...you guys knew I didn't mean my actual period, didn't you? I'm referring to how I'm down to posting approximately once a month.

Jokey jokey. Heh.

Tough crowd.

Anyway...

I know I suck at keeping up with you all and it has nothing to do with lack of interest. Mostly it has to do with the chaotic turn my life has taken of late. The situation with Zoe's teacher seems to be better now that she's been put into another class for half of the day, but the time that she's in with the 'regular' teacher seems to be less productive than I'd like too. I honestly don't think this lady gets Zoe. I keep receiving notes from her on Zoe's work about how she 'repeated the question but didn't answer it'. Duh. She's a mostly non-verbal, and the teacher has been made aware of that. You have to rephrase the question a couple of times. Not always, but there are times when that's what's necessary for getting an answer out of her. Zoe hasn't scratched or bitten her in awhile, so that's great, but I remain concerned about her grades because I don't think this teacher is as patient as she needs to be. I've seen her with the other students and she's just plain awesome with them, so perhaps she just isn't comfortable dealing with autistics. Tough shit. I'm sure Zoe isn't exactly comfortable being autistic, either. Doesn't mean she's not willing to put forth the extra effort to understand the work and get it done.

Speaking of Zoe...

She gave us a terrible scare a few days ago. She had an asthma attack of titanic proportions. We had to take her to the ER and she was admitted to the hospital, where she spent two days. Sucked very much bad. By the time we got her back to triage she was turning blue, which then became grey as they got her breathing more under control. By then her pores were wide open from the struggle and she had a rather pitiful case of the shivers. Once the steroids kicked in she got better quickly but her dad and I are still a little shaky from the experience.

It turned out to be the week from hell. Zoe was hospitalized with the worst asthma attack she's ever had, I ended up with a sinus infection so severe it mimicked bronchitis and my PS3 went all nuts and now won't read the game discs. Yeah. Just a couple of weeks before the Game Of the Year edition of Fallout 3 was due to be released. John and I had an agreement that if he scores me a copy of the GOTY edition (which has all of the add-ons and various patches to cover the glitches) I'd give him my copy of the standard game and he could either sell it or keep it to use on his own PS3. It hardly matters now. I'm having some pretty wicked detox. When I said in my last entry that Fallout 3 was all that was keeping me sane, I wasn't kidding. I barely get out of the house and a girl has to have some kind of outlet, you know? Having it repaired via Sony will cost close to $200 that we now do not have because we had to pay almost $900 to get our water system fixed. We had planned to go away this weekend but that's not going to happen. We'll go out for a little while on Saturday and have to be content with that. We had hoped to do something a little more special for our tenth anniversary, but I guess it will have to wait. Life in The Money Pit continues.

Things aren't all bad, though. Yesterday I learned that Obama has made autism research a priority and will be putting lots of money into it. Not only did W not do this, he actually took money away from autism research. I guess our disabled children aren't nearly as important as funding his two bogus wars and protecting his precious oil interests. I hope he gets incurable jock itch. Anyway, as part of Obama's health care plan, insurance companies will no longer have the luxury of refusing people with disabilities coverage based on their 'pre-exisiting' conditions, which means a lot more people with autism will get the coverage, care and therapy they so desperately need. Also, insurance companies will have to leave the door open for the families of autistics to get counseling if they need it. We don't have to take it, but it won't be denied if we want it, which is a great blessing, considering the immeasurable stress we face every day. Now we at least have hope that a breakthrough is on the way. I don't expect a complete cure, but maybe some type of therapy that helps autistics communicate more clearly (or at all), or even prevention of future cases...either would be wonderful. There has to be a reason why autism is epidemic now and I had long ago lost hope of seeing any kind of answer regarding why in my lifetime. But now it looks as if it may happen. Granted, funding doesn't guarantee results, but it sure ups the possibility, no?

So yeah, loving Uncle Rocky pretty intensely right now. In fact, if at all possible I'd kiss him full on the lips as a thank you - and I wouldn't even care if Larry was watching.

Don't get all excited. It's not as kinky as it sounds.

I guess now things can start looking up. We have water, we have a baby girl who's feeling much better and we still have a day out to look forward to.

Also, I think John can be talked into letting me borrow his PS3 again.

What's not to like?

I'd love to say that we went to lots of great places, got some pretty pictures and had the time of our lives, but...

We didn't. The summer was severely divided between making sure the babies got to their summer program and trying to keep my sanity until real school started. At some point early on (before starting the summer program), Zoe developed a fascination with babies. She'd go onto YouTube and watch videos of cute, smiling babies eating and cooing, and just be utterly enthralled by it. Then for reasons I don't know or understand she decided she likes it when they cry, so for the last two months I have been subjected to a daily barrage of screaming, shrieking little monsters blasting forth with great gusto from the speakers of the PC in our living room. Having her turn down the volume is only a short term solution. Two minutes later it's back up to deafening levels and if there's one thing that will make a person crazy, it's hearing babies shriek all day. There's one in particular named Summer (I'm not linking that here because then I'd have to hear it again and frankly I'd rather have to walk on my boobs than do so) whose parents have filmed her in various states of agitation and thoughtfully shared their footage via YT. This kid has the most screechy, agonizingly unpleasant tone to her cry of any baby I have ever heard. I have developed an intense dislike for the little bundle of noise and I don't even know her. There's a 3-4 minute video montage of her greatest hits polluting cyber right now, and if I knew where to find them, I swear I'd lobby for forced sterilization for both of Summer's parents.

Meanwhile, Trent was becoming interested in informercials, which is all he wanted to watch all summer. Well, that and Scooby Doo, which I quite enjoy and always have. His hero is Billy Mays. Oops. I don't have the heart to tell him Billy's annoying the unititiated in informercial heaven right now. Billy checked out approximately a week or so before Trent discovered him. Gone, but not forgotten, as they say. I'd love to forget the guy but my son won't allow it. He has designated the living room the 'Billy Mays Informercial Room' and like Zoe, he has difficulty keeping the volume on the PC down to a merely painful level.

But it gets better...

I've had to hide both the house phones and my cellphone because he keeps trying to call and order the stuff he sees on the informercials. I have caught him navigating the menu a couple of times and once actually caught him speaking with a CS person.

He also managed to hack my Amazon account. I'm not 100% sure how, but I think it may just be that he was in the room once when I typed in my password and it was easy for him to memorize it. Photographic memory. Heh.

Anyway, I've had to change my password (and now I have trouble remembering it because I was so used to the other one), but did so too late to stop my son from ordering $25 dollars worth of Scooby Doo downloads. One was a rental. The rest was an entire season.

He has also taken my credit card and attempted to use it via phone. Thank the Gods, I managed to catch him before the call got through. So now I have to keep my purse in a padlocked box as well.

My babies have also fallen in love with Numa Numa, so I have heard every variation *including the Chipmunks* all summer.

By the time we had back to school night I was ready to just let them spend the weekend at the school. Early start and all that.

This summer I have had more times of inability to sleep due to terror and anxiety than I have ever had in my life. I'd try to sleep but images would play in my mind of the children having miserable lives as adults and being completely unprotected without us and it would take me hours to fall alseep. The quality of sleep was much worse than usual too. This seems to be tapering off, though.

If not for Fallout 3 I'd have completely lost my mind. Thank you, Bethesda Softworks. Best. Video Game. EVER.

So now they're back in school and all was going well for the first two days, until Zoe came home from school yesterday afternoon with a note that said she was to leave her stuffed animals at home. I've been letting her take her plushies with her everywhere she goes for years because it seems to help her feel more secure to have some of her favorite things close by. I do not like this, nor do I agree with it so I wrote Zoe's assistant a note last night.

This morning as I was walking the babies to the bus I let her carry her Piggy, which I intended to put into her backpack, thinking she'd feel better if she knew it was there. The bus driver told me she had been told by the teacher that she was NOT to get on the bus with anything other than her school stuff. When I took Piggy away Zoe looked as if I'd just punched her in the stomach. I've been on the verge of tears ever since. I decided not to wait to hear from Zoe's assistant and called her teacher myself this morning as soon as the bus left. According to Mrs. R, Zoe is completely engaged during class and didn't ask for her Piggy once for two entire days. She also said that they (I'm guessing in this case 'they' means her and the admin staff) thought it was time to wean her off of her security plushies.

Really now? You decided? And no one thought that perhaps Larry and I - you know, her PARENTS - should be consulted? No asking, no discussion, just this is the way it is?

The school has always been very accommodating and understanding in regard to my children and other children with issues. One little girl was allowed to attend class in her pajamas for the first two weeks of school until she felt secure enough to wear her regualr clothes. Trent has been allowed to explore every corner of every classroom he has entered. And until now, Zoe has been allowed to take her Piggy and a couple of other things to school to help her feel secure.

Now that she is in Mrs. R's class there's suddenly a problem and they think it's time to wean her from carrying anything around for security. Am I in the wrong here, or is this supposed to be my and Larry's decision?

I agreed to try it for a couple of days just to see how she does, but if she has even the slightest problem Piggy's going back to school with her and if the new teacher has an issue with that, we'll have to agree to disagree and have Zoe transferred to another class. I know baby girl needs structure, but she doesn't need a teacher who makes decisions without consulting with the parents of her students.

So I wish I had something more pleasant to write this morning, but this is it. This is my life. Just be glad it isn't yours.

Yeah, I know...it seems like I've been on one for awhile anyway. Things are just so busy right now. But going well, I'm happy to say. The babies only have two more days of the summer program then they have to start school again on the 24th - yeesh! The flipping 24th?! It seems as if school starts earlier every year. Why not wait until after labor day since they're going to get the day off anyway?

Anyway, all is well and I hope things are going great for all of you, too! I'm going to take a break from blogging until after school starts so I'll catch up with you all then.

Love you guys!

The price of a doll I've been admiring for awhile went down a few weeks ago and of course I didn't know. I happened upon this information last Friday and contacted Mama Rabb to see if he was still available because the link to the auction she posted didn't have a winning bidder. He is and hopefully at the end of the week he will be all mine, and my beautiful Malachi will have a little brother!

To see this delightful sweetheart, go here.

I can't believe she's willing to let him go so cheap! Her new creations tend to be between $70 and $125. And worth every penny and then some. This lady's work is truly superb.

...gross and hairy. Me!

I've been sort of waffling for the last few months over whether or not to have my hair done, and I have finally decided to go ahead and do it. Having my hair all one length makes me look older, especially now that my grays are starting to show and to be quite honest, it's a pain in the butt to have it in my face all the time. Larry likes it long so I found what I think is a smashing compromise; bangs and layers.

Sounds vaguely suggestive, doesn't it?

*ahem* Anyway...

I am still quite apprehensive about posting my picture because my face is so round these days, but I have lost about 12 pounds and am feeling a bit better, and I can't exactly ask you all for advice if you don't know what I have to work with here, so here I am:

I had to use my cellphone to take it and my hair is still wet from the shower, but you get the idea. Sadly, this is the best picture taken of me in a long time.

The hairstyle I want is a cross between these two. The bangs on #1 and the layers on #2:

My only real concern with either of these hairstyles is that they may be too young for me. I just turned 40 last March and the images I posted are of girls who are about twenty years younger than I am.

So tell me what you think and don't hold back. Am I too old to have my hair done like this?