Saturday, December 27, 2008

OMG, POTTY!!!!

Total potty count for Loki for christmas day- 3, yes folks, three! ONce at my mom's and twice at home after a rediculously long nap. He asked/told us at home, as well, it wasn't a case of changing pants in the bathroom and asking 'cause the opportunity was there, like at my mom's. No, Loki walked up, said "Potty please, NOW!!!" we ran in, sat him down, and viola! Pee, in the potty!

We had two more trips last night, and one so far today.

Can you tell that I have been dealing with daipers/pull-ups for the last 7.5 years? Seriously, Hermes was at the tail end of training when Thor was born, and Thor is in the 'stay one step ahead of Loki" stage of training.

Seriously, I will be done with daipers in all their forms, other than 'goodnight pants"** in a few months or so...WOOHOO!!!



***Goodnight pants are essentially pull-ups for overnight. They are designed in brief style for younger boys (think 4 and under) and in 'boxer' styles for boys 4 and up. Loki shouldn't need tham for too long, if at all, but with Thor's sensory issues, he will not wake up if he has to use the potty, and this way, we will not be changing sheets so often, and hey look and feel more like boxer briefs than a pull-up.

Thursday, December 25, 2008

It's Chrsitmas!

Christmas day has, so far, been awesome. Chrsitmas at my mom's was smaller this year, but in many ways that made it better. There was a lot more thought put into the gifts, and everyone really seemd to enjoy what the recieved. The adult kids gift exchange had a smaller limit this year, but we were stil able to get everyone what they really wanted. I got Buppy to movies she really wanted, plus an awesome dragon calander, Hubby got an illistrated guide to his favorite book series, My step-bro got me an "Omg! Ponies" shirt which I will undoubtedly wear to death, and Hubby got the future BIL two pair of much needed gloves. The boys got awesome presents from everyone, clothing, books, toys, all of it appreciated. Right now, Thor is napping with the giant stuffed Elmo that santa brought him, an Elmo that went every where with us today, even wearing a sweat jacket out and about, as Thor did not want him to get cold, Loki is sleeping with the stuffed pup he got from one of his brother's last night. Hermes is currently playing with his Pirate themed Lego set he got from his Auntie Sistah Girl (who loved the coloing book I got her- yes, we are an odd family, why?

There was an odd thing that occured with gifts this year. One of the smaller items Hermes got from Santa was a Capt'n Jack Sparrow action figure, yesterday, he got a large Pirates of the Carribean coloring set, 8 markers, 4 twistable crayons, and 20 large coloring sheets, and then he got the Pirate lego set from Sistah Girl. He is really happy about all of these, as he can assemble his legos, set up the posters he colos around it,m and have Capt'n Jack as a giant over the legos. Smart kid.

A few things really stand out for me from today. It was a really enjoyable breakfast, first off. Loki behaved as well as can be expected from a two year old on Christmas. Hermes was as patient as you can expect a 7 year old to be, and Thor di amazingly well, making sure to wish everyone a Marrr-ee Christsmasts! One of the gifts Hubby and I recieved from Mom-the hipple and Cool-jazz dad was a Mandarin Chinese Immersion set, so that we can actually understand Hermes, and help him with school stuff.

One of the greatest gifts, though, was a non tangible. Loki peed on the potty at Mom's. I am thrilled, as this means that come this time next year (sooner actually, but I don't want to jynx it) I will be done with daipering all together!! No more stinky pants for me!

One of the other great things, every thing ran smoothely, everyone was hppy, there were no dissapointments, so snark, no fights, it was just a good, relaxing day.

I needed that after yesterady, when everything was running a good hour and a half later than we were told, so Loki was overtired, Thor was melting down repeatedly before dinner was even served, and it was jsut tense for Hubby and I. I came home from that, spent about n hour being numb, another hour crying, and some more time fuming, before BIL and SIL came over to do a gift exchange (HellBoy II: the Golden Army dvd...yeah!) and then I whipped out all the santa presents, and wrapped all the gifts that were going to moms.

I am slowly doing the post holiday clean up and sorting of gifts. I am having an amazing day so far today, much better than I have had, holiday wise, in years, and I want it to last.

Oh- and something ultra heartwarming. Troll Who Lives Under The STairs, AKA Friend (who doesn't actually live under our stairs, nor is he a troll) Is working today, 8am to 6pm. While at work, there was a alrge family waiting for their photo order to be complete. He runs the photo area. After he completed their order, they thanked him profusely for working today, and handed him a Christmas card. Inside was a $10 gift card for Target.
Total strangers, being nice to retial folk. That is part of Christmas too.

Wednesday, December 24, 2008

5:30 does not equal 7

So, I had a really long post started. I realized that it was upsetting me more, instead of calming me down.
I will update after tomorrow, when I will have had a good experience to offset my evening tonight.

Sunday, December 07, 2008

Toshibasaurus

So, I have a temporary laptop solution in the guise of the ToshibaSaurus.
The Toshibasaurus is one of my father-in-laws older laptops. To gove you an idea of how old it is, it was running WindowsME. Yeah.
I found my XP discs and am in the process of running the longest upgrade EVAH.
Once this is done, I will have a mostly functional laptop.
Not a permanent solution by any means, but something that will definitely work until we can afford a new laptop, probably around tax return time.

There are a few rather valid reasons on why the ToshibaSaurus is not a good long term fix. A) it is ancient in laptop years, a good 8 years old, if not more. It has limited hard drive and memory space. It does have wireless internet, as long as I make sure the wireless adapter card is securely plugged in. Did I mention that, among ither things, this laptop still has a floppy drive? Yeah, it's takes the 3.2s (the ones that I always confused as 'hard disks' when I was younger, as I grew ip on the day of the floppy, actually physicly bendy, 5.whatever floppy disks, as opposed to the hard plastic cased, smaller but holds more data, 3.whatevers)
The batterry only hold a charge for about half an hour, unless you leave it plugged in for roughly a week before running it on just battery power, so I really need to be close to an outlet to use it for any amount of time. The keyboard is missing a few keys, and so on.

It is slow, cumbersome, and unattractive, but it works for now. It will help greatly to get me through my first quarter of school, and after that, I can transfer all my info onto my (hopefully) new, shimy, sleek, effective laptop.

Hopefully.

Monday, December 01, 2008

Toys for Tots

To everyone out there in internet land who has donated to Toys for Tots, this year or previous years, thank you. There are so many people that you are bringing Christmas to that you may never know. Some of these people have had recent hardship, and are working their way out, and Christmas scared the shit out of them, some have had longer standing hardships, and see no way out, but either way, you are bringnig Santa into the lives of their kids, you are the true spirit of Christmas to the older kids, those who have outgrown Santa, and to the adults who have to request the toys, you are proving that despite what we were led to believe, Santa does exist.

Thank you to the Marines, who for going on 60 years have spent time and energy bringing the vision of one man and his wife to liffe. Thank you to the news stations that get the word out, thank oyu to the orginizations that get the toys out.

If you can, please, drop a toy in the bins when you are out and about. Do not forget about the older kids, either, as Toys for Tots distributes gifts for those of up to 16 years of age. Some state have a tech for teens or toys for teens program geared specifically for older kids.
Drop some change in the red buckets with the bell ringers if you can, as you may be giving someone food and heat.
I know that times for everyone are hard, but if you can spare anyhting to make it a little easier for someone with less than you, this year is the year to do so.
For those who have, thank you, for those who want, help is coming, and for those who cannot, but need not, it will be OK, too.

seriously, no really...

Loki hs the Death Cold!!!
I have not had more than three days in the last MONTH where one of the kids in housewifeland has not been flinging snot.
I know that does not sound attractive, but it could not sound worse than what is happenning around here. See, the unique thing about having three kids, is that different colds have different incubation periods. This means that it is totally pssible for all three of them to have one type of cold at the same time, then have one ofthem get a new cold, then pass it on down the line.

When Hermes is sick, he is either bemoaning how icky he feels, and become a hermit in his room, emerging only for sustenance and cuddles, or he insists that he feels juuuuust fine, and why can't he (insert any number of things that is unacceptable to do while ill)

When Thor is ill, he want's momma. Maybe he want's poppa, too. Thor just wants to be snuggled, given warm food and drink, and put to bed swaddled (and try swaddling a humungous 4 year old!) when he is sick.

Loki, though. Loki will run away from you when he is ill, you may try to feed him, or change him, or make him feel better, or do something that would make him want to rest, and dangit, he is a man on the move- no time for being ill. He is soooo crabby that he will whine or cry almost contantly until he is better, he will even wimper and whine in his sleep.
Out of all of my kids, I dread him being ill most of all. Yeah, Thor cannot tell us what he needs, but we can generally figure it out. Yeah, Hermes gets annoying, but we can send him to his room. Loki, well, I will be chock full of frazzled nerves by the end ofthe day, but once he is better, he will smile, and cuddle, and thank me, and tell me he loves me, and I am no longer mad until the next time.