Finally, they called back and said they couldn’t get me in until Tuesday morning.

“so, since I have to wait 24 hours, can something be called in until then. I’m really uncomfortable.”

“You can take four Advil.”

“Okay, but I’m pregnant.”

“You’re pregnant?!?!!? Don’t take the Advil and your OB has to fill out a form before we can see you.”

I got in contact with my OB, they had faxed the form back right away and I’m just sitting, waiting for ten tomorrow morning. I put Eli down for a nap, I laid down in my bed and fell right to sleep. Then, out of nowhere, a shooting pain shot through my gums into my ear. The pain continued and never, ever stopped. In fact, it became worse.

I called the dentist back and asked if they could PLEASE call something in. They said “no.”

I called my OB’s office, they called in Tylenol 3. We went to pick it up.  Friends, I was in excruciating pain times 100. I can’t even describe it to you. I wanted to be knocked out, shot, anything. We went to Walgreens and they hadn’t checked their voicemails, yet.

So, no pain medicine.

I start crying. AGAIN. (I’m in the car, freaking the shit out of my kids, I’m sure) Brian’s inside probably telling the pharmacist that if he doesn’t check his voicemail, it’s very likely I’ll come in and check it for him.

After an hour, we get the prescription. I come home, take the medicine. My tooth laughs at it. I still want to die.

And here I am. Still waiting for ten tomorrow morning.

good times.

Do you want me to tell you about the photography workshop I’m attending in two weeks? (details will be limited because that’s just the way I am but still…I am dying that it’s almost here.)

Do you want to hear how my 8 year old daughter hurt my feelings last night and how last week she said “sex” and this morning she said “bitch” and how scared out of my mind I am to be raising a daughter? (which will undoubtedly turn into a post begging parents to either A. watch their language around their children or B. if you must use these words in front of your children, please stress to them that these are words only adults use…)

Should I tell you how I gave Anna and Noah Rice Krispies today, for their first time and I was like “listen! SNAP! CRACKLE! POP! ooooh” and they were like “yeah but it still tastes like sand.” And I realized what a simple child I was.

Would you rather hear about how my husband spoiled me on my birthday shopping trip on Saturday and see my goodies from Anthro?

or would you prefer I shut my mouth and show you some newborn photos from my session on Monday?

Seriously.

You decide.

Awhile ago, many, many, many years ago, I decided that I would never do a product review without giving away that same products to my readers.  You guys are important to me, I have always said “I like free stuff but I like my readers better.”  Believe me, I know what it’s like to go to blogs and read endlessly about products they are reviewing and you end up scratching your head and wondering “is this person even telling the truth?”

You know I’m right.

Anyway, a few weeks ago, I was contacted about reviewing something called the Fisher Price EZ Bundle.

Aren’t the colors cool and fantastic?  I think so, too.  But, I just couldn’t do it.  I have standards, people!  I showed it to Brian and he was like “so, when do you get it?”  I was taken aback…”um, no, I’m not going to do it because I don’t do reviews when there isn’t a giveaway attached” and he was like “yeah, but maybe do it, this thing looks pretty awesome.”

Me: But no giveaway!

Him: But lots of free things, things we will actually use!

Me: But

Him: FREE

Me: STANDARDS!

Him: We have $14 in our checking account.

Me: BUT.

and I surrendered and I sort of want to apologize to you because I feel like I’ve let you down but I feel kind of good about this because maybe you should know about this product and also I have SO MANY CUTE PICTURES OF ELI!  (so, we’re cool, right?)

Also, maybe Fisher-Price will be like, “awwww…let’s give away some to her readers!  You’re getting a Fisher Price EZ Bundle!  You’re getting a Fisher Price EZ Bundle!  You’re getting a Fisher Price EZ Bundle!  You’re getting a Fisher Price EZ Bundle!” or whatever.

Aden + Anais blankie, froggie and cute baby are not included.

This is what I put Eli in each morning while I shower and get ready.  I like it pretty well!  ”I like it, too!”  he says.

That chair piece comes off and attaches to other components.  The idea being that rather than having all four of these full size things (swing, infant seat, toddler seat and highchair) taking up much needed space in your home, you can just have one.  But really, that’s not true, you have one put together and two other components, lying around.

So, less stuff but still stuff.  And good news, you need not be a genius to take these things apart and put back together.  I did it without instructions WHICH SAYS A WHOLE LOT.

Here’s Eli in the highchair.  We love this highchair.  He sits up incredibly well in it and he things it’s pretty fancy.  The other components are placed in front of the highchair.

Cute baby and crinkly book not included.  This is Eli’s FAVORITE book.  It’s about crinkles and things to bite on.  and drool.

Hey Mom, I dropped my book about crinkles.  A little help?

And then his brother came home from school.  (neither brother is included.   They are mine.)

And here’s the seat as an infant seat.

Eli likes it pretty well but we think he would have REALLY liked it 2 months ago.  Now he thinks he’s sixteen and wants to sit up all of the time.  Fortunately, there is a toddler seat, which is the highchair without the legs, but we haven’t put him in that, yet.

So, what are my honest thoughts?  Well, HONESTLY, when I saw that first picture (pictured above) I thought, “WOW!  Four products in one box, SMART!”  So, either the marketing is a little misleading or I have zero brain cells leftover.   Then Brian took it out of the box and I was like “wait, there are 325 pieces missing.”  And then he explained to his wife, who has lost too many brain cells, exactly how it works.

We like it.  It’s incredibly sturdy, high quality, lightweight,  easy to clean and really we think traveling with it will be awesome.  Would we want it instead of having each thing individually…not necessarily.  I’m always on the move, from one task to the next and having to put Eli down (on the floor?) to move things around just doesn’t seem to fit with my life, so that bothers me a bit.  But for the price $150.00?  I think it’s a pretty good deal.

Questions?  Concerns?  Ask me!  And thanks Fisher-Price for the review.

*and now back to our regularly schedule no reviews without a giveaway show.  Thank you for your patience.*

This product was given to me, free of cost, in exchange for an honest to goodness review, which you see here.

I’m not even that picky about ice cream.  Give it to me straight up or on the rocks, in a waffle cone or in a bowl, covered in hot caramel?  Sign me up.

I think it’s something I’m passionate about, I think ice cream should be a part of everyone’s lives.  This Friday, I’m hosting a 31 Gifts Party (live in my area and want to come, email me!).  I’m having an ice cream bar.

Because THAT MAKES SENSE.

Anyway, this past week was really hard.  Nothing went right, I felt like I was constantly fighting with my kids and my husband.  My heart felt broken, my spirit; shattered.

And on Saturday, I didn’t have any ice cream.  For the first time in weeks.

I laid in bed, after crying into my pillow for a long time that night, thinking about how hard life is sometimes.  I realized I had gone ice cream-less all day.

I cried even harder.

{woe is me.  I know.}

While tears fell on my pillow, I prayed (begged) to God for grace the following day.  I asked Him to give me strength, to be a bigger person, to not always WANT, to GIVE more.  I also asked for a way for me to be ME again.  To be happy and in love, not just with my kids but also with my husband.  I asked Him to help me to be less angry but I also asked that my family GIVE more, too.  (it’s only fair.)

I can’t say everything is solved.  Because, my goodness, it’s not.  But the tears stopped and I’ve felt more happiness than I have in a long time.  And not just because of decisions and prayers on my end, but also decisions and prayers from those I live with, it’s a work in progress.

On Monday and Tuesday, I made up for it and had ice cream twice.  (I also felt and saw a whole lot of love and smiles, too.)

Last week, Stephanie, Lovelyn, Rhonda and I all met for ice cream at a local parlor.  Our kids were so hyper and honestly, driving us crazy.  And then Gray fell and lost his ice cream.  He was so sad.  But he sat down and continued to eat his chocolate waffle cone despite the tears and the sadness.  This little four year old taught me a serious lesson.

Some moments are bad, some are good, either way, things are better with ice cream.

***

This week, I lost 1.6 pounds.

Back to picking outfits for the day when I love the way I look, I’ve decided to go with beachwear this week.  This is me.

I like it.

Today, I nursed him and laid him back down at six and then I laid down and fell asleep HARD CORE.  He woke up at seven crying his tiny little head off.  I still can’t figure out why.  I’m thinking maybe a belly ache?  I nursed him and that relaxed him and then he had two explosions in his diaper.

We have been putting him in this new chair (new for him) and he loves it.  That’s how I’m able to write right now.  He stares at it likes it’s an alien and then he kicks his legs like crazy.  It’s unbelievably adorable.  I already feel like he’s growing up too quickly.

Today is the first day of summer vacation.  I feel like I should feel like a bad Mom because right now Noah is playing Wii and Anna is on the computer and it’s only 8:38 in the morning.  But I don’t actually feel like a bad Mom because I know once they make their beds and brush their teeth, they’ll go outside and play all day long.

Anna has a birthday party today at the neighbor’s house.  They have a pool and water scares me.  I’ve made plans with Stephanie, we are taking our kids on a picnic and a walk while Anna’s at the party, I’m so nervous leaving her there.  (she can’t swim)

Brian tells me I need to loosen my strings a little, that I bring so much stress on myself just with worry.  I can’t help it, I get it from my Mom.

So far today, Anna has asked me at least 25 questions and she’s been awake for 70 minutes.  That’s a lot of questions to ask someone who doesn’t have a lot of patience today.  We bought her a new bathing suit and face mask last night.  She wants to put them on right now for a party that’s in three hours.  I’m tempted to let her just for the sake of peace.

Don’t you hate it when you don’t have patience?  It’s like you know you don’t have patience, you know you don’t like not having patience but you just don’t know how to get the patience.

Anna keeps talking to me about the party, like right now, as I type.  She’s trying on her bathing suit right now.  I just gave her permission to keep it on for awhile, for the sake of peace.  Eli is getting fussy and now I’m wondering how I’m going to get through the day without any patience.

I mean, I know I’ll get through it, but I’d like to do it somewhat gracefully, you know?  So far?  That’s not happening.

ANYWAY, this weekend is the first weekend in a really long time without any plans.  I hope it stays that way.  We plan to start the weekend out by cleaning the house tomorrow morning.  I have this deep desire to make my house lighter, to fill up bags for Goodwill and give stuff away via Freecycle and also to throw things away.  We have too much stuff.

I feel like I’ve tortured you with my ramblings.

By the way, this piece of crap post took me over two three hours to write.

I need some tylenol.

I hope your weekend is better than this post.

I’m so far from perfect that it’s hysterical and yet, sometimes, after I write a post to all of you, I think “gosh, I sound so…’on’ all of the time.”

The truth is, I’m not always positive, I’m sometimes grouchy, I always procrastinate, I sleep too much, I eat too much, I don’t eat my veggies, I sometimes go to bed angry, Brian and I do argue, he sometimes IS right (shhhhh….), I don’t hug my kids enough and I’m terrible with money.

Remember on Friday when I was like “hey, this weekend I’m going to show you a handmade project that ANYONE can do?“  Well, guess what?  I did it on Saturday and SCREWED IT UP.  No lie.  So…there’s that, too.  (don’t worry, it’s still coming to you, just with better instructions than what I received.)

*phew*  I feel better.

Also?  I never say “phew.”

The thing is…I KNOW that you guys don’t care.  My husband doesn’t care, my kids don’t care, my friends don’t care…so why do I?

I don’t know…but I’m working on it.

s.l.o.w.l.y …

I’ll begin working on it as soon as I finish this bowl of cocoa puffs as I sit on the couch with laundry just SITTING in my dryer.

Then I’m off to my son’s school because he forgot his lunchbox in the car.  {he’s not perfect either!}

BUT THEN…

we got sick.  And we didn’t want to expose the beloved grandparents to this horrid flu, so we decided to make the meal a little bit more simple.

So, we ordered pizza and luckily I made the guacamole (easy recipe below) before the GREAT FLU FEST OF 2009 overtook our cozy home.  Although it wasn’t quite the feast we had prepared, it was still delicious (hello?  IT’S PIZZA!) and we had fun.  We sat in the living room using just paper towels as our plates and we played Uno and Zingo and read (a ton of) books.

It was perfect.  In it’s own special, very mucous-y, yet delicious way.

Because I’m all about the sharing, here is this recipe for fresh guacamole…IT IS YUM.

3 very ripe avacados
3 roma tomatoes (gently core inside, then dice)
1 large lime
red onion (use about a 1/4 of a cup, when not pregnant, I love it and I dice it up real nice, when I’m pregnant, OHMYGOD it’s evil and shall not even enter my home)
1 hot pepper (or jalapeno pepper) slice and dice as much as you wish.  The more you use, the kickier the guac.
Green onions (finely chopped…again, add as much as you’d like, I typically add 1/2 cup)
2 garlic gloves
1/2 a bunch of cilantro (finally chopped)
salt and pepper to taste

Mix together and dip your chips.  Enjoy!

This post was sponsored by Viva Towels. For fun, fork-free recipes – including videos – and snappy entertaining ideas, get over to the VIVA® Diva Café.

I have to clean my whole house by 11:00 today because I asked my cleaning lady to come back after having to say goodbye to her in an effort to save money before summer started.

Yes, I clean my house before my cleaning lady comes…it makes sense.  Yes it does. She can’t clean my bathtub if it’s full of clothes.  Not that mine is full of clothes. *cough*

On my way to dropping the kids off at school today, I plugged in my iPhone to the audio system in the car and played a song that I had in my mind and I really listened to the words and it nearly brought me to my knees with it’s lyrics.  It was my life.  It is my life.  I finished the song and felt refreshed and not alone and Anna said “will you play that song again?”

I wonder if she had the same experience, although, probably, hopefully, not as heavy.

Tomorrow, Brian and I are heading to our favorite little town in Indiana to spend four days with my sister and her husband.  This is the eighth year that we have done this trip and it just gets better and better.

No kids.  No responsibilities. No cooking.  No laundry.  Just ice cream.  Pizza.  Shopping.  And for the husbands:  beer and golf.  We share a condo…it’s literally BLISS.

I’ve been more emotional about things this week than I have been throughout this entire pregnancy.  Not that I sit around crying all of the time, although I did while watching flash mobs on You Tube yesterday, it’s just that I’m feeling things more deeply than I have been.  It’s possible I’m feeling again because I’ve cut back on my prozac significantly.  I always felt that prozac was like a concrete barrier that prevented me from ever going to “that place.”  It’s like a great protector…but also, sometimes that place needs to be visited.

I took Noah to the dentist on Wednesday, somehow, the conversation with the hygienist led to losing James and Jake, which is so strange because it’s not something I bring up with people I don’t know, but it couldn’t be prevented.  So, I shared.  I’m glad I did.  She asked me questions, real questions, it was a good moment.   To recognize their place in our lives feels good.

It’s interesting to me that two little boys who were so small and who were here for such a small portion of time, can impact us FOREVER and SO DEEPLY.

I am so grateful for them.

I probably won’t be around much until maybe Tuesday or Wednesday, but I’ll try to pop in when I can.  My sister, Sarah, is 28 weeks pregnant and she and I are doing a maternity shoot for her, so maybe I’ll come by and show you how wonderfully cute she is.

She is so cute.

I’m off to begin my day…THIS DAY that is so remarkable and beautiful, I’ll be sure to live it because that’s what it’s here for…I’m hoping you do the same.

One night, I even stayed up until 12:24 IN THE MORNING.

I know.

My life, oh this crazy life of ours, will hopefully be returning to normal tomorrow.  So much happened this weekend beyond the funeral, (which was perfect, thank you so much for your thoughts and prayers), so much good but also so many bad, negative things that make my heart hurt.  Things I can not speak of here because it’s not mine to tell.  It’s just not good.

Today felt lighter and brighter, despite the rest of my family heading back to their home all over the United States.  I miss my brothers and sisters and their wives and husbands and kids so much.  I hate living so far away from them.    This afternoon, I took a beautiful nap, I was so tired and slept so hard.

Pregnancy, death, drama, trauma, it’s all so exhausting.

So, tomorrow we return to the mounds and mounds of laundry, school lunches, grocery shopping, homework, school forms that we are endlessly filling out and regular life…I’m ready for it.  I am so ready for it.

This family of mine is out of sync.  I blame it on school starting and both of the kids being gone ALL DAY LONG for the first time ever and now I’d like to take a moment and blame our van because the transmission went out yesterday.

It’s not worth fixing.

Which means one thing:  we must buy a new vehicle.

Brian took off of work today and he and I searched all day long while the kids were in school, and then again after they got home.  We haven’t purchased anything but we are close.  Today was frustrating and mind boggling and completely exhausting.  Fortunately, we starting looking about a month ago, so we have a lot of looking and comparing under our belts.  Unfortunately, we are sick of looking.

I’m actually feeling quite badly about not giving the kids any downtime today.  They got home from school, did their homework and after twenty minutes, we drove ourselves to the south side of Chicago, which was…INTERESTING.  One of the cars that we were most excited about was situated in a very strange, very scary location.  I may or may not have thought we were going to be mugged TWICE while looking at cars.

It was fun.  No really.  it was.

We’ve narrowed it down to three vans.

The first had a full cigarette sitting in the back of the car.

The second had a notebook with a child’s writing on it that had “I will not play with fire.  I will not play with fire.” written over and over and over again tucked inside the glove compartment.

And the third not only smelled like dirty socks, but happened to have dirty socks underneath the stow and go seats.

Which would you choose?

Stupid used cars.