1 And 2 Years Ago Today

For the first time in who knows how long, I can remember exactly what I was doing not 1 but 2 years ago today.

2 years ago today, I was eating Blueberry Betty and Geocashing in the middle of nowhere (not at the same time) to try and start contractions. Bobblehead wasn't quite as ready as I was though. MIL was running out of vacation time and was going to have to go home in 3 days if something didn't happen.

1 year ago today, we were in Iowa visiting Hubbs. We took the kids and MIL to the Steamboat Museum in the early afternoon and I think that was the same night Hubbs and Lonnie took me to my first titty bar.

And today? I am sitting at work watching the wind blow and drinking a humongous Red Bull. Strangely, MIL is with the family this year too.

My first paid vacation ever starts on Friday at 5:00 p.m. I am so excited to have a week that I can do whatever I want. Not have to worry about getting to work or getting the kids off to daycare. I can just do whatever, whenever. And still get paid for it.

I have a list of things I am going to do.

I am going to screen my calls and not answer the door. I am going to stay up late, get up like normal because of the boys but be able to take a nap if I want. I am going to get all my crap organized for a yard sale and get the State the rest of the information they need to hopefully get us on State health insurance. I am going to get my hair cut. I am going to take the boys around town and finally show them what makes our little town special to me.

Or I might not do any of it. But that is the best part of vacation. If nothing gets done, so be it! It doesn't matter.

Beef and Pasta Bake-Yum

We had this for dinner last night and everybody loved it!

Thanks go to Melissa on the Coupon Board for the recipe.

Ingredients:
2 cups cooked pasta
1 lb. ground beef
1 medium onion
2-3 garlic cloves, minced
1 can tomato sauce
1 pkg. cream cheese
1 cup sour cream
2 green onion, chopped
salt and pepper to taste
2 cups shredded cheddar cheese

Preheat oven to 350. Brown beef, garlic and onion. Drain. Add tomato sauce and seasoning. Simmer 15 minutes. Mix sour cream, cream cheese and green onion. Layer cooked pasta, tomato sauce. Spread cheese mixture over top. Sprinkle with cheddar. Bake uncovered about 35 minutes or until top starts to brown.
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This is a great recipe since it uses stuff that I normally have on hand. Next time I make it, I am going to change it a little. After the pasta is cooked, I am going to mix it with 4 beaten eggs before I layer the rest of the ingredients and bake. Personally, I prefer noodles that stick together (like my spaghetti pie recipe) as opposed to them swimming around on my plate.

Bad Mom?

Monk Man has been begging for 2 weeks to go to pre-school. I told him no because I had heard it was really expensive. Now in my mind, really expensive means thousands of $$. We just can't swing that.

Well, last night I found out that it is $75 a month. Now that is doable. Especially when our daycare cost would drop from $360/month to $180/month. Half the time=half the bill. We would be saving money.

This morning, I walked over to the school (which just happens to be across the street from my moms house and daycare) to see what I could find out.

I didn't get any good news. The pre-school runs on the same schedule as a normal school year. Period. The only way they could make an exception was if Monk Man was special needs, which he isn't.

The guy I talked to suggested trying Headstart. My sister's baby's daddy's girlfriend (no lie, this is Springer shit) works for Headstart. She is NOT a good person anymore and I refuse to expose Monk Man to her. See, she used to be a good person. She was actually my next door neighbor and I have known her for years. But then she cheated on her husband (who is still my neighbor) and they got divorced. That is when she turned into what she is now. Psycho bitch.

Anyway, now I feel like a bad mom for not getting Monk Man into pre-school earlier. Does it really make me a bad mom or is it just standard mommy guilt?

I really want to make things right so I need your help. I want to start doing pre-school things at home in the evenings.

1) Tell me, what the hell do kids do in pre-school?
2) Send me any links related to home schooling or preschool. Blogs, printable stuff, pictures, web sites, anything.
3) You can email me: mommycrisp at yahoo dot com, PMAN on babycenter or leave a link in your comment.

Twitter

Well, I drank the Kool-Aid and joined Twitter.

You can follow me if you want. But no pressure.

Before I give the link I feel like I have to give some kind of disclaimer or something. I try to avoid using F-bombs on here. I might not be so careful on Twitter. Just sayin. I will most likely be tweeting from my phone so I probably wont spell correctly or use capital letters either.

Ok, here is the link. http://twitter.com/mommycrisp

I promise I wont be pissed if you don't follow me if you promise not to be pissed if you follow me, I decide I don't like it and quit. Was that confusing enough for you?

Cleaning Fool

I have been a cleaning fool for the past 2 weeks.

It is like that crazy nesting phase I got while I was pregnant.

I let the housework go completely in between camping trips and the disaster I fondly think of as my home was finally starting to get to me. Plus with the MIL planning on visiting next week, I was starting to go a little psycho.

Oh yes, I said next week. What happened to her being here while I am on vacation in 2 weeks? She just decided to change her plans last night. Ummmm, that is too bad MIL. I can NOT change my vacation time with this little of notice. So Hubbs can entertain her while I relax at work.

Anyway, back to cleaning talk.

I started with the office/playroom. I had gone through the boys toys a long time ago. The boys got to keep some, a lot went into the trash, some went to my mom for my nephew, but the majority went into the living room to be given to Step MIL for her CPS kids.

FIL came by to see our "new to us" truck yesterday so I put all the toys that were still sitting in my living room into the back of his Tahoe while he was playing with the boys.

Yay, I have my living room back again!

After FIL left, MIL called to tell us that she was changing her plans.

Huh? Dude! What the hell?

So I took my frustrations out on the bathroom.

You all already know that I am a stockpiler, right? Well, if you didn't, surprise! Please don't think I am like those hoarders you see on Intervention or some other TLC show. I (try to) only keep things we are going to use. Unless it is free, then I give it away to someone who can use it or it gets shelved until I have a yard sale.

What can I say, I love all things coupon! Especially if it smells good because with all these boys in my household, things can start to smell like ass, quickly.

My problem is, I can't keep things organized between stockpile shopping trips, which used to be every weekend. So my bathroom was stuffed full of stuff. I pulled everything out of the cabinets, out of the drawers and off the shelves. That all went in the hall. I grabbed a box and started filling it with the crap like body spray, body glitter, mousse, gel, hairspray, volumizer, gloss oil, sculpting wax, teeny tiny hair clippies, expensive shampoos and conditioners. All the junk that I was never going to use went into that box and set in the bedroom for the yard sale.

I just realized that I could have supplied a strip club for a year with all that stuff. Aaahhhh, the pre-children days.

After all the junk was gone, I organized all the stuff I was keeping.

It looks like a store in my bathroom. All the shampoos, conditioners, bubble bath, buddy bars, band-aids, body wash, and everything else body related are put away in their own rows. The kitchen cleaners, the bathroom cleaners, the Pine-Sol, carpet shampoo, mildew remover, oven cleaner, CLR, Magic Erasers and everything else cleaning related are put away in rows too!

I even got all of my smell good stuff under control. The Glade candles, the refills, the Air-wicks, their refills, the Plug-Ins, their refills, the Renew-zits, Febreeze and all that stuff are all organized in drawers.

My biggest accomplishment was getting space for bath towels. Bath towels are my Achilles Heel! I am really picky about towels. I can't dry off my body with something that might have touched somebody else's ass. I just can't do it.

So everybody gets a new towel, every time they bathe. And I only do laundry once a week. 4 people x 7 days x 1 or 2 bath/showers a day=a TON of bath towels. And washcloths, and hand towels.

Usually, after I do a load of laundry it all goes into the laundry pile until someone needs something to wear/dry off with. Whatever was needed gets removed from the laundry pile. Nothing ever gets put away. If I am feeling super motivated, the clean stuff might end up in their designated laundry basket. Kids clothes are supposed to go in one basket, Hubbs socks get their own basket, grown up pajamas, thongs, boxers and my socks go in another basket, and towels get the biggest basket.

Tonight I am going to not only sort all the towels, I am going to fold them and put them away in their new home, under the sink. For the first time in almost 7 years, I finally have the room to put the towels IN THE BATHROOM, where they belong.

That, in itself, will be one of my greatest accomplishments.

If I end up finished with the towels with enough time before the season premiere of House, I might start on the pantry.

The hall is pretty clean.

The kitchen is good, except for the floor needing to be mopped and the walls around the stove wiped down or repainted. I try to stay out of the kitchen as much as possible. It makes my head hurt. Hubbs will have to deal with that room.

The living room is passable, except for the carpet smells like dirty feet. But the steam cleaner can be ran on Saturday or Sunday before nap time.

You would think with my anal retentiveness and my OCD issues, my house would be cleaner than it is.

Bunkbeds

My mom is getting the boys a bunk bed for their birthdays.

The first thing that popped into my head after hearing this news was the bunk bed scene from the banned-from-our-home-forever movie Step-Brothers. I had to laugh. I couldn't help myself.

If you haven't seen the movie, let explain it a little.

Imagine 2 adult, single men, around 40 years old or so, still living with their parents. These guys are about on the same mentality level as a kindergartner. Action figures, nose picking, a tree house fight, and cockandballs jokes pretty much make up the whole movie.

Ok so these guys have twin beds that they decide would make great bunk beds. A few nails, a bottle of Elmer's Glue and a roll of Scotch Tape later, they have this amazing (to them) bunk bed. Long story short, the bunk bed collapses. Lots of crying, screaming and "Oh my god I am going to die"ing later, their parents decide on no more power tool use is allowed after bedtime.

Don't worry, I don't think that the bunk bed for they boys is going to collapse. I actually think it is a good idea. I mean, it isn't a wow, how fun gift, but whatever. They are still little enough to think cardboard boxes and tissue paper ARE their presents.

The first few nights are going to be interesting. Right now, they both sleep in our room. Monk Man is on a day bed and Bobblehead is still in his pack-n-play. Yeah, almost 2 and still in the PNP. Shame on me. I can so imagine them both sliding across the kitchen floor in their socks and diaper/undies in the middle of the night playing air guitar (like that old Tom Cruise movie) while Hubbs and I are passed out.

Wait, I just realized that I will have a kid free bedroom. For the first time in almost 5 years. How awesome is that? Now if I could only convince Hubbs that sleeping on the couch is good for his hangover, I would be all set.

Another Great Customer

I just got off the phone with Crazy Old Man Ed. Ed claims that we put his headrests on backwards.

Yes, his headrests.

But wait! There is more!

He says his back seat is at a downward angle. To clarify, he slides off of it when he sits on it.

Umm, ok?

I asked him if he locks his car up when he gets out of it.

He doesn't. And he has been somewhere in California since my boss delivered his car to him, 2 weeks ago.

There are too many things wrong with the story for me to believe that our shop is responsible for any of it.

#1. I don't think it is possible to put the head rests on backwards. There are these grooves in the metal that hold them into the seat and make them adjustable. They are like a key, sort of. They only go in one way. I could be totally wrong, but I am pretty sure that they are idiot proof.

#2. The boss, the owner, the one who does the final inspection before the car is released to the customer, drove the car to this guy. I think he, of all people, would notice something like that.

#3. On this particular car, the part you put your ass on is attached to the car. With bolts. The part your back rests against is the part that moves. It folds down and you can see the trunk. Now, this is how I am seeing it in our estimating database. We all know how I can see one thing and my brain reads it some other way, so I am not going to say that I am 100% positive on this one.

#4. I can say, without a doubt, none of our guys would pull a stunt like that. They all value their jobs too much to do something that shitty. I don't think that it would even occur to them to do it at all.

#5. The car was parked on the street, unlocked. For two weeks! Hypothetically, say you CAN put in headrests the wrong way. There are tons of asshole teenagers running around town, unsupervised, in the middle of the night. My money is on some little punk or group of punks doing all that crap to his car. Again, hypothetically speaking.

#6. I forgot what my last point was going to be.

In any case, I told Ed to bring his car by and I will have my boss take a look at everything.

He said sure, as soon as OnStar unlocks the car. Because the one time he does lock the car, he leaves the keys in it.

Dumbass.

Nice Try Buddy

Nice Try Buddy

Click on the link. You know you want to. I promise it isn't nasty or anything.

It is a link to peopleofwalmart.com and I have been over there looking around since about 2 this afternoon.

Funniest shit I have seen/read in a long time.

I am a teeny bit afraid that I am going to find myself pictured on the site.

Spaghetti Sauce Recipes

I don't think I have ever posted my spaghetti sauce recipes on here so here you go.

Growing up I never had jarred spaghetti sauce. My grandpa had the greenest thumb ever and always grew enough tomatoes to can for the whole family to last us well over a year. So I am kinda a sauce snob.

Here is the "From Scratch" recipe:

1 quart jar of canned tomatoes
2 small cans of Hunts Tomato sauce
1 pkg of Lowry's or McCormick's dry spaghetti seasoning
2 cans of diced tomatoes

Add all the ingredients in a large sauce pan. Cover and let simmer all day and stir often.

Now that my grandpa isn't around and my tomatoes haven't done crap the last few years I have to deal with fixing Ragu, Prego or Bertolli jarred sauce.

Slightly different from the home made recipe, here is my "Fixing It" recipe:

1 jar of pre-made sauce (whatever is already in stockpile)
1 small can of Hunts tomato sauce
1 can Rotel or diced tomatoes with peppers
1/2 pkg of Lowry's or McCormicks dry spaghetti seasoning
If the kids are eating something else, I add half a can of El Pato sauce.

Add all the ingredients all at once in a large sauce pan. Cover and let simmer all day and stir often.

Any kind of pasta works well with either sauce. My family likes medium shells and linguine the best.

You can also add meat!

Hamburger: Brown a pound of hamburger with a can of diced green chili's. Drain. Add to sauce.

Spam: Dice a can of spam and fry in sauce pan. Don't drain, just add sauce ingredients.

Lil Smokies: Open package. Add to sauce.

Smoked Sausage: Slice and fry in sauce pan. Don't drain, just add sauce ingredients.

I Hope This Works

I found out last week that my MIL is going to drive down from Colorado to spend Bobblehead's birthday with us so I need to take my vacation time the 2nd week of October to keep her company. AND she is staying with us instead of the hotel she promised us she would stay at the last time she mentioned the visit.

Nice to find out on short notice. At least it isn't going to be a surprise visit this time.

Well, since I am going to be out of my mind because I have so much deep cleaning to do since she is staying with us I am not going to have time to plan Bobblehead's birthday party.

So she can plan it. And if my mom wants to pout about it, she can plan a separate party. And if FIL and Step-MIL want to act the same, they can plan a separate party too. Screw it. I am not dealing with the bitching this year.

No one can even seem to fake getting along with each other. They couldn't even be in the hospital together after Bobblehead was born. Their visits had to be almost scheduled so they wouldn't accidentally run into each other.

My plan will probably backfire on me somehow but I refuse to be stuck in the middle of all the bitching and dirty looks and talking behind backs.

I just want to sit back, chase kids around, get drunk and enjoy a party for a change.

I Have A Secret

When I refill the hand soap at work, I secretly use cheap ass Suave shampoo instead of the overpriced Bath & Body Works crap they used to use.

Nobody has noticed.

Just Whining Today

Ok so I didn't listen to the Presidents speech last night. To be honest, I didn't even realize there was a speech last night.

But I did read a transcript of the speech and this is what I have to say about it.

There are a LOT of details to be worked out still. I will not be comfortable making a yes or no decision without more information. I would like to see something written out down to the smallest detail. I don't care if it turns out to be 1000+ pages. I want to know exactly what would happen, step by step, in laymans terms.

BTW, feel free to skip this post, I just have a lot to whine about today it seems.

I think healthcare is WAY too expensive, for everyone involved except the insurance companies.

If your insurance is employer paid, it is very expensive for the employer, even with group rates. When I worked at the dealership I had to write checks for the premiums every month. It is outrageous. To get a semi-affordable group plan we had to go with a crappy insurance company and have even crappier coverage. Plus the more claims turned in and paid out, the higher the monthly premiums went. My job now doesn't offer health insurance because it is so much money.

COBRA is a joke. So you lose your job. After a while you insurance is gone too. The monthly rates for COBRA makes me sick to think about. No job, little or no money. It is that simple. I would rather put groceries on the table and keep the water running than pay for COBRA.

State sponsored insurance is no help either. Well, for some it is but not for us. My family makes too much on just above minimum wage and unemployment to qualify for any kind of state help.

And the suckiest of all, having to go without any kind of insurance. Right now, we have no insurance.

So what do we do? We just don't go to the doctor. I have to rely on hopes and prayers that no one gets hurt or sick. It really sucks and I lay awake at night over it. But what else can we do? I mean, if one of the boys (God forbid) gets sick or falls and breaks an arm, I will take them to the doctor and make payments for the rest of my life. But if Hubbs or I get sick, we just deal. No doctor, no pharmacy, just deal with it. But it is totally unfair to expect my kids to do the same. I would never even consider it. I would sell everything I own and then some to keep my kids okay.

I DO think that it is time for the government to step in and do SOMETHING. No one should have to die because they don't have insurance and can't afford to pay for a doctor. It is complete bullshit that those kind of things are happening in this country.

There Must Be Something Wrong

I am in such a good mood today! Everybody else around me are in shitty moods but I am super awesome.

I haven't been this happy in a LONG time and I don't really know how to handle it.

I have to go to Wal-mart with Monk Man after work and am *gasp* actually looking forward to it. He grew out of his very cool Sponge Bob knock off crocs in the past week somehow (code for: momma washed and dried them) so he needs new shoes. Plus I have a ton of coupons for Pull Up wipes so I might as well get those while I am there. And Bobblehead has decided it is time to potty train so we need Pull Ups that fit his skinny ass, not the 4t-5t I have stockpiled.

I even woke up in a good mood and that NEVER happens. I am so not a morning person. I seem to be at my best if I stay up until around 11, 11:30 and then sleep until noonish but since I get to work a normal job it is more like stay up until 9, 9:30 and sleep until 5:30, 6.

The whole getting everyone ready for their day chaos went smoothly. Nobody fought their morning shower and the boys got dressed without argument. Nobody cried about not getting to kiss Hubbs bye bye first, drop offs were quiet and painless. It was amazing!

I didn't yell, scream or cuss at anyone today. I don't think I even rolled my eyes at anyone either.

I wonder, if I am this happy tomorrow and don't get to yell, scream or cuss at anyone, will I explode? I can't remember the last time I went an entire day without unleashing on someone.

What. The. Hell.

Tomorrow I am going to blog about the figurative bullet I found out I dodged last weekend. Hopefully blog about it because with me, you never really know for sure.

But today, I will leave you with something I promised to reveal sometime last week. Remember my post about deciding what I wanted to be when I grew up? I am ready to put it out there.

I want to be an Event Coordinator. Yeah, a wedding planner, party planner, whatever you want to call it.

I think it would be SOOOOO exciting. You all know how anal I am with all my lists and psycho I can get with my attention to details. Well, I think I would do awesome in this line of work. There are still some things to look into before I make a final decision but so far, it looks like something I would do well at.

Torture

Monday and Tuesday were hell. All 4 of us caught some kind of stomach bug and it was horrible.

Barfing, pooping, achy body, fever, chills, dizziness, and all that other nasty stuff that comes with a stomach bug.

Did I mention that we all share 1 bathroom?

By Monday night I was ready to check into a hotel, just so that I could spew without worrying about whether or not someone else would need it before I was done.

My little brother (the phlebotomist at the local hospital) said he wanted me to get us all tested for Swine Flu because we had the symptoms. He must have forgotten that our insurance went bye bye months ago and we are broke as hell. His job has made him a little paranoid. Thanks for the concern little bro but we will just ride it out (whatever "it" is) with lots of fluids, rest and vitamins.

We were fine Saturday and Sunday. We went to bed early on Friday so we could get an early start out to the picnic and get our camp set up.

Yeah, we ended up camping out there Saturday night. Hubbs never gives me all the information when he wants me to make a decision. And I guess I don't think to ask for more.

Anyway, the kids had fun playing with the 9 other kids that showed up. Sad. There are 200+ Elks Club members in town and out of those 200+, maybe 30 members don't have kids or grandkids. But I really can't blame them for not wanting to show up. There wasn't anything planned for them to do!

Not a damn thing except for a 10 foot high dirt pile with money hidden in it. I am not sure what happened this year. There was supposed to be a HUGE breakfast on Sunday morning, games all weekend and night time activities for the ones who got to stay up late on Saturday night.

The boys were so disappointed! We actually were headed out of the campground by noon on Sunday. We left our tent up and most of our stuff there since the Chili Cookoff starts Friday night. Not to worry, it is all safe. A few people we know were staying all week and would keep an eye on things.

We all laid down for a nap when we got home on Sunday because Hubbs and I stayed up way too late drinking after the kids all went to bed. When we got up, I felt kind of crappy but I just thought it was my hangover so I didn't think too much of it.

Bobblehead went to bed around 8, Monk Man and I went around 10 and Hubbs went around 2. Just like normal. When I woke up Monday morning, I felt okay until Monk Man walked down the hall crying that he had gotten sick in his blankets. I messaged my boss on Facebook (because we live on FarmTown) that I was staying home to take care of the sick Monk Man. As soon as Hubbs and Bobblehead got up I started feeling sick. And that was the end of me.

But we all seem to be doing okay today. My stomach is still a little angry but I felt good enough to get everybody off to daycare and myself off to work. I am keeping my fingers crossed that tomorrow isn't a repeat of Monday.