Burn Baby, Burn!

Hello All!

It is the last day of the month, and I have not posted in weeks, so here is my obligatory post-holiday... post:

Thanksgiving went very well. We only had a few guests over in our tiny apartment, but it was a hit. Apparently, I'm a good cook. Shocking. I really thought I'd end up on Worst Cooks in America. But anyway, we had fun. I began my prep work Wednesday and finished most everything off by Thursday. I did forget a couple of dishes, like the cranberry sauce (made from scratch) and I burned the biscuits. Funny story about that: I completely forgot they were in the oven as I didn't hear the timer go off. After dinner, I remembered that I left the oven on, which I turned off. Later in the evening, say around 10ish, I realized that the reason the oven was on in the first place was to cook the biscuits. So I ran over - like that made a difference - and pulled light brown hockey pucks out of the oven. Instead of chucking them, I figured they'd make good croutons or something. But I have yet to test that theory since they are still sitting on top of the fridge.

Let me tell you, I am really burned out. I did so much cooking, cleaning and washing dishes over the weekend that I am hard pressed to find the energy to do any of that now. This week has found me crashing, leaving a lot of housework undone. Don't get me wrong, I've been maintaining, but I haven't been following my schedule. And of course, because I am not made up and cleaning up, I feel miserable. It really doesn't help that the piping work is still not done in the complex, so my closet is still mostly empty and my room a wreck. I can't wait for this work to be done. If they aren't back by Christmas, I am putting everything away and letting them move it themselves. Ugh.

On a positive note, my little girl and I have gotten back on track with our school. She is back to her studies (pre-k), and I to mine (distance-learning dressmaking course). It will be a relief to begin accomplishing goals once more, even if they are relatively small.

Well, I think we shall hightail it out of here. The plumbing is off, and with small children, that is never a good thing.

Ta-ta!

The Hardworking Housewife

Bad Week

So Tuesday was the proverbial "bad day." My little ones absolutely refused to listen from the moment they woke up, and that combined with the impending repiping that wasn't started Monday, I lost my sanity for the day. They refused to get dressed, nearly making me late to drop off the oldest at school, and I nearly left the grocery store twice because they refused to sit still and stay in the toy car part of the shopping cart. There were multiple minor and major meltdowns from both children Tuesday. The icing on the proverbial cake was me dropping my house keys into my coffee cup when we arrived home. It was at that moment that I realized there really were such things as "bad days," meaning days that are actually bad. I managed to get the kids upstairs, AND carried 60 pounds of groceries (everything I purchased) in one trip from my car, which was parked on the street, of course. I am amazed I made it up the stairs (we are 2nd story, of course, of course). We were confined to the dining area of our apartment because of the work, and I just couldn't take sitting their with the kids. They had energy to burn, so I packed them back up, packed up my laundry, and took them to Grandpa's to hang out with my brother and do laundry.

Fortunately, Tuesday didn't end so badly, and Wednesday started out wonderfully. Unfortunately, Wednesday night ended in screaming fits from both kids, and they had 4 with their babysitter (that poor girl!). I managed to get them to bed when we got home, but I didn't fall asleep until 2 AM.

Today is on the fence. I woke up okay, not fully rested, but not too terribly tired. Because I wanted to avoid what happened the last couple of days, I made the little ones breakfast, which is something I never do. I usually just give them cereal with milk. But I enjoyed making breakfast so much, I may continue this trend. They loved it!

Now, I sorta promised an explanation on why I have a babysitter: I work part time, and because my husband works full time from early morning to mid afternoon, I have my babysitter watch the kids for me. I typically only work Saturdays, which doesn't require a babysitter. But Thursday nights do, since I have choir, and when I work, like I did yesterday and will today, I have her come over. I pay her almost half of what I make (which isn't much to begin with) and she watches the kids for me. It works our rather nicely for both of us. Oh, and the kids love her. When she's here, it's "bye mama," and them asking her to pick them up. Win-win, I say.

Well, that's all for now. Hopefully, this week ends better than it started.

The Exhausted Housewife

Repairs

Re-post of my current Facebook status update:

So our complex is re-piping the units this week. They have yet to make it to our apartment, but to prepare, my room looks more like a storage shed as I had to empty my closet (it lines up with both bathrooms). I am waiting to move things out of the kitchen cabinets until they get here. I really only want to move what needs to be moved without creating too much extra work. BUT, I used this as an excuse to organize the hall closet. I am taking a little break for lunch before I go reorganize the toys and start moving things out from under all the sinks. [End post]

This means that this week is going to be fun. I'm wondering when they will get to our apartment and the extent of the work. I've only ever seen re-piping done during a full-scale remodel, and that was only on TV. I'm not sure how well they will work around us or how the kids will deal with this. Right now, it's just me and the littlest guy waiting to see what will happen. I'm hoping the work won't be too extensive, as I don't really feel like going insane at the moment. There is good news, though, and that is that the main living areas are relatively clean, save for a little vacuuming and/or mopping, and there is only one spoon in the sink. It's the simple things that make a mama happy. Well, I better get my littlest dude down for his nap (hopefully) so I can continue working on the things I need to get done before the contractor makes his way to our humble little abode.

Ta-ta!

The Hardworking Housewife

Too Tired

Hah. I just start this new routine, and already this week found me stumbling to the finish line. I don't think Halloween helped. It interrupted my entire schedule. I know. I know. It was a holiday yada yada yada. For future reference, I will definitely need to plan holiday weeks ahead of time so this doesn't happen again. I also think I need to post a daily schedule for each week day so everyone can help keep this place in order.

To make matters more annoying, something blew into my eye yesterday morning while I was blow drying my hair. I have no idea what it is and it's still bothering me. I also need more coffee, but I feel too nauseous to drink any more. That usually happens when I don't eat or when I eat too much [Halloween] candy.

Well, here's to me trying to take back my day!

The [Exhausted and] Hardworking Housewife

Hope You Had A Happy Halloween!

Good morning!

 I trust everyone had a happy and safe Halloween! We had quite a walk last night for our trick-or-treating. We went with friends and walked for a good 2 1/2 hours, up and down hilly streets, which isn't easy when you're wearing 4 inch heels and dressed as Fran Fine, The Nanny. But the kids had fun and we ended our trick-or-treating with a super scary haunted house. It was neat. Of course, because it was Halloween, we absolutely didn't keep to our schedule. Dinner consisted of candy and watered-down juice. I figured, though, because it is a holiday, it is okay to toss the schedule out the window. It all blew back through the window this morning, but at least we had fun.

 Which brings me to today. I have designated Thursday as "dusting day," which means on top of picking up yesterday's ruins, I will spend the day dusting the house and cleaning surfaces I usually don't touch the rest of the week. Breaking up the housework in this way makes maintaining the home so much easier.

 Well, that's all I have for now. I've been awake since 5:16 AM, and I'm still not awake. But I got showered at least. And coffeed (a little). As for makeup, I am going light and I'm going to just blow dry my hair.

The Hardworking Housewife