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One More Try

22 Dec

After another aggravating issue with our DSL phone internet service, we are now surfing hi-speed with the cable company.  This just better work!  I can’t even begin to describe how incredibly frustrating it’s been not having a reliable internet service – especially since I was counting on the internet to do most of my Christmas shopping!  Really, the only problems we’ve had since we’ve moved have involved two of the pastimes we love the most – this and TV watching.

It’s funny because before the move we were talking up DIRECTV – saying it’s so awesome and we always get great service.  Since the move, we’ve been through 3 different High Def DVR receivers (something that made us miss the last episode of Heroes before the new year!) and now the access card on another new one could be going bad!  And every time Andrew would call to try and get help they would put him on hold where he would eventually be disconnected!  Hopefully, we’re through with our TV/Internet issues.  The phone company problems made us so angry that we’re completely canceling service (even though we had a great phone number!).  All of you friends and family reading this – please bear with us – I’ll let you know the new house phone number as soon as we know it.  🙂

One other ridiculous thing that’s happened to us since the move – I tried to order pizza from Pizza Hut (which is like less than a mile away from us) the first week we were here.  We didn’t have a house phone number yet and when they asked for a number I told them I had to use my cell.  The girl then tells me my cell is not registering in their system and because it’s not registering I can’t order pizza from them!  WHAT?!?!  What about the days before everything was computerized and they had to take down my order on a notepad and drivers had to have maps in their cars?  I mean, all I wanted was two medium original pan crust pizzas with Italian sausage!  Of course, Andrew’s response to all this didn’t really help my disbelief – he simply said “Well, we won’t be ordering from Pizza Hut anymore.”  NO!  I LOVE FREAKING PIZZA HUT!  Although I’m annoyed they wouldn’t deliver me pizza I don’t want to write them off altogether.  Every once in awhile I need that grease fix that only Pizza Hut can give me!  I just thought it was a riot.  NO NUMBER?!?! NO PIZZA!

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C-Minus One Week

18 Dec

At this time next week, Santa will be busy putting Nia and Nate’s presents under the tree, filling their stockings with all sorts of goodies and snacking on cookies that the sweeties left for him and the reindeer.

Right now though, Santa is stressing – worried about what to cook for dinner that day, what kinds of cookies to attempt to bake and whether to pay the extra ten bucks to send presents in the mail express or priority. I mean, the pressure of deciding how to ship something really torments me – I pick out what I think are pretty cool gifts, go through the checkout process and then have to pick which shipping method will get it to the special someone on time.  It’s something that forces me to use my fingers to count the business days it says it will take to get there and then I round up a day just in case.

Now I’ve cooked Christmas dinner before but for some reason I’m really thinking hard about this year’s.  I think it’s because that’s all a part of my new job now – before with work, I hardly had anytime to shop and or I was working on the day so we just kept it simple.  Last year we were spoiled because my mom was with us and she took care of EVERYTHING.  It was AWESOME.  Now though, it’s all on me to make sure our meal is yummy and special enough to be enjoyed every Christmas. I know I’m making the Rafiani recipe homemade spaghetti (what I’ve always had on Christmas) and I’m going to try and bake a ham (I’m nervous about this because I never have by myself) and I also must have Wedding Soup (another Rafiani family tradition).

As far as the cookies go – I’m scared to death.  Last year was the first year I even made homemade cookies for the Holidays and my mom really did all the work.  My sister is a baking queen – she’s the reason I’m even attempting this. I plan to start baking Tuesday.  We’ll see how they end up then…

What’s funny about all of this is how Nia doesn’t care a thing about any of it.  All she’s worried about is that Santa’s not going to bring her a Little Mermaid castle – you better believe Santa got that stress over with and is now just waiting on shipping!

Online Again!

15 Dec

You know you’ve moved to a small town when it takes a freakin’ week to get the internet!  What the heck?!?!  We just got it up and running and this was the first website on my long list of sites I need to visit in order to feel a sense of balance again!

Now for the difficult decision of deciding what to write about – I mean so much has happened to the Valles Fam in the last few weeks but I couldn’t possibly write about them all – like you really want to read about them and frankly I don’t want to re-live some of them.  What I will share is a general idea of our lives so far –

We love our house – it’s twice the size of our old one and offers the kids tons of play space – although we still haven’t fully baby-proofed it yet (Andrew just put a gate at the top of the stairs but I know the crazy little man will try to rip it out of the wall).  Our priorities are pretty odd when it comes to getting the abode together – we still have boxes to unpack and rooms to situate but we made darn sure to paint Nia’s room like a princess.  Pink – Purple and Blue – When we get the camera stuff hooked up I’ll share some pics-  it’s really pink but Nia LOVES it.

Andrew has to drive anywhere from 2 and a half to 3 hours a day to get to and from work right now until his company finishes the new plant that’s closer to our house.  They say it will take about 6 months for that to happen.  We just hope it will really only be 6 months. He seems to like working out here – I think he really likes the challenge of trying to fix something and make it better. I just have to give him the time to do that and not call him 10 times a day about the silliest things.

As for me, I’m still trying to figure out how I’m doing.  Everyone keeps asking me how it’s going as a stay-at-home mom and if I’m getting the hang of it.  I really don’t know how to answer that. (DISCLAIMER – please don’t take offense if you’ve asked me these questions – it’s frustrating hearing them so many times.) I mean, it’s not like the job I was used to – where I would see results at the end of the day.  Right now, I just consider it a good day if zero or very few tears are shed (both from me and the kids) – I really don’t know how to gauge if I’m “getting the hang of it.”  The question actually kind of angers me a little bit too – I mean what do people really think I’m going to say – “NO! I HATE IT AND I WANT TO QUIT! I WANT TO RUN SCREAMING FROM THE HOUSE SOMETIMES”  Or, “Why yes, I’m an excellent mother with perfect children and I never have any issues with them.  All I do is watch soap operas, Dr. Phil and Oprah and eat chocolates.” Really, all I can say is – I’m doing the best I can.  Anyone that tells you it’s easy either doesn’t care that much about teaching and disciplining their children or has a housekeeper and cook.  Just like any job – there are ups and downs – in this case the downs are Nia crying “I want to be nice to brother!” over and over after just pushing him down and then sitting on him – sometimes the ups come out of the downs though – for example when Nate looks at me and his sister with a smile as she continues to scream she wants to be nice to him –

I’m hoping that once we are really moved in and finished with the big house projects I will be able to have more of a routine with the kids.  I’m sure that will really help us all.  I’m also looking into getting Nia involved in a part-time preschool just so she can interact with others who want to color all of the time and play tea party.  (As much as I love to do these things with her it’s kind of hard when there’s a 1-year-old boy standing up on a little rocking chair like he’s surfing.)

I guess I’ll just have to see what tomorrow brings and thanks to our working internet connection – I’ll get to share some of the humor (and grief) with you!

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Much Better

23 Sep

Because it smells clean, is it?  The want-to-be-normal side of me says sure – why not?  The paranoid-germ-o-phobe side of me says the nice smell is just covering up something gross.  No matter – the smell and look of this hotel room makes it WORLDS better than the one we stayed at two weeks ago.

Something that appeared (I hoped) was chocolate was splattered on the wall –
Crumbs/bottle caps/barbie shoes/hair clips covered the carpet in places –
Some sort of black crud that Nia called poopie lurked under the rim of the shower –
Several stains of who knows what were accenting the couch designs –

The first night there I actually cried about how disgusting the place was.  I cried because I was so upset at myself for worrying so much about it.  Andrew felt awful.  (He spent a lot of time trying to find a hotel that allowed dogs and offered two adjoining rooms so we could veg together like we’re used to while the kids slept.)  He said we could leave but we had just got everything in the room and it was really late – I wasn’t going to go that far – instead I ended up going just about a block away from that far.

I bought:

  • Comet to scrub the tub
  • Disinfecting wipes to remove any spot I saw and clean anything my kids touched
  • One of those new sticky broom things to collect the crap on the floor

I also made Andrew buy two blankets – one so I would feel better when Nia sat on the couch- another so I would feel better when Nate crawled on the floor.  I even built a barricade of sorts around the blanket so there was no way his hands touched the carpet.

I know – I’m a freak. Even when we got home I continued to drive Andrew nuts with my worrying.  He came up to me and said “Why are the bags in the hall?  I had already put them in the bedroom.”  Knowing he would seriously wonder if he needed to get me professional help if I told him why I replied, “You don’t even want to know.”  “Oh, come on,” he said.  “Well, I heard that bedbugs can travel and I didn’t want the bags next to our bed just in case.”

Now comes the best line from Andrew – “Should I burn the bags?”

Of course, that didn’t happen – but it was tempting to me.  Instead, we packed up those same bags last night and are now at another hotel – a much cleaner hotel.  At least it smells that way.

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Right now I should be…

16 Sep

getting the house ready for another “showing” tomorrow.

That means cleaning, tweaking and hiding.  I should be doing things like washing the dishes, scrubbing the dog drool off the windows, sweeping the fur balls off of the floor, stuffing paperwork/clothes/personal items in places a possible buyer likely won’t open and doing all the other gazillion things our realtor told us other realtors thought would make a difference.

Will moving the living room furniture around really be the key to sold?  So far – no.

Will making it look like we don’t have a dog be the answer?  So far – no.

How about moving furniture out of our bedrooms only to crowd them in the garage?  You guessed it – so far – no.

It’s not that I think it all won’t help – I just thought if someone really likes our house then it won’t matter how we have it.  I mean, they’re not buying the furniture and after the houses we looked at to buy our house is spotless!

In one house the carpet was DISGUSTING.  We would have to replace every bit of it.  Also, the microwave that comes with the house – covered in splattered food.  I know that’s something I can clean but come on!  You know you’re trying to sell your house – you know people are going to be inspecting it to see if it’s for them – the least you can do is wipe out your microwave!

I know I’m picky but there are lots of people like that (and much worse) and their houses sell so I have a pretty good feeling mine will too without having to rent a storage place to hide all of the furniture we’re stacking in the garage or repaint the house or resod the yard or lose my mind!

Buy Me

Despite feeling that way though, I know as soon as I leave this computer I will do everything I don’t feel like doing – hoping it will be the last time I have to do it.

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