Tuesday, May 31, 2011

My Struggles

While I love being able to be at home for my kids while they need me the most I really struggle with things sometimes. I miss working and the interaction with other adults. I LOVE to talk and it is hard to hold a logical conversation with children 4 and under. Heck it is even hard to hold a reasonable conversation with a 10 year old most of the time. I try to talk to him and I get many "I don't knows" and it irritates me. I would like to know what is going on in his young world. At least when I was working I had many different types of people to talk to so I was not ever bored.

I also am frustrated living in England. It is supposed to be pretty easy to make friends with other military wives but I am not sure how to do this. I have become pretty antisocial since being at home. I would not have any clue how to meet new people at this point in my life. I am too afraid of being judged. Are my children behaving well? Probably not as well as I would like but they are kids. Is my house clean enough? Who knows? I have too many kids or not enough. I have dogs. I breastfeed. I want to go out once in a while without kids or husband. I just want to go somewhere and do something with other people who are not always in my immediate family sometimes. I had met a few people when we first moved here and that was great. We took turns going to each other's houses and going places like the beach but that ended way too quickly. I have not had any friends near me for the past year and it really sucks. Two of the girls I was friends with went away because I couldn't deal with the abusive type relationship one of them had and so when I quit hanging out with her the other quit hanging out with me. The third girl quit talking to me conveniently around the time I got pregnant with H. I never really figured out why she got mad at me and quit talking to me. She said I hung up the phone on her and I didn't so I have not a clue what really happened. It makes me sad! There are a couple of women that I can chit chat with once in a while and they really seem like great women but they have no kids and I seem to be bogged down with mine all the time. I think if either they had kids or I didn't have kids we would hang out and have fun but then again maybe not. Maybe I am just not the type of person who deserves to have good moral people with healthy relationships in my life. I seem to attract all the needy ones who have zero desire to better themselves.

I am also stressed about where we might have to live when we go back stateside. There are three states that The Man and I have either family or friends in. None of them seem to be the perfect place for us. California, where The Man is from and all of his family still live is beautiful but too much money for us to live a comfortable life. Arizona, I have family and 1 set of friends there. Neither of us love the heat but the prices are decent and we would be able to do well on our income. Washington, I have family that I do not really have much to do with and I have friends there. I love Washington weather. It is similar to the weather here in England. I would be able to grow a garden easily and we would be only a couple hours to the beach. It would also be only a 2-4 day drive to either my family or The Man's family. This would be my choice but once again I think it may be a bit too pricey. I keep watching house prices all over and it is killing me to see how much they have dropped in the 2 years we have been here. To be quite honest, if I had some friends or family and could afford to stay I would love to stay here in England. There is so much to do here. The only thing I do not like about being here is the no friends and family. Of course the biggest thing about where we will live when we go back is where The Man's job sends us. Of course we are hoping for somewhere we might like to retire as it would be nice to try to get established before he can retire in a few years but that is not always what happens.

I know that my struggles are mostly due to my own insecurities and lack of trying but I really never thought I would feel so alone when I have a husband and 4 children. It is difficult to feel so alone all the time. Of course The Man doesn't understand because he is just fine having no other people around him. He would be happy to live with just his man toys and his cable and Internet. I am not though. And to top off my struggles I am getting sick. I already have an ear infection. Now I have a sore throat and headache too.

Thanks for letting me grump and hopefully I will start feeling better soon.

Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Wednesday Weigh In

Today I weighed in at 207 lbs. It is kind of disappointing as it is a 1 lb gain, but I have been not feeling well for the past week and I haven't been feeling well because of the ear infection. I haven't been to the gym since last Wednesday as well. I did go today and managed to do 15 minutes on the elliptical. I am hoping for a bit of loss next week.

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Headache And Ear Infection

I have dealt with ear infections for most of my life but I think they get worse the older I get. I have been lucky and have not had one for a few years but now I have one. I also have a couple lumps in my neck/head area and have had a headache for almost a week now. I went to the doctor and got some medication but it doesn't seem to be helping. I am hoping for some relief from the headache soon. The kids and dogs are too loud to be having a headache all the time.

Wednesday, May 18, 2011

Weigh In Wednesday

I will be the first to admit that I am overweight and need to do something about it so starting this past Monday I am. I am going to weigh myself weekly and try to exercise more. My goal is to go to the gym 2-3 days per week. I will also be attempting to watch my portion sizes. I will not starve myself or try to avoid certain foods as that seems to be a huge pitfall for me. Today I weighed 206 lbs.

No More Children For Us

The Man had a vasectomy on Friday and I am still working through my feelings on the matter. I knew he was getting it done and supported him through it even though I still sometimes have doubt. We have 4 wonderful children but I am sad that I will never be pregnant again. I am not a great pregnant lady but I love feeling the kicks and hiccups inside me. I love the speculating on whether the baby will be a boy or a girl. Will the baby look more like The Man or me? I am sad that I will never have a tiny little newborn to snuggle and nurse again. I know H is only 10 weeks old but it seems like she has grown a ton already. While these things make me sad there is an up side as well. Not too long from now there will be no more diapers or spit up. Some day they will all be old enough to hold actual conversations with us and not try to run out into the road. We will be able to take family vacations and they will all remember and we wont have to drag a playpen, diaper bag, or stroller with us. Until then I am going to enjoy all the snuggles I can with my beautiful baby and try not to think about the fact she is going to be our last as long as his surgery worked.

Sunday, May 8, 2011

Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to all the Moms out there!!!!



I am feeling a bit down for myself. I didn't expect much today other than a simple hug and a "Happy Mother's Day" from any body in my house but it is now 2:30 pm and not one person in my household has acknowledged today is Mother's Day. I am quite sad about it to be honest. I do not expect to get any gifts or anything of the like but it would have been nice for someone to acknowledge me today.

Thursday, May 5, 2011

Grocery Update 5/1-5/14

I did my grocery shopping today and I am over by a little bit but I am doing pretty good so far this pay period. The three littles and I went to Sainsburys and I spent 24.17 pounds. The boys were good so I spent the rest of the pounds along with some change from the change cup in the car to treat them to McDonald's. I spent 9.20 pounds there. I also went and cashed in WIC and picked up a few random groceries at the commissary. I spent $0.50 extra on WIC fruit and $46.08 on random groceries. The reason I spent so little and got such random things is that The Man was gone and I spent money on Burger King (ewww).

Burger King - $22.56
Burger King - $18.16
Ikea sauce from mom - $13.13
WIC overage - $0.50
Commissary (tip included) - $46.08


Budgeted - $100 and 30 pounds
Spent - $ 100.43 and 33.37 pounds


What I got-
Sainsburys:
4 pks diapers
4 organic butter
2 organic whole wheat flour
1 organic cane sugar
1 baking powder
1 ltr organic sunflower oil

WIC:
3 gallons milk
2 boxes cereal
1 lb mozzarella cheese
2 frozen orange juice
1 doz eggs
6 pouches salmon
1 bag granny smith apples
5 containers blackberries (jam time)
1 container strawberries

Commissary:
1 dried apples
1 can organic diced tomatoes
1 pk pectin
1 6 pk toilet paper
4 semi sweet chocolate chips
1 frozen blackberries
1 frozen mixed veg
1 frozen broccoli
1 frozen carrots
1 large beef piece (will be cut into a roast and some steaks)
1 lb ground pork
1 lb ground chuck (reduced)
2 lbs ground beef
1 boneless pork ham

All together I think I have done pretty good but would have done a lot better if I had not given into my laziness and taken the kids to get Burger King. I tend to not give into the eating out as much when The Man is home. He is home now and hopefully wont be leaving again soon so I wont fall into that crazy trap of myself.

Wednesday, May 4, 2011

Children And Chores- I Need Suggestions

As a child I did not have chores and so I struggled quite badly to learn to keep a house clean and still struggle to this day. My house is not horrible but it is not nearly how I feel it should be. I would love to have a house that is presentable at any time to visitors. As it is right now I would need about 30 minutes warning so that I could tidy up and make me comfortable enough to have people over. I know that I should not expect a perfect house as there are 6 people living here and 4 of them are under the age of 10.

I have struggled with how to teach my children to help keep house as well. I don't want my children to be little slaves but I feel they should help out in the house. I struggle most with my 10 year old. He acts lazy. I know he isn't lazy because when it is something he wants to do he will do a good job and put effort into it. It shows in school as well as home. He loves math so he puts effort into his math and does well at it. He doesn't like reading so he chooses not to put much effort into his reading by picking books that are at the very lowest level acceptable to his teacher. He likes to watch TV or play video games and so he does well at vegging out and doing that. He doesn't like to help in the house so when I ask him to do dishes he puts the 10 largest items in and says he is done. I ask him to pick up the toy room and instead of putting things in their proper place he just puts them where ever they fit. He knows this is unacceptable to me and I make him redo these things. My struggle is how to get him to do things properly the first time. How do I get him to show pride in doing things right when they are not things he likes? I have already tried doing a chore chart, allowance, and taking privileges away. None of those worked with him. I have tried explaining to him that he needs to do something to help every day because he is a part of this family and unless I bug him to do it he will not do anything. Do you have any suggestions on how to get him to want to help out and show pride in the things he does even when he doesn't enjoy them?