defeat

I have been defeated. I have been looking, casually, whenever I’m out and about, for fall/winter dress shoes for K. She has some white patent ones from last spring that are too tight on her and some white faux leather sandals from this summer that still fit. But she doesn’t have any black Mary Janes or felt/velour closed-toed shoes for this fall. I just kept thinking I would find some at one of the four Targets nearby. We have to go to a wedding tomorrow. Fashion ettiquette (not that I normally pay much attention to such things, but I am aware of the whole no white after Labor Day general rule) would dictate that she not wear her white sandals to the wedding. So there I am out tonight. Going to first one and then the other Wal-Mart that are in our vicinity. Took me a whole hour (WM on a Friday night is not the easiest parking lot or store to navigate) to get to the two stores only to find that there were NO black shoes in a girls’ size 10 to be found. Well, in the second WM I did find one pair of shoes and walked around with them for a few minutes before realizing that one of them had a strap and the other one didn’t and couldn’t be fastened. I can’t find shoes for K for this wedding or for Sunday or for any dress occassion. I did quickly run in Rack Room Shoes which happened to be in the same shopping center as the second WM. I could have gotten her a pair of black dress shoes there for $24.99. I couldn’t do it. I figure if I’m going to pay twenty-five bucks for children’s shoes they had better come in navy blue (which matches more of her clothes than black does) and be a whole lot prettier than these were. I do not understand why children’s shoes (at least the cheap ones at Target and WM and so forth) seem to only come in black and white and sometimes red and the occassional pink. Not a wide selection of colors on the cheap end of shoes for little girls. I can’t justify buying the expensive (but very well-made and good for your feet) Stride Rite shoes for Sunday/dress-up wearing. I will spend more than $20 on a pair of shoes K will wear every day. All her tennis shoes are Stride Rite. But she gets good wear out of them. For shoes that she only wears a few hours each week, I’m not laying down that kind of money. I came back empty-handed tonight, defeated in my valiant attempt to shod my child before morning with appropriate footwear. So, we’re back to square one. I guess she will wear white shoes to the wedding tomorrow. Fortunately nobody usually pays attention to what shoes a 4 year old has on. But I am still left the the problem of finding her some dark colored shoes for Sundays this fall and winter.

excited over the strangest things

My vacuum has given up the ghost. It no longer sucks. Which sucks. So I have borrowed my neighbor’s vacuum. She’s going out of town for 2 weeks so it isn’t any big deal to her. Not like her husband is going to use it while she’s gone either. I can’t wait to vacuum. Since my vacuum has been slowly dying over the past few months, I honestly don’t think this carpet has been vacuumed well since we moved in, nearly 3 months ago. I’m so excited about finally being able to get the dirt up.

blame

Kyra blames me for her experience at the allergist today. New doctor, new office. Difficult, complicated directions to the main office that we will never visit again as we will be seen subsequently at the branch nearest to us. Doctor wanted a blood sample. I agreed. Kyra got her finger stuck and they took two vials of blood from her finger. Screamed the whole time. I wound up sitting on the examining table with her just holding her while she cried. It was awful. and it took forEVer. I felt so inadequate as a parent. I didn’t know what to say to make her feel better. But tonight and all afternoon she kept saying, “you shouldn’t have said yes to the testing, mama.” “It’s all your fault my finger hurts.” She really does blame me for it since I did agree to it. I hate that.

biology

Here’s an interesting study. I’ve always resisted the biology is destiny philosophy of thought. But, particularly after giving birth and breastfeeding, I can’t help but feel like biology certainly does do some things to us that we don’t cognitively anticipate. The longer finger issue is food for thought.

coming to grips with the fact

I used to love to cook. I enjoy doing things in the kitchen. I like putting a meal together. Heck, I made all my own baby food when my children were infants. I have lots of great Pampered Chef tools and thing that make cooking fun. But I haven’t cooked much since I’ve been here. I finally am coming to grips with the fact that I hate this kitchen. It is too overwhelming. Too hard to keep organized. Too hard to keep the crap from getting laid on the countertops/island so that I have any room to do anything. And since I can’t move freely through this kitchen, I don’t like cooking in it. Which is part of our money problem. We are spending far too much on food because I don’t like and can’t move comfortably in this cooking space.

more frustrations

I found out that K’s initial allery consult with her new allergist – which is 1.5-2 hours long – is now going to be at the allergy office downtown(!) instead of the one out our way (which is why I chose the practice). I’m pretty pissed off that, with the drive, it will take me nearly 4 hours to do this with her on Friday.

lack of direction

Charlotte doesn’t know what it wants to be: a really large small town or a small big city. It vascilliates between the two, not doing either one very well. It flounders and is full of fits and starts, never really finding an identity. I don’t know if it is from lack of visionary leadership or intentional or what — haven’t lived here long enough to figure it out. After years of living in a well-planned, well-focused, self-confident small town, I am losing patience with the mass of confusion and stupidity that is this city.

progress, such as it is

Trying to organize mothers of small children is like herding cats. it’s so hard. we had our meeting. we got off track and I had to keep us focused. we were watching our kids, too, so naturally we had to police that action which makes things hard, too. we met for nearly 2 hours. not sure what we accomplished in the specifics but we did get some generalizations established. getting the PMO off and running will be hard. but there is real interest and need. we have to deal with capacity and insurance and hiring and so forth. it’s a big undertaking. and of course I want it all done yesterday. anyway, I should feel encouraged but I just feel tired when I think about it. I suppose that I should take comfort in the fact that since it was so hard to have a meeting about starting some child care options is, in itself, proof of just how important and needed this service is and will be.

meeting my own needs

I am trying to start a drop-in child care program at church. There isn’t anything like this anywhere in the immediate area. I want it to be a Parents’ Morning Out program. I want to do this because I need it. Desperately. But the church needs to be doing something with its nice new building anyway. This morning I’m meeting with several mothers at church who also feel this is a real need. I do hope we can get something going.

mornings

I took an Ambien last night. I slept so well I even had dreams. I got over 8 hours of sleep, from around 10:30 or so until 4ish when I nursed E. Then I went back to sleep until around 7. It is truly amazing how much better I feel this morning. I’ve been getting the paper for two of my neighbors this week: the older gentleman next door who is taking chemo. and the couple two doors down and who are on a trip this week and who usually get the other man’s paper for him. This morning as I walked all the way down to the couple’s house I remembered why I like being up early in the morning; it just smells good (even with all the freakin’ traffic along the highway in front of our houses). Mornings feel wonderful. When I was little I always liked getting up early. But as I have grown up and stayed up later (and post-kids, gotten less sleep in general), I wind up spending less time awake in the morning. Anyway, I was reminded that having a good night’s sleep and being able to be awake in the quiet of the morning (as long as I am fully rested) is really a wonderful thing. I love mornings.