SAHM I Am

Everything beeps in my house; everything.  In my last house, a few of my appliances beeped, but they were easy enough to silence.  In the new house, it’s as if the CIA encrypted my gadgets with secret codes that only a rocket scientist could figure out.  I’ve spent the last few days (not really) trying to decipher what each beep is really telling me.  Where do I begin?

My toaster beeps three seconds before the toast pops out.  It’s like a warning telling me to run back in the kitchen because the glorious toast is about to make it’s arrival and you know how hard it is to butter cooled toast.  My toaster thinks it’s doing me a favor.

My coffee maker beeps to let me know that the grind function is off. It beeps three times, thank God, because once just isn’t enough.  It then beeps when the coffee is done brewing.  “Get your coffee while it’s hot” it beckons me.  It then beeps when it has been left on too long and it’s reminding that it is now shutting itself off.  I guess that’s a safety feature I can’t argue with.

My microwave beeps for just about everything and I have not found a way to silence the buttons.  It beeps when the food is done which is fine and normal, but then it just keeps going.  If I leave the food in for just a few seconds longer, beep beep beep beep.  “Please come get this food out of me, I can‘t hardly stand to be inconvenienced by not only nuking your food but also serving as a place to store your nuked food.”  My microwave is a snob.

My refrigerator beeps, but it doesn’t say that it’s beeping, my LCD screen on the freezer door (another appliance snob) let’s me know that the alarm is sounding.  Not only do I get a written warning, but I get beeps as well.  At least with that one, I just press the button that says “Silence Alarm” and all is quiet in kitchen-world once again.

I hate my dishwasher.  It is the snob of all snobs. It is one of the two appliances that came with our home, and because this was a model home, the felt they needed to install the world’s most expensive dishwasher, a Bosch.  The shortest cycle on this thing is 150 minutes, and yes, you read that right.  The manual states that it conserves more water and gets my dishes “restaurant-standard sanitary”.  What about energy usage; and why can’t the dishes just be cleaned like any other regular dishwasher? I hate the dishwasher because it beeps and beeps and beeps. As soon as the cycle is finished, it beeps four times.  If I don’t immediately run into the kitchen and open the door to turn the machine off, it beeps four more times.  “Come empty me, please, I’d like to waste another 150 minutes of your time with another load.” It will do this for hours on end if I forget to shut it off. 

My stove beeps if you lean on one of the buttons in front too long.  It beeps to let you know that you turned the oven light on, the oven light off; you’ve decided to set the clock, etc.  Luckily, I figured out how to silence it, but it looks at me with its sad stainless steel eyes, “Please, let me beep for you one more time, I promise I won’t be a nuisance.” My stove is the wimpiest of my appliances.

My washer beeps and my dryer beeps; but I don’t use them all that often so they’re not my enemies.  My car beeps reminding me that the door is open, the keys are in the ignition, I haven’t yet buckled my seatbelt, and that I’m running low on fuel.  My car thinks it’s my friend “Just trying to be helpful”, but my car is wrong. 

My cell phone beeps to let me know that I missed a call, have a new text message, new voicemail, I’m running out of batteries and my balance is low.  I figured out how to silence the phone, now it vibrates so hard it shakes the cup holder that I keep it in.  I don’t know what’s worse.

I am grateful to my smoke detectors and carbon monoxide detector.  They beep when they need new batteries, and luckily they’ve never had to beep to warn me of imminent danger. 

It’s a digital age and you’d think by now I’d be used to all the “beeps” in my life, but I just want a little peace and quiet once in awhile. I’d complain more, but I need to run downstairs and shut off the dishwasher, check my voicemail, and turn the oven on for tonight’s casserole dinner.

When I sat down today to start typing this blog, a little light bulb went off in my head.  I can’t really write this without using “A”’s real name.  When I first started blogging here, I thought by using just her first initial, it would be to protect her identity.  Then I realized that not only is it a pain to type in “A” constantly, but also if someone really wanted to know what her real name was, they’d probably find out anyway. So here goes, my daughter’s name is Audrey. Audi if you really know her and Miss Audrey when she’s being sassy.  Lately she’s been saying something that cracks me up.  When someone asks her a question like “Well aren’t we silly today,” she always responds, “I’m not silly, I’m just Audrey.”  Whatever she’s pretending, she has to add her name to her character.  Princess Audrey, Super Hero Audrey, Bob the Builder Audrey, just to give a few examples. 

She seems to quite like her name.  She doesn’t speak in the first person like Elmo does.  “Elmo likes milk.” “Will you be Elmo’s friend?”  But she sure does like to tell you who she is.  To any random person we meet in a day “Hi, I’m Audrey and this is my mommy. My birthday is soon and I will be three.  My mommy is 30.”  My daughter has introduced us to nearly every person in Lake Country.  I might just be known as “mommy”, but they all know who Audrey is.

Today Audrey’s cousins Aiden and Ava came to visit.  They are actually the children of my cousin, but they’re cousins non-the-less.  Audrey and Aiden are exactly two months part in age and if they didn’t look so different, you’d swear they were separated at birth.  We noticed how similar they were when they were just about a year old.  The two of them spoke a language that only they could understand.  It sounded a lot like “Ya ya ya” “Ya ye ya”, but they’d laugh and giggle at each other like they were the funniest things in the world.  I have to add that we live about 90 minutes apart and don’t get the opportunity to visit that often so it’s not like they see each other so often that their interests should be similar. When Aiden started to watch Caillou, Audrey started to watch Caillou.  When Aiden switched his allegiance to Little Bear and Monsters, Inc, Audrey was right there with him.  Right now they’re both into the Backyardigan’s and both just happen to adore Tyrone.  Before Aiden arrived today he told his mommy that he was going to be Tyrone today and Audrey could be Uniqua.  Audrey told me that she was going to be Tyrone and that Aiden could be Pablo or Austin.  Within thirty seconds of Aiden arriving, the two were upstairs in Audrey’s room singing the theme song to their favorite show.  There was no argument about who would get to be Tyrone; I think they both decided that they could be the good ol’ orange moose.  Aiden wasn’t hungry, Audrey wasn’t hungry.  Aiden wanted to go home, Audrey wanted him to leave.  After two hours of playing together, they both got tired and needed some down time.  However, five minutes after he left, Audrey wondered when Aiden would be back to visit. I’m hoping soon because I love watching the two of them together.  Their laughter brings the biggest smile to my face and I know they share a love for each other that only the two of them can understand.

I’m going to put this right up front; I’m a bit of a worrier.  I worry about things that I have no control over.  I worry about finances, I worry about my daughter’s health, my mom’s health, my health, the fact that my brother is having a hard time getting financial aid to become a nurse.  You name it, I can worry about it.  This isn’t a new thing for me.  I’ve been a worrier as long as I can remember and it’s just a part of who I am.  I’m not a gloom and doom type person and I don’t even consider myself a pessimist, I just worry.  There are times though that my thoughts can get really out of control and I have what I call a “Whoosh, there goes the room” moment.  It’s a time where all of my random worries come together and make it feel like the room has physically moved. It’s not a dizzy feeling, it’s not a panic attack, it’s just a “Whoosh”. 

For some reason, I had one of those moments yesterday.  Maybe it’s because there were too many sad stories on the news involving children or maybe it was because my daughter’s 3^rd birthday party is coming up and soon after she’s starting pre-school, and maybe just maybe it was a combination of the heat, humidity and a complete lack of sleep that did me in. 

My thoughts started with “A” drowning.  There was a story about a 15-month old who drown in the family’s pool; tragic.  “A” is not afraid of the water and we swim almost every day.  She has taught herself how to swim under water and I consider her to be pretty strong for her age, still I wondered, what if something happened?  Whoosh, there goes the room.

My thoughts then turned to school, and it wasn’t just the start of pre-school. I was thinking much further down the road when she’s with kids who will start picking on you if you are “different” for any reason.  What if she has a flare-up with her JRA and she can’t participate in gym or in sports? Will the kids taunt her for that or will they be understanding of the disease? Whoosh, there goes the room.

I told myself to calm down, take a deep breath and know that all is well right now.  She’s safe, you’re safe, we’re all relatively healthy, just calm down.  Oh, but then I start thinking of college. Yes, 15 years away and I’m thinking about college. It must be all the dang “Back to the Dorm” advertising I’ve been bombarded with.  I start thinking about when I was in college and how naïve I was.  I went to school downtown Chicago and lived literally across the street from housing projects. I witnessed drug deals, heard gun shots a few times, watched a man being dragged from his car and beaten after he allegedly hit a little girl the night before.  Yet, I continued to walk right on through.  Going through the projects was a lot shorter of a walk then going six blocks out of my way just to find the campus bus stop.  I took the El to my job at a law firm in the Loop and in the evenings it was quite crowded so I never felt scared.  I took the bus up Halsted to a shop where I just waltzed right in and got my belly-button pierced; turned around got right back on the bus and headed back to my apartment.  The thought of “A” doing this, well you know how it goes, Whoosh, there goes the room.

We, as parents, try our best to instill values in our children. We try to teach them right from wrong, stranger danger, when to say “no”, all things that we think will help keep them safe as they grow older.  We hold their hands as they walk in parking lots and we hold them tight and tell them that the storms will pass quickly.  We hunt for monsters and ghosts and explain exactly what every shadow is in their room before they fall asleep.  We want our children to believe that it isn’t a scary world that we live in and I think we all do our best to make sure they don’t hear all the bad stuff on the news.  However, we must also teach them reality.  Bad things can happen, but no matter what, we’ll try our best to protect them.

I try not to be overprotective and I love that “A” is becoming more and more independent.  I used to hover over her as she took off on her tricycle.  Now I watch as she rides with the neighbor kids.  Around and round the cul-de-sac they go.  I’m there if she falls, but mostly I just watch.  She plays in her playroom by herself as I clean up or make dinner, and I’m not worried about her getting into something and hurting herself.  She calls me if she needs me and I’m content with that.  Still there is nothing better than sitting on the couch together, “A” tucked under my arm as we read yet another Berenstain Bear’s story. The feeling that, together, we’re safe and alive and happy.

Hooding Carter states “There are only two lasting bequests we can hope to give our children. One is roots; the other, wings”.  Oh the “wings” part, Whoosh, there goes the room.

My daughter has been fixated on two questions lately, and no, one of them is not “why?” I think “Why?” would actually be easier for me to answer, but being a mom isn’t supposed to be easy, right? So the questions I get constantly are “Who?” and “What?”

I don’t know why this is so important to her, but almost every object in our house comes with the “Who bought this?” question.  Before I start reading her bedtime story she asks, “Who bought me this book?” I’ll explain who bought it for her, than she’ll come back with “What for?”  I asked her one day why it was so important for her to know who bought her the things that she has and she didn’t have much of an answer. “Because” was all I got out of her.   

We live in a new construction house and she finds this fascinating because we still have a lot of people coming in to do work.  People hanging blinds, landscapers putting in the lawn, pavers putting in the driveway, you name it, she’s learning all about the trades.  Because of this, we hear a lot of “Who built this toilet, who put in the light bulbs, who made the door?”  “Kohler, daddy, and Pella” I answer.  Luckily, she was content with those answers. 

If I tell her “No” she asks “What kind of no?” I always explain that there is only one kind of “no” and once again she is content.

“What is that person eating?” “What’s that boy doing?” Some days it’s endless. For those types of questions I usually have no idea and I tell her so, but then this leads to at least five other questions.  I have friends (friends with no children mind you) that tell me I should try distracting her or just to ignore her, but I find that cruel.  I want her to always be able to ask me questions.  My mom said I should start asking her questions.  I tried this today.  We went to see Wall-E and on the way home she asked me “Who made that movie?” I told her Pixar and then asked her specific questions about the film. To my surprise, she answered every single one of them.  She didn’t get sick of my questions so I’ll let her continue to amuse me with hers. 

One day I’ll start getting the “Why’s?” and I’ll probably be begging her to go back to “Who built that staircase?” and “What’s that baby crying for?”

My first few blogs have all been pretty light-hearted and that’s what I intend to keep providing, but I needed to take a little time to write about the last couple of weeks.  The last few weeks have taught me that talking about things, even things people rarely talk about, helps more than I could ever imagine.  They have also taught me that little children understand way more than we give them credit for.

I mentioned awhile back that we moved into a new home just about six weeks ago, on a Friday.  The Tuesday after we moved in, I found out I was expecting our second child.  To say it was a shock would be an understatement, but of course we were also very excited.  I told “A” right away, but only because she was in the bathroom with me wondering why I was holding a stick in the toilet.  I told her she was going to be a big sister and she just said “okay”.  I didn’t think she really understood.

I called my Ob/Gyn right away because I had experienced early complications when I was pregnant with “A”.  I had an appointment scheduled at just about 5 weeks and went in not knowing what to expect.  My little one had to go with me which made the experience oh so enjoyable.  Nothing like a toddler checking things out, right along with the doctor. I can’t really write about what came out of her mouth, but let’s just say she was fascinated by what was being done to mommy. I had an ultrasound at that time and we saw a very faint heartbeat and I was so excited to call my husband.  That same day I was told my progesterone levels were very low, just as they were with “A”. I wasn’t worried, because she’s here with us. 

My follow-up appointment was scheduled for July 5^th and I was now 8 weeks along.  This time my hubby and “A” came back to see the ultrasound.  My progesterone levels seemed to have taken care of themselves so we were optimistic, but as the image on the screen appeared, I knew something was wrong.  Nothing had changed since 5 weeks and there was no longer any little flicker.  The baby was no longer developing.  I was told that I should go home, come back on the 7^th to get more blood work, and what to expect during a miscarriage.  On Tuesday the 8^th, it happened.  Because I knew it was going to happen, I wasn’t scared, just still a bit in denial. 

My husband had tried to explain to our daughter what was happening to mommy and the baby, and again, I didn’t quite think that she understood.  But as so often happens when you’re a mom, I was wrong.  On the 10^th, the three of us were watching a tv show where the little boy was so excited because his baby sister was coming home.  “A” looked at me and said that she was so excited to be a big brother too (okay, she got the gender confused).  She then lifted my shirt so she could see my belly and then put it down again.  She said “Oh, the baby is sick, right mommy? Maybe I’ll be a big brother later.”  It was the first time I really cried.  Not only did this affect my husband and me, but now we had a third little person who was just as concerned. 

It’s amazing when I told the few people who knew I was pregnant, how many had their own stories to share.  I’ve met 9 people in the last week who have all experienced what I had, and maybe only 15 knew I was even pregnant to begin with!  Many of us talked about how our experiences were similar, and what was different for each of us.  Just talking, just being able to really relate to others, it has made this past week tolerable.  You’re always so grateful to share the good stories and the laughs.   But  there’s also nothing better than being able to just be honest with people; to let them know that you’re hurting, and knowing that they’re not there to judge, but just to listen and to say “I know what you’re going through, and I’m here if you need me.”  So to those women, and to my daughter and husband, I just wanted to say “thank you,” I couldn’t have gone through this without you all. 

My daughter is a professional backseat driver.  She and I have had quite a few adventures lately since we’ve move into our new town.  I like to get in the car and drive and find new ways to get to places, to her, this is getting lost.  I will admit, I’ve gotten us lost a couple of times, but all the friendly strangers I’ve asked for directions have been quite helpful.  Today was a typical drive in the car.  We were headed to Wirth Park for some fun in the sun, and from our new location it takes about 25 minutes to get there.  For me, the drive seemed to take an hour, but for “A” I bet it just flew by.  There wasn’t a moment of silence the entire trip and I am not exaggerating.  Here are some snip-its from our trip:

“Are we almost there?” This was said about two blocks from our house.

“Are we going around in a circle?”

“What are we going to do about the roads?” Everywhere we go, there’s construction.

“Why is that road sign not working?”

“Where is the hot air balloon?”  We saw a hot air balloon about two months ago and she still asks me about it every time we’re on Hwy 16.

“Red light mommy, that means stop.”  How have I been driving for 15 years and not noticed that?

“Can you find a gas station so I can throw up?”  Let me explain. 

As you may recall, “A” forgets nothing.  About two weeks ago I took her strawberry picking at Basse’s Farm.  Getting there was half the fun.  I took out a map (no I didn’t just Google it), and found what looked to be a scenic, back roads, drive out to Colgate.  I know now to never again take the scenic back roads through Lake Country.  This involves many winding roads, more hills than you can count, and a wide variety of speed limits that can cause uneasiness in even the most seasoned of travelers.  “A” has gotten car sick on a few occasions, so this was not really the best route for us.  She told me she had a tummy ache so I asked her repeatedly if she needed to get sick.  I asked if she needed me to stop the car on the side of the road, and then I finally asked “Do you need me to find a gas station so you can throw up?”  Now, every time there’s even the slightest dip in the road, guess what she requests? Yes, a nice gas station so she can throw up.  I have to add, she actually never ended up throwing up at the gas station, but she knows the option is there and I think she’s determined to take advantage of this.

As much as I love my little back seat companion, do you think it would be rude to politely say to her “Would you just let me drive?”  My husband says this to me almost every time we’re in the car together. Hmph, I wonder where she gets it from?

“A” is close enough to “3” now that I can really say, yes, the 3’s might just be worse than the 2’s.  I can’t pinpoint the exact day it started, but I can tell you exactly what transpired that made me think “Uh oh, it’s going to be a long year.”  I’m pretty used to the fact that when I ask her a question, the first response I’m going to get is “No”, no matter what the question is.  “Do you want to go to the store? Do you have to go the bathroom? Do you want a cookie?”  That last one usually throws her off, but I throw it in every once in awhile.  Well on this particular occasion, I didn’t just get a “no” to the question, “Are you ready to take a bath?” (I have to add that she loves baths so this should have been a no-brainer).  This is what I get back “No. I don’t WANT to take a bath. I don’t NEED to take a bath. Nuh uh. You can’t make me. It’s not fair.”  A simple “no” would have sufficed. 

I don’t think she quite understands what “It’s not fair” means, but I certainly wouldn’t apply it to taking a bath.  It was all a bit dramatic even for her.  Most of the time when she tells me “no,” I can wait a few seconds and ask her again and she’ll be agreeable, but not this time.  She was dead set on not taking a bath or maybe she was just dead set on having some control of her little toddler life. I’ve heard that’s what happens around this age.  At 2 they’re “testing” their independence, but still rely on mommy and daddy for most everything.  By 3, they’ve figured out what they can do on their own, more what they THINK they can do on their own, and won’t have it any other way. 

I’ve also heard that at 3, some children experience regressive behavior.  This is the age of “Big Girl (or boy)” Vs “I’m a Baby”.  “A” has figured this out nicely.  She changes what she is based on the situation.  Examples:

A.     Dressing herself  “Don’t help me, I’m a BIG GIRL”

B.     Eating “I don’t need a fork, I’m a BABY”

C.     Playing outside “You can go in mommy. I’ll stay here, I’m a BIG GIRL”

D.     Brushing her teeth “I don’t need to brush my teeth. BABIES don’t have teeth”

My daughter, master manipulator at three. 

Don’t get me wrong, this has been my favorite age so far.  We can do more things together, like go to the movies and actually sit through the whole thing.  We can go to restaurants and she’s really good and actually eats.  I don’t have to ask her twenty times if she’s hungry or thirsty, she just tells me.  She’s been potty trained for a year now so I don’t have to worry about accidents while we’re out in public.  All of those things are quite enjoyable.  I just need to figure out a way for me to deal with the defiance, sassiness, and terribleness of the Three’s. 

It takes us awhile to get back into our routine even after a smaller holiday like Independence Day.  “A” is completely out of sorts.  It starts by having her daddy home and mucking up the routine she and I enjoy nearly every day.  Get up, watch Dora, have some breakfast, run errands or go to some activity, come home, eat lunch, take nap (long, long nap), wake up and wait for daddy to get home.  When he’s here, a lot of that stays the same, but there’s always a project to do or a store to go to that we wouldn’t normally venture to by ourselves (ie Home Depot or Menards).  She’s also not too keen on taking a nap when daddy is home because who wouldn’t want to miss him hanging shelving in the garage or rearranging the sprinklers in our yard for the 100^th time since he installed them? 

You throw in some loud action-FIREWORKS-and you have the makings of an incredibly overtired toddler.  “A” hates loud noises the way some kids hate vegetables.  She can’t stand vacuums, the automatic flushing toilets, the constant tractors on our cul-de-sac; you name it, if it’s loud, it has no place for her.  While we absolutely love the area that we moved to, we never really took into account just how many firework displays we’d have to endure.  Starting June 3^rd and going on nightly through the 5^th, with some lingering bottle rockets on the 6^th, at around 9:15 PM each night, all hell broke loose. 

The 3^rd wasn’t too bad because she had fallen asleep pretty easily that night and wasn’t bothered much by them. The 4^th was a little worse because she didn’t have much of a nap and woke up as soon as the first big one went off.  The 5^th was terrible.  We had spent the day at Nana and Papa’s and no nap was had.  Not only did we have Okauchee’s display, but the people behind us decided they’d take matters into their own hands. Guess where they ended up “exploding”? Right next to her room. She had fallen asleep at 8 and was up that evening at 9:30, 10:30, 12:00, 2:30, 4:30 and then finally slept soundly until 8:30 AM.  Great, she slept late, but because of that she didn’t take a nap again yesterday.  Thankfully no one had any big displays and the bottle rockets could only be heard faintly in the distance. 

Daddy has gone back to work today; it’s a cloudy day so I can get away with telling her no pool or park today.  When she wakes up we’ll watch Dora, eat some breakfast and head to Wal-Mart.  It’ll be good to get back to normal.

I’m pretty quick to admit my faults and one of my biggest has to be my potty mouth.  Before I had a child, I never really thought about what I was saying.  I was never really around kids and didn’t have to constantly watch my mouth.  I don’t swear because I think it’s cool or for any other reason other than the fact that it just comes out of my mouth.

After “A” was born, I started to make a conscious effort to clean things up.  Of course, with that, came a lot of “flippin’” or “friggin’”, and quite a lot of “Holy Crap” because that’s so much better than the other word (sarcasm greatly intended).  At the same time I had my little girl, all of my friends were having babies as well.  I am so good around other people’s kids.  I speak eloquently and maybe have let something slip once or twice, but when it comes to my own, I’m still trying hard not to incorporate cussing into my speech.

I have a child who forgets nothing. She can repeat an entire conversation we had the week prior as if the conversation just happened. So it goes without saying that she has picked up too much of what I have said.  The first time she ever said something bad was when she was about to turn 2.  We were outside flying her kite and it got stuck in the tree.  “S—t, my kite’s stuck” could be heard echoing down our cul-de-sac.  I didn’t say anything for the fear that if I told her to stop saying it, she’d keep repeating it.  She has never said that word since, and I thought I had it figured out.

Well now we have her favorite, and it just happens to be “Son of a -----.”  My mother has graciously reminded me that I say this quite often, but how can this be? I don’t ever remember saying it (that often).  I know when we moved into our house one month ago I had spilled Chinese food all over myself and I think I might have said it then, but I can’t recall another time since.  Everything to “A” is SOB now.  Her doll is sad because she’s acting like a “SOB”, her bike won’t work because it’s a “SOB”.  You get the picture.  I tried ignoring it like I did with the other word, but she hasn’t let this go.  My husband and I have sat her down to let her know that it’s nothing something nice to say and she smiles, nods, and says “Okay mommy, okay daddy. Now where is my SOB blanket?” 

I know parents get so upset when their kids call something stupid, or dumb, and “A” has never said that; instead I get the cute pixie who talks like a trucker.  On her preschool application it asks if there is anything special they should know about our child.  I explained a little about her JRA and then added, oh, and she swears like a sailor too.  Alright, so I didn’t really put that on her application.  I’m hoping that by the time school starts in September that she’s going to be over this.  It all starts with me so I’m thinking of starting a swear jar or something along those lines.  Maybe every time I cuss, I have to watch an episode of Yo Gabba Gabba; something that should make every parent cringe.  It has been a full 24 hours since “A” has said her favorite phrase; let this be a sign of good things to come.

The closer “A” gets to 3, the more observant she has become.  By observant I mean the more likely she is to blurt out everything she sees, hears, and smells.  It’s never “My what lovely flowers I smell” it always something along the lines of “Yuck, that flower smells awful.” Flowers don’t have feelings so I’m not too worried when we head to the nursery, but pretty much every where else we go, I’m on pins and needles.  The last two weeks have been the worst so far so I’d like to take a moment to apologize to the following people:

To the woman who works at the grocery store we frequent; I’m sorry she blurted out “Whoa, big momma.” I don’t know where that came from, and furthermore, her mother is not thin so I’m really confused on why she had to say this.

To our waitress at our favorite Sunday breakfast spot; I think the only reason she said “Wow, those are big boobies” is because you leaned right over her and had a very skimpy top on and she just couldn’t help herself.

To the person who so obviously let one slip at Marshall’s; something did smell awful, I’m just sorry she had to point it out so the entire store could wonder what she was talking about.

To the clerk at the beauty supply store; I’m saying sorry just because “A” really needs to keep her comments to herself, however, adults sometimes think your nose ring looks like a booger too and it’s not very common to see people with green hair so when she said “Green hair is pretty funny”, can you really blame her?

And finally, to my husband; I don’t think she was laughing at your body parts, but she rarely sees you running through the bedroom naked because you were running late for work. So I think when she said “Ha ha daddy that’s pretty funny looking”, I am pretty positive she just meant the whole situation was funny; at least that’s what I’m hoping.

I think that just about covers everyone over the last two weeks. If I missed anyone, I apologize, and to anyone she may offend in the future, I apologize in advance.  I’m working with her, but this may be a long process.