Dating and Interviews

I was terrible at dating - this should come as no surprise to anyone.  I would agonize over whether or not the person was right for me...did they have the same goals and aspirations?  Did they like me as much or more than I liked them?  All of this before, after and during the date.  Then I would get home and start the unpacking of why they weren't right for me BUT I COULD make it work if they would just do this or that or change some how.  Followed by a nervous week of time, where if my phone rang I would think it was them and what would I say if it was?!?  Had they changed the obvious issues with themselves and I could now see them as someone that I could be with?  But the week would pass, my phone would be silent and by the two week mark it would ring true..."He's just not that into you."

This is EXACTLY what I am doing with job interviews now.  I have been on two face to face interviews all the while dissecting the company, the employees, the benefits, the time away from the kiddos only to have a week of silence followed by the thought "Holy Sh!T...they didn't even like me."  Luckily I have more self confidence in my older self than I used to, but it still stings.

If there was sound associated with this picture you would know that Jackson is actually laying there crying not sleeping.  Poor thing is getting the remaining canine teeth and they are driving him crazy.

Oh and this sweet girl...just look at that smile?!?!

Remember that....

Remember that cloak of Mom guilt?!?!?  Well it officially swallowed me whole the other day.  Austin had field day complete with a "fancy" BBQ that everyone was supposed to attend on Friday...I bought the tickets and Goose was so excited to go and watch her sister.  Then one of the companies that I did a phone interview with wanted to meet me in person, the only time slot that they had left was during the BBQ.  So off I went, to the interview in my dress clothes that make me look like a lactating stuffed sausage. :-(  I suppose if I get a job where I work out of the house I might want to get used to the constant disappointment on my children's faces.  This week is Tyler's last week of pre-school and she is having a celebratory party on Thursday...another one of the phone interviews called back and wanted to meet during that.  I just couldn't do it - the cloak still felt so heavy from the last one.  Luckily they were able to reschedule for Friday afternoon.

Hunter is officially 6 weeks old today.  She seems so much older and younger at the same time.  She's bigger than she was but still so tiny compared to Jackson.

 Pictures never do babies justice...they look blotchy and red.  I love her little smiles and looks they just crack me up.

This little girl is always surrounded just like this picture...see how Jackson craft-fully goes directly for the soft spot?!?  That's a talent that only a one year old can posses. ;-)

I made cupcakes for Tyler's class for her pretend birthday (since her's is during the summer time and they won't be able to celebrate in class).  These bad dogs took me four attempts at the frosting and three attempts at the hearts that went on them...but the cloak was so heavy that I couldn't just give up and buy some from the store.  Someone told me that if I had more than just the two kids that I would "ease up some" or "relax a little"...whelp still waiting on that to happen, perhaps I am more of the run hard until I explode Mom.

Deep breath...

Wow, the Mom cloak of guilt is heavy today.  As I hide from three of my children (two of which are crying) to have a phone interview - all the while cussing at Verizon for making me look for a new job.  Sigh.

Now on to something more positive - tid bits that I love about each of the kids at this stage.

Austin - She is at this really great cross roads of becoming a "big kid", we give her more responsibility and expect more from her too.  She very rarely slips back into the tantrum little kid routines.  And watching her figure things in society out has been fantastic, she was reading one of the practice sentences from her homework the other night that said something like "The story sure started off boring.".  Her face crumpled up and she looked at me and said well that's not very nice to say about a story that someone else wrote.  She is at the Special Olympics event today, she was invited again this year to be someone's buddy (a different special needs student than last year).  Again I stress that even though parts of their schooling drive me crazy these pieces are worth it.

Tyler -  Tyler is not ready to be a big kid (not that we are asking her to, but her big sister growing up has paved the way).  She tries hard to fit in at school which tends to be taxing to her, and then tries to find her pecking order at home which means that she challenges Jackson more than Austin does.  Joe and I have been actively trying to take it easier on her since we can both see her working on these things.  She assumes the big sister role when Austin is at school - so all morning long I hear "No, no brother not yours" followed by a loud pitch scream that means that she took whatever it was from him.  Jackson sees Austin as the big sister and Tyler as his peer, which leads to more fighting between them.  She is so sweet though under the concerned facial expressions.

Jackson - Loves his little sister so much already, gives her kisses all day and "helps" with her pacifier.  I will bet that he knows most all of the words that we say and just can't speak many of them back to us, it is amazing to ask him to do something and watch him run off to find it.  One of my favorite things right now with him is that he gives these really great hugs complete with his chubby little baby hands griping your neck.

Hunter - Sitting on the couch at the end of the night with her fast asleep on my chest might be one of my favorite activities right now.  Listening to her breathing and feeling her warmth is pretty much the best thing ever.  And I know that unfortunately this is a such a fleeting time - and very soon she will be running behind Jackson asking for jeeww-ice (which is a drawn out version of juice).

Wow!

Wow does time fly these days?!?!?  I find it crazy that even jobless I do not have any additional time, apparently the time that I did spend at work is now filled with Hunter (if I look at it that way - it was a fantastic trade).  Now for pictures and updates, since without the pictures I can't even remember what happened this morning.

Hunter caught her second cold - awesome to have such sharing older siblings.  Poor little mouth breather. :-(

This kid - complete with his chocolate face - fast asleep in the car.

We managed to get nearly a foot of spring snow the other day - glad I haven't planted anything yet.

Jackson has what looks like a mole on his side so we went in to the dermatologist to have it looked at - chalk those people up to be the worst informed in the medical community.  He told me it was "probably just a mole" and I said yeah but since it showed up within a month or so and didn't go away the pediatrician was worried that maybe it was some kind of wart.  He looked at me and said - could be - let's treat it like it is.  So he applied wart medicine that wouldn't hurt even it was a mole - glad we waited for a specialist for that treatment. *Shaking my head*  But I sure thought he looked handsome at the doctor's office. :-)

The cat was checking Hunter out the other night and I thought it was too cute.

Austin and Tyler had a PTO sponsored Star Wars dance at their school the other day so the littles stayed home with me and the girls went with Joe to the dance.  Jackson spent his time eating BBQ chips and kissing his sister.

Goose was a little scared at the dance, apparently it was chaos complete with people dressed in scary costumes.

Hence the reason that she wasn't smiling in this picture.

Joe completely bailed me out on my Mother's Day gift to Carri and my Mom.  I wanted to make them these awesome fairy gardens with ponds. lights and everything (if you look closely there is bubbling water in that back pond) but since Hunter was in need of - well everything that a baby needs - I sat in the garage nursing her while Joe built these and got them all setup.  They turned out awesome and I am so grateful for his help.