Well today is December 13 and I have accomplished NONE of my christmas tasks that I set forth to do months ago. Almost everything I wanted to have finished a couple of weeks ago, I'm in the middle of it. I don't even have any of our Christmas decorations up yet...
Part of the reason for this delay is that I have started working at the bank again, part-time. We (me and TPTB - The Powers That Be) went back and forth for about three weeks, finally settling on all the details of this "new" job that we both agreed upon. I am doing the same job I did before but I insisted and they agreed that I only had to work Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays. I was worried because I know what this job entails and I never dreamed they would agree to it. I was dreading having to work every day when I only need a part-time job plus it is extremely difficult to find daycare, let alone have to worry about half-days, full-days, etc. I was extremely lucky that this awesome lady in our ward wants to watch Carson and Morgan. Kimberly is a dream come true. She has a son Carson's age and a daughter Morgan's age. Her husband is in his first year of medical residency and she needed a little extra money so we were an answer to each other's prayers. They live in Rochester so Bryan takes the little ones to her house on the way to work and I pick them up afterwards. It is a little bit out of the way, but the peace of mind it brings knowing my kids are in a wonderful house is worth it. I don't mind driving the few extra miles...
I started working this week on Tuesday and let me say that the older three were not thrilled with this new schedule. It requires that I get them to school about 20-25 minutes earlier than they are used to, so we have to get up earlier, eat breakfast earlier, and they were not happy. On my first day of work, Cameron came home with a detention slip because he got in a fight with another kid at school at the bus stop. Yesterday when I dropped the kids off at school, Rylee was in tears because I had taken her AR book away. Jordan and Cameron were fighting in the back seat all the way to school. I had to go into the school and talk to a teacher so I hussled in with the kids behind me. As they all were walking into school, Jordan started screaming at Rylee and continued his melt down into the school which prompted Rylee to another round of tears for the morning. He was stopped by a teacher who then came in and told me what had happened, so I had to deal with that, talk to another teacher and try and make it to work as fast as possible.
Honestly, I don't even know if I am embarrassed anymore by Jordan's public meltdowns. It happens. However, I feel so helpless when he does that because I feel like I don't know how to calm him down. I pulled him to the side and told him he could not yell at other kids and if he was going to have a bad day at school, he would not stay. I also told him that he would have to go spend the day with Mark (his step-dad) because I had to work, his mom had to work and Bryan had to work. He pretty much calmed down after that, because he likes to be at school. I know 90% of Jordan's anger comes from interactions with Cameron but what do we do? They are brothers and they live together.
So hopefully they will get used to this new schedule. Tuesday nights and Wednesday mornings are always difficult around our house because Tuesday is church night and the activities don't start until 7 pm. Not that I'm complaining because for the past three years they started at 6 pm and that was almost more difficult trying to get the kids home after school, fed, homework done in an hour and a half before we had to head to the church. Now we have 2 1/2 hours BUT we always get home between 8:30 and 9:00 pm and that is so late. The kids are never ready to get out of bed on Wednesday mornings.
Concerning my job, I feel very lucky and also very torn. I am so lucky that this job just basically fell into my lap. Bryan and I had decided at the beginning of the summer that we would quit the paper route at the end of the year. I had decided that I was going to substitute teach to earn some extra money since we still need me to work some to get by. I did all the necessary steps to become
a substitute teacher at the beginning of this school year and then I received little or no calls for the whole semester. I did get a call once when I was in
St Louis at a drs appt for Morgan and then another time when
Bryan was out of town on training. Both times I had to say no. Then the day before my interview for this job at the bank, I got another call to substitute. I just told them I was getting a job somewhere else... I need to make sure they take me off the roster. I thought that would work best for our family because then I would have my summers off and still feel like a stay-at-home mom. BUT that was not to be, so now I'm working at the bank. It will work well, that I still get some time with my kids but I won't get summers off and we'll have to find babysitters for the older kids when they are at our house (very expensive). However, it will allow us to stop the paper route with it's crazy schedule and to be able to take family vacations together or at the very least go spend the night in St Louis or at our friends in Charleston and not have to worry about the stinkin' paper route. Finally, I do feel like I have let my kids down since I won't be with all the time. I feel bad that I haven't been able to live so frugally that I can stay home with them. We have been living on the cheap side since we married, I mean have you seen our house and cars? BUT I have to remember that I have two wonderful happy children who are the light of my life and a husband who works incredibly hard for our family. It won't always be like this. Yeah, now I can stop my pity-party.
Which made my day because it's been a LONG time since I felt like a girl, this 37 year old woman's body and mind sometimes doesn't feel so young! But it was surely a nice complement.
