop up that said that a new achievement was unlocked, and I didn't notice one.)

 

It is weird that I am starting to play video games.  I can't account for my sudden interest in them except the stretches of free time I have now that I don't work.

 

YAWN!  I am sleepy.  I think I will rest well tonight.

 

Love, Jen

 

 

When you are upset does your body act up too?  Mine does.  And it seems the worse I feel emotionally, the worse my body feels.

 

Right now I have a raging headache (come on fast-acting Excedrine, do your thing!), nauseous stomach, and shakey arms and legs.  The only thing that helps me feel better is snuggling Colleen, which she happily let me do for an hour tonight after I got home.

 

See, I had the monthly HOA board meeting to go to tonight.  I haven't had to endure something like that since my working days.  (Side note here, I haven't been a part of the professional world for almost two years now.)  I won't go into specifics (this isn't exactly the most appropriate place for it anyway), suffice to say there was a lot of strategizing and political manuevering and just a lot of things that didn't sit well with me.  They are also going to do something bad to one of my friends and I am very conflicted about it.  The situation is that the friend knows the potential consequences of their non-action, which the board is now going to enforce to the maximum penalty.  Ethics-wise: Do I remain silent about the whole thing, maintain a "I'm not getting involved" attitude?  Or do I take my friend aside and alert them that after years of threats things are actually going to move forward the way the board has been saying all along?  I wish that I could trust my friend not to throw my name around during confrontations if I do tell them ahead of time.  I do believe that my friend is in the wrong, both in the original offense and their continued actions; but at the same time I think the board is going way overboard as far as penalties and ultimate consequenses are concerned.  We had a vote to determine the course of action tonight and I did vote against their over the top punishment, but I was outnumbered 1 to 2.  I don't know what to do and it is tearing me up.

 

Shawn, I know it is small potatoes and a year from now it will not matter at all.  I am seriously considering your suggestion to resign my post and have nothing further to do with any of it.  I am torn because I gave my word to serve on the board until the annual meeting and I do not want to go back on my word just because the going got tough.  I knew what I was getting into.  However, the disillusionment that came with the realization that there is not a damn thing that I can do to influence that board is almost too much for me.  (For those who don't know, I am one vote of 3 and the two non-voting participants side with the other two voters in practically every topic of discussion.)  I took this on thinking that there were things I could do to balance the power of the board better, to give homeownes a little more say in what goes on in their community.  I saw first hand tonight that every aspect is controlled by the board, including the person that will replace me in the vote for the spot at the annual meeting.  It is bullshit.  There is no other word for it.  Bullshit.  I felt dirty when I came home tonight.  I actually ran home because I could not get here fast enough. 

 

Do you know that they actually pressured me a bit to keep writing the newsletter (which I do FOR FREE, not just writing it, but taking it to get printed, folding, addressing, stamping, and mailing) even after I move.  I thought they were joking.  Why on earth would I keep volunteering for something like that?  It is not like it is a charity, or something that I believe passionately in.  I only do it now because communication from the board is a joke and as a homeowner and community participant I wanted to change that.

 

I am very dissappointed right now and I am so glad, SO GLAD that we are moving.  At this point it is "the sooner the better" for me.  Good riddance to this neighborhood and the power-drunk HOA.

 

And thank God for my Shawn and my Colleen (dear Wes was already asleep when I got home).  Their hugs and snuggles mean the world to me.  As does Shawn's support, because even though he doesn't understand why I am tormenting myself, he is there to hear me out and comfort me.

 

And I thank anyone who will comment on this with advice.  What would you do?  Tell your friend or remain silent and let the HOA speak for itself?  Stick it out until February 15th (when the new person is elected) or tell them to stuff it tomorrow?

 

PS - New photo album of Wesley's braces and shoes.  He is the cutest kid I have ever seen in my life.  And that is not just motherly bias talking.  He is so adorable it makes my heart sing.

... and snagged Shawn before any other hot babes caught on.  :)

Darn titles.  Grrr.

 

I really don't have a thing to talk about tonight, so here goes nothing:

 

Weslely's second birthday is in May, his theme is going to be Disney/Pixar Cars and his game is going to be running around traffic cones.

Colleen's fourth birthday is in July, her theme is going to be Barbie and the Twelve Dancing Princesses and her game is going to be making princess wands and then dancing ballet with them.

 

Wesley's cake is likely to be a standard sheet cake decorated as a race track.

Colleen's cake is going to be one of those 3 dimensional skirts with Barbie head and torso sticking out of it.

 

Who knows where on earth these parties are going to be held... if all goes according to plan this house will be sold by then and we will be living in an apartment.  The complex does have a recreation hall, I wonder if they would let us use it for parties?  Hmm, something to keep in mind.

 

Something else to keep in mind is that I am very likely addicted to McDonalds icecream cones and french fries.  Here's how you do it - you order a cone and a small order of fries.  Go sit in a quiet corner to avoid weird looks.  Use the french fries to scrape icecream off of the side of the cone and quickly cram the fry in your mouth before the icecream falls off the fry.   Mmmmm.  So delicious.  And... and... the icecream is fat free.  And it may have a smidge of dairy in it, so you could probably count it as a serving, and let's not forget the calcium that dairy has in it.

 

Not buying it?  Me either.  Can't blame a girl for trying.  As it stands, I'll just have to feel guilty every time I eat it.

 

HUGS!  -Jen

Last night Shawn and I watched the movie Jackass2.  It is, for the most part, right up my alley.  I could do with out the scenes that involved poop, the one with the leeches (made Shawn fast forward through it!) and of course, the one where they drank... um never mind what they drank.  Suffice to say I was making more throw up noises that they were during that skit.  Shawn was worried (and rightly so) that I was about to toss my cookies on the living room floor.  Yuck. 

 But all the parts where they deliberately did things that were going to hurt - and hurt bad - I loved those.  The one where they were in the dark room throwing weighted exercise balls at each other delighted me.

The ones involving animals worried me.  All I could think about is the poor animals - those snakes were probably scared witless at being in that ball bit and when that bull ran into that teeter totter I'm sure it hurt!

Anyway I am getting WAY off topic here.  This is not a Jackass2 movie review.  This is where I go on and on about how, although I accept and embrace my own sense of humor, I secretly long for a dry, sarcastic wit.  Shawn is like that.  There are two bloggers that I regularly read that are like that.  Dooce, who somehow makes every day headaches hilarious, and Mo Moments.  This is terrible of me to say, but the worse her day gets the funnier her entry is.  I wish I had the kind of sense of humor so that I could pull that off. 

Now that I think about it, it is probably not the "sense of humor".  It probably lies more in the "attitude" department.

Those people - Shawn, Dooce (her real name is Heather) and Mo are all people who can successfully pull off "Don't even THINK about messing with ME."  They are people who could carry a "The" before their names - THE Shawn (which was a nickname of his a while back!), THE Dooce, THE Mo.

Me... not so much.  I am not exactly what you would call intimidating.  Or forceful. or even authoritive.  More often than not when I am mad, Shawn has a hard time not laughing.  Evidently my anger is comical rather than fear-inducing.

I've always longed for the adjectives with Oomph.  Beautiful.  Intriguing.  Seductive.  Tough competitor.  You know, something that STANDS OUT.  A force to be reckoned with.  If I was a cartoon, I'd love to be Jessica Rabbit.

It's not gonna happen.  My destiny is cheerful, upbeat, and (the dreaded) cute.  I'm saddled with "cute".  I do "cute" pretty well.  Who am I kidding?  If I were a cartoon I'd be Piglet.

And I am fine with that (mostly).  It is who I am and I don't see it changing.  And overall, I like being the happy-go-lucky one.  But once in a while, like tonight, I wish I had a dry, sarcastic entry to post.  Something witty and cutting and utterly hilarious.

PS Click the picture, it is funnier if you see it big.

I dislike having to come up with a title for my posts.  It is the hardest part for me and I think it is why I often cancel out of the "write a new blog" screen and just give up.  I am not clever enough to constantly be thinking up witty new titles.  I may start numbering them like symphonies... Blog #1, Blog #2...

 

Or, maybe I should just get over it already and write my darn entry!  LOL

 

Today was hectic.  We had to get up early (virtually impossible in this house), get Colleen off to Janice's for preschool, then get ourselves down to the design studio to write the contract on our final choices for the house.  Thank goodness we emailed them our choices ahead of time, because even though they had nearly 100% of the information ahead of time, the meeting still took 2 hours.  Wesley was not exactly patient during the appointment, but at his worst he is still better than a lot of other kids.

 

After the appointment we got Shawn off to work (2 hours late!) and Wes and I headed home so that he could nap and I could do my "phone errands" and plan my grocery shopping.  I let him sleep as long as possible before waking him up to go to physical therapy.  His new "walking boots" (that is my term - the medical term is SMO) came in and he got them fitted today.  After his therapist got the legnth and padding just right Wesley was DONE.  Since the hour was almost up anyway, we just skipped formal therapy work for today.  Wes still has lingering tactile sensitivity issues (from spending most of his life in a full leg cast) and he is not very tolerant of having his foot touched.  Taking the brace off, putting it back on, adjusting it, etc etc put him in a near melt down state, the poor guy. 

 

We recovered by going to the grocery store.  He LOVES... LOOOVVVVESSSS to ride in the cart with the big car on the front.  The one that is impossible to steer and hogs the whole aisle.  But it makes him happy and a happy Wes is a happy Jen.  We got our shopping done and at the check out they had to call the manager over to do an override - I had too much in coupon savings.  It is my goal to get that override, I try for it and get it practically every time.  I saved $32.60 in coupons today, on a $120 order.  I think I may take too much pride in that, but a girl's got to have goals in life.

 

After the grocery store I picked Colleen up and we went home.  I packed away the food and made the kids a snack, then it was time to go get Shawn from work.  I didn't make it to stride rite today to get Wes' new (off the shelf!!!!) gym shoes, so I've got the car again tomorrow to get that taken care of.  He is supposed to spend several hours in the shoes and braces tomorrow, so that we can see if his therapist has to make any changes to the fit at his appointment on Thursday, so it couldn't wait until I had the car then.  I also have to run back to the design studio - they made an error in our favor and the options are actually going to be $1000 less than we signed for today, so I have to go get the new contract with the corrected price on it.  I also have to stop by the development and pick up our mortgage approval documents.  I had the bank fax them directly to our sales rep, she is going to make copies for me.  What else do I have to do tomorrow?  Hmmm.  Oh yes, Lydia's Loft and Goodwill drop offs, Library drop offs (they take my old books and I get to see my name on the donor list in the newsletter, it is thrilling to see my name in print!).  Hmmm, anything else?  Can't think of anything right now, but that is sure to change between now and the morning.

 

I'm going to need all the rest I can get, so after a quick game of DOA Extreme 2 I am going to bed.  As Tina would say, G'Night, Y'all!

 

HUGS  -Jen

Hi everyone! 

 

I have been so busy - whoa!

 

We have pretty much finished making our selections for the Design Center options for the new house.  We did end up choosing Bamboo flooring for the first floor.  Horizontal cut, carbonized.  It is beautiful in the sample, I can't wait to see it all over!

 

I have also started doing my research on storage units, apartments, and repairs that need to be made to this house so that it can be considered "move in ready".  My head is swimming with numbers and I am a tad overwhelmed.

 

Then something totally unexpected happened...  I discovered that I like to play Dead or Alive Extreme Beach Volleyball 2.  Also very "money-centric".  Good grief, I can't escape it even during leisure time!  I was temporarily better than Shawn on the waterslide (he is so competitive, once he found out it was his mission to make it down all the way first).  I believe that I am still the better photographer, but that is because he would rather make millions playing volleyball, whereas I stink at volleyball, can't ever keep partners, and so I have to spend my vacation by myself, with nothing better to do than take pictures of myself all day.

 

All in all, it has been a good weekend, we kept it low key overall.  Went to Toys R Us this afternoon to spend gift cards the kids got for Christmas.  We got a 2 pack of magna doodles (full size and travel size).  We really needed the travel size because we only had one and the kids fought over it every time we got in the car.  Colleen also fell in love with this purple dress up dress with a big hoop skirt.  It looks like a purple version of Belle's yellow dress in Beauty and the Beast.  We just had to get it for her, and she danced like a "baller-ing-ah" all evening.

 

Wesley chewed off the top of his last bottle nipple.  No more bottles for Wesley.  He is going to be 20 months old on the 17th, so it was way past the time he should have given them up anyways.  He got a big boy haircut the other day and he is just as cute as he wants to be.  He is also talking up a storm.  Impressively so.  He busted out with "purple" and "excuse me" today.  When I make a big deal out of his new words he looks down and gets a big smile on his face, then he looks away and won't look at me - his whole "look how adorable and shy I am" routine.

 

Shawn is doing well.  He has some very exciting things coming up for him at work - he will be traveling the first two weeks of February - comes home the day AFTER Valentines!  LOL  That is not a big deal in our house anyway, so it is no big deal that he won't be here for it, except that he wanted to make a big deal for Colleen this year since she can understand valentines and what not now.  Oh well, there is always next year.

 

I need to get my nose back to the grindstone tomorrow - I want to have a detailed project plan for the house transistion in place before the end of the day.  I won't have every little thing in it yet, but at least when things come up, I will be able to look at what I already have and fit them in instead of jotting things down on post its or just trying to keep them in mind.  Shawn keeps telling me that I will not be able to control this process, I think he is trying to get me to relax.  I will feel better once I have my list all written down in one place, then I can add to it as needed and cross things off as they are accomplished.  When I start feeling very overwhelmed I can look at what I have already done and feel better, not to mention the wonderful freedom of just doing the next item in line (rather than running around like a headless chicken trying to do 20 things at once).

 

I read Plum Lovin' by Janet Evanovich tonight.  It is another one of her "between the numbers' mini novels and just like Visions of Sugar Plums, it features Diesel and the "Unmentionables".  It is a story vein that I can't really get into, but this book definately had it's funny parts and it is a nice treat while we are waiting for the next full legnth story to come out.

 

Well, folks, it's late and the kids are going to get up at the same time regardless of when I go to sleep, so I better hit the hay.

 

I will attach a few pictures of items we chose for the new house.  HUGS!

I haven't posted pictures in a long time, I know!  I made a new album of some recent photos, including Christmas.  Enjoy!

 

Jen

I know I haven't been writing in my blog very much lately.  I wonder if I have writer's block?  I open up my blog at least 2-3 times a day but can not ever think of something interesting to write.  I used to just write about what happened that day, like a diary.  I made lots of friends, got lots of comments, but it seemed so selfish.  Or rather, self centered.  However, it would appear that my daily activities are my only source of blogging inspiration.  Harumph.

 

Lately my free time has been spent on the new house... choosing options, researching mortgages, running through the numbers, trying to decide what to cut and what can stay... running the numbers again...

 

I have the car tomorrow, Wesley has physical therapy in the morning.  The kids are going to a neighbor's house at 4pm, and I am heading down to pick Shawn up, we have an appointment at the builder's design studio to pick colors of stuff (flooring, counter tops, etc etc)  The lady is supposed to be an interior decorator (or some similar title) and is going to advise us on tasteful and complimentry combinations.  I am not good with that stuff, so I need all the help I can get. 

 

This coming weekend I am going down with a neighbor to look at the model home and then to the design studio so that she can see my choices.  Her house is amazing and I very much like her decorating style, so I am looking forward to her input.

 

Tomorrow afternoon I have to walk the neighborhood and evaluate each house as to the condition of it's exterior.  The HOA sends out letters each year to homeowners who need to paint or repair their trim, siding, and even those that just need a powerwashing.  Being on the board sure has it's perks, huh?  I get to walk around with a clip board looking like an idiot and judging other people's homes.  The saddest part is that there are quite a few letters that need to go out.  I wish people would be more proactive.  WELL, in all honestly... I DID get a letter myself two years ago.  It was something we were getting around to, but I was expecting Wes at the time and had just lost my job.  Fixing the trim was the furthest thing from my mind at that point, but oh well.  :)  That reminds me, I still haven't written the newsletter that needs to go out.  Now that I know I am moving I have lost all interest in it.  If I was still working a 9-5 they would say I had Short Timer's Syndrome.  :)

 

HUGS -Jen