Highly Educated and Flat Broke

If you're en education monger like me...did you ever find yourself saying after this degree I'll get this job and then...or, after this degree I'll get that job and then...or do you find yourself saying, after the 4th degree, I'll get that job, the economy will take a dump, pay cuts, furlough days, unpaid holidays and benefit increases will ensue? ME NEITHER!!! Well, despite the stupid, ugly, annoying, disturbing...well you get the picture...economy, I still find myself on the path to paying down my debt and sending my first daughter off to college. Has it been easy? Really? Not at all. But I'm sticking to it. We have sure learned to live with less....and that often includes gas and groceries, but there are times you feel like you're being closed in on and then the break is going to come. I surely hope that's where I'm at.

I finally have my type 75, which means I can and am applying to a variety of schools to see what options are out there for me. I am also just waiting for one more form from my college so that I can take my LCSW and finally after almost 6 years can begin seeing clients that have insurance. I have always said, when I knew starting out the road would be this long, I wouldn't have started. In hindsight, I'm glad I didn't know...and I'm glad I started...and I'm even more glad I finished. Now it's time to accept the challenges, take the risks and move forward.

I've been married 21 years. The very first book my husband and I read together was "Do what you love, the money will follow". OK, every day I find myself doing what I love. It is now time for the money to follow!

On a brighter note...my kids are on spring break this week. I am not, but I took the week off for 2 reasons. It's the last spring break my kids will be home together and I didn't want to miss it. AND, oh my gosh, could I be any further behind? The paint I bough in December is still sitting in the dining room with the half-stripped wallpaper. That, my friends, cannot continue any longer! The laundry and this house have been put on notice...Spring Cleaning time has arrived!!!
Open the windows and let the fresh air of spring move you!

Couldn't be any more delicious...

Tonight I find myself in wind down mode...for two months or what seems like an eternity, my girls have been practicing for Footloose the Musical....many nights, many hours, and many many trips to school with dinner. Once or twice I cooked and took food to them, but most of the time it was fast food. Isn't it amazing how fast food can seem like a treat, until you eat it all the time and then...YUCK!


Today was the last show. I've seen the play 5 times in 5 days and I am more than ready for a break, a nap, and did I mention....HOME COOKED FOOD! Tonight I made a simple thrown together recipe I call rice stuff for lack of a better name...celery, hamburger, rice, chicken noodle soup, cream of mushroom soup, pepper and Parmesan cheese. Sounds terrible I know, but tastes terrific! It's one of the few all-in-one-pan foods my son will eat. He looked hesitantly in the pan and announced, "Oh! I like that!" Yes son, I know you do!

So...the thrown together recipe, canned green beans, and a glass of milk. In a real glass. Without a lid...or a straw. Nothing has ever tasted more delicious!

Are you thinking Christmas yet?

It is just the very strangest thing, how urges come and go with me. My very latest urge is to cross-stitch, which I find very odd. I haven't cross stitched in about a hundred years, but when I go to my mother in law's house or my mom's house, there hang beautiful cross stiches that I have done over the years. In true form, I have none in my house...none. Well, as long as you don't count the unfinished projects! (I know they're around here somewhere!) I've been wanting to start cross stitching again for about a month now. I have talked myself out of it over and over telling myself, it will soon be spring and the garden will need the attention, not the cross stitch! Recently I have told myself that perhaps the house requires the attention, perhaps finishing the half peeled wall paper border in my dining room and maybe even using the paint that I bought 3 months ago to paint the dining room! Oh, and I might possibly find time to find my missing telephoto lens and the battery charger for my camera. Lord help me! So much to do, so little time; unfortunately to no avail...

Today...I gave in.

After a blissful hour spent at Michael's browsing the painting aisle, the scrap aisle, the floral isle, the cake making aisle, and the cross stitch aisle...I was hooked. And what I have I decided on you ask? Christmas stockings!

When I came home and hopped on ebay, I found myself humming Christmas carols on this, the 'spring ahead day' with the warmest weather of the year. How very odd is that? I am most pleased to say I purchased this little darling on ebay...

You can't stand it right?!? Neither can I!! As I was looking through a variety of patterns and picking out one for my husband and I, I thought to myself..."self...in the not too distant future there may be spouses, that may require a stocking on the fireplace, and self, you better buy more than five patterns" :) And so I did!!! NINE, count them NINE patterns....one for each of us, and three for future spouses, and 1 extra :) In case there's a pattern I don't like!

I strangely feel better. I've talked myself into the fact that I can cross stitch in the summer...after dark right? Then I won't be taking time away from the garden, the bird feeders, walking the dog or any other daylight sort of thing. In case I haven't mentioned it...I am also DONE!!! with a capital D; DONE with college in 7 short weeks and I will certainly require something to fill my time. Not to mention I have a baby going off to college in 5 short months. I am anticipating some time to cross stitch. It's good to know I'll have plenty of patterns to choose from!

Completely away from the Christmas topic...I made my first potential garden trade today. (insert an incurable smile on my face) Let me begin by saying that my house and especially my gardens have suffered over the past 5 years I have been in graduate school and interning. This year, I intend to get these gardens in order! Ihave even contemplated rejoining the plantaholics garden club :) My son's friend's mom (got that?) has a beautiful hosta that I have been envying for the past few summers. Today I mentioned to her, as I was there to pick up his forgotten DS, you know, I'd love to trade you some hosta of mine for some hosta of yours...and she agreed! Give us a few more weeks when they peek through the ground and let the trading begin!!!

Happy Spring! oh...and Merry Christmas!

A useful use for something...often annoying

My husband is the king. THE KING I tell you...of bad jokes. Jokes that he thinks are hilarious and because of this feels it necessary to tell them. Repeatedly. I've tried everything to change this. I've told him the old adage...never tell a bad joke more than once. I've given him an online subscription to joke of the day. I share jokes with him that I actually think are funny. FUNNY!!!! There's a novel idea...a joke that's funny.

I think, however, I may finally had the epiphany we've all been waiting for. The other day while driving back to work, after droppin the precious one at the library for a research seminar (nothing but a good time I tell ya), driving through and getting my lunch, and not 8 seconds later receiving a call asking if I could bring him lunch, I found myself on the phone, listening to another less than stellar joke. "Did you hear about the midget (If your under 4' please don't be offended, it's not my joke) that moved into a nudist colony?" Uh, no, and I probably don't want to, was my response. "He was asked to leave cuz he always had his nose in everyone's business" Followed by nearly hysterical laughter at the other end of the phone. I was silent. "Did you hear me? He had his nose..." Yes dear, I heard you. "Well isn't that crazy funny?" Silence. I do actually feel badly for him at times ;)

Wait for it...

Here's my new solution! Honey, I said. I think I have a useful use for your jokes! The very next time a telemarketer or better yet A BILL COLLECTOR calls you....TELL THEM YOUR JOKES!!!! There I said it! Doesn't that just sound like the best solution ever? Certainly it will cut down on unwanted calls and my husband could continue to tell the bad jokes over and over to someone other than me...or his precious children...or his mother...or anyone else that will listen. If you'd like, we could start a daily email of bad jokes and you could use them too!

Needless to say, my husband went on to figure out who he hadn't told his latest and worst too...his poor mother. Sorry Grandmother I tried to deter him, but to no avail. Better luck next time!

It's not summer break, but it feels very similar

Life as a mom of three darling high schoolers can be hectic. Can be? Wait. IS HECTIC! All. the. time. Just sayin. However...there are points in life, such as today, when the darlings have a 4 day weekend. This allows me to get up, not wait for the bathroom, not run around waking the dead 3, 4, 8, as many as it takes times, before finally bellowing, "I'm leaving!!! Good luck with getting up!"

This morning...it is peaceful, tranquil, quiet, serene...you get the picture. Just me, one big lazy dog, one small hyper dog and two adorable cats (who may become unadorable very quickly if they don't get some breakfast).

It almost seems like summer :) Ahhhhhhhhh summer. Except for the pesky snow on the ground, which serves as a reminder that school will resume on Monday. Until then, I'm livin in my fantasy summer break world. Have a great day!

You take the top, I'll take the bottom

Let me just be the first to say that Great Dane feet are NOT, I repeat are NOT meant to walk on human feet. As I am sleepily trying to let the little dog in this morning, my old big dog decides that my foot would be the perfect place to stand. And not move. Thereby pulling my sock right off, as I tried to get to the door without falling. I was successful in letting the little dog in; I was also successful in noticing how sweet and adorable that big dog is. Before leaving for the day, I squeezed him and whispered....it's ok Blue...you walk on the top and I'll walk on the bottom. (An old time statement compliments of my beloved Gramma Bee) Have a great day!

We're just lovin' and laughin' and bustin' our asses and we call it all livin' the dream...

Do you ever find yourself evaluating that whole livin the dream thing? I'm here to tell you that it seems to me that livin the dream ain't all it's cracked up to be sometimes. I am ETERNALLY grateful that after many hours each week of bustin my a** that I have a safe haven to come home to where I have a wonderful husband, three amazing kids, a peaceful home and a handful of pets.

There are times in my life when I have certainly had my fill of liars, fakes, and people without ethics or morals, and not that I'm perfect...cuz I have a looooooong way to go...but I'll tell ya, I know right from wrong as do most kids by the time they reach 5 and I just don't understand how people get through life, become adults, get themselves a happy little job and just fake their way along.

There's a saying I learned a long time ago..."I put my eggs all in one basket and I was surprised when they got broke". I tried HARD to be trusting, that people would not let me down if my eggs were all in one basket. I gave it my all. I learned. Next time....no eggs in that basket. Just sayin. Live and learn. Thanks for listening...the domestic Goddess of the Ruchus feels much better.