Category: Backstories

Not that I have anything against old people, not at all. I’ve been driving around like a mad woman since last week and the handful of old people who should not be allowed a license all happen to be on the road at the same time as I am. John said that phrase this afternoon and I thought it was hilarious (and so true. I even said, “That’s SO going to be my blog entry title!” I was supposed to change the title on my entry about Anna Nicole to “The Day John’s Penis Died” but I never did LOL.) We were on a McDonald’s run when TWO cars full of Winter Texans almost slammed into us from each side. That’s been the norm since last Thursday it seems.

I’m at my desktop computer in the living room right now, with Alaethia’s bassinet at my side just in case she spits up like she did a few hours ago. Scared the crap out of me. Thank goodness I was passing right by her bassinet when she started screaming.

I didn’t get to enjoy the fruits of my laptop and wireless internet for too long since Mario got tired of how slow the laptop was and sold it today to one of his co-workers. So now we’re saving the $600 we bought and sold it for until we can save a little more to buy a better laptop. I had no problem with it; I loved it. Mario, on the other hand, is impatient and the poor little processor in the laptop was too slow for him. He also likes to mess around with the inards of operating systems and hates that Windows Vista doesn’t really let him get into all the folders and such. I just want to update from my bed again :(.

Anyway, I didn’t drop Noelia off at work on Thursday. It was nice to get some extra sleep in the morning. After I picked Jaylen up from school, Jaylen, Mom, Alaethia and I headed to the hospital to get Alaethia’s PKU done. It thankfully didn’t take super long to get called in since we had to make it back on time to pick Sammy (Yazmin was admitted into the hospital since she had a bad throat infection that needed intravenous antibiotics to clear it and nobody was around to pick up Sammy) and Eenan and Brandon up from school.

I braced myself for some tears (not just hers, but my own as well) when I put Alaethia up on the table and removed her sock. The nurse pricked her heel and it took her about 5 seconds to realize what had happened and she screamed her little Kitty scream. I picked her up and consoled her and she calmed down. Poor baby. I only got a little teary eyed this time, but I’m nervous about her immunizations next month!

We looked around the gift shop for a little bit, where mom got me a cute, soft little teddy bear that has “Special Daughter” embroidered on the tummy, aww :). We made it back with more than enough time to pick Sammy up, so we wasted some time at Joy Dollar. Jaylen of course went straight to the toys and picked out some swords with shields for him and Eenan. Can’t beat quieting the children down for $1! Well, quieting them down while we’re at the store. Once they have those swords out at home and are dueling with eachother, that’s another story.

Everything went pretty smoothly that night until it was time to make dinner. I decided on spaghetti and meatballs since I had a brain fart and thought, “It’s easy to make and I don’t really have to do much.” Right. Completely flew over my head that I actually have to prepare the meatballs. Alaethia started crying unconsolably just as I was defrosting the ground beef and would not let me put her down. Luckily, I still got it: I made meatballs with ONE HAND. Mashed all the ingredients and made perfect little balls and everything. *pops collar*

I finally gave her her first “full bath” that night. Her belly button stump had fallen off at the beginning of the week, but she still had a huge scab across her belly button and it was a little red and would bleed a little on her diaper. I was concerned, but they’d told me at her doctor’s appointment that she was healing well. I still couldn’t wet it though. I got tired of mopping her down with damp washcloths so I gave her a bath as carefully as I could without getting her bellybutton wet. It was a success and of course we took pictures :).

John and I went to Target earlier that day to see if they had the stuff he wanted and we made a quick stop at Michael’s, where I bought $3 worth of scrapbooking papers (they were on sale for a quarter each) and some embellishments. I bought one of the papers especially for documenting her first bath :).

I had to drop Noelia off on Friday morning and Mario had to work so I had to rush and get the kids to school then get Noelia to work on time. I got everything ready as quickly as I could that morning and then Noelia, Mom, Alaethia and I got into the truck. Got her to work with a few minutes to spare.

On the way back home Mom and I are looking for an old thrift store we used to go to. I’m so intently paying attention to all the shops on each side of us and trying not to get into a car accident that I’m stunned when I see something fly across the windshield and CRACK!! I frantically look around to see what happened and notice a circular crack on the top right side of my windshield. Looks like a baseball hit it. A darn trailer that was going in the opposite direction somehow managed to toss a huge rock at my window diagonally. How the hell does that happen?!

I call Mario to let him know what happened. We already had 3 small “stars”, one that had been repaired and now that huge one. I was pissed. Mario was annoyed. I called Mary and she tells me to put in a claim and get it taken care of with the insurance. So I do that as soon as I get home. I speak to a guy from the claims department at the company I’m getting the windshield repaired at. I ask him about the crack: it’s 2-2 1/2 inches long, can it be repaired? He says yes, as long as it’s less than 6 inches long it can be fixed. Awesome. I give him all my details and he says he’ll call the insurance company. I have an appointment at 9:30 at the windshield/glass place on Saturday morning. Lovely.

After picking Jaylen up I start getting ready to leave to my optometrist appointment. It’s about damn time I get new glasses; the ones I currently have I’ve had for 6 years. I’ve had the exact same frames two different times but the lenses have been the same for 6 years. I’m beginning to have problems seeing letters from far away again and have so much trouble seeing at night so I’m way overdue. I leave the house with enough time to find the place; I wanted to be early since I had to be there 5 minutes earlier than my appointment at 1.

I’m driving down the street looking for the place. It just so happens to be on the same street Mario works on. After frantically looking for it and pissing everyone around me off for driving 15 MPH, I decide to stop at Mario’s and ask him where the darn office is. We can’t find a phonebook anywhere and when we finally do, I’m already 5 minutes late, which means I’m 10 minutes late if you count the 5 minutes I was supposed to be there early. Turns out they moved the one that was near Mario’s work and it’s all the way on the other side of the expressway. Nice.

I finally get there and customer service SUCKS. One guy finally pays attention to me and directs me to the back of the place, which is so odd because nobody really knows they’re allowed to go back there O_o. Once they call me in it’s cake; everything was done really quickly. I’m only slightly more blind than I was before, so I guess that’s good. I got some brownish frames this time, sort of square and they’re Transitions lenses with anti-glare, which I’ve always wanted. Came out to $135. I almost died, but the lady who was attending me painted such a pretty picture, and after telling her how long I had my current frames she said I deserved some spiffy new glasses. I told myself, “You know what? You DO deserve some new glasses!” so I got just about everything they “recommended” I get. Mario was a little upset with how much I spent, but like I told him: this is the first time I go all out with my glasses and I’ll probably keep them for another 6 years. Not like him, who spent $170 on Tommy Hilfiger glasses that broke in a few months. Grr.

I picked up some McDonald’s for the both of us and I dropped it off to him. I was starving. All the weight I lost is going to come right back if McDonald’s keeps taunting me with it’s big golden arches :(. They’re everywhere! And I don’t usually like McDonald’s!

Mario got out early but I didn’t see much of him anyway. He was outside bonding with his dad by the fire of the bar-b-q. I left them alone and chilled out inside with my little lady and my littlest man (Eenan was sleeping over at Mary’s), since the day’s beautiful weather was quickly turning chilly and damp.

I actually got online to check my Myspace that night and to my surprise I had a friend request from an old friend from Middle School: Carmen! When I first saw her name I thought, “Could it be? No…” But it was! We exchanged messages for a while then had a nice, long talk on the phone catching up on eachother’s lives. We made plans to meet the next day for lunch somewhere.

In the time I’d left Alaethia with Mom for the few hours that I was at my eye appointment and then picked up the kids, she managed to screw up her routine. She gave me so much trouble that afternoon; she’d cry and cry, drink about an ounce of milk, go to sleep, wake up screaming and would drink another ounce. It took a few hours to get her back on track and I was fearful that she wouldn’t let me sleep that night and that her almost perfect patterns were gone for good. Although Alaethia did pretty good that night, and did pretty good every other night before, I felt so exhausted on Saturday morning. I overslept by a few minutes and it threw off my whole morning. I didn’t even get a chance to iron Mario’s clothes. I ate some breakfast real quick and got all of Alaethia’s stuff together. I was taking her with me; there was NO WAY I was leaving her with Mom again for that long! The boys, on the other hand, weren’t making much of an effort to get ready and since I was already running late I left them with Mother.

I was nervous driving to the glass place that morning since it was cold and rainy. She did great on the way over there and was an angel the entire time we were there. It took a while to get done this time and I was starting to get worried. It didn’t take but half an hour the first time we went there to get a chip fixed. The receptionist was just appologizing for how long it was taking when one of the installers came in to tell her it was done being replaced. I laugh and say, “Oh, you mean repaired.” The guy chuckles and says, “No, it was replaced.” My heart starts racing and I slap my hands over my eyes. I say, “It wasn’t supposed to be replaced! It was only a crack!” He says he looked over the work order and it was put down as a replacement; there’s no way they’d be able to repair that type of crack. I tell him I specifically asked the guy if a crack of that size could be fixed and that he’d said as long as it was under 6 inches, it could be. We stand around pondering what to do and then the guys tell me not to worry about it, to go home. I say, “What? I just…leave? Just like that? What happens then?” The same guy chuckles and says, “We just won’t get paid our comission.” Just dig the dagger deeper in why don’t you? Like I didn’t feel guilty about everything that was happening already, and that’s because I didn’t even do anything wrong! So we decide I’d just leave and we’d resolve it on Monday. Yippee.

I drove to Mario’s to show him our new windshield and told him the horror story behind it. He sort of just laughed it off, which annoyed me a little. I parked and called Carmen up to get my mind off the darn thing. We made plans to meet at the mall and have lunch there. She was going to have her kiddos with her and I had Alaethia.

It was so good seeing her! We held eachother in a hug for a few minutes when we first saw eachother. I remember that at the end of 8th grade we weren’t as close as we were in 7th. You know how all that middle/high school drama goes. Sadly I can’t even remember what happened that came between our friendship. She moved away after 8th grade and we lost touch completely, but I’m so glad that it’s like we never stopped talking!

Her kids went to this little mall event they were having for the kids’ club. I signed up for Sephora.com and got some free makeup, yay! We walked around and just chattered on and on and then we had lunch at the food court. I had spinach and mushroom stuffed pizza from Villa Pizza. *drool* That was delicious and oh, so sinful.

We peeked into a few of our favorite stores. She has a wedding to go to, so we went into Macy’s to look for dresses. I saw red clearance flags in this one section of the store, and I quickly skidadled over there. I found a cute tee (Just Jimmy’s one of my current favorite brands) for $4.99. I just noticed how much the shirts actually cost. I’ve got 5 of them and I’ve never paid full price for them. I usually get them at ross for under $7. That’s why I LOVE Ross!

John called telling me he wanted to go to the mall, too, so as soon as Carmen and I were done walking around the mall I went home and we made plans to go right back. The boys didn’t want to go, again, so it would just be John, Alaethia and me. Well, Alaethia decides she needs a bottle at the last minute (and she’d just eaten right when we got home) and then Mary asks us to drop her off at Noelia’s work. Everything took an additional hour and 15 minutes to get done, so we didn’t end up going to the mall. John wanted to get Alaethia a cute blanket from Hot Topic. I hope there’ll still be some left for when we finally decide to go back.

I started feeling sick with a sore throat that morning so after stopping by Game Stop, where John bought some game thing, we went to H-E-B to get medications, honey and chamomille tea, cereal and ice cream :P.

Mario was home on Sunday and since Target was finally going to have some DS’s in stock John asked if we’d be kind enough to do him the favor of getting up at the crack of dawn and getting one for him. We left the house at 9 and we expected them to be sold out. We get to Target and there’s 6 whole shoppers in the entire store. Better for us. I’m so glad we have a Target “over here”. The ones in McAllen are always sold out of the good stuff because of the people who come shopping over here from Mexico.

We had some breakfast afterwards at Burger King and then Paul called us to go over to his house so we could work on networking their computers. I just sat with Alaethia on their bed and talked with Norma while Mario figured out the computer stuff (with Paul watching LOL). It was nice seeing them after so long. Their kiddos are all so big!

Mario dropped Noelia off at work today, so I got the kids to school extra early and got home with enough time to do everything I needed to do. I tried taking a nap with Alaethia after everyone left, but everybody and their mama kept calling. Including the lady from the glass place. After a whole bunch of BS, I still won’t find out what happens for another week. My deductible is $100 now, but they were saying it was still $500, which isn’t true. If they do accept it as $100, I won’t have to pay anything at all. It better happen that way; I don’t plan to pay anything since it wasn’t my mistake.

I got a call from a guy at I.R.R.A. asking me to pick up my darn high school diploma (that I’d ordered since 2005) already, so after I picked Jaylen up from school John and I went to Edinburg to pick up the darn thing. It looks nice and un-cheap, unlike my first diploma. I called Sally while we were over there and we made plans to meet after 3:30 at my house.

We met Mario for lunch (after we’d picked up the McDonald’s I mentioned at the beginning of the entry) and ate at the park we’d eaten at on Thursday. It was so nice out today. I wish I could see my Babe more often, but I guess since I don’t get to it makes the time we do spend together more special :).

I was to help Sally figure out what to make for dinner and then we’d go buy the groceries we needed. So fun! We wrote down recipes and talked for a good while and when we were about to leave she realizes she doesn’t have her wallet. She calls Pete and they realize they threw her wallet in the trash at the park they were having lunch at this afternoon by accident! Thankfully, Pete goes and checks and to everyone’s relief the wallet was still in the trash! Sally’s going on a hiking/road trip this weekend, which I’m so jealous of! Hopefully, after she comes back all the girls will be able to get together like the old days :). I can’t wait!

So I guess you can say I’ve had a pretty awesome, albeit hectic, week. I’m on Cloud 9 in life right now. I’m so grateful to be surrounded by loving family who’s more than willing to help me out when I need it and friends who I can count on and distract myself with. I was so afraid I’d have Post Partum Depression again for the 3rd time, but I’m so incredibly thrilled to say I don’t feel the baby blues at all!

(Edit @ 12:35pm) Just went through this entry and realized the insane amount of typos and things I left out since I was writing this with one eye open last night. I was that sleepy. I also realized just how long this entry is. I salute you if you actually read through the whole thing! (End Edit)

Life as a family of five (OMG) has been pretty darn sweet. I’m not even sure where to begin, since I’ve gone so many days without updating and I can only remember so much, but I’ll try and recall things as best as I can.

Let’s see…going back to Thursday, the 25th, we were released from the hospital around 2:30, which was great because Jaylen would already be home and Eenan would be arriving from school around the time we would. They kept threatening to keep Alaethia at the hospital, which was the exact same thing that happened with Jaylen, because she refused to take more than an ounce of formula during her feedings. All she wanted to do was breastfeed, which we were thrilled with, but the nurses weren’t for some weird reason (I really didn’t like that hospital–well, the postpartum part of it anyway). We ended up getting our way though, thank God.

Mario drove under the speed limit all the way home, and even flipped a guy off who was tailgating us and then cut us off when Mario refused to go 80 MPH. He was trying to be as careful as possible with our precious cargo.

We had a quick stop to make at Dollar General, since it hadn’t occured to me that I’d need a pack of extra large pads (ah, yes, the FUN part *sarcasm*). Mario offered to get them for me, willingly, all by himself. NEVER, in our almost 10 years together, has he offered to go buy me pads. They didn’t have the brand I use, but he found another brand and guess what? They were even better than the ones I used to use, I kid you not. Extra points for Mario.

We got home and Jaylen ran to the car, with ‘Welcome home, Alaethia!’ written on his Magna Doodle (with help from Mom, of course). He was so anxious to see what she looked like; he was almost in disbelief that this new little person was “his” and was real. I can’t even count how many times he said, “Aww, Mama, Alaethia Wohse (Rose) is so cute!”

Mario and I were exhausted, so we headed straight to our bedroom while Mom and Mary organized our bags and put them out of the way. Eenan got home and jumped on the bed to see his new sister. I’d been breastfeeding her and if I remember correctly I think he said something like, “So that’s what they’re for!” LOL

Brandon and Noelia came over to see Alaethia, and after everyone was gone, Mario took a nap and Alaethia and I tried taking one, too, but it didn’t last too long. I’d been getting horrible cramps since the night I had her and they weren’t getting any better. The more I breastfed, the more it hurt. I don’t remember ever having that kind of pain with the boys. I don’t remember them hurting even more than actual labor pains, either. I kept getting up to warm up my Rice Sock to get a little relief from all the pain I was feeling.

Yadira and the girls and Matthew came over later that evening to meet Alaethia. It was nice sitting and talking to everyone and relaying our experience. We got the boys ready for bed and everything went without a hitch, thank goodness.

That night, Mario took the first shift with Alaethia and let me rest. I’m telling you, this man is an angel. He said he was more than happy to take care of her since he got to sleep in the afternoon and I didn’t. When it was my turn to feed her that night she did so well and let me sleep about 6 1/2 hours (woke up twice during the night). Mario got up and got the boys ready and took them to school. I was already up making Alaethia a bottle at that time, so I helped him out a little but he did so good on his own. Model father, he is :).

Mario was home from work that Friday, the last day :(. He helped me as much as he could; picked Jaylen up from school and Eenan and Brandon, too. Mary made dinner for us that night, which was such a huge weight off my shoulders. She’d also done laundry for us while we were gone. She wanted to help out more with Alaethia, but couldn’t since she had pneumonia (and Noelia had bronchitis, Mom had a cold and so did Elda and my boys!)

We watched TV that night after we’d gotten into bed. At around 11pm, I started getting sleepy and Mario told me to go ahead and sleep, he’d watch Alaethia if she woke up. I could hear her crying around 1am so I got up to get her. Mario quietly told me not to worry about, he’d take care of her. I felt so bad since I knew he was going back to work the next day and needed his rest but he told me he was fine. He fed her and I drifted off into sleep again. A few moments later I could hear her crying so I opened my eyes and saw the most wonderful thing ever: Mario was changing her diaper–something he said he’d never do! I thought it was so sweet and wished I had my camera with me to capture the moment. I fell in love with him all over again :).

I stayed quiet and watched him fumble with the diaper and wipees and I hear him whisper something to her like, “I don’t know what I’m doing, Baby…” and he caught me looking at him. I asked, “Do you want help?” and he said, “Yes! I don’t know how to clean her!” I finished changing her and then went to sleep. She did pretty good that night, too.

I woke up Saturday morning to engorged breasts. I thought my milk was never going to come in and boy did it, with a vengance even. I was in absolute pain by night time. Mario’d told me to buy a breast pump and I didn’t listen. I was counting on WIC giving me one because Alaethia’s eligible for it but the woman who supposedly called and said she’d even make house calls never answered or returned my calls when I tried getting ahold of her. I was so desperate I called Mary and asked if she’d take me to Target that night to get one and a few other things I needed.

I got ready and to my horror realized I still needed to lose a few inches before I could fit into my jeans. I put on a pair of before/after maternity cargo pants I had and looked pretty decent. Mary even commented as we entered Target, “You look so skinny already!”

I got the pump, a First Years one, and some bassinet covers and I can’t remember what else. As soon as we got home I washed the pump and pumped away. I immediately felt better, but the darn pump didn’t work too well. After using it a few more times it definitely wasn’t working right. $25 down the drain. And since I’d begain pumping, the cramps I’d been having got worse once again.

Aunt Nora came over to visit on Sunday morning. My hair was a frazzled mess and I was still in my PJs and pumping my boob when she arrived, but she didn’t mind. We (Mom, Aunt Nora and I) stood around the bassinet where Alaethia was sleeping and oohed and ahhed at her cuteness and talked about our experiences with each of our labors. Aunt Nora even brought us Christmas presents. Mine was a gorgeous red/pink set of gloves, hat and scarf and an even more gorgeous silver jewelry set. Aunt Nora was here a good hour and a half or so and after she left, Grandma Ofelia stopped by.

She kept saying how pretty and alert Alaethia was. She said she looked really good for being 4 days old; not wrinkly and asleep like most newborns LOL. She gave me some advice about taking care of myself and we talked more about the baby and then she left to the church where she’d be meeting some friends for bingo :).

Sally was going to stop by and visit next, so after putting Alaethia in her bassinet once she started to get sleepy I took the opportunity to put some clothes on, brush my teeth, wash my face and for the love of God, brushed my hair.

Sally arrived and she told me how cute Alaethia was. We talked about Thursday, the day after she and Pete had visited us, and then had fun looking people up on Myspace and freaking out over how much some people have changed. We had great conversation, as always, and after an hour or so Annie, Cat and their kiddos came over. Annie kept saying how much she looks like Jaylen, and even resembled John, which is what a lot of people say about Jaylen, too.

Everyone asked about her sleeping patterns and if she was a good baby and I had nothing but good things to say. I must have jinxed myself because that night we had lots of broken sleep and I was up with her from 1am to 5:30am. I’m not sure if it was that night or not, but one night she had terrible constipation and the next she had HORRIBLE diarreah, probably due to the high-fiber diet I have to be on according to my doctor. It didn’t get any better, so I stopped breastfeeding :(. I gave it a two-day break, just pumped and threw the milk out, and she got better. When I resumed breastfeeding she got diarreah all over again so I stopped again. I haven’t breastfed her and she’s fine. I feel kind of disappointed and just really bummed that my milk could do that to her :(. I was so thrilled that I finally had a baby that latched on right and everything and this goes and happens.

I was freaking out the next day over how I was going to make it to my appointments but thankfully John got out of work early and picked Jaylen up for me, picked Eenan and Brandon up and took me to both appointments. At the doctor’s office I ran into a girl, Fabiola, that I’d met there and become friends with during my pregnancy. Her little girl is 3 months old now and is adorable (she was 9 months pregnant with her when we’d met). We talked about our babies for a good while until they called me in.

I weighed 122.5 lbs., which is 2 lbs. more than my scale at home (but the one at the doctor’s is correct since that’s the one I went by the whole pregnancy.) My iron was great; it was at 15 and I think 11’s usually the average. Alaethia still weighed the same as she did at birth, 6 lbs. 10 oz., but Dr. C. said that’s fine since they usually lose weight after birth (so not the case with her brothers, the eldest of which DOUBLED in weight at 2 weeks!). He said she looks great and I pointed out the little white “dots” she had on the roof of her mouth and he said those were calcium deposits, which are normal in some babies. I also pointed out the funny way her bootie “starts”, but he said we’d wait it out for a few months before getting X-rays or anything done. He says he thinks she’s just fine though. Thank goodness :).

The next couple of days are sort of a blur now, but I remember the boys got dropped off by Mario each morning, Jaylen was picked up by either Vito or John and Brandon and Eenan were picked up by John, too. I also got into the swing of my evening routine, which is helping Eenan with his homework, cleaning up a bit, tending to Alaethia, bathing the boys around 6pm and starting dinner around 6:30. I feed the boys, hopefully feed myself if Alaethia permits, get the boys ready for bed, serve Mario food when he gets home from work, bathe while Mario watches Alaethia and then get ready for bed myself. It’s been pretty easy; not as stressful as I thought it would be.

John got out of work early again on Thursday and our income tax refund check had come in so he took me to pick up and cash that and to get Alaethia some formula. Later after we picked the kids up from school and dropped them off with Mom, we dropped money off to Mario, who wanted to get some headrest TVs for the Equinox. John was supposedly going to get an Xbox 360 but changed his mind at the last minute as always, so we went to buy groceries instead.

Mario stayed at work a little late that night installing the TVs with his co-worker, Mario Z’s, help. He got home and asked me to go out to see the TVs and they looked fabulous! He even installed wireless headphones so the kids can watch TV while we listen to the radio or the iPod!

Friday was the first day I woke up at 6:30 to get the kids ready for school. Mario needed to be up to drive them at 7:45 and then had to drop Noelia off at work since she’s car-less at the moment and I knew he wouldn’t get much time to catch up on sleep since he had to pick Jaylen up at noon. So, I got up. I don’t remember how much sleep Alaethia let me get that night, but I did get sleep and I didn’t feel tired so I got up while I could and got them ready and then woke Mario up to drop them off. I came back to bed with Alaethia, who needed to be fed and then we slept.

After Mario picked Jaylen up from school, we went to pick up his paycheck and he drove around all over the place looking for a good, inexpensive magazine for his new gun (still so creeped out about having a gun in the house, but he’s got locks and stuff all over it and has it in a safe place. But still…guns…ew). We stopped by Mary’s office to show off Alaethia and spent a good amount of time there. Everyone was gushing about how cute she is and I got complimented on how nice I looked for having her a little over a week ago. That makes me feel so good about myself :).

We picked Eenan up from school that day and John went with us so he could buy some stuff from Target (which he didn’t end up doing, again!). We wanted to take Mom with us, but we had no room in the truck now that we have Alaethia’s huge carseat. We bought some movies at Target (The Guardian, Open Season, Talladega Nights) and then met Mary at Applebee’s for dinner. I was so disappointed to find out that the Friday’s in McAllen was CLOSED. I loved that place :(.

I ordered the Shrimp and Steak something-or-other from the 3-course Menu and Mario had the Chicken Fiesta one. He HATED it. Threw a fit about it and everything and I felt really bad, especially since we spent a huge amount of money. I enjoyed my plate at least–it was delicous. I even had the brownie dessert, yum. Alaethia was a total doll and behaved wonderfully. The boys were so well-behaved, too. Well, until they both suddenly needed to go poop and made Mary take them each to the bathroom for about 10 minutes, but other than that, they were great.

When we were walking out, an elderly lady reaches out and gently grabs my arm and says, “You’re a great mother.” I felt so good that someone, a stranger, noticed that I’m a decent parent and was on cloud 9 the rest of the night, even if Mario was in a crappy mood. He appologized before bed that night though, so all was forgiven.

Eenan needed to be at the school by 6:45am Saturday morning for their last UIL meet. He was one of 3 chosen to go. I’m not sure if it was 3 for Storytelling or 3 out of the whole school, but he was thrilled to be going. We found out later last night that he placed 2nd DISTRICT-WIDE!! I’m so proud of my little dude. He’s going to get the trophy he’d been desiring all year!

Elda and Jose got married for the 3rd time yesterday, only this time it was through the church. After Eenan got home from the UIL meet, I made him change his clothes and the rest of us got ready. Since Alaethia’s little umbilical cord stump fell off but it’s still not fully healed I can’t bathe her yet, but I did give her a washcloth bath. I was in such a hurry, but I managed to get all three kiddos ready, plus myself. I managed to fit into my pre-pregnancy nice black slacks and nice shirt. Shoot, I think I look better in them now that I did when I was working (when I bought them). I even wore the beautiful, expensive BCBG Max Azria sweater Mario bought me off of Eddie :). According to my scale, I now weigh 116, which is really 118. Yay!

Although the ceremony was sort of all over the place (they didn’t even let them rehearse or anything) and we all forgot our cameras it was nice. We got home and had Pozole that Elda had made and later had wedding cake that Annie had bought for them. We spent a good long time together just talking and laughing. Love days like that.

We woke up sort of early today and Mario picked up Burger King for us for breakfast. Mom watched Jaylen and Eenan went to CFF and church with Mary while Alaethia, Mario and I went to town to pay bills and buy things. We paid off most of our Home Depot credit card, since our interest goes up in March and it’s super high. We also went to Best Buy to get a $499 Toshiba laptop but of course, the whole 5 they had in stock had been sold in like 5 minutes, to the people who come from Mexico. Thankfully, Circuit City had the exact same one on sale, but with a mail-in rebate so we went and got it. Mario got down by himself at the store, since I was feeding Alaethia, and once he took half an hour I knew we’d gotten one. I’m updating from my bed at this very moment. The only reason I’m updating at all LOL.

We got the wireless router from Target, some curtains, a nice curtain rod and some toys for Alaethia. Not that she can actually play with them or anything; when I showed her one of the little toys that hangs from her carseat handle her eyes immediately crossed :P.

We went to Kmart next, where Mario wanted to show me some nice bunk beds he’d seen. We wanted new beds for the boys, but the ones we liked were huge and probably wouldn’t have fit in their bedroom. I loved the bunk beds so we got them. Now we only have to buy Jaylen a twin mattress.

We got home and started messing around with the laptop then went to Yadira’s where Elda and Jose were having a little get together in memory of Anthony’s 20th birthday. I still can’t believe he’s been gone for so long :(. I can’t believe he’d be 20 already.

We spent a few hours there and then went to Jorge and Maggie’s, where they were having a Superbowl bar-b-q. Maggie presented us with a huge colorful basket full of gifts for Alaethia. She bought the whole Fisher Price line with pink butterflies on it! I told her she didn’t have to–she seriously went all out but she insisted that she wanted to get her something nice. She really wants a little girl. I hope Jorge gives in ;).

We talked and I had a great time. Manny, their neighbor and Jorge’s good friend, kept saying that it didn’t even look like I had a baby. I’m hoping I can stay looking that way. The last time I got compliments like that, with Jaylen, I let it get to my head and I stopped watching what I ate. If I can help it, which I can, I’m not going to let that happen this time.

Okay, so now that it’s 12:25 and Alaethia’s been asleep for about half an hour I should get going before I’m up till 2am like yesterday. I’ve got so much to do tomorrow now that I’m going to start driving around again (well, I didn’t get the O-K till Wednesday, but what’s 2 days going to do? Now watch my uterus fall out *knocks on wood*). I’ve got bills to pay, appointments to make, things to return and a Gramma to show a new granddaughter to. I still can’t believe it. I gave my Gramma a granddaughter!

Since I’m not allowed to do anything today, like walk or do my piles of laundry, I’m frantically trying to get my old entries up (I had 2004-ish to June 2006 to upload; I’m currently on April 2006 Woo! I’m done!) so that I can get the plugins I want installed (perferably before Alaethia’s born, as I know I won’t have time for zip then :P). While reading through each entry (because I’m anal-retentive like that and every old entry needs to be catergorized, too) I figured out the exact moment that Mario and I got sick with Mono, when my friendship ended with Ricci, when Mario surprised me with wanting to try for a baby (and we found out our Padrino had been murdered in the most dreadful way), when we bought our truck (and Eenan got his very first stitches), and when I found out I was pregnant with Alaethia!.

It’s kind of weird, sometimes heartbreaking, and sometimes fun to go back and read all that stuff. I remembered a meme I’d seen floating around and decided to finally do it. I just hope I don’t have one-worded sentences as the first sentence, which, knowing me, I probably do :P.

Directions: Write the first sentence in your journal from every month.

January: I tried blogging yesterday, mostly because of the fact that Annie was talking about all these superstitious things, one being that doing something on the 31st or the 1st will help you do whatever you did all through the year.
February: I’m fine, I’m alive.
March: So much has happened since I last updated.
April: You know what just blows my mind?
May: So we’d planned on leaving for our Mini Vacation at South Padre Island on Friday after Eenan got out of school.
June: Hmm…seems like I’ve gotten the hang of updating once a week.
July: I wish I could say that I haven’t updated because I’ve been working at my new fabulous job, but the truth is I’ve been running around doing errands and taking Mom to her doctor’s appointments since last Monday.
August: I had the weirdest dream last night.
September: I really hate taking a shower. (LMAO)
October: I think part of the problem with me trying to update daily is that I can’t think of anything interesting to write.
November: We didn’t do much on Halloween night.
December: The cold front came in and has been lingering since Thursday.

Well, it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be, but we can officially establish that I do not know how to start off a journal entry (or end one, for that matter!) :P.