Category: Shopping

It’s quite nippley out. It’s not even that drizzley outside and it feels frigid out there. I had to cave in and put on some sweatpants. I never wear sweatpants while I’m pregnant because I get hot really easily, but I was freezing this morning. And since the washer/dryer are outside and I had to get Mario’s clothes out to iron them before he got ready for work, I got cold and not even standing in front of the spaceheater helped. I’m praying I don’t get sick.

It’s been cold almost every day since the last week of November. I need to backtrack and read my entries from November-December 2004 so I can check if the weather’s the same as it was at that time, because that year it snowed. In South Texas. On Christmas Eve out of all days. That would be so awesome and magical if it happened again this year. I’d be really surprised if we don’t at least get sleet or something. It’s so COLD!

Jaylen and Eenan are doing much better. Eenan slept over at my mom-in-law’s last night and showed up a while ago wrapped only in one of Mary’s sweaters–he was naked other than his underwear. Darn kid. He started hacking while he thawed off in front of the heater. I started putting clothes on him and tell him, “Ahhh! Are you coughing again?!” He clears his throat, waits a minute to supress a cough, and says, “Nope.” Mmmhmm.

I dropped the kiddos off at school yesterday and came home, had breakfast and slid back into bed next to Mario, who makes me insanely jealous since he gets to sleep super late without interruption. It was the best 2 hour nap I’ve taken in a long time. I think it’s the cold; it just knocks you out and being wrapped in a thick, soft comforter next to a very warm husband makes it all the better.

We picked Jaylen up and John, Jaylen, Mario and I packed ourselves in the truck and went to pick up his paycheck. We had just about every bill to pay this paycheck, so we set aside all the Bill Money and deposited a bit more “just in case”. We won’t get to buy any presents this time (although I’m going to town after John gets out of work to visit Gramma and get Mario a pocketknife he wanted) but I’m just glad we paid all the bills plenty of days before we had to. I still have to go grocery shopping though. I loathe grocery shopping, especially when I have both kiddos with me. It never fails that one of them throws himself on the floor and that just so happens to be the exact moment that the whole store’s quiet and everyone turns to stare. *Hiss*.

We came back to pick Eenan and Brandon up from school. We went on a little hunt for Eenan’s jacket again, since he forgot it in his cubby and his teacher had locked the door. While I’m waiting for him I see a little boy who looks *just* like Eenan running in a sweater and jeans, hair flying everywhere and his backpack half-hanging off his back. He was searching for a janitor to open the door to his classroom. I got off the car and followed him and we walked to his classroom where his teacher just so happened to be standing with a group of ladies. THANK GOD he got ahold of her since this weekend’s proven to be really cold.

We went back to town, this time with Noelia in tow, and dropped her off at her mom’s office. Then we paid more bills and went to Target, where Mario got his gift-exchange gift for work and John got his gift-exchange present for Matthew. I forget what else we did exactly but we picked up some pizzas from Little Cesar’s (sp?). Yay! No cooking for me.

We ate at home, then I went through our DVD rack and dusted them all off. I really need to update our DVD list since I think we’re missing some and that sucks. Doesn’t help that we have them out in the open where anyone can just come “borrow” some when we’re not here (’cause everybody and their mama has a key to our apartment).

I washed the unsightly pile of dishes afterwards and after Mary got here with the cake mixes and icings I asked her to pick up for me I started making a chocolate cake. For Mario and his buddies at work. He kindly volunteered me to do so after he took some leftover Funfetti cake to work and all the guys ate it within 5 seconds. Mario didn’t even get to have a piece. Most of the guys wanted chocolate, so I made that one and I’ll make him the Funfetti one just for him here at home. I also had to get strawberry icing since John’s still holding me to my promise of making him a birthday cake that I never got to make him (I was working at the insurance place at the time). I guess I’ll do that before he gets home from work.

I hope there isn’t all kinds of traffic. I only have to go to Gramma’s nursing home, Kmart, Wal-Mart and Target and they’re all pretty close together so I don’t have to go into the hellhole that is McAllen during the holidays.

Speaking of McAllen, it’s kind of sad that the city I grew up in and was raised in is the #1 poverty-stricken suburban city in America. Wow.

According to the Weather Channel, it’s 47° now. I wish I could just go shopping in my sweatpants :(.

The cold front came in and has been lingering since Thursday. It feels great outside — totally a pregnant woman’s kind of weather, or mine anyway. I’d much rather feel cold and warm up quickly than feel hot and sweaty and get no relief from fans or air conditioning.

I had a tough night Thursday night with Eenan. He’s gotten into the habit of throwing tantrums often and being extremely rude. I was so frustrated, especially since I’d been arguing with Jaylen over his games (he couldn’t find his Gameboy case) that I poured a half of a whole salt shaker into my mashed potatoes. The hormones took over and I immediately felt like a failure for messing up dinner (it’s funny to me now, but I was so sad that night) and felt even worse since Eenan kept trying to find ways to disobey me. I ended up just cupping my hands over my face and sobbing, which Eenan thought was completely his doing. He freaked out, jumped up and down and said, “Oh no, Mama! I don’t want you to cry!”

I felt horrible that he thought it was all his fault, and told him when he got into bed it wasn’t entirely his fault; I was stressed and having a bad night, but he was still punished for being rude all day long. He took the punishment (grounded from games) and went to sleep.

I felt much better the next morning (after I’d bawled my eyes out to Mario when he got home from work the night before — he puts up with so much; bless him). Eenan appologized and gave my belly a huge hug and we all left to school.

We went to his Awards Assembly at 9, where he got two certificates for getting All ‘A’ Honor Roll and Perfect Attendance for the 2nd six weeks. I’m so proud of my little dude.

When the kids got rowdy and one of the teachers spoke with them she said, “You need to be respectful to your friends who are coming up here and receiving their awards. They tried so hard this six weeks; they studied very hard and came to school even when they were sick–”

Mario and I turn to look at Eenan and he nods his head and points to his chest, implying that he’s one of the ones who felt sick and still went :P.

When he went up to the front to get his awards, I frantically tried taking pictures with my camera. Stupid thing would turn on, then swallow up the lens again. Then it showed a “low battery” picture, which wasn’t right since I’d had it charging the day before. I throw Mario a look of desperation and he says, “Toldya you should’ve bought another camera during the sales. Toldya.” Nothing like pouring salt in the would, eh? I got at least one blurry picture of him, but was totally disappointed I didn’t get one of him shaking the secretary’s hand or the group one of his class in front of the Christmas Tree on the stage. Poo.

When his teacher came to pick them up, I gave her Eenan’s Christmas picture money. We went to Jaylen’s class afterwards to turn in Jaylen’s and we see him happily sitting cross-legged on the rug. He’s wearing a little “hat” with the letter ‘N’ on it and a picture of a nest. He sees Mario and runs up to him to hug him while I spoke to his teacher. Mrs. S. and Mrs. T. had just been telling me that morning how the troublemaker in the class, a little boy named Ray, kept smacking Jaylen on the head the day before, so they had to remove him from his spot, which is next to Jaylen’s. Just that morning I’d seen him punch a little girl on the arm for passing Jaylen a sheet of stickers to pick from instead of passing it to him (and he hadn’t turned in homework–that’s what they choose stickers for). They told me Jaylen won’t say anything at all if someone’s bothering him; he’ll either ignore them or take it. I tell him he needs to let his teachers know about it, and that being hit or picked on is something he’s allowed to “tell”. He nods his head and Mrs. S. says, “I hope he does. In order for us to find out we have to catch him (Ray) doing it.”

Jaylen and the girls aren’t the only ones Ray picks on. He’s this tiny little boy, smaller than Jaylen, even, and he picks on all the kids–even ones twice his size. Kind of makes you wonder what goes on at home that he’s so aggressive and mean all the time :(.

When we leave the school we go to Family Dollar to pick up the rest of the Megaman action figures we’d seen the day before. They also had the Pet player thing, which used to cost $25 and we got for $5, yay!

John had another day off so we went to Whataburger after we picked Jaylen up from school to get the rest of us lunch (Jaylen eats lunch at school). We ate, Mario came home from Tommy’s house, where he was installing an alarm and he ate and then we got to talking about cameras. I told him I didn’t want to spend money on a crappy camera and have it stop working in a few months–it would be a waste. He wanted to get me the Canon PowerShot S3 IS, but it’s super expensive so there’s no way I would’ve let him buy it. He told me to do some research on Target.com and Flickr. I found some on sale at Target, but after reading reviews I decided I’d wait on both. Then I came across a Kodak EasyShare Z650–love at first sight! Although one of the other cameras that was on sale came with a gift card and was 7 Megapixels with 3x optical zoom, this one was 6 Megapixels with 10x optical zoom. My other camera only had 3x optical zoom as well.

I accompanied Mary to get some papers done for a loan and then we picked Eenan up. After we picked Eenan up, Mario and I packed up the rest of the boxes I had left in our bedroom and got them ready for whenever we could go to storage. Then we were off to Target.

Since I received my 10% off all-day coupon for getting 1,000 points, we decided to get the kids the games they wanted for Christmas and Mario got a book. We saved a good $50 at least on our purchases. And since everything came out to about $350 (it was originally $400) I automatically qualify for another 10% off shopping day in January, which is awesome since we can totally use the savings for Alaethia’s things!

The camera was about $20 less online, but Mario said, “Why wait? You’d have to wait for it to arrive at home.” So I just got it right then and there. I LOVE this camera. I’ve been lugging it around taking pictures of anything I can for the sake of using it LOL. Mario’s not a camera-person, but even he was stoked about it and was looking for accessories on Ebay for me, like lenses and stuff.

I made Mario promise he wouldn’t get me anything else for Christmas, because he’s got a knack for giving me my present “early” and then still getting me other things on the actual holiday. This is enough and much appreciated.

On the way home, while clutching onto the box, I immediately started to feel guilty and told him I hate spending so much money. He says, “Woman, you never ask for anything, ever. You deserve this!” I tell him, “Yes I do. I ask for…you know, stuff…”

He chuckles and says, “Like what? All these luxuries like pads, toilet paper, and shampoo?”

Aww <3. We bar-b-q'd at night and by the time we went to our room and read our books, it was 12:30am. Stupid mistake, especially since I had to wake up at 6am to get Eenan ready for his Competition today. I got Mario's stuff ready and now I'm waiting for 9:45 to roll around to drop John off at work, then Mom, Mary, Jaylen and I are going to town to finish Mom's Christmas shopping and hopefully make it back on time by 1:00pm to pick Eenan up. I hope he does well!!

The past few days have been…insane. I’ve been up and about since 3am Friday and my feet hate me for it. They’re thankfully not swollen, they just feel like I’m walking on glass or something.

Thanksgiving went without a hitch. Mario woke up at 6:45am to help Mary put the turkeys into the oven since one of them would have to be hauled to our house since we were having 2 turkeys, as usual. He totally let me sleep in; I didn’t wake up till 9am. By the time I showered and made myself presentable, it was 10am. I woke Mario up, who’d fallen back to sleep, and got the kiddos ready and we went over to Mary’s. The food was delicious as always. We had turkey, of course, mashed potatoes, stuffing, corn, broccoli rice, green bean casserole and probably more that I can’t remember at the moment. I lost my ravenous appetite half-way through my meal since Jaylen had been playing in their clubhouse and lost his footing at the bottom of the steps. He scraped his back on the last two steps and naturally screamed his head off. Since Mario was playing pool (since he’d already finished eating), he sends Jaylen in so that *I* can take care of him. After cleaning him up with peroxide, q-tipping some Neosporin on the scrape and covering it with a bandaid, I didn’t feel as hungry anymore. I put my plate away and about half an hour later, joined everyone who was eating dessert. I’ve craved pumpkin pie with Cool Whip so much during this pregnancy! Thank God I’m pregnant during the Fall/Winter months LOL.

Dad called and said he unfortunately couldn’t make it. I sort of figured he couldn’t come since his car isn’t working but I was hopeful. We agreed to make plans to get together later though.

We chilled out the rest of the day and later on when Andy and Noelia arrived (she was meeting some of Andy’s relatives she hadn’t met before) we started to browse through the Black Friday ads. All who were going sat around the kitchen table and discussed our game plan: who was going with who, what each person was in charge of getting and where we would meet in each store. At first John was hyped about going, but ended up changing his mind. Mario thought he was going to have the day off, but was called in, which really sucked. Andy would be at Best Buy; Mary, Sonia, Yadira, Tommy, Noelia, Yazmin and I would be at Wal-Mart (eek!) and would split up there. After that, we’d go to Target.

We left the house by 3am. Mario would stay with the boys till 8am, which is when he’d leave to work and Mom would take over. Mary, Noelia and I left in my truck, then we dropped Mary off at Yadira’s.

I won’t go into detail because so much went on, but I’ll say this: people were trampled, we heard a woman scream in pain, a man punched another man (probably because of the portable DVD players that were on sale for $50) so Mission P.D. was called (there were 5 cars outside the store), a fight broke out in electronics over some cameras, and I heard a woman crying in the bathroom when I went to pee before we left. DRA-MA. It was terrible. When Noelia and I were together at the beginning, we got the present Eenan wanted, which was on sale for $28 (down from $38) and some game boards. My job later on was to find some DVDs that were on sale for $3.88 and then get 2 hand mixers that were on sale for $4 for Mary. I did both without getting hurt. A nice family let me scoot in with them before the caution tape was cut to get to the isles with sale items. Everyone was really cautious because of my big, protruding belly :P.

Poor Mary had trouble finding the iDogs she was looking for. When a nice lady she’d met had held one for her, this bitchwoman who looked like a bulldog told the lady she was with Mary and that she’d take the iDog for her. We got there right when they were making the exchange. I tell Mary, “Tell her it’s for you!” and the bitchwoman says, “Too bad. She gave it to me.” Grr. We saw her later when we arrived at Target and I silently hoped that I could somehow curse her causing her not to find anything she wanted LOL.

The line at Target was insane. We were somewhere in the middle but people’d been camping there since the day before. Weirdos. I don’t know what they’d be there so early for. I was there for DVDs, I found the toy we got Eenan at Wal-Mart for $15 so we exchanged the other one later, Game Cube games, a crock pot and I can’t even remember what else. It was much more civilized and controlled at Target. People who were trying to cut in line or wait at the front of the parking lot to run in with the rest of us who’d been in line were quickly sent to the end of the line by the employees. And there was plenty of merchandise to go around.

Andy met us there. Poor thing didn’t get the computer he wanted from Best Buy, but that’s only because psycho people were waiting there since 4pm the day before O_o. I could never do that. I’m crazy enough to wake up at 3am, but not actually SLEEP there.

Andy did, however, get Eenan’s main present for us on sale (almost $100-150 off!), so that was much appreciated.

We had breakfast at Burger King and a few more stops, like K-Mart (which didn’t have much on sale and not much left of what was actually good), Academy and another 2 stops at Target and Walmart to return stuff. We had a very successful shopping day. My legs hurt SO BAD after we were done shopping–I couldn’t even climb into my truck to drive home!

I know 3 things that I’m getting for Christmas, buahaha! Edward Scissorhands and Season 1 of Grey’s Anatomy from Mary and a Flickr account from Mom–woo!

Mario got out of work later than he thought he would, and because of a misunderstanding he didn’t get his paycheck cashed before the banks closed. Totally sucked. I was hoping we’d make it out to KB Toys to get Jaylen’s main present, but I sucked it up as best as I could and we just chilled out here.

I left to town with Mary the next morning while Mom watched the boys. We went to pick up Mario’s check at work, came back half-way and cashed it, then went back to town. We went to Best Buy, where I got 4 awesome DVDs for $20 (as you’ve probably noticed, I’m not mentioning much of what I got just in case I get some snoopy readers ;)! *cough*family*cough*) We went to Target again and then had lunch with Mario at El Pato. We dropped him off and finished our shopping (I’m so out of it I can barely remember where we went!) and we finally came home. I ended up finding Jaylen’s main gift at Target–the LAST ONE LEFT. I was so happy I almost cried. I was certain I wouldn’t be able to find it anymore and was kicking myself for not getting it the day before, but yay, we found one :). And cheaper than KB’s or anywhere else for that matter.

My feet were on fire that day.

I got the kids ready in their costumes for Brandon’s birthday party when we got home while they watched Ice Age the Meltdown. I *had* to get it; the cheapest I found it was $14.99 at one of the Targets in McAllen. All the other ones had it for $19.99, which I found really weird.

Elda had decorated the carport in a Haunted House theme and the kids were wearing their Halloween costumes. They had a moon jump and musical chairs and the food for the adults was menudo (the kids had hot dogs). It was really good and the desserts were cute. Elda borrowed my Betty Crocker Bake-n-Fill cake pans and made a spider cake with chocolate Twizzler legs.

John and I were going to go to Target after the party, but I could hardly keep my eyes open and my legs still hurt really bad, so Mary and Noelia offered to join us. Mom stayed with the boys while they watched Ice Age the Meltdown. John ended up buying an iPod after being annoyingly undecisive for half an hour. I got a gift for Catherine’s birthday, which isn’t till December 13th but I was getting such a deal I couldn’t pass it up. Mario had called while we were there and asked me to buy him a long-sleeved shirt since it was cold and he wanted Mary to drop me off at Jorge’s for a party they were having for Manny, their neighbor.

Mary drops me off, but we ended up coming home since Maggie was just home from work and in the shower and Mario wanted to rent movies anyway. We stop at Video Plus and rent some movies and get some ice creams. We get home, get in our PJs and about 15 minutes into the movie (You, Me and Dupree) decide we’re too darn sleepy to watch it LOL.

I dropped Mario off the next day since he wanted me to pick him up and go grocery shopping. I woke up that morning to Mary washing my mountain of dishes that were left in the sink from the past 3 days since I had hardly been home (and when I was, I was resting my poor feet!). I felt so embarrassed and kept telling her she shouldn’t have. I cleaned for a while and then John came over and watched the boys (I don’t want to leave them, they just hate going on any kind of shopping trips because ‘Mama takes too long’) while Mary, Mom and I went to Target yet again since Mom needed to get some Christmas gifts that were on sale. We’d done our gift exchange the night before and I had two boys I needed to get games for and they just so happened to be the exact amount of money I needed to spend on each gift, so I got them. I also got a gift for Mario’s godfather which I got for a pretty damn good deal. We’re thankfully almost done with Christmas shopping! We only need a few more small gifts for the kiddos and about 6 more gifts for the family and a birthday present for my dad-in-law. I’m so happy :).

We stopped to see Gramma for a while and put up her Christmas decorations per her request. She’d also asked me to make her a Christmas CD so I obliged and we were listening to it while we put her tree up. I miss my Grimmy and wish she could be here for Christmas :(.

We picked Mario up when it was time to do so and we went grocery shopping. I love when he’s there–it’s so much easier to pick stuff to cook during the week when he makes suggestions.

I was on a cleaning frenzy yesterday and sat like, 2 times during the whole day. Mario even had me drive over to his work during lunch to drop off some stuff and pick up a pizza for him. I had to get more cough medicines for the kids since Eenan’s teacher was complaining that he’d gotten the whole class sick which is a bunch of bull. She told the nurse I should have kept him home, but hello? He coughed maybe 3 times all day long–how could I keep him home for a cough?!

I actually got to take my morning nap today (didn’t fall asleep till 1:30am yesterday) and then cleaned, sewed curtains for Mary, and cooked. I had everything done by 8:30pm, which is why I actually have a chance to update. The kiddos are actually sleeping pretty well during the night which I’m so grateful for. I haven’t heard one cough. Thank God for Triaminic, Vicks Vaporub and humidifiers!

I have my 31 week doctor’s appointment tomorrow. I’m so excited. I’m actually getting really nervous and anxious now since there are only 9 weeks left! I have so much to do before she’s born. Mario and I decided we should get my registry done as soon as possible, while I can still walk. John and Mario are always teasing me about how big my belly is and how it seems to grow every few minutes LOL.

Oh wow, the weather should be nice and cold by Thursday. I can’t wait!

I shall shower now. I plan on sleeping early tonight, no matter how late Mario gets here (it’s Tuesday–they have beers on Tuesday).