It feels nice having one less thing to worry about.

Otherwise I’ve been working at my Resolutions this year. They are blissfully simple.

1. Reduce
2. Relax

Bam. That’s how you do it.

While Andy is away, I’ve been paring down on absolutely everything. Goodwill has received multiple loads worth of donations and I have a bunch more on my porch waiting to go.

We’ve always had the habit of accepting items from people, especially furniture, and all of this has just accumulated. Plus we both believe in the power of “I might need that later… so let’s put it here just in case”. But all this really leads to is a house full of things that we don’t necessarily want or need. So I’m getting rid of lots of it before he gets back. Less stuff to move, organize, and keep clean.

Simplifying things.

It’s already made a huge difference in the way the house looks. Nobody needs as many end tables as we owned! Also I purged our entire VHS collection since my VCR/DVD player is having some weird electrical problems. The buttons are glitchy so that any button you press, it thinks you want it to PLAY! Using the remote, it acts as it should but for some reason it likes to ignore the VCR side. Mostly it was a pain in the neck and almost all of our tapes I’d gotten second hand, so I’d rather save the space and stress by donating them all.

I also got a bunch of document boxes and finally brought some much needed structure to my office. It houses all my various crafting projects as well as all the household paperwork and computer things, so the order is SUCH an improvement. I feel ready to start sewing some skirts already.

Cleaning and organizing is so invigorating, especially when you are having moments where it seems like everything else is going haywire. Organized house means an organized mind.

Next up? The car and the garage. Both of which… require extreme attention. Until then, however, I’m going to work on my second resolution by taking a nap and then playing legos with the kidlets.

But I keep thinking about how bogged down I am already and I really don’t want to risk killing my GPA by taking on more than I can handle. I’m not sure what my brain can take these days.

Sometimes just getting through the day is difficult. All the constant repetition of tasks and then the endless chatter from two small children, charming as they are, is flaying my nerves and my sanity. It hasn’t even been a year yet.

Deployments blow.

Sometimes I’m not sure who it’s worse for, Andy off away from us or me stuck at home. Sure he’s in a more hostile work environment but I get to clean spaghetti sauce off the carpet every day and take care of the dog and the kids. And, you know. Some days I’d like someone to give me a hard hat and tell me to go do something task-like that I can accomplish that will STAY ACCOMPLISHED. Because that momentary YAY I GOT ALL THE DISHES CLEANED AND PUT AWAY! AND THE LAUNDRY!

DON’T FUCKING DROP A THING ON YOUR CLOTHES! WHY ARE THERE CRUMBS, I JUST VACUUMED? And then I go sit in the bathtub or knit crazily in the corner.

Domestic life is a nightmare. It really is.

At least, it is when you don’t ever get a break.

I’m turning into an insomniac since after their bedtime is the only time I get to myself and even then I usually spend it putting clothes in the wash. Tumblr is my refuge.

And all of my plans for this year regarding living arrangements? I keep throwing them into this mental box labelled SHIT TO DEAL WITH LATER. Mostly because I have no idea how any of this is supposed to work out but since I’m the one who has to magically solve these things I keep telling myself that everything can be handled really swiftly… later. Not now. Later.

The box is busting at the seams.

And I think the worst thing of all is that I keep trying to come up with ways to make things easier.

One notable option is to find a new home for our dog, Kayla. She’s a pitbull/lab mix and a loving family dog. Jas and Cody have grown up around her while Andy is absolutely enamored with her. Not being a dog person, I provide all the necessary care but our relationship is strictly business. I’m the alpha and source of life requirements, things are good as long as she doesn’t lick me.

But as she’s considered a ‘dangerous breed’ finding a rental house is kind of impossible.

All these big challenges stand in the way of family togetherness. And I feel like a bit like Don Quixote fighting windmills. Certainly everyone I tell my problems to looks at me that way. No one has any suggestions because it all looks rather impossible, but no way in hell am I staying up here once he comes back. We’re moving no matter what. Fiery credit score dragons be damned.

So many things to configure, so little brainpower. I feel like if I could get 36 hours of peace and quiet I would be able to derust the sword and make some headway but that just isn’t possible these days.

While I do have some family help, both people have their limitations. For one, handling both kids for more than three hours is too much and the other person feels the need to call every half hour to report on whatever the fuck is on his mind while he fills the children with ice cream and soda. So that after he’s given me a few hours to myself I get to attempt to wrangle sugar-drenched rugrats. Yay! I should have just locked myself in the bathroom and turned on Dora the Explora which is so damned glitchy on Netflix Instant that it is ridiculous and doesn’t work half the time anyway, why am I paying for this? For fucks sake.

Just dammit all.

Anyway, if you need me I’ll be wandering around the grocery store pushing one of those carts with a car attached to the front because it’s the easiest way I’ve found to amuse both kidlets in the winter. That is, after they wake up. Give or take two hours.

Erin’s advice for 2012: don’t have children, don’t buy a house, don’t own pets, don’t let thy spouse join the military, and for goodness sakes please pray for those of us that do.

we’ve reached the apex
anticipation and hope
a rollercoaster

I really love St Louis. It always kind of surprises me when I visit, but I really enjoy that city so much. It’s exciting and peaceful with so many things to do.

To celebrate the kidlets birthdays we visited for a few days and I think my favorite spot was right outside the St Louis Art Museum, just past the plaza right on the grass in front of the whole park. It was simply beautiful.

I sat there enjoying the view while the kids rolled, tumbled, ran, and stumbled all over the hill. And while Cody did the Leo Strut. He does this all the time and it cracks me up on so many levels.

It’s easy to feel so small with the sky and gentle hills all around you. Not to mention that the weather was really beautiful considering that it was early December. Things to be thankful for.

We visited a few other places too: the St Louis Zoo, Laumeier Sculpture Park, and the World Bird Sanctuary. I wanted to check out a bunch of other places too (Museum of Contemporary Religious Art, the Missouri History Museum, and CityGarden) but I didn’t think the kids could handle it quite yet. When they get older. I also thought about stopping in the Science Museum since it was such a big hit when we visited two years ago, but we ran out of time.

Definitely one of the best cities to vacation in if you are on a small budget since there are so many activities with free admission.

I also started teaching Jas to use the Nikon (with much trepidation, to be sure) to some fun results. She already loves taking pictures with my Canon and has cracked it a bit on one side, so now my trusty point and shoot is mostly down for the count. Sometimes it acknowledges the full battery, sometimes it doesn’t. But still worth it for some of her hilarious shots.

But the best pictures of the whole trip happened shortly after we left the Art Museum because Cody was having himself a conniption fit. Which I turned into an animation, because lemons and lemonade, amiright? You may have to refresh, since I only set it to loop a few times.

Plus this shot which I’m getting a copy of so that when I rejoin the workforce I have a picture to look at on sad days:

Anyway, a good time was had by all except for those times when it really, really wasn’t. But life is like that. Family shot for November 2011:

To me, starting a New Year means getting life in order and purging like crazy. My office is about to be ravaged, ransacked, and rankled. That wooden box holding papers that need to be filed… will be handled. The staggering amount of “practice fabric” will be USED or DONATED because for fucks sake, this is ridiculous.

I’ll be rehoming the roll-top desk and metal file cabinet, as neither system really works with my organizing style. Either I’ll be building, buying, or rehabbing furniture so that I have a bookcase/cubby situation going on where I can use smaller boxes and an organization more conducive to my “Monkey See, Monkey Do” mentality. Like this only affordable or this except made of wood rather than particleboard.

And I’ll be paring down my paperwork immensely.

First step: packing up the Christmas tree. Tomorrow, let the games begin.

But since the semester is over I don’t have access to Adobe Premiere so my changes will have to wait until Spring semester. Mehhhh. Anyway, enjoy!

Not sure what the movement is about? This is the best summary I’ve seen, written by the Occupy New York movement and submitted to the NY General Assembly. Copies available online by emailing c2anycga@gmail.com. I’m reposting it from this tumblr post. I bolded the parts I find most important, although all points are valid and worthy of further investigation and action by our Congress.

Declaration of the Occupation of New York City

This document was accepted by the NYC General Assembly on September 29, 2011

As we gather together in solidarity to express a feeling of mass injustice, we must not lose sight of what brought us together. We write so that all people who feel wronged by the corporate forces of the world can know that we are your allies.

As one people, united, we acknowledge the reality: that the future of the human race requires the cooperation of its members; that our system must protect our rights, and upon corruption of that system, it is up to the individuals to protect their own rights, and those of their neighbors; that a democratic government derives its just power from the people, but corporations do not seek consent to extract wealth from the people and the Earth; and that no true democracy is attainable when the process is determined by economic power. We come to you at a time when corporations, which place profit over people, self-interest over justice, and oppression over equality, run our governments. We have peaceably assembled here, as is our right, to let these facts be known.

1. They have taken our houses through an illegal foreclosure process, despite not having the original mortgage.
2. They have taken bailouts from taxpayers with impunity, and continue to give Executives exorbitant bonuses.
3. They have perpetuated inequality and discrimination in the workplace based on age, the color of one’s skin, sex, gender identity and sexual orientation.
4. They have poisoned the food supply through negligence, and undermined the farming system through monopolization.
5. They have profited off of the torture, confinement, and cruel treatment of countless animals, and actively hide these practices.
6. They have continuously sought to strip employees of the right to negotiate for better pay and safer working conditions.
7. They have held students hostage with tens of thousands of dollars of debt on education, which is itself a human right.
8. They have consistently outsourced labor and used that outsourcing as leverage to cut workers’ healthcare and pay.
9. They have influenced the courts to achieve the same rights as people, with none of the culpability or responsibility.
10. They have spent millions of dollars on legal teams that look for ways to get them out of contracts in regards to health insurance.
11. They have sold our privacy as a commodity.
12. They have used the military and police force to prevent freedom of the press.
13. They have deliberately declined to recall faulty products endangering lives in pursuit of profit.
14. They determine economic policy, despite the catastrophic failures their policies have produced and continue to produce.
15. They have donated large sums of money to politicians, who are responsible for regulating them.
16. They continue to block alternate forms of energy to keep us dependent on oil.
17. They continue to block generic forms of medicine that could save people’s lives or provide relief in order to protect investments that have already turned a substantial profit.
18. They have purposely covered up oil spills, accidents, faulty bookkeeping, and inactive ingredients in pursuit of profit.
19. They purposefully keep people misinformed and fearful through their control of the media.
20. They have accepted private contracts to murder prisoners even when presented with serious doubts about their guilt.
21. They have perpetuated colonialism at home and abroad.
22. They have participated in the torture and murder of innocent civilians overseas.
23. They continue to create weapons of mass destruction in order to receive government contracts.*

To the people of the world,

We, the New York City General Assembly occupying Wall Street in Liberty Square, urge you to assert your power.

Exercise your right to peaceably assemble; occupy public space; create a process to address the problems we face, and generate solutions accessible to everyone.

To all communities that take action and form groups in the spirit of direct democracy, we offer support, documentation, and all of the resources at our disposal.

Join us and make your voices heard!

*These grievances are not all-inclusive.

Some great sources of news: the Guardian (Why do we get better reporting from the UK…? Oh right. And look, a whole section!), This Is Why We Are Protesting – tumblr (links to different articles and pictures from actual protestors as well as links to various supporting petititons), Occupy All The Things – a tumblr (tons of graphics), Think Progress – official site & Think Progress – a tumblr, and Mother Jones

Police have been attacking protestors at schools, parks, and locations all across the nation. Protestors who have been passive and nonviolent. Where is Obama defending their right to protest peacefully? He defended the rights for Egyptians and has fallen silent while students are peppersprayed on their own campus (1, 2, 3, 4).

And darling Michelle Obama, champion of revolutionizing school lunches. Where are you? You should be condemning Congress for deciding that two tablespoons worth of tomato sauce makes pizza a vegetable (1, 2, 3, 4). This is your pet project and they are shitting on it at your doorstep. Hold a press conference, shame, scold, and kick up a fuss about this. It isn’t right.

And don’t even get me started on where all those military cuts will likely be coming from. Because Congress sure as fuck wouldn’t want for us to withdraw our forces from other countries and close some bases. There’s terrorists about! Teh muslims! Instead co-pays will go up for Veterans, survivors benefits and programs that help military families will be slashed, and I’m not even making this up (1, 2, 3). I agree, we need to reduce the amount we spent on military by a TON. We need to do it by bringing our forces home and closing some foreign bases, not denying benefits from contracts signed with our enlisted soldiers.

There are so many things going wrong in this country. We need to work together to take it back.

Kayla [the pirate dog] expressed concern for the duration of the exercises. And for some reason felt the need to rub up against me as I was trying to do lunges. Balance was compromised.

And I don’t know where both of Andy’s 5lb hand weights are so I used two cans of corn. Same difference. Sort of.

Erin is tired. And going to bed. And if twitter had been working, I probably wouldn’t have been on tumblr for an hour because I just would have tweeted about this and been done with it. But no.

This is twitters fault.

Or the insomnia.

My cousin restrung my violin for me. So now I want to pop on youtube and start playing. But just this morning I made an important discovery. Cody can now vault out of the crib and land safely, although clumsily on the floor. So… probably not going to play tonight.

I had to carry him to bed three times. And now I’m paranoid that he’ll hurt himself trying to escape in the dark.

Also a recent development, he likes to take off his diaper and sling it across the room. Regardless of contents.

So between the bedwetting and diaper launching, it’s like a bodily fluid nightmare over here.

I’m done with them, for the most part. They can start up next year. My apathy seems a bit misplaced since everyone else is amping up for them but that’s just how things are. I plan on making christmas cards, sending them out, and calling it a season. We’ll also get the tree out and decorate it.

But buying presents? Andy always did that. I never really did. I’d give him suggestions for certain people but then he’d peel out of the driveway to a destination and return home with a look on his face like don’t ask how much all this costs because I had to do it for the holidays. Pavlov hit him hard.

So… the local family is in for a rude awakening. I’m saving all that money to pay for my daycare so I can afford to go to school this spring. Suck it. I have to anty up $3k. So no, I’m not buying you something. Enjoy this homemade card.

I’m not sure the best way to explain that to the in-laws. Maybe I should just send an email. Please don’t buy Erin anything because I sure am not buying anything for you. After a certain age though, what is the point of buying presents? They can purchase everything they want and need. Why buy them something? This isn’t the 1800s.

See? This is why Andy does the Christmas shopping.

I guess this anti-gifting apathy can be attributed to my dad. I remember we’d always ply him with questions asking what he wanted for his birthday or fathers day or Christmas and he always responded that he had everything he needed. To me, a gift equates a need. None of my local family needs anything. Except maybe exercise. Me too, while we’re at it. But I’ve found it impossible to giftwrap a verb or action. Whenever science figures it out, that’s something I’d buy.