fun. crazy. life.

So I called to update our credit card info for our automatic payment of our Verizon internet.

I was transferred SEVEN times. To this person who couldn’t help me, to another person who couldn’t help me, to this person could only help me if I lived in New Jersey… Then they couldn’t find my account number. Then they couldn’t find ME. Despite the fact that I have paid them lots of money EVERY MONTH for the last EIGHT years… They have no record of me existing.  Part of me really  wanted to just let my credit card expire and bounce right back to them. Clearly they won’t miss me, since they don’t seem to know who I am.  But instead, being the responsible citizen that I am, I wasted 45 minutes trying to find the ONE SINGLE employee out of thousands who could actually help me.
FINALLY someone was able to update the info I needed. Which took all of 1 minute.

Then, my heart full of dread, I called the company that makes this Hello Kitty boom box.  Ellie got this for her birthday and it just randomly stopped working, so I called customer service.
An ACTUAL REAL LIVE person answered the phone. She told me to mail it to them and they would fix it for FREE and if they couldn’t fix it, they will MAIL ME A NEW ONE! Amazing!!

Feeling confident, I called the insurance company. Who managed to make Verizon look downright speedy and efficient. The insurance is denying to pay any of our maternity/newborn care. Because it was all filed under Husband’s policy number. (Obviously they would deny maternity care for him seeing as HE IS A MAN.) It is very simple fix - they just needed to change things to MY policy number. I tried to explain this to them, but it was apparently MUCH too complicated a concept for them to understand. Seriously - my head almost exploded after having the same conversation over and over for 30 minutes with an women who kept calling me “Honey” and was INSISTING that there had been no mistake.

And there goes two hours of my life that I will never get back.

So Colin has started projectile vomiting all over the place several times a day. I’m a little concerned. Not for his health - Grace did this too when she was a baby. It was just reflex, no big deal. He’ll be fine. Especially since he is HUGE and is CLEARLY not in danger of losing too much weight.
I’m concerned for our wardrobes. Last night he got me straight on. I had to change my sweatshirt, my t-shirt, my pants, my bra AND my underwear. That is how soaked I was. (Say it with me… EWWWWWWW!!)  What am I going to do when he does this in public? I’m going to have to start carrying a duffel bag with complete changes of clothes for the whole family. And clothes for any unfortunate bystanders. Can you imagine? What if he gets a total stranger in the grocery store? I. Would. DIE.
Maybe we’ll just stay home until he outgrows this.
Don’t YOU want to sit next to us in church this Sunday?

Yesterday, while cleaning out my closet, I made an interesting discovery.
Look at this:

Not a great picture, but let me tell you what this is.
11 black sweaters
3 short sleeved black t-shirts
6 long sleeved black t-shirts
3 black dresses
I didn’t include the pants, skirts or maternity clothes in this picture. Since CLEARLY you can get the idea, since you can no longer see my couch under all the black tops.

This tells me two things:
1. I really need to wear OTHER colors. Not branching out into charcoal grey, but some actual colors. Like pink. Or blue. Or ANYTHING that is not black, white or grey, which is really just both.
2. I am a perfect example of American excess.

I have been justifying this discovery to myself. Saying things like “Some of these shirts and sweaters I have had since college!” and “But all of the sweaters are different! There’s the long-sleeved crewneck, and the long-sleeved v-neck, and the cable knit one and the turtleneck and the turtleneck with short-sleeves…” Because I obviously NEED all ELEVEN black sweaters. Besides what if there was some sort of emergency crisis and I could not do laundry for 20 days and we HAD to wear ONLY black tops??  WHAT on EARTH would I do THEN??? Huh??

And I admit - I love clothes. I love shopping for clothes, trying on clothes, reading up on the latest trends, watching tv shows about fashion, picking out what I’m going to wear (although not lately with the whole 6-weeks-post-baby-body). Except ironing clothes. I hate that.

But, as I’m trying to justify it to myself… I’m realizing I’m ashamed. It is completely ridiculous that I own as many clothes as I do period. Nevermind this many of the same thing in exactly the same color. Is this really the best investment of my resources?  Just yesterday - while cleaning my excessively full closet - I was talking to a woman in my Bible Study who told me she was saving up to pay the registration fee. Of $25. (Can you imagine not being able to scrape together $25 to join a Bible Study? I am so paying for her to go in scholarship.)  I’m remembering the people I saw in India, who owned one or two changes of clothing.  I came home determined to live more simply and to cut down on excess in our lives. And, less than 6 months later, I’ve lost it.

I know I didn’t go buy all these shirts in the last month. (That is years of hard work on that couch!)  But it serves as a symbol to me about my ‘wants’ and ‘needs.’ About how I’m spending money. About perspective. About what is important. And about what isn’t.

First, let us all give a shout out, no round of applause, no STANDING OVATION to my boy Colin. Who slept SIX hours last night!! IN A ROW!!!!

Mama feels like a new woman!
**********
So today I spent almost all day cleaning my closet. Yes, it was that cluttered.
And by “cluttered” I mean “complete and total disaster.”
I could no longer walk in to my walk-in closet. I had all of my spring and summer and fall clothes that I wore last year. Then I had all of my maternity clothes. Then I had the non-maternity winter clothes that I have been pulling out of the storage containers as the maternity clothes are too big, but the remaining summer/fall clothes are too small. 
So, now the winher and maternity clothes are packed away, the cute spring clothes are ready to be worn, the pants-I-cannot-quite-zip-up-yet-but-I’m-hopeful are hanging neatly and the shoes are straightened. As a bonus, while cleaning my closet I found:
* a basketball (Since we all know how sporty I am. Ahem.)
* oven mitts (???)
* hot pink platform flip flops (score!)
* approximately eleventy-jillion coat hangers
* a roll of Christmas wrapping paper with cute little snowmen (quite smushed and wrinkled)
* a black 11×13 picture frame with a white 8×10 mat (Nice!)
* the baby blanket I began knitting when pregnant with Ellie (Who is now FIVE) (By “began” I mean it is still about 5 inches long)
* a Toys R Us gift card that I thought I lost (good thing, since it has like $80 on it!)

Maybe I should clean under my bed…. Who knows what I’ll find under there!

At least there wasn’t much blood this time. Husband likes to take his life insurance policy out for a spin every week.
He usually comes home looking like this. He’ll knock on the slider door and wave, grinning, very proud of his rugged manly muddiness.
Then I open the slider and hear the dramatic story of how he fought the gigantic rock that leaped into the bike path and attacked him, flipping him over the handle bars and into the mud puddle.
Then I say something like, “Don’t even THINK of coming in the house like that. Go in the mud room, strip and put everything DIRECTLY into the washing machine.”
Then he usually makes some sort of snarky comment involving a raised eyebrow because I used the word “strip.”
Then I return with a raised eyebrow and equally snarky comment like “Whatever. Try not to touch anything on your way to the shower. Thanks for not killing yourself.” 
And so another biking season begins.