Long weekends are always a good thing. Gives people extra time to get things done and spend with their family and friends but it also gives kids more time to get into trouble. We had the sheriff's department at our door yesterday because my know it all 16 year old went and hunted down some kid who has apparently been talking shit about him. Well we now have a court date because the other kid called the cops and said they feared bodily harm so yeah its just been a great weekend. Our kid just keeps saying I didn't touch him, well dumbass it doesn't matter because you were in the wrong. I know have keys to his vehicle and dad drove him to work and I will be taking him to his first day of school because like hell I will allow any of your friends to come and pick you up. I know at one point we were all 16 and doing stupid things but I never had the freaking cops called on me. I still overly pissed off and don't even want to talk to the kid right now because all I do is chew his ass. I hope everyone else had a better weekend!

Let me tell you the struggle bus is a real thing today. I am not sure how, but it seems like every chance I have had tonight I have spilt water. It is a normal Tuesday around here busy as always. I will say I wish work was little busier right now, but it will pick back up and then I will be wishing for these days back. The baking business however is not slow by any means. I have made 14 loaves of zucchini bread, 3 dozen cupcakes and 9 dozen cookies this week, again it is only Tuesday. I am looking forward to the long weekend and spending time with my family camping. I am not a tent type of girl, so we have a camper, I am told old to sleep on the ground much less without my fan lol. I am hoping all of our kids will be able to make it, at this point it is the plan that our daughter and her boyfriend will be joining us, but they are also in the process of moving so we will understand if they are busy. We are also hoping a really good friend and his family will be able to stop for a visit. It never seems to fail that our best friends live at least an hour away. Not much going on around here and I am exhausted so goodnight until the next post. 

Happy Monday everyone!! It has been a busy few days around here. My youngest ended up testing positive for strep on Friday night at urgent care, this is the second time in exactly month. I use to get strep a lot as a kid and I was always horrible, instant fever and my throat would start closing off and I would have to get a shot of the antibiotic to get rid of it. The crazy thing to me is he don't show any signs of having it or being sick, the only way I even knew is he asked for a cough drop and told me his throat hurt. Unfortunately, it threw a wrench in our plans to go and stay with my 93-year-old grandma for a couple of days because there is no way I will go and get her sick. I felt bad because my son was upset that he did not get to go and see grandma and grandma was sad we didn't make it but she understood. I am very thankful that my son and grandma can have a relationship because my grandparents were such a huge part of my childhood and probably the reason I did not end up in a foster home permanently or dead at the rate my parents were going. It turned into a busy weekend trying to fill orders. I have put out 7 dozen cookies, 12 loaves of zucchini bread and 3 dozen cupcakes. I love my business but sometimes it is overwhelming trying to juggle it all. 

It has been a busy few days! We ended up with a baby bunny Thursday, my coworker's son found it in a mouse trap in their garage, so he brought it to work for me to take care of. My poor husband never knows what I will end up with next. There was one day I seriously came home with a fawn. Now I only took it from a customer so it would be taken care of, and we did end up getting it into a rehab place. I am a sucker for animals and even worse when it comes to one in need. We took care of the bunny for a few days, and it was not hurt and got its spunk back so we as a family went to my dad's and released it into a covered part of the woods where it can go find the other bunnies to live with. My kids are getting to have all the experiences. My grandmas was like this and fostered for an animal shelter for many years, I like to think I got it from her. 

I can finally say I feel like I am turning a corner and starting to feel normal again. Mental health can be a shitty thing to deal with so again if you are going through anything and need someone to talk to please do not hesitate to comment or email me @ drowninginthisthingcalledlife@yahoo.com  . Even though I slowed down due to my mental state life did not so now trying to play the catch-up game and get everything back in order. The house suffered even though my husband was really pitching in to try and take things off of my plate. I will give him tremendous credit for making sure our sons summer school homework was done every night and I cannot complain that the man makes supper 9 out of 10 times. Tomorrow I am losing my favorite coffee shop employee as she moves onto college, so I made her a dozen chocolate chip cookies to take with being she loves them. I mentioned before I also run a baking business and because of this I have started supplying one of our local coffee shops with their baked goods. It gives me a sense of accomplishment knowing my business has gone somewhere. Not sure how I am going to juggle everything come next month and our Wednesday night church starts back up since I also happen to be in charge of that. I do believe I might be crazy and have been told I am a workaholic. 

Well, I have been MIA for a few not feeling great. My anxiety has definitely decided to try and take over which has also been fueled by my husband's ex-wife just being her normal not great self towards the kids and unfortunately it is their time with her. I just wish there was a way to get her to agree to the kids staying with us more since that is what they want. But other than that my cup has been filled by spending time with some friends I have not been able to see very much in the last few years. I don't think you realize sometimes how much you need time with people that are comfortable and know you in the good and the bad. I have been struggling with sleep lately though. No matter how much sleep I get or how little I am just overly exhausted all the time. It makes me feel like I am failing as a mom and a wife because I have no energy to do anything. My menta health is off and it is not hard to tell so hopefully I can snap out of this soon. I hope everyone else that is dealing with mental health will seek the help they need because you deserve it and you are enough!

I am not sure how the rest of you feel about this week, but it has been exhausting, no matter how much I sleep it just does not seem to be enough. I know I touched on our older 2 going back to their moms yesterday and well the oldest boy is already back so he can watch the football game with his dad. Truth of it is he just does not want to be at his moms, and I mean who can blame him when he comes over at 8:30pm and says she has been drinking since about noon today. It's hard not to be judgmental when they tell you things like that. Anyways back to the day work has been slow lately and everyone seems to be suffering some crankiness because of it. Today I seriously had to put my ear pods in and listen to "How to Catch a Smuggler" just to keep my mind moving enough to do the paperwork that had to be done. I know the weekend is just around the corner, but it never seems like they slow down at all either. Between doing our shopping on the weekends and then filling my bakery orders it seems like I blink, and Monday is here already. I know I am not the only one who feels this way and if you have any recommendations on how to make it feel like a weekend, please let me know. I will say for the first time in probably 6 months my husband and I will be kid free for a night and we get to hang out with another couple that we love but never get to see. Hoping this outing will help recharge my battery and help me motivate to get back into a better routine. I thrive on routine and schedules. I know this comes from my upbringing because there was never any rhyme or reason to what was happening or why there always seemed to be random people around. I have anxiety and OCD that seems to be calmed by having a schedule and routine. Thats all the random thoughts for tonight, here is to hoping this weekend is what everyone needs to recharge your battery. Please if you need someone to talk to reach out, you can find my email on the contact page. 

Today feels like it has been 3 days in one. The constant need for my help gets exhausting sometimes. Between my family and work I swear I go numb to hearing mom or my name. Our older kids went back to their moms today which always proves hard on the youngest who misses his brothers. He is starting to understand better now that he is almost 8 but it is still not easy for him. He tends to be extra crabby the first couple days after they have left, and I assume he is just decompressing from the chaos. As we were finishing up supper tonight my husband got a phone call from one of best friends saying he was sitting on our porch. We never mind when he comes to visit because he is a good guy, but he does have a drinking problem. I always tend to bring him some sort of baked good that I have in the house being a I run a baking business out of our home in addition to having a fully time job and being the youth director for our church. He tells us he has been out on his motorcycle since around 10am so I naturally offer him some supper. Let me tell you if you show up at my house around mealtime you are going to get fed, I don't care who you are. He said no its okay I don't need to eat so I used my mom card and told him not to argue with me and to get in the house. Getting him a plate, he admits he has been out partying most of the day. An even better reason to sit down and eat being you are driving around your motorcycle. I am glad my husband has stepped away from the drinking part of his life because we would not be together if he hadn't. One thing I will not tolerate is a drunk. My dad spent many years of my life that way and even sober he still has the personality of a drunk. I also made the mistake of trying to be in a relationship with one before I met my husband being sure I could change him. Well news flash he is still a drunk even after getting into a car accident where he broke his back. Time is short and precious there is no reason to put yourself in a situation where you are not happy. I wish I could do something for our friend to make him realize this, but I know he has to do it on his time and when he is ready. For now, we just support him and try and call him in the mornings lol because we usually know we can get him before he starts. How do you handle these situations? Is there something in a relationship that would break it for you? A lot of our personal deal breakers come from our childhood environments and once you recoginze this you give yourself the power to say no. Giving yourself the power to stand up for what you need is a wonderful thing. You have the power to make yourself happy and it is a wonderful gift to give yourself!

The last few days have been a struggle around here. My husband has 50/50 custody of the older kids, so they are with us a week on and a week off, this schedule has been like this since I met them. With the fair being in town this last weekend they older 2 have wanted to be out running with their friends a lot more which I understand because I remember being 15 and 16. I must say though the 16-year-old is very arrogant which I know seems to be more common these days. He decided to argue with his dad about what time he should have to come home but we put our foot down and made his curfew very clear to him. Once home he was mouthy, so we sat down to talk about it and of course mom and dad don't know anything. I ended telling him that he was a very arrogant kid right now to which I had to explain to him because he did not know what it meant. Well, I hurt my kids' feelings, but I do stand behind what I told him because I have seen a major attitude improvement since this conversation. I know these conversations are not easy, but they can be had without yelling and name calling. I do not tell him these things all the time but every now and then everyone needs a little bit of a reality check whether you're an adult or teenager. I believe the most important thing to remember is they have feeling and opinions also and they need to be able to express them in a safe way and space. I am very grateful to have the amazing relationship that I do with the older kids. I do not view them as my step kids they are plainly my kids and they have chosen to call me mom.  Either way parenthood is hard and there are no short cuts! 

Welcome back since I missed a day, it has been busy! Childhood trauma will take a back burner today as this also supposed to be about my day to day life also. I swear in the blink of an eye the weekend is already nearing over. Off to the races right away yesterday after getting off of work. It was my dad's birthday, well my brother's dad but the one I claim as my own. A simple get together with a bonfire and good company just to sit around and talk shit with. However, one of our old "friends" was out there with her soon to be husband and it is just so hard to listen to her talk being she tried to ruin my relationship with my now husband even though she is how we met. That is a story for another time. Now talk about scary parent moments, my 15-year-old got his permit this week and he drove me to the next town over this morning to do out grocery shopping and pet food shopping. He did not do bad, but it is always hard to take that first step and actually put your life in their hands to teach them to become a good driver. It also happens to be all the kids' favorite weekend of the year, the county fair. I decided I really wanted to enjoy myself this year and actually bought myself a ride wrist band and rode with my kids. Let me tell you it is a good reminder of how actually old I am. I am already exhausted, and I can feel it in my legs and feet from walking around all afternoon. Cute story, I seen a family I have in my church class and their little girl is 3 and she was so excited to see us that she completely came running over and then wanted to ride the Feris wheel with me. I was so impressed with how well she did, she was absolutely amazed with being up so high and kept say " I can see everything". Do the things that are scary, don't make your decisions based on the people you think are judging you because at the end of the day your family is what matters, these memories are what matter. Let people talk, let them wish they had the courage to not care what others think of you and make those core memories with your babies even if they are teenagers. 

We will start at the beginning of my story. My parents got married young, my mom only 16 and my dad 20 or 21. They were not married long when I came along, I would say about a year. Neither one of them ready to be married or have a child. I believe they met in some type of treatment or group. My dad an alcoholic and my mom an addict of some type, from my childhood I remember the problem being men.  They had moved out of state and hours away from either of their parents making it easy for things to go unseen. I have heard many stories of the fights that would happen with me either on the floor or in my crib with the family dog protecting me. It didn't take long for their relationship to fall apart leaving me in limbo. My grandparents ended up having me a lot of the time and luckily for me both sets of my grandparents got a long great and ended up being friends. I always knew it was a lot of back and forth, but it never really sunk in until my uncle talked about having my first birthday at their place which was in an entirely different state due to the fact that my dad's parents would go to Arizona for the winter at that time and that is where my uncle and his family lived. As a parent myself now I do not understand at all how you could allow your baby to leave for the entire winter without seeing them, let alone missing their 1st birthday. I at one point asked my mom about this and her response was I was couch surfing and your grandparents both sides decided that would be best for you. I turned 1 in January and by July my mom was having her second child by a different man not even divorced from my dad yet. Let me tell you I have never been one of those people who wanted their parents together, I have a hard enough time dealing with them separately. From their my mom went on to have 3 more children none of us having the same dad. My dad went on to have 3 more children with 2 having the same mom. Like I mentioned in my first post I have also had many step siblings. Life was never normal from the beginning, thankfully I have had some good influences. We will dive into the rest over the next few blog posts.