Stinko de Mayo

I'm so glad this day is almost over.

It started out a little unusual because instead of sitting in front of my computer all night, I actually went upstairs to tell Hubby about Kitty's therapy (super tough cause we talked about Birthmom being engaged. Then I crawled into the bathtub where I soaked and read a book that had nothing to do with RAD, attachment, mental health...

1:45am Finally went to bed on the sheets we cobbled together, because we'd forgotten we'd thrown the only bed sheets that fit our bed in the washer.

7:15am Hubby woke me up and then took Ponito to school (Hubby is amazing). Got ready for work.

7:50am Came downstairs to say goodbye to the girls and Hubby (Hubby takes them to school then heads to work). Grab breakfast (squirrel bread yum!) and sit down to look at e-mail.

8:25am Bear's bus arrives and he goes to school (we have him on the special ed bus which takes him door to door because he kept getting into trouble on the regular bus).

10:00am Wake up! Oops! Search for Kitty's birth certificate (can you believe I'm not listed as a contact on the kids' Medicaid account so Medicaid won't tell me why they denied Bear's glasses). Found it! Now I can go to the Medicaid office and fix this... but I'm out of time this morning so will do it this afternoon.

10:30am Arrive at work and start up computer. Talk to sales guy about why he left work suddenly Monday afternoon (poor guy is losing his house unless he can come up with $7K). Start bracing myself to talk to the guy we laid off (his last day is Friday), but he's on the phone and then steps out.

11:30am Lunch (Mexican) with Hubby and a friend who is a potential new employee that Hubby wants to meet.

11:45am Kitty calls wanting permission to take Tylenol (she calls with a headache 2-3 times a week.

1pm Walking out of lunch. Ponito calls. Grandma's car is broken and the younger kids have early release today. Call neighbor to pick up the kids and take them to my house (it's too hot to leave them outside). Get a call that Kitty's glasses are ready to pick up. Run by work to get my laptop. Run home and pick up Ponito and my niece (nephew has pinkeye so stayed home). Grab a snack for the kids (more squirrel bread).

1:30pm Pick up the girls and take all the kids to sister's house to drop off niece. End up playing with nieces and nephews for quite awhile. Kitty is overwhelmed and spends most of the time outside with the dogs. Drop off Bob to do her homework (she can be left at home alone!).

2:30pm Pick up Kitty's glasses, and meet a woman who adopted 2 children from Siberia and is in the process of adopting 2 more from the state. We chat for quite awhile. Finally the kids drag me away. We do some shopping and I've told them I'll get them a treat (for $3 or less). they search for almost an hour but only Kitty finds something (earrings). Ponito pouts.

4:12pm Bear calls to tell me he missed his bus. I was just blocks away and picked him up. He tried to tell me the bus left early, but we actually passed the bus on the way in. Bear realizes I don't believe his story.

4:30pm Turning onto our street for home I see a baby bird hopping from the side of the road further into the road. He's a big bird (pigeon?), but obviously too young to fly. I give the boys a paper bag with instructions to quickly shoo the bird off the main road and onto the curb (with strict instructions to "hurry" and "be super careful on the road"). They dawdle and by the time they arrive the bird has already been squished. Granted it might have happened before we even parked, but I was frustrated by their dawdling. They were happy to talk about guts, but I stopped that.

5:00pm We're having a special Cinco de Mayo dinner (despite having had Mexican for lunch) so I start on the Flan and rice.

Get a call from Bear's bus driver. Our original arrangement was that if Bear missed the bus we would get a call from transportation so he wouldn't be able to roam for an hour before we even knew he wasn't on his way. The driver says that she's not supposed to make the call (only been doing it for the whole school year!!) and she was off duty the last couple of days (he's "missed" the bus a lot). She says she's heard Bear is claiming she left early so it was her fault he missed his bus. Bear realizes who I'm talking to and starts trying to tell his side... again... loudly. I ignore him which causes him to get angry. I mention to the driver having Bear escorted to the bus again (we did this earlier in the year because he was not getting on the bus on a regular basis and claiming it was because they were leaving early) Bear becomes even more angry and says if we do that he'll "take off."

After I get off the phone and tell him I can speak to him now, but he says he won't talk to me. He mentions he spent most of the day in the assistant principal's office, but refuses to tell me why. He gets on the kid's computer and shuts me out. I know he's done his chores (as well as he ever does), so I decide to ignore it).

6:30pm Hubby gets home and I tell him what happened. Bear goes outside to pout in the backyard. I finish dinner (tacos, beans and rice, chips and flan... just realized there were no veggies. *sigh*), and send Hubby out to get Bear. Hubby and Bear end up sitting outside and talking for over an hour. We wait awhile then finally go ahead and eat. (No one but Bear likes the flan so I end up eating most of it.)

8:30pm Ponito reminds me that since Grandma didn't come today, I was supposed to finish the Purple People Eater costume for tomorrow's 50s play. Last time I did it it took us weeks to finish (but I think it turned out quite well - see the picture at the top of this post). Because they're paper mache and the school only uses them every other year they usually don't survive until the next play. Grandma had done all the paper mache part on this one (although it needed some repairs), but it hadn't been painted and she hadn't figured out how to do the eye or how it was going to fit on the child (unlike mine it was just a head, but it was huge and rolled around). Ponito helped me spray paint it purple.

9pm All the kids but Bob go to bed. She needs help with her math, and Hubby had been outside with Bear so it isn't done.

9:30pm Bob is done with her homework so I make her hold the head while I use a hot glue gun to burn the heck out of myself make and attach an eyeball out of guaze. She goes to bed and I finish painting and hang it to dry.

11:00pm I check my e-mail, eat all the leftover flan, and then start this post while watching Naked Gun. So now I'm covered in purple paint, have burned fingers, am full of beans and flan, and didn't get done any of the things I was going to get done today. Hope Hubby made the bed!

Happy Cinco de Mayo y'all!