Blowin' It

We're surprising the kids tomorrow with a trip to Disney World. It will be a miracle if I don't blow the surprise before then.

I've had to bite my tongue at least a dozen times in the last few days. If it were up to me, I would have told them weeks ago. But my husband really wants to surprise them.

So I'll be off for a week. I hope everyone has a lovely Easter.

Home Dreaming

Today the asking price on the house that I've had my eye on in that-state-that-I'm-going-to-stop-naming-so-I-can-maintain-an-illusion-of-anonymity-and-mystery was reduced by $15,000 putting it into our price range.

Woo hoo!

My husband is so excited to go house hunting. I am mostly nervous. The truth is that I have expensive tastes and I know that although there are many really wonderful homes in our price range, none of them are in the parts of town in which we need to live.

I keep thinking, a forty-five minute commute to the kids' school wouldn't be so bad and the husband would be even closer to work! And my husband keeps telling me, "No!" Or actually, "Hell no!"

He thinks I won't be happy driving so far back and forth to school. He says, "You know you're going to get all involved and have to be up there all the time."

But I swear I plan on kicking back for a couple of years. And he swears I'll regret not living closer almost at once and make his life hell until we can afford to move again.

Cynic.

Anyway, I write all this just to pass on a cool link that a military wife friend of mine introduced to me. It is MilitaryByOwner and you can look up homes both for sale and rent by military bases. Many of them are For Sale By Owner by military families but some are represented by Realtors. That the listings are grouped by distance to base is perfect.

I can't seem to stay away from the home listings online right now. It's making me a little nuts. I've been watching too much House Hunter on HGTV. Too many listings can make a girl house crazy.

Dang it!

Ack! I tried to edit this post and managed to lose half of it.

Oh well. Must be a sign. I'll have more to talk about tomorrow.

Four Years

Four years ago today, I started this here little old blog. It's hard to believe I'm still at it.

And all three of the first bloggers I read, who turned out to be my first (and most supportive readers) are still blogging too. Thanks, as always, Mark, Nicky and Matt. I love you guys.

Happy 4th Birthday, Tuna Girl! I'm glad you're still here for me.

There Are Some Dumb Questions

Today I made a tragic error.

One of my best friends is chairing the big auction fund raiser for our school. I had volunteered to coordinate a certain committee. Today I went down to check on the auction items I'm in charge of.

I stuck my head in the office where my friend and the Development Director were working and asked, "Do you guys need any help?"

Dumb, dumb, dumb move.

The auction is on Saturday. We're setting everything up tomorrow. Today I spent a couple of hours driving around picking things up for them. And tonight I'll be up until about 2 a.m designing and constructing thirty display boards.

I can't help but wonder what they would have done if I hadn't stopped by and offered to help. Somebody would have been pulling a couple of all-nighters.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to peel this layer of adhesive off my hands and get back to work. Hee Haw themed display boards wait for no one.

Update: Yay! I'm done. Thirty boards complete by 2 in the morning.

I'm oddly proud of the damned things. It reminds me of my days working in marketing. And my husband helped me until about 11 when he went to bed. That was nice to work together like that.

Not that I want to go back to work ever again. Heck, no. I'll just keep sticking my head in doors and asking dumb questions.

"We're here about my bladder."

My son really is amazing sometimes.

Yesterday my husband and I took him straight to the urologist after his violin lesson. My husband and I were both a little nervous but my son was as happy as can be. He was just so happy to be alone in our presence that he skipped and chattered like going to see a doctor about his penis was just no big deal.

He waited patiently while I came close to losing it with the receptionist. The American healthcare system is just so fucked up. There was some question about a referral, but I was not going to leave without seeing the doctor even if I had to throw a fit. It's been a bad few days for me.

But we got in when I had our pediatrician's office clear up our problem via my cell phone. After weighing him they had him pee in a cup.

Then they "took a picture" of his bladder. Once the nurse said that his bladder was actually empty I was hugely relieved. I was worried about a narrow urethra or some other medical problem but now that we know he is emptying his bladder, our path is much more clear and pain free.

My son is so friendly and easy-going that he actually seemed to enjoy his office visit. We saw two different doctors who both had excellent bedside manners. And we walked away with prescriptions for medication and directions to buy a urine alarm that should help him.

Now we just have to teach him to swallow a pill. But so far, he is taking that in stride too.

On April 11th, we're going to spend a day at what will probably be our new school. This is the school that liked my son so much when they met him, that they offered us a spot for next year. My little boy who was happy to go to a urologist may just belong at this school after all.

Onward to the Penis Doc

Yesterday's post was therapeutic for me. I am much calmer now. It was good to get it all out like that. I'm glad I still have my blog for the occasional personal rant.

I got the rejection letters at noon yesterday and spent the whole day stewing before I could tell someone. None of my friends answered their phones when I called, including my husband. By the time he got home last night and we had a minute alone to talk, I was a wreck. It wasn't pretty.

But, whatever. It's over. On to bigger and better things. I just regret looking at Great Schools last night and seeing that the school we're actually accepted at has some negative reviews. You know I'm going to obsess about them for months now. That's just the way I roll.

I think I will apply to one more school per Misty's advice. I had only held off on that school because they have rolling admissions and I didn't even know if we would be moving there when I went through this whole process.

Are you as sick of hearing about my kids' school options as I am with writing about them? Ugh. I promise to lay off for a while and get back to some real writing. I think it will be very good for me.

Thanks for rolling through it all with me, guys. After almost four years and gaining and losing hundreds of readers, I still love you all.

This afternoon my husband and I will be taking my son to an urologist for some testing. I hadn't been thinking about it much, but now that the appointment is here, I am dreading it. I just hope we can get him some real answers and real help.

Weren't things suppose to be worse when my husband was in Iraq?

Well, This Sucks

My children were not accepted into the school we were hoping for. I had told myself I would be cool with it, that the kids would end up where they best belong no matter what. But I am crushed.

I have to admit it though I want to pretend I'm fine. I am vacillating between crushing disappointment and indignant anger. But both of those feelings are completely overshadowed by guilt.

What didn't I do right for my kids? Where did I go wrong?

You see, I have never not gotten something I wanted in my life. Things have always come very easily for me. I have never received a rejection letter in the mail. Now my husband is another story. He almost never gets what he wants. He gets screwed by life at every turn. I guess his luck was in play here.

I know that not getting accepted into the hoity toity private school of our dreams is a luxurious kind of problem to have. But it still plays to every doubt I've ever had about my own parenting.

Oh, sure. The admissions director wrote a nice little note on each kids' rejection letter. And the letter itself said that they were wonderful candidates but the school just doesn't have room for them at this time. And what a disappointment for the school, and they are on the waiting list and blah, blah, blah. But I don't really buy it. I can see where they just might not have room for my daughter since her class is already full, but they accept 40 new boys into the first grade. Obviously, my son just didn't make the cut.

Or we didn't make the cut as a family. Maybe I made a bad impression.

I have decided to consider their decision their loss. Unlike the other schools we applied to, they didn't really take the time to get to know us. Other schools asked us to write whatever we'd like so that they could get to know our child and our family. Other school wanted us to visit, just so that they could talk with us. The school that rejected us only wanted us to come for testing and their application procedures were based on forms, records and test results.

At first I was put off by the school we will be going to because they accepted us so quickly. Now I am fully embracing everything they are about. Where before I thought that they were just trying to fill in numbers, now I have decided that they were brilliant to recognize what wonderful additions our kids would make to their school so quickly.

It's a great school. It has many more military families than the other school. The kids there seemed much happier than the other school. But it just doesn't have some of what that other school had, like a violin program, great facilities, excellent technology, and outstanding college placements.

I am going to throw myself into our new school with as much dedication as I have at our current school. They are the school that welcomed us with open arms.

A small part of me broke today. I was walking through life with the delusion that my kids were really amazing. Everyone has just always seemed so overwhelmingly impressed by them. But now I must face it. When it comes to purely objective measures of who they are, they are mediocre. Which means I am mediocre.

I need to adjust to the idea, but its okay. Now more than ever I will embrace the subjective things that make them so very special because those are the things that will make them truly happy in life.

But today, I am a failure at the thing that most matters to me in the world. I need to wallow for a bit.

Internet, Violins, Auctions and Me

I've been sans Internet for almost a week. And I was starting to really lose my shit!

My Internet access didn't just up and go out. Oh, no. Like a sadistic lover, it kept me guessing. Sometimes it would work, but only for a moment. Just as I was about to hit "Complete Order" it would seize up yet again.

But my patience ran out today when I was desperately trying to order a new shoulder rest for my daughter's new violin.

We now own four violins, each more expensive (and a little bigger) than the last. Who the hell told my kids they could grow enough to need new violins? And why the hell do they feel so attached to their old ones that they have begged me not to sell them? Anyway...

My husband, my savior, figured out that it was the splitter that was broken. I didn't even know we had a splitter. I don't even know what a splitter looks like.

Now I have a hundred e-mails waiting for me, at least fifty of them regarding the big, fancy, schmancy, fundraising auction that the school is having on Saturday that I foolishly volunteered to help with because one of my best friends is chairing the event.

But at least I can e-mail all the softball parents if our Monday practice is canceled due to rain. I used to hope that softball practice would get rained out so we could have a break. Now that I'm the coach and know how much work we need to do before games start, I'm obsessively checking the weather and praying for sun.

I can also obsessively check real estate listings in VA and hope that something amazing pops up on the market in our price range. What's bad for the economy and most Americans is going to be sweet for me. Buyer's market, here we come!

Internet, violins, attitudes about softball, real estate prices...it's funny how things change?

Now if only my husband can fix my printer, Treo, bluetooth, water purifier and mind, I'll be all set.

Good News

I feel like my life has changed since the last time I posted here.

I know where we're moving!

It's where I was hoping to go. I'm so excited! I hadn't even realized just how much I wanted to move there until my husband gave me the news and I felt like jumping for joy.

The kids are going to be going to a good school (or maybe even a great school if they get accepted--cross your fingers for March 15). Much of my excitement stems from the fact that I won't have to do any more school applications, interviews, or have the kids do any more testing. Woo hoo!

We'll be able to afford a decent house. We'll be able to see the ocean occasionally! And we're so much closer to our friends and loved ones. (But not too close.)

But nothing is official yet, so I can't get too excited. Orders are not in hand.

Oh, and we have no idea what kind of job my husband might have. He could be mopping floors for all we know. That kind of sucks.

But he'll be mopping floors by the ocean!

I feel like I'm on the precipice of great change and I am so very happy.