One More Equals Four

We had such a busy day yesterday!  I had told the kids we would go light on school and heavy on “Home Ec” because we normally bake goodies for Daddy’s office and we hadn’t done it this year.  I am hoping we are running out of time before baby’s arrival so Monday was the day.  We made fudge, candy cane puffs, chocolate revel bars, peppermint bark, Oreo truffles, and coconut chocolate chip macaroons!  Oh, the chocolatey goodness!  The kids loved crushing the candy canes and actually were quite helpful!  It was pretty fun.  We have a few more goodies to make but we just ran out of time so they will have to wait.

Dancer had her last ballet lesson before Christmas so we headed out for that and then rushed back home to get baseball boy ready for basketball practice.  We scrounged around for something to eat and sent Tigerfan and B.B. off.  Football Boy had a little homework to finish and I finished the baking and then we began getting ready for baths.  Dancer wanted me to fill her tub really high and I told her I couldn’t because F.B. needed hot water to take a shower.  She convinced him to just take a fast bath with her so she could have lots of water.  So, in they climbed and began a discussion about the jets.  None of my kids have ever liked the jets so in four years in this house, I am not sure they have ever been turned on, but for some reason last night they decided they wanted to try them out.  In my infinite wisdom, I agreed.  I turned on the switch and the bubbles came to life!  Followed very closely behind by four years of goop, mildew, hair, and other disgusting build-up that has been lurking in those jets!  Both children SCREAMED and jumped out of the tub as it instantly turned to a brown mucky mess!  F.B. was okay, I told him he could get a shower in a little bit when the water warmed back up but poor Dancer had already got shampoo in her hair and it had to be rinsed.  So I wrestled her into an ice cold shower and rinsed her head as she wrestled and screamed at the top of her lungs!  The rest of her “bath” consisted of a rub down with wet wipes and a good toweling off. 

When I finally got her calmed and settled, I went back to the tub.  By this time all the water had drained and all that was left was four years of brown yuck slimed all over the surface of the entire tub, because, of course I had filled it really high!  And so, the scrubbing began.  I got the Comet with bleach and a rag and began cleaning which wasn’t too bad as long as I was on the side close to me.  However, cleaning the far side of a rather large whirlpool when you have a belly the size of mine was not quite so easy.  Really, all I could do was laugh at the absurdity of it all and what I must have looked like as I stretched and contorted my oversized self to clean that tub! 

Why am I telling you this?  Because, it is proof.  There is NOTHING—NOTHING short of medical intervention, I feel sure, that is going to coax this child out of me!  He is warm and it must be very peaceful and quiet in there and he isn’t going anywhere if it is up to him!  Dogs cannot get him out, exploding bath tubs cannot get him out, stretching membranes–no, walking, running, jumping–no.  Not a full moon, not bad weather, not spicy foods!  So please, I am begging you.  Tomorrow I have a Dr. appointment in which the sweet man has offered to induce IF labor and delivery is not too crowded.  Say a little prayer, pray for the precious women already there that they will give birth–SOON.  Pray for those thinking about going, pray for those Dr.’s and nurses working so hard!  Pray they will CLEAR OUT because I want a room and some pitocin TOMORROW!  Is that really so much to ask????

 I’ll keep you posted!

I may have expressed once or twice about my deep affection for our lovely dogs (ha!)  I must be completely honest and say I did not want the animals, we are not good pet people and after killing a fish, five ducks and having a psychotic yellow lab, I had pretty much sworn off anymore pets.  However, I somehow lost that battle and we now have not one but two black labs.  Now in all honesty, they are beautiful, sweet little dogs BUT we do not have a fenced yard.  We have a great dog yard with almost 3 acres and a pond, but there is no fence and so I do not feel we can let the dogs loose to freely roam.  Therefore, most of their lives are spent in a dog pen that is far too small for two ever growing labs.  When they do get out, you can imagine, they are a little wild!

Football boy keeps telling me that we should fence at least part of the yard so they can run free, and he is probably right but with baby and Christmas and life in general, it just hasn’t happened.  So my love/hate relationship with them continues.

Today has been a wonderful example.  We had tutorial today and I just came home tired!  The children wanted to go outside (because it is almost 80 degrees in December).  I finally relented with a less than stellar attitude.  I have a huge headache, I am tired and cranky and I really would have preferred a nice nap but I consented and we headed out.  I noticed the dogs going a little crazy and asked the boys had they been fed yesterday and no one could really be sure…so I told them to go feed them.  That is when the real trouble began.  Football boy wanted to let them out and I consented.  I know better than this.  I am far too big and round right now to try to wrestle two large, hyperactive dogs.  They came flying out of their pen, thrilled to be free (it really was cute)!  I started grabbing everything they could run off with and trying to put it in the garage and close the door, but it was too late.  What they found first, though, was the bag of dog food and judging by the way they both stuck their entire heads into the bag and ate as if they had never had such a joyous meal, I would have to say no, they were not fed yesterday.  (PLEASE, someone call animal rescue!!!)  I finally got the boys to run them to the pond thinking I could get everything else safe.  Before I could, however, they had run to the pond, got soaking wet and made their way back to the house so they could shake their little doggy bodies all over Dancer and I who were still wearing our good school clothes!  I ran to get a broom to try to get them off of us when Football boys friend’s (who comes home with us on Tuesdays) mother arrived with her other two children to pick him up.  FRESH MEAT!  The dogs saw an opportunity to slime more innocent bystanders and wasted no time.  By the time they finally left, the dogs had run off with Football boy’s good tennis shoe, attacked the neighbor’s dog, pooped in the front flower bed and then “cleaned up” by throwing pine straw all over the driveway which is just a sure way to drive Tigerfan to the nuthouse.  When our friends were leaving, she kindly offered to allow me to place the dogs conveniently behind her car, but they would not be still!

Supposedly during all this, the boys were cleaning the dog pen and feeding the dogs but somehow were unable to do this with all the other drama going on.  I finally screamed to just forget it, give them food and pen them up.  However, the boys could not get the dogs back in the pen.  By this time my already not so stellar mood had declined to well, less stellar!  I stomped in the house to get some meat to lure them to the pen.  Marching back outside I yelledsuggested to the boys that they help me.  They did put the food in the pen, then sat back to watch the show, which in hindsight probably was very entertaining considering a 38 week pregnant woman with two pieces of ham was being mauled every step by two salivating labs.  I kept my temper until I got to the pen and threw in a piece of ham.  One dog ran in after it.  The boys watched, holding the door open, OPEN! while I tried to wrestle the other in, who by the way caught the other piece of ham mid air before it ever reached the pen.  The entrance was completely muddy due to what effort baseball boy had made to clean the pen and as I was screaming hysterically at the dog in his midair catch, the other dog was leaving the pen AS THE BOYS WATCHED!  It was at that point I lost my last ounce of self control.  I really do not know what I said, I know there were threats made to the dogs and suggestions  of where I would like to send them (no ugly words were included, I promise!) and I know that I “suggested” to the boys that instead of standing by watching their pregnant mother get mutilated by two dogs, they might want to engage and help me since I was still in my good clothes and shoes, standing in a mud puddle grabbing a dog almost as big as me by the ear (it was all I could hold onto) and trying to force it into a pen.  We did finally manage to get the dogs in and only one child ended up in tears.  I did apologize for my loss of self control and we cleaned up and went in.  Since things were going so well, I decided to have the boys do math.

Dancer went up to play in her room and homework ensued.  I called Tigerfan to see when he would be home and when I should have supper ready.  My mood had not improved too much when I walked upstairs to find Dancer in my bathroom.  All the blinds were open, the lights on and Dancer is standing in my room in a swimsuit top with a tube of lipstick in her hands “fixing her makeup”.  I might have lost it again.

In hindsight, now that the children are in bed, it is a little funny (a little) however, the irony of it all is, none of this excursion or excitement has helped with baby a bit!  If an afternoon like this cannot put a woman into labor, I just do not know what can!

I know that I have been completely absent from here for a week and am actually just stopping for a moment to say no news is just no news!  No baby yet.  I have high  hopes that the Dr. will check me tomorrow and give me a little hope that things are progressing but for now, nothing.  We are rushing around trying to finish up all the last minute details.  I got Dancers outfit back and am waiting for Tigerfan to put it on the computer  far too technical for me.  For now, we are waiting but frankly, I am incredibly tired and my sinuses are acting up so between a stuffy nose and a massive headache, my heart just isn’t into blogging right now.  I promise I will be back soon and will let you know as soon as baby acts like he might make an appearance. 

Remember, only13 more shopping days until Christmas!