Not Me Monday

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

Okay, so this Not Me Monday was almost very different, but thankfully a certain 16 year old decided to come clean so we could all NOT do so many fun things this weekend. Thanks, Gabe for NOT being honest. More on that later.

I have not been very stressed out lately. I’ve been totally calm and collected and have not been flipping out in the least. Good thing, cuz it is never good for a mama to be near the breaking point with her job and her eldest child.

So the sweet hubby decided to take us all to a nearby city for the weekend. We did not stay in beautiful resort for very cheap. We definitely did not take advantage of my hubby’s business connections to get a wicked price on a fabulous room. We did not laugh at all of the golfers and make silly golf jokes all weekend.

Our plan for this weekend was to do some major shopping. Gabe had a clothing allowance to spend, so it’s a good thing we didn’t nearly have to leave him behind due to some more major honesty issues over very stupid stuff. That would have totally sucked, so I am glad that we didn’t even have to consider that. After checking into the hotel we went over to Old Navy where we did not take full advantage of the half off men’s clothing sale and get Gabe  a whole new wardrobe. I was not extremely proud of how he chose COLOR instead of black. I did not sit at the kiddie table by the dressing rooms and color a Father’s Day picture for my hubby. Said hubby did not chuckle profusely and say VERY LOUDLY “Well you’re not Early Childhood at all, are you?”

I was not more than a little pissed off that my favorite Old Navy jeans no longer fit me appropriately. I did not wish multiple times this weekend that my curves were easier to find clothes for and that the butt-crack-factor was not the first thing I had to consider with a pair of jeans.

I did not have to contain my joy multiple times as my men-folk rushed around store after store trying to find me clothes to try on. I do not thoroughly enjoy the fact that both my husband and my son love to shop. It’s annoying and I don’t love the bragging rights one bit. I was not extremely proud of myself for keeping my heart guarded as I tried on clothes. I did not totally impress myself with my good attitude as my “not gonna do it” pile kept growing and growing. I am not totally thankful for arrow prayers and a Holy Spirit that cares about how I feel about my body.

After a full day of shopping, I did not return to the hotel with 1 pair of pants and 1 shirt and 1 nightgown thingy with a cape. I did not thoroughly enjoy the amazing Mexican food that the hubby treated us too.

Saturday night, I did not feel like a kid again as I went down the water slide head first again and again and again. I did not have a few moments of childishness. I was not tempted to tell the little girl in front of me to quit cutting in line.

Sunday, I did not feel a little guilty about missing church. I was not extremely blessed by the wonderful worship music on our favorite Christian radio station. It did not make me feel much MUCH better about spending time with my hubby, sister, and son. I did not find it totally ironic that I found more (brand new) clothing that fit at the local Goodwill than at any other store.

Finally, I did not eat some really GOOD food this weekend. I was not so full after an amazing lunch of ribs and wings yesterday that I wasn’t the least bit hungry until breakfast this morning. I did not feel much better knowing that I did a butt-load of walking all weekend.

I am not feeling quite overwhelmed at how God has truly blessed us this year. I do not find myself thinking of how few people, even in our nation, have been blessed with such provision. I am not in awe of how God has blessed ME with such a wonderful husband, who cared enough to not only take his wife shopping but cheer for her along the way. I am not filled with glee after a fun weekend with my sister who is my best friend. I am not feeling very motherish after our first real family get away. God is so not good.

Oh wait! HE IS!!!

Leave a comment | 1 comment so far | Tags: bargain shopping, marriage, parenting

Not Me Monday

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

I was absolutely perfect this weekend. There is nothing to report of anything embarrassing.

When I got a call from my husband telling me of MORE major manipulation and lying from our eldest, I did not want to strangle the boy and shake him violently saying “WHY!!!!” I was not more than relieved that I was still at work and would have three more hours to cool off before I had to face the child.

I was not more than a little disappointed that the husband had completely cooled off and was totally calm and collected when I got home. I did not feel like I missed a great chance to vent and yell for a while. I did not totally turn my brain off by watching two recorded episodes of So You Think You Can Dance.

On Saturday I was totally prepared for the 8 hour training I was teaching. I did not have one HUGE “OH CRAP!!!!” moment where I realized I forgot half of the supplies needed for the training at the office. I was not relieved near tears to see that one of my trainees had arrived half an hour early and could help me set up. I definitely did not share the “Purple vomit” story with my trainees because it pertained to our topic matter. That would have been totally unprofessional.

After I got home from my training I did not collapse into bed and sleep for nearly three hours and then collapse into bed again only four hours later. I did not totally take advantage of my hubby’s recent sweetness and allow him to wait on me hand and foot.

Finally, Sunday was another perfect day. I did not thoroughly enjoy the company of our little guy even more than normal because his big brother is driving me BONKERS!!! I am not feeling like I don’t understand Gabe one little bit lately and I am glad I don’t feel like every moment I have to talk to him lately is work and takes WAY too much energy. When our eldest was mopey for the entire afternoon AGAIN and would not tell me why AGAIN I did not want to shout at him as loudly as I could ” FINE! Be grounded for the rest of the summer! It’s your choice and this is what you are choosing! If you want to be miserable I am just going to let you be miserable!” I am not more than skeptical that our 1 hour talk before he went to bed last night really had any effect. I am not expecting to have the same conversation again tonight…and tomorrow…and for ETERNITY!!!

I am so glad I am so composed and have it all together. I would not be so foolish as all of that.

Leave a comment | No comments yet | Tags: Adoption, foster care, marriage, parenting

Not Me Monday…again :)

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

I am so thankful that MckMama and Stellan are home safe and sound. It’s just icing on the cake that we get to have some fun with Not Me Monday again.

This weekend was full of activity. On Saturday we went to an estate auction where I thankfully did not almost bid on very expensive farm equipment by pointing at something up in the sky. That would have been very embarrassing, so I am glad that my hands were totally under control. When I saw the cutest little girl with her mom, I definitely kept my composure and didn’t play with her for a significant portion of the bidding. That would just be obsessive, so I’m glad I didn’t do that. She did not become my friend in a matter of seconds and did not ask me to come sit by her on the sidewalk, totally ignoring her mother in the process. I don’t have this effect on kids often. Nope, never.

I am totally capable of continually handling our eldest’s attitude issues without effect on my emotions. I have not become weary and found myself being overly harsh and impatient. Nope, not me. I know better than that. I am definitely not enjoying the fact that he is in deep trouble right now because that means that I can give him extra chores and be justified in doing so. That would just be cruel. I do not need an attitude check myself. I do not need to focus on how to teach and encourage instead of how to correct. Who would want to do that?

I volunteered to watch our friend’s little one yesterday. She was sick and very sleepy and cuddly. Thankfully, I am totally in control of my maternal instincts, so they did not kick into overdrive and my breasts definitely did not start to ache after 8 hours of caring for this very sweet, needy little one. That would just be weird.

We went to a friend’s graduation party yesterday and I totally did not hit up the hostess for leftover Mexican Lasagna so that I would have some for lunch today. That would just be rude.

Oh, there are so many things I did not do. It’s been a long week, but I think that covers the gist of it.

Oh, except that I am totally ok with my hubby having to go away on business for the next few weeks and I am not afraid at all that I am going to screw something major up.  That’s a biggie. I am so glad that I am more self-assured than that.

Leave a comment | No comments yet | Tags: Adoption, foster care, marriage, parenting

Not Me Monday…Gabe edition

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

I am so glad I did not do anything warranting a Not-Me this weekend. I did not take full advantage of Gabe’s turning 16. I did not go into full “Mom” mode and snatch as many memory making moments as possible. The boy-child did not have a camera in his face at every possible memory-type moment. I did not purposely take a lot of candid shots just to try to capture the moments as realistically as possible.

Kaleb and I did not intentionally buy him “preppy” clothes, knowing that he would wear them because he has little else to wear. Kaleb and I did not oooh and awww over the child, who cleans up really well.

The whole family did not nearly collapse from sugar comas from my excruciatingly good ice cream cake! I did not offer extra hot fudge and whipped cream to make it even worse.

It did not feel good at all to hear Gabe call me Mom as he knocked on my bedroom door to check in after chores. Nope. Not good at all.

****Update****

I want to post some fantastic photos and video from this weekend, but I am not sure what permission I need to obtain first. Hopefully I can post them soon.

Leave a comment | 2 comments so far (is that a lot?) | Tags: Adoption, foster care

Not Me Monday

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

So, I have very little to report. I did not do anything embarrassing this weekend at all. I did not eat pizza for two out of three meals, three days in a row. I did not eat pizza for breakfast Saturday and then switch it up and have very healthy chocolate chip pancakes for dinner. Nope, that kind of eating never happens at my house.

I am a very responsible person, so I did not take full advantage of our almost-16-year-old foster son’s dog walking ability. It was cold and blizzardy all weekend, so I am so glad I did not send that good-hearted boy into the cold multiple times. I also did not take full advantage of Gabe’s cleaning talents. I didn’t let his young, flexible body take on the carpeted stairs because all of us 20 something old folks get too sore doing it. I would never do that. Thankfully, I remembered to never thank him profusely for all the hard work he wasn’t doing.

I am very poised and self-contained, so I didn’t do an inward happy dance when my beautiful hubby let me know that he was accosted in a Wal-Mart aisle by our former supervisor asking if we would be willing to take a 9 year old boy. I definitely did not grim from ear to ear just at the thought that Kaleb was considering taking this precious child. I am much more subtle than that.

And currently I am not laughing at all my eastern and southern friends who are complaining about snow. I have much more compassion than that.

How about you? What kind of embarrassing things have YOU not been doing?

Leave a comment | No comments yet | Tags: Adoption, faith, foster care, marriage

Not Me Monday

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

I am so glad that I have nothing to be embarrassed about this week. For example, I did not go bra-less the whole weekend because I am down to one bra and need to give it time to rest. I am also not avoiding my daily exercise because of the lack of “athletic support” and I don’t find it a completely valid reason.

I am most definitely not sore after trudging through 14+ inches of snow multiple times yesterday. Nope. My legs are much more in shape than that. Of coarse, I didn’t capture said snow on video to save face when people ask why I wasn’t in church yesterday. Nope, I am not that self-conscious. I will not be posting that video later, because I want to show my southern friends how wimpy they are. That would just be cruel.

I did not fall into a crying ball of jealously when my husband left me alone in the sauna and I found him playing video games with my sister. That would just be silly. I am so glad I didn’t do that.

I am not having increasingly intense, weird dreams about babies and adoption almost every night, and I did not get accused by my husband of only craving sex with him so much because I really want a baby, and he is not partially right.

I did not try to read a really good, hard-core get closer to Jesus book yesterday, only to find out that my brain and heart could not process the information, and that I can’t remember almost anything the book said.

I did not bounce out of bed on time this morning solely because I was hoping that I would find that I couldn’t get my car out of the garage and would have to call in to work. I was not more than slightly disappointed when the car easily rolled through the 5 new inches of snow since our plow guy plowed last night. I did not leave so early that I ended up getting to work almost 20 minutes early and snoozing in the parking lot, getting strange looks from our secretary.

I am so glad that I don’t do those embarrassing things.

What embarrassing things do you not do?

Leave a comment | 5 comments so far (is that a lot?) | Tags: Adoption, faith, marriage

Not me Monday

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

Okay, so there is NOT a lot of crying in this post. I did NOT spend hours upon hours crying this weekend over various semi-serious at the moment things.

My husband’s departure to California did NOT have a much more profound effect on me than I had anticipated.I am NOT already missing his smell and the taste of his kisses. Nope, I’m NOT that sentimental.

My entire diet Sunday definitely did NOT consist only of biscuits and blueberry jam.

I really did NOT actually sleep in till nearly 1 PM Sunday after driving my hubby to the airport, and I did NOT ask my sister to put the dogs in the sauna so I could sleep undisturbed.

I did NOT wear the same pair of pants all weekend.

I was NOT a little relieved that Baby Degu died on Friday because it means one less critter to have to worry about and feel guilty about not spending enough time with.

I am NOT secretly hoping that the training I am supposed to do on Saturday gets canceled, because I definitely don’t want to spend the day with my Gracie girl.

I am NOT contemplating going to a certain frozen custard restaurant after work to get a large cone of the flavor of the day.

Leave a comment | No comments yet | Tags: Adoption, marriage, the critters

Not Me Monday

One of my favorite blogs that I have become addicted to is the Mck Mama at http://www.mycharmingkids.net. Every Monday she writes “Not Me Mondays”, so I thought I’d give it a try.

Friday I did not discover that my coat had bird poop all over the collar. I have no idea how that happened, and it definitely couldn’t have been my beautiful African Grey. I most definitely didn’t wear that coat to work anyway and hope no one would notice.

I did not get my butt beat by my overly-lucky husband at 3-13, and I definitely did not lose to my sister at 3′s.

I did not leave my beautiful sister a sink and a half load of dishes after our pizza night.

I am not pestering all of my friends and family over facebook to check out my new blog.

I did not forget on purpose to tell my husband that our beautiful Pe had chewed through the electrical plug for our cable box more than a month and a half ago. He definitely did not remain a lot calmer than I thought he would when he found it while looking for some computer tools.

Pretty boring Not me Monday…but it’s my first one, so I don’t feel so bad.

Leave a comment | No comments yet | Tags: family fun, the critters