odds and ends

1.  Every day.  Every every day, I struggle and battle not to take the xanax, and then finally, probably about once a week, I give up and take it and then I spend the rest of the day wondering why I have to be so masochistic and wondering if maybe xanax would like me to have its babies.  I think Jesus is down with xanax, guys.
2.  My poor laptop is now missing so many keys it is Ridiculous!  Let me list for you the keys my kids have popped off and lost: enter, whatever is supposed to go above enter, whatever is supposed to go beside the up arrow, the letter m, the letter o.  I now have to hit the little rubber doo-dads whenever I want to use these keys.  It is slowing my typing down just a skosh.  The space bar is also not on quite right and only responds about half the time.  I am tempted to take it to the geek squad, but I am afraid they will yell at me for being such an irresponsible laptop owner and perhaps call laptop protective services.  Also, I am afraid they will charge me too much money.  Maybe they could just offer some type of scared straight program to laptop abusing toddlers.
3.  We made a sugar cookie map of the United States today highlighting the 13 original colonies and Ohio.  It was a smashing, delicious messy success.  I live for these moments when I don't feel like a total homeschool slop artist.  We also made shaving cream puffy paint cookies.  My 6 year old can now tell you how many colonies there were and what each group of colonies specialized in.  My 4 year old got the letter c and its sound.  A good school week.
4.  I have decided to make it my new motto to never let a spider go past me alive.  If all of us purposed to kill every spider that came any where close to crossing our paths maybe the spiders would stop terrorizing us and realize that we mean business and they need to stay the heck away.
5.  I have also decided that there should be a limit to how many times one is required to sweep and or mop ones floor in a single day before said floor is considered clean no matter what the actual state of the floor.  For instance, if one has swept and or scrubbed ones kitchen floor 4 times in a single day that floor is regarded as clean even if one's baby proceeds to dump an entire bag of mini oreos on that floor and then step in them 100 times until the whole floor is covered with black dust. 
6.  I have decided that my kids don't need dopey names (no offense to those of you who blog and use dopey names of your own).  My girls are Linley, Faith, and Ellery

the rules

So, do I really have to think up cheesy nicknames for my kids like sunbeam and skylark, or can I just call them by their real names.  Why is it okay to post photos of them, but not to say their names?  I have never really understood this... 

Well, shoot

I was hoping to be witty.  I didn't really want to do a daily blow by blow, or a homeschool instruction blog (there are enough other people doing that better than I could).  Right now though I feel incapable of repartee.  I feel rather incapable of standing up.  I took a new med this morning and I am feeling crazy dizzy, and I am having those weird electric zaps you may be familiar with if you've ever come off an anti-depressant, I also feel super brain fogged.  The perfect combination for writing a blog, obviously.  These symptoms are setting off a panic attack and I feel like crying and perhaps going to the hospital.  My husband had to walk out the door in the middle of my full blown melt down or he was going to miss his flight out.  So now I am home alone with all 3 kids.  He did tell me before he left that my behavior wasn't fair to him or the girls.  I know that this is true.  All 4 of them deserve better.  I often question why God decided to give my precious wonderful babies to such a crazy person.  Hearing him say this out loud does not do me a whole lot of good though.  It actually makes me rather angry.  I guess being capable of holding 2 thoughts at the same time is a skill... on the one hand I totally agree with the idea that my mental illness is not fair to my family, on the other hand it is not really fair to me either.  I did NOT choose this.  If getting rid of it were possible just by wishing and praying and wanting to badly enough, it would be gone.  If I could just perform a ritual and cut off a toe and say and incantation and be okay, I would have been better months ago.  I do not know how to make it gone.  I do not know how to stop.  I hate frustrating everyone who loves me.  I hate going down to the same stupid dark places over and over.  I hate failing my girls.  I hate not being strong enough to just say to my brain, Enough!  We're done here.  Good day!  I hate that this is my current reality.  As much as I wonder why God chose such a screwed up parent for my girls and spouse for my husband, I wonder why He chose this path for me.  But now I am starting to feel better.  Maybe I can go back to trying to be witty.  The problem being that I am not as good as I had hoped at distilling my daily life into funny.  Back to the drawing board.    

usa-centrism

I get annoyed with myself for getting annoyed when drop down menus of countries are listed solely aphabetically without having a United States option first at the top of the list.  Then I get annoyed at myself for being annoyed at myself because I should be entitled to my opinions and not let pretend criticism from other pretend people keep me from wanting my country first on the list.  Then I get annoyed at myself for being so self important that I think my opinion should overrule the entire alphabet.  Then I hear the voice of my husband in my head telling me to stop being insane and go to sleep.  (don't tell anyone, but I miss him)

About Me

I am a homeschooling mother of 3 daughters ages 6, 4, and 1.  My 4 year old has juvenile rheumatoid arthritis in both her knees.  She has also been diagnosed with aspergers syndrome which is an autism spectrum disorder.  This somehow seems unfair to me.  One of the other girls should have to have the JRA if she has the AS.  Let's spread out the disorders a little.  My husband travels 5 days a week for most of the year with a Christian women's conference.  By the end of a 6 week run I begin to feel abiding bitterness for Christian women, despite the fact that this I would place myself in this category.  Although, I think in my mind I may still be a Christian girl.  I have general anxiety disorder, or maybe obsessive compulsive, or maybe panic disorder, or maybe hypochondria, or maybe my own hell-ish mix of all of them.  Every doctor and every therapist has a different opinion.  I am still in the closet on this mental illness thing in my real life (other than a very core group of friends and family).  Naturally, it seems prudent to share it with anyone who stumbles here accidentally...  I am currently taking lots o' meds.  This only bothers me at the doctor's office when the nurse recites them all to make sure the list is current and I wish they didn't make me sound quite so nutty.  I am awake and writing right now because going to sleep seems too scary.  Even taking my ambien seems too scary.  Chatting with my laptop with all the lights on is more my speed.  I used to be a teacher before I became a mom.  I love teaching, but I would be okay with being a mom and wife only indefinitely. My oldest daughter is in first grade.  She is homeschooling through our local Christian school, so she gets to be involved in the specials and field trips and parties.  She has already fallen in love.  The object of her affection is the cutest boy in the first grade, so I am quite proud of her taste level.  My middle daughter is doing preschool at home for now while we wait for the education services people to get their act together and get her IEP going, so that she can enter the Autism scholarship program at our local Christian school.  My littlest daughter either eats or destroys everything in her general vicinity.  They are all much much cuter and smarter than any other living child.  I have known my husband since the fourth grade. We have been good friends for the entire span of our relationship, but we didn't become romantically involved until my sophomore year of college after we had both moved away.  He is endlessly patient, hard-working, long-suffering, good at everything he attempts, and wonderful.  Blech.  No more mushiness.  My goals will be learning to: 1)group like ideas in the body of my writing and 2)end a blog gracefully.  Don't hold your breath.

First

Hmm.. Do I really have enough to say to write a blog?  Do I have any time at all anywhere to write a blog?  Do I have anything to add to the already over-stuffed land of everyone on the planet having 6 blogs minimum plus one they write for their iguana?  Will I ever post again after right now?  Am I willing to tell the really interesting secret stuff?  Who in their right mind would read this?  Will I ever spell 'their' right the first time I type it?  These are the questions that plague us.