This is what you would call a DELUGE...

So, all of our plans for the day got scrapped. Ugh.

We have been down to one vehicle for the last two weeks, as my husband's car just refused to start one day. So Daddy Mac has been taking my van to work, coming home at lunch and picking up Monster Boy to take him to school, and then leaving work early to pick up Monster Boy from school and bringing him home. I needed the van today to run some errands, so Miss Sunshine and I went with them to take Monster Boy to school and then dropped Daddy Mac off at the office while I ran my errands. The original plan was to pick him up from the office after getting Monster Boy from school - well he called and said he was going to get a ride from someone at the office and to just head home instead. Well, I went home and stopped to get the mail on the way. I get back in the van to start it back up and drive the half a block to our house, and the van won't start! I called Daddy Mac, he got a ride right then, they tried to jump the van with no luck and we wound up pushing it down the street to the house. A friend of ours came over to look at the van, and we all immediately though the battery was bad. After a battle to pull the battery out of the van, we took it up to the parts store to have them test it. Nothing wrong with the battery, so now we don't know WHAT is wrong with the van. We were able to jump the car and currently have it hooked up to a battery charger, hoping and praying that will be all it takes to get it back on the road at least temporarily until we can get the van running again... hoping being the operative word there.

I think we've bypassed pour and are full on into monsoon at this point...

Toothy Tuesday!

Little Miss Sunshine cut her first tooth today! She had her hands in her mouth all morning so I decided to do some investigating, and sure enough, there it was, right through the gum! You can't see it yet, but you can definitely feel it! Took her long enough...

In other news, we are struggling with her speech. She has the appropriate number of words for her age and so she is not TECHNICALLY speech-delayed. HOWEVER, she does not say consonants other than M, N, and W sounds. This is an issue. Both the speech therapists at Shriner's and our local speech therapist here from Rainbows United have said that they would expect more consonant sounds out of her at this point - specifically B, P and D sounds. And we've got NOTHING. She also is not doing much "responsive" speech, other than the words she already knows. If you try to get her to mimic "baby", for example, she just looks at you like you are crazy and goes and gets her baby doll. Not a peep will come from her. Now, she'll spout off "mama" and "more" for you no problem, but good luck getting much else. We did get her to say "uh-oh" during her speech therapy this last week, and she's been saying it continually ever since, which is great!, but still not where we want her to be. At this point, we are trying to stay away from being overly aggressive, but we also want to keep her speech at least age appropriate and prevent her from falling behind. Our speech therapist here gave us some good ideas to work with and will be back in two weeks to check on our progress - hopefully in that time we can squeak an "up" or a "baby" out of her!

On the agenda for tomorrow are some fun activities with the kids - Monster Boy located a large box that he can fit inside of and it's now his "secret hideaway" as he calls it. I told him we could decorate it with markers and paints tomorrow - so that is on the agenda... Said box will then be making it's way into the basement playroom so it does not take up so much space in our living room. Also, tomorrow is on the schedule for Easter Egg time! Who knows whether that will happen or not - it may get postponed to Thursday...

I'll be selling some handmade wares of mine in a local craft show in May, and if that goes well, my stepmother and I will be joining forces on Etsy (where she already has a tie-dyed baby clothes site!) to sell a few things on there... I've been working on stuff slowly but surely lately, hoping to build up a stash and get things going. Our ultimate goal is to find a way for me to continue to stay home with the kids until Monster Boy starts kindergarten (sniff!) in the fall, at which time we are hopeful I may be able to go back to school as well... I've been applying for several jobs in the area without much response, so we feel more and more as though this "going back to school" thing is really what is meant to happen. Of course, in order for that to happen, Daddy Mac has to find a steady form of income or I have to find a way to bring more money in. I've applied for a few part time positions to see if maybe I can get a leg up there and at least get SOME money coming in, and am hoping perhaps this Etsy shop will be another answer for us. We will have lots of fun and exciting items for sale - and as soon as things are set up and running I'll throw you all a link and maybe a button or two! So keep your eyes peeled for that one! I'm hoping to get some more followers going on here as well, so hey, recommend me to your friends! If I can get enough of a following going, there might be some giveaways in it for you!

Happy Birthday, Honey!

My mom is keeping the kids tonight so Daddy Mac and I can go out and celebrate his birthday and our anniversary. A kid free night all night long. And I'm even nice enough that I let him pick the movie we will see - one that I totally do not want to go to. It is his birthday, after all!

Monday will mark our two year wedding anniversary. Seems like it's been so much longer than just two years - and I mean that in a good way. I really just don't remember what life was like without my husband. He has been my rock over the past year as we have dealt with the discovery of Miss Sunshine's cleft and all that has entailed. My emotions have been up and down and taken him on quite the roller coaster ride, for sure. And I know we aren't done yet. Things are hard right now for us, emotionally with the kids, financially with me being laid off and his job just not going well, and even physically as we have both struggled with some emotional weight gain and all that entails on our health. But I have faith that the next year of our marriage will bring better and brighter days, and that the trials we have gone through thus far will do nothing but serve to make our relationship that much stronger. I look forward to the days ahead, and am ready to put the days behind where they belong - behind us.

And what is real life?

It's amazing how much your feelings can be hurt by someone you've never even met in real life. You might still consider that person a friend, a confidant, someone you trust and/or truly care about and believe cares about you. And if you find out that things aren't all as they seemed, you can feel hurt, betrayed, saddened, and disillusioned.

How is it that we let people we don't even really KNOW have so much power over our lives? I have this strong desire to trust everyone, to take everyone at face value. I hate it when I find out that face value isn't really a value at all.

This has been a very long week for me emotionally, as many things that have come out in an online community that I considered to be a group of friends has turned into something very negative. I cannot help but feel hurt over it. I have tried very hard to stay out of the middle, away from the drama. I am human, and I admit to not always succeeding at that goal, but I have TRIED and at least I can say that. I want to rewind this whole situation by MONTHS and go back to before when everything started to seriously unravel. I have trusted these people with some of my heart, and it's beginning to feel like that trust was misplaced. I've discussed things with them about my children, about my husband, about my LIFE. I can only hope that they will consider my trust as sacred as I considered it when I gave it to them and don't abuse it anymore than it has already been abused.

I have learned my lesson, and it was a hard one. And now it is time to move on.

Getting Crafty

I read some pretty cool Mom Blogs in my (little) spare time. A lot of them give great tips on DIY projects to save money, and I have recently put a few of these to the test. I have been SUPER pleased with all the results and am passing them on to you!

My first DIY project was making my own baby wipes. Miss Sunshine has developed a sensitivity to pretty much every baby wipe on the market, even the sensitive formula wipes. I was looking for an alternative, and one of my friends just happened to have a "recipe" for making your own baby wipes. I made a few alterations of my own to her "recipe" as some of the called for items (specific brands) are not available in my area without ordering online, but the measurements and types of product used remained the same. I am THRILLED with the results. They smell SO good, they work SO well, and no more rashes! Hooray! If you want to learn how to make your own baby wipes, head here: Alanna In Suburbia.

My next DIY project was to make my own baby legwarmers. I have to tell you all, when I first saw Baby Legs and the generic versions in stores, I honestly thought they were just the most ridiculous things ever. But then I got a pair as a gift and fell IN LOVE. They are fantastic - the perfect addition to a dress or onesie to keep baby's legs warm and protected - and no messing with pulling tights on and off at diaper change time! Hooray! So, another mommy blogger I follow posted directions on how to make your OWN baby legwarmers out of knee high socks. I desperately wanted a St. Patrick's Day themed pair to go with the Jean skirt, t-shirt and hairbow I had for Miss Sunshine to wear on St. Patrick's Day this year. So I went out, bought a pair of shamrock knee highs and followed directions. They were SO easy and took me less than 10 minutes to make, and I definitely do not qualify as a veteran sewer in any way, shape or form. Head on over to My Boho Baby is Hippie Chic to learn how to make your own baby legwarmers too! And, some photographic evidence of my foray in to baby legwarmer making for you all:

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Well, things have been BUSY BUSY around the Mac household these days. Miss Sunshine is growing like a weed and into EVERYTHING. Monster Boy is being his usual charming self.

This week was spring break for Monster Boy. Wednesday we shipped him off to one Grandma and Miss Sunshine off to another and set about redoing his bedroom. Our house has builder white paint on the walls and has since we moved in. Slowly but surely we've been painting the rooms, and his was next on the agenda. It seemed like a good time to do it since we had to purchase a new bedding set for him anyways - he has a bit of an obsession with scissors, as it turns out, and not in a good way. So far he has decimated the dogs leash, cut his own hair and the latest was cutting a hole in his bedspread. I let it go as long as I could, but it had reached the point where the dog (and Miss Sunshine) were pulling the filling out through the hole. So I bought a new bed set and gave him some paint chips to pick a color from. My bad in the part that I didn't realize just how BRIGHT the final color choice was - it honestly didn't look that bright in the store. The paint job turned out well, and it goes wonderfully with his new striped bedspread (that will grow well with him as he ages) but MAN it is blinding in his room. I have some pictures for you, but they don't really do it justice...

Well Dang...

Phew - I got all hot and bothered and wrote up my other post - and wouldn't you know it, didn't even check out my counter to see that I FLEW past 1,000 hits sometime in the last few days! Thanks for joining me along on the ride...