You Are Getting Sleepy.....Sleepy....Sleepy

It just occurred to me that I have not slept straight through the night in well over a year.

It is all her fault!!!

First it was the pregnancy and having to go to the bathroom all night.  Then it was living in the apartment and sleeping on my little foam pad on the living room floor.  But I have been sleeping in a real bed now for about a year, the same amount of time she has been living outside my uterus.

I will admit that it is partly my fault.  Usually, by now, I would have gotten fed up with the constant desire to nurse and be held by mom in the middle of the night and used the "tough love" approach and let her cry it out.  But, I am old now and she is my 6th and probably last baby - and...as much as this old lady wants sleep, I just can't seem to make myself!

I know I will have to force myself to do it....soon....before she is spoiled....or is it too late already?  I don't know. 

I do know that I need sleep.

And I would prefer it in a bed...not on the floor.....

Hey, wait a minute....maybe I should put HER to bed on the floor....it seems to work wonders!  Maybe she is still remembering our apartment months....I know my back still remembers those months.

I Have Decided Something....

I have made a discovery about myself.  I am not a good enough housekeeper to be a "real" stay at home mom. 

You see, for my whole adult life, I have always worked outside of the home.  Many times I had more than one job....either one full time and an additional part time job....or numerous part time jobs that I could arrange around the schedule of my husband and kids. 

That is, until we moved to Georgia.

We moved to Georgia when V-Girl was just 3 weeks old.  I was traumatized by the move, leaving my family, having a new baby and moving across country, still being puffy....I think you get the idea.  Getting a job was not even close to the top of my priority list.

We had always worked my jobs where one of us was basically home with the kids....with a few exceptions...so, I still considered myself a stay at home mom....but just one who also worked part time. 

I had decided that when we moved, I would try to embrace the stay at home-ness of my new situation and see what I thought.  Would I like it?  Could we afford it?  Well, time has told the tale that, at this moment, we really can't afford it...lots of credit card debt from the move to pay off, etc., etc. 

So, I made the decision that I would just get a fabulous, high-paying job that I can carefully craft to my individual needs and desires and still take off when we want to take a family vacation, right? 

Wrong.

Nobody wants to even talk to me. Honestly, I haven't sent out too many resumes.  I can tell that they aren't going to let me show how I can do the job well, spend lots of time homeschooling my kids and take a road trip when we feel like it. Maybe I shouldn't pre-judge what they will think - but I feel like I am saving myself the awkward conversation later about what hours I actually want to work.

Once again, I didn't realize how good I had it in Minnesota.  I had work connections with people who knew me before children and who had trusted me enough to see if I was still capable of working as hard after children.  I was.  I even had bosses who understood that when it came down to it.....family should come first.  I had bosses who trusted me to work from home, so I could still be with my children, kiss the boo-boos, microwave the chicken nuggets for lunch, and still meet the deadlines.

I had it great.

Here, no one knows me.  I am an outsider from Minnesota.  Not sure if seeing that all my experience is from Minnesota is a consideration....but I have applied for jobs that really seemed perfect for me....and I hear nothing.  Maybe it is the economy.  Maybe it isn't.  Maybe it is me.  Maybe I have an old fashioned resume.  Maybe I don't have the latest version of Word/Excel listed on it.  I don't know.

There is a part of me that has been loving "just" being a stay at home mom.  No deadlines.  No putting the kids off because mommy has to meet a deadline, so I can't read/snuggle/tuck-in/watch Dora for the thousandth time.  But, there is also a part of me that misses being with adults.  Part of me misses knowing that I am really good at something.  Part of me misses having "my own" money.  Part of me misses getting a break from the children.

But, really, what I have probably noticed the most.....part of me misses having the excuse of being a working stay at home mom....so that pile of junk in the corner can be ignored a little longer....the dishes piled up on the counter can be ignored a little longer....the fact that my footsteps are crunchy because someone spilled cereal on the floor and left it, can be ignored a little longer....BUT, I don't have that excuse anymore.

Now, I really am a stay at home mom, no extra jobs, no extra money, just the job of keeping the house in order, food on the table and making a peaceful haven for my hubby to come home to....all on a smaller budget. 

That is a lot of pressure.....I think more than meeting the deadlines of my past.

The Rest of the Gang

My last few posts have introduced you to the 3 youngest members of my family.  Being introduced to the oldest members will have to wait.  They are all at the age (including Rain Man) where their psyche is a bit fragile.  I don't want to reveal too much, embarrass them too much, or label them with something that they will be haunted with and that will someday take them to therapy to talk about their mommy.

So, more to come....but I have to have to craft the information very carefully....cause I love their little psyches.

A-Man

Doesn't he look sweet?  Behind the sweet face lies quite a mind....

We have a few rules in our household.  We have banned "bad" words like "Shut Up" and "Stupid".  Worked fine with the first 3 children...they would occasionally say those things, mommy and daddy would gently remind them that we don't say those things and problem solved....they wouldn't say them.

This little man has found a way to work the system.  When he wanted someone to be quiet and stop bugging him, he would shout at them "Shut The Door Up"....so, you see, he wasn't saying the "bad" words that have been banned.....Shut Up. 

Or, when he was fed up with someone and wanted to belittle them, he would call them "Stuart".  Yes, Stuart....as in, "You are so Stuart!!!"  See, once again, he is not saying the bad word that has been banned from our household.....Stupid.

Clever little guy, isn't he?!?!

He also makes up jokes.  His latest cracked me up which is kind of the problem with him....he is very funny and I think the way his mind works is hilarious -so sometimes, he is hard to discipline!  

Here is his latest joke.

What is 2 plus 2 plus head?

4 Head.

Get it?  My husband didn't....at first.

I cannot wait to see what he turns out to be as a grown up!

But look at this guy.  He is a total sweetheart.

He cracks me up.

He LOVES babies - even when they are on the inside.  Here he is with me and our latest...I got daily hugs and  kisses for the baby on what he referred to as my "puffy" belly.  He would also hold daily conversations with the baby and occasionally read baby a good book or two! 

His question for me after the baby came out...."Why are you still fat....I mean, puffy, mom?"  

Maybe he is catching on to the rules.  You don't say Stupid.  You don't say Shut Up.  And, most importantly, you DO NOT say Fat to a woman who just had her 6th child!!!

Yeah, well, it has been almost a year - and yes, I am still puffy.

S-Girl

Here is my S-Girl wearing a dress I had when I was little. 

Here is a picture of me around the same age. 

Here she is at her 1st visit to the dentist recently.

I love how serious she looks in this one!  She did a great job and wasn't scared at all. 

V-Girl in Action

For my family who haven't been able to see my V-Girl in action, here is a quick video of her walking around.  I apparently flipped the camera sideways for a portion of this - so you will see here walking sideways....sorry....hope it doesn't make you sick or anything. 

She has been walking for almost 2 months now.  She has even mastered walking backwards.  If you are sitting on the floor, she will walk over in front of you by quite a ways....walk backwards until she hits your legs and plop down.  It is very cute.  She also now reaches her arms to you when you wants to be picked up and opens and closes her fingers at you.  As D-Man says, "I just can't turn her down when she does that!!!!" 

We "think" she may be starting to talk - as she says things that sound like words - but she rarely repeats them on command, so it might just be wishful thinking.  She definitely adds to the noise level around here whether she is saying "real" words or not!!!

I Want This Hair Cut

I have been flipping through the home shopping networks (not sure why - I don't even like to shop in real stores - and we are working on Dave Ramsey's Total Money Makeover, so I can't actually "get" anything - but I am still watching) and stumbled upon this woman getting her hair styled on national television.  I became so enamored with her hair, I called for my little servants to bring my camera and the remote, so I could pause and rewind and get a good shot of it.  My kids scurried to do my bidding....well, actually they didn't....I got up and got them for myself...but they were now interested in what mom was going to do next.  I proceeded to pause the screen when I thought there was a good shot and my daughter stood in front of the T.V. and took the pictures.

I like this view too.....

The actual product is some sort of "age defying" hair goo....whatever....I was constantly being distracted by the man applying the goo, because he had really, really long fingernails....beautifully manicured....but really long for a guy.

And finally, the back. 

I want this hair...not the gray/grey color.  It sort of reminds me of the "Kelly" from Charlie's Angels style that I have wanted since the 70's.  I never wanted the Farrah and certainly not the Sabrina....always the Kelly.  We will see if I can find anyone here in Georgia that can make magic with my hair though.  See, my hair is very thick, very coarse and there is a lot of it.  Here in Georgia, it is so hot, that 99.9% of my days I have my hair pulled back with a headband or up in a pony tail.  When we arrived here almost a year ago, I had short hair, but since I didn't know any body to cut my hair....I just haven't gotten it cut.  I did get a trim sometime last November....but since then....nothin'. 

I finally have began (begun) to feel less traumatized by the whole move and have started looking at myself in the mirror....after almost a year of ignoring myself...it has not been a pretty sight.  I am also facing the body that I have allowed to comfort itself with food for the past year.  It has transformed itself into something I don't recognize.  Kayla, just Shut the Fridge.

Oh, well, if I find a stylist, I will post before and after pictures for us all.

I'm a Georgia Peach!

I have now voted twice in Georgia - once in the primary last month and yesterday in the run-off and both times, as I left, I was handed this adorable sticker.  I don't know why I think it is so cute...probably because in Minnesota, we just got a red sticker with white words saying "I voted".  The Georgia version is waaaay better and my voting place is about 3 or 4 minutes from my front door, so that is waaay better in Georgia too!

Shut The Fridge

In deciding to have my own blog after much encouragement from my sister Kandiland...one of my first hurdles was to come up with a name.  I solicited input from my little darlings and got ideas like "Lame Mom Who Likes to Torture Her Kids", "Not Cool Mom", "Mama K" , to just name a few of the loving names they came up with.....however, I was informed by my 12 year old son that any use of the word "Mama" in my blog title was totally, NOT cool.  We also threw around the idea of "Kayla And The Gang", because that is usually how I sign cards and things.  However, after a Google search of that name.....let's just say....the page choices that popped up were not for young impressionable eyes....well, not really for my old, middle age eyes either.  So, we moved onto things I say a lot....we toyed around with "Uff Da Y'all"....because I do say Uff Da....being from Minnesota don't cha know....and, I have found Y'all sneaking into my vocabulary.  We all kind of liked it and I liked that it seemed to encompass my old life and my new life....but it still wasn't grabbing us all by the throat. 

Then one of us came up with "Shut The Fridge".....perfect.  I say this to my 6 children probably 10-20 times a day....actually I even say it to my hubby because he likes to get out all his sandwich ingredients set them on the counter next to the fridge, create said sandwich, pack it in his lunch, get some chips, pack those, get some pop, add that, get a napkin, add that, discuss some sports trivia with my oldest son.....and then start putting ingredients back into the fridge and finally shutting the door.

The more I thought about this name, I loved it....it describes part of my life as mom and part of my life as Kayla, who since our move last fall, can't seem to Shut the Fridge for myself either.  A little...well, no, I guess, a lot of comfort eating has happened!!!

So, welcome to this little snapshot of my life and, "Don't just stand there!  Shut the Fridge!"