Meow

Sure, everyone loves the cover of “Such Great Heights” on the Garden State soundtrack. (As well they should, I mean, it’s a great cover.) But you ain’t heard nothin’ until you’ve heard my three-year-old meow it!

Also, challenge #135 of having two munchkins: They both fall asleep in the car. Who to carry in first? When did the three-year-old get this bloody heavy? How do I juggle said three-year-old and my Starbucks?

0 to 60 (cupcakes) in 3.5 hours

Feeling a bit like Supermom right now, as I spent the better part of this evening making 60 cupcakes for Auggie’s Valentine’s Day party at preschool tomorrow. Chocolate and vanilla. With chocolate sour cream frosting at first, which Auggie nixed promptly. Leading to chocolate butter cream frosting for the majority of the cupcakes. Topped with a candy conversation heart. Oh yeah, I got it. And, to top it all off, they are peanut-free, baby!

So we had our first Financial Peace University class last week. It went so well, that I’m still processing it all, frankly. I don’t know what I was expecting. I suppose that I automatically think that everyone is as cynical as me and instantly views anything earnest or “bettering” with suspicion. (This sucks in so many ways, you don’t need to tell me. I’m working on it.)

Anyway, everyone laughed at the jokes during the video. They even did the audience participation stuff! And then the discussion time was awesome, with most everybody chiming in. Tim’s only critique was to talk about ourselves less, which I will try to do next week. I guess the most difficult thing for me was leading the discussion while knowing that I was pretty much the youngest person there. I’m no expert on personal finance, that’s for sure, but I have been paying attention to Dave Ramsey for a very long time.

I hope I don’t mess anything up, or offend someone or something. That’s my biggest fear.

The overcommitted chronicles

Sorry, sorry, sorry. I know, I should update more. There’s tons of exciting stuff going on, which would be fun to talk about, but with all the excitement, there’s less time to write, etc., etc.

The most prevalent thing right now is our coordinating a Financial Peace University course at our church this spring. We just had “orientation” this past weekend, and classes start on February 10.

In typical Beth-like fashion, the decision to do this went something like this:

1) I want to attend Financial Peace University (Dave Ramsey’s 13-week personal finance course).

2) The closest FPU is in Hazelwood (way far away from us).

3) Why can’t we just have the class at our church?

4) Talk to a couple of people to see if it’s OK. It is.

5) Call Dave Ramsey’s company to get more info.

6) Get all excited about it.

7) Commit to coordinating the class this spring.

8) Realize the huge commitment this actually is.

9) Oh, crap.

But we are muddling through. Despite my rather pitiful promotion of the thing, our enrollment is very respectable. I won’t be talking about any of the folks’ details here because it’s all confidential of course, but I will continue to keep you all updated about our progress towards debt freedom and the like.

Speaking of progress, we hit a bit of a snag in the ole debt snowball this month as Tim underestimated (by nearly half) my income for the past year. The fact that my income has grown so much over the past year (even with a month off for the baby) is great. The fact that we hadn’t been paying estimated tax payments quarterly since we thought the new little tax deduction would cover it is not. Great, that is. So we had to send off an emergency tax payment to the IRS this month.

What is super-great, though, is that we actually had the money. When Tim got really down about his miscalculation, I reminded him that, if this had happened only six months ago, we would have been sunk. I mean, trying to come up with three grand back then would have seemed impossible! Now, I wrote out the check without even hyperventilating. Would I have rather the check been to Ford Credit? You bet your sweet bottom. But, hey, the next one will be. I just need to get the numbers figured out for February.

Not that I’m obsessed with our budget. Who has time?

Elliott is —–>this<------ close to crawling. He is scooting everywhere on his bottom, and that, combined with his rolling and general squirming skillz means that the kid can get just about anywhere he likes. Which is wherever the paper is. The boy has a serious jones for paper. And woe to you, sir, if you should take away the paper once he has it. Wherever did he get that temper??? We’re in a good patch with Auggie too right now. I hate to risk a jinx, but he is just a super little boy and I couldn’t be prouder to be his mom. What a lucky mom I am.

The Big Sigh

A snapshot of my life right now: Whenever exasperated, angry or otherwise annoyed with anyone/anything, the first word out of my mouth is, “August..!” Actually, it’s more like, “Augu-” as I catch myself mid-name and then feel pretty dumb and more than a little guilty for unconsciously blurting the name of my challenging three-year-old instead of the actual perpetrator’s name. Bad mommy.

Happy Half-Birthday, Elliott! Yesterday! Wow, I pretty much suck at this mom stuff.

Moving on”¦ I’ve been in this half-melancholy since we watched Garden State last week. I totally loved it, of course. And even though I’m woefully behind the rest of the world who fell in love with this movie when it was in the theater last year, I’m kinda glad that I didn’t see it while I was pregnant. I probably would have sobbed for weeks. Anyway, the half-melancholy is all iTunes’ fault. You see, the next morning when I popped out of bed after dreaming about new love and Zach Braff and awesome music (in no particular combination, ahem), I thought, ‘I’d love to have that soundtrack, but who has time to go to the record store anymore now that I’m an old crone?’ Then I thought, ‘I wonder if that new-fangled iTunes has the soundtrack”¦’

Guess what? They did! And since I’d tried it out last summer by downloading a rather disappointing “iTunes-exclusive” Death Cab for Cutie EP, all I had to do was hit “Buy It” and it was mine. Five minutes later, it’s burned to a CD and playing in my car while taking Auggie to preschool.

Steve Jobs, this crone owes you a hug.

But the half-melancholy, you’re wondering why, right? Well, Tim and I celebrated our seventh (!) anniversary on Sunday. And watching the movie just reminded me a lot of when we fell in love — how much it sucked, living in separate cities; the excitement of Friday evenings (I think we only missed one or two weekends my entire senior year); the crushing sadness of Sunday evenings; just being young and crazy and in love. To say that things are different now is laughably obvious, but it’s not why I’m half-melancholy. Sure, it would be fun to visit that time again, but I wouldn’t trade now for anything.

My husband is”¦ I can’t think of anything that isn’t a total cliché. Which is why there are clichés, I’m sure. He’s mine. I’m his. It’s hard to even imagine the point where he stops and I begin, especially when it comes to the boys — they are the never-ending us.

I’m not doing this justice. Suffice to say, it’s not so much of a half-melancholy as a wistfulness. And that’s OK.

That last title was about the Da Vinci Code

This is totally bizarre — I’m going on at least three full nights of rest here! I almost don’t know what to do with all of this alertness. I mean, waking up all on my own? Without having to hit the ground running? Crazy.

I am enjoying my Christmas vacation, even though I wasn’t really planning on taking much of a vacation. It just seems that all of my clients and contacts are on vacation, meaning that I am too, I guess. It’s nice having the extra time to bake cookies and play with the boys’ new toys.

Speaking of which, the guys made out like bandits this year. So much for “we want them to know the true meaning of Christmas, so we’ll just get them a couple of gifts.” As if that is possible with two adorable boys. Even if you (the parents) only get them a couple of gifts, everyone else is going to get them one too. So by the end of Christmas morning, your three year old is numbly ripping off paper, only wanting desperately to actually play with that cool toy he opened five presents ago. Looking back, we should have meted them out over the course of the day, or several days for that matter. Look, kids, it’s Christmas and Hanukkah rolled into one! Except instead of the oil lasting eight days, it’s Thomas-related toys!

Elliott seemed unfazed by the holiday proceedings. Although he is completely bonkers over the baby basketball hoop that Tim’s brother Jim’s family got him.

So thanks to everyone who got them gifts. They were all big hits. (And Aunt Jennie, just you wait until you have a wee one yourself. It’s pay back time!)

It snowed a foot in my hometown last week, then the temperatures plummeted so none of the snow melted. Meaning that we didn’t get to my grandma’s house for Christmas. Which sucked. Yes, it was nice having the day at home for the boys to enjoy their new toys and such, but I missed my crazy family. And my grandma’s chicken and dumplings. Sigh.

Moving on, today was just a stellar day for my boy Auggie. We hosted his playgroup and he was pretty much a fantastic host. Even when he got bullied by a not-yet two year old. And now that both of his bottom front teeth are in, Elliott’s mood has improved quite a bit. So I’m hoping that tomorrow is going to be fun again.

Tim is very excited because we got the title for his car in the mail today. This was pretty much the last thing we were waiting for after paying off his car. It feels so good, knowing that we OWN it now. With the invoices I’ve got out now, we should have my car paid off by the end of February. Sweet!

We’re coming for you next, credit card.

APPLE! OH MY GOD, it’s APPLE!

Oh, hey, yeah — I have a blog!

Life continues to rocket past me. I’m just trying to hang on.

Tonight, we were driving home and we passed a house that was Griswold-esque in its Christmas decor. I asked Auggie, ‘Is that house wack or what?’ And he said, ‘Mommy, that house is wacky.’ That’s my boy from the suburbs. But Mommy’s from the streets!

Let’s see… News… Oh! We paid off Tim’s car earlier this month! And, with the invoices I’ve got out, we should have mine paid off by February. That leaves one final debt (other than the house), that should be paid off by May, if we stay on this pace. That’s five months earlier than we planned!

I’m such a nerd about this finance stuff, Tim gave me a membership to the “My Total Money Makeover” site. It’s got some pretty good budgeting software there, forums for other nerds and lots of DR (that’s Dave Ramsey to you non-nerds) content.

Also, our friends Dan, Heidi and their daughter Jillian welcomed their new son, Miles, into the world today. Can’t wait to meet you, Miles! Congratulations, guys! Your LONG pregnancy is finally over! And you get a baby!

We slogged our way through a month of colds, emerging with some hacking coughs (Elliott) and a minor ear infection (Auggie). Elliott continues to grow at an astounding pace, and he’s been sitting up on his own for a couple of weeks now. He can scoot backwards and rolls back and forth with ease. Sigh. It’s only a matter of time before the boy’s mobile.

Now, it’s December the 16th and I have completed 0 Christmas cards. Aw, crap. Every day, more and more cards come in the mail and I’ve got nothing. Plus there’s this scarf that I was wanting to finish for my mom for Christmas… Crap!

But I had to take a few minutes to update you, my gentle readers, about the sheer banality of my life.

BTW, The Da Vinci Code? Meh.

Woo hoo. 30.

Sorry that I can’t get too excited about my birthday. It was a fun day and night prior. My mom came up to watch the boys while Tim and I went out for coffee (the Starbucks affliction continues) and a movie (The Incredibles). The mix of coffee, popcorn, Milk Duds and Diet Pepsi gave me a genuine tummy ache. See, kids?

Thanksgiving was good, too. Only one minor family altercation, which is too depressing to elaborate on.

Man, I’m tired, can you tell? You’re probably even asleep by now!

I wish that I had more exciting news. Um, we’re planning to pay off Tim’s car next week. That’s exciting, right? That leaves my car and the credit card left until we’re debt-free (except for the house). Holy cow. I’m pretty proud of us.

I hope that I can write something more upbeat next time.

Happy birthday, Jane!

She lives! But does not blog!

See, you thought I was kidding when I said that I was circling the drain, now, didn’t you? Well, consider me flushed because after a week of neverending deadlines, I face another week of insanity.

But tonight I took a Night Off. And I finished a book, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime, which I rather liked. The narrator is a fifteen year-old boy with autism, so it was really interesting. One of the character’s names, though, was Siobhan, and I find that name incredibly distracting, because I’m not sure how to pronounce it. So everytime the name comes up, I find myself thinking of possible pronunciations of it and end up glossing over the next few paragraphs. (It was even worse than the great Hermione debate of 1999, when Tim and I took turns reading Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban aloud on a roadtrip to New Orleans.)

Anyway, book = good. Siobhan = I’m an idiot who should just google it already.

Both of the boys have colds. And I can’t even ply myself with the good old placebo effect of drinking orange juice because I have two incredibly painful canker sores in my mouth (see above whine about stress). It’s pretty incredible how quickly their noses get crusty. Just when one is wiped and crust-free, the other has crusted over again. At least Elliott can’t wipe his nose on his sleeve yet.

I tried to relax and make myself feel useful by making dinner tonight, and, I must say, it was quite good. And fiber-rific! I made Meditteranean lentils and veggies with brown rice. Oh, quite the health-conscious home-cooker am I! (Ignore that mini cookie-dough Blizzard that I snarfed a while ago, please.)

Did I mention that I turn 30 this week? Because I turn 30 on Saturday. I’m not really sure how I feel about this. And then I teach Sunday School the next day. Rockin’.