Strange Summer Days

I thought that summer would be a time for sleeping late,relaxing and having fun. I even posted earlier that I was thinking about decreasing my anti-anxiety and insomnia meds. I was soooo wrong. I have been able at times to sleep later, but that's it. Everyday I have been dealing with kids that can't get along. They constantly yell at each other and threaten bodily harm. Of course at times actually harming one another! It's all Mama Mama Mama Look at Meeee Look at Mmmeeeeee! I don't want to look at them all the time. Some days I don't care about seeing their coloring projects or see T jump on one foot. I just want to be left alone for just a few damn minutes. One day I heard both of them screaming from outside. I went out to see what the fucking problem was now. I found T swinging a wooden croquet mallet at E because he thought it was his turn to swing on the tire swing. YIKES!

It seems my anxiety has been steadily increasing with each passing minute I have to spend with these demon children. On some days, by 11 am even, I was already tearing through my medicine cabinet in search of anything that might help my nerves. One day I took an Ativan meant for my dentist appointment, one day I found an old Darvocet. Do I have to become a drug addict in order to deal with my kids. I just can't handle the noise, yelling, petty jealousies and constant need for attention most days. Finally, having no more meds hidden away, I resorted to separating them at the first sign of bickering. That did help a little. I also made an appointment to see my doctor to update my meds....

Then, Monday came and E started her week of Girl Scout day camp. Wow, what a difference in the home atmosphere. T and I had a wonderful quiet day together. No yelling, fighting and he even was able to entertain himself for over and hour with his cars. I asked him to come swimming with me and he said "not now, I am playing with my cars". Really? He, at this very moment, on this now Thursday day 4 of E being away, is playing by himself with his Tinker Toys. I even WANT to go play with him.

It is not all E's fault and I don't want you to think that I blame it on her alone. Even though she can be a real bitch for a 9 year old. T turns into an annoying little brother when she is around, and she doesn't for the most part want to be near him.

While T and I were hanging around outside on Monday we noticed this strange flying insect on our flowers we have never seen before. I looked it up and I think it is a Hummingbird Moth. It is just slightly larger than a bumblebee with wings that work like a Hummingbirds. It is very pretty and it wasn't bothered by me shoving the camera at it for a close shot. It has come back to these same flowers everyday since.

I have no idea what the flowers are called. I just named them Paisley because of their shape. Maybe one of you know?

Pretty Paisley Flowers

Pretty Hummingbird Moth on Pretty Paisley Flowers

Infatuation

Could I have really been in love with David Soul ? At the time I thought so. I was a little older than E is now. Maybe 11-12? I remember looking forward to watching Starsky and Hutch every week. Most of my friends liked Paul Michael Glaser, but I always seem to root for the underdog. I even had David's 45 'Don't give up on us baby' with 'Black Bean Soup' on the b side. I listened to it over and over and over again.



When Starsky and Hutch moved from a weekend night to a weeknight and my parents told me I could no longer watch the show, I threw a really huge temper tantrum. Of course I got my way and they let me stay up!


When I mentioned my once love for David Soul to my husband, he informed me that around the time the show was on or soon after, David was accused of wife beating. Is this true? I was devastated.


I loved many actors when I was young, but that's for another post. And now when E has a tantrum about staying up late to watch her idols on TV, I will be able to empathize. Yeah, right. "GET YOUR ASS IN BED BITCH!" just kiddin.

Surf City

I'm back!

Yes, I was away for a week on vacation in case anyone noticed. Almost every year since I have known my husband we have vacationed on Long Beach Island in New Jersey for a week. Yes, NJ, I know, people from Vermont are supposed to vacation in Maine, but we tried Maine a couple of times but we always return to NJ. I like that in NJ we can walk almost everywhere, in Maine we had to drive to the beach and shopping etc. I also think the sand is softer and the water is warmer and less salty in NJ. Of course Maine's seafood is better, but I had twin lobsters this week in NJ and they were delicious!

I also love that LBI is small enough that we can walk from the bay side to the ocean side. The sunsets are beautiful. (Hus said it was OK to put pictures of him and the kids on the blog if they were shot from BEHIND, who knew?)

Sunset on the Bay

The kids loved playing in the sand and swimming in the ocean waves. The water was a bit too cold for mama, but I did dip my tootsies in a few times

Beached

We noticed this sign placed at every entrance to the beach. This past year they took sand from deep in the ocean and put it onto the Surf City beach to help build up where nature had eroded. In the replaced sand they found WW One Ordnance which is another word for explosives or ammunition! The sign warns not to dig deeper than 12inches. Yikes! Luckily the kids were well behaved so I didn't have to tell them to go dig a deep hole somewhere way over there.

Danger

We gave T some fancy sand castle beach toys for his birthday which worked very well. I don't remember ever having anything like these to make castles with, usually I had a broken bucket or a plastic cup.

Mamas Castle

One thing that was different this year was that we had neighbors. We rented the same place last year but nobody was staying in the downstairs apartment, and before that we had always rented one family houses or cottages. You would have thought we never saw people before. We were like bumbling idiots around them the first days. Should we talk to them, should we avoid them, sneak in and out when they are not home, should we not answer the door? As you probably have gathered by my posts and by the fact that we live way way out in the country that we are not the sociable type. We like who we like and if we don't like you we don't want you as a neighbor, so why take a chance with neighbors?

Well ,it turned out these people were very nice, sociable people, and didn't seem to notice our bumbling. They even acted like they wanted to spend time with us. After a bottle of wine I became friendly too. My hus and I even enjoyed spending a couple of evenings with them. I was only disappointed because our vacation is the only time my hus and I get to watch movies together so we missed two movie nights(and after movie action). We did get to watch "RV" -very funny family movie, "Yours Mine and Ours" another funny family movie and "Little Miss Sunshine" HILARIOUS, not for kids movie, which we didn't know until grandpa started with all the foul language and drugs, by then it was too late to turn it off!

The neighbors had kids also that E and T could play with, which made vacation a lot more fun for them. T didn't seem to mind one bit they were all girls!

T, also not used to being around people thought it was OK to run around naked outside (girls screaming) and my husband also caught him about to PEE OFF THE DECK! The second story deck. OOPS.

I Hope I Have Done Something Right

Last week I was having a particularly stressful day at home with my kids. I had no patience with them that morning, like many mornings, but this one for some reason I felt more agitated. Every word out of their mouths was making my muscles feel like they were being constricted. If I heard the word "Mama" one more time my head would explode! I can't even remember what happened or what they were doing to drive me insane that day. But I felt like I just had to escape for a few minutes at least, alone. I find it very difficult most days to continuously answer questions and always pay attention to what my kids are doing. "Watch this Mama, I can jump on one foot" "Look Mama, that's a tree!" "Mama, I am hungry". Sometimes I snap. "Listen, people, Mama needs to not hear the word Mama for a while, can you just go do something by yourselves which doesn't involve hitting one another with a croquet mallet?" Yes, my son attempted to hit E while she was swinging on our tire swing because he thought it should be his turn! Yikes! Sometimes I even YELL!

Anyways I left my two children inside while I went outside claiming I needed to get something from the van. I really went outside to clean the van and I didn't want help. While I was sorting through all the trash and papers thrown about the vehicle, I came across this song E had written. My heart sank. It is so sweet. I wondered how long ago it was written, it had to be after Christmas as that is when she got her guitar.

So maybe my yelling once in a while and need for time on my own is not scarring my kids mentally for life. I really hope not. I really do love them and I am glad E knows it.

I Wish...

1. The volume on my car stereo would go higher than 37. ( I have adult angst)

2. I had more time to blog. (obvious)

3. Cats could speak English. ( If they have food and water, I say "sorry, I don't know what the hell you are saying to me, meow, meow, that's all I get", probably they are telling me how much they love and adore me) (or "meow, give me canned food Bitch, meow!")

4. Humans could survive on air and water alone. (think of how skinny we would be and no messy waste products)

5. Little fairy painters would magically come over and finish painting my living room. ( My hands are numb and I'll have to remember when I am having chest and arm pain tonight it is not a heart attack)

6. My airbag light would shut off without me having to spend $65 to just diagnose the problem. (lots of people still drive cars without airbags anyways, right?)

7. That all my underwear did not look like something a great grandmother would wear when down to her last pair, after being incontinent in her "good pairs". ( I AM married with children)

8. My kids could get along for more than 5 minutes. (too much, I know)

9. The price of gas would go down. (then I could afford to have my airbags checked)

10. Buffy the Vampire Slayer was still on TV and not re-runs. ( I do have the complete collectors edition of all 7 seasons, guess I could just watch it again and again...)

I miss Spike, he always knew what was going on and what to do about it.

I also wish for larger breasts, smaller tummy, peace on earth and good health for everyone!