UGHHH!!

Do you ever have those days when just about every single person you encounter annoys you? I am having one of those today. I got a call from my co-room rep this morning and to say that I don't really like her and that we are not working well together would be an understatement. I am trying to find at least one redeeming quality but so far am coming up with nothing. This is hard for me because I actually like most people (granted I like most people in small doses but still that counts). I went to a Dr appt this morning and he really aggravated me. I needed to get bloodwork drawn by noon if I was going to get it done today or I have to wait until Saturday morning and of course I didn't get out of the doctor's appt until 11:55. So I was annoyed by that too. I had lunch with a great friend that I have not seen in a few months and she kind of got on my nerves. I spoke to my mom, my brother and my aunt today and they all sort of irritated me. We are trying to put together a deal on another house and our real estate agent is getting on my last nerve. My daughter came home with her report card and I ended up being annoyed with the teacher because I don't understand where she came up with her grades. She actually did very well but she had better grades in all of the math but the one I thought she was doing pretty well with and she didn't do as well as I thought she should have done in reading. I really think she may have mixed up the grades somehow - annoying!! Truly the only people that I enjoyed today are my husband and my daughter. Now that is a change from the ordinary. I can usually muster up a smile and lots of grace for everyone BUT my immediate family. I am thinking it probably wasn't that all of these people are annoying. I think a few of the above mentioned are just very very annoying and so they are ruining it for everyone else today.

NYC, Stress & Relief

We were in NYC this weekend for a wedding. I have been friends with the groom since we were both 12 years old. For a while after college we lived down the street from each other in Federal Hill. We've had so much fun over the years. One of our mutual friends was the best man and in his speech he said that when you are with Josh you always get to do the best stuff. That is so true. He is the kind of guy that absolutely always knows where & how to have the best time. He has an unending supply of energy and he is a fabulous friend. If you are his friend he treats you better than any other friend you will have. I don't even get a chance to talk to him much at all anymore but he definitely always makes me feel as if no time has passed. He called me to tell me when he got engaged. When he found out I had had cancer he scolded me for not letting him know while I was going through it so that he could have helped. He told me that I was a fool for moving in with my boyfriend (now husband) when I moved to Baltimore - maybe he was wrong on that one! The point is, he is the type of friend that everyone needs. He loves you through it all and he is not afraid to speak up and hurt your feelings every once in a while if he thinks you are doing something you are going to regret. He's brutally honest and I love that - so hard to find in a friend. So, of course his wedding was THE BEST! It really was one of the best weddings I have ever been to. Very, very nice - probably cost more than my first house but that is not really what made it the best. The band was fantastic - they played all the right songs at the right time and everyone was dancing all night. The food was great, service impeccable but what really made it a top ten wedding was the bride & groom. They were so totally in love but not in an annoying and sappy way. Josh was happier than I have ever seen him and the way his wife looked at him was just beyond words. I have been in weddings in the past where even as all of the bridesmaids were lined up to go down the isle we were discussing what a big mistake it was. Most of those marriages have not ended well I'm afraid. Anyway, it was a great time and they make a great couple.

We brought my daughter out to my mom's house for the night so we could go to the wedding and she had a nice time visiting with Nannie. On Saturday we took her ice skating in Rockefeller Plaza and to see Mary Poppins. She loved the ice skating and did so well, especially considering it was her first time. Actually ice skating was probably the highlight of the day. Mary Poppins was okay but I must admit I had a hard time staying awake. I don't think that reflects on the show - just on how little sleep I have been getting lately. We also hit American Girl again this trip but this time was much quicker - in and out. We bought a birthday gift for a friend and two things for my daughter. She has not been playing with her dolls as much since our neighbor moved this summer. It was something they did together daily and I think it makes her a little sad to do without her. I am hoping that changes especially since my mother bought her Kit's tree house for Christmas. We also went to a fantastic place for dinner on Friday night - Pepolino. It's in Tribeca & the food, service, atmosphere - everything was just wonderful. The woman who owns it is super nice and we had a wonderful meal and a great time that night at dinner (and a little too much wine). It was a little pricey but definitely worth it.

I've been a bit stressed out lately. I don't usually feel very stressed about much and I really don't like feeling this way. I feel like I am being pulled in a million different directions and I think I have over committed myself. I backed out today of my daughter's school auction. I don't generally do that. If I commit to something I follow through regardless of how crazy I get. In truth, I sometimes thrive on the craziness. After the first meeting I found myself just really dreading it. They had volunteered me to chair a subcommittee when in fact I had only volunteered to be on the committee and they had me working something the night of the auction. In the end, one of my commitments needed to go and since this is the one I am looking least forward to it went. I am also feeling a lot of stress over a situation that I can not actually talk about just yet but I will say that it is not health related and it something that is either going to be the best thing we've ever done or it is going to be an absolute disaster - nightmare!! There is no in the middle with this and there will be a lot of uncertainty before we get to the end so I am going to have to find a way to deal with this stress.

Breast cancer awareness month is also stressing me out. I feel like I can not escape it. It is everywhere. I remember wondering if there would ever be a time where cancer did not occupy nearly every one of my thoughts. I have reached that time. I think about cancer every day and I examine my reconstructed breasts every day. I do worry more about my health now than before too but I do not live in constant fear and worry anymore. Cancer for the moment does not have a stronghold on my life like it did. The problem with the pink ribbons everywhere is that although it is good to make people aware of breast cancer, it has become almost ridiculous and it is something that a lot of cancer survivors have a difficult time seeing. I do not need to be reminded of it. I am a breast cancer survivor just the same as I am right handed and have brown eyes. It is a part of who I am and I know it influences the way I live my life but it doesn't control it anymore. I know the pink ribbons bring in money for research but at times it feels like all of the breast cancer survivors are being "pimped out" - exploited in order to make money. Many of the products with the pink ribbons give maybe 2 cents per purchase to breast cancer. I don't know it just seems way out of balance and I for one will be glad when the month is over and I can buy a yogurt or a box of tissues without a pink ribbon on it. I do donate to breast cancer causes but I research them and try to ensure that my donations are getting put towards something that will make a real difference. I do believe that the message is out there though about early detection and maybe we have the pink ribbons to thank for that. I suppose if it helps one woman find her tumor early enough to save her life than it is worth me having to see the ribbons everywhere and feeling crappy. I did get a call yesterday afternoon from a woman I know who had a mammo that showed some areas of calcification. She was scheduled to go to have a biopsy done today. I have not heard from her today and I am really hoping she is okay. She is a nurse and she seems to think based on what they have told her that more than likely she is not fine. Her twin boys went to Pre-K and Kindergarten with my daughter and her husband is one of my husband's competitors. We traveled together quite a bit last year because we both took the kids out of school and tagged along on some of the husbands' business trips. It was really nice to have someone to spend time with on these trips and to have someone for the kids to play with. She also has a 9 year old daughter who is just super sweet and after our trips I found a little note in my daughter's room expressing her love for one of the twins. So, I am anxious to get her call but I'm sure she probably doesn't have any news and won't until the biopsy results come back. Maybe I'll call after the weekend to schedule a playdate with the boys and give her some time to herself.

As for relief - I heard some news today about a fellow blogger whom I consider a friend which I know is kind of ridiculous because even though I have been reading her blog for a while I really don't know her nor she me - maybe that is just the world of blogging. Anyway, she was facing a breast cancer scare and she found out today that she is fine. I can not tell you how relieved I was to read that. I keep getting choked up about it every time I think about her. I am just so relieved.

Daisys

What have I gotten myself into??? I am beginning to think that I am incapable of saying no. I wanted my daughter to be involved with girl scouts. All of her friends started a month or so ago with their troops through their schools but we had not received anything from her school. A few weeks ago I learned that there are troops that meet at our school but they are apparently full with children returning from last year. I was not really happy about that. It is our first year and I know there are several other new families as well and given the opportunity I believe we would probably have had enough children for a new group.... but I digress. When I didn't think there was a troop at her school I contacted the girl scout council and inquired about a troop closer to our home. When I heard back the woman asked if I would volunteer to help with the troop and I got the impression that without this help, there would not be a troop for my daughter to join so I said yes. So fast forward to tonight's meeting (which I almost missed because I thought it was being held tomorrow) and I am now the leader with a co-leader of a group of about 12 girls. Oh and by the way, I had to lead tonight's meeting with the moms. Hellooo... I don't know ANYTHING about this. There is a meeting about it all tomorrow night and I will be attending that as well. Maybe it would have been helpful to have that meeting tonight and tonight's meeting tomorrow - I'm just saying. On the upside, my daughter is sooo excited about being a daisy and she met some nice girls tonight. To tell the truth I am a wee-bit excited about the whole thing too. It sounds like it is going to be some definate work but I think it is also going to be a whole lot of fun. When I called my husband on the way home his question to me was, "Can't you ever just be a participant" - followed by a good, long laugh. I don't think I can just be the mom that drops off and I know there will be times when I am kicking myself for committing to so many (so, so many) things but for the most part I have a lot of fun with it all.

Spooky

The Halloween decorations have been taken down from the attic and our house is officially ready for Halloween. Just getting the decorations into the house is a major feat since it involves the husband and he just doesn't really see the point of decorating for holidays - not even really for Christmas. Although, to be fair, he did tell me the morning after we had decorated how nice everything looked and that he was enjoying the house this way. Wow - who are you and what have you done with my husband!! Perhaps it is just wishful thinking but he may even want to get in on the action for Christmas. The house is coming along though and the holiday decorations are helping to make it feel like our home again. The painters are almost done and think after today they may finally be done. They are just going to come this evening and finish up the front door. We're going red and I am a little nervous about that. Red can be tricky. It can be great or it can be garish. I am hoping for great! We are still in the process of putting in crown moulding and the husband is doing it himself. It is definitely a work in progress and it is taking infinitely longer than he anticipated. These projects always do. He thought the upstairs would take about a weekend and the downstairs may take two weekends. That would mean we would be done by now. The reality is that each room is taking about a weekend so at this point we have three rooms upstairs completed. At this rate I am hoping he will be able to complete it by the end of the year. He is saving us a lot of money and he is doing a wonderful job. I think for him part of wanting to do this has nothing to do with saving money and everything with proving to himself that he can do it. Really I believe he can do anything. He has done irrigation systems, french drains, wainscoting, drywall work, installed tile floor, baseboards and the list goes on. Last fall he took two of our smaller bedrooms and took out walls and installed new ones to make it into a bonus/game room that we now actually use. I thought I knew him very well before we married but this was a talent he kept hidden until after we were married. Mostly I love this about him but when we are in the throes of a project it starts to get old. Every project always takes months longer than he estimates and I get impatient. Right now I am tired of having my curtains off the windows, furniture moved all over and dust constantly in my house. Talk to me when this project is complete and I will be singing my praises of him and his work. At least the downstairs is orderly and now spooky and we can all enjoy that.

Candy Corn, Apple Cake & Spicy Cinnamon

What is it about candy corn that makes my daughter ga-ga? Perhaps it is the ten million grams of sugar that each kernal possesses. Nonetheless, I must live up to my alterego - fun mommy - at least some of the time and so I break down and buy it the first chance I get every fall. Luckily for me and the husband it is not one of the things that appeal to either of us so we are not tempted by it. I have, however, been tempted by an apple cake that I read about on another blog, The Entertaining House. I would link you to her site but first of all I know no one actually reads my blog and secondly, I don't know how to link you to her blog. The cake looks delish. It is totally NOT on our diet and I can not stop thinking about it!! So I am going to have to bake it and I am thinking that I may do it this week. I have secured a friend to take the remains of the cake off of my hands so I am not tempted to overindulge and eat the entire thing. See the problem with the cake is that I want to try a tiny piece just to satisfy my curiosity and my craving for it and the husband and daughter may also have a tiny piece but then we will be left with the rest of the cake. Being the good girl that I am and having been raised with my depression era Nana I am physically unable to let the rest of the cake go to waste and will subsequently eat the rest of the cake over the course of a few days. So I need to get rid of the remains of the cake but you can't just take a half eaten cake to your neighbors house or your daughter's school - that is just tacky. So, instead I have secured my husband's single friend who works in an office and he is going to take the rest of the cake and bring it to work. He will set it in the conference room and all who enter will think that someone else has already been to the conference room and tried a piece. I do not know why I didn't come up with this idea a long time ago and many extra pounds ago but I think it is brilliant. Truth be told it was not even my idea. It was our friend's idea. I told him about my cake dilemma and asked if he would like the remainder of our cake for himself but then I remembered that he is also trying to eat a healthy diet so I didn't want him to be in the same boat and lo and behold he came up with this brilliant plan. So the cake will be baked this week. It will be a good opportunity to use up some of our apples before we leave for our trip to NYC on Friday and I will know if it is as delish as it sounds. If so, I will put in a bid to my mother so that I can add it to the list of things I will make for our Thanksgiving trip. So, that's settled. I do not think I have time to make it today and one of things I am looking forward to when I make it is the smell that will fill my house with the promise of yummy goodness. Today I already have that smell because I cleaned out a drawer this morning and stumbled across a spicy cinnamon candle (how it ended up in a drawer is anyone's guess. So now my house is filling as I type with the scent of a cool fall day and at least in my mind I can pretend that it is cool and crisp with a bright sunny sky outside but in reality it is probably going to get up near 90 here today.

Nothing in my Closet

My husband and I have been doing a weight loss program for a few months and so far so good. He has lost about 45 pounds and I have lost about 25. More importantly, my body fat has dropped more than ten percent. We have made a complete lifestyle change with the way we eat and think about food and I am so happy with our results. The downside is that none of my clothes fit me now. I know - boohoo for me. But, it really is a problem. I don't want to buy new clothes because I have not reached my goal but I clearly am out of options in my closet so I guess I am going to have to buy a few things to carry me through. More importantly I am going to need to get a few new things to take to NY next weekend. Now I just need to figure out where to start. I don't want to break the bank on clothes that are going to have a short shelf life in my wardrobe but I want things that are going to look nice. Wish I had time to hit the outlets. I may have to make a trip this weekend.