I have really held myself back lately from ranting and raving all the time about the 2 now turned 3 year old.  But today he has just driven me up the wall.  I have to figure out a solution.  I am not good for him and he is not good for me.  He acts great for other people, but for some reason when he is with me he likes to run around laughing maniacally, he will get something he isn't supposed to have and run around and then throw it.  He will give Lili things she isn't supposed to have (I watch him like a hawk around her).  He destructs and gets into everything, On his bedroom floor he has dumped lotion, mouthwash, fabric softner.  I do keep these things up he climbs and figures things out.  He is just bad.  Then when he gets in trouble he screams so loud that everything inside me feels like its going to break into a million pieces. 

The communication is getting a bit better, he is forming sentences.  But still no matter how consistent and how bad the discipline gets it doesn't seem to phase him. 

Then the potty training - nothing is going there.  I even ordered a little dvd from the Pull-Ups people.  At the end of it I wanted to punch all the happy happy sugar sweet smiling parents and lady hosting the DVD.  Stickers don't work, candy doesn't work, clapping doesn't work, cheering doesn't work.  Sadly my kid is not normal like every other kid.  If I find something that works it only works 3 to 4 times and then it loses its power just like any form of discipline I use.  I am at my wits end.  I dont' think its good when you don't like your child(I love him but I find I don't like him often) and find yourself wishing you were very far away from them.  I understand that for every now and then but not often. 

I don't deal well with Change and I suppose that is everything that this kid is about the fact that the same discipline doens't work after 3 or 4 times.  I just don't know,  I do know I am tired, I am tired with dealing with him and I am tired of the fact I feel he takes complete joy away from family time.  I am not a happy cheerful mom for the rest of my kids, my patience has been worn to the point of none, I am often sharp with the kids.  I hate it.  I have really tried to work hard on all these things.  I have tried to change and change the way I react but after the 10th time I just lose it all.

I dont' know what to do.  My only answer is to put him into day care.  My problem with that is I can't afford it.  I am trying to figure out a solution to that.  I just assume day care might help, because he seems to do great if he stays constantly busy but as a mom of 4 I find it hard to keep him completely busy every second of the day.

And as I type here he is screaming his face off, and it makes me feel so crazy on the inside.

I don't know, does anyone else out there have a kid like this?  What do you do?  How do I solve this problem.  I want to love and like my child.  Not wish for Kindergarten to hurry up.  And constantly wish to be far far far away from him. How is it my other kids are fantastically well behaved and he is not?  I didn't do anything different with him.

I don't know, I just don't know 

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you can't make eye contact with your daughter.

My little girl is 6 months old and if I make eye contact with her while she is anywhere that is not in my lap she will start crying.  I can see she is staring at me right now but if I want to finish my lunch peacefully then I sadly cannot make eye contact.

Its kinda funny actually.  She is a real mommas girl this one.  But she is a real sweetie pie, sadly my digital camera died but I need to get some more pics up of her.

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Life is good, I feel like I have to start off with that sentence.  I find myself aggravated a lot these days but not all the time just at certain moments, but all in all life is good and all it is is God working in me.  Sometimes when God works in us we do desire it but it can be painful.  I don't like unknown I like to have a direction to go in and know where I am going.  God doesn't always let us know what is going on which is good but sometimes hard.

I feel like sometimes I am so obscure when I post, I just don't know what I want to say even sometimes.  I feel like I go in waves of like and dislike of this city.  On one hand I do believe God called us to move here, I love the church, I love being a part of it, I love all the new friends and people we have met and just for that I would not trade the new friends and relationships for home for anything.  I love the new relationships and all the richness they have brought to our life. 

Since we have moved here life has never been harder, things seem to come out of no where and never stop.  I am far away from my comfort and my safety.  Life has so many more responsibilities almost too many if feels sometimes.

I feel very vulnerable here and somewhat helpless.  Which I guess is just where God wants me.  And I dont' think I am the only one feeling this way and going through this.  I have to say I don't like it but as always if I would quit fighting it and just do what I need to do maybe I could get through these things quicker.

It probably doesn't help that I was on the strip most of the weekend, I have a friend who came to visit.  We all had a blast and we did have fun on the strip, but then again all the crap that is just blared at you and all the fakeness and all the money and crazy priced stuff, and the pervertedness of the strip gets to you.  And I feel disgusted with people in general.  But again I have to realize that is what we are here for to change the world and to bring truth and life to everyone.

The thing that really gets me is I get so angry with myself because no matter how hard I try I allow my feet to get knocked out from underneath me.  I allow my thoughts to get away with me, I start to dwell on the negative and not the positive and I fall down the spiral of frustration and I start running away in my head and thinking of all the other places I would rather be.  When if I used this time to pray and read my bible and meditate on God instead of wasting all my energy on getting angry and crying and feeling crazy I would be feeling so much better.

So I guess I have my answer and I will start working on it harder.  I mean I realize I am human but I still need to work harder and get control of my emotions and feelings and not let me run away with myself.  I do feel positive because even though I didn't do wonderfully well this time with Gabe being gone I did do better than last time.  So yea for that.

And one last thing lets all sing Hallelujah Gabe is coming home tomorrow!!!  I made it through today I know I can get through tomorrow.

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I feel like I am in a weird place at the moment.  On one hand I feel like I am where God called me to be and I do desire His will in my life, but on the other hand I do not like that place.  Lets just say I am not a fan of Las Vegas.  I love our church, it is doing well, I love my part in the church and I love the people in our church all of them are fantastic.  But I keep on finding myself just really really not liking Vegas.  I mean maybe its just because we have hit triple digit heat.  But I don't think so

I want to escape, I want to be anywhere but here.  It seems all it holds is pain and irritation.  The only thing I hold onto is that God is doing something.  I have never seen so many changes happen in such a short time in our lives.  I am trying to be joyful in midst of the frustrations and trial but it is such a fight.  This city sometimes makes you feel like you are a prisoner in it, circled around by mountains.  It can also make you feel very alone.  It deceives you, because I know I am not a prisoner and I know I am definitely not alone.  Everything that we have gone through has been worth it, It is worth all the great people I know now, I wouldn't trade that for anything.  And its worth it for the wisdom. 

I wish somehow I would just let go.  Maybe if I just let it go things would not be easier but just easier to deal with.  I always think I am letting things go and being pliable but before I know it I am back to feeling like a big scribble. 

I don't know what I am trying to run to.  Its not like there is a perfect land of happiness and perfection.  I don't know, I just want to live with some green in my yard where my kids can play and maybe the city is a bit smaller.  I want to be at peace with what God is doing not fighting it constantly.  I know thats on my part and I guess I just have to try harder.  I guess Gabe not being here doesn't help with these feelings. 

But I can't complain Life is good and as always we will get through these things and look back and think that it wasn't really that big of a deal.

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I have not posted in FOREVER.  I hate that, I love to blog.  Life continues to get faster and faster even though it seems some days are so slow.  Also I have to be really picky on my time because I have so many choices and I have to make smart ones not always necessairily ones I want to make.

Stupid responsibility.  I like doing the right thing, but I hate responsibility sometimes.  I have too much.  But I need to enjoy each day and even the responsibility in it.

I am going to probably want to shoot myself tomorrow.  It is 12:19 at night and I am up posting.  Knowing that in all likelihood Miss Lili will be up around 6 ish and if she isn't Mr. Granticus will be.  Oh well.  When Gabe is off on a trip I seem to become a night owl.  I just prefer to go to bed when he does when he is here.  I mean I have always known I am not a morning person but I realize it even more when Gabe isn't here. 

Oddly enough I am doing very well this time around.  Last trip he was on I was mean and irritated and just very unenjoyable all around.  This time I am doing ok.  I still don't like it and I hope this doesn't become crazily common, but I am glad I am doing better.

I feel like Life is weird right now.  I feel like I want to run away from Vegas, not the people or church I just don't like the city, but I am not necessairily wanting to fast forward life either because I don't know if I am more scared of the future or not.  I guess I just want to enjoy where I live.  It doesn't help that the weather is now getting into the freaking 100's.  Stupid heat, I hate it.  I don't know, at least God is always working. 

Things with the family are going well.  The boys are doing well, Lili is growing like crazy, and she has had her first haircut - pictures to come.  Grant is still a very busy often frustrating 3 year old, but we are working on it.  I have to keep it all in perspective and constantly try new ways of keeping him in line.  I am currently trying 123 magic and not just go into crazy mode when he has flushed something again or gotten into my makeup and made a huge mess.  I lately have been trying to encourage him when he starts into his tazmanian devil mode to remember to keep showing me how much of a good boy he can be.  It seems to make a bit of a difference.  There are times I am reminding him every five minutes but we are both trying.  I have tried potty training but that is a battle of the wills and I am putting it down for awhile.

Life is good, weird, but good.  Even though I haven't posted in a long while, I do try to keep up with everyone and read everyone elses.  I enjoy reading everyones blog so much.  I am going to see if I can at least post once a week, and I gotta find a way to get my pictures up, I am back logged, and my dig camera has just died sadly, I have to figure out how to get a new one fast, can't miss the precious times of my sweet girl growing up, and the boys are growing just as fast too.

I hope everyone has a great weekend and hopefully the posts wont be so few and far between.

I am off to bed now!

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weird title, but one of my favorite Spongebob episodes.  He finds a seahorse befriends it and takes it to work with him, of course Mr. Krabs is not happy about this and tells him to get him out of there,  Spongebob doesn't and the seahorse whinnies and Mr. Krabs comes back and Spongebob tries to cover up with, WHEE-SAW" "It's just my impression of Mystery" Mystery of course being the seahorse.

I don't know everytime I hear Spongebob say "Whee -Saw" it makes me laugh. 

Darn Spongebob, why is it so entertaining.

So the explanation of the title of my post is just about as painful as one of my messages I leave on answering machines. 

For some reason they seem to make me nervous.  Like I just don't know what to say, so my messages are very long and often times things are repeated several times, not bad things just things like I hope you are having a great week, things like that.

The other day I called a lady from church who I am trying to develop some relationship with get to know her a little better.  On my message to her I repeated several times over the whole long message just want to get together and hang out sometime, Today with another friend from church I said the whole hope you are having a good week like four times. With both messages I did say other things besides that but still.

What is wrong with me, its like I lose all ability to talk and be a normal person when I have to leave a message I become weirdo Bobbi.

Maybe its a disease, dysfunctional answering machine syndrome.

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Offense is a nasty thing at times.  I don't think its wrong to be offended or to feel aggravated by things, but its the way we react to it that is usually the killer. 

We live in a world where if someone offends you you go off and rant and rave to someone else about things, and in some way someone gets hurt, may not be the person who offended but often times others that we talk to, they get the wrong idea and become judgmental.  We all deal with this, offense is a common occurance in life. 

We live in a world where we all want to take the easy way, we don't want to do things that are hard and could hurt us.

The clear way to handle offense it to take it back to the person and say hey this bothered me and I feel you should know it.  Some people do handle it that way, and that is awesome.  Let me be the first to say taking my offense to someone is one of the hardest things for me to do.  I personally would rather do the whole get offended and rant to a close friend or husband about it.  This is an area I am working hard in because over the last year I have seen how offense not handled correctly and hurt so many, and it can continue on for a long time and spread out over people and just cause a mess.

I have recently had a situation that came up in our lives, that has been a case of us offending someone else and then we find out about it from someone else, (if you are a friend who is reading this it probably is not you so don't worry about it.)  Anyway this situation has the ability to hurt three people, The person offended, a mutual friend and us.  It would be very easy for me to be offended and get my panties in a wad.  This is where I find God prodding and saying stop the pattern now.  And this is also why I have really determined that if offenses come up in the future I will not be a talker I will take it to that person and deal with it so that I will not cause lots of hurt.

I am not posting this because I am angry, I am just getting my thoughts out, I am fine with this situation, I give it to God and believe that He will correct things the way they are supposed to be.  I just think this topic is very interesting and have seen it go towards an ill direction a lot in life lately.

I am curious and anxious to see what God is doing in the lives around us as well as ours,  He is doing great things and even though sometimes its painful I am glad God is changing me and bringing the bad things out of me.  I am chasing the pain instead of running away for once.  And it is good.

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I no longer have a two year old, he turned three today.  He is affectionately called by many names, Granticus Maximus, Grants pants, Grantzy Pants, and even Granticus Panticus.  Who knows I rhyme names for some odd reason, always have, probably always will all my pets names have have had nicknames that rhymed.  What can I say I am a weirdo.  Mostly around the house you will just hear a loud GRANT!!!!  from any one of the family members. 

So my little monster is three today and it boggles my mind.  I keep on thinking about what was going on Three years ago.  So much has happened since then. I must say though I am not sad that he is one year older,  I am very excited, he still pulls out the I don't understand card.  He does understand but he is in the in-between stage of talking, he can say a lot but communication is not a two way street fully.  So the older he gets the better the communication and hopefully the better the behavior

I wonder who he is going to grow up to be.  He is definitely an interesting child.  He has the ability to have people instantly fall in love with him.  Everyone loves Grant.  So apparently he has the cute and charm down for sure.  He is cute I agree, but he doesn't charm me he drives me up the wall for me he has the ability to instantly drive me crazy, he is constant and extreme for me, of course for everyone one else he is an angel.  He does not act up or act out for anyone the way he does for me, I don't know what I do to inspire this in him, you would think hey I am the person who takes care of him and loves him and does things for him he would hold me in high esteem but instead it is the opposite.  But thats ok we will make it. He is my little monkey, I have not seen anything the kid can't climb or tries to yet.  In fact the other day when we were off to go pick up my husband from the airport I had opened the garage door and he grabbed on to it and was going to the top before I noticed and ran and grabbed him off of it.  I think we were both in a state of surprise with that one.

Regardless of how crazy he makes me I do love him and look forward to seeing him grow into an amazing man.

Granticus3

Look at those big brown eyes, they don't work on me anymore, well maybe sometimes :)

Granticus2

Granticus1

And there is his sweet smile.  He is Mr. Extreme, if he is good, he is super good, if he is sweet he is so sweet you could just eat him up, if he is mischievous its not just a little its to the max.

Happy Birthday my Dear Grant!!!

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Ok so I really really hate posting things like I posted before,  I feel like a bad person, I feel crazy, I feel wrong.  I do have to control myself and not write negative things all the time.  I am not a totally negative person but sometimes it seems way easier to be negative or point out negative than it is to be positive.  For me I used to use my blog for ranting.  Which is good sometimes but then I thought if people read this and think thats all I am like they are going to get a poor picture of me.  So I have tried to curb using my blog just for rants, I don't know if I have been super successful but I have tried really hard.

But I am glad I posted earlier, I feel so much better, and I pinpointed my problem of this week.  And now I know what I need to work on and how to change my attitude and ultimately help me to be a better wife. 

I would have still been crazy this week having four kids to take care of on my own, but not so much if there hadn't been an underlying situation I was dealing with.

I have identified it and now I am working to find a solution to fix the problem.

So I am sorry for the negativity and craziness of earlier, but then again I feel so much more relief to have it out and to know what needs to be fixed.  Its like I knew what was wrong, but just acknowledging it and saying it out loud has helped, doesn't make sense but hey it helped.

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I have been trying to keep it together, I have been trying not to blog about things that are negative especially this,  but I guess I am taking the low road.  I just can't keep it together on this one.  I have been battling so hard on this one and fighting it and trying to repress it.  But I can't seem to be victorious on it.

I am just so angry I feel I could spit fire. Probably since I am tired and have a blaring headache its not good either. My two year old decided to visit me around 3:00 last night and didn't go back to sleep very fast.  That on top of a 12:30 bedtime makes Bobbi a tired tired girl. But oh well.

This week has been a horrible week.  I have really tried to battle it, I have had some positive things and I have tried to dwell on it but this anger and sadness and frustration just take me over.

This stupid trip my husband is on is killing me.  The whole problem is the fact about two weeks ago I got to go with him to this same place.  It was supposed to be a celebration of our 10 years together, Today 10 years is good, I plan on having many more but still I wanted to celebrate the 10 years with something big.  I had hoped to renew our vows on the 10 year but there was no possible way, and we are so freaking far away from all our friends and family.  So anyway this business trip of my husbands come up and its perfect because we don't have the money to afford a romantic getaway.  So this was going to pay our way minus my plane ticket.  I realized it wasn't a just fun trip.  But I was under the impression he was going to have Sunday off.  The trip I went on, he worked every day and had to go in early like 5:30 and 6:00 every morning and one night didn't even make it home till 10:00.  I just wanted one day with him, to go have fun to relax and feel fun together.  We haven't done anything like that in a long time.  I mean a LONG TIME.  I love being with him and having fun with him.  There was none of that.  We didn't get to see anything fun or scenic and when we did try the cool thing we wanted to do was closed.  We had some nice meals together and that was nice,  but nothing out of the ordinary.    And then the hotel was so far away from where he was working in the city and it was in an odd part of town and it was not fun to get out and walk around so I did that once or twice and I had my fill of it.  It was very frustrating, but I was like oh well, at least I got to have rest and I got away with him and out of Vegas for a bit. I was frustrated but ok with it.

Then about a week later Gabe calls from work and tells me he has to go to Seattle again for a week.  And thats when all of this frustration was brought up again.  Of course this trip he got a different hotel closer to where he works and in a really nice part of town where there is lots to do and have fun and good restaurants. Of course its an awesome hotel. He has not been overworked and actually had time off to do things.  There is a chance he can come home tonight.  But he said there is also a good chance that his boss will ask him to stay just to be available.  That means nothing to do just to be there for a whole other day.  A day we could have done things and been together, spent good time together, gone out and seen some fun things in Seattle.  It has been a very laid back easy trip.  I am happy for him.  But I am seething mad that our trip got so totally screwed.  We didn't know he would have to make two trips.  His boss did know.  I wish his Boss would have told Gabe, just so we would have known we would have had some options.  And probably now would have been a better time since we had barely moved in.  It would have still been tiring and stressful with the kids for one of the trips but we would have had options.  I am so angry that the one time we try to do something as a couple it gets totally screwed up.  When we are apart everything goes perfect. In a sense, perfect for him.  CRAPPY for me.   I would have been ok with our sad 1st trip if he hadn't gone two weeks later and had the trip we should have had, and even he said this to me that this was probably the one I should have come on, which totally made the anger rise that much more.

I don't know why I can't get over this.  I just have moments of crying every day because I am so angry over this.  The other issue is it probably wouldn't be that big a deal if we just had money to blow on a trip and people to take care of our children, but we don't,  that was what was so good about or what we thought about the last trip, it was an alternate way to take a trip for us.  Our problem is we don't have extra money to spend on things like this plus we have four kids, so having four kids makes it almost next to impossible to go anywhere or do anything that is alone or romantic.  I need that, but I feel like that is never going to happen.

I am trying to hold it together when I talk to my husband (although I think I am doing a poor job)  I do want him to be happy and have a nice trip.

I know I am acting like a 5 year old. 

I am just tired and very angry and hurt and I don't know how to fix it.

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