12:28PM

So the day was looking good when it was 7:20am and the kids were still in their rooms. I'm not sure they were asleep at this point, but they hadn't woken me up so that was a plus. But the moment was overshadowed by the fact that I now had 20 minutes to get both kids dressed and face the snow to drive Aaron to school so I could have the car for Jazzercise. And my nose was clogged. And my throat hurt. And then the moment I touched Olivia I knew we weren't going anywhere today. She was burning up. So I had to call and cancel Jazzercise which I HATE doing so much. But it wasn't too big of a deal.

So we stayed in our PJ's and watched pbs kids. And then Abigail wouldn't take her morning nap. And then she was really cranky. So then I gave her my phone to play with because that never ceases to bring silence. But then I couldn't find my phone. Then I found my phone.

Wedged in the depths of the recliner. And when I say wedged, I mean WEDGED. Like it would NOT budge. I was pretty ready to accept the fact that my phone was entombed in the recliner and that's where it would rest. But after about 15 minutes of different angles of pushing and pulling and wiggling, I got my phone out.

Only to see the touch screen has a huge chunk taken out. This phone relies heavily on the touchscreen and pretty much doesn't work at all without it. So I have no phone.

Oh and while I was moving the chair around to get to my phone I found a squished BLACKBERRY. Not like the phone, but the real fruit, that stains incredibly bad, blackberry. Smushed into the carpet. I have no idea how long it's been there. I'm pretty sure any attempt at removing the stain is going to be futile. But I'll try. 

And it's still snowing. A lot. So that means no mom/nanny-funness happening this weekend.

So let's recap - sick me, sick Olivia, broken phone, lots of snow, ruined carpet, and no mommy.   :( 

(Sorry mom, not trying to guilt trip you - it's bad out there, it's good you're not coming.)

Sufganiot

 Yeah they don't look so good. I think sufganiot is probably best left to the Hebrew experts. But we watched them being made on Sesame Street, and Olivia came to me and asked, "Mom can we make see-see- those doughnut things?"

They actually tasted amazing. I got the recipe from Martha Stewart's website. The only problem was I had the oil too hot, so the first few got kind of dark. Then I lowered the heat too much and so the last batch was kind of dough-y. But still good. All good.

We are celebrating our Jewish heritage tonight. Ya know since my cousin married someone who is Jewish, I'm pretty much orthodox.  Really we are just eating sufganiot, and singing the dreidal song. (I could just imagine my Poppy's reaction to this evening's festivities.)

grumpy

My kids have been waking up no later than 6:00am. EVERY SINGLE DAY. Today was actually 6:00am. Most days it's been somewhere around 5:30. They seem to go through these random spurts where they like to torture me like this. I need to start going to be earlier. I haven't been getting more than 5 hours of sleep, and that makes me grumpy. And they're grumpy. And when we're all grumpy it's not a good combo.

Olivia has dance class today. There's like 3 feet of snow on the ground. And I'm grumpy.

My mom and nanny are supposed to be coming for a little visit. I really hope they can make it, but this weather is a bit unpredictable. But still it would be so nice to have them. And Nanny has never seen my own house. Which would be nerve wracking, but fun at the same time. Seriously my Nanny (what I call my mom's mom) irons pillow cases. She literally feels sick at the thought of leaving the house without her bed made. She can't sleep if there's stuff in the dryer. She never sits still all day long. She's 79 years old and she painted her basement stairs one day to make them look nicer. In fact, it might be better if they can't make it because seeing my house might give Nanny a heart attack. I started my cleaning attempts on Monday but it's kind of futile with Hurricane Olivia, and Tropical Storm Abigail swirling about. And let's be honest, it's a special treat if I make my bed.

I took the kids out in the snow the other day. It was the first time using the new baby sled. It has a little buckle, and is designed to hold one small child. So I put Abigail in. Buckled her in, and took her to the little hill on the side of our apartment. The hill is pretty wimpy. And it flattens out for a while before going to the parking lot. A very empty parking lot. In fact where it ends isn't even really parking spots, just the end of the parking lot. Can you see where this is going. So the hill is so wimpy I never could have imagined Abigail would reach like 20 mph in her little baby sled, speed down the hill, down the flat part, off the curb, into the parking lot. As soon as I saw her gaining speed I started running after her. She was seriously flying! I couldn't catch up to her. I thought about lunging my body forward and trying to grab the sled before it reached the bottom of the hill, but I could really only imagine that scenario ending badly, so I just tried to run faster. And then she went off the curb into the parking lot and I really tried to book it. I may not be the brightest crayon in the box, but I know baby in a sled in a parking lot could be seen as child endangerment or something. And then right as I was reaching full speed, and about to catch her, I slipped on a patch of ice. I think I literally flew in the air, because when I hit the ground the air was knocked out of me. Fortunately Abigail was stopped just a few feet in front of me. Olivia was standing flabbergasted at the top of hill asking, "Mommy what happened?" All of this literally happened within a minute. I just laid there on the cold ground for a minute thinking about the situation and couldn't stop laughing. I got myself up, got Abigail, and decided to go inside until Daddy got home.

I checked the 10 day forecast for Erie. There is literally not a single day without a chance of snow. I miss when the 10 day forecast showed nothing by sunshine and the occasional cloud or two.

scrabble

Aaron and I played Scrabble tonight. And he kicked my trash. His vocabulary is insane. I challenge almost every word he throws down.

"DIAZO?! THAT IS NOT A WORD!" And his "z" was on a triple letter tile, so I was extra angry. He looked it up. It is a word. And it's in the scrabble dictionary. Grrr... I seriously make him look up any word that's going to get him more than 30 points. And then when it's my turn he helps me find the best placement of my letters. I yell and call him names. He helps me, and tells me to calm down.

Easy for him to say when his lowest point word was worth like 15. How can I compete with that. I have a new goal in life. Forget all that virtuous woman crap, I am going to improve my Scrabble skills.

Look out Aaron, you're going down.

....and I think I may take Scrabble a little too seriously.

Eateth not the bread of idleness.

So this morning I was in a bad mood. Did you read my last post about my night last night? It was not the best not sleep I've had in my life. And it was preceded by 4 or 5 nights of less than 5ish hours of sleep. I can take one or two bad nights, but after that I am just a grump. So this morning Aaron said it's not very often he gets worse sleep than me, and he coudn't wait to come home and take a nap. And my blood boiled. I SLEEP THE WORST! WERE YOU UP WHEN ABIGAIL WAS CRYING AT 4:00AM?! DID YOU GET YOUR BOOTY OUT OF BED AT 5:30 WHEN OLIVIA WOKE UP FOR THE DAY?

And then I was sorry. Because remember all the puke cleaning from last night and whatnot? And he probably did sleep worse than me last night. And it's not a competition. We're on the same team.

But I was still grumpy. And I decided I would spend today in my pajamas and not do anything productive at all, except keep my kids alive.

I did read my scriptures. And I read Proverbs 31 verses 10-31. Here are some of my thoughts I had while reading.

10¶Who can find a ^avirtuous ^bwoman? for her price is far above rubies. This was in ancient biblical times. If it was hard to find a virtuous woman THAN, I imagine today her value is even higher.

11The heart of her husband doth safely ^atrust in her, so that he shall have no need of spoil. I think this means he knows she won't cheat on him, and he won't cheat on her. I think.

12She will do him good and not evil all the days of her life. Like not biting his head off for saying he got a worse night's sleep than you.

13She seeketh wool, and flax, and worketh willingly with her^ahands. Okay... buy cute fabric at Joann's and make stuff. I can do that.

14She is like the merchants’ ships; she bringeth her food from afar. Grocery shopping?

15She ^ariseth also while it is yet night, and giveth meat to her household, and a portion to her maidens. Yeah, that whole riseth while it is yet night is pretty familiar.

16She considereth a field, and buyeth it: with the fruit of her hands she planteth a vineyard. Gardens?

17She girdeth her loins with strength, and strengtheneth her arms.

18She perceiveth that her merchandise is good: her candle goeth not out by night. Shop all night? Again though, the whole her candle goeth not out by night is sounding pretty familiar.

19She layeth her hands to the spindle, and her hands hold the^adistaff. Sew. Okay got it.

20She stretcheth out her hand to the ^apoor; yea, she reacheth forth her hands to the needy.

21She is not afraid of the snow for her household: for all her household are clothed with scarlet. Go play in the snow with the kids today. No problem.

22She maketh herself coverings of tapestry; her ^aclothing is silk and purple. Wear more purple?

23Her husband is known in the gates, when he sitteth among the elders of the land. Have you seen Aaron sitting in the gates? Yeah he sits with the best of them. I really have no idea what this means.

24She maketh fine linen, and selleth it; and delivereth girdles unto the merchant. Ohh, pretty sure I'm being commanded to open an etsy shop.

25Strength and honour are her ^aclothing; and she shall rejoice in time to come.

26She openeth her mouth with wisdom; and in her tongue is the law of ^akindness. If I don't have anything nice to say don't say anything at all. I should work on that.

27She looketh well to the ways of her household, and eateth not the bread of ^aidleness. And this is the verse that struck a chord. I think I eat kind of a heck of a lot of the bread of idleness. Like how many hours do I spend on facebook, watching tv, reading blogs, etc.

28Her children arise up, and call her blessed; her husband also,and he praiseth her. PRAISE ME!

29Many daughters have done virtuously, but thou excellest them all. Me? Who was this written to? I'd love to be her.

30Favour is deceitful, and ^abeauty is vain: but a woman that^bfeareth the Lord, she shall be praised. UAdd a Note

31Give her of the fruit of her hands; and let her own works praise her in the gates.

Wow. I've read these verses before. But something really touched me today. I've been focusing a lot on beauty. Not so much on fearing the Lord. I pondered for a few minutes about what it means to be a virtuous woman. And then I also realized I'm raising two daughters. I feel like I've been an example of idleness more than an example of a virtuous woman. I know I'm not the worst mom in the world. I also know I'm not the best. And I can try harder. And be better. And hopefully raise my daughters to be virtuous women.

So anyway, I decided not to spend the day in my pajama's. And to really look well to the ways of my household. And I taught Olivia how to fold laundry. She was so proud of herself for folding pants all by herself. So I'm going to excuse myself from the cyber world today and work on that.

Thanks for reading my ramblings. If you made it this far you deserve a medal of some sort.

"Mommy I Puked!"

Last night, and about every night this week Abigail has been waking up at 4:00am. She cries until she sees mine or Aaron's face. Literally we just walk in, make sure she's alright and walk out. And then she's fine. But for some reason getting out of bed at that hour does something to my brain, and I literally can NOT fall back to sleep. So last night was a bit worse. She cried more than usual. I held her a bit, but ended up just laying her down because really that's all she wants. So I put her in her crib and I went back to bed and watched the clock for 2 hours. Finally at 6:00am I started to doze off. At 6:25 I had Olivia in my face asking for breakfast. All day long I have been waiting for bedtime. Sleeeep. Oh sleep. But once the kids are in bed, I need to unwind a bit. Watch a show, cuddle with hubby. Finally ready to sleep around 9:30. At 9:32 I hear, "Moommmmyyy I puked. Mommmmyyy..." Aaron and I get to work cleaning up her and her room. He is amazing and handled all the pukiness of her bed. I cleaned her. Babied her with some medicine, crackers, and flat soda. She has no fever. I have no idea what it is. She seems absolutely fine, besides the fact that everything that was possibly in her stomach is now in our washing machine. She is now back asleep in her bed. And I'm left with my head racing. Is she really sick? Are we going to spend all day tomorrow puking? Is she going to puke again the moment I fall asleep? Is Abigail going to get it? Maybe it was just something she ate. I think it was just something she ate, since she's been acting fine. She did poop a lot today. And Abigail is so constipated. I have no idea what's wrong with her little tummy, but it's really bad. My life revolves around disgusting body functions. I should take them to the doctor. Are those her little feet I hear running over my head, or the people who live next door? I hope it's next door.

I don't have a mommy stomach. I literally couldn't even come close to the puke. I started gagging. I'm so grateful for Aaron. Like seriously... I don't know how single moms do it. Or any mom that doesn't have a hubby there and willing. I just imagined for a moment I was alone. I'd have to leave Olivia somewhere while I cleaned her room, and I definitely would have puked myself cleaning that mess. And she probably would have cried a lot without someone holding her. And Abigail probably would have been crying. And I'm sure I would have been crying. Yeah. I'm grateful for Aaron.

Meanwhile today I watched a Disney special thing about Disney cruises. Tonight I reeeally hope I dream I'm on a disney cruise.