Undone

Time to review 2009 goals. So… here we go!

Increased Church and Temple attendance. This feels kind of personal, but I know i can do better than I did. How’s that for vague?

Have a happy Baby in July – Man oh Man, did I accomplish this! July 2, I had a beautiful Baby girl. She is happy and smiley and even when she’s in a bad mood (from teeth, that she got on Sunday December 27, 2009, Bottom right) she still manages to be sweet and charming. Huzzah!

Attend The Specialist’s wedding – Yes. it was beautiful. We were a bit late. and we worried about leaving Katie out to play with Dax, but she was happy enough, and had a good time. Sweet girl. Amazing.

More Crocheting – Uh No. I still have not mastered the art of Crochet.

more Quilt work – I got Audrey’s Monkey Quilt done. Beautiful. I still need to take pictures LOL.

Get Katie’s Big girl room set up – YES! Twice! She was set up in a big girl bed upstairs, and downstairs. Amazing, we rock!

Have a great 5th anniversary – I was huge and pregnant, so it wasn’t the awesomest Anniversary ever, but it was definitely not the worst. 🙂

My Goals for the new year? Of course!
Save Money
Pay off debt (Most importantly RC Willey, and Scott’s Car)
Have a great time at Disneyland
Give Audrey a Great Party (whoo hoo!)
Become a Stay at Home mom
Spend more time with my kids and Scott
Learn to Cook … better? More? Whichever, or both 😉
Learn and grow more in the gospel
Sit IN the chapel more than once a (EDIT) month.
Potty train Katie (if she’s ready, and I think she is. :))

Recap:
(at the end of the year, In case I didn’t mention it in 2008, My BFF forever DQ moved in!)
Attended The Specialist’s and The Ballerina’s Wedding. Very Beautiful.
Found out that I was having my second little girl!
Scott took me out for a crazy romantic night at a B&B, and got me a pretty new necklace. 🙂
Work got a WHOLE lot busier as they cut jobs and increased our work load. I am grateful that it was not my job they cut, even though we are usually fairly busy.
Got really sick, and spent some time getting rehydrated in the hospital
Picked out Audrey’s name. Beautiful. I am very happy with it.
Had to Call 911 for Scott
Had Audrey! 🙂 Sweet girl of mine!
Finished Scott’s Book
Got my hair cut, LOOKS AWESOME!
Came up with a book idea, Leaving it floating in my head.
Got a Kidney infection 🙁
Went trick or treating for the first time With Katie, She was Cinderella
Thanksgiving and new moon with DQ, Fun times!
Cars break, Katie loves Christmas
I turn 25… GOSH!
Derringer Meryl [year end review] Out

A crayon went through our washer (and dryer) and now, a load of laundry (with some great cute clothes of my kids) has been ruined.

I’m upset. Especially since some of the clothes that have been ruined are Audrey’s Christmas clothes (Dress and PJ’s) and the prescribed method to get it out is the following:

1.      Examine all articles of clothing from the offending batch of laundry. You will want to remove the crayon from all pieces of clothing at one time. It’s going to be tedious and time consuming, but it’s definitely a process worth going through.
2. Lay the stained area of clothing on several paper towels. Four or five paper towels should do the trick. Try not to have any layers of material under the stain or you may end up with more mess than you bargained for.
3. Spray the stains with a car part lubricant. Let it sit for a few minutes. Flip the clothing over and spray on the opposite side. Let the fabric sit for a few minutes more.
4. Pour a little liquid dishwashing detergent onto the stained area. Gently rub the detergent into the stain. The wax will work it’s way onto the paper towels. Replace the towels as needed. Continue to work detergent into the stain until all of the crayon is removed.
5. Wash the clothing with laundry detergent and color-safe bleach. Use a hot water cycle for 15 minutes or on the heavy load option. Rinse the clothing in warm water.
6. Verify that the stain(s) have been completely removed. If there’s still crayon residue on the clothing, repeat steps above.

I don’t know what the life of a Stay at home mom is like, but I can tell you I don’t have time to clean 15+ items like this, especially each spot on the item. some of them have 5-10 areas on it that would need this method.  Part of me says to just move on and replace the items, but some of them are irreplaceable. One of Audrey/Katie’s receiving blankets got marked up, and honestly even though I could make a new one (or my mom could, whatever, since she made that one) it wouldn’t be the same. So I guess I’ll go through and determine “Can I/Should I save this?” and work from there. It’s really disheartening. i already feel like a failure most of the time because I’m really hard on myself as it is, but to have proof kind of bugs me. *sigh*really though when you think about it, one load of ruined laundry looking back over 5 years of being married and I did some of my own laundry (and my parents) prior to that, it’s a fairly good track record I guess.

I better go get the kids in the bath while I figure out what to do now… 🙁

Derringer Meryl [upset] out

I swear December is the month of things breaking. 😛

My car decided not to start, so I drove Scott’s car for a while, and I think that we should all know that I can’t drive manual to save my life. Ok. I can to save my life, but I’d probably pee myself in the process. LOL. Then Scott’s car would only drive in 3rd, and so that makes things ultra fun. So we took my car in, and luckily enough it was JUST the battery.  Then Scott decided to look at his car, and he just needed to jam the shift cables back into the right place. I still maintain the triumph that me driving manual is a bad idea, I will break your car. 😛

However,  because our cars were broken, i got to spend a very magical day with my girls,  as we set up our Christmas tree. Sometimes being an adult it’s really hard to remember what makes Christmas so great. Now days it’s full of stress and events and we lose a lot of the carefree moments of being able to run and play and anticipate. the fullness of our lives just pushes it out. Well, I got the tree out and katie started to sing songs. I would say they ar e Christmas songs, but really the only lyrics were “Christmas day christmas day” over and over. But it was sweet. She got the ornaments out and hung them on the ledge of our bed, and then after I took those down she started hanging them on the Christmas stick (the tree w/o the branches yet attached) I had to show Scott, who laughed wholeheartedly at her antics. Then, the most cutest thing ever happened, she was leaning into the Christmas tree box, and *THUMP* she got stuck, her feet wouldn’t touch the ground and she couldn’t push her way back out. LOL it was great to see her feet dangling over the edge of the box. So cute!

Audrey is growing by leaps and bounds, and is doing really well with sitting up. She is also a scooter, she will try to scoot off your lap to stand up, so adorable.

I’ll have to do my year end wrap up, review my goals. I don’t know how I did this year, but we’ll see. 🙂

Derringer Meryl {at peace} Out

What’s the matter with Kids these days??

Not really. I have been with my kids this weekend (and other people’s too LOL) and I love my girls. They are a light in my life. While they on occasion drive me absolutely nuts (see this evening) they are sweet, and cute, and a blessing. There is a saying I learned on my message board, which i think is absolutely true….

“Our first child helps us to discover the depth of love; our second child, the breadth of it.”

I love my girls, I cherish them. I am grateful that they were sent to me and Scott to bring joy to our lives and allow us to progress as children of God.

Derringer Meryl [what’s the matter with] Out

Well, It seems everytime I think “well at least I don’t have to go back to the doctor”it turns out that I do. 😛 I love the doctor. Please note the sarcasm there. I’ll be heading back in December 😛

it’s also been one whole year since I found out that I was pregnant with Audrey. it’s crazy. I think of our life before and it’s hard to think of what it was like before she came. She has slid in so naturally with our pace, that it’s insane. Though it can be hard to make sure she goes everywhere we do in the house since Katie usually makes sure that I chase her upstairs at least once or twice a day. It can be difficult to fix Katie lunch or dinner because Audrey wants me to hold her while i do it. So there is usually someone crying.

Work has been work like. Not terribly fun, but then again that’s why it’s work and not play. I have been doing really well at keeping my stats high and making sure that I keep my job. I’m grateful to have one, but sometimes it’d be nice to work some where else. I think everyone in  the world should at least have like… a month of working somewhere they’d love. I think that’d be fun.

Katie was Cinderella for halloween. She probably wouldn’t have been anything had it not been for my mom who is awesome, and made the prettiest dress for her. My mom collects (I guess you’d say) fabric and had some really pretty blue brocade (I’d call it that, but I might be mistaken, maybe damask?) that she had saved for 10 years and worked out perfect for katie’s dress. She looked beautiful in it and wouldn’t get out of it for Pj’s on Friday (we had a halloween party) BUT we were able to get her out of it on saturday in exchange for some cup of noodles. She’s addicted to those things. I think they’re pretty gross. LOL. she didn’t want to go very far trick or treating, and a lot of our neighbors had their lights off. Next year we might have to skip the party with our friends in favor of the Halloween party at our ward. I saw a kid going tick or treating via car (IE his parents were driving him around) and all I could think was “the point is getting all that exercise so you can eat the buckets and buckets of candy!” but apparently the point was lost. Katie just hit the houses on our street that had their lights on. She kept crying for Daddy who was at home handing out candy, so we finished the street and went home. Hopefully next year we can meet up with her friend and go that way so that she can understand  more what’s going on. She wasn’t really that into it. I was fine just going on our street since I was carrying Audrey (she wanted to be held to sleep) and that was straining to hold a hand, a bucket and a baby, I felt like I was juggling and I was afraid I would drop Audrey, which would have been horrific. We didn’t have too many kids, but we live in an older neighborhood, so it’s not that unusual. (As a note, Audrey was a Penguin in a store bought costume, she stayed SO dang warm in that thing, it was perfect.)

I was thinking about trick or treating as a kid, and I was trying REALLY hard to remember what happened, and it came to me that we did trunk or treat at the church mostly (and inside, as it was often cold! Yay Colorado!) and I remember it being a GREAT time. We had a scary maze, a cake walk, and several other activities. It was fun to spend Halloween with my friends. I don’t think I even ever won anything (except candy) but I had such a good time, being in a costume, playing games and spending time with my friends.

I still had fun when I came here though, it was a new experienced, we walked ALL OVER getting candy. We were not the only ones. I was glad to have a large group to go with. I don’t remember all of my costumes over the year (though I recall some, I know at the very least, I was a medieval woman, a cat and Snow white. Other that, I’m at a loss, sorry mom!) It was great to go trick or treating with a large group, and to go EVERYWHERE up and down a bunch of big streets in my parent’s neighborhood.

I have been listening to a lot of Weezer lately. I find that sometimes that Weezer helps me boost out of a bad mood. i was driving home, and turned up “In the Garage” and sang along at the top of my lungs. In that moment I was 8 years old again. As I drove my family wagon home so I could fix lunch for my girls, I realized that despite the fact that I am still relatively young in years, I have a lot of responsibilities. I have two beautiful girls, who depend on me for many things. I often find myself feeling young and carefree and then it comes to me that I am NOT carefree. Not to be a downer, I love my family, but even if i sit in my car listening to music all day it can’t hold off the truth that i am Old. Not in years, but in obligations. I think about how i love/d playing video games, but I simply don’t have the time or patience for it anymore. It makes me sad as I still want to play, and when I do find time someone inevitably wants a drink or needs fed, or needs a diaper change. Something always seems to need to be done.  I am hoping that later today I will get to play some, Maybe Final Fantasy 12. I haven’t gotten to play in a year and a half.
I was pining the other day at some on Sale Ben and Jerry’s when I whined at Scott about how I really wanted it. He just shrugged. I told him, most of the time when I’m complaining like that I need someone to give me  permission to do something nice for myself.  Scott just sighed, clearly exasperated. I do require people to tell me “Why don’t you take some time for yourself?” I put myself last. Always. I don’t know how to change that. I come after my children, after my husband, after just about anything.

speaking of… Katie needs me. Off to be the most super-est mom I can be. 😉

Derringer Meryl [here there everywhere] Out