Holiday Plans

Ah, Thanksgiving: the time of year when we stuff ourselves fit to burst, pass out in front of the television, and then wake up at 3:45 AM to get that great deal on a new vacuum cleaner. All while avoiding Aunt Margie's smothering hug or cheek-pinching icicle fingers.

Most years since my husband and I have been together, we've attempted to have Thanksgiving dinner with both families -- mine, in Columbus, and his, in Cincinnati (for those of you who aren't from around here, they are about a two hours' drive apart). And every year, our families have set dinner for the same time or an hour apart. I was mad: at my husband because we always ate dinner with his family first (and therefore ate more with them), and at my mom for not working out a different time for ours -- seeing as it was at our house.

Last year I was on bedrest and we lived in Boston. One of my husband's friends from BU was kind enough to invite us over for dinner. Her husband was a great cook, and they would have been alone for the holiday too, if not for us. They had a car and came to pick us up so I wouldn't violate my bedrest orders.

This year will be a little different. We'll attend Thanksgiving Mass, since we'll be out of town on Sunday. Dinner today will be at my parents' house, and it will be small, as it's been since my grandmother stopped hosting due to my unruly cousins. My mom, dad and grandma (maternal) will be there, as well as my sister and her boyfriend (who will have eaten at his house already -- my mom is so mad). My dad's sister and her husband will be there, and of course my husband, son, and I will too. And that's it.

Tomorrow we'll drive to Cincinnati and have Thanksgiving dinner at my grandma-in-law's house. She's been talking about doing a Friday dinner for a few years, so all her children can see their in-laws on Thanksgiving day. This year, she's going with it. We expect to see my father-in-law, his fiancee, her six-year-old from her previous marriage, my sister-in-law, brother-in-law, and at least two of their aunts and their families (the third lives in New York).

Then on Saturday, we'll meet up with a couple friends of ours in the area, since we haven't seen them in about six months. That evening, my husband's cousin will be having an engagement party. It was supposed to be Labor Day weekend, but he got called back to New Orleans because of the hurricane. He's a firefighter, and he lives there now, since he went to Tulane for school.

Overall, it should be really busy but a great time. Yay for food!

I'm in the money!

...or at least I will be in about two weeks.

Since we moved back to Ohio from Boston back in February, my husband has been substitute teaching and looking for work that will actually support our family of three (subs are paid per day of work, whereas full-time teachers have a yearly salary divided up over the twelve months; subs do not get paid over the summer, and during the year, they only receive a total of about half of a regular teacher's salary anyway). The original plan was that he would find a job as a full-time teacher, and I would be a stay-at-home-mom until the summer, when Adam would be 6 months old, and then I would go back to work while he stayed home with the baby.

We have both been searching for the last seven months and thus far, have been unable to find work. About a month ago or so, my husband decided that since he wasn't getting anywhere (and I do mean anywhere -- he looked for jobs in high schools, colleges, libraries, the Department of Defense, and put his resume up on Monster) in the job search, that he would go back to school. In the meantime, I kept looking for work as a secretary, and then as a daycare worker/preschool teacher (in the hopes that Adam could be cared for in my place of employment, at a discounted price).

Two weeks ago we got a break. My sister Sara works at the Jewish Community Center, and has for the past three years. She was assigned there for her freshman observation (she's in school for early childhood education), and they liked her so much, they hired her Monday through Friday after classes and also for their summer camp. Then we found out that Aaron's aunt is the director of the center. I was a little nervous about putting myself out there for the open position, because I have "some college coursework completed," none of which is in education. The one thing I have going for me is 10+ years of babysitting experience, and informal child care/supervision of youth activities at both my church and in the SCA (Society for Creative Anachronism, more about that later).

I've been trying to get paperwork done for this job, and silently freaking out about getting a physical and a TB test done (we can't find a general family doctor, either -- but at least Adam has a wonderful pediatrician). I wanted so badly to post the good news about the possibility of a job, but I didn't want to jinx it. And then today I got a call from the director. The original position I applied for was one that someone else had left, and this person apparently came back to it in the past few weeks. But I can still work two eight-hour days and be a floating sub for the rest of the week! I hung up with the director, and danced around my kitchen/living room until my quads hurt.

Deep sigh of relief. Damn, did we need this. I won't be getting a huge salary or anything, and they don't have a place for Adam now, but as the child of an employee, he is at the top of the waiting list. And it's something. Especially when we're fighting with the loan company to disburse the money for Brandon's first semester so he can actually, you know, pay for books (he's been in class for nearly two weeks already). Happy little dance!

Edited to add: Sorry, folks. I know I promised this would be shorter, but I just couldn't contain my excitement!

Further edited to add: Upon reflection, I think the reason my posts are so long is because I feel the need to explain EVERYTHING, since you all know practically nothing about me (personal friends excluded). Hopefully this will get better with time.

Labor Day

Here's a fun little holiday-themed meme I found over at The Musings of a Mom. For the instructions and full list of participants (I'm #224!), head on over to Rocks in My Dryer -- she's the one who started it!

How long were your labors?
Just one so far for me (well, apart from the labor at 30 weeks that was successfully delayed), I was kind of in and out of labor for about 6 or 7 hours, then actually in for about 6 or 7 hours until I was put on terbutaline to delay the labor until they could attempt the external cephalic version (my son was breech).

How did you know you were in labor?
I was scheduled to get the version and told not to eat or drink anything after midnight, and then late the night before (or rather, early morning, as in 1 AM), I started having contractions. I went in (they had told me to come in for contractions occuring every 10, rather than 5, minutes because of the breech thing). I went in around 2, they monitored me, told me I was not in labor, my husband went home to get our place ready for the baby (he was not expected for another two and a half weeks). Several hours later, they started up again, but I was like the pregnant woman who cried wolf and was not listened to. My husband came back and I filled him in. He insisted that they at least check again, and in fact, I was in labor.

Where did you deliver?
St. Elizabeth's hospital in Boston.

Drugs?
Terbutaline to delay the labor so they could try to do the version. During which the only thing that kept my mind off of the excruciating pain (of the version, not the contractions) was the cute anesthesiologist asking me questions. All the while, the crazy nurse was touching my feet (this is a mortal sin in my family) to try to comfort me. And then anesthesia: see below.

C-section?
Yep. Endured the pain of the contractions, the jitters of the terbutaline, and then the agony of the version for nothing (Note: For those who don't know what a version is, it is when your OB and a really old guy that must be the premier obstetrical expert in the hospital, push down on your uterus with all of their combined weight to try to get the stubborn little bugger to come out your vagina instead of swimming toward your throat). Version failed, got my anesthesia, baby came out all pissed and breathed/swallowed a WHOLE bunch of mucus on the way out. Apparently being born that day was not his idea, but rather that of my womb.

Who delivered?
Dr. Katherine Marshall, my Boston OB. She was really good, although a little forgetful (like she would forget how much weight I gained, what prescriptions she had written, etc.).

So yeah, that's my birthing story. Not what I expected or planned, but how many births really are? I'm just glad my uterus evicted him at nearly 38 weeks instead of 30.

Together at last: our first meeting outside the OR.

Surely, you must be joking...

*****RANT WARNING*****

We recently bought our friend's car. Today we went down to the BMV to get the title taken care of, since his birthday was on Monday and the plates are now expired. I should probably mention that this was the second (and not final) visit on behalf of this particular car. Let's not forget the three times I went earlier this summer because of my old car.

Oh yes, my friends, this is a story about bureaucratic bullshit.

Let me back up a bit. I have owned my 1993 Nissan Altima for 5 years. Back when my husband and I were first dating, it was the nice car -- his had a broken speedometer, among other things. And really, for a 10-year-old car (even a 10-year-old Japanese sedan), it was in great shape. A few years later, my husband bought a 2002 Mazda Protege. So then that was the nice car. Fast forward a few more years, and we were planning to move to Boston with my newly discovered fetus. On a trip from Columbus to Cincinnati (where his dad lives), the Nissan started making funny noises. We were planning on leaving our cars here while he did a year's worth of grad work (would you want to pay for Boston insurance and a parking spot a quarter-mile from your tiny apartment, and oh yeah, have I mentioned Boston drivers are INSANE?). So we just figured we'd leave my car at his dad's house instead of his car, and in the meantime, my mechanic brother-in-law could look at it.

Long story short (yeah, I know, not that short), we decided my car was no longer fit for transporting an infant. We moved back in February and bought our friend's car with the intention of selling mine soon. It's taken us this long to sell my car, for about 30% less than what we wanted for it. The economists who say we're not in a recession can bite me. In the meantime, the tags expired in June because they were still in my mom's name -- she had turned the title over to me, oh, the weekend before we moved. No time to get new plates then. And because we live in an apartment, any car with expired tags gets a notice. Apparently people abandon cars in these parking lots? If you say so.... So I had to pay for new tags, despite the fact that we had already spent 4 months trying to sell it, all the while not driving it. And then I had my birthday three weeks ago. Another year's worth of tags. And then we sold the car, and they wanted more money from me to turn the title over to the person who bought it! WTF? They already get fees from the buyer, what the hell do they think I am, made of money?

Things must be simpler now that we've sold that car, right? Ha. So my husband goes to the BMV a few weeks back to get the title for the Hyundai (our friend's former car) turned over. Chad had signed the title and mailed it to us, since he lives in Cincinnati. My husband said he'd need to get it notarized, too, because it says right there on the title that that's what you have to do. They argued about it, and Chad insisted he was right. So Brandon took the title in, and guess what? They told him it needed to be notarized. We mailed it back to Chad, who took his sweet time getting it notarized and sent back to us.

So now we're caught up to today, thinking that nothing else could possibly go wrong. Why do we even bother? The lovely ladies at the title agency tell us that we still cannot finalize the sale of this car. (See the title of this post). "The car belongs to your friend and his wife. We can't turn the title over without both of their signatures. You can try going next door to License Services for a 30-day temporary tag so you don't get pulled over." Where they tell us that no, they cannot do that, because it would be illegal. Furthermore, we cannot put my brand-new license plates on this car, because those plates are only in my name, and not in both our names. Bite me. They might as well create a robot to do these people's jobs for them, because we would get just as much compassion from it.

We are now blessed with the privelege of sending back the title, having Chad's wife sign it, get it notarized, send it back, go back into the title agency, and try not to develop depression and ulcers in the process.

And all I could say to Brandon was, "When can we move to Canada?"