Wednesday Open Letters

[twinmomma]

I can't believe it's already Wednesday! Short weeks mess with my brain!

[twinmomma]

Dear WPs,
Is it weird that I kind of want to change my last name at this point? LOL It's almost our one year anniversary, and I kind of want to hyphenate my name, even though it would be a hot mess of a name to spell out for people. I just feel like I want that connection to DH. But it feels silly to do it a year after we got married.
Signed,
Indecisive

Dear MIL,
We appreciate your offer to pay for us to spend Christmas overseas with SIL's family. It's beyond generous. But we cannot just go ahead and book things right now. We have to negotiate dates and schedules with coparents. Our kids are not just our own when it comes to deciding schedules. It's complicated. We will let you know the dates we have locked in, when we lock them in.
Signed,
DIL

Dear DH's Ex,
You better agree to these dates for our overseas trip. You pull enough bullshit with schedule changes and travel on your end, give us this one trip. We have never asked for extra time for a trip. We always plan our family vacations within the confines of our custody days, even if that means we cut it shorter than we'd like. You want to make swaps constantly based on your travel. If you put up a fight over this, it's going to get ugly.
Signed,
The new wife

[macmars45]

twinmomma short weeks mess with my brain too. Yesterday my supervisor was emailing our team about what we needed to do Tuesday-Thursday and I was so confused about why she left Monday out of the planning. (face palm)

[dglvrk2]

twinmomma, I totally get your desire to change names. Your reasoning is valid IMHO. Go for it!

FWIW, one of my dear friends is a recognizable reporter for a major news source in our state. She's "professionally known as" first name and maiden name. However, legally, her last name is her husband's.... She said it is very manageable. She also didn't legally change her last name until a few years after they were married.

[waverly]

Dear DH,

I'm sorry but I cannot stay for the family meeting (kid meeting?) that you called 1 minute before I was supposed to leave for work. I am sure you can handle whatever you wanted to tell the kids on your own.

P.S. we could have done this last night.

Signed Wife

Dear Boss,

Your plan to take a peron away from my department and let the chips fall where they may is a terrible one. I have anxiety and resentment about this "plan". And I don't think you have taken any of the steps that you promised to take when you made me agree to this terrible plan.

I also have no idea what you want to do with my employee that asked to go full time. And now 2 of us are on vacation at the same time leaving only the person who has been working there for 6 weeks. So, yeah, I guess we won't get work done and that is cool? I'm going to start cutting things that we do if you won't take action. I get we don't want a ton of downtime but this is coming at the busiest season for us, so my other department isn't going to be able to help like they could have if it were fall/ winter.

Signed,
Cranky employee

[supertrooper1]

twinmomma, it's not weird at all and if you want to change your name, do it!

I'm almost a year and a half past my divorce and I'm still working on changing everything. I have updated my DL, SSN and some other random things, but still haven't done my bank account yet. I want to change it at work, but it will take months and is a PITA in some of our software.

Dear temporary supervisor,

It was fine that I covered for you on your day off. But I don't need to "see" how supervisor meetings run or what it is like to be a supervisor. I know you still have this image that I'm a newer employee because I'm younger than you, but I have been with the government 10 years longer than you have. I do not have ANY desire to be a manager. So in the future, please use your volunteers to cover for you instead of me.

Signed,

Happy to be a regular worker bee

[186momx]

Dear Mom
Please just bite your tongue and follow DD's wishes regarding her birthday. You are both being stubborn, and I'm stuck in the middle. As of right now I'm ready to cancel our family dinner celebration. Both of my siblings are in agreement.
Eldest Daughter

Dear DD
You aren't going to change grandma. I'll take you out for dinner on Monday for your birthday to wherever you would like to go.
Mom who is trying to be Switzerland

twinmomma, I hope DS's mom let you go and doesn't give your DH a bunch of crap about time. If she does I would 100% stop accommodating her.

[rere]

Dear Wp,

Well I'm officially freaking out. I had my mammogram today and have to go back for an ultrasound. I've been down this road before and it turned out fine, but will I be so lucky. It just seems almost inevitable that it's one day not going to be good. Several people my age have been diagnosed recently. My ultrasound isn't until Monday.

Signed, Monday seems forever

[k3am]

rere, waiting is awful. Fingers crossed for boring results.

Dear WP,

We're finally making progress with this first floor renovation we're planning and I'm scared.

Signed,
Ready to be done already

PS: By "making progress" I mean our plans are almost permit ready. Then we'll need to find a contractor and finish picking everything out. And hope we come anywhere near our revised budget, since we blew past the first one super fast.

[mae0111]

Dear Pool Guy -

We booked you and put down a deposit for a replacement liner in September 2023. We did this so that we would be at the top of the list, and we would be done and open before Memorial Day. A couple of weeks ago, you promised that the pool would be running by Memorial Day. We have that in writing.

It's now after Memorial Day, and it doesn't look like we're a heck of a lot closer to a completed pool than we were a few weeks ago. Liner has been in and sitting there, pool is 1/2 full of water, but it's filthy and unusable and you never fixed the lights or cut any holes for the blowers or filter or lights.

There has been no big issue to delay this project. Nothing unexpected. No bad weather. Just your people being extremely slow. While I would very much like to just start deducting money from the total for every day that this drags on, DH is against that. So he will be cranky, and I will be cranky, and you will continue to be slow. And when it's all done, I will tell all of social media exactly how this project went.

Signed,
Wish we could have used our regular pool guy, but he didn't think he could do the job well...

[mommyatty]

Dear Cats,

Why do you stand at the bathroom door and cry every time I use the bathroom? You don’t do this to anyone else in the family. Honestly, you do not want to be in here with me. Do you think I’m eating the treats we keep in the bathroom drawer or something?

Signed,
Not a Party “Pooper”

Dear WP,

For the record, it’s not so weird the cat treats are in the bathroom drawer, I swear. This is our downstairs “spare” bathroom, and we have one of our cats’ feeders and litter boxes in here. It’s where they get medicine, so pulling treats out of the drawer is efficient.

Signed,
Cat Lady

[waverly]

Dear DS,

I understand that you would prefer to not do any tasks that require work. Unfortunately that is not how life works. I am also aware that you dislike writing. Texting doesn't come naturally to you and you are a slow adapter from the days of ringing the doorbell. I was a slow adapter to texting also.

I don't appreciate you lying to me repeatedly when I ask you about texting your friends. Unfortunately, hiding in your house and waiting for your friends to contact you is not a good habit. Learning how to set up plans is a life skill that you need to practice which is why we are doing a "summer curriculum" on how to text to set up plans. (DS benefits from direct instruction rather than learning through osmosis/ picking it up.)

We did have a good discussion about what you do want to do and what you don't want to do. For example, you don't want to walk home from school because you hate McDonalds and the dollar store. I get it- they aren't the greatest. But if you do not want to do what your friends are doing then you need to invite them to do something that you want to do.

If you stop fighting me and being stubborn then you can learn how to cultivate the social life that you want and respond appropriately to other's invitations. Now you have flag football set up for Friday (fingers crossed), and it was not that difficult. You can do this! Most of your friends are kind and receptive, and you do have friends, so you have no reason to worry.

Signed,
Mom who won't let you molder in the basement with no social skills

P.S. I am told that social skills classes run by adults are not useful because they don't actually address real life situations in the moment. This is my way of addressing real life situations in the moment, but honestly it would be easier if someone like the tutor did it and not MOM.  

[186momx]

Dear DD
Wow I can't believe you made choux pastry last night and got it right on the 1st try. I also am shocked at how well your whipped cream turned out. The cream puffs are amazing and I can't wait to eat one when I get home from work.
Love Mom

Dear Who Ever
Why can't I find a class or camp or anything for my aspiring teen chef. Cooking camps are how to use a knife, boil water to make mac & cheese, etc. Classes are for adults only or seniors only.
My kid is now passed my culinary expertise and YouTube and watching cooking shows on repeat can only teach her so much
Me

waverly, DD really likes to voice text her text messages. I can always tell when she types vs voices it because I get more than 1 word messages.

[waverly]

186momx , I'll have to ask him if that helps. Not sure he ever tried it. I think he is just generally a passive person in some areas. I'm assuming this is part of the EF delays (task initiaton?). Worried that they are busy because everyone is. When the neighbors used the ring the doorbell it again was them doing it about 75% of the time. He was just very much like well they will come to me and if they don't I'll play video games. Sometimes the video games are with friends, but he needs to interact with them in person especially in the summer when he doesn't have camp or school. He has about 4-5 weeks without much going on. So basically I am just asking him to text 1 person a week when he doesn't have camp. So basically send 5 texts all summer/ set up 5 hang outs. I don't think that is too much to ask in 10 weeks.  I don't think he knows what to say or the cadence of the conversation when setting up plans.  In group texts he mostly lurks and occasionally will say something.  

I need to do this also.  I have 2 friends that I need to circle back to but everything has been so whirlwind that I can't catch my breath.  

[erbear]

May 30, 2024 15:10:25 GMT -5 186momx said:

Dear DD
Wow I can't believe you made choux pastry last night and got it right on the 1st try. I also am shocked at how well your whipped cream turned out. The cream puffs are amazing and I can't wait to eat one when I get home from work.
Love Mom

Dear Who Ever
Why can't I find a class or camp or anything for my aspiring teen chef. Cooking camps are how to use a knife, boil water to make mac & cheese, etc. Classes are for adults only or seniors only.
My kid is now passed my culinary expertise and YouTube and watching cooking shows on repeat can only teach her so much
Me

waverly , DD really likes to voice text her text messages. I can always tell when she types vs voices it because I get more than 1 word messages.

Do you have a Sur La Table near you? They have some summer cooking and baking that look like they are real skills and geared to teens. I was going to sign my 13 y/o up.

[186momx]

erbear, damn the closest one is Kirland Washington 300 miles away. She might like the online video guides though. Thanks!

waverly, I forced DD into making plans last year to meet up for the free lunches or at the park and it bit me in the butt. Her friends all said yes and then bailed on her and she was stuck waiting alone. Now she won't make plans and just assumes either everyone is busy or won't show. I'm going to try and get her to just do an open invite and not care if anyone shows this year. "I'm going to rec swim at XYZ from 1-3 on Monday if anyone wants to join me" and then just leave it and be okay if no one takes her up on an offer to meet up. Her friends all have at least one parent that is a district employee so are off during the summer which is why I think sometimes her friends stand her up because the parents decide no, we are going to do X instead last minute.

[dglvrk2]

waverly, kiddos for using this as a teachable moment, especially since you know your DS wants to cultivate friendships

Dear DD2,
I feel I've been short with you lately and I wish I had more patience. AAANNNNDDD when I say to do something menial and timely like brush your teeth after you eat breakfast or put your lunch box on the counter when you get home from school, I'm really not in the mood to argue about how you normally do these things after you watch a show or 3 minutes later than I asked you to...

I'm done with pedantics.

UR Mom

[xctsclrx]

Dear WP,

I passed my PMP! I'm officially done pursuing certifications and degrees for the year. I think I have one more cert I need to get eventually but I'm taking a break


Signed

Relieved

[mae0111]

xctsclrx, congratulations!!!

[waverly]

May 30, 2024 16:44:44 GMT -5 186momx said:

erbear , damn the closest one is Kirland Washington 300 miles away. She might like the online video guides though. Thanks!

waverly , I forced DD into making plans last year to meet up for the free lunches or at the park and it bit me in the butt. Her friends all said yes and then bailed on her and she was stuck waiting alone. Now she won't make plans and just assumes either everyone is busy or won't show. I'm going to try and get her to just do an open invite and not care if anyone shows this year. "I'm going to rec swim at XYZ from 1-3 on Monday if anyone wants to join me" and then just leave it and be okay if no one takes her up on an offer to meet up. Her friends all have at least one parent that is a district employee so are off during the summer which is why I think sometimes her friends stand her up because the parents decide no, we are going to do X instead last minute.

I've only been to 1 free lunch program, so this might be #regional, but it wasn't my understanding of a tween hang out.  Girls are more into Starbucks here (rolls eyes). 

Did she confirm with them before she left the house?  I'm kind of going through the stages of the conversation with DS (which seems to be more work than he expected) and confirming once or twice seems to be the norm nowadays with cell phones.  That way at least she isn't being stood up or waiting on them.  Kids are coming to our house, so at least if no one shows he didn't leave the house.  

It is super rude of the parents to blow off their kids plans and not have the kid text though.  Standing someone up is the epitomy of rudeness.  I've told DS to expect rejection. There will be people saying no just due to the schedule and that number will be probably pretty high 20-50% maybe.  

ETA- I should add I think I am doing this more at this point for the parts of the conversation as opposed to actually seeing his friends.  Even if he doesn't see his friends (which if he did would be awesome), he has still learned how to initiate the text, be specific about the time, keep the conversation moving, and confirm plans.  1 friend showed up early, so lets see if the other one shows up lol.