New methods of torture

As if going to kettlebell weren't enough torture. I somehow managed to go to my cardio class today. Though the motivation to move quickly was gone and I got there super late. At least I forced myself to go.

And because sometimes physical torture isn't enough, I had added mental torture. Starting yesterday, I kept hearing a beep in the basement. I couldn't figure out where in the world it was coming from. It was like a cricket! You stand in one place, wait to hear it, move to where you think it came from, wait to hear it again, only to find it came from where you used to be standing. ARGH!!! It was torture! My biggest concern was a sump pump problem as our basement tends to have lots of water around it. I can't handle a sump pump problem again. I just can't. Then I stood by the water heater, A/C, washer and dryer, heater, etc. Nothing. I looked in all of the rafters, per Amber's suggestion, and there was nothing that looked like an abandoned smoke alarm. But I still couldn't find the source. At this point I was near tears. I need a husband. I can't find the stupid beeping, and even if I did find it, how in the world was I supposed to fix it???

I started standing by boxes. First the toy boxes, per Jessica's suggestion. No go. So, I'd go to each box and wait for the stupid beep to come back. Finally, FINALLY, I found it in one of Natalie's boxes. There was a smoke alarm in the kitchen box, and apparently it wasn't happy to be ignored. Yes, Natalie, I still love you.

Cheating!

Okay, so I'm behind on blogging. I haven't done much blog reading this week and I'm trying to catch up. So, please excuse the copy of part of my post on the weight loss blog...

"Owie! I went to the Y to workout today and started talking to another lady in the locker room. I wasn't feeling very motivated to hit the elliptical machine as I forgot my mp3 player and exercising without music is akin to torture in my book. She said she was going to a kettlebell class and that I should check it out. I was skeptical, but as I had nothing better to do, I thought I'd try it. W.o.w.z.a. I was lucky my legs still had the strength to walk out afterwards. To make things worse, there are only 4 people in the class, and it is taught by Anita. Anita is TOUGH! You may recall me whining about a cardio class she taught this summer. She kills me! And there were so few people, I couldn't even slack off or do things half-way. So, it is probably good she is there to whip my butt into shape, but OWIE! Kettlebell really worked me over and I can tell it is going to help get me in shape, so I went ahead and signed up for the class. I may regret this later. I don't know why I'm paying to torture myself...."

HAD TO!

Sorry. Had to share this.

http://www.starz.com/promotions/bunnies/Pages/Bunnies.aspx

Kids!

I got this from my friend Kate. It was too hilarious to not share with the people I love! ENJOY!
It is from the Washington Post, btw...

By Carolyn HaxWednesday, May 23, 2007; Page C10

Carolyn:
Best friend has child. Her: exhausted, busy, no time for self, no time for me, etc. Me (no kids): Wow. Sorry. What'd you do today? Her: Park, play group . . .

Okay. I've done Internet searches, I've talked to parents. I don't get it. What do stay-at-home moms do all day? Please no lists of library, grocery store, dry cleaners . . . I do all those things, too, and I don't do them EVERY DAY. I guess what I'm asking is: What is a typical day and why don't moms have time for a call or e-mail? I work and am away from home nine hours a day (plus a few late work events) and I manage to get it all done. I'm feeling like the kid is an excuse to relax and enjoy -- not a bad thing at all -- but if so, why won't my friend tell me the truth? Is this a peeing contest ("My life is so much harder than yours")? What's the deal? I've got friends with and without kids and all us child-free folks get the same story and have the same questions.

Tacoma, Wash.


Relax and enjoy. You're funny.

Or you're lying about having friends with kids.

Or you're taking them at their word that they actually have kids, because you haven't personally been in the same room with them.

Internet searches?

I keep wavering between giving you a straight answer and giving my forehead some keyboard. To claim you want to understand, while in the same breath implying that the only logical conclusions are that your mom-friends are either lying or competing with you, is disingenuous indeed.

So, since it's validation you seem to want, the real answer is what you get. In list form. When you have young kids, your typical day is: constant attention, from getting them out of bed, fed, clean, dressed; to keeping them out of harm's way; to answering their coos, cries, questions; to having two arms and carrying one kid, one set of car keys, and supplies for even the quickest trips, including the latest-to-be-declared-essential piece of molded plastic gear; to keeping them from unshelving books at the library; to enforcing rest times; to staying one step ahead of them lest they get too hungry, tired or bored, any one of which produces the kind of checkout-line screaming that gets the checkout line shaking its head.

It's needing 45 minutes to do what takes others 15.

It's constant vigilance, constant touch, constant use of your voice, constant relegation of your needs to the second tier.

It's constant scrutiny and second-guessing from family and friends, well-meaning and otherwise.

It's resisting constant temptation to seek short-term relief at everyone's long-term expense.

It's doing all this while concurrently teaching virtually everything -- language, manners, safety,
resourcefulness, discipline, curiosity, creativity. Empathy. Everything.

It's also a choice, yes. And a joy. But if you spent all day, every day, with this brand of joy, and then, when you got your first 10 minutes to yourself, wanted to be alone with your thoughts instead of calling a good friend, a good friend wouldn't judge you, complain about you to mutual friends, or marvel how much more productively she uses her time. Either make a sincere effort to understand or keep your snit to yourself.

Game time!

I had such a great weekend with my friend Jill and her family here. We went through 5 loaves of home made bread because it is just that good! Jill and I got to play racquetball, at the Y, 2 of the 3 days they were here. Oh, how I love racquetball. I keep hoping to find someone here to play. Sigh...

We also played quite a few games of Settlers of Cattan, which I love. I even tried a new game called Ticket to Ride. It was fun, but I must confess that I preferred the online version. Why? I don't like adding up points. I play games for fun and don't really care much about points. The computer adds points for you so I don't have to think about it. I guess I'm just not competitive enough.

My kids really loved playing their Wii that the Pierce's brought with them. I didn't even get a chance to try it! Okay, maybe I didn't even try to take a turn. I'm sure the kids would have let me have a turn if I wanted to have one. I'm just afraid to get hooked and then be sad to not have one. They also had lots of fun with Anna and the newly adopted children Keith and Kristina. I was SOOOOO impressed with how great the kids all got along. Stinker loved their dog, perhaps a little too much. We were having so much fun we didn't even mind that it snowed almost the entire weekend.

Thanks for the fun weekend, Pierce family!

Baby, it's cold outside!

It is soooo cold outside. I guess it is -25 with windchills taking it to -30. My nose hairs froze in the time it took to take the trash to the end of the drive. It is so cold that they cancelled school today. Wow. So, I had to say good-bye to my plans to go to the gym and the store. They don't do child care for Jaden's age and the Y and there is no way I'm going to the store with 3 kids if it isn't a necessity.

Thankfully, my friend Jill and her family are trekking here for the weekend. They are bringing some games and their Wii, so it promises to be a fun weekend. And we can't forget the Bollywood, which will also be plentiful while they are here. WAHOO!

Station change

Today's post will be entirely on the the Cookie Monster blog. Sorry. A picture of Stinker's quiet-time antics says more than I ever could.

I have being trying, without success, to add a video since yesterday. I have now given up and hope that the problem will be resolved when I try again in a few days. It is either that or throw my laptop, so we'll go with giving up.

Duh

I might just be stating the obvious for some of you, but I'm not one for surprises. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE it when Brad comes home with flowers or something, but anticipating something isn't for me. I am, unfortunately, an instant gratification person. If something good is coming, tell me what it is so I can enjoy the anticipation. I'll enjoy it a lot more than way than if I'm left wondering. Having said all of that, you don't have to wait for your Valentine's letter to see our family pictures. They are in a slide over in the Cookie blog. And yes, there are a TON of pictures. I left in the bad ones so you can see what a pain Calet was being, and because I'm all about keeping it real. I have to say, I really really really like having a CD. I can print as many great quality pictures as I want, and I get all of the pictures, not just 1 pose. And I don't have to scan anything. LOL! So, go check out the pictures and get a sneak peek at the Valentine's cards I'm sending out, since I totally missed Christmas. And for those so curious, our 'theme' was that we all wore our favorite colors and the girls wore sweaters too. There. That is a theme, right?

And here is some housekeeping. A lot of my family and friends would like access to my siblings blogs. I'm not really comfortable having them permanently linked on this public blog, but I will be putting their links up in the private Cookie blog. Resa and Brooke's blogs are public and you don't need permission to view them. But they reserve the right to change their minds in the future. :) I'm putting Aubrey's link up too, even though her blog is private. I can relay messages to ask to get on it, but I cannot put you on it myself. And, as of now, Tylerr and Becca, Jeremy, Gerrick and Heidi, and Byron don't have blogs I know about, so they won't have links.

And one last thing, does anyone know how in the world this icicle was formed?!!? It looks so bizarre to me! It narrows and widens. It has grooves and divets. It is so narrow near the top, I thought it would break for sure! I've never seen such a thing! Any ideas?! Ignore the purple diamond. It is there merely to have contrast.

And this is the snow drift, from our recently plowed road, that my snow blower munched through. Have I mentioned how much I LOVE my snow blower!??!? Best money I've spent in a long time!

For Stinker's birthday

Elaine did this as a first-born tag. I'm changing it a bit, so I can do it for each of my kids on their birthday. Since I already missed Stink's birthday, hers is a little late. I didn't want to wait until December to do it. I'm just not that patient. ;)

And this probably is not necessary to mention, since I don't think any guys read this, except for Lisa's friend who stopped in to say hi once and some family, but this has the story of her birth in it. Be warned. And skip #20 if you'd rather not know.

1. What's her birth order?
She is my third, first girl

2. What were your reactions when you found out you were pregnant?
We were so excited! It took us awhile to get her and it was pretty discouraging.

3. How old were you?
I was 3o when I had her.

4. How did you find out you were pregnant?
I could be off on this as my memory is awful, but my sister-in-law had just found out she was pregnant a week or two earlier. Our girls are 6 weeks apart. She knew we'd been trying so she brought over her left over tests.

5. Who did you tell first?
I think Brooke was there or came soon after...

6. Did you want to find out the sex?
I did, Brad didn't. I went and got an ultrasound while I was at my family reunion and Brad couldn't come. Unfortunately, someone announced it at a party, so I had to do some damage control and tell Brad before the word spread. But, I was really glad to find out I was having a girl, so I can't say I regret doing it. Plus, my mom, brother Travis, and SIL Resa were all there with me and that was great.

7. What was your due date?
Dec. 6th

8. Did you deliver early or late?
I had an awesome doctor who agreed to induce me on the 4th. They almost induced me a week early for high blood pressure, but it got better before they could start anything.

9. Did you have morning sickness?
I puked for all 9 months with all 3 of my kids. (((Shudder)))

10. What did you crave? I loved pickles. Oh, and jalapeno pepperjack burgers from Braum's. And ice cream. I love Braum's.

11. Who irritated you the most?
Um, no one really, so I'll go with the stupid anesthesiologist who couldn't do the epidural right.

12. What was your child's sex?
A girl

13. How many pounds did you gain throughout your pregnancy?
25 exactly

14. Did you have any complications during your pregnancy?
Not really a complication, but I got some serious depression. I was so tired of puking, I asked if they could just put me in a coma until December. They said no and put me on depression meds for some reason. ;) I think my biggest complication would have been that Brad was a 4th yr med student and had lots of out of state rotations and interviews. It wasn't easy being home alone with 2 boys and puking frequently. I guess it was good preparation for now though. Every time I want to complain about how hard this is having Brad in Philly, I remember how much worse it was while pregnant. hee hee

15. Where did you give birth?
Saint Francis, in Tulsa

16. How many hours were you in labor?
4

17. Who drove you to the hospital?
my mom

18. Who was in the delivery room?
Brad and my mom

19. natural or c-section?
Natural

20. Did you take medicine to ease the pain?
Oh, what a story that is! They broke my water at 8:30 or so that morning. I had an epidural at 10:30 or so, but it hurt like the dickens going in and it didn't even work. My doctor checked on me at 11:45, but I was still a 4 or 5, even though I was literally bawling from the pain. She said she was going to go have lunch and come back in an hour. 10 minutes later I told them the baby was coming now. They checked me and sure enough I was a 10 and she was coming. They called the doctor back up, I pushed all of once or twice and had her at 12:15. That was when the anesthesiologist came to fix the epidural. Very helpful indeed. Can I tell you how bad it hurts to go from a 4 to having a baby in half and hour? Ow. The epidural kicked in a few minutes before I started pushing, so I had all of the painful contractions, and none of the cool feel the baby thing. Not fair. But at least I didn't feel it when the placenta broke off inside me and she had to dig it out. :)

21. How much did your child weigh?
7 lb 13 oz

22. What did you name him/her?
Stinkerbell Mons. LOL! Her name comes from Brad's great great great great grandma. Brad's mom's family is Cherokee and the summer I was pregnant with her, he found it while working on genealogy. Her name means sugar or sweet in Cherokee. She doesn't have a middle name, because on my side of the family, the girls don't get middle names so that they can keep their last name. So, my name is Melisa Jones Mons now. And since our last name is pretty unique, we thought it would be nice for her to be able to keep it.

23. How old is your child today?
just turned 2 a month ago!

Pictures up!

I have 3 new slides up on Cookie:

1) Stinker with a pony tail and looking like a peacock
2) The boys eating lentil soup with their Bakugan toys
3) Tons of snow pictures, including the skiers on my road.

I am working on a post for Stink's birthday, about a month late. :) I'm hoping to have it up tomorrow, but at the rate I'm going....

Calling for a brave soul!

Brad is taking his vacation in February and will be here for Valentine's Day. We were hoping to get away and spend the night at a hotel in town. Would anyone being willing to swap babysitting? Since he won't be working, we could go during the week, and you could pick Friday or Saturday or both nights if you didn't want to do an all nighter. We'd probably leave around 5 pm and return about 1 or 2 pm the next day. Or I could watch them a non-Valentine's night. Let me know if you are brave enough to tackle my Mons-ters for a night!

Rainbow stairs!

This morning, Roo spilled the container of Captain Crunch down the stairs that lead from the kitchen to the rental. I had a beautiful rainbow of yellow, blue, red, green and purple cascading down the stairs and flowing into the rental. But somehow, I didn't quite see the beauty of it until they were almost done cleaning it. Totally should have taken a picture. The fact that things are done on accident doesn't make them any easier to clean. Thankfully, the boys did most of the cleaning, even if it took them an hour and a half...

Hi neighbor!

Yes, I'm watching Mr. Roger's Neighborhood with Stinker, but this isn't about that. :)


And before I begin, may I just clarify something? I do appreciate all of the comments yesterday, but I most certainly don't expect people to comment on all of my posts. Most of my posts are just silly anyway. The main reason I did the de-lurking post is because I have a couple of people who regularly come to the site without ever saying hi. I'm not sure if they are coming because they like me and are my friends, or if they come because they like to see me suffer (as in flooding basements, broken garage doors, and a week of puking kids). If they are coming because they like me, well then I'd love for them to say hi, so I can make a new friend. And if they are coming because my life is such drama, well, can't argue that point, my life does get crazy. Such as last night....


*Warning, please skip this paragraph if you don't care about football. You were warned.* I thoroughly, and I do mean THOROUGHLY, enjoyed watching OU lose last night. As many of you know, I lived in OK for 7 years. I LOVE OK! But I think OU has a serious superiority complex. I'm not saying that OSU is better at sports, regretfully, they are not. All I'm saying is that I spent 7 years getting sick and tired of OU's arrogant and condescending behavior. Obviously I don't know everyone who went to OU, in fact I love many people who did go, and all I have to go off of are news paper articles and the ridiculous comments of one Barry Switzer, UGH!!! I just get so irritated when I read comments like a certain OU player, who shall remain nameless, saying that Tebow, who is quite a football stud, would only be 4th best in their conference. Uh, seriously? So arrogant. Tebow, of course, was totally classy and laughed it off, but this isn't the first comment from OU that has annoyed me. One of the announcers even picked up on it and said that the guy probably heard it all the time in his locker room and was just repeating it. I'm pretty sure that wasn't a reference to other players.


ANYWAY, to make a short story long, I was very happy after the game last night. So happy, in fact, that I watched the post-game, which I don't normally do. About 12:30, I decided to get to bed. I went to the boys room to cover them up, and I heard voices outside. I looked out the window and some people were standing around in my yard. My first thought was that they had hockey sticks, which I thought was odd. I'd see skiers going down my street, but ice skaters??? My next thought is that it was my 'for sale' sign stealers coming back. Naturally, I had to go out there. :) I went out the door and saw a car in my yard. I asked if they needed help and heard the familiar voices of some neighbors from down the street. We spent the next 30 minutes trying to get the car out. We shoveled to try and remove some snow surrounding the car. We used plywood under the tire that wasn't getting any traction and tried pushing. Then I suggested we start rocking it. We finally did get it out. The neighbors were very grateful and apologetic, but the daughter didn't say anything to me, probably out of embarrassment.


So, I took some pictures on my way back from the gym this morning. It was too dark last night. I am a really bad judge of height, distance, weight, etc, but I thought this snow bank was pretty big! She would have had to hit that corner pretty fast to plow through it. And, Brad, before you get too concerned, she did manage to miss the wall. PHEW!!!


And there is my crazy story for today!

Have a comment?

My sweet friend, Jill, is having a delurking day, and I thought it sounded fun. While I am no longer concerned about lurking, due to the fact that pictures and videos of my children are no longer on this blog, it would be nice to meet a few people who have stopped over and not said 'hi' yet!


And yes, there are a few of you I will mention by name who are totally off the hook for leaving comments since I know who you are and I know you don't leave comments. So, mom and dad, Grandma Jo, George and Olivia, we get to email, so comments aren't required. LOVE YOU!

***For the record, I don't mean leave comments for every post. But if you are new here, and I don't know you, it would be appreciated.***


Okay, the shameless plug is now over. :)

And Jacob will be played by....

http://www.stepheniemeyer.com/newmoon_movie.html#1

my nightmare

This would be one of them. Seriously. I hate being cold. Click on the picture to read the article. BRRRR!

Bus update

Well, it doesn't take much to get me crying, that is for sure, but I wanted to give a happily ever after to a story I just posted about.

Roo got off the bus today and told me the mean boy, hereafter referred to as Z, didn't talk to, look at, or trip him today. He said that Ms. B, his teacher, is keeping an eye on Z. And that Z sat in the front seat and he sat in row 8. He seemed very happy after getting off the bus today.

Then I got an email from Ms. B, that I won't put on here, seeing as this is a public blog, but I will sum up for you. She said she heard multiple kids talking about Z today, so she got on the bus and asked the bus driver to seat Z away from all pre-Kers and told him that if she heard one more report about him she was calling his mom. :D

Yes, I'm crying. Probably mostly hormonal, but I'm just so grateful to not have this weighing on my heart anymore. While my heart aches for Z and the rejection and embarrassment he must feel for being singled out by a teacher while only in 1st grade, I have to think of my son and his feelings first. I'll still keep an eye on this, but definitely not with the same dread as I had before. So yeah! Rejoice with me for awesome teachers who are on the ball!

End of the story

Just for you curious ones out there, I have some endings to stories:

The family I had renting the basement moved out last Thursday, in the midst of Stinker's second day of puking. I finally made it down there to clean today, which is good, since my new renter is coming tomorrow!

Roo's teacher talked to the bully and he told her Roo threatened him that Dogzilla (a wonderful book we have that he took to school for 'share a book' day) would eat him. Roo's side is that he said Dogzilla would eat him if he kept teasing him. Today the boy told Roo they were no longer friends (huge shock) but didn't touch him. I'm definitely keeping an eye on this situation. Today I stood out on the porch and tried to be an intimidating presence when the bus arrived.

And in Blogger news, my Google reader has agreed to work again. Alas, I now need to spend time putting blogs back into it. This could take awhile.

So, we are back to our routine, including getting my butt back to the Y. And it feels great, if not slightly painful. :)

I can't stand it!

I have spent the weekend trying to install a new hard drive on my laptop. I did it by myself with coaching from Brad. I had him on both webcam, cell phone and remote assist. Apparently it worked because my laptop is up to speed. Almost all of my software is reinstalled. What is the problem? BLOGGER! Yeesh! I can't get my Google Reader to work. So frustrating! I'm totally embarrassed to admit this, but because most everybody has a blog, I have about 80 some odd blogs on my Reader. I tried importing it to Bloggers reading tool, and all that did was mess up both tools. I'm telling you all this because in all of the changes, I've lost quite a few blogs. I don't know which ones they are. So, if I stop reading your blog, assume it is because everything in Blogger world has gone crazy over here, and I'll just need a little reminder. I've lived in 5 states and 2 countries now, so I don't get to see a lot of my friends. Blogs are such a great way for me to keep in touch with everyone. Thanks!

Oh, and one more little thing, cute pictures of Q-T and David over on Travis and Resa's blog. I have the link on the Cookie blog to help with their privacy. Hope ya don't mind!

Happy Day!

Today is the day! Quinton's birth dad couldn't get his act together to file the petition. Quinton is officially a Jones! Wahoo! We are so happy! Check out Cookie for a link to their blog.

Okay, I've been trying to upload dang cute video of Stinker for about 2 days and it just isn't working. I don't know if it is my broken laptop or Blogger or what. I'll let you know when I get it up though!

***It's up, but apparently it is a Grandma video because it is all sideways, so only a grandma can enjoy it.***