Stay at Home Chaos

This week has been the most stressful yet most rewarding this summer. It was mentally exhausting to anticipate Evie going to preschool, and her love of it makes makes me filled with emotions two times a day. She just waves bye to me and she happily goes into her school and gets just as excited seeing me come to get her. Ory got upset yesterday and today as he witnessed me dropping Evie off. He didn’t approve. He only napped 30 minutes yesterday before he woke up screaming and remained upset until Evie came home. Today, as I loaded him back up in the car, he kept pointing at Evie’s empty seat. The look on his face was either a “she’s still gone!” look, or a “are we going to go get her?” look. They’re both happy today.

Our backyard progress has been at a stand-still lately. We’re considering finishing the porch this weekend, but first we want to go look at stones and materials to get an idea of what we’ll need. We’ll probably need to rent a truck in order to relocate the materials we need. It’ll be very pretty when we’re done with it. Then we can add the flower boxes and steps. Then, next spring, I can plant some flowers! I will then kill my flowers with my fail at keeping plants alive, so I’ll sulk for a while. I have ordered a compost-thing that Tim wanted which should get here sometime next week. Non-related, I ordered some stackable recycle bins to use in the garage that should come in handy (they were cheap too!). I should get those in a couple days. Tim has been wanting something like that too.

I want to relocate my rabbits back to where they were, but I don’t know if Tim is going to cooperate. He likes them on the porch. I’m thinking if I try to move them to a patch of grass that hasn’t grown back in, that he’ll be more willing to get them off the porch. They’ll be helpful when it comes to getting our compost started, with all their hay bedding and rabbit droppings. My future dead plants will also work. You can see I don’t do gardening very well. I have a low tolerance for heat, pollen, and nature in general. I hate the outdoors. I’d love to fix this problem as my kids LOVE the outdoors. I sprayed them with a hose earlier. I don’t think Evie likes going outside with me anymore. Ory loves me that much more though.

Actively, Kiki is practicing her outside voice because she’s in her highchair and finished her snack and wants out. She pulled herself to a standing position today! She’s been pulling herself to her knees, but she made it all the way up to her feet today.

I had my birthday over the weekend. I’m now 24 years old. I got a figurine, a new tea pot that I asked for, and a watch. Evie noticed the watch right away and enquired as to what it was. She now knows that watches go Tick-Tock. During my birthday, I hardly got to talk to my twin. My last hamster living, Riddick, died. He was acting really well yesterday, so I knew to check on him today. When I checked on him, he was laying on his back twitching… actively dying. His tumor on his paw had shrunk drastically. He died within 30 minutes, when I checked on him again. Tim spent my birthday cleaning and I watched Scooby Doo for nostalgic purposes.

Kiki started getting on her knees and bouncing up and down in the cute baby dance. This means nothing to her mobility. She can already army-crawl anywhere in the house. She’s just trying to figure out normal crawling. She loves sitting up as well, but she can’t get to her tummy by herself if you sit her up. She tries falling forwards and her legs get in the way.

Tim also got me birthday cake and ice cream. We put candles in the cake and let the kids go at it. You can put an unlit candle in front of Ory and he still tries to blow it out. My kids are adorable little monsters.

I’m not very happy today though. I had a depressing time before bed and it has carried on into this morning. My eyes are swollen and I battled the need to throw up all night. My dreams were even against me. In my dreams, people are waving different items in front of me to see what would make me sick. Then I’d wake up dry-heaving. It was a hard night. Then all 3 kids got up consecutively this morning. I didn’t brush my teeth because I knew it’d make me sick. Instead, I got everyone downstairs and got sick once I got down here. Then Tim left for work. This goes back to why I was depressed to begin with. I have no one here. No one. No support. No babysitter. No friends. When I need help, I have to rely on Tim, and I never know when I’ll get the support. I don’t get it today. I hope I can stay awake.

Exhaustion is taking its toll. I’ve been trying to get more sleep too. I woke up in the middle of the night last night to calm Kiki down so Tim could feed her. I then proceeded with the morning sickness path and gagged and spit but didn’t vomit even though I really, really needed to. This went on for about an hour until I finally got sick and managed to get back to sleep. Then I was out like a log.

I’ve decided that I’m just way too tired to continue my school work. Tim agrees with me. I’m having problems keeping up as it is. My concentration is quickly straying and my free time is going as well. I don’t enjoy my me-time anymore because I’m tired and just want to sleep. I won’t be ever going back to school. I’m going to have 4 kids. I think it’ll be best if I just stay home. WIth my luck, when they’re in school, they’d each get sick on different days of the week.

I learned today that my cousin, Jimmy, has estranged himself from our grandma within the past month or so. I’m ecstatic. Our ranks are growing. I’m not speaking to her, Jimmy isn’t speaking to her, and I know several other of my cousins, her grandchildren, despise her as well. I like knowing that there are others who feel the same as I do. That it isn’t just me. Here’s to a wonderful future!

Back around Mother’s Day, I ordered Tim’s mom a present. I then got an email stating it would be shipping in 4-6 weeks, which was way past Mother’s Day and more like a Father’s Day present (and I don’t think Tim’s dad would like it!). Frustrated, I said I’d cancel it and Tim picked out a present by himself. Yesterday, I was contacted about the order I made back in early May and didn’t cancel. Guess what? It’s been backordered! It will ship at the end of September. My opinion on this? It all works out in the end. It should get there in time for my mother-in-law’s birthday! I guess she wasn’t meant to have it for Mother’s Day.

In other ordering news, the Disney bedroom set I ordered for the girls (also in May with a 6-8 week wait) will arrive tomorrow. I only paid for curbside delivery because it’s cheaper than having them haul it inside and set it up. I’m excited about it. There is a bunkbed, a dresser, and a mirror. It’s not really Disney’ish as it is princessy. I wanted the princess look, and it fit the bill. We still need mattresses and twin-sized bedding. Bedding doesn’t have to match, because Evie has accidents sometimes. If they matched, I’d need three of the exact same bedding to make sure everything looks the same! I’m not going to be that weird.

What I also got today was a PTC paper test. It cost $3 on Amazon for 100 strips. I only need a couple. A PTC paper test lets you know whether or not you are a bitter taster or not. I took my test while on Web cam with my sister. At first, I didn’t taste anything, so I was thinking that perhaps I just wasn’t a taster. Then I tasted a little of something. The moment I tasted something, it got really disgusting really quickly. I had to rinse my mouth out. Very gross! I could taste it for about an hour afterwards. Tim is going to take one when he gets home.

At age 23, I have gotten a DNA test from 23andme.com. It hasn’t really told me much I didn’t know already. I have a decreased risk for asthma, Crohn’s, MS, Lupus, and several others. I have typical risk for most things like heart attack and lung cancer.

Surprisingly, I have a decreased risk for Alcoholism, something I’m terrified of developing to the point that I won’t touch alcohol. Not surprising is that I have an increased risk of being addicted to nicotine. Again, something I won’t touch with a 10 foot pole. Fun stuff to learn, though.

Unlike Tim, who has no variants of any of the tested traits, I do have 1 trait that I can pass on. Luckily, it isn’t anything I need to worry about because Tim doesn’t have the trait and it’s harmless by itself.

I have learned that I do no have alcohol flush, I can taste bitter things, and my eye color is brown (who knew?). I have no resistance to the Novovirus that I caught two weeks ago. Based on a basic study in ‘Avoidance of Errors,’ I effectively learn from errors. Tim does not. Next time Tim calls me paranoid because something bad happened to me ONCE and I refuse to let it happen to me again, I can blame it on genetics.

Being in a house with two parents, neither Tim nor I have to stay up all night for any reason. We have the other one to pass children off onto. Last night, I couldn’t sleep. I just couldn’t. I laid in bed until 2:30 am when I couldn’t take it anymore. Everything was loud. I needed to move. I unplugged the water fountain only to hear birds chirping outside. Birds shouldn’t be chirping in the middle of the night, but that’s what they do here. I laid back down and briefly considered sleeping in the closet.

I ended up getting up, eating a banana, drinking some juice, and taking a heartburn pill. That didn’t make me sleepy at all. So I started laundry. I got one load completely done by morning because my dryer hates me and we can’t get it to dry decently no matter what we do (2-3 hours to dry a load? Please dry faster…). I did school school work until 4:00 am when I decided to lay back down. Ory woke up briefly and I got him back down with a struggle which is unusual. He woke up twice last night which is also unusual. I had to get up in 2 hours. I needed those 2 hours. At 5:00 am, I needed that one hour. At 6:00 am, I turned away from the clock and hoped for 15 minutes. I’ve always had insomnia, but man. This was a killer.

While waiting for Tim to come wake me up, I thought of coping strategies I could use for the day. I wasn’t taking a cold shower. Tim couldn’t stay home because he had an important meeting today. He never stays home on Wednesday’s anyway, because of his Wednesday meetings. Today he happens to have another meeting so it’s a no-go. I thought about becoming a coffee addict, if only I had a coffee maker and some coffee beans. Ory woke up first. I let him out of his room and went to the bathroom. Then Tim came in late. I informed him I didn’t sleep. I even informed him I tried to wake him up and he didn’t move. I told him everything I did last night. He offered to stay home before remembering his important meeting. Then he offered to come home early before he remembered his late Wednesday meeting. I have to suck it up.

So I got the bright idea to make a nice hot breakfast. Oh, what a mistake that was! The pancakes turned out good, but I spilled batter on the burner and didn’t realize it. I also sat the spatula on the pan instead of to the side like usual. Next thing I know, the house is filled with smoke and the spatula has melted some. This is the second time I laid this exact spatula on the pan while it was hot, resulting in melting. You’d think I’d learn the first time. We have another one which I haven’t melted yet. We all ate pancakes for breakfast. Ory didn’t touch his and had a cereal bar instead.

It’s almost 10:00 am and I’m just waiting for dinner time so I can pass out. 8 hours to go.

I believe I’ve discussed my hatred of people taking free items off the curb. I have even more reason to hate it. Tim finished laying sod in the yard last night! It looks really great. We had leftover sod that we hadn’t discussed what to do with yet. While Tim was laying it down, some teen boy ran up to our tarp wondering what was under it. Some girl he was with said, “It’s probably just dirt.” He has to look anyway. “It’s grass.” He seemed disappointed. If he had been playing in the park next door like the rest of the kids, he would’ve known it was grass.

Tim is driving to work this morning. He left something so I called him back shortly after he left. During this call, he informed me that our sod is gone. Someone came in the middle of the night and stole it. What the hell? There was no implications that this was free. In fact, if you see sod with a bunch of empty spaces where sod used to be, you can assume that the person needed a lot and might not be done. But no, some idiot stole it. I bet you they probably thought it was leftover (which is accurate) and took it assuming it was free. However, based on the fact that it was done in between 7:30 p.m. and 8:00 a.m., I’m not buying that logic. That person knew he was taking something he shouldn’t have. He should’ve came back later, because we probably would’ve put a free sign in front of it, then he wouldn’t have needed to steal it and still gotten it free.

What I want to know is who suddenly needs sod the moment its on the curb. Any ideas?

First off, even small cuts of sod is as heavy as an elephant riding a whale. When the sod was delivered, Tim wasn’t ready for it. It got here two hours early. If I hadn’t woken Tim up an hour early because Ory was being a terror and I needed assistance, he would’ve been asleep when they delivered it. He finished prepping the yard while mumbling to himself. He had the kids so they could be terrors outside.

Tim had almost two lines done. Each ‘line’ is about 10 pieces of sod. We used the wheelbarrow to move three pieces of sod at a time. After he got nearly 20 pieces laid, he was tired and sweaty so I decided to give it a shot. Tim at first didn’t want me to, but let me after he was tired. I did about 5. Yes, only 5. I have children to care for and I don’t like mud in which I was covered. Later, when he finished the line I started, all the kids were asleep. This meant extra productivity! I was able to load up the 3 pieces of sod and get them to him by the time he needed one. This was a huge boost. By the time I had to go back inside for child care, the sod wasn’t heavy to me anymore.

Tim did lots more. He was beyond exhausted at this point. It’s dinner time. We got the sod at 11:00 a.m. He goes inside to order pizza for delivery, which we never do. He normally picks up pizza and gets me chinese at the same time. But this time, it’s pizza for everyone. I go outside and do several half-lines on a different portion of the yard that Tim started. Pizza would be here in 20 minutes! That was not 20 minutes. I finished up. The sod was really, really heavy in the beginning, and really, really light at the end. Both my arms are scratched up because Tim only left a path to the yard by and underneath the rose bush. The bush wanted to amputate my arms with its samurai sword impersonating thorns.

Dinner time! We all eat. I was starving until I took the first bite and tasted the pizza. Then I lost my appetite. I ate two pieces anyway because I needed the fuel.

In the end, we have most of the back yard done except half a line. He finished at 8:00 p.m. Tomorrow, Tim finishes that and does the side yard. It should take all day again. Tim is considering taking Monday off work so we can all moan around the house exchanging stories about our battle scars we received this weekend.

After the yard is all grassed, we need to make plans on finishing the sidewalk and adding the flower boxes which we left dirt paths for.

It’s coming. The sod will be delivered today. Do you know what this means? No more mud filled yard. No more muddy paws, floors, pets, children, and shoes. No more daily baths to remove mud. Or, as Ory would put it, “No Mo’e!” That has to be my most favorite thing he says right now. I wake Tim up at 11 a.m. to finish the yard before the sod delivery people get here. I’m so excited. This means the project is over! Oh, wait…

Tim still has to install flower boxes and make the sidewalk larger. Well, darn it all. At least the yard will be useable in 10 days. Tim says the dogs can go outside, but we can’t. I don’t see the logic. The dogs would do more damage than I can. The rabbits hutch is on the porch instead of in its ideal spot. I picked their spot because of sunlight limitations and visibility from my main window. I like being able to keep an eye on them.

My sister got me hyacinth plants. Exactly that one, if you click the link. She wants me to have something for my flower box. I know I’m going to kill it once I try to transfer it. I can’t find anything anywhere that tells me how or when to move it. Nor can I find anything that tells me how to properly de-head it when needed or what sort of care to give it when they naturally whither. For now, it looks great on my window sill. It’s up high so the kids and pets can’t get it. So far, I haven’t killed it! Its perfume is very, very strong. You can smell it from far away. Since the plant has bloomed, everything has a smell. It’s beginning to bother me. I wonder what kind of plants we’ll put in our flower boxes once we have them.