In list form!

• I took a jewelry beading class a few weekends ago, a class I thought would mostly be stringing, but ended up being wire working, and I have to say, I loved it. However, it has brought a few things to light, namely:
  • Cheap pliers are just that. Cheap. The teacher had tools for us to use, which I did, and then when I got home and tried to use the cheapo pliers I had initially purchased, my hands were killing me. Ouch.
  • Silver wire is expensive! She gave us all copper wire to work with, because it’s relatively cheap. Silver is pretty expensive. However, I am not particularly drawn to copper. I don’t hate it, I just don’t usually go for it. And now, after the class, when I look at the copper wire, I have no idea what sort of beads to pair it with. I am paralyzed with inactivity. I have no wish to make copper jewelry. I ache to make something, but I don’t know what. I just am more partial to silver, really.

  So, I’m kind of antsy and anxious to get started with some more jewelry, but a) i need some good pliers and b) I want silver wire. Both of which cost a decent amount of money. But after wobbling about for a week on what to do, I bit the bullet. I bought some very good pliers online, along with a small amount of sterling silver wire, and a bigger amount of (silver-looking-in-appearance)(cheap) nickel wire. I figure I will use the nickel and if I make a piece I really like, I can redo it in the silver. Now I can’t wait for my order to arrive!

• My upper back is having some sort of reaction to something. At first I thought our cat had scratched me or something, because I just had this very mild irritation on the back of my shoulder, and indeed, could feel a miniscule scratch, but it has progressed to a much larger area than just the invisible scratch area and wtf? No rash or other visual indicator is present, but I’m telling you, not a minute goes by where I don’t feel pain somewhere in this general area. Not a big pain, but a pain-in-the-ass pain, because I keep being made aware of it, over and OVER AND OVER AGAIN. Time for some hydrocortisone cream I guess.
• Today at the office there is a potluck, and OFFICE MASSAGES. When I wondered over to the front desk to sign up yesterday, I was aghast that there were hardly any people signed up. I was tempted to put myself down twice. Don’t these people like to relax and be massaged? After the last week, I CANNOT WAIT.
• With the potluck today and a class party in Jocelyn’s classroom on Friday, I made a whole crapload of pumpkin cupcakes. I just LOVE these things. I wish I had the time to decorate them like Melissa from Suburban Bliss did her BOO cupcakes – LOVE THESE – I’m telling you follow the link and just scroll down for the pictures. Creepily DELIGHTFUL. But I did not have the time, so I just dipped them all in halloweeny sprinkles and called it good. And spent the entire trip into the office this morning thinking of some ghoulish names to accompany them. I’ve settled on “Putrid Pumpkin Pustules Slimed With Creepy Creamed Cheese of the Occult” I’ll take any suggestions!
• This year when I bought out the hat and gloves department at Target for the family, I hit on something. I usually buy several pairs so that when the first glove goes missing (as they all inevitably do) there would be back-up gloves. This year – I bought TWO PAIRS OF THE SAME GLOVES for everyone. Why did I not think of this?? Then when the end of winter comes and tons of gloves are missing, we are much more likely to have MATCHING GLOVES. I can’t tell you how many times Jocelyn has gone to school with one supergirl glove and one transformer glove. Hopefully this year it will be Supergirl FTW! Also, I bought some fingerless gloves to try out in the office and I HAVE NOT NOT USED THEM SINCE. I LOVE them. My hands are warm, but my fingers are not constricted by any bulky material. In fact, these aren’t fingerless gloves, they’re more like fingerless mittens, because there’s no individual fingers to them. Yet another idea I should have adopted YEARS AGO.
• And just not to leave anyone hanging, Ethan has been doing well this week. No major incidents. He appeared to have totally brushed off the girl in his class telling him he was kicked out of daycare. His teacher said that he replied, “No I didn’t.” and he hasn’t brought it up to us at all. The counseling center got back to me and we decided to do some initial psychological testing just to see what’s what. Now that everything seems to be going OK, I feel like maybe I’m overreacting with the whole professional help thing, but I know that it is still the best thing for him. Even if the worst is over, this still can only help him, not hurt.
• The kids expressed astonishment that there was CHRISTMAS stuff up at Target already. And when we were there yesterday they had already taken down the major Halloween setup. Ethan: “Don’t they know that Halloween isn’t even over yet???” I know, Ethan. I KNOW.

That’s it. I just leave you know with the conversation James and I had last night. I had just been blathering on and on about who knows what and after a short silence, this came out.

Oh, what sweet marital bliss:

me: God. I hate the sound of my voice. I don’t know how you can stand it. Blech. I wish I could just STOP TALKING.
..
james: (SILENCE.)
..
I look at him.
..
He looks at me.
..
I give him THE LOOK.
He grins.
james: I am racking up the points right now!
me: OH NO YOU ARE NOT!
james: What? I am too! I am totally keeping my mouth shut! You know what I COULD BE SAYING RIGHT NOW??
..
I fix him with a stony glare.
me: You are losing more points with every passing second, mister.
james: What??!!!
me, taking on a fake voice: “Oh, honey! Why would you say that? Don’t be so hard on yourself. You have a lovely voice! That’s why I married you! I love you! You’re perfect in every way!”
james laughs, and takes on his own fake voice: “I wish you would stop talking! You’ve been driving me nuts for the past 20 minutes! That voice is the voice that is going to drive me to my grave! That voice—”
I cut him off, and retort: LOSING POINTS. EVERY SECOND.
james just grins.
me: I’M TELLING THE INTERNET.

Internet, you have been duly informed.

-amy howls at the moon.

Well, it’s time to give more details, especially since the plot has thickened.

I am not making any excuses for my son. He has issues. But I kind of suspected that there was more going on in his after school care classroom than we, or even the teachers knew. I felt like some of the kids had pinned a “bad kid” label on him and were possibly even pushing his buttons to get a reaction. Now, I can’t back this up with anything, it’s just something I’ve noticed, and something James has noticed. One day last week, James was picking Ethan up who had spent some time in the office, when another kid came up to James and told him in a snarky voice, “Ethan got sent to the office today!” James said that Ethan was obviously bristled by this, and frankly, it pissed James off as well. I’ve noticed a few other things in the classroom as well, and I’ve tried to pass this on to the center’s director, while trying not to sound like I’m making excuses.

When the news came down that Ethan was no longer welcome at the daycare, we debated about what to do. For a long time now, I’ve wanted to be home when the kids were done with school for the day. If we were to find another daycare for him to attend after school, we would likely run into the same issues, at least in the interim. What would be best would be if we could arrange to be home by the time school is out. And if we can arrange that for the short term, why not arrange it for the long term? We both thought that this would be best for our family, regardless of what is going on with Ethan. And if we could work it out and keep it up, then when Jocelyn was in kindergarten, there would be no daycare situation at all, which is so much the better. We decided that there was no reason to tell Ethan that he was “no longer invited” to go to his daycare, which would only serve to lower his self esteem more than it already is. We simply told him that we had decided that it would be better for our family if we picked him and Jocelyn up early. It gives everyone more time at home together.

Well, James and I arranged our work schedules so that part of the week, he will get to work early enough to leave in time for when school’s out, and I will do the other part of the week. I had a trial run of sorts last week, and this week is the first full time go at this new routine. (Getting up early really sucks.) I emailed Ethan’s 1st grade teacher so she would be on the same page (with everything, our decision to seek professional help, no more afterschool care, etc.)

Today James was gone before it was fully light out, and I got everyone out the door (only going back twice for forgotten coat/hat/mittens & mommy’s ipod!) and was almost to work when James called me to tell me Ethan’s 1st grade teacher had emailed.

Of course my fears were instantly of bad behavior, but nothing was wrong. In that regard, anyway. No, what was wrong was that a girl in his class that also attended the afterschool daycare Ethan had, was telling him that he was kicked out, and that “somebody at the daycare had told her so.”

You can imagine how angry James and I were. How angry we ARE. First, I am angry at the school. She heard this from the school. Where do they get off telling anyone else why Ethan is no longer attending? And secondly, I’m mad at this kid. At all the kids who have pegged my son into this “bad kid” box and are now refusing to let him out of it. So, I called the daycare school and let them have it. I was so angry, I confessed, I yelled. And cried. And probably got a bit incoherent there at the end. I probably should not have called. The director denied that any of her teachers would tell any of the students that Ethan was no longer invited to attend. But I’m sorry, that girl didn’t say, “You must have been kicked out,” she said, “You got kicked out.” Someone told her something.

Jocelyn is doing fine there, so I’m a little torn, but frankly, I don’t feel that I can trust their teachers. James and I are debating whether or not to move Jocelyn elsewhere. We’re leaning towards elsewhere.

And I can’t stop shaking this morning. It just keeps on coming.

I should end on a good note. I am so glad and grateful for all the support that has come our way. Everyone has messaged me, twittered me, emailed me, facebooked me, expressing their sympathy and their offers to help in whatever way they could. You guys rock. I’m also grateful for Ethan’s 1st grade teacher and the school’s administration. They’ve been awesome.

Today is still going to really suck.

Last week, Ethan did well in his 1st grade class at school, but had problems (mostly on the daycare bus) nearly every day at daycare. We’ve been dealing with behavior problems from Ethan, off and on, since the end of summer now.

On Tuesday, I got a call from the daycare that Ethan had some pretty serious incidents on the bus. Namely, he was licking the seatbelt, then he hit people with it, then he pulled a girl’s hair and pushed/pulled her down to the seat. Then as he was leaving the bus he kicked the glass on the front door, told everyone to shut up, and tried to punch the girl in the face. She brought her backpack up, so he didn’t hit her, but rather the backpack. While sitting in the office, he continued to tell people to shut up.

They called me and requested I pick him up immediately.

On Tuesday after the incident, James and I agreed that these issues had been going on too long and it was time we sought professional help in the form of a child therapist or psychologist.

Yesterday I got recommendations from our pediatrician, ruled them out because they weren’t in our network, researched some others IN our network, and submitted some initial paperwork to get us started.

This morning, the director of the daycare called and informed me that because of the dangerous nature of the incident on Tuesday, Ethan was no longer welcome to attend.

It’s a pretty emotional day… nay, week.

I will have more to say on this later, but for now, just wanted to get that down and see if it helped me carry on with my day any more.

– amy struggles along.

But this is a slightly better shot:

The background is very gray though. I think I need a bigger box.

I think I’ll be hair motivated for a while 🙂 I may even stay loyal to the gal I went to, which I rarely do. I love this color, love the chunk in front, and the haircut is nice.

(still working on the “light” in “lightbox”)

I have things to say, GOD do i have things to say. But I have no time. Suffice it to say, Ethan has been in trouble, not at his real-school, but at his after-school school, and it has brought me near to tears all morning. I can’t tell if it’s entirely kid-anguish that is almost bringing the tears, or maybe it’s partly lady issues that has me so almost-weepy, all I can say is, if I am going to get a speeding ticket in the near future, today would be a good day so that I might call up the tears that are just there, hiding, waiting to spring to my eyes and hopefully melt the policer officer into a puddle of mercy.

So, here, have a cute little robot. I have no idea when I took this picture. The date stamp on it is yesterday and I know that’s not right, that’s just the stamp of when I got it off my iphone. I vaguely remember being alone with James at the time and taking it very spontaneously, stopping our walking from Place A to Place B, in order to take picture of Thing Robot Of Cuteness, but that is all I remember. James? Any other memories here?

Here you are.

conversation between james and i last night, during one of the many tivo pauses of the presidential debate:

james: seriously, if I was elected president, that’s the first thing I would do.
amy: what?
james: torture. In my mind, that’s the most heinous thing that needs to be corrected.
amy: You know, that’s one thing John McCain supposed to defy Bush on, but he’s slipped a time or two.
james: The torture, it’s just despicable. First day in office, that’s what I’d do.
*amy just stares at him.*
amy: Really?
james: yeah.
amy: the VERY FIRST THING?
james: absolutely.
amy: Oh, I don’t think so. I think there’s something you’d do first.
james: what?
amy: come on! you’re finally president! you’re PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES! you KNOW you’d crack open all the super classified shit and find out the real deal about aliens!

I know that’s what I’d do. What would you do?

Maybe not THREE months, but it feels like I’ve been making or trying out a lot of things that I’ve neglected to report on. Some of which is DARN CUTE or DARN TASTY!

Darn cute:

Baby Blanket

Big Footed Bunny with reversable dress (this shot was still in progress, never got a completed shot):
Dress on side A

Dress on side B

Granola (it was OK at best):

And with no photo accompaniment,
Monkey Bread

Potato soup (it was ok, but got much better as it aged)

Beef Stew (Still have some of this in the fridge, and it was Yum, despite some technical difficulties)

Pumpkin Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting (orange, with jack-o-lantern faces painted on) (I guess I could still take some photos of these) (for some reason everytime I eat one, I think of our friend Kurt, who loves anything with pumpkin – Kurt, you would love these)

I also have a bunch of things on deck that I am aching to get started on.

I need, nay, I REQUIRE myself to make chili in the very near future, along with some cornbread.

Butternut Squash soup

Butternut squash risotto (this one may be dropped)

Braided Challah Bread

Picture Day dress for Jocelyn
I saw this adorable corderoy jumper at Kolh’s yesterday that I am going to try to make for Jocelyn. It was a dark chocolate brown with a pink long sleeved knit shirt underneath. Pink and brown always make me swoon, so sweet. We’ll see if this actually gets accomplished. There was another one next to it, pink with cute little princess embroidery embellishments along the bottom.

It is also at Kohls.com.

Very sweet. I am not going to repeat my mistake from last year and put her in a busy print for picture day. NO SIR.

Circle Skirt for Jocelyn
This, I actually did for Jocelyn last night, using the Fold Over Elastic that Angry Chicken has been going on about. Now, with normal elastic, you measure the waist and then make the elastic 2 inches shorter. I cut the elastic about 5 inches shorter with some trepidation, and it is still too loose. I should have just not worried about the actual measurement and just stretched it as tight as I could while sewing it on. There will be sewing and adjustments made tonight. I also don’t like the look of the full circle of the skirt, so I may be fiddling around with using only half a circle as well.
Final note on this skirt, I cut into some beloved fabric that I had been saving forever, but looking at the HUGE STACK OF PINK fabric, I shook it off and cut (the fabric I used is the top right in the picture in that link). As my mother always says, there will always be cute fabric, no need to hoard. I will be showing this skirt off when I finally work out the kinks.

*UPDATE* SKIRT COMPLETED! Here it is!

Picture taken last night, immediately after finishing

Taken this morning.

Hopefully James got some good pictures with the camera, as these iphone photos leave much to be desired. Still, I am VERY proud of myself, as this sucker pretty much came directly out of my head, no patterns involved (though some tulle inspiration probably came from the dress I saw in Kohl’s).

And finally, I have ordered a bunch of stuff to start beading jewelry again. I say “again” like I used to do it last week, but I haven’t done anything with beads since high school, when me & friends used to string beads onto fishing line, melt the knot with a lighter and call it good. I have actually ordered some tools and got a book and even am going to take a CLASS! My initial order should have been here by now, but due to my recent ordering of fabric on the internet for my mother, I accidently put down an address that was half my own, and half my mom’s, for my bead order. Who knows where it is now, DOH. So this, “Did it come did it come??!” ending with deflation and RE-ordering has made me super excited to GET GOING ALREADY!

– amy will string you along with a trinket or two

Otherwise known as:
OMG SHE ACTUALLY MANAGED TO POST SOMETHING! WITH PHOTOS NO LESS! BRACE YOURSELF!

SATURDAY:
Pumpkin patch with corn maze (tricksier this year!)(we made it out alive)
pumpkin cupcakes with detailed instructions and help given by Jocelyn
visit to firehouse’ open house, complete with HELICOPTER parked out front
t-ball game
t-ball snacks
home to make frosting with detailed instructions and help given by jocelyn (must be orange! we need black for jackolantern features! LET ME HOLD THE MIXER!)
Toy Story 2
bed, oh thank god, bed, Zzzzzzzzz..

SUNDAY
train ride up to Clifton for a Clifton festival
colored hair spraying (jocelyn)
face painting (jocelyn)
getting of balloons (whoops, they were from republicans, oh well)
park playing
denial of buying children tickets for big bouncy thingees
tears shed
accidental letting go of balloon (Jocelyn)
denial of buying ANYTHING that has to be carried home
tears shed
seeing of McCain | Palin stickers EVERYWHERE
seeing NO ONE at McCain|Palin booth, Obama|Biden booth very busy, with all stickers gone
democratic balloon obtained (Jocelyn)
Obama|Biden car bumper sticker obtained
Sighting of Wonder Sarah Palin Woman
(Bipartisan balloons in the family! W00T!)
Funnel cake BOUGHT AND CONSUMED OH YUM!
losing of democratic balloon
tears shed
AND SHED
bipartisanship lasted an entire 5 minutes
Bye bye clifton, drove into fairfax
good vanilla purchased at whole foods (at least i hope, it looks suspicious to me)
book store with kids while
apple store (james) to exchange white recalled outlet thingees
soft serve Kline’s ice cream in Manassas on the way home
GROUP COLLAPSE FROM EXHAUSTION AT HOME
and then to cap the day off… 20 minutes of washing and rewashing Jocelyn’s hair to get all the pink out….
and putting my Obama|Biden sticker in my car in the dark. I didn’t do that great a job. I have never put a bumper sticker on my car.

MONDAY:
James and I stealthily took the kids to their respective schools w/out dropping a hint that it was a day off for us.
Watched a few Futurama’s
Went and saw Burn After Reading (not sure I recommend it)
Lazy long lunch at Rio Grande
Sat and watched kids playing in the water fountain (aren’t they COLD??)
best buy (Sleeping Beauty & Speed Racer purchased)
book store (james)
old navy & kohl’s (me)(new clothes for kids purchased)
kid pickup
surprise dinner at mcdonalds (for the kids, we were still stuffed from lunch)
home

THE END!

EXCEPT FOR!

PICTURES!

Children Posed for Picture In Corn Maze

Children NOT Posed for Picture In Corn Maze

Ethan Shuffling Into Third Base

Jocelyn Girl-Running Into Third Base

Jocelyn’s Pink Festival Hair That Later Took 2 Shampoos To Get Out

Jocelyn’s Butterfly Face Painting

Very Busy Democrat Booth

Totally Dead Republican Booth Directly Opposite Democrat Booth
(to be fair, they could have just been grouped around Wonder Sarah Palin Woman)

Sarah Palin Wonder Woman

Handsome Man Relaxing at Rio Grande

Busy weekend for the Panders.