OH MY GOODNESS!!!! Alanna has a rant

So from the title, I'll bet you can guess what kind of day I had today. It's not that it was totally bad. It started out pretty well, and I can think of like 10 things that would have made it worse - but it definitely wasn't a good day.

Aidan woke me up early (as usual) but I was asleep when my alarm went off, so I must have gotten back to sleep for the 10 minutes I had left. I had my shower and woke Aidan up, got him his breakfast and went to go do my hair and makeup. I took too long, as usual, and I was rushing around trying to find my keys and my debit card and get myself organized in time. I wanted to leave early so I could stop at the bank and cash some checks because today was payday for Darlene. Of course I couldn't find my keys anywhere and was scrabbling through a drawer looking for Michael's extra debit card right about the time it was time to go. I finally made it out the door, but I was even later than my regular time! Fortunately I had exactly the amount I had to pay Darlene in cash already - kind of odd, but I could have checked the night before and saved myself a headache!

Work was good...I was still dealing with those stupid people at Staples (which I won't go into, I think that story could take up a whole other post!) and there was a guy that has been repeatedly coming in wanting a check who is really annoying. He and his buddy showed up for work, expected us to supply them with all their tools and when we told them to take a hike, then they expected to be paid 4 hours for their time!!! I don't get some people, they think they're entitled to everything! Anyways, we had had pizza for lunch and I had eaten a couple pieces of Tropical Chicken and right about 2:30 I felt like I was going to throw up, it was awful! My stomach cramps were so bad I could hardly move, it really sucked. The pizza was pretty greasy, I guess that's what the problem was - it's amazing that a couple pieces of pizza can cause that kind of reaction!

I had to leave early - I had an appointment for 2:00 at the Mental Health Department scheduled for Aidan and then a doctor's appointment at 4:10. About 10:30 Patti the therapist called to say she was sick and had to reschedule. I tried to be nice about it, but this appointment was already a reschedule and it's so frustrating because I could have really used this appointment at the beginning of September, not the middle of November!! I guess the reschedule was okay because it meant I got 2 more hours of work in and that's always good. My stomach had mostly calmed down by the time I had to leave which was great, but then I got to the mall, found Aidan and discovered that they had forgotten to bring his clothes along (he was dressed as Winnie the Pooh) so someone was off getting his clothes. We waited and waited and finally got him dressed and then discovered they had also forgotten his jacket. *sigh* Then it was off to the doctor's office. I was worried we were going to be late, but we made it there pretty well on time. I walked in the door though, and the receptionist said 'Oh, I was just going to write you off as a no-show' and I said 'Really? What time is it?' My cell phone said it was 4:13. Three minutes! Then we had to wait in the waiting room for 20 minutes because someone else had been waiting and was allowed to go first since we had been 'late'. That ticked me off. And then when the doctor finally did come in, it turned out that somehow, Aidan's blood had not been tested for allergies, which was the WHOLE POINT. By this time I was getting pretty ornery. He gave me a new sheet and we went down and got more blood taken. I requested that it be tested for all allergies and they did me one better. His blood is going to be tested for all allergies and inhalents. Hopefully everything comes back negative. I think this whole thing is a waste of time. I asked what we were going to go if he was just lactose intolerant and the doctor said remove anything that gives him a reaction (i.e. really super gross diapers) wait awhile and then let him have it in small doses. Now maybe it's just me, but that sounds like something I could have done 3 months ago on my own, plus saved myself trips to the doctor and time away from work. I should mention though, that the clinic where they take the blood, the people are super nice and both times I've gone down there they get me in right away which is so wonderful.

After that we had to stop at Auntie Bev's and also Uncle Pat's to trick or treat. It really isn't that far from the doctor's office to these places, but it took us an hour and a half to get there and get home. I think Aidan thought I was mad at him because I kept getting mad at the other drivers. I know there's snow everywhere, but that doesn't mean that we have to drive like idiots! We can still retain the use of our brains while driving in snow, I'm not sure if people in this town know that or not - maybe I should post a sign.

I'm just waiting for Michael to finish up his shower and then I'm going to have a bath and relax and then go to bed. I had planned to make mashed potatoes and meatloaf for dinner, but Aidan just had some candy for dinner ( I know. Please refer to the previous post where I discuss my lazy-ness) and I'm still not up for anything resembling food. I'll just get up early and make it in the morning for my lunch.

Hopefully tomorrow goes better. Wednesday's are usually good days. The roads are looking much better which is really great. It only took me 20 minutes to get to Darlene's this morning and yesterday it took a good 30; that's a wonderful improvement.

For the 1 person that reads my blog...

Just kidding, I know more people read my blog - I was pretty impressed with myself on the weekend though, 2 updates in as many days. I think it helped that Michael was around and helping out with Aidan and cleaning the house. He did the dishes, swept and mopped the floor, vacuumed, helped me sort the humonguous piles of laundry, cleaned out his closet (without any nagging from me) and helped look after and discipline our little monster. That was so so so nice that I didn't have to do all that stuff, but it just kind of made me more lazy! Not that I am wanting to be motivated by doing all that housework, but if I have to do everything, then I get going and just kind of get in a groove. I wasn't sure what I was going to have for lunch today because I didn't even go grocery shopping. This is the height of my lazy-ness (or is it laziness?). Since I didn't go grocery shopping - partly because I'm lazy and partly because it snowed and I'm scared of driving in snow - I thought 'I wonder if I can go a whole week without shopping and just use stuff in the cupboards, fridge and freezer'. It seemed do-able, maybe I can do this for a couple weeks and save some money. Now that would be pretty amazing. Combining both my lazy-ness and my thrifty-ness!

I made it to work this morning without incident. I must admit I was a little nervous, but I just drove super slow and everything was fine. It was weird, like everything was in slow motion because all the cars were going soo slow because of the snow. My top speed this morning was probably about 50 and even then I thought 'Oh, better slow down' because my car was wiggling to the side a bit. I was so happy about the time change this past weekend because it was actually light outside this morning. I left the house at 7:33 and got to work just in time to punch in at 8:30. I told Aidan I would set up the mini dvd player for him back there. If he's going to be in there for half an hour, he might as well make good use of his time and watch a show or two. They said we got 34 inches of snow with this dump and everyone was putting in double shifts at the city to get the roads clear. I was really happy that the snow fell on a Friday evening/Saturday morning as opposed to Sunday evening because that meant that the church parking lot was cleared. If it had fallen after the church service, I doubt they would have cleared the parking lot. Aidan enjoyed watching the loader push the snow around. We had an extra truck parked in our driveway that we couldn't move so we didn't bother to move our cars like we usually do, but the loader got as much snow as he could from behind the cars which was really nice of him. Now I wish I had a truck! I want one of those little CRV or little Jeep things, but Michael doesn't want to get one for me because it's like an SUV - I think he has something against them, I'm not sure.

Lately I've been obsessed with eBay. I go on there constantly to look for stuff. Usually I don't find anything that I want, because my searches yield dozens of pages of results - or just 2 or 3. I did find a pair of jeans, but Michael forgot to change his password or something, and wasn't able to get them. That was kind of sad because they were a good price and looked super cute. They had rhinestones on the back pockets and were Old Navy. Now I'm going to have to go back and find another pair for him to buy. Pretty much anything I've ordered on there I've been really happy with. I got a jean jacket that I love.

Well now I'm just kind of rambling...I got on here to see if my mom wanted to talk, but she's not showing up so I think I'm going to go watch a show and go to bed. We always forget to email each other - sorry I missed you mom! Michael said you left a message on the phone, but I forgot to listen to it and get back to you. I can't be that busy!! My brain must be dying. Okay, well I'll try to remember to email you and we can set up another time to talk.

Carving the Pumpkin

This morning Aidan and I carved the pumpkin finally. He had a great time lifting up the lid, exclaiming at the gross seeds and gunk inside, and helping me to scrape it out - 1 seed at a time.

Strangely enough I had no problems coaxing him to pose for pictures beside the pumpkin. Maybe he's over his camera shy-ness. We lit a little votive candle and put it inside and then brought the pumpkin into the bathroom where it was dark and we could see the face. This was even more fun then saying 'Ewww!' and 'Yuck!' at the seeds! I wasn't able to figure out how to get a picture of Aidan beside the pumpkin the dark where you can see both of them, so the top left is with flash and the bottom right is without flash.

I mixed up some dough for cinnamon buns last night, but I started too late in the day so they ended up being overnight buns. It worked out alright, the buns tasted amazing this morning! Aidan drank some tea and ate raisins while watching me roll out the dough and put the topping on and then roll it up and cut slices. Michael brought some Cinnzeo buns back from Edmonton and we had a couple of those, but I think mine were/are better than those. Of course I'm biased, but I could eat mine without icing and they would still taste amazing. I've been doing a lot of baking lately, I need to buy some more flour because I'm almost done my big bag of it! I looked at it the other day and couldn't believe it was almost gone! I've been making blueberry poppyseed pancakes, banana chocolate chip cookies, oatmeal raisin cookies, blueberry banana muffins, and then these buns. I got a breadmaker awhile ago through the freecycle program here but I have yet to use it. I keep meaning to...maybe once I use it and make some super great bread I won't be able to stop using it!

Anyways, I keep meaning to go through all my songs and organize/rename them all because iTunes messed them up and now is as good a time as any.

Traffic Pet Peeves

Doesn't it seem that everyone else around you is a horrible driver and you are the only good driver out there? Since my daycare is 20 minutes each way, I'm doing a bit more driving these days and my list of pet peeves has definitely grown! The latest is the 'hover' where the car is either straddling both lanes or so close to the line (or even on the line) that you're not sure which lane they're in. I'm a big fan of the horn, but I've been trying not to use it so much lately. I'm also going through a phase where my music is super loud and that becomes a problem when combined with the horn thing. For example: One day I was driving to work listening to Justin Timberlake's new cd cranked and I was behind this lady at a red light. The light turned green and she didn't move for the longest time (okay, it was more like 10 seconds) so I honked at her. But I didn't hear my horn, so I honked again. This went on for a couple honks until I realized that the reason I couldn't hear my horn was because my music was so loud! Kind of embarassing. So now I try not to use my horn so much anymore.

I started this post Friday after I got home from work while I was waiting for Michael to get home with Aidan and everything was relatively dry, but starting to rain/snow. Today, however, is a much different story. Aidan had swimming lessons this morning and Michael very kindly drove us down to the Leisure Center. We got stuck about 6 times trying to get out of the driveway - but once we got out on the roads it was a little better. I was happy to see the graders and snow trucks out there starting to clear the snow, but I'm still pretty apprehensive about driving on Monday. Michael and I are going to go out tomorrow while Pat takes Aidan so I'm going to take a try driving tomorrow before Monday morning. Hopefully it doesn't snow too much more and the roads can be cleared well enough. I had hoped we could escape winter until after Halloween but I guess not...

SNOW!

Michael told me this past week that he would take Aidan Saturday morning and let me sleep in - it was so nice! I can't remember the last time I've been able to sleep in! I only slept til 8:45, but Aidan got up at 6:45, so I got 2 extra hours. Then when I finally did get up Michael told me to look outside and there was like 3-4 inches of snow everywhere! Last night it had started snowing when we went to pick up Aidan's costume, but I never expected it to get cold enough for it to be more than just some slush on the ground.

Michael went to pick up Aidan last night and when he got home Aidan was Superman with Cars boots. When I had dropped him off at Darlene's that morning, he was Winnie-the-Pooh with tie up shoes - a remarkable transformation!! The Pumpkin Patch party at our church was last night, and I really wanted him to go as Poohbear, so we packed him up and drove across town to exchange costumes. The only problem was that he decided to have a major major fit in the car and by the time he got calmed down it was past his bedtime and I figured that we might have another blowup if I took him to the party, so we didn't go. I really wish we could have, but he had a party at his daycare that afternoon and the actual Halloween is yet to come.

Michael and Aidan are out right now checking out the Grande Prairie Kids CanSkate program. If it looks like a good program then we'll sign him up for lessons starting in January. I keep meaning to take him to a public skate to try out those skates I got him, but I think that would mean that I would have to put on skates as well. All these activities that I am signing him up for - I'm not sure how this works, but how do I end up participating in all these things? I hate swimming - so why am I in the pool? I don't remember the last time I went skating - chances are he'll be better than I am with no experience at all!! Anyways, it's not really that big of a deal, I just find it a little ironic.

News and Shoes

I honestly keep meaning to update my blog, but it’s kind of low on my list of things that have to get done and so it keeps getting pushed back to the next day. It’s been a busy past couple weeks and even work is busy so when I go home I usually just want to sit on the couch and do nothing!

This coming Saturday is Aidan’s last swimming lesson. I should have signed him up for swimming lessons awhile ago, but better late than never I guess. There are 7 different levels for pre-schoolers and Aidan is currently enrolled as a Sea Turtle. He has learned to dip his face in the water and blow bubbles, practiced floating both on his back and on his tummy and how to jump into the water to me. By the time I went to register him for lessons there were only spots left in the parented class, but I thought that would probably work out better for his first set of lessons. Then he figures out what’s going on and when he graduates to the Salamander level he’ll be more confident in the water with just the other kids and the instructor. This last Saturday the kids got to go down the little yellow slide a bunch of times and every time Aidan went down, I would catch him and he would say ‘Yeah! I’m the best!’ It was so funny. I’ve really noticed him saying all sorts of little phrases back to me. I’ll ask him how his dinner is and he’ll say ‘just fine’ or the other day I said I love you and he said ‘I luff you too!’ with a big grin on his face. We were having a disagreement this morning and he actually told me to leave him alone – I wonder if he overheard someone say that at the dayhome he goes to. I was a little taken aback because that’s the first time I’ve heard him say that. He has been doing much better at this new dayhome and a couple times actually was upset when I came to pick him up because he wanted to stay. He seems to get along with the kids there and talks about Sammy, Brooklyn (book-a-lynn), Hayley, Tristan and Andrew when he’s home. He still keeps saying he doesn’t want to go to Darlene’s house, but by now I think it’s just habit, because he gets there and runs upstairs to play and when I come to pick him up usually he’s happy to see me and we go out to the car without incident. Hopefully by saying all this I don’t jinx it, but I’m really happy to have him someplace where I’m not worried about him while I’m at work. They also do crafts there – one day he came home with a Halloween tree they had made. They painted tree branches black and then hung bugs and cobwebs and a paper cutout of a skeleton from the branches and also draped some orange pumpkin decorations around there and stood them up in little black plastic pots held up with rocks. It’s pretty cute. We arrived there on Monday to quite the setup on the front lawn. She had set this archway of branches up by her front door and put about 4 or 5 lifesized Halloween characters – a skeleton, Frankenstein, a werewolf – sitting and standing around and then there were lights and cobwebs all over the branches. I hoped Aidan wouldn’t be terrified because he’s really not into stuff like that and gets scared easily, but I told him that Teddy was scared because he was really little and to tell Teddy that the guys weren’t real. So because he had to take care of Teddy, he just held my hand really tightly, held Teddy to his chest tightly and looked around a lot as we went up to the door but didn’t say much. Now every time we go back he tells Teddy the guys aren’t real and that it’s okay and he does alright. I am finding that as he gets older he is getting more rather than less attached to his teddy. When he was little and we lost his teddy or misplaced it, he was okay to go to sleep without it, but now it’s a pretty big deal if we forget Teddy at Darlene’s house. Nevermind that he’s got like 20 more stuffed animals in his room!

Last night I went out and got a very cute pair of shoes. I tried on the size 9 ½ but they were a little tight, so I tried the size 10 and that seemed to fit a little better. The only problem was that they only had the red in the size 10 and blue in size 9 ½ and I wanted the red, but today they’re feeling pretty loose. I think I’m going to have to get some grips to put in the heel and hopefully that will help. I still think they’re super cute even though my feet feel like they’re 3 feet long!

I was just getting the picture of the shoe from www.keds.com and I found these (below). Aren't they cute? I may just have to go back or check out ebay or something! I love all the different flats that are available this season. I'm not really into heels and they don't really work at my job - I'm big into casual and these are both cute and warm - check out the lining! I should get a pair for me and my mom *smiles*
Well...that's pretty much everything that's going on with us.
I bought Aidan a pumpkin on the weekend but we have yet to carve it. Maybe I'll see if we can do that tonight and take some pictures of how it turns out.

The Pooh Bear in his Natural Habitat

The little Pooh Bear costume was so cute on Aidan I had to take some more pictures.

He loved it too and even wore it eating his lunch. Turkey sandwiches - such a yummy after Thanksgiving dinner meal! Also quick and easy which is a bonus.
This is another swiper smile....although right here he just looks very concerned. I"m not sure what he's doing here - but note the skull and crossbones tattoo on his arm, a leftover from his Pirate Party. Goes quite nicely with the Pooh Bear suit.

The CAKE

This is the birthday cake that I made for Aidan's party. I baked the cake Thursday evening and then decorated it Friday evening so it was all ready for Saturday. It was a good thing I didn't leave it too late because there were lots of last minute things I forgot on Saturday - like sticks to roast the hotdogs, and wood for the fire. I felt like an idiot for not remembering those things, but fortunately I was able to find cheap wire things at the Dollar Store and I roped the only Dad that came to the party into chopping kindling for me.
I'm pretty proud of how the cake turned out. It didn't look exactly like the picture, but it was close enough - and the kids thought it was pretty cool. Mostly they just loved all the extra candy, but then who doesn't?

This, I assume, is typical birthday child behaviour. All the other children (except Luke in the forefront) sit down nicely with angelic smiles and the birthday boy stands off to the side pouting. He really did have a great time, I think he was upset that Shaun/Batman was sitting exactly where he wanted to sit, nevermind that no one was sitting on the other side of me.
The kids had a great time playing in the leaves. Most of these kids are in Aidan's class at church. Nathan Olsen is in the yellow jacket, Shaun Rehaume is in the Batman jacket (his sister Ashley is in the pink jacket with brown hair and is 2 years older), Miriam Barreth is in the pink jacket and pink pants and Luke Friesen was the boy in the front of the group picture.
Aidan and I went for a walk on the trails on Sunday. I love fall, all the leaves changing color and covering the ground, it's so pretty.
We usually walk up to a look-out point and I thought I would take a picture because it was so beautiful. This is what our neck of the woods up here looks like.
Finally I was able to find Aidan a Halloween costume! They started showing up in the stores at the beginning of October and I thought I had plenty of time but I was wrong. I went out on Saturday to try and find him a costume and there was NOTHING in his size! His first choice was Spiderman, then a Pumpkin, then Batman and then Superman and I couldn't find anything. We were in Costco today and I saw this costume and I persuaded him it would be a good choice. And it will be warm and cozy. He tried it on when we got home and both Michael and I had to laugh, he looks so cute! He loved it too, he wanted to have his nap in it but I had to say no.
Spiderman has recently moved to the top on Aidan's Favourite Superhero List. Aidan calls him 'Pa-Man' because he can't say Spiderman. I bought him these three finger puppets for bearing with me as we walked around the Women's Show Friday night.

Well, that's mostly what's been going on with us recently. Aidan's birthday was October 2nd and his party was October 7th because his parents can't read a calendar and schedule properly. Michael and I both decided that we would have Aidan's party on the 7th because that was the weekend that we thought he was off. It might have been me more than him that thought he was off that weekend, but anyways, on Aidan's actual birthday weekend we realized that Michael wasn't off the following weekend. Oh well, all the kids except for 2 that we invited showed up and they all said they had a great time so I guess we can say the party was a success. We played outside and went on a little treasure hunt, finding pictures and then going to find what the picture was to find another clue and eventually ending up at the treasure chest which held all their loot bags. Since we were outside and the presents were inside we didn't open the presents when everyone was there which was a mistake, I think that's like the highlight of a little kids party! Aidan got a 20 car gift set of Hot Wheels along with a launcher, a pail of Lego blocks and a coloring book, a race car helmet and Berenstein Bears book and a tool set. I wasn't sure where the tool set was purchased and since Aidan already has more than 1 tool set I was going to return it, but I think we'll wait for Toys for Tots starts up and donate it to that. Aidan also got a tool stool from his Mama and Papa in Abbotsford and a Lite Brite type toy and some Tonka Construction Activity books from his Nanny and Papa in Kitimat. All in all Aidan thoroughly enjoyed his birthday. I think this is the first year he's been aware of everything happening - he talked about his friends coming over and having cake and presents and was very excited about getting cards wishing him a happy birthday. It's great to see him understanding events and stuff a little more. We didn't get him an official birthday present, but I decided that the train table could be his present this year.

Since Michael was working on Thanksgiving weekend, we just had our Thanksgiving turkey dinner yesterday. I hadn't made a turkey since Christmas 2004 I think, so I was a little nervous. That turkey didn't turn out so well either. The breast was cooked good and was moist but the rest of the turkey wasn't fully cooked so I wasn't very confident in my turkey-cooking skills. But, this turkey turned out perfectly. Everything was cooked and tender and tasted wonderful. I tried something new this year - brushing the skin with oil before I put it in and then with butter right after I took the foil off and Michael said it made the skin taste better. I also did mashed potatoes, yam, cranberry sauce, stuffing, corn and gravy and then made a 2 layer chocolate cake for dessert which we had with Oreo Ice Cream. It was just a mix, but it was Milk Chocolate and it was really really yummy! I could not for the life of me find a pumpkin pie anywhere - there were millions everywhere last weekend but I guess they all vanished this weekend. I didn't feel like making a pie from scratch so Michael said he wanted a chocolate cake and that's what we had. Michael had bought some fireworks while he was in Fort St. John on one of the many jobs they do out there, so right before Aidan went to bed we shot some off. Aidan was really not excited about it and kept saying 'No no no no' throughout, but agreed that it was 'cool' after it was all done.

I think that's about it for now. I will try to update a little more frequently in the future. I am going to attempt to make turkey broth from my turkey today and also catch up on everything else I didn't have time to do yesterday so I should probably start in on that. Have a great week everyone!