The end of April

4/21/08- Alright Yoda
We finally heard back from the PT people! Geez!
Anyway, the lady is VERY nice and I really enjoyed talking to her. I think we’ll get along just fine! They’re coming on Friday and I couldn’t be happier! She’s bringing a trainee with her, I don’t mind, more people to show my baby off too, oo, did I just say that?
My mom is going to be here during the visit so she can keep Kenzie happy and I can focus on the therapist and Maddie.
And then to the dark side if you will…
We got served with an eviction notice today. That’s beyond embarassing to say, I can’t even TELL you how it bruises my pride. Our rent hasn’t been paid for April and we pray that we can get it paid so it gets cleared up.
All of our good rental history, gone. God I hate the damn economy! We can’t even get hired at McNasty! And we even tried! No joke! Don’t ask me what we’re going to do, because frankly I don’t know.
I spent the last few hours holding Maddie and Kenzie and crying. I know it wasn’t healthy but I couldn’t let them go. I let them laugh at me, and boy did they ever! Maddie kept wanting to stand up, and touch my tears as they fell. She laughed so hard, she passed gas. How could I not smile at that?

Edit: Today is a bad day for renters! My bestest friend Lora was told that the house that her and her family {husband and 2 kids} have lived in since they got married is being put on the market. Like now.

4/22/08- Mama bear
We had our appointment with the vice principal today. It went very well. Basically we just told her what we heard happened from Mackenzie and how it affected her and our concerns.
Which basically are that she will not be teased, taunted or embarassed any more by this experience. Considering she already has had self image and self esteem issues, she doesn’t need any help with that.
She wrote all of my concerns and points down and I have to admit, she seemed threatened or scared by me. I think she was expecting me to go nutso on her and get all protective and mama bear-ish. Moi?!
But I didn’t! I kept my cool! I reminded myself that this was a young boy who did this, a young boy who is her friend and didn’t mean to hurt her and probably didn’t even realize the audacity of his actions. I also reminded myself that we love this school, it’s teachers and administrators. They’re amazing and they always go to great lengths to keep it’s kids safe and happy.
Basically, it couldn’t of gone better.
Oh and Maddie’s taking a second nap right now…maybe we’re not done with the 2 nap thing after all!

4/24/08 Crap-o-la
Well we got the date for our court appearance for the eviction.
Oh and…I’m officially not watching American Idol for the rest of the season starting last night. Carly Smithson got voted off. I threw up. I try not to get too involved with reality TV, hell who am I kidding, I live vicariously through my television lol.
4/25/08 Cry me a river
Today was Maddie’s first PT eval. The Early Intervention specialist was going to come out and watch her and talk to me about her and what they think they can do for her. The lady was a sweetheart, her name is Jan. I hope I get to keep working with her because I took to her personality immediately {anyone who knows all 70’s music lyrics is too cool for school in my book}. Maddie seemed to like her as well.
Right before they got here, Kenzie and my parents showed up from getting her at school. Kenzie was riled up and Maddie wanted to play with her. So, when she couldn’t, she got pissed. My parents were supposed to keep Kenzie occupied, didn’t work so well. We had 8 people in our house {me, mom, dad, kenzers, maddie, todd, jan and her shadower, becky} and Maddie and I were supposed to concentrate. Didn’t work so well.
Jan immediately determined that she needed help. Not by a physical therapist, she thinks. It doesn’t seem medical and she thinks she just needs a little assistance and she’ll be right on track. Score!
Then she asked me about our financial situation. If we were able to provide for our children and just then, my mom had walked in and told them we were in dire need of financial help because of Howard not having a job. I started to cry. Like an idiot. My mom left and I got absolutely hysterical with silent sobs. It has got to rank up there as one of the most humiliating experiences of my life. I don’t even like crying in front of my husband! And here I was crying in front of two total strangers!
Through sobs I told them the whole story and I totally had an anxiety attack. I guess the realization of losing our home, what’s going on with Kenzie, what’s going on with Maddie, just crashed down on me all at once. They showed nothing but concern and compassion and passed zero judgment. They offered me some contacts of some agencies that might be able to help us. Then they excused themselves. I walked outside, handed my dad the baby, went into the bathroom and cried for half an hour. It was like a flood.
Between our financial woes, telling the painful, bittersweet story of the twins birth, having to explain Morgan, something being wrong with Maddie…it all came crashing down.
Finally, it stopped. When I left the bathroom everyone wanted a play by play of what happened with the appointment, which I did not want to talk about that, or anything for that matter. I was numb.
By 9pm…our entire life had changed.
Howard had came home, with a job offer. A real one that could support our family the way we’ve wanted to for years.
My grandparents, after hearing this news, called to tell us to meet my sister tomorrow and get the money they decided to lend us to pay off the eviction crap and pay our rent until June 1st.
Howard and I held each other as we cried in the kitchen after realizing that everything was going to be ok. And promised each other that this would never happen again.

4/26/08 Flipside
We met my sister today at my niece’s last gymnastic meet. She did very well! I was a very proud aunt. Howard loved watching her, considering he hadn’t been a meet and he adores my niece and nephew like they were his.
We saw a demonstration of what she will be doing next year and my sister looked like she was going to throw up lol. It’s very complicated, but Alyssa’s very talented and I think she’ll do beautifully.
We got the money from her and a huge sigh of relief came over us. No, I didn’t cry again, lol.

4/28/08 Hot blooded
I have been so beyond sick today. 103 fever. Kill me.
Oh, I paid our rent today in my sickened stupor.

4/29/08 Lawyer
I woke up this morning still feeling crappy so I went and got my parents. Sometimes I love that they don’t work. My mom cleaned my house and took care of Maddie while I was a vegetable.
While I was vegging Howard got some disturbing news about Able Body, the contract labor place he works through. Apparently there is a clause in the contract that states that he cannot go to work for any company he is called out to for that company. If he does then he has to pay a fine, ect.
Well, to make a long story short. He and I both showed up at Able Body that afternoon and demanded to see the contract. They REFUSED to let us see the copy that Howard signed but they gave us a new copy and it said he can not take a TEMPORARY job from any company that they dispatch him to. Umm, not a temporary job here.
This is not the end of this. I’ve already called a lawyer.

4/30/08 No worries
Apparently, we no longer have a need to contact a lawyer.
The company that is going to hire Howard, called Red River Services. They’re a recycling/trash company. He’s going to be doing quality control, assistant project manager and eventually project manager.
Anyway, they BOUGHT Howard’s contract from Able Body. Done. Over.

Busy April 10th-20th

4/10/08 Alright Buddy!
After we got home last night and got the kids to bed, I took a shower and passed out soon after. I woke up because of thunder at 5ish, luckilly they passed before we had to get out of the house to take Kenzie to school.
After Kenzie got off to school I spent, oh about 5 minutes with Howard before he left to finish Vicki’s car again. Maddie slept in until 10:30! Poor kid! But I enjoyed the peace by sitting my butt on the couch and reading, lol.
Howard called me at 12:30 and said the car was running and he was done. It’s after 2. He’s still not home. He called me at 1 and said he had everything picked up, he was going to run upstairs and tell my mom he was leaving and he’d be home. My mom calls at 1:30 and talks about nonchalant things, not mentioning that he was there or anything. At 1:47 I call my mom back wanting to know when Howard left, so I knew how much I could call and bitch at him for. He answered the phone.
me: hey, where are you, I was getting worried. You know her house is like 4 miles from here.
Him: Yeah I know.
Me: I talked to my mom earlier and she didn’t mention or give me any idea you were still there, and neither did you!
Him: Well, I’ve been right here.
Me: what are you doing?
Him: talking.
{could he be any more elusive and vague?!!?!}
I sat there in silence for a few seconds and said, ok, bye.

I was so incredibly annoyed at that point. I texted him a few minutes ago and told him not to forget to pick up Kenzie. He just called me and I let him have it. Not just because he didn’t have the decency to call me, and if I would of done this he would be LIVID, but because he wasn’t even busy doing anything. He was sitting on my mom’s couch talking and didn’t even CONSIDER that I’d be worried when he said he’d be headed home in a few minutes over an hour ago for a 4 mile drive. He actually said, he didn’t think about it. Nice.
Men…ppfftt!

4/16/08- Nuts
What the hell is up with the Emerald Nuts commercials? I mean, Swiss Family Robinson? What the french, toast?

4/17/08- Bummer
Well, it’s been a month and no chance of getting our stuff back on. Although the wiring is finished, now they are putting the breaks on us because we haven’t paid in 2 months. Even with the credits from the outage our balance is bad and way more then we have now. When you don’t have anything coming in, you can’t put anything out.
And don’t get me wrong, we have some money. We have the leftover from our pathetic savings to pay for diapers and food. We’re not starving, and when we start getting nervous about our depleting amount of money, Howard does some contract work.
I’m bummed.

4/18/08- Happy Birthday my Love!
Today is Howard’s birthday!
He got to choose dinner, pizza. He got his favorite cake, carrot. And he got his 15 month old daughter to say, Happy Birthday Dada! Of course it wasn’t that annunciated, but she said it!
We also spent the afternoon at a park and man did they all have a ball!

Howard’s brother reliving his youth

Umm, yeah.

Yes, his cake says, Happy Birthday Powie- Nick name, lol.

4/20/08 Full moon

I didn’t blog about this when it happened. I was trying to comprehend everything.

On the 17th I was sitting in the parent pickup line waiting for Kenzie. I was talking to Lora, and a weird number was calling me. I clicked over and it was the acting vice principal at Kenzie’s school {Real VP took the day off}. She told me that today {Thursday} Mackenzie was on the playground and a little boy pulled her pants and panties down.

Shock. Embarrassment. Concern. I immediately asked if she was ok, the principal assured me that she was. She also told me that she offered to call me when the incident happened but Mackenzie refused. I was sitting in the parent pickup line, or I would of driven to the school immediately. I was in such shock. I kinda stuttered and the Temporary VP assured me that the student {whom she cannot name, state law} is being punished severely as is any other students involved and will have to make a formal apology to Mackenzie regarding this event. She asked me if I had any questions, and my response was, not from her. I wanted to talk to my daughter.

Minutes later a smiling Kenzie jumps into the van. She says she had a good day but something embarrassing happened. Patrick Yep, remember, total, shameless, flirtation? Which made me even more concerned about the incident. If it was just childs-play or sexually aggressive. She said that he pulled her pants and panties down and some people saw, not too many. 2 little girls laughed at her and made fun of her and Patrick did too. She told me that all 3 children never came back to the classroom, meaning they got sent home. And in the words of 1st grade punishment, this incident is going on their permanent record and is also being treated VERY SEVERELY! The school is taking it seriously, which I didn’t doubt for a minute, but I’m glad that I have conformation.

After talking about it and through it and after her telling it to me again and telling my mom and Howard she got more and more embarrassed. So, we explained to her how the situation was bad. And how serious it is. And we also told her that sometimes kids don’t know what they’re doing. That’s why they’re kids, but she did nothing wrong. She told us that before the girls went home, they came back to the classroom and apologized to her. The little boy made her a card and apologized. I explained to her that it’s good that they apologized but she had to make sure that she tells them that she’s not ok with what they did, and she can forgive them or choose not to if she likes. I also told her I’d rather her keep away from Patrick, not to be mean, but because I wanted to protect her. She said she understood and agreed with me.

I kept her out Friday. I didn’t want her to have to go back and deal with it right away. I didn’t think that was fair. The school agreed. I’m going to make an appointment with the VP ASAP. Not because of punishment, but because I’m concerned of my daughter. I want to make sure that if any repercussions come of this that it’ll be taken VERY seriously. And I want to make sure if she has any confidence issues {which she has had a lot lately} because of this she can talk to the counselor if need be. Just explain my concerns and get my daughter’s voice out there.

I don’t want to seem like I am downplaying the event. I’m not. I wanted to go postal, trust me. But that’s not right for Mackenzie, and I can’t do that to her. I need to do what’s right for HER.

April 5th-9th

4/5/08- Birthday Party x2
Kenzie was being quite defiant today, I didn’t think we were going to do birthday parties at first. But then she straightened up when I threatened her with being homebound instead of a party girl and man it worked!
The first party was for a girl that was in Kenzie’s Kindergarten class, and they’re still friends and we love her parents! It was at Main Event Entertainment which we had never been to. Kenzie bowled and kicked everyones butt! Seriously, out of 15 kids, including boys, she got the highest score!

Surprisingly Maddie did AWESOME the whole party! The bowling didn’t scare her at all, I thought it would, I’m glad I was wrong. After the bowling, the kids went in and had pizza, cake and Kellie (birthday girl) opened presents.

Birthday Girl:

Then we went into the arcade and Kenzie continued to kick butt on racing games and air hockey. We had a small gap in time between this party and the next. We took the girls home, got Kenzie and Maddie changed, packed Maddie a bag and got dressed ourselves. We took Maddie to my mom’s for the evening because Howard decided to give us a date night, SCORE!
We dropped Kenzie off at my cousins and headed to eat mexican food, and omg it was delicious! I had a margarita that was very strong, but very good.
Then we went to pick up Mackenzie from the party and my aunt, cousin, sister, niece x2 and Kenzie forced convinced me to sing a karaoke duet with Mackenzie. They videotaped it and got pictures, I’ll try to pry the evidence away from them and share it with you.

Cousins: L-R Kenzie, Ashley {birthday girl} & Alyssa

Diva baby!

We were singing to eachother

We were tipsy…and it’s the first picture taken of just us in FOREVER!

4/6/08- Repercussions
Yesterday evenings strong margarita has had bad consequences.
My ulcer is killing me. I’ve been doubled over in pain all day.
To top it off…I’m pretty sure we all have spring fever. Runny noses, coughs, sore throat, light fevers, it’s lovely.
We planned on going to the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center in downtown but with gas prices about at $3.50 a gallon that wasn’t happening, considering it’s 30 miles away.
Not to mention with all the sinus issues, wildflowers is not where we need to be. Hopefully we can try again this coming weekend. I hope so.
I finally got Howard to sit and watch Enchanted with Kenzie and I. He loved it of course. God that movie is so cute, and the music is catchy and ‘uppidy’.

4/7/08- le sigh
I love you Lora, lol.
Text from her:
A fairy tale: One day, long, long ago…
There lived a woman who didn’t whine, nag or bitch. But this was a very long time ago and it was just that one day. The end.

4/8/08- Mom and Daughter day
Howard watched the baby a good part of the day today so I could go to the library with my mom, help her file her taxes and allow me to go to the store without children grabbing things off of the shelves, lol. I really do love him!
After filing her taxes, she turned, looked at me and said, “Why do I have to make everything so damn complicated?”
That’s a typical woman trait mom. I think it comes with the genetalia. Yeah, she needs to clean my windshield now. It got soaked. I really should learn some tact. Or, rather, not speak when others are drinking.
When I got home Howard was doing the thing that apparently a few men do. He would talk to me and be perfectly fine. I’d try to discuss something with him and OMG! The world caved in and the rocks annoyed him. He got over it. I did say I loved him, right?

EDIT: Oh and I was told to pencil in that the net would be on in one week. Then I can finally transfer all these damn entries to my blog! SCORE!

4/9/08- 15!!!
Maddie’s 15 months old today. She had a checkup this morning and it was…informative, to say the least.
1st thing is she weighs 23 pounds 10 ounces, and was over 33”! That’s a 2 pound, 5 ounce weight gain and over a 2 inch growth! She’s in the 90th percentile for height and 50-60th for weight.
Her little spring fever allergy runny nose has turned into a bit of bronchitis! We gave her a nebulizer treatment last night because I feared that, and turns out, my fears were accurate. So, he prescribed her an antibiotic and 2 allergy medications.
Then he did an assessment of where she is developmentally and boy was he impressed. Although she was terribly shy with him, clinging to me like a wet rag she managed to show him what she could do as far as imaginative play (she flips through pages of books and spouts off words like she’s reading), she has a vocabulary of 12 words from what he could tell (she actually has a few more) and she’s very observant and comprehends really well for a 15 month old! I’m proud.
Then came the physical part. She’s lagging. I knew she was but everyone kept telling me she’d catch up. I thought so too, but deep down I knew something was up, even with her being a preemie. Her legs are very strong; she’s been able to hold her own weight since she was 4-5 months old! Her muscle tone is awesome; she’s very strong, nothing wrong actually PHYSICALLY with her. But she’s lagging in the ‘brain, tell my body to walk, crawl, ect.’. She doesn’t pull up unless we help her. She doesn’t cruise. She doesn’t crawl, or even attempt to. She walks, hell she RUNS when she holds our fingers. And when she’s in her walker (which we have oh a very low setting so she has to stand to move herself and use her legs) she can chase her 7 year old sister down!
So, he gave me the number to a good PT that will come to our house and with a handful of visits he said she will be chasing us down, minus the walker. He thinks a few should do it and she WILL be walking by the time she’s 18 months. I trust that man, he’s thorough and he knows what he’s doing and talking about so…yeah.
I’m going to call the PT today! Wish us luck!

OH! She also got 3 vaccinations that we both cried during. Poor thing! She’s pretty fussy so she’s sleeping now, hence the computer time, lol.

SECOND ENTRY: Auto Service Extrodinare!
We spent from 3pm-9pm at my mom’s house. Why? Howard was trying to fix my mom’s friend…oh god, too complicated. Her name is Vicki. He was trying to fix her car yet again, with the next problem with it.
Kenzie was terrible. She was defiant, wasn’t listening, it was hell with her and Vicki’s daughter lol. Maddie was so fussy and tired and obviously wanted the comforts of her own home. She was miserable the majority of the time. Finally, at 9, half an hour past Kenzie’s bed time and with poor Maddie crying constantly I told Howard if he didn’t call it a night, I was leaving without him. He quit. Thank God for small favors.