Scary

Wendy's latest post talks about exactly why I took almost all the pictures off this blog. It's a scary thought, that this really does happen, but that's reality these days. You can never be too careful. It really is sad!

Well...

So I finally found a dress for the wedding in October! Preggo here at work actually found it for me. At Sears for 6$...seriously a huge bargain, it's a really nice dress EXACTLY in the style I wanted(black, 3 quarter-length sleeves, wrap dress)! I'm telling everyone Preggo is my very own Personal Shopper. I wore it to work today so she could tell me what she thought of it on me, and everyone keeps saying how nice I look. So that makes me feel good! And I'm thoroughly enjoying wearing heels today(cute little strappy sandals I've had forever but haven't had anything to wear them with in years)...I love the little tap tap tap noise they make as I walk. So wish I was rich, I would have heels in every color. I would love these from WetSeal...





Although I really don't have anywhere to wear them so it would really be a waste of money. Oh well they're cute anyway though.

Halloween & Weddings!!

Hailey is going to be a ballerina for Halloween! We got the cutest little skirt in the little girls dept. at Walmart and these shoes at Target...



Now we just need to find a long sleeved onesie...

I think this coat from Old Navy is so cute! It looks like one I would have had when I was little. If Hailey's coat from last year didn't still fit her, I would definitely have to get her this one!!



We have ANOTHER wedding to go to this Saturday! I have no idea what we're going to wear. But I love the family to pieces, so hopefully it will be a lot of fun! I'll try to take pics...those of you on my MySpace friends list, I'll try to get pics posted there soon after. Now, for the really good news...I've convinced my sister to get married HERE! We're so excited. She's excited to actually have a really wedding, instead of a Vegas deal...and I'll be there, standing by her side. I have to find something to wear before then. It's all very quick...in December! But I told her I'll help her pull everything together. Anyone have any cheap wedding ideas? I think for her cake we're going to do sheet cakes to serve to the guests, and we're going to make the boquets ourselves! Any and all ideas would be very helpful! I'm really excited, I love doing this sort of thing! I'm going to be making the invites too, so any ideas for that would be good too! She's already got her dress, it's really pretty! Unfortunately we did get some really horrible news...her fiance will be going back to Iraq in Feb./March next year. My sister is very heartbroken about that. Her first 8 months or so as a newlywed will be spent apart from each other. But we're all trying to stay positive.

Frustrations

I'm so incredibly glad this is Friday. I did over 500 checks this week at work, and entered over 1000 invoices. I've been working my butt off, I'm so ready for a break! I was really excited to have a nice relaxing Friday night...our family friend called and invited my mom, Hailey and I to dinner at their house(she makes THE best spaghetti EVER, it's her signature dish--we LOVE it!) and I quickly said yes to her invitation! She wants me to try on a dress my friend left there, for the wedding at the end of next month, since I have yet to find one I like in my size. It's a black velvet short sleeved dress...I'm not sure it's really my style, but it would go good with the shoes I got...they look MUCH cuter in person!



Hailey has a blast at their house. It's huge, with a nice open floor plan...I thought it sounded like a nice evening! Well unfortunately my mom thought otherwise, and was quite pissed that I'd accepted the invitation without consulting her first. I know everyone's entitled to bad days, and feeling down and pissed off...heck we all know I have had my fair share of those days. But we've got a weekend coming up with no big plans, time to just have fun and relax, and a free meal tonight in the company of good friends! How can she be in such a bad mood? She says it's work issues. But still, don't let it ruin the whole weekend! And I think she's stressing a little too much over nothing honestly. Anyway, I'm frustrated and bummed now...I'm afraid she's going to be in a cruddy mood all night, and when my mom's in a cruddy mood and we're around these friends, they tend to grate on each other's nerves and I'm stuck in the middle. :o( I'm going to try to just make the best of it, and hopefully once my mom's around Hailey she'll perk up and be in a better mood.

Awesome day

So today started off kind of crappy...my computer at work starting doing all kinds of funky things, and we had to call the IT guy out to fix it. Luckily, the guy they sent is my age, has things in common with my husband, and very easy to talk to. You'd never think it by looking at him...he's pretty easy on the eyes, dressed very nice...just not the kind of guy you'd think would be really down to earth. So anyway, I had someone to talk to all morning and keep me from getting incredibly bored at work! Turns out he knows my husband through college. Neat huh...small world. Then tonight after I finally took my cat to the vet to get her shots caught up and all that, I met up with Walgreen's girl and her son at this local play place for kids. Her sister came into town with her 3 year old son, and we all ate pizza, played and just had a blast! I'm very proud of myself, I've definately come out of my shell the last 5 years or so to the point where now I can just talk to random people without feeling shy or self conscious! Sometimes I do still feel a bit dumb when I'm talking to people, but I feel like I've known this girl forever, it's weird. She's my age too I found out, so that's neat. We have a lot in common. We had so much fun tonight, we're definately going to go there again and we made plans with Walgreen's girl to meet up with them again next week. I'm glad I took the initiative and gave her a call yesterday! Then we got home and I gave Hailey a bath. We had fun playing, and then we rocked and read books. I've realized something the past couple days...while Hailey may not be as agile as some other kids these days(she can climb and run, but she can't jump or slide on bigger slides and stuff yet) she is DEFINATELY a really fast learner. It literally takes about 10 seconds to teach her a new word, which includes how to say it and have her understand the meaning. I'm not joking, it's crazy. She knows hundreds of words now, speaks full sentences, it's just nuts! Tonight as we were reading one of her books she was asking "Where the star go?" and then she'd point and say "There it is!" It just amazes me, she's so little but yet she can talk like crazy. Then she was asking for a book called Busy Bugs. Usually she would just say "bug book" or something to that effect...not tonight...tonight it was "Busy Bugs mommy, read Busy Bugs!" And after we read it once..."read again!" Then as we were reading yet another book, she kept pointing at Mickey Mouse and saying "Mickey Mouse! Mickey Mouse! There he is! Mickey Mouse!" Where on earth did she learn that? We don't have anything Mickey except this one book, which to my knowledge we read for the first time tonight. Maybe they read about him at the sitters?? I have no idea, but I was shocked. She's growing up so fast...

Well it turns out I'm not going to Vegas to my sister's wedding after all. They found an affordable package that includes photography, so they really have no reason to spend that extra money on my ticket out there. The rest of the family is driving up 4 days before the wedding, but not only will we not all fit in one car, Hailey would NOT do well in the car that long. Could you imagine, a 17 month old in the car for like 10 hrs straight? That's just crazy. At least it would be for Hailey. She cannot sit still that long. So anyway, I'm a bit bummed...I won't be there to see my sister get married, and I'm missing out on another trip. But it's ok, at least I don't have to stress about FLYING!!

Ok I'll end this post w/ a story about a little boy I met at this play place we went to. He was the most adorable little thing. He walked up to me and sat down across from us. He was really pale, freckles, crazy big red curls...seriously he could have been straight out of a story book...so incredibly sweet. He tells me the kid in the green shirt said he would be his best friend, but now he says he's not. And he said he really wants to be his best friend, so that makes him really sad. I felt so bad for him! I told him "I'm sorry sweety." I asked him how old he was and he held up 4 little fingers, and I asked him what his name was and he said "Sammy"...I told him that I like that name and told him my name and Hailey's name. He sat there looking sad, and said "I just really want him to be my best friend"...seriously I wanted to just pick him up and give him a big ol hug and go make that other boy be his best friend, I mean this kid was so sweet and cute and innocent...I just wanted to make it all better for him. I have no idea who his parents were, I didn't see anybody around...and I have no idea where he ran off to, he just kind of disappeared. I just thought it was so sweet that he came up and told me that. I must look really friendly.

Explanations

I really feel like I need to explain a bit more about what led to my actions the other night. I've been feeling uncomfortable for a while now posting pictures and things on the internet. I hate it that I'm so paranoid, or that I have to be so paranoid. I love sharing things with you guys, and I love keeping up on all your lives. Then I saw an episode of CSI (seriously, I'm banning myself from watching this show...it's singlehandedly responsible for about 75% of my fears!!) where this woman found a family's website/blog and started taking info about their son and even pictures of him and altering the pictures to include her etc. She recognized the playground in the background of the pictures and would visit there often in hopes that the little boy would show up to play. She tried to kidnap him. I know I'm rediculous, it's just a TV show, but the sad fact is things like this DO happen. There is absolutely nothing to stop people from taking our pictures we post on our blogs and doing whatever they please with them, even if they are copyrighted. And any bits of personal info we put on our blogs can lead people right to us. I know I sound like a paranoid freak, I'm really not that bad. But I just started feeling really bad about the whole thing. I'd posted pics of Hailey around our house, at the parks in town etc. I'd posted pictures of myself and bits of info about the town I live in. It just started to make me really uneasy. PLUS, the fact that I was putting my extra time and energy into the blog, when I should have been putting it into writing things down about Hailey. I used to write things down daily...cute things she would do and say, milestones she'd reach...I guess I'm clinging to every little thing now because I don't remember hardly anything from the first 8 months of her life or so, since I didn't keep track of things back then...I have no idea when she got her first tooth etc! I have next to no free time, since I work full time, have to clean/cook etc. at home, take care of Hailey etc. so I got to where I quit writing all that stuff down and put some of it in the blog instead. The problem with this is, not only did I neglect Hailey's journal but none of you care about what Hailey learned to say each day or how I dumped milk on her head. The more I moved towards that sort of thing, the less people read, the less comments I got. I started being really boring apparently. But that's just my life right now. I don't have time for anything extra, and what can I say, I love my kid more than anything on the face of the earth, EVERYTHING she does is adorable and smart and silly to me! And let's face it, other than my close family nobody else is going to want to read such mundane daily details about my kid. So instead of putting things on here, I've starting writing them down for Hailey's journal again. I'm going to TRY to shift the focus of this blog, TRY to find other things to write about. Right now I am really busy at work. While "hate" might have been a strong word, I don't LOVE my job. Don't get me wrong, I'm still very happy here and I still am SO glad I moved here from the "hell hole"...but I don't want to be doing this specific job 2 years from now. I barely get a moment to breathe, let alone think about anything other than work. Accounts payable is just not fun! So, there you have it...

Ok, MOVING ON!!

My sister and her fiance have decided yet again to change the plans for their wedding. Now they have decided on going to Vegas. It wouldn't be for me, but hey whatever works for them. The cool part though, is that they've offered to pay for my trip if I'll go with them and take pictures! The problem is, I'm terrified of flying!! I've never flown, and I have this huge irrational fear. Not just of the plane crashing, but of something so small and silly. My ears popping. I can't pop my ears! And I've heard this can be excruciating on flights! What do I do if I get up there and my ears are hurting so bad, and I can't pop my ears?? How does that all work? Besides that fact, I'm really excited about the whole thing. I've never been anywhere before, and come on a free trip?? I'd be nuts to pass that up. Plus I'd still get to see my sister get married, instead of them waiting til she gets to CA to do it w/out any family. They're thinking of doing it in the next month or two, so we'll see how the plans come along!

Late night realizations

So I was lying here in bed, unable to get to sleep. And I finally realized something...I've been using this blog as a journal, but not just as a way to get things off my chest etc...I've mixed milestones about Hailey in as well. I don't have time to write everything twice. If I write it in the blog, it doesn't make it to her journal. As a result, Hailey's daily journal ended about a month ago, and I feel absolutely horrible about this. I work 40+ hrs a week, I have housework to do PLUS spending time with Hailey. What little extra time I have I really need to be devoting to keeping track of our family memories better. This has really been bothering me lately. Instead of posting things/pictures in my blog I really need to be typing up journal entries and printing them for her journal. And it's started making me really nervous posting pictures on the internet. When I started this blog I said I wasn't going to post pictures. But who doesn't want to share their adorable kids?? So I caved, and started posting more and more. And oddly enough, the more pictures I posted, the less comments I got. I really don't see the point anymore, especially with the security risk these days. WOW I just realized this is all sounding incredibly negative...hmmm, I'm not meaning it that way. Basically, I went back and deleted most of the pictures of myself and Hailey I put on here. Lucky you if you happened to see them, and for those of you who didn't I'm sorry. I'm not closing the blog, but as my readers have seemingly dwindled my posts will probably be few and far between. I've become overwhelmingly busy at work, to the point where I am really hating my job and counting down the days til I can be a SAHM, so I just don't have time to post much anymore. I'm either taking time away from my work or staying up late at night to post. It's just too hard, being a working mom and trying to keep up with everything.

Hopefully now that this is taken care of I can get some sleep...

Crying...and laughing...over spilled milk

I had one heck of a morning. First of all, I was running a few minutes late anyway. So things were a bit more frantic than usual. I had successfully changed Hailey's diaper, gotten her dressed and fixed her hair. I left her sitting on the living room floor. As I walked over to the recliner to get dressed myself, I heard her say "It stuck!" and as I look back I see her shaking her sippy cup of milk. I walked over, stood right next to her and proceeded to turn her milk cup upside down over my hand and squeezed. WHAT was I thinking. Obviously I wasn't thinking. I was just trying to see if the holes were clogged. After a while the holes on those Take N Toss cup lids start to close up. So of course, when I squeezed, the obvious happened. The lid popped right off, and the whole cup of milk splashed down on top of poor Hailey's head. It was dripping down her face...she was soaked from head to toe. My carpet was soaked in a circle about 3 ft. in diameter. My legs were soaked. I gasped, Hailey looked up at me like "what in the world just happened???" and as I started laughing, she started bawling. "MIIIIIIIIIIILK, MIIIIIIIIIIILK"...yes, she was crying over spilled milk. Seeing her sitting there on the floor covered in and surrounded by milk, and just the realization of the idiotic thing I just did, made me burst out laughing, I couldn't help it. I scooped her up in a towel and decided how best to handle the mess. I took her in her room, got her clean clothes. Took her wet clothes off(even her socks were soaked!), wiped us both off with baby wipes(no time for baths) and redressed Hailey in a clean/dry outfit. I wiped the milk out of her hair as best I could, then cleaned the carpet. Then dressed myself. Finally we were out the door, Hailey a happy little camper and me just laughing at my odd morning. Then halfway to the sitters Hailey realized she didn't have a boppy(pacifier). I told her I had one in my purse but it was pooey dirty so I'd have to have Heather was it off when we got there. So, on the very day she turns 17 months, when I had PLANNED on only giving her the boppy at naptime and bedtime to slowly wean her off of it...she starts wailing in the backseat..."WHYYYYYYYYYY, boppy, WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY" Then, holding her hands up in the air like she does when she's looking for something she wailed "Are you boppy, are you???????" as in "where are you"...then again, "WHYYYYYYYYYYYY." Oh it broke my heart and made me laugh at the same time. So dramatic. Obviously she's a little more attached to her pacifier than I thought. My automatic reaction was to think maybe we should hold off a little longer on getting rid of the boppy, until she understands better WHY we're getting rid of it...ie, big girls don't need boppies. But then I'm thinking, maybe this just goes to show if I don't get rid of it NOW, we'll have an even tougher problem getting rid of it later after she's had even more time to get attached to it??? Anyway, that's been my day so far!!

Maybe boppies aren't such a bad thing after all...

The wierdest thing happened today after I picked Hailey up for daycare. I went to Walgreen's to pick up my prescription. I had parked the car before I realized what I was doing, but then decided the drive through takes too long anyways. So I walk up to the prescription counter holding Hailey(who is covered in dirt by the way--she loves digging in dirt, what can I say--and she has her boppy(pacifier)in her mouth as always) and stand behind a girl that's getting her prescription. Her little boy is sitting in the cart, a boppy in his mouth as well. So of course Hailey starts staring him down like "what in the world are you doing with my boppy in your mouth??" and this little boy just reaches out and tries to grab hers like it's his. We kind of laughed and his mom made the comment that Hailey still has the "baby" one (the green softer one) Her son had the one for older babies that's blue and harder. I told her she just won't use the harder ones and she said her son wouldn't for the longest time either. So the little boy waves at Hailey and they head off to the front of the store to leave. I get my prescription and make my way to the front of the store and end up meeting up with her again. I asked her how old her son is--20 months, 3 months older than Hailey--and we talk a bit. We made our way outside, but we stood there talking outside for at least 15 to 20 minutes! It turns out she just moved into town not too long ago and has no mommy friends here. We have quite a bit in common, it's odd...her boyfriend went back to school as well, but he takes night classes so he can still work full time so she's able to stay home with their son. She was a very nice person, very put together and so easy to talk to. We talked about everything, jobs, having more kids, what parts of town we live in etc. Even her son and Hailey seemed to get along, they were handing stuff back and forth to each other the whole time. While we were talking I noticed she'd say something about letting me go but then we'd start talking again...I could tell she didn't really want to just say bye and leave it at that, and honestly I didn't either. I was thinking wow here we bumped into each other so randomly and we're talking like we've known each other forever and we've got so much in common and have kids about the same age...it would be such a shame to just leave it at that and never see each other again. Finally I got up the nerve and just said "So I've never done this before, but would you want to exchange numbers and maybe get together sometime and let the kids play?" She got all excited and said "Yea that'd be great!" and she even started talking about taking them to this local play place that's newer in town and actually right by my house. How cool is that? I've been thinking lately how I really wish I had some mommy friends...I mean I have my friend S but she's so busy with her family I rarely ever see her. It would be so neat to have somebody with a kid about Hailey's age that I could just hang out and talk with. But I have no way of meeting people. Around here you generally don't just meet someone at the park or play area in the mall. Even going to church you don't meet people here...they're all so huge, people just keep to themselves and their little groups. So anyway we'll see what happens. I'm not sure if I should call her in a couple days, or wait to see if she calls me...but what if she's waiting to see if I'll call her so she never calls me? Jeez this is oddly like dating isn't it? Who knew making friends would be so difficult as an adult...there's an email address on the card she gave me, maybe I should just try to email her? Any advice from anybody??? I'm so excited!!

Alright

Not a whole lot to write about today, it's been a normal day. Last night was great, D was home. He got Hailey ready for dinner, we ate together. She yelled at me "NO!" anytime I'd try to talk to D...she wanted her daddy all to herself! She was so excited to see him. When he droved up in the car she waved her arms and yelled "Daddy!" So cute... then D even cleaned her off while I finished eating and they went outside. We all sat outside on the back porch for a little while til it got dark. Then *gasp!* D gave Hailey a bath! He is just awesome. He stayed til I went to put Hailey to bed and then went to work. And because I knew he would be home soon I fell asleep at 10:15!!! YAY FOR SLEEP!! I'm not so groggy today.

Today I traded in my cell phone that I just got for a bit better model/brand. It was only 10$ to trade up...the neat thing though, is that when I told D this on the phone this afternoon he was in full support, saying I needed a good reliable phone that's going to last, not one that's going to keep going downhill on me. While this may seem completely normal to some people, this is everything to me. It's that whole "sticking up for me" thing again. Supporting my decisions...you know that whole bit that we've had a problem with over the years. It's just really nice to have things finally falling into place. We get along so great now, he's been a great husband and a wonderful father! I'm loving it.