Men Are Morons Sometimes - Yes, I'm Venting

At this point, I'm not really certain what's wrong with me. My mood has gone from bad to worse this week. It started out with my mini-strike, which I'm fairly certain didn't go unnoticed. When I arrived home Friday evening, James had kinda straightened up the house (i.e. he did the dishes and wiped down the counter) and much to my surprise he'd decided on his own accord that he was going to make dinner.

That's an incredibly rare occasion and typically his idea of "making dinner" is ordering a pizza. Instead, he made tacos. I was both stunned and grateful for his little surprise.

I'm not one to question sudden sweetness, but it didn't really surprise me when he brought up a "guys day" after we finished eating. In all honesty, I don't really care when he goes out with his friends. Sometimes it's nice. And even though he just was out two weeks ago, I told him to go ahead and go.

My problems with him going really didn't start until we woke up to this...

In case you're wondering, our roads still aren't plowed
and it looks worse now then this morning.

See, I have a near paralyzing fear of driving in the snow (yeah, makes sense to live in the Midwest doesn't it?). When he started getting ready to leave the house around noon or so, not only was it still snowing, but it was pouring down sleet with it! There was a very distinctive tink, tink, tink, as it fell on the hood of the car. The idea of him driving an hour away  and staying out till 2 am when he didn't really need to made me uneasy.

I did attempt to ask him nicely to stay home today. I told him I really thought going out right now wasn't the best idea. I recommended waiting a little while longer to see if maybe the weather got a little better. Basically, he just laughed in my face. "I'll be fine!"

I showed him the post where our local police department had asked people to please stay off the roads. I showed him that 80/94 was shut down again, because of how slick it was out there and that there had been another accident involving a semi. Even though he'd be taking the express way, he continued to laugh it off like I'm just being crazy.

This resulted in my blood starting to boil a bit. And... And... Well... I lost it. I told him that it was absolutely stupid to go out right now just so that he can go sit in front of a TV with his friends for the next 12 hours. I know they do UFC Fight Night every month (though I usually don't find out until the day before when it is), but I just can't see how risking your life and the life of others can be worth it. Believe me, I recognize that I should probably be medicated for my fear of driving in the snow, but when the police tell you not to drive I believe you better damn well listen.

He didn't of course. My only debate now is do I wait up to make sure he gets home safe and potentially erupt on him like a volcano or go to bed and maybe lock the bedroom door because I'm truly still pissed about the whole thing.

I F*cking Hate Sports!

I know I'm a terrible mom right now, but once again softball has ruined a perfect weekend. This weekend was supposed to be the first weekend in months where we had no kids! It was not supposed to be our weekend with Anne and Paige so I arranged for Lena to go to my parents house. James and I were supposed to have a long needed and awaited date night and now that's not going to happen. 

James called me on lunch a little bit ago to inform me that we had to switch weekends because of Anne's softball schedule. I love the kids, I just hate that their sports schedules trashed our summer and has now taken over our fall. She doesn't even like to play. She complains about it constantly! But her mom played, Paige plays, and therefore Anne has to play. Her mom has enrolled her in a travel team, which means not only an unpredictable schedule but it also comes filled with unpredictable insanely far away locations. 

She found out today that on one of our weekends with the girls Anne has a ton of tournaments. That means either A we need to switch or B we have to drive all over creation to make all 6 games. Taking Lena into consideration (and her equal mis-like for sitting there for hours without end) he decided it would be best to switch. So it's bye bye date night at the hibachi grill. No Japanese noodles and steak for this girl. Not unless I want to shell out extra money for food our 7 year old won't even eat. 

I feel like such a shitty parent for thinking that way, but who knows when a golden opportunity to spend an entire weekend with no kids will come again. Certainly not anytime soon and I can't help but feeling perturbed by all the surprise crap that comes from sports.

And right this moment, I really want to cry...

I'm Venting... You've Been Warned

I must admit I'm ever so grateful this weekend is over and I'm back at work where I can get a break! I confess though, that I was a complete raging bitch crab for most of this week and it all came to a head this weekend.

Since about mid November our weekends have been filled with family obligations and I'm not exactly sure where that leaves time for our little family of five. Every weekend has been dedicated to either my family or his family, but not our family. It was building up for a while and this weekend I basically snapped.

I had plans with my sister on Saturday to take Lena dress shopping for the Daddy Daughter Dance next Friday (not that her father has been to a single one, but it's still a big event). This is year number 4, Uncle Steve is her most handsome date, and every year we make a day of going to the mall, trying on dresses, going out to lunch, picking out shoes, etc. You know, all the fun things that come with being a girl. However, Friday night it gets sprung on me that we have a dinner event that we're supposed to attend with James' parents... In Elburn... A good 2 1/2 drive away from home for us. This was pretty much the final straw for me.

Don't get me wrong, I absolutely adore his parents. They're two of the nicest people in the world you could ever hope to meet. But this game of rotating weekends has left me exhausted and feeling extremely overwhelmed at this point. I just wanted to enjoy dress shopping with my daughter. I told him that I didn't really want to go, however, turns out we were already paid for so there was simply no backing out.

We did manage to find a dress and the perfect shoes, but I still felt like I didn't get to fully enjoy the day because we had to rush and be home by 3 in order to get on the road up north. Ugh!

All and all though we did have fun at the dinner despite the fact that we didn't get home until about 11:30 which is WAY past my bedtime.

Sunday morning comes and I haven't even finished my first cup of coffee when my mother sends me a text letting me know her and dad are coming down for coffee. Oh boy! Here we go! About 10 minutes later they show up and at this point the kids are awake and starving as per usual. Sunday breakfast is kind of a big deal in our house. I love to make a big breakfast. My mom on the other hand tries to send Paige (she's James' oldest who's 18) back down to her house to fetch a bunch of microwavable breakfast sandwiches. I'm sorry, but yuck!

All three girls are looking at me pleadingly not to skip making the waffles I'd promised, so of course I had to tell my mom NO. That never goes over well. I did end up making the waffles, but of course my mom felt it was necessary to give the girls a major guilt trip about "making me cook when I didn't have to." News flash mama, I like it! But that doesn't seem to matter much I suppose.

As I'm finishing up feeding everyone (parents included) James announces that him and my dad are going to go up to Gander Mountain (he'd won a $50 gift card in the raffle the night before) which left me with all three kids and all the cleaning because I knew they would be heading straight over to their house for the Super Bowl later. They ended up returning a couple hours beforehand and he did initially plan to just go spend the day down the street. Wrong!! By the time they'd returned I was in full swing cleaning mode and had started literally pulling the house apart because I felt far too claustrophobic and it was going to be fixed now not later.

He ended up helping me gut our room, but after that I was on my own. I did however make the kids his responsibility for the evening so I could turn the stereo up to eardrum splitting level with all the Nickelback and Buckcherry I can't listen to with the kids around. I continued to clean until I wore myself out, picked up Lena (Paige and Anne had already been taken home to their mom at that point) and ended my night with Finding Nemo (incidently a truck coming down our street tore down the cable line Friday night so DVD was are only option all weekend) and a MASSIVE apology for my behavior when he finally come home.

Oops... Better luck this week I hope.