I have had kind of a hard day today.

It started last night at dinner. We went to our favorite casual pizza place. Luckily it is a very casual place because the kids were TERRIBLE. All three of them had their moments of awfulness. Nora started out by throwing her plate off the table. Then she proceeded to do it 2 more times. Have I mentioned what a challenge she has been the last few weeks? Then Emma started being sassy and bratty. She kept making this annoying noise over and over. I asked her to stop, she looked me squarely in the eyes and kept doing it. She got a time out for that. I was so frustrated by the time dinner was over.

To add to the fray, the pizza was terrible. I had been looking forward to going to Vinny’s all week. When we got there I noticed the sign was different and they had a new name. Everything else in the restaurant looked exactly the same, so we hoped the food would be too. Unfortunately the pizza is different. The crust was different and there was too much cheese. I don’t think we will be eating there again.

Then this morning Vicky, the office manager, stopped my mom and told her that she had gotten another complaint about the kids being too loud. Last week the people upstairs complained about slamming doors. This time someone complained about Nora crying early in the morning. It just sent me over the edge. I was so frustrated with the kids at dinner, and the last thing I needed today were complaints about noise.

It is so hard in these condos in Maui. We are all so close together, and everyone has their windows open. My kids wake up early, there really isn’t anything I can do about that. And Nora is extremely loud. Unfortunately she is also two, so there isn’t much I can do about it. I can’t do much to prevent her from crying, and when she cries I can do my best to get her to stop, but it isn’t like I have a magic wand.

Anyway, on a long trip like this, there are bound to be some problems. I did get to go shopping for a while with my mom, while Scott watched the kids. I found 2 new bathing suits, so that cheered me up. Tomorrow is bound to be a better day–we are off to Oahu to visit Pearl Harbor and I have a sitter all day!

I’m too tired to post much.

I spent most of the day having carpets cleaned at my parents and my house. They just left my house and it is 10:28pm!

We had quite an eventful day. I started the morning by going to spinning. Then watched my carpets and air ducts become spotless. Hopefully all the cat urine is out of the carpet, and we won’t have any more accidents. You wouldn’t believe the stuff that came out of our air ducts. Almost a whole magnet alphabet set, multiple chunks of drywall, more toys, a huge rock, and tons of sawdust and building materials. The air we are breathing will definitely be cleaner now!

I managed to be home when the UPS guy came, so I got to sign for and receive my camera. Unfortunately I had to wait for the battery to charge so I didn’t get to play with it much. I’m looking forward to shooting some photos tomorrow.

While the carpet guy was cleaning, Ian got a hold of one of the screws from the cold air returns. We took them off so the tech could clean the air duct. While the kids were watching Rudolf, Ian decided to scratch 4 lines into our BRAND NEW tv and then throw the screw at the screen. I came running when I heard Emma say that Ian threw something at the TV. There are 4 small lines in the bottom right of the TV screen. Only one is really visible when you watch the TV. Then there are 2 dead pixels where the screw hit the screen. I was so angry I almost cried. Scott had a talk with him and put him to bed. What can we do? We explained to him that it was a very bad thing he had done, but he just kind of looked at us like he didn’t get it. I don’t really think he understood why he had done it. He just got the screw in his hand and started doing it without thinking. UGH!

I am exhausted and can’t wait to get to bed! Only 25 more things on my to do list tomorrow

Ever since Flora’s visit to the vet a few weeks ago I have been keeping her in the laundry room.

The vet said she might need some time to get retrained to use the litter box. Also we never really ruled out cystitis, due to the blood in her urine. I wanted to keep her confined to the laundry room until we ruled out a medical problem.

We were supposed to recheck her urine after 2 weeks. A few days ago I went to the vet to pick up a little box and this really cool litter called “Nosorb“. You are supposed to put only the Nosorb in a litter pan. It doesn’t absorb urine, but gives cats the feel of cat litter. I thought it was neat, but Flora didn’t.

The first thing she did was go into the box and scratch all the litter out of it and spread it all around the cabinet where her box is located. I kept checking to see if she peed, so I could collect the urine to take to the vet. I kept looking in the box, but it was dry. Then at the end of the day I noticed that she had been peeing all around the litter box. GRRRR! I was able to suck some of it up with a syringe so that I could take it to the vet.

After that I spent forever cleaning up small black pellets of Nosorb and cat pee. I dropped off the sample to the vet yesterday, and expected a call with the results today.

I did get the call, but no results. Apparently the lab spilled the sample in transit! Why did this have to happen to Flora, who is such a pain to get urine from???? For plenty of other cats it would have been no problem at all. But for Flora it is a total pain to get urine.

The vet was super nice about it and offered to do just about anything for us. I decided to drop her off there tomorrow morning and let them worry about getting the urine this time!

Ugh. I am totally sick of the snow. I know that I just spent 3 weeks in Maui, so I don’t have much room to complain, but I can’t help it It feels like it has snowed constantly since we got back. We have hardly seen the sun at all this winter.

I am really anal about our driveway and keeping it clear. I am usually the one in charge of snow blowing. This year I hired a snowplow to keep our driveway clear while we were in Maui. They did a terrible job. A few times I talked to friends back home who commented that it didn’t look like anyone was plowing. Now that I am home I can see why. They come at the most random times. They plowed yesterday morning before the storm started–we had about 1/8 inch of snow. Then we got about a foot of snow in our driveway and they never came again all day. If it wasn’t for our neighbor snow blowing for me, I couldn’t have gotten out of my driveway this morning.

Which brings me to my next complaint–our snowblower. When I got back from Maui one of the first things I did was to get our snowblower going and try to clear the driveway. It seriously looked like the snowplow hadn’t been there all winter. I started it up and got about 2 rows done and it broke. Some part that made the wheels turn broke. I was so bummed. I knew that it would be weeks before I got it back, and the weather report was calling for lots more snow. I could just picture the snow piling up on our driveway.

I finally got the snowblower back a couple of days ago. I couldn’t wait to start it up and get the driveway cleaned up. I used it one day, just to widen the driveway where the plow never plows. I was thrilled to have it back.

Yesterday we got another storm. I fired up the snowblower and tried to snowblow the driveway before Scott left for the airport. I got 2 rows done and IT BROKE AGAIN!! This time a spring broke that engages the auger. I can see the spring right on the outside of the snow blower. It seems like an easy fix. I called the repair shop, and they were supposed to come twice to look at it, and they still haven’t made it. Who knows when they will show up, or how long it will take to get the part. And, of course it is snowing again!

The last week or so has been really hard. I have not been feeling myself emotionally at all. I am extremely tired and grumpy all the time. I don’t remember feeling this way with any of my last pregnancies. It is really starting to bother me. I have been fighting with Scott constantly, although I don’t think it is just me. I know that I am more sensitive than normal, but I think he is extra defensive and quick to snap at me too. I am really feeling pregnant, and not in a good way. Maybe I needed this to bring closure to the whole pregnancy thing for me. I am feeling really glad that I will not be doing this again

I am concerned lately about how I am going to take care of 3 kids!! Scott is gone most of the weeks and I will be parenting 3 kids mostly by myself. I have been so tired lately that just 2 are exhausting, what am I going to do with 3??? I REALLY wanted this baby, and I still really want it, I am just having a bit of a hard time and feeling overwhelmed with the anticipation of taking care of 3. I have been thinking about maybe finding out the gender to help me bond a little more, but maybe just seeing the baby at the ultrasound will help me bond a bit more.

I just hope this passes soon. I feel like crying a lot of the time, and I hate being grumpy with Scott!