I'm pondering the wisdom of using hair dye I randomly found in our house.

Of course... I'm only pondering it now, as the dye is setting in to my hair.

The things I do to cure boredom / procrastinate from council reporting.

Also, I think I may be addicted to the smell of Burt's Bees Almond Milk Beeswax Hand Creme. No fooling, that stuff is awesome.

I have more to say, but I really should get to starting that reporting, and I have about 20 minutes to kill before I have to rinse anyway. When I have time, I'll talk about my mom, my son, my daughter, my work, and the books I've read (someone who reads this is probably anticipating remarks about a book so that they can be smug and say "I told you so". Not naming names or anything).

This has got to be one of the neatest sites I've seen in a while. Talk about a wonderful comprehensive way to teach the kids how to navigate the night skies!!!

I recently re-discovered our public library. The kids were happy as crickets to get a bunch of books out - C's arms were stuffed beyond belief. K was more conservative, only choosing one book and one dvd to borrow. He says he worries about forgetting a book and would rather borrow one at a time. C says she doesn't have time to go there every day, and would rather get a bunch and then return them and then get a bunch more.

So I digress. I got out a bunch of books, sort of all over the place in the choosing. I have a tendency to randomly type something into the search, check that call# and then let Dewey lead me where I'm meant to go. One of the books I randomly picked up was Angela's Ashes, and I'm already halfway through after starting it up last night. It's a pretty good read, although terribly sad, and some parts made me angry, but a lot of parts made me realize just how damn lucky I am to have all that I have.

Next up on the list when I've done that book is Ysabel, by one of my favorite authors (if not my very favorite), Guy Gavriel Kay. I don't know why I've resisted the purchase of this book, but it was at the library mocking me so what the heck, I'll borrow it. And then of course I will kick myself for resisting the purchase of said book, and end up buying it anyway. Because that's what I do.

There are more, but no sense listing them until they've been read.

I can't stand all this snow dropping down on us. Winter is my least favorite season, for so many many reasons. Time to go shovel off the car & get the kids to school.

Oh! I also managed to get my shift changed, so that I could both drop off AND pick up the kids from now on. Whee!

So below is a photo of GIR in all his glory. I had to frog the arms once (forgot to change from blue to gray on shoulder part) and the tongue twice (the pink yarn I used is thicker gauge than the worsted used to make his body) but all in all, I think I did pretty swell!

Tonight was a meeting for K's first communion. It was the typical blar blar blar. I nearly fell asleep during the video, no joke. Then I talked Hammer into taking a spin with me through the drive-through of Tim Horton's because it beat her freezing her knickers off while talking with me in the parking lot. Apparently there is drama going on in the other Gr 4 class that doesn't involve either of our daughters, which suits me fine and is a nice change from the norm. However it also makes me pretty sad - ugh. Already, it starts.

My Dad is leaving for Brazil this weekend. He'll be gone for a while so in the meantime I have to keep an eye on my mom and her healing up etc. No word on what is going on yet, but I remain positive.

I have had serious bouts of insomnia, probably brought on from the stress of dealing with family member dying and my mother having issues.

Tomorrow I go for breakfast with Sir T, an event I am looking forward to because frankly I miss chit-chatting with him. Ok. Enough posting, I need to take a hot bath and uncoil all the tension. Breathe deeply. Wax on, wax off, Daniel-san. That sort of thing.

Ciao.

Today I:

- Managed to get the kids to school on time, in spite of all of us sleeping in.
- Got out of having to actually answer the phones by offering to take training on a certain aspect of the job I haven't learned yet
- Had to borrow the fil's car in order to get a friend from work so she could come over and make a soup to be judged tomorrow for entry into the "Soup's On" thing
- Comforted my daughter resonably when on the way to fil's house she tripped and fell all over herself, getting mud all over her new jacket and favorite jeans.
- Got the friend from work and got to show the kids my workplace. They were delighted that I had not only their photos up, but little things they had drawn for me were on display as well. It is one of those things that drive the point home to them that even when I'm at work I'm probably thinking of them.
- Made some kick-ass garlic cream soup. I can't even tell you how awesome it is.
- Disbursed a great sweet n' sour sauce recipe
- Got in a huge fight with my son when it was time to take friend home, as he wanted to finish watching a show. The words "I hate you" and "I wish you would disappear" came out of this boy's mouth. A bar of soap was considered for entry into said mouth but I decided to let it go. When we got home he mentioned he had had a really bad day and was tired and sorry and didn't really mean anything he said, etc etc. Man oh man. I didn't expect to hear that until they were into their teens. Isn't parenting fun?
- Got home and ignored the dishes in favor of sitting down with the kids and a book. Showers already had and pajamas on, you could see the remnants of a cruddy evening just uncoiling from them and releasing.

The really big thing I did all by myself:

- I managed to configure our wireless router so that all PCs in the house are now connected wirelessly. I also managed to set up an encryption for the wireless access in order to prevent others from reaping the benefits of our connection. I did this all by myself, within about an hour. I don't want to tell you how long today my S tried to get all this done. It was enough hours that a lot of swears were said when I told him I had it all figured out and working.

As a result, I am typing this from the comfort of my bed. Hurraz for progress, I guess.

Ok, time to finish up the last bits of GIR so I can stuff it and give it to sisterinlaw. Cheers~

So my great-uncle Arturo passed away today. He had been struggling with lung cancer for a few months now, but interestingly enough it wasn't the cancer that killed him; it was a bout of pneumonia.

My dad is pretty upset but doing what he always does when he's upset over something - squashes it down to the bottom of his toes and walks it off. There is a lot of stuff behind this and I would like to elaborate but I shouldn't and especially not on a public journal. Suffice it to say - there is a lot of misguided guilt there with regards to great-uncle Arturo's brother Danny and I don't want to elaborate too much but my Dad has some very hard feelings against the man (Danny not Arturo) and is going to have to squash those down as well as great-uncle Danny will most likely be at the funeral. Which is interesting because I thought he was in jail or something (again, LONG LONG story).

This is my grandfather's brother we are talking about here, just to make it a bit clearer. I don't really know how to process it. I knew the man and loved him because he was family, but didn't feel incredibly attached because he is all the way in Fall River MA and I'm all the way here. We used to visit twice a year though, and he was nice and had the kind of laugh that made you feel like you were in on some delicious joke.

I don't know what else to say, except that I feel a little numb, and it isn't just the cold doing it this time.

I really like Feist, I have no idea why.

I have a headcold.

I have a headcold, which means my head is full of goo.

I have a headcold, which means my head is full of goo, and I'm worried about my mother.

I have a headcold, which means my head is full of goo, and I'm worried about my mother, BUT my friends witchie & fez (but mostly witchie) sent me a kick-ass package.

I have a headcold which means my head is full of goo, and I'm worried about my mother, BUT my friends witchie & fez (but mostly witchie) sent me a kick-ass package, which made me cry.

I have a... oh fuck it.

Witchie, I got your package and it was awesome and everything was wrapped so beautifully that I was half-afraid to open them, and every little treasure I opened up just made me happier and happier, and I cried because I've had such a lousy time of things lately and this just made me so damn happy it wasn't even funny.

So thank you. And thank you. And thank you. I feel blessed, in spite of the head full of goo and the very sick mother.

For the first time ever, as in ever in my entire life, I bought a lottery ticket for myself yesterday. I don't know what impulses were working there, but it just seemed like the thing to do.

I'll let you know how it goes.

I am so sick and damn tired of snow it isn't funny.

In other news, I'm knitting GIR and I just finished one of his arms and realized I forgot to switch to grey after doing his shoulder in blue and now I'm all flustered and angry and I realize I'm going to have to rip it out but I just finished the damn thing and doing a four-string I-cord on 4 separate needles is HARD do you hear me????? The gad danged needles keep slipping and ARGH! If this weren't for my sister-in-law I would have done with it and feed the yarn to the cat already.

*heave*

*sigh*

Ok.

Today is the last day of vacation for the kids, and frankly I'm glad because they are driving each other and as a result ME up the bend. They stay at grandma's while I'm at work for the 5 hrs a day I'm required to go in, but the minute I'm home they are like rockets, ROCKETS I TELL YOU around the house. But ANGRY ROCKETS that shoot laser beams at each other all the damn time but the laser beams in this scenario are sharp pointy YELLING WORDS.

I have that stupid damn Amy Winehouse song stuck in my head and it won't go away and I want to gnash my teeth.

To end this post on a happy note I found out yesterday that one of my co-workers is having a baby in July. This is happy news because she's had some real trouble not only conceiving but managing to keep a baby in her belly over the 3 month mark. So hooray! I'm very glad for her as she is the type that truly wants a million kids and stuff.

Ok off to make breakfast for my family. Ciao.

Where the hell did the year go?

My mom needs to have a bunch of external cysts removed. they just up and started growing out of nowhere. They are huge and very noticeable and she says they are also very painful. She measures the pain as a vouchsafe against the dreaded "C" word.

My heart aches and I am tired and I am worried about too many people, none of them being myself.

I need a vacation from life.

Currently making a couple dozen butter tarts. I hope 2 dozen is ok - I figure there will be lots at the bake sale and I'm too tired to put myself out any further - it's been a very long, very stressful few weeks and I can't really put forth any more effort than I already have. Last week was report card week and the parent-teacher meetings left me drained and crying. It's too long to get into here and frankly not something I feel the need to publicly air (shocking, I know). If you are curious then you'll know how to get a hold of me to find out what is going on.

Tomorrow night is a council meeting because yet again they had to reschedule. If it keeps going on Monday nights I'm going to have to quit because it conflicts with my schedule BIG TIME. Sigh.

Ok I need to go do more things. Because I have a zillion on my plate and hopefully want to pare it down to a million by the end of the night.

I don't know what to do with K anymore. Third note home since November 5th with regards to his being rough and picking on, of all people, his best friend. All three incidents involved his friend, all three incidents he "said he was sorry" and had to go to the principal. I have no fucking idea what to do with him as our typical punishments don't seem to be getting through.

What really makes me irate is that just this morning, he and I had a long talk about his behavior and he PROMISED he would behave. Promised me like there was no tomorrow. So imagine my surprise when I find at the bottom of his school bag (which was soaking wet for the third time in a row because yet again, he didn't put his water bottle in his lunch bag and also left the damn bottle open) another note from his teacher explaining that, yet again, he has done something not very nice to his friend. This time around he threw snow down his friend's coat and hat. Last time he had pushed his friend into a block of ice. The time before, oh god I can't even remember.

I was so mad I was crying. I'm at my wit's end and have no idea how to get it through to him, that if he continues to behave this way, a few not so nice things will happen. First he will lose every last one of his friends. Nobody likes a bully. Second, he'll probably get suspended or expelled. Thirdly... I don't even want to think about it. The path he is walking is not a good one. And it just kills me because he is such a good boy, deep down, and has such a good heart, and I don't know where all of this aggression is coming from. He says he just can't control himself sometimes and this is what he does to let out whatever is in him. I say he needs to learn and real damn quick son because: my wit's end? Yeah. I'm there.

So I'm at a point where, do I do the thing I really don't want to do, and not give him the main thing he really wants for Christmas, to teach him something? Or do I try and figure out something else? My dad would say just tan his hide until he can't sit for a week, and while in a way I'm tempted, it would just be sending the kid the worst kind of mixed message.

I don't know. And I'm so upset, and I'm embarrassed because I really like the family of his friend, and there are only so many phone calls I can make to apologise before even I don't want to hear it anymore. What do I do? I don't know. I don't know. The only thing I can do right now is cry. I'm so frustrated.

Ugh. SNOW! Freaking. Snow.


Sigh.

I can't seriously be the only one that hates this weather.

In other news... my friends are going through the same hoops that S & I had to go through last year to get a Wii. Hopes up, hopes sunk. Hopes up, hopes sunk. Lather, rinse, repeat. My sister-in-law is doing what she can to help, and I assured them that we didn't end up getting one until Christmas was practically in our laps, but it got done. Still, I know how it feels to be in the uncomfortable position of simply not knowing if it will happen or not.

Speaking of sister-in-laws, I am knitting her a green version of the Jayne hat, taking a break from the sweater I was knitting because while it's beautiful, the lady who wrote the pattern was off by a few things and I had to do a lot of patch-ups where she missed stitch instructions etc. I figure it out but I need a breather. All that's left is the sleeves, and a hat is a pretty quick knit nowadays. I couldn't have said that a year ago - it took me a month to make my first hat - but now I can whip those up in a heartbeat.

Ok off to shovel the rest of my driveway and uh, go window shopping I guess?

Ciao.