Archive for November, 2011
I thought I’d be able to make it through NaBloPoMo but work won out after all.
We have a big project going on at work right now and I am just exhausted. I am averaging about 4.5 hours of sleep a night with last night clocking in at slightly less than 3 hours since I was working late (sometimes laptops and bringing your work home with you is not a good thing). Then we had to get up early to try and walk in for our 900th fingerprint appointment for our second I800A application with USCIS since, once again, the fingerprinting appointment they gave us wouldn’t work for either of our schedules. Thankfully that trip was successful (based in large part, I think, because J wore his uniform which comes in handy for a perk every now and again) and didn’t turn out to be a really early morning and long trip through the tunnel for nothing.
Fingerprints? Yeah, they’re as bad as always. Maybe worse. It’s always good to hear you have the worst fingerprints the technician has ever seen. He asked me if I cleaned a lot since household chemicals can damage your fingerprints. I nearly fell on the floor laughing at that, of course. He also proactively did a paper and ink copy of my fingerprints since he thinks it’s likely my electronic ones will be rejected. All this would be great if I were a criminal, apparently. Not so much since all I want them to do is approve the same form they’ve already approved for us 4 times over the last 6 years.
So anyway, I blew this 30 day posting thing . Ah well, I’ve posted more this month than I have all year so at least there’s that.
Just when I think my head will explode if I hear “MamaMamaMamaMamaMaaaaMaaaa” one more time – I heard this tonight: “Mama, I love you more than marshmallows, cupcakes, and frosting.”
Knowing how much she likes frosting (she IS my kid after all), I take this as high praise indeed.
She also gave me 42 hugs. She counted every single one of them AND threw in an extra one “just because, Mama.”
I simply could not adore this kid more.
We officially started our holiday season today with Thanksgiving dinner #1 with my family. (Oh my word, I’m still stuffed HOURS later.)
We haven’t visited my folks in a while and since we have J’s folks coming to our house for the actual holiday we decided to make a quick (quick being relative since it’s a 5+ hour drive) trip up before the holiday. Fortunately my family was game with moving the holiday up to accommodate us so we spent the whole day doing nothing but cooking, socializing, and eating. And make no mistake, we definitely ate. A lot.
My whole entire immediate family (+ an uncle) was here which is always cool. I know these days can’t last forever so it’s especially nice when we can make it happen. Most of the grandkids were also here so Ava had cousins upon cousins to play with. And to be clear, by play with I really mean boss around. She’s the youngest so she tends to be a tad bit spoiled (by everyone) sometimes.
What I really love about these days is that I can relax a bit with Ava. It’s so nice to know that I don’t have to eagle eye her every minute because I know that my mom and my sisters and her cousins are watching her too. On top of that, it warms my heart to know that all of this running about and playing with her cousins are building these lifetime memories for her. I remember all of the holidays with my grandparents/aunts & uncles/cousins and I so want her to have at least a taste of the same. It’s harder, of course, since we don’t live close enough to make it an everyday thing but we’re doing what we can with what we’ve got.
Also nice is making that last minute trip to the grocery store (that’s a Thanksgiving tradition too, isn’t it?) and running into an old childhood friend that you haven’t seen in years and years and years. That can only ever happen in your hometown and you realize how much you miss stuff like that after you’ve moved on and moved away. I mean, running into people we know happens at (now) home but these are people I’ve known for 12 years or less. The gal I ran into today has known me almost my whole life. Even though we don’t often talk there’s just a comfort level with people you’ve known and been friends with forever that you don’t have with anyone else.
You know what I don’t miss about my hometown, though? Trains. Stupid whistle-blowing at all hours of the night gets old fast…
Heading back home tomorrow and will jump right back into the hectic rat race and all of the stress that awaits me in my real life. But today was a really, really nice day and gave both J and I a desperately needed break. The rare opportunity to relax a bit today made the whole drive worth every minute.
To Mamaw and Papaw’s house we go for an early kickoff to our Thanksgiving celebrations.
We have at least a 5 hour drive and we’re leaving at rush hour with nothing prepared in advance. This means throw some clothes in a bag, the kid in the carseat, the dogs in the kennels and hope for the best.
Wish us luck.
Updated: We made it. 6+ hours later with a detour by Wal-Mart for cough medicine for the husband and kid including an impulse purchase of a toddler cheerleader uniform that was strategically placed by the door as I walked into Wal-Mart. Hey, we are in Hokie country now. How could I resist?
I was going to do a random phone photo post – - except I’ve just spent the last 30 minutes looking for my iPhone and I can’t seem to locate it. On top of that, Find My iPhone isn’t working for me right now so I have no clue where it might be (except maybe in the car and I’m not going out there to look tonight – too cold).
Crap. This means I’ll probably have to do an Ava purse search in the morning. That’s where I found my debit card last week after it had been missing for ages. And my keys. And my work ID badge.
So that’s all I had for you tonight. Sorry.
Oh, wait. Ava had another fabulous day at school. I dare not hope we’ve turned the corner completely but it’s given me hope in a week when I sorely needed it. Work is, ummmm, stressful (not in a bad way) right now and knowing that I can come home to an easy(ish) night and just relax (well, not much due to school) is priceless.
Now that’s really it for tonight.