Lack of Blogging, and Some Bad Luck

Well, I have officially been a slacker. I have posted only a handful of blogs during this month of November. Part of it is due to Steve's schedule. Part of it is due to holiday stress. Part of it is due to my lack of creativity. I digress.

I mean to post pictures of B Man. He is growing like a weed! He's started to get up on his knees and rock back and forth. We tried to convince him that he needed to start crawling over the Thanksgiving holiday so that his Chicago grandparents could witness the milestone, but Brett thought otherwise. Oh, well. But, I don't think it will be long now! We have started buying babyproofing gear. We bought a net to put over our loft railing and electrical socket plugs. Today I plan to make another trip to BRU to buy a baby gate with my coupon. I am thankful they just started an "R Us" rewards program. Lord knows we are going to spend money on all of this stuff!

We also just bought him a new carseat. After much research, we decided on the Britax Roundabout. It is perfect for my VW bug since it is designed to fit into compact cars. His infant carrier was getting a bit too cramped for him, and once we added the winter coat, the kid became absolutely miserable in the thing. Well, we purchased said carseat online because the color I wanted was only online. Plus, I had been saving up for this carseat for months, by selling things on Ebay - so it was all in my paypal account and I could pay for it via paypal online. Simple enough, right? Plus, I got a free shipping coupon, a 15% off coupon, and I was able to use my R Us rewards. This was looking really good! Until the carseat came in on Tuesday and it was "granite" instead of "tan swirl". Grrrr!!!! I was pi$$ed to say the least. We called customer service and after a long conversation had them ship us another one overnight for the same price with free shipping. So, now we have two sitting here in our living room. The right one and the "granite" one. The good thing is that the granite color matches Steve's car perfectly... but I hadn't yet budgeted for another expensive carseat. We did however get it at the discounted price. And, it will be a pain in the a$$ to re-ship it back (they won't accept it in store because it is also a color that they only carry online). So, anyway, I think we are going to hold onto it for a little while and see how he likes the one in my car and decide if we can affored to keep that seat for Steve's car or not.

Otherwise, the other news occured black Friday morning. And, this did make my Friday rather black. We had pre-planned our route and our first stop was Staples. Our printer had gone out early in the summer and we hadn't been able to afford a new one yet. Well, they had exactly what we were looking for at 50% off and I had a gift card to spend at Staples... so we ended up getting this printer for free! (well, $1.16 after taxes). We got in line before the store opened. Steve dropped me off and I got in line. He parked and joined me. We spent all of 5 minutes in the store. We located the printer, picked it up, checked out and got back into our car.... we arrived at Kohl's not realizing what had happend yet. Steve couldn't find the spare $$ he had for tolls which was sitting in the cupholder next to his seat. I didn't think anything of it until we were leaving the Kohl's parking lot. I went to start my iPod. And, it wasn't there. My $299 first generation video iPod, which I bought in January of 2006 with over 2,000 songs on it, the first season of The Office and countless hours of work to customize it uniquely for myself was... gone. I was beside myself. The worst part is that it wasn't backed up so I lost everything. I never kept much on my computer harddrive because I didn't want to eat up the memory. So, in addition to everything... Brett's 200 + song playlist and my beloved Ben Fold's 150+ song playlist? GONE (Gone, gone, gone........ kudos to anyone who gets that reference). Oh, and the $79 monster radio adapter was swiped with it.

We called insurance and we have a $500 deductible, so basically I am SOL. I am actually mourning the loss of this small piece of my life. I am not an electronics junkie and I never have to have the newest of the greatest piece of technology. But I LOVED my iPod. I never used my car radio... it was all iPod, all the time. And, when I would go jogging in my neighborhood? I had the whole jacket and armband for it so I could use it for motivation. I'd just turn it to my "running mix"... which started with Republica's "Ready To Go".... ah, I am already sad. And, what makes me even sicker is that I know that probably within minutes of it leaving my hands, the thief restored it back to it's original factory settings... deleting the 15 GB of my stuff.

I'm really trying to get over this.. I am. And, it couldn't come at a worse time. We are financially very tight right now. My salary was cut in half when I took a part time job. We knew it would affect us, but didn't realize how much. We are being very creative for Christmas.... Tina introduced me to this fabulous "Mypoints" site. So, I have done alot of shopping online, trying to accumulate points towards gift cards. We are concerned with paying the bills and buying groceries... so the LAST thing I NEED is an iPod. I hope to have another one eventually. I have asked for gift cards now for Christmas... so that I can hopefully accumulate them all into a purchase of another iPod. I am also going to keep selling little things here and there on ebay to hopefully make enough $$ to buy one. I am also taking my time to research all of the new models. They have changed a lot since mine came out 3 years ago. I am leaning towards the iPod touch (I guess it has wi-fi with it!), but I'll be lucky if I can afford the 8 GB nano (which is also cute... I could get a blue one that matches my bug). This time I won't put as much effort into downloading my whole life onto it. I am just going to add what I will most often listen to. That way I won't be so heartsick if this new one gets swiped.

Nothin' Like A Boy & His Dog

I meant to post this on Sunday, but time got away from me. Nothing makes Brett happier then playing with his dogs :).

And yes, you CAN hear football in the background (sigh).

Showin' Some B Love

I feel as though I have not posted anything about my B man in awhile. And, you know what, I think I'm right. So I took a couple of pictures to add. This teddy bear has become a favorite of his recently. He got it from a Great-Grandma for Halloween and as soon as we paired the two of them up he started up a conversation with it.

Also, notice the wet shirt. This kid is a non-stop fountain of drool. I am constantly checking for teeth, but haven't felt anything yet.

Dreams

I've always thought dream interpretation was fascinating. Being one who has highly vivid dreams, I've looked up what they mean from time to time.

Throughout my life I've had 4 or 5 reoccuring dreams. The first I can remember is of my flying. I haven't had that one in awhile, but the funny thing is that I can tell you exactly how I could fly in real life. I always fly the same way. Isn't that strange? It's been years since I've had that dream.

But, recently I've had other dreams... the second most common dream I have is a variation on a common theme. Sometimes I'm late for class. Other times I can't find where my class is. Or, I can't open my locker. More commonly I'll find out that I have JUST missed the cutoff for the amount of credits that I need to graduate, or I have to go back to grade school or high school. But, one dream usually occurs more often than all of these. This would be the dream in which I signed up for a class and I totally forget about it. Then, when it's too late to do anything about it (i.e. - halfway through the semester, and I can't even drop it then) I remember and panic. I usually attend class once then and realize that I am totally screwed.

I started having this dream in college, around my junior year. Then, I'd have it on and off. I had it again a couple of nights ago. So, I looked it up...

"Class - To dream that you forgot to attend a class you signed up for, indicates your anxieties and fear of failing. You may also be lacking self-confidence in your ability to handle new responsibilities or projects."

Wow.

Okay, I've also been having another reoccuring dream lately. This one is where I find extra rooms in either my old sorority house (weird, huh? I've not been there for like 10 years), or more commonly, our house. Usually I rediscover a hallway downstairs that I've totally forgotten about. It leads to all of these amazing rooms including a movie theatre and usually an outside swimming pool. The funny thing is that the layout is often the same and I will remember this in each sequential dream.

Okay, looked this up....

"Rooms - To dream that you find or discover new rooms, suggests that you are developing new strengths and taking on new roles. You may be growing emotionally. "

And finally the newest reoccuring dream I've had lately involves me chewing gum. I had this dream once about 5 years ago and still remember it. Within I'd say, the last 3 weeks I've had it about every 3-4 days. The setting varies and the events in the dream are different, but they all share one common element. I'm chewing gum. And my mouth gets tired and I take the gum out, but there is still some left and it increases and I keep chewing. And I repeat this process, never able to get rid of all of the gum. I finally looked this one up this morning too...

"Gum - To dream that you are chewing gum, suggests that you are unable to express yourself effectively. You may feel vulnerable. Alternatively, is symbolizes a sticky situation that you found yourself in. To dream that you are unable to get rid of your gum, suggests that you are experiencing some indecision, powerlessness or frustration. You may lack understanding in a situation or find that a current problem is overwhelming."

What is crazy is that these explinations all fit me to a tee right now. I am taking on a new role, mother, and I am still stressed about it. I'm still scared I'm going to "break" my baby... especially after taking a tumble down the stairs. I am definitely growing emotionally, but am so afraid to fail.

I think the frequency of dreams has increased over the past couple of weeks because this is Steve's "busy" time of year. He is going back to get his doctorate and is taking Mon & Tues classes, which keep him in Muncie late and he usually doesn't get back until Brett has been tucked into bed for awhile. But during late fall and late spring he also has late nights of testing related to his job which keep him at work really late. I've felt like a "single" mother over the last couple of weeks... he's barely seen Brett. It's been stressful and overwhelming (hence my lack of blogging lately). I love my little man to pieces, but feel like everything has gotten away from me. The house has gotten messy... plus I'm super concerned about my sister in law starting her cancer treatment. She goes in for her first round of chemo today. I know she'll be okay, but I am stressed out about that as well.

Anyway, looking up these dreams this morning was crazy accurate. I was like "wow". This is a good site, and I highly recommend it for anyone who wants to look up their dreams.

Now, if I can get a good interpretation of the dream I had last night. It involved me going to see Steve at his house (for some reason we weren't married yet in the dream). He was listening to Andrea Bocelli and eating a piece of white cake with vanilla frosting, and his house had ugly shag carpet on the walls and he had a scottie dog that his ex roommate dumped on him.

Hmmm... I need to look into that one. I told Steve about it before he left for work this morning and I think he thought I was crazy.

Trying out a new layout

Let me know if it is hard to read or anything. I was just getting bored of the old one.

News

Some of you already know this, but last Wednesday my sister-in-law Mandy was diagnosed with breast cancer.

It's quite a shock. She's only 28 years old and has two beautiful small children... my niece Paige and my nephew Derek.

She has already developed an amazing support system to see her through this and they've started a blog, The Journey. I've added a link to my blog list on the side if you want to follow along with her.

Our thoughts are prayers are with her and her family, and any support you can show her is much appreciated!