Thursday updates

[waverly]

I've been feeling kind of meh this week, and not sure why.  I think it might be because it's the end of the school year, and I am not mentally ready.  Also, my last child is done with elementary school, and I am in my feelings about it.  The pandemic sucked, and we missed out on a lot, but I tried my hardest to do all of the elementary school things at least 1-2 per year, so that I got the whole experience.  I did class parties, I was assistant room mom during Covid and supplied all the crafts for their parties that year.  I did Kindergarten mother's day. I did field day, I volunteered in the classroom twice, I did observation day, and it still doesn't seem like it was enough time.  We went to as many events and parties as we could (fall party, spring fling, glow party, Art show).  I still missed out on some things, but not that many.  

I love our middle school, but it is so not the same.  Most middle schoolers don't go to any of the district parties, and they just go to the dances obviously without parents.  The dances according to DS are not great and consist of a million kids in the gym.  He spent his last dance walking the gym in circles with his friend group.  DD is done with band which was super fun for the parents, maybe not for her practices.  She is also done with Girl Scouts.  It's just a lot of endings.  DS barely goes to the book fairs and doesn't purchase anything anymore.  Parents aren't even invited to them anymore.  We just are side notes in Middle School.  

I'm sure there are fun things ahead of us, but I'm not feeling it right now.   We had a rough soccer tournament last weekend, which is the only other activity that they are in right now, and it was not fun.  Soccer will be over with in 3 weeks which is a nice break, but then the only activity we have going on is DS's horseback riding which is fun.  We can't do daytime though and always end up with the late night classes.  Last year it was 8:30pm on Fridays.  This year it is 8pm on Thursdays, so I am hoping that is slightly better. 

[supertrooper1]

waverly, change is hard. Middle school seems to be a strange limbo place where it's different from elementary school but doesn't have everything a high school has to offer. This is my DS's last year of elementary school and I know it will be very different for him the next three years.

I've been hive free for the last month, minus 3 or 4 days. I noticed that 2 of the days were the day after I ate the same Indian food, however I've had other Indian food and it didn't affect me. So I'm wondering if I have an allergy to something in it, although I would think that a food allergy would happen almost immediately or the same day. The doctor called about scheduling my appointment for Xolair, but now I'm on the fence about taking it since the hives are no longer daily.

[mae0111]

I'm feeling the same way, waverly. Just very blah... I'm worn out, stressed x 100, and can't get myself out of the anxiety circle that I'm in. I keep saying that I just have to get through this weekend... The past few weeks have been terribly busy, and I'm feeling incredibly overwhelmed right now. I think that, once we get past Memorial Day, I'll start to feel a little bit of relief. I swear, May and September are my LEAST favorite months at this time in life. I used to love both months - changes in weather, things blooming or starting to cool off in New England, maybe a little foliage color at the end of the month of Sept... UGH now it's just so insane...

[waverly]

mae0111, yeah May and September are the busiest, and they are a lot of fun with school events and parties, but I think I am also just tired and that is why I am having trouble making plans for this weekend because I just want to do nothing.

[dglvrk2]

I'm also feeling a bit blah.....I think I'm tired of dealing with the hard stuff and know there will always be hard stuff to deal with. We still had 3.5 weeks of school left (yes, AFTER Memorial Day weekend).

I think having something personal to look first to would bring me up a bit, but am not coming up with anything of this sort at the moment.

My parents signed the papers to sell my childhood home yesterday! We are all having mixed emotions about it. They built it 40 years ago, soni moved in as a little kid. It's too big for them to take care of and they moved into a retirement community earlier this year. I was/am in total support of the move, but it's weird to think I'll likely never drive that road or go into my childhood house again.

[k3am]

dglvrk2, it is definitely a weird feeling. DH and I both had our childhood homes sold in April. For some reason, it's actually weirder to me that my kids won't be driving to DH's parents again than the fact that my house was sold.

MIL/FIL now live really close to BIL and his family and they've seen them just about every weekend since we moved in. SIL's parents also seem to come over really frequently. I love it for them - they all seem to enjoy it! - but the idea terrifies me.

[twinmomma]

waverly, Leaving elementary school is really tough! We had so many community events and activities at the elementary school level and now in middle school there's just... nothing. The kids have some stuff to do, but as a family, it's just a weird disconnected feeling. The girls obviously both finished elementary school in the same year last year, so it was like this huge culture shock to just be out of that world and into this new one. I totally feel you on feeling like there's just not enough time and missing it!

I'm also feeling a weird blah/stress vibe lately. I've had so many conflicting events and schedules and DD2 being sick that now I can't seem to get myself back on track and focused on work again. I'm super bogged down in projects but can't get myself to focus on any of them. I've also had a big realization about some past trauma with ExH that I'm trying to work through so I know that's throwing off my focus too. Thank god for therapy!

[sdlaura]

I’m not in the same place in terms of kids’ life stages…since even though DD has her elementary/6th grade promotion coming up in a few weeks, we have another 9 years of elementary school left 😬 DH will be 57 and I will be 52 when we’re done with elementary.

I was up from 4:30-5:30 am yesterday with a sick just-turned-4-year-old, and he still regularly poops in his night pull-up and we have to wipe his butt…and I have another two years of paying $1500 a month for preschool. If any of that makes you all feel better about having older kids! There are definitely pros and cons.

Tomorrow is my birthday and we decided on Monday to go out with two other couples - and both of them are having trouble finding a babysitter. I think our babysitter/a former au pair would probably agree to watch all 8 kids for a super high hourly rate, I don’t want to do that to her. While 6 of the 8 kids are between ages 10 and 12, the boys can be a handful. I really hope they don’t have to cancel for lack of babysitters.

[twinmomma]

sdlaura, All that is exactly why I tell our kids all the time that DH and I will not be having an "ours" baby. There is not a chance in hell I am starting over at this stage of our lives. (DH totally would in a heartbeat but he's clearly insane.  )
Power to you for managing your family! I couldn't do it but I am in awe every time I see you describe how you juggle everything. 

[sdlaura]

Ha twinmomma, I think the same about you and how you just finished grad school while working FT and managing 3 kids!

I’m really glad to have four, especially now that the physical challenges/sleepless nights and diapers are mostly behind us. But it doesn’t make for a relaxing life 🤣

[erbear]

I am so done with the parents in my current class 😭. Kids are great. Their parents are so much work. It’s a small group but man are they exhausting. Within minutes of sending home any communication, they’re on the phone or email “asking”’a million questions that are all essentially “this isn’t how I want this. Are you going to change it for me?”

Today, it’s rooms for the DC trip. We have done this the same way for 14 years. Kids choose 5 kids they want to be in a room with; we make sure at least one of them is with them. But no, mama needs her precious to be with exactly the three kids she wants. They aren’t comfortable with other kids. How about you teach your kids some resilience and that they don’t always get to engineer the perfect situation for them because it’s not always about them?

[waverly]

twinmomma, yeah I definitely think there will be a bit of a void next year. I've been trying to decide how I want to fill it if I want to join the local charity club, join a church, or just do more Yoga and other community events. I signed up for a mixology class which should be fun.

I enjoyed all of the volunteering that I did over the years because it was kind of a testament to now I am a person again and have time to volunteer where before DH traveled every week and I had 2 young children, so I didn't have the ability to do any volunteer work for a good 5 years and after that was pretty limited for another few years.

[waverly]

DH told me something yesterday that made everything make sense with my friend. Backstory: They iced us everyone out during the pandemic because we are all disease vectors, apologized, more things happened....

I was waiting to see how she would act after the apology, and it was just crickets. So anyway, I finally realize that she expected us to fall into our old communication habits which was a bit of DH hounding them and issuing last minute invitations, and because of that she no longer makes an effort because we are supposed to do all the work. I didn't realize she had that expectations that we do all the work until DH told me, so it was a moment of clarity. DH had been the main communicator because it was too difficult for me years ago.

Considering all that happened, unfortunately, we are no longer able to step into that role of doing all the work. The only reason all of this is even relevant is that occasionally she will throw a guilt trip our way, and I didn't understand why because obviously she didn't put in any effort. So I think now I realize that the guilt trip is her lashing out because she is realizing that we aren't going to make all the plans anymore.  

Also, feel free to disregard this as it is more of a dear diary post.  It was a bit of a revelation for me because I am currently working on communication coursework and trying to figure out communication styles.    

[mommyatty]

waverly- what an asshole. I think next time I got a guilt trip, I would respond with, “Oh! We are waiting for you to reciprocate. After Covid, we just have a family guideline that we don’t want to overstep or be pests, so we don’t reach out to socialize to people who don’t reach out to us or invite us to do stuff with them.”

We had former friends who were vocal in wanting to get together. Then I was talking to the other mom who also hosted these get together. She asked if we had ever been invited to these friends’ house. Nope. No one to this day has been to their house. F that. Friendship doesn’t mean one party plays cruise director for lazy passengers.

[waverly]

mommyatty, thanks for the support. I've been at the point for a while that I don't actually consider us friends anymore, so I am not too worried. I just didn't want to get random guilt trips about not seeing us if I am the only one that did anything in a year.

[k3am]

waverly, it took almost 2 YEARS before DH pointed out some issues with former BFF after she dropped the friendship with me. I'm not sure if he only realized it after 2 years or he only felt comfortable telling me after 2 years. Or maybe I just wasn't ready to hear it until 2 years. But it was such a strange sense of relief and closure. I hope you're experiencing some of that too.

[waverly]

k3am, oh yes, I definitely feel really calm and at peace about the situation.

Ironically she will text me random holiday stuff, so we aren't in the place of not talking, but IMO we have moved solidly into casual acquaintences. I generally respond with the "say hi and move on" method.

[dglvrk2]

Some of the best friendship "advice" I ever received: planning for things should be easy!

A friend of mine who is 2 or 3 years older than me told me this as we were giving her infant son a bath about 18 years ago. We were neighbors at the time and she invited me over for a drink, which turned into two or three drinks, which turned into me helping her get her kid ready for bed. We had been lamenting about a few mutual friends who could be really difficult when it came to planning brunches. (Yes, brunches. We were in our 20's and most of us were in DINK relationships , living in a biggish city with lots of brunch options. Oh the good days! I digress.)

She wasn't intentionally giving me advice, just commenting on our situation. Nevertheless, I'll never forget it and wish I had heard it earlier in life!

[waverly]

May 25, 2024 15:56:27 GMT -5 dglvrk2 said:

Some of the best friendship "advice" I ever received: planning for things should be easy!

A friend of mine who is 2 or 3 years older than me told me this as we were giving her infant son a bath about 18 years ago. We were neighbors at the time and she invited me over for a drink, which turned into two or three drinks, which turned into me helping her get her kid ready for bed. We had been lamenting about a few mutual friends who could be really difficult when it came to planning brunches. (Yes, brunches. We were in our 20's and most of us were in DINK relationships , living in a biggish city with lots of brunch options. Oh the good days! I digress.)

She wasn't intentionally giving me advice, just commenting on our situation. Nevertheless, I'll never forget it and wish I had heard it earlier in life!

Oh for sure. I guess they were easy at first and then she stopped making an effort and DH stepped up because I couldn’t deal with it. He most likely artificially extended the friendship by a lot of years. I was trying to think what changed and all I can think of is stressors on their lives. I’ve been more graceful than needed because of that. I think they’ll always be stressed though (can’t go into reason on the forum) and we just want to have fun so it isn’t a good fit.

[dglvrk2]

waverly, I have quietly quit a few friendships for this very reason: they're always stressed and I want more fun. There were imbalances of emotional support and enjoyment, so...

[dglvrk2]

On another note, my Instagram is flooded with ads for couch covers. They look super easy to put on and cute... But I'm sure there's a catch. Has anyone purchased these?
We have a 15-year-old Ikea couch in our loft. Our loft is our home office/tv room. It's not super public so I'm not really concerned about keeping the furniture in this room updates, but this couch could use some new covers...

[k3am]

May 27, 2024 11:32:33 GMT -5 dglvrk2 said:

On another note, my Instagram is flooded with ads for couch covers. They look super easy to put on and cute... But I'm sure there's a catch. Has anyone purchased these?
We have a 15-year-old Ikea couch in our loft. Our loft is our home office/tv room. It's not super public so I'm not really concerned about keeping the furniture in this room updates, but this couch could use some new covers...

Every time you sit on them, you’ll need to readjust them. They never stay nice. That’s the catch.

[k3am]

DDOT: We have to figure out how to get my dad out of his decorative box and into a biodegrable urn. He died when I was 7, so not emotional. Mom has kept him in a box in the closet since he died, but we sold the house and my sister doesn’t want him. So we’re going to make an honest woman out of my grandma who wrote in the family bible that he was buried at sea. His wishes were to be flushed down the toilet - I’m assuming she didn’t want to write that. 😬

I’ve been googling. I’m hopeful there’s a bag inside the box and the transfer is relatively easy. There’s not enough wine in one bottle to deal with this.