Why do I feel every post should be called....."True Story"??

So I had a horrible day......nothing major. Just bad.
BUT.........the actual story comes  into play when I was driving to the grocery/liquor store this evening. heh heh WHAT?!?!?!  "The Babysitter" graduated from college today......HUGE accomplishment for her :) And I only wish that I'd remembered this a day earlier because I was forced to pick up store bought baked goods. UGH!!! You know this is a knock to my "professional" baking front. She is a gluten free character.......not strictly, but should be, so I bought some stuff just for her! It was surprisingly yummy for being in the frozen section!!!
Anyway, my day was mainly spent in the Ragiing Rhino...driving Child 1 to and from school, then the Hubbs to and from a doctor's appointment, and later, to and from an MRI appointment all the while towing un-napped kids.  SHOOT. ME. NOW.
So my day end a nearing..........and I'm off to the grocery store/liquor store pre celebration....windows open.....music blaring.........bee flying through my open window......landing on my corroded artery....stinging while I'm driving.
Now I can't help but laugh while I'm typing this. Because this seriously happened..and doesn't sound reasonable at ALL.
I can't turn my head to the left.
Five hours later.
LOL
My misery today will be posted at a later date.
Take joy in the fact that I shared my personal misery with you today.
It was a 50/50 shot that you'd hear it :)
 

Pack

So admittedly not a shining quality to share with everyone.....I used to be one of those people who judged parents with their child on a leash! I know...totally shallow. Especially since I didn't have kids yet, and even for a while after having my own.
Comments flew through my head(and sometimes my mouth) like, "really lady? just control your child." or "maybe if you give it a bone, it'll stop crying?" and "is it that difficult for you to bend down to hold his hand?!".
OBVIOUSLY.....I had no friggin CLUE what I was talking about and the person who invented those little leashes for kids should be awarded a Nobel Peace Prize!
My sweet little angels were fairly manageable in public until we were outnumbered by Child 3! Now my 4 1/2 year old thinks it's hilarious to dart up and down the aisles in stores completely out of my sight. (which scares the crap out of me.) And my darling 2 1/2 year old daughter follows suit or ever-so-sweetly curls herself around my ankles while I'm carrying Ginormous Child 3 and he's wiggling like a walrus having a seizure trying to break free of the ninja grip I have on him.
Whew..........I'm exhausted even THINKING about going to the store.
And while I know there are tons of self proclaimed experts on Child Rearing, I never love everything they have to say when I'm searching for advice.
So I go to the source that I trust.
He's foolproof.
And people all over the country email and call and even go see this gentleman to tap into his wealth of information about handling ornery loved ones. Even if it's just the simple case of being outnumbered like I am.
So I email the Dog Whisperer.
Really.
You know? Cesar Milan!
He really is amazing...I mean COME ON......they gave him his own show and everything!
I email him about my "pack". I mention the kids as certain breeds that I associate them with. For instance, my daughter is very petite but can easily defend herself against her brothers when she needs to. She has a quick step, is very agile, super smart, very capable, not shy, and stubborn as all hell.
She is my Jack Russell.
My youngest is HUGE. He's a 30 lb one year old. Bleach blonde hair. Chubby cheeks. Very happy and sweet. But you sort of cringe when he's running towards you because you know it's gonna hurt. Oh and clumsy :) He's flippin adorable and squishy and complete strangers walk up to him to touch his cheeks.(I hate that by the way...please keep your strange, dirty hands off my adorable baby boy!)
He is my Bulldog.
Now my oldest is a very shy dude. He's highly intelligent. But wired and crazy at the same time. He pushes every boundary known and unknown. But looks after his sister and brother like they're his responsibility.
He's my Labrador Retriever.

My emails go something like this:

Dear Cesar,
I walked in the room the other day to find that my Jack Russell had feces on her face. How do I discourage this behavior without standing over her all day every day?


Dear Cesar,
My Labrador is ornery with myself and my husband. He nips at our Jack Russell every once in a while. But I think it's just for added attention from us? I have made a point to put him into a social environment outside of our house. He loves preschool the dog park but is shy with the other dogs and owners. He loves to play but isn't comfortable engaging others. Any tips on socializing a "shy guy"?


Dear Cesar,
My bulldog eats EVERYTHING! Is this NORMAL?!?!?! Oh, and is there breed known for climbing? 

Now you know my secrets to good sound advice!
I have to go grab the minis out of their crates....I mean rooms and get them ready for Easter Dinner!
Sans leashes of course.
Happy Easter folks!

buzz buzz buzz

There are literally 1743 things buzzing through my head right now....not a one of them that I can grab hold of long enough to actually focus on though. UGH.
The Hubbs hasn't given his 2 weeks notice yet. The new company has been running all the background checks and what not, and a start date was to be determined once everything had officially been cleared ie: when they found out The Hubbs is NOT a crack head or addicted to crystal meth or anything. That's all been done and the new boss announced to him today that the first round of training in California starts on May 2nd! WHAT THE?!?!?! (Insert expletive here________) Any guess what came out of MY mouth?! I'm sure you guessed it. Now as I mentioned before, The Hubbs hasn't given his notice to his current employer. And, just to get technical here, two weeks from today is May 5th. Just sayin'. And the first round of training goes for three weeks....in California. Which just so happens to fall in the same month as Mother's Day and the start of BBQ season! The new boss did say that maybe they could push the training back for him another week so it would start on the 9th instead! But that was a big maybe and only because The Hubbs has 10 years experience in this field. Now more than ever, I feel suffocated. Don't get me wrong, I'm excited for the move. But the training is the LEAST exciting part of all this. Parenthood is hard enough when there are two of you. I seriously don't know how single parents pull it off. I did this last summer and it wasn't fun. So I have some anxiety issues about being left for weeks at a time again. Throw on top of that....the house needs to be sold........and weeded through before I can pack it up.....then packed up.....cars have to be sold....I NEED to have a garage sale desperately....oh.....and I should probably find us a new place to live in Colorado?! Yikes! All this with 3 minis running circles around me? Well, if I ever get on this blog again, it should make for a pretty interesting post or two! That's for sure.
I've already informed The Hubbs that I will be taking a few "girl's nights" over the next two weeks since I'm going to be trapped at home held against my will unable to get away when he's gone. The first one is tomorrow night :) with "the babysitter" and her 170 pound puppy Baloo. I'm going to the sanctuary that is her house for some quiet, calm, focusing time over a few beers and some good conversation! She's a very positive force in my life. She has a great outlook on things and is already checking into airfares to Colorado to come visit :) Love her!
Shit......maybe I'll even bring a lavender scented candle and one of those eye gel masks. We'll pretend it's a spa night...but with beer!
#1744 floating around my head right now>>>>>>Why don't spas have beer?
Accompanied by
#1279-How the HELL did I spend $150 at Walmart on Easter basket "filler" yesterday??
#317-What am I going to make for dinner?
#600-Did I shower today?
#1801-Should I go buy boxes right now? #1802-It couldn't hurt to start packing right?
#5-Weird that this pain showed up in my neck as soon as The Hubbs told me when his training class starts.

:)
SERENITY NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Whoops....sorry about the delay!

HA! I suck. I'm sorry I didn't have a follow-up post! I actually thought I had posted?! Clearly, my mind is going in a million different directions....none of which seem to be FORWARD!

Here's the long and short of it.
They verbally offered The Hubbs the job. The written offer was emailed and another copy is being FedEx'd to the house. They did offer a little less than we would like. So now negotiations will begin. But really only minor negotiations about salary. From here, they require a background check, DMV check, and drug test. We were told those take about 2 weeks. Once those are all cleared, they will discuss a start date and how much notice will be given to the current company. It's pretty much.....in the bag. Which hasn't really hit either one of us yet. I mean, we are excited. And nervous. But in a good way.

~~I guess when you dream about something for so long, and it finally comes to fruition, it's hard to accept that it's reality at that point.~~


Now all the planning and decision making is coming into play. Sell or rent this house? Where exactly in CO should we rent? (there are a few variables here) Dates? There are 12 weeks of training that come along with taking this position. Six of which will be in California. So the minis and I would probably stay East for the majority of that. So our summer will probably be a NJ one.

Obviously, none of this is written in stone because The Hubbs hasn't actually accepted any offer. There is one major thing that could happen here. It is very possible that his current company could offer a counter-offer. The Hubbs had mentioned to his immediate supervisor and the supervisor in the Western territory that he would like to be considered if a position were needed in the CO region. The supervisor out there had said that it was a possibility in the future! So there's always that.

We sat down over a few drinks last night and wrote some Pro/Con lists about the house and the companies. The one thing we did realize from doing this, was that we didn't have the need for a CO vs. NJ list. There is only one thing in NJ for us. And that's our family. Which we love dearly and will miss terribly! But which we also know wants us to be happy no matter what. We will all adapt to Skype conversations with the kids and extended visits back to NJ with big BBQs and parties just because. While this is hard for us to swallow, and for all of them also, it's what we want more than anything and it's ok to chase your dreams!

So away with you Catholic Guilt that's been ingrained in us since we were wee little ones!!!!

We deserve to be happy!

.................

So we've walked around all morning with our stomachs in our throats...the clock ticking ever so slowly. 8am PST is 11am here. And 11am in the eyes of parents of three minis, is late in the day already.
Well.........it just got even later. The Hubbs went up to the silent sanctuary of our bedroom to receive the phone call. And when it didn't come promptly at 11, he checked his email. Then his email RESPONSE to the HR rep. When he relied to her, he said........I will be available at 9 and am looking forward to speaking with you.
SO......
we have another hour to WAIT!

lmao

gulp!

Now I'M Pacing!!!!!!!!!

Okay Okay Okay.......without any fancy wording....or fun story.......
The Hubbs handed his email over to me right before leaving for work. It was from the HR rep at Abbott Labs and here is what it said:

Hello Hubbs,(ok so it said his name....WHATEVER read on)

Are you available tomorrow morning at 8:00 am PST?  I would like to move forward with a contingent verbal offer.  If not, please feel free to suggest an alternate time.

and then he LEFT for work!!!!!!!  So I've been pacing ever since. ALONE! Until over Facebook chat I somehow convinced my Dear Friend AND babysitter mentioned in previous posts to come over and bring her sister with HER three kids!

WHEW!!!!

Having all of them did wonders for all of my pent up nervous energy, that's for sure. But now I sit here drooling typing this and wondering how I'm going to make it up the stairs for bed tonight? And once I get there....will I actually be able to sleep? 

Only time will tell.

The above mentioned 8am phone call won't actually happen HERE in Jersey till 11am SO...tick tock tick tock.

More to follow tomorrow :)

Not bad news....not exactly good news either

So here's a little taste of Murphy's Law for ya.....
We were in a funeral procession today. The last car in fact. And my coat starts buzzing. Little did I know, The Hubbs threw his cell phone in my pocket at the church. And now it's ringing. While reaching to get it I said "watch that be the Colorado job!". The Hubbs takes a look at his phone and goes "holy crap it's blah-blah-blah area code!!!!!!". I'm typing it like that because obviously I had no friggin CLUE where blah-blah-blah area code was at the time(or now even since I can't remember it! LOL). Indeed it was from California where he had gone to interview a week and a half ago. WOOT! But we're driving...and The Hubbs has no "hands free" device to answer the phone with. On top of that, we were the last car in the procession which holds the responsibility of flashing your hazards, zipping through red lights trying to catch up to the rest of the line, and waving to all the lovely Jersey drivers flipping us off to thank them for letting us through for a funeral! Whew....exhausting really.
Luckily the woman who called left a message for us to listen to on the way. It went a little something like this...."This is so and so from blah blah company calling to give you a status update on the field service position available. Please call us at your earliest convenience." Immediately I watch my other half's shoulders drop. While the woman was very friendly in her message, the words "status update" led him to believe they had gone over the candidates, chosen one, had one accept their terms, and hired them and were now calling to inform him of all that. After all, the manager would call him to offer the position....not an HR representative. Right? So this probably wasn't good. And now that horrible sinking feeling settled into both of our stomachs. UGH. We arrive at the cemetery at the end of the line and there's a brief wait. Suddenly the windows are being rolled up and The Hubbs is dialing the phone with speed and gusto. He was not about to wait any longer. THANK GOD! Because I am incredibly kind of impatient. So he called and the woman from HR answered right away. She is very sweet on the phone. Likable even though she might be about to deliver very disappointing news to us. She opened up the conversation with a very hopeful voice asking "are you still interested in the position?" WHEW. If she was about to tell him he didn't get the job, this woman was a whole new kind of evil after asking that question!!! My poised hubby answered perfectly saying how he was excited about the opportunity and definitely still interested. He has a grace with words that just eludes me. And it's nice to hear him speak on a professional level. I've always worked with burping, farting, or at least armpit farting folk...so it's refreshing to hear the "other" side. haha  Once she heard that he was still interested the tone of her voice changed a bit, almost sounding like relief. This is a good sign, I'm thinking. Or maybe just psyching myself up even higher?! You say potAto I say potato. She begins telling The Hubbs how they have two more interviews they are committed to this week and then that is all of them, but that he is a wonderful candidate and made a great impression all around. She thanked him for being so flexible throughout this process and almost sounded apoligetic to him that they were interviewing anyone else. Her wording "we're committed to these interviews" almost sounded like....we have to do it even though we want to hire you. The Hubbs reiterated to her that he is currently employed so it's not like he's living in a cardboard box with no income until he hears from them(he said this in a much more refined way of course) but that he looks forward to the opportunity to speak with them again. She then threw out another time line(AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH) of a week to a week and a half that we would hear from them "either way". Which translates to 3 weeks the way they move.
Needless to say, we were pretty relieved with the phone call. And I still have a good feeling about the whole thing. Lets hope my gut doesn't let us down!
So we play the waiting game again. If anyone knows of a pro/semi pro team that we can join to play the waiting game..............we've gotten pretty damn good at it! Always have a back up plan!!

Tick Tock Tick Tock

Ok...so I don't actually hear a clock ticking, it's more like the theme song to Jeopardy. We have yet to hear from this company about the job. Ugh. I KNEW this would happen. They are less than expedient about getting back to people. But come ON!!!! Don't they understand that our lives have been on hold for soooooooooooo long and this one phone call could throw us into action?! No, I suppose they don't. But still! A little common courtesy of timelyness shouldn't be so much to ask for.
Instead, The Hubbs is wearing a path deep into the living room carpet and now the hardwood floors with his pacing. And I think I'm developing a blister from "refreshing" our Inbox to see if there's a new email waiting for us. Because they're going to email him?! That's ridiculous, I know. But when powerless, it's all I can come up with!
Every time one of his phones(yes, he has two cell phones) ring, my heart skips a little beat. It even did it when MY phone rang yesterday. Because again, if they don't email him with an offer.....clearly they'll just call ME directly?!
Good thing I don't have my hopes up high or anything. Cuz that would really suck!
In other news, The Hubbs hemmed and hawed yesterday until he finally up and did our taxes. I am 100% not capable of such things. So I give him a shit-ton(heh heh) of credit! He seriously sits down, starts them, and finishes them less than 2 hours later! I don't understand? I swear I used to witness my folks sitting down to do their taxes with a tax guy(this is why I don't touch our finances...."tax guy"?!) for days. Maybe even a week! I remember not being able to go into the kitchen for said days or week because of the 5' tall stacks of paper, ie: receipts, bills, other crap that was important. Thinking back, I don't know if we were even fed during tax season? Oh well. Anyway, ours are done! WHEW! One less thing to pace about....if pacing happens to be your thing ;)
We are also in the process of getting a new vehicle for the crew. The Raging Rhino is just too ginormous for this tiny family of 5 plus 2 dogs. Ok, it's really not that bad, but it gets about 2 miles to the gallon. And with gas prices closing in on $4 a gallon, we'll be able to afford maybe a really big box to house us all if we keep this giant van. Option........mini van. Oh how I loathe those 2 words together! I guess I've always had it in my head that I was too cool for a mini van. I'd rather a diesel pick up with an extended cab. But that's just me I guess. And we'd both have to work, and at least one of the kids too, to afford the gas for that. So mini van, here we come!!!
I'll be sure to update as soon as we hear from The Company. Which better be today, or I'm going to have to tap into our savings for some new area rugs!
Is that my phone?????
Gotta run

Where Have I Been....Part 2

Now, between work, school, playdates, hiking, geochaching(our newest, most fun thing to do as a family!), baking, St Patty's Day(ouch), and just life in general........things are moving forward for us, and quickly! We have it in our minds and hearts that we want to live elsewhere. The rat race around here is just out of control! And we are very outdoorsy people, which isn't always easy to do when you live in Northern NJ, a hop skip and a jump away from New York City. We want to live by mountains, and rivers, and lakes and just.....nature. Not highway after highway....McMansion after McMansion. We've always felt this way. I lived in Colorado for two years. The Hubbs flew out there to drive me home so we could start our lives together, and he fell in love with the place! I remember standing next to him around 1am shivering my arse off because we stepped outside to smoke(I have trouble remembering the days when we smoked?! We both quit over 5 years ago.) and the awe on his face when he looked at the sky. It was alive with stars! Stars you just can't see where we live because of all the lights around here. But in the middle of the mountains, you can see every single one of them and it's breathtaking. We didn't have much time out there to tour around together, but he's been back since for work meetings and loves every part of the state! Sadly, I couldn't join him on that trip because........GUESS?!?!?! Yep, I was pregnant. :) A piece of my heart and his stayed in Colorado. And in the back of our heads(okay maybe not the back....we've always talked about it) we've always known we'd love to end up there. And throughout the years, he's kept his employer aware that if a transfer came up, to let him know because we'd consider anywhere other than Jersey at this point. And while we haven't actively made the move toward Colorado, we've always known, we'd get there. Our hearts fill with joy that our kids will be able to grow up in that environment! And over the past couple of weekends, we've taken the kids on some ridiculously long hikes for toddlers and they were totally in their element. This just confirms our belief that these little gnomes will love the lifestyle that WE do. I could easily see our oldest son getting into Wildlife Management or something like that. And our daughter, well, she might just go live with wolves?! The two of them are becoming master deer trackers, pointing out every single pile of "deer poop" along the way and even starting to recognize other signs that deer have been around. It's awesome to watch. Even Child 3 was very content to hang out in a backpack for 2 hours at a pop as long as we fed him regularly!
So this past Thursday, St Patty's Day, I drove The Hubbs to the airport where he left to fly to California to interview at corporate offices for a job based in Colorado. We are super excited! The interview went well, and now it's just a waiting game to hear from the company. But I have a feeling about this time. I feel like this is it for us. It's finally going to happen! I know it's not practical to have my hopes up this high, but I'm actually nervous about it too. Because my feeling is so strong, I'm also hit with all the reservations about moving as well. The wonderful family and friends we'll be leaving behind. Although I know we are all very capable of travelling from here to there, it's not always in the cards for one reason or another. And that sucks. But the thought of raising my kids in a place that doesn't make us happy, where we can't make ends meet, makes me sick to my stomach. So travel we will! All of our lavish European vacations will be replaced by RV trip across the US stopping at every World's Largest Ball of Yarn or Bottle Of Ketchup along the way. We don't ever go on lavish European adventures, so we certainly wouldn't be sacrificing anything there.And I'd love for our kids to have a rich sense of their country. I sure don't. I've been to Disney World and that's about it! I'm not complaining, they were wonderful family vacations full of fun and fantasy. But I've never even been to a National Park!! I want to explore all these things alongside our kids....Mount Rushmore and the Black Hills, The Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, and every other place along the way!
Cheers to adventure!
I'll keep you posted on the job/move.
:)

Where Have I Been??

No really? Why is it that I feel like I just posted on here? Time flies when you have little ones, I suppose. March has been a wickedly busy month for us so far. In a good way. And quite frankly, I can't even believe it's almost over?! How does that happen??? My last post was sharing a link to my friend's blog. But the one before that was almost 2 weeks ago! I had mentioned how The Hubbs and I haven't really had any time(over the past 4/5 years) to concentrate on just us. And it was time to turn that around a bit. And that Friday( I think), we went out on a date. It was a total surprise to him! Which is basically what I LIVE for. I'm totally one of those people that wishes I had billions of dollars to get everyone around me exactly what they want......the search for the perfect present is one I love. Anyway, I set it up with our friend that she would come by once the minis were already in bed, because.....well....isn't that just easier on everyone involved? I love this girl dearly. And we are very fortunate to not have to pay for our sitters! Oh don't you worry....I feed them well :) And this one person in particular, has become family to us. WHICH by the way, is a double edged sword. Where I trust her with my kids, my dogs, my house and everything else........she's also become a staple at our family gatherings and parties!!! SO, when it comes to needing someone to watch the kids when we're going out with all our friends/family, we're screwed because our sitters are right there partying with us! LOL  Eh, the hassle of finding someone else to watch the kids is totally worth the friendships we've built over the past couple of years. SO, it was dinnertime here and I was serving up a "gourmet" DiGiorno frozen pizza for the kids and The Hubbs was giving me a sideways glance like..."where's my food?". So I kind of had to bust the surprise at that point so he knew he would indeed be eating sometime in the near future. Kids fed, check. Baths, check. Shower for me and clean clothes put on, check. EYE MAKEUP(oh yeah baby!!!), check. This was a date after all! Kids in bed, check. Sitter over, check. Her approval of my outfit(yep.....I SO need this these days!), check. And out the door we went to a little BYOB Italian restaurant that my sister-in-law gave us a gift certificate to back in November for our birthdays. We picked up a bottle of wine for us, and one for the sitter for when we got home so we could all hang out. When we were seated, I have to tell you honestly, I almost felt giddy about us being on a date. We have gone out before since having kids, but I'm usually pregnant or something. This time was just different. We ate like pigs KINGS and stuffed ourselves like we couldn't even believe. We had no problems polishing off two appetizers, salads, 1/2 of our entrees(doggy bags ROCK), the bottle of red and about 14 glasses of water! I insisted on dessert. Solely for the fact that I didn't have to bake it and um.......I LOVE dessert! Can we say lava cake?! YES!!! And much to our surprise, the waiter brought over complimentary shots of Sambuca for each of us. Wow! Now THIS was a date we could appreciate. Food, glorious food, and drink! As we were waiting for the check, secretly wishing we could unbutton our top buttons without strange looks from other restaurants goers, I text the sitter to let her know we were settling the bill and would be home soon. To which I got the response "Home? Go enjoy your date night! Go dancing the night away!". Can you see why we love her so much?! She was at our house studying for a report she had to write for college. To which I attribute her temporary amnesia of who she was talking to............we don't dance. Clearly her brain was fogged with college stuff(such an overachiever) and after I responded "dancing? US?", she came back with "silly me.....go to a bar and go shot for shot..IT'S DATE NIGHT!" She's the best! However, those days are long gone and instead we chose to come home and hang out with her over a few drinks. She tried to bolt out the door so we could have "alone time" but we assured her that would only lead to more work for her in the end if another kid were to come of it! Needless to say, she stuck around for a few drinks and some deep(and not so deep) discussion. We have a little running joke that she's never left our house before 1am. But I'm pretty sure even on the nights where none of us could tell time, she's right! Anything before 1am is too early when with good friends anyway.
Ever want someone to just be around you all the time? Yeah, it's like that. We are truly lucky for the people around us.
In the interest of this not being the longest post EVER......I'll write a part 2.