Catching up

Lots has happened lately, some great things some not so interesting, but here’s a recap. 

The greatest of October was celebrating Cayla’s birthday.  This year we opted for something entirely different.  She was undecided on what she wanted to do for her birthday, but we came up with a perfect solution.  She invited her 3 closest friends and had a girls night.  She’d thought about having a slumber party and she’s always wanted a swimming party (but with an October birthday even if the weather would cooperate none of the local pools are open).  We rented a hotel suite at the local Holiday Inn.  The indoor swimming pool gave her the impossible swimming party, and then she got the sleepover as well.  On October 7th, the four little girls and I packed our bags, and headed to the hotel for a night of pizza, swimming,  movies, a scavenger hunt, snacks LOTS OF SNACKS, a dance party, donuts, and lots of giggles.  The girls took control of the main room and thought it was quite funny that I’d agreed to sleep on the love seat.    Cayla LOVED this party, so there was no doubt that this was a great decision.  At the end of the morning, we were able to check out of the hotel and leave the crumbs and popcorn kernels behind. 

Around 3 a.m. the final girl was alseep and so was I.  The next morning Chris came bearing donuts and Tate.  Tate stayed with us the rest of the morning while Chris headed to Houston meet his BFF, Dave Ramsey. 

Over a year ago Chris read Dave’s books and put his plan in motion.  I never read the books, but after hearing about it I told Chris I was in.  I told him, just give me the rules and I’ll play by them.  Since then we’ve played the allowance game and made great strides.  (far exceeding what I ever even thought was possible)

  

Maybe I’ll be able to talk Chris into guesting blogging about his best friend Dave. 

Other than that this month as been jammed packed.  Chris spent Monday-Thursday in Humble for training.  Thursday also started what we are referring to as “Off-Duty Palooza”.  This is the extreme number of over-time jobs that have recently come available.  Over-time shifts generally to come in spurts and seemingly not so often.  So, it’s literally a “strike while the iron’s hot” mentality (that and we joke about how Chris will do anything for money).  Tired, sick, almost dead, he’ll work a shift if it becomes available.  However, he typically does things that don’t take away much of our family time.  Most often they just cut into the time he would be sleeping.  Halloween is the last night of “Off-Duty Palooza”.  He will get some free time back and our Christmas shopping for 2011 will be fully funded. 

On the subject of sleeping things will be very different for us in 2012.  Chris will be working t nights.  I’m not totally stoked about this transition, but I think it’s only because he hasn’t worked nights since Tate was a baby and I’ve gotten quite spoiled.  In effort to find a silver lining I’ve pointed out that at least both of our kids sleep through the night now (he worked nights when Cayla was a baby too – I think I must have drawn the short end of the stick).  On a lighter note, there will be no disagreement on whether or not the TV should be on at bedtime.  I can sleep with the TV on during the night and he can have it quiet when he sleeps during the day.  The exception to this will be when he’s trying to sleep during the day on the weekends while we’re all home.  For those days he may just be getting a good pair of ear plugs for Christmas.    However he won’t go to work until 9:30 or so each night, so he will still be home with us until after the kids get to bed.  It certainly could be worse.  In November he starts his rotation of weekends off which will last until the end of the year.  The “normal schedule” will spoil me a little further and make the change in January seem a bit yuckier. 

Other than all of that, all is well.  Last week Cayla had a dance club performance on Tuesday and the 3rd grade musical on Thursday.  She was nervous about the musical but it turned out to be really cute.  She was very happy to see that Chris made it back from Humble just in time… she was so worried he may miss it. 

Tate is his usual crazy self.  He’s not so fond of his teacher Ms. Monica, because she’s really making him work.  He despises homework!  His writing has come a long way, even though he really doesn’t like it.  He’s also cursed “blessed” by being a lefty which has brought it’s own challenges.  I’m glad we “blessed” him with a short name… because he writes those four letters very begrudgingly.   Cayla was certainly the right child to give a seven letter name to. 

Today Tate has decided he likes to call me “Tracy”.  We met Chris for lunch and the conversation on the way home leads us to the quote of the day:

Tate: Tracy? Tracy?

*I ignore him at first waiting to be called Mom, but this just makes him turn up his volume and call me Tracy even louder*

Me: Tate, why are you calling me Tracy?

Tate: Because I am.  *he grins and this is a typical response from him – ie Question: “Tate why are you licking your leg?”  Answer:  “Because I am”.

Cayla: I think it’s because he’s going through puberty.

This conversation was so screwed up on every level.  I wasn’t thrilled about my 4 year old calling me by my first name, but I was certainly less thrilled about my 9 year old referencing puberty.  EEEEK!!!!