I’ve been extremely bored and frustrated today. I’ve hurt my foot. I think it was caused by the boots I wore last night. They were real high heeled, and my foot was fine when I went to bed last night. This morning, though, when I woke up, I could barely walk on it. So, I didn’t go to church this morning, and that kind of threw my day off. I just felt “blah” all day. So, then, I was going to go to my little brother’s Christmas play tonight, but it was snowing and I was afraid the roads would get slick. I don’t like driving in the snow, especially at night, and especially with the kids. So, I’ve been at home all day, looking at the mess, and getting depressed. My foot has really hurt all day, too. I had determined to go to the doctor tomorrow, but it’s starting to not hurt so bad, now. Hopefully, it will be better in the morning.

I finally got off my good-for-nothing, lazy butt, and did a little bit of something tonight. Not much, but I got the dishes done. I’ve done a couple of loads of laundry. I’m pretty much worthless as a housewife. I sent my husband off to work without making him any dinner, too. He had to stop at Subway. Kyra’s dinner was macaroni and cheese and jello. Healthy, huh? Elijah had a couple bites of mac and cheese, a few bites of jello, two graham crackers, and a jar of mixed vegetable baby food. Then I nursed him. Hopefully, he’ll sleep good tonight. He usually does when he goes to sleep right after eating a whole lot. I had tuna (in a bowl mixed with mayo), and a couple of slices of colby-jack cheese for lunch, and a salad for supper. I also ate three or four bites of Kyra’s mac and cheese that she didn’t finish. Other than that, I ate some animal crackers at different times today when I was doling them out to the kids. I don’t know why I decided to share what we’ve ate today with you, but I did. Let it be a lesson in what is not a good choice to feed your family. Tomorrow, I’m going to make a decent meal of low-carb spaghetti. We’ve not had spaghetti in like seven months, on account of Chris’ diet, so I bought the lc kind to try out. I miss pasta.

Wow! Did I just break a boring record? I do try.

We decided to open our gifts here at home on Thursday, the day before Christmas Eve. Chris has to work both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. We were going to open them on Christmas Eve between the time Chris got home and we left for dinner with my parents and grandparents and my brothers, but I don’t want it to be so rushed. I want Kyra to wake up and come in to see the presents all under the tree, and I want her to have all day to play with her new stuff. I want to have plenty of time to videotape them opening and playing with their gifts, and I want to see Chris enjoy his. I want to fix a special (non low-carb) breakfast for everyone to enjoy, and just have time for our own little family. So what if it’s not the actual day? I think it will be more special and less hectic that way. I can’t wait to see Kyra’s reaction to it all.

It snowed today, as I mentioned before. Kyra kept asking to go outside and build a snowman “please!”. She didn’t understand that if the snow wasn’t laying that she couldn’t build one. She is so obsessed with snowmen. She loves them. I wish it would snow about a foot so that she could play in it, and build her first snowman. I really don’t like snow, as a rule, but I think I could enjoy it on her account.

Let’s see, what else? Um, I’m thinking.

Nothing comes to mind. I think I’ll go for now, and come back when I have something interesting to say. Or not. I may just come back when I have more pointless crap to write about.

I have an acquaintance of sorts that I really want to help. I’ve never met her in person, but have become acquanited with her online. She is in a very, very, VERY difficult sitation that will never be better in the near future. It’s not something she got herself into or could get herself out of. Just a bad circumstance life handed her. I can’t help her in person, because she’s on the other side of the country. I can’t even really help her much monetarily, which is what she really needs the most. I’m going to try, though. I wish I could send her a big sum of money to help her out. My heart just hurts for her. It’s so hard to understand why God would give her the circumstances she has, while I have been blessed beyond measure with my children. She deserves happiness just as much as anyone. I just wish I could really do something.

I am finally making some progress with the guitar. Finally. I wish I could say that I was really rocking it, but it’s pretty elementary stuff. I got some new strings for my acoustic tonight. I’ve got to get it re-strung. I’ve been playing the electric lately, but I want to be able to play both. Especially because the acoustic is much easier to carry around, and practice with somewhere other than my bedroom. It’s too much trouble to move the amp and stuff around to play the electric. Anyway, that’s all pointless.

I started The Winter of our Discontent by John Steinbeck the other day. Pretty good so far, but I’ve not really gotten very far into it yet. I love the title of it, though.

Oh, well, I’m bummed. Mom just called and said that Jason isn’t coming home for Christmas, after all. That sucks. So, he and Aaron will both be away this Christmas. Jason is going to Nebraska instead of Tennessee for the holidays, because he didn’t get as much leave as he thought he was getting. Oh, well. We’re down to four. Four kids home for Christmas, that is. Me, Malachi, Luke, and Seth. If it gets to be less than that, I’m really going to be sad.

I’ve discovered a new form of birth control. It’s very effective. What is it? Potty-training. Potty-training a toddler is enough to make you want to never do it again. Lucky for Elijah, he was conceived before we had attempted to potty-train Kyra. If it weren’t for that…who knows!

Seriously, though. Potty-training is so frustrating. It’s enough to make you crazy. I will be so happy when Kyra is potty-trained. By then, it will probably be almost time to start it with Elijah. Ick. I HATE POTTY-TRAINING!!!

Man! I hurt my shoulder again last night. I hurt it several months ago when I went bowling, and it had just recently (in the past few weeks) got completely better. Then, last night, Eli was in the bed playing between me and Chris, and he sort of lunged over me. I thought he was falling off the bed, and I somehow twisted to grab at him and hurt my shoulder again. I heard it pop when I did it, and it was immediately excruciating pain. I thought I was going to die from the pain at first. The extreme pain went away pretty quickly, but it is still hurting me this morning. It was kind of amusing right after it happened, because when Kyra heard me yell out and then sort of crying…she ran into our room to see what was going on. She heard me telling Chris what I did, and she started saying, “JoJo’s so mean! JoJo hurt Mommy. JoJo’s so mean!”. It was pretty funny. Hopefully, this time around, it won’t take my shoulder so long to get better.

So, I finished Islands in the Stream tonight. It was a pretty good book. I’m going to have to read some other things by Ernest Hemmingway. He’s a great writer. I have two books left to read. The Winter of Our Discontent and Cannery Row by John Steinbeck. Looking forward to them.

I practiced guitar a little bit today. It’s so hard to concentrate when the kids are with me, though. Kyra is always reaching in to try to turn the tuning keys, and Elijah is just pulling up on me, the amp, etc. and getting tangled in the cord. One of these days. I was thinking that, when Elijah is a year and half or so old, that maybe I could leave them with their grandmother while I take actual lessons. See, with Chris’ odd schedule, it’s hard to do anything regular, like guitar lessons. I can’t count on him to be able to watch the kids, and I’m very leery about leaving them with anyone. I don’t trust anyone. Sounds bad, but I’m just being honest. So, anyway, I’ll continue to muddle along without a lot of progress until then.

It’s raining like crazy. It has been pouring all day. I truly mean all day. I had to go get some groceries today, and I got soaked. I had water inside all of the grocery bags. Better to go when Chris is here and get soaked, then wait till it’s not raining and have to take the kids with me. They’re pretty good, but just the logistics of it all is hard.

I think most of my Christmas spirit has left me for now. I can’t get out from under the big black cloud that took up residence over my head around Thanksgiving. It’s really got me all bent out of shape. Maybe it will go away soon. Or maybe not. Who knows.

Well, well. I guess that’s it. Aren’t you glad you stopped by?