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Been keeping busy at work: we wrapped up the Career Fair Friday; the Pink Slip Festival is a week and a couple days out, and there's still a ton of details to handle for that; the day after the Fest I have another two classes to coordinate ... I'm looking forward to August - when Dan will be on vacation for a week and I'll be sitting around with my thumb up my butt. Comparatively speaking, at least - there will still be tons of copy writing, web site maintenance, Tweeting and status updating on his behalf, brand-building ... the things I do and have learned to do on this job are so awesome for my resume and future employability. Assuming I ever leave this job :)

I had a dinner meeting Thursday (I am starting to gain weight from all the dinners and drinks lately ... lunches weren't that bad for me, since I could make good choices - but dinner and beer ... ugh.) to start the ball rolling on the next event Dan's thinking about - a golf tournament. More on this later, because I really can't take all of that in until I wrap up the Pink Slip dealie. But yeah, a golf tournament. Thankfully I know rules, etiquette and terminology since I've dated a lot of golfers. I even understand *how* to play; I just wouldn't subject anyone to playing with me.

Bean's b-day party is Sunday the 19th at a drop-in daycare place, Wanna Play Playcare. They do private parties on Sundays so that should be a nice change from the flashing lights, loud noise and frantic chasing around at places like Chuck E Cheese - I'm anticipating this being a lot more laid back and less stressful because the kids will be locked in a couple thousand square feet and the parents won't need to watch their every move.

Although I won't be running my usual zone coverage on the girls - Dave and his parents will be there, as will my folks. With that kind of support watching the girls, I could hold the party at the beach in heavy surf and feel a bit more relaxed than I do when I'm on zone defense. I just usually never get to talk to anyone because I'm tracking Bean and O; it'll be nice to have them both confined and to have extra eyes on them.

And speaking of Bean, who sent her and O the Sherlock McBiscuit book? Too, too cute!

Bean's behavior the past two nights has been horrible. It's like she can make good choices and be well-behaved until like 6:00, and then it all shuts off. She won't listen or do what I ask, she runs away laughing, she ignores me ... it's enough to make my tiny little brain *snap*. So there's hollering, screaming, threatening and, sadly, sometimes a spanking - that she laughs about and then ratchets my blood pressure up like a bazillion. And then right when it's time to lay down, tearful apologies and promises to make better choices so she can have her stories back that she lost, get to change out of the pajamas I put her in when she wouldn't listen, etc ... like that makes it all okay and that gets her everything back. She can't act like a sh*t for an hour and then say "sorry, I'll make good choices" and *poof* get everything back. I actually took her new Ponies away and 'threw one in the garbage' last night. Seriously. Well, 'seriously' in that she thinks it's in the garbage, but I really went that far in an attempt to get her to listen and behave. It worked for 3.5 seconds.

And then when it's all over she wants me to hold her and apologize to her. And then tells me I'm bad when I won't apologize. Good times.

I've got a tired, crying toddler to deal with (up at 4:45. Joy.) so I'm just going to wrap this up so I can post something ... I've been working on this since the 9th!
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Happy Birthday Bean!!

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My Big Girl turns four today! She went to school dressed in her newest (and poofiest. and pinkest.) princess dress, de-frickin'-lighted that today was her day. When one of the boys from her old class saw me, he asked "Where's Bean?" I called her over and he said "you look pretty". Awww. This was one of the other kids that the delightful Miss A picked on, so I have a soft spot for him anyways :)

Dave brought a fruit tray to school for her to celebrate with her friends this afternoon, and he owes me pictures - as soon as I get one, I'll share it, but in the meanwhile, here's my big girl at the fireworks on Saturday.


Happy Birthday, Bean. Mommy simply adores you for all you are and for everything you say and do.
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I'm like that kid in the story, the boy that stuck his finger in the duck.

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What a great way to wrap up a fun weekend - an email from Julia (and C) asking us to join them at the pool. An hour or so at a great pool, followed by BBQ and play at her place was a fab ending to a weekend of fun for the girls and I.

I was off on Friday, and the girls' school was open, so I took advantage of a slacktastic day and had lunch with Shirley before picking the girls up. Saturday was an early day (ugh), so we stayed in jammies and hung around the house to ensure they got naps. Would have loved one myself, but by the time I got Miss O to sleep, Bean was waking up.

My parents came over later in the afternoon and we headed out to the girls school - they offered free parking and hot dogs/burgers for families that had kids there, and since the school is right across the street from the big fireworks park, it was a no-brainer. We walked over and checked out the vendors and stuff to do in the park, and the girls played on the playground for awhile. We went back to the school to hang out and play there, on the well-shaded playground, since it was, after all, *July in Texas*.

Grabbed some dinner and then my folks took Miss O home and Shirley and her older daughter met Bean and I to stay for the firworks. It was my first fireworks experience with Bean, and she loved it. I was grinning from ear to ear watching and hearing her reactions.

She was a little Mayor McCheese, too, hanging out with all her school friends and hamming it up for whoever would listen. She's such a social little thing, and she makes me more social by default ... especially when I'm removing her from a picnic blanket and stopping her from sharing some random kid's lunch!

It was close to 11:00 by the time she got to sleep, and she was up this morning at 7:00, so I mandated a nap again today if she wanted to do anything this afternoon. We had breakfast at the bagel place, did a Target run and then O fell asleep in the car, as I drove her around, I got the email from Julia, so once both girls had a short nap, we hit the pool. Neither of my girls swim, so the pool in J's neihborhood is fab, with a great beach-type entry and splash area. One of my neighborhood pools has the zero-entry thing, too, but best I recall, it's just the way into the pool, not an area for plating, per se. Julia's neighborhood actually has a whole shallow 'pool' area that the beach entry leads to, where the water stays pretty shallow. Bean and O loved it.

I managed to hit the 7:00 bedtime I was striving for tonight, and after the hour-long struggle to get O to sleep, actually got the house cleaned up a bit, too. I've got a stressful week coming up at work, so I really need to get to bed myself. Send me good thoughts that I don't butt heads too hard with the boss or the officemate :)
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Happy July 4th

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It's been a day rife with Beanisms, so in addition to extending my wishes for a very happy July 4th to all, I'll spread the love and the smiles with some jems from my 4-year-old.

"I pooped in my panties at daddy's. I won't do that here because I care about you mommy."

"I like horses more than you could ever imagine."

"Thank you Earth from protecting us from dinosaurs. Thank you for bringing big rocks down and killing Tyrannosaurus."

"Look at how big (the corral) is and how many people are in it. We fitted in a lot of people. So everybody give yourself a hand."

Bean: "My favorite body parts are the heart and the tummy."
Mommy: "Why are those your favorite parts?"
Bean: "Because my heart cares about you and tummies grow babies. That's why I like them so much."

Simple as that.

I hope everyone has a safe and happy Fourth!
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Well, I sorta test well.

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What a difference a teacher makes; Bean has been doing just amazing since the switch back to the Clownfish class. The almost compulsive nose-picking she had been doing has stopped, her behavior has improved and Miss Stephanie reports that if you just take a second to talk to her when she's upset, she's easy to reason with. Huh. What a novel idea - talk to the kid instead of belittling and humiliating her. Who'd have thought *that* was the solution?

(An aside: when Bean was doing her yoga at school the other day, she was in the gym with one other teacher and a bunch of kids. The evil bitca teacher showed up to assist - I watched as Bean's face shifted from joyous and smiling to this unsmiling, tense look. It. was. awful. Thankfully she looked up and saw me and I was smiling and waving and blowing kisses, so she recovered quickly. She might have recovered quickly even if I hadn't been there - she's a tough kid. But that instant shift from happy to sad was really hard to see.)

Yesterday when I dropped the girls off, Bean's teacher was all excited to tell me something, so I went and dropped O in her room and went back. Apparently during bean's nap refusal yesterday, Stephanie took her with her to go give another teacher a break. That teacher is new, so she had administered a Kindergarten 'here's what I know' type test to the kiddos in her class, just so she knew where the majority were, learning-wise. For shiggles, Stephanie gave Bean the test.

She totally nailed it, and then some.

Stephanie said "she blew me away!" Only thing she didn't nail was her address and phone number, but in her defense we've never told her that and she has two addresses and phone numbers. She had Dave's city and my subdivision, though :)

She can count to 99, identify numbers and letters, write her name, knows her left from right (which Stephanie was really wowed by, but seems kinda mundane to me), knows her colors, etc. The coolest part to me was the color part. There were like, what, 10 or so color names written in boxes, and the test goes something like: the teacher says the color and the kid selects the right color and puts a check in the box indicated. Stephanie had to get up before the last three were done, and she came back to find that Bean had put an orange check in the "orange" box. Here's how the subsequent conersation went:

Stephanie: did you put that check in the orange box?
Bean: Yes.
S: Why did you do that?
B: Because that box says orange.
S: How do you know?
B: Because orange starts with o and that word starts with o.
S: (pausing) and what about the other two (unchecked) boxes?
B: Well, (pointing to the pink box), that one says 'pink' and there's no pink marker. And that one (pointing to the white box) says white, and it's already white.
S: ... ... ...

It's already white. I *love* that. The deductive reasoning on the pink and orange boxes was awesome, but the comment on the white box is what blows me away.

Based on her testing, and the nice new teacher in the Blue Tang room, they'll be moving Bean up before the official August move-up the rest of the kids will be doing. She'll be going to the 4-4.5 year old room Monday, I believe, to see if that's a good fit for her. Honestly, though, her being with a good teacher is far more important to me than her being in an age-appropriate room, if that makes sense? The raving bitca that was in Manta Ray would never have thought that Bean was smart and perhaps acting out because she was bored (Miss Stephanie's theory), so Bean being with her peers wasn't all that helpful to her in that case.

I'll now be spending my free time smartening up so that I can keep up with my big girl :)
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I'm a leaf on the wind...watch how I soar.

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A convo with Bean this a.m.

Bean: Do you like the Earth?
Mommy: Yes.
Bean: A lot?
Mommy: Yes.
Bean: I like the Earth all the way to the Moon and back. That's how much I like the Earth.

My little eco-warrior in training :)

The girls were on TV this a.m. ... tho just barely: http://bit.ly/ADJxj ... if you look closely in the baby room, you can see O climbing on me instead of participating; in the gym, there are a couple quick shots of Bean. Both girls love doing yoga, in spite of what O shows the KXAN viewership. In the baby yoga room, the camera guy commented that it was like herding cats - I told him cats were easier.

Bean executed her poses not a the flow-y, leaf-on-the-wind way, but instead in a choppy, jump-to-it way. My girl is not a flow-y girl. But she really enjoys it and often breaks out my yoga mat at home. She's dubbed my favorite pose (warrior) "star wars pose", combining the star pose with it :)

I've been feeling kinda down about the divorce lately; a vastly improved relationship with Dave has kind of blurred my edges and made me nostalgic and a bit sad. And it seems everything I stumble upon online just does something to underscore it. I hope no-one takes it to mean that our much friendlier divorce needs to change - because I don't want that at all. It's just a new adjustment for me. We went through such a rough period of interaction that the return to the post-divorce relationship we said we wanted has been really nice; but because it's so much smoother, it makes the reasons for divorce a little less clear.
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Help me out here, Spock, I don't speak loser.

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Unfortunately, I do.

So, flew to Sarasota Thursday, landed, went to Kelly's and we hung out drinking beer and catching up.

Friday morning was the beach with Kelly and her girls and Kerri and her boys. The plan was for the kids to play while the grown-ups chatted, but Mother Nature had other ideas and kicked up some good-sized swells. I spent a lot of time in the water with Kelly's older daughter (9), who also happens to be my goddaughter. I did get in a nice long walk with Kerri from Crescent Beach to Siesta, though that wasn't really enough time after so many years. But she had to work that night and again Saturday, so the little bit of time had to be enough.

Kelly and the girls and I went back to her folks' place (they were out of town), spent some time in the pool and relaxed a bit. Then I got dressed and dolled up for my reunion and headed down to Casey Key. After a ridiculously long wait at the little bridge on Blackburn Pt road, I got there. I walked up to the entrance of the restaurant, panicked and went back to the car.

Why? I couldn't stop thinking about how I was just kind of the loser who left in tenth grade, and why would anyone care what I had been up to or what became of me. I had a 'what the hell am I doing here?!?' moment that I couldn't talk myself down from.

And I left.

I left because I was a coward who couldn't bear the thought of standing around like a dumbass if no-one really talked to me. I hate typing all this - it makes me feel like such an ass now, but I've never held back before so why stop now. Usually it doesn't cast me in such a bad light, though.

So, yeah - pansy supreme, that's me. I've had "I'm a loser baby, so why don't you kill me" in my head all evening long, as I procrastinated on blogging and copping to my loserdom. Even contemplated the old "I had a headache" line, but figured I needed to own the decision.

My Friday night was, instead, walking around on Island Park with Kelly's younger daughter, then hitting St. Armands Circle for some strolling, shopping and ice cream from Kilwin's. We got home around 10, and everyone crashed.

Saturday was a blast - Kelly dropped the girls off with friends for the day and night, and she and I ate, shopped and were somehow overserved when we went out at night. Breakfast at Yoder's, shopping downtown, Publix subs for lunch, sunset at Sharky's, beers at The Hub and Gilligan's and then dancing to a totally attention-starved 80's cover band at The Beach Club. (Seriously. Attention starved. Like after every song "Let's hear it Beach Club!" and stopping after the opening bars of something everyone really liked and not starting again until everyone was screaming for it. I started screaming "love me! LOVE! ME!!!!")

Sunday morning came around a little too early, but I got packed, hung out a little with Kelly over coffee, and then headed for my sister's house to see her and grab some lunch before I hit the airport. It was great to see her, too, though she at least knows how to make a plane reservation and come to see people in other states. Unlike some best friends who shall remain unnamed.

And then back to work today, where my jet-lagged brain didn't catch up until probably 2:00 or so. Next time, I burn an extra day off and make sure to give myself a day off between vacation and returning to work - because I was more or less worthless today and really, really don't have time for that with so much on my plate.

At least I had my girls back tonight, and between all the hugs and kisses and O's babbling, I caught a few good ones from the mouth of Bean:

I was born first so don't push me around Miss O because I'm growed.

Mommy: Can you tell me about what you drew?
Bean: It's art.

Bean (about 'sugar bugs' on her teeth): Why can't I see them?
Mommy: Because sugar bugs are microscopic.
Bean: That means I need a microscope to see them.

Mommy, can you turn the light on for me? I'm scared. My mind plays tricks on me. Minds do that sometimes.

Yes they do, sweetie. They even trick you into thinking you shouldn't do something that you really should have.
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I'm not soothing? I can be soothing. I could soothe your ass off, pal.

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I have some thoughts that will be shared *privately*, but let me just say that sometimes, I feel like kicking people in the shin. Hard.

Two days from now I'll be chilling, poolside, in the balmy Sarasota and enjoying a beer with my BFF. I cannot wait. I haven't seen her in almost 10 years, and it's a long overdue visit. I'll be down there for my 20th high school reunion - oddly enough, from the school I left after 10th grade. But Pine View is a kind of special case, where most of us were there from 4th-10th, so my leaving my junior year isn't the same as if I had only known them two years, yanno?

I'm really looking forward to seeing my old classmates; I'm looking forward, too, to time spent with Kelly and Kerri, to being in my old stomping grounds, to seeing my sister, to the sunsets and sand and emotional recharge of Siesta Beach ... And hopefully to not burning to a crisp when I go to the beach on Friday. I think it's been just shy of a gazillion years since I've been to a beach. Actually, it's only been since I was on a cruise about 5-6 years ago, but still. I'm fairly certain there are vast tracts of skin that have forgotten, entirely, what the sun is.

I'm also looking forward to getting my iPhone at work tomorrow. My poor boss - it was supposed to be for when I was there 90 days, but I'm going on vacation after being there two months :) So my punishment is an iPhone; that way I can do work when I have some free time. Because I'll have sooo much of that. I figure it'll be great for airport time.

And I'll have a QWERTY keyboard!! Yay!! Do you have any idea how hard it is to text on the old Razr I have? It's so sad.

Actually, I'm a little stressed about taking the time while I have so damn many balls in the air, but it is what it is. I'll bring my laptop and the new phone and maybe be able to stay on top of a few things. Sort of.

And, since it's way overdue, a couple pics of the girls.







And yes, she is out cold


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I've got beer. You want some beer?

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Ahh .. a little Los Bad Apples, a little Blue Moon ... it's a tough life but someone has to live it. All business meetings should include beer and martinis.

(FYI, I was all about the Blue Moon and *not* the martinis. Martinis + Blue Moon would equal very bad decision-making. Even in the marketing world.)

Nothing says summertime like a weiss beer with orange slices. Nothing. Kels, you may argue that Corona says it better, but you just need to come to terms with being wrong. And nothing says "solid bidness skillz" like weiss beer and bidness. I even built a bridge over troubled waters.

Yes. I am *that* good.

Work is crazy - I'm coordinating a career fair, 11 career building classes and a community event for 500+ people. Oh, and yeah - still doing my 'regular' job of copy writing, branding and client communications. I'm two weeks out from the career fair and only have half the employers I need confirmed; and 30 days out from the communit event (The Pink Slip Festival) and still identifying balls I've dropped on that one. I said I had event planning experience when I landed this gig, but was pretty specific that it was corporate events, so I'm a bit over my head here.

Doesn't make my job any less fun, just a bit more overwhelming at times. I'm falling asleep thinking about all the stuff I need to do, dreaming about work and waking up remembering something *else* I have to do. Le sigh. I have 'to do' lists everywhere and if it's not on the list and no-one reminds me, it's in the dead zone - hopfeully I'll remember, but if I don't, hopefully someone will ut me some slack.

I have a 9:30 meeting tomorrow to wrap up more Festival loose ends, then need to get back on the phone lining up companies and recruiters for the job fair on the 8th. Oh, and did I mention I'll be out of town the 25th thru 28th? I will. And likely with limited or no Interwebz ... ah well, it's extra motivation for Dan to get me my damn iPhone :)

On Sunday I got to see a coupe of the guys I went to college with; they were in town visiting (one was in Kileen on bidness, the other now lives in Houston) and Dave invited me to spend a little time with them when I dropped off the girls. It was really great to see them - it's funny how those of us who go to college a little later really don't change much over ten years. But man, do situations change. Last I saw these guys, I was getting ready to get married; now I'm dropping the girls off at Dave's for his turn on parent duty. But sitting and talking to those guys was just like talking to them in 1999 while we were all studying at Marston Science Library at UF or over-indulging while we tailgated for Gator games.

Makes me even more excited about seeing my old middle/high school friends at my reunion this weekend ...
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Update

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Ack.

I am too. damn. busy these days ... I'm just going to do a quick update and try to get back to the blog later.

Discussion at Bean's school went well. Long story short, Bean's back in the 3-3.5 classroom while the owners/director handle the situation as they see fit. We've been asked not to talk about Fight Club, so I'll just let it go for now. When the situation changes. I'll fill y'all in.

Bean is delighted with the demotion - she walks into that class and gets treated like a rock star by all the kids. When I picked her up Friday, the teacher gushed about how great Bean was all day - not sure if she's going out of her way to be a cheerleader or not, but whatevah. If they treat Bean well, that's all I care about.

More later, just didn't want to go another day without at least a brief update. Thanks for all the support for Bean and I!
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