And the beat goes on......

Just when we thought we were out of the Stomach Virus Woods.....

WHAMO!

Squiggy Magoo up All Night Long (no exaggeration...but oh how I wish it was!) crying, whining, fussing, kicking, wanting to nurse..... And of course by this morning has a fever and after some Tylenol *then* can manage to sleep!

Izzy Man sent home from preschool with the runs....

Jake the Great declines to attend his basketball activity because "I feel like I'm going to throw up again..."

Oh yeah.....another great week in store for all of us at the DollyMama house!

Why are women so hard on each other??

Chez Miscarriage has had some interesting posts lately about how it seems women just can't win. We're always bad: did you realize that?

Have a child and stay at home: What? Only one lonely child? And you don't even work and contribute to society?

Have more than one child and stay at home: Don't you know about the overpopulation problem? And why don't you get off your rear and get a job! You're so boring and dowdy staying at home with your kids all the time!

Have children and work full time: You are a selfish, bad person! Why would you have children if you weren't going to raise them?

Have children and work part time: You must be too selfish to stay at home and really devote yourself to your children. OR: You are too into being a mother to be able to commit to your job and do it well.

Normally fertile woman who chooses not to have children: You are too selfish to have children!

Normally fertile woman who chooses to adopt children: Why adopt when you can have your own kids? You are adopting kids that other people who can't have children should have first dibs on!

Adopting a white baby: Why spend all that money just for skin color? There are babies of other colors who need you so much more!

Adopting any child within the USA: Why adopt these kids when there are children in other countries who have so much less hope of a bright future like any child in the USA has?

Adopting a child internationally: Why spend all that money to adopt outside of the country when there are so many children needing homes right here in the USA?

Infertile people going through infertility treatments to get pregnant: Maybe you weren't meant to be parents. OR, You should just adopt since there are so many children needing parents!

Infertile people deciding to get off the infertility treatments and adopt: But how can you love and adopted child as much as one of your own? Maybe you should keep trying.

Breastfeeding mother: Yuk! Weird! Don't do that for too long, it's abnormal. Your kid will have problems.

Bottlefeeding mother: Didn't you even *try* to breastfeed? What kind of a mother ARE you feeding that kid poison??

Co-sleeping parents: Your kids will die in bed because you'll smother them! And if they live, they will be insecure and weird!

Parents who don't co-sleep: Do you think your kid likes to sleep all alone in that prison-bar bed you call a crib?

Homeschool: Your kids will be brainwashed freaks!

Public school: Your kids will be brainwashed, undereducated cogs in the pitiful wheel of society.

Private school: Snobs!

and on and on it goes.

So why do we do this to each other? What is it about motherhood that is so polarizing? What is it about motherhood that makes us see so much that we disapprove about one another?

I have to admit that I actually haven't received that many bad comments over the years. I'm just about 6 feet tall and am generally confident and happy, so I think that may contribute to people mainly saying nice things to me about my kids/life. I've had a few zingers, though. (Like the nurse who brought me towels so that I could dry off after giving birth to my third child. She looked me over (I was getting out of the shower) and said, "You sure haven't lost that belly yet, have you?") So I'm not really bringing this up for myself as much as I am because it seems so prevalent that people do experience this.

Grrl at Chez Miscarriage asked people to write in with some of their best/worst "drive by comments" about their parenting. There are almost 200 right now. Go check it out and be amazed. Perhaps you'd like to add to her list, or possibly share some here.

For me, I think that when I was first a mother I felt so blown away by my mothering instincts, it was nearly impossible for me to imagine that doing things some other way could be just as valid. The way we parented is something that came from our personalities and lifestyle, and is something that we have stuck with pretty much through all 6 kids. Thankfully, I have found that as I have had more children, I've learned a lot more, experienced a lot more, and therefore am so much more able to appreciate the different choices that others will make for their families. Obviously, I still have my reasons for what I do, and if you were to ask me about them I might even seem like I was trying to get you to see things my way. (Do we all do that?) But, ultimately, I believe that children with reasonable, loving parents turn out fine despite all the variables.

What do you think? Have you made rude comments to people? Had rude comments made to you? And what about those of you who seem to want to see every comment as a rude one? (For instance, if you have little kids and someone says, "You sure have your hands full" or "I can't imagine how you do it!" or "Wow! Are they all yours?!" these are not necessarily rude comments. You DO have your hands full! You ARE busy! It IS unusual to see families with many children! Stop looking for abuse where there is none! Smile and say, "Yes, they're all mine! Yes, I am busy! I don't know how I do it either. But, they are so fun!" and keep right on walking. Don't look for abuse where it doesn't exist.)

Comet! It makes your teeth turn green. Comet! It tastes like gasoline. Comet! it makes you vomit! So have some Comet and vomit today!

Guess who came to visit our house? The Stomach Virus Fairy, that's who! The one major down side to having a large family is that there are so many more people to vomit when sickness comes to call.

Happily, it seems to be a 24-hour (or less) plague, so although they are quite pitiful for one day, then they are off the hook and it is someone else's turn to make load upon load of foul laundry for me to get washed.

Don't hate me because I'm beautiful......

(remember that crazy commercial?)

Valentines Day: Trick or Treat?

Valentines Day has been funny at the Dolly Mama household.

First, the good: 3 sweet emails from my hubby (who had to work a 24 hour shift today), plus a big bunch of beautiful roses delivered to me! Awwww!!!!!!!!!!

Second, the funny: When I saw my 12 year old son after school I noticed he was wearing this cross necklace thing that I had never seen before. "Where'd you get that?" "It's from Sheryl" he replied. "A Valentines Day gift."

Oh, yikes! Valentines Day! My poor kid! He hadn't actually realized that *today* was V Day. And here comes his little girlfriend with a gift for him, and he had...nothing!

Ooops!

I guess it would've been nice to do a little coaching, but, we didn't even think of it. Also, we had been trying to dissuade him from getting into the whole boyfriend/girlfriend scene, so I guess it would seem rather contradictory to then turn around and try to teach him how to be a good boyfriend.

Nevertheless, he has himself a girlfriend, and he had committed a major faux pas today, so I felt like I should help him out. First, we had to scrounge up a gift. I volunteered my box of chocolates that came with my roses, since I haven't been eating sugar for 6 weeks (and I lost at least 8 lbs. thanks to that!) . I also offered one of my roses, and got it all gussied up with a fern and baby's breath and some nice tissue paper and a bow (let's hear it for my wonderful new craft center that I organized a few weeks back!).

Next, he had to call her to try to weasel his way out of the fix he was in. I helped him craft his story, to save his butt, although we were careful to not lie. So, the recommended conversation went something like this:

"Hey Sheryl, it's Sullen. I bet you think I didn't get you anything for Valentines Day. Well, actually, I *do* have something for you. I don't think it would have done well on the bus and through the whole school day, so I wondered if I could bring it over to your house tonite."

Am I good, or what?!

So, she went for it, and we then had to head out to Sheryl's house. I had wanted to get the directions from the mother myself, but Sullen came up the stairs with a paper with what looked like directions on it and read them off to me, so I said fine and we got everybody ready and headed out.

So....first leg of the journey the directions are:

"Go down this road 12 miles til you see a bridge on the right. Turn RIGHT there."

So, no name of the road we are turning onto?

Nope. Just a bridge. I think it's something-something Road. We'll know it when we see it.

Oh. Ok.

So, we start driving down The Road. It's a pretty rural road to begin with, like for the first 4 miles, and after that it gets kind of...... Well, let's just say that after 4 miles my preschoolers were acting very scared and saying, "There's monsters here!"

Although I told them there were no monsters and that we were very, very safe, I thought it was MiTee Creepy out there in the sticks.....

So, at about 5.5 miles Sullen points to the LEFT and says "There's a bridge! Turn there!" and of course I flew right past it since it hadn't been anything close to 12 miles yet. But he tells me he's sure this is the way to go. So, I pull over (well, actually, by this point the road was mostly a one-lane affair, so there really wasn't anywhere to pull over to. I just stopped. Don't worry--there was absolutely no traffic whatsoever.) to consult the directions.

And what do I see?

Names of roads. Route numbers. And a squiggly line.

"So, these are the directions?!" I ask.

"Well, yeah. I just drew a map and remembered most of it in my head."

Oh GREAT! So, we see now from the squiggly line that we should actually turn left (which made sense to me in relation to where I thought she lived) but had no idea what other roads, house numbers, landmarks, etc. we were looking for. Goodie.

I know! We'll call them on the cell phone.

But I bet you know what comes next!

No reception for the cell phone out there in Monster Land!

Of course.

So, I decided to be adventurous, make a memory, and go back to turn on the road my son thought was the right one. (And I hoped to high heaven that we could find our way back home, too, because it was totally dark with no help in sight.) From there we made another turn, purely on instinct, and then got to the end of that road and it was one of the roads we were looking for! (none of the other roads had signs or markers of any type) So, which way do we turn? No telling.

Thankfully, at that point, the cell phone beeped at me, letting me know we were now in an area where I could make a call. So we sat there at the stop sign and called her.

I would like to make a small side note here, that I am very unsure what my son sees in this girl. She's pretty I guess, and she seems to be pretty down-to-earth, which I know is more his kind of thing. But, you know, these middle school love affairs don't even include the kids speaking to each other in person or sitting together or anything. He doesn't call her hardly at all, didn't get her anything for Christmas, and just generally doesn't seem very preoccupied with her. My theory is that with all the pressure around him to "have a girlfriend" he just got one so that he can say he has one, and everyone can leave him alone about it now. The pressure's off, I guess.

When it comes to this girl's personality, well, I just don't know. When I first met her at the middle school dance she barely spoke or looked at me or anything. (Maybe a 6+foot tall boyfriend's mom is just too darn scary??) But, heck! She didn't even speak to my son either! Tonite on the phone I noticed that the child can barely speak discipherable English. She didn't know if one should turn left or right to get to her house. She didn't know her own house number. She didn't know which side of the road her house was located on. And, sadly, it seems these questions were somewhat challenging for her mother as well.

So, um, we found their home, Sullen braved past their 3 barking and snarling dogs, and handed off the V Day loot to dear Sheryl. Their exchange was short, which I guess it had to be considering that Sheryl was trying to juggle flower, card, box of chocolates, and a dog wrapping it's chain around her ankles while barking and jumping. Sullen stood there with his hands in his hoodie, nodding while keeping a wary eye on the dogs (he's been bit/attacked by dogs twice in the past year, so he's kind of nervous around them now). It looked like they basically said something like,

Hi.
Hi.
Happy Valentines Day!
Thanks.
So how many dogs do you have?
16. If you look around at the neighborhood trailers, you can imagine why.
Yeah, I see what you mean.
Well, um....
Yeah, well, see you at school tomorrow.
OK, bye.
Bye.

Definitely a holiday for the books!!!

Lookie! My product label! Super Mom's No-Lice Hair and Body Spray will be available Feb. 25 (or hopefully sooner). I am so excited!!! 

Shhhhhhhhhhhh............ Be Vewy, Vewy Quiet........

They've found me......

Who?

Oh, Internet Explorer, the Mozilla Firefox police, and of course, Kim Kommando.

They heard my bold declarations of hatred for Mozilla, that I had never had any problems with IE, and that I was deleting MF from my computer.

Yeah, well, they got to me. Brought me to my knees, they did.

About as soon as I said goodbye to MF, my IE started acting up something fierce. Eventually I could barely get it to load any web sites at all.

So, guess what.

I reloaded Mozilla Firefox last night. I've learned my lesson. Don't tempt the computer gods......

(let this be a lesson to us all)

Greetings, mainly to prove that I'm still alive......

Hello dear blog readers! How have you been getting along without me? Things have been so busy for me, I've barely had time to read blogs, let alone write anything in mine. But, alas, I'm going to take a few minutes to tell you of the thrilling happenings in my life in the past several days:

PreMS

Present MS

kids that have done any/all of the following: vomiting, diarrhea, coughing, sneezing, snotting, whining, fighting, clinging, mess making

Worked on my product label and other items

came up with a great new way to streamline our laundry system a little bit more

drove around in my nice new Suburban

cleaned the house and saw it totally trashed again in less than 24 hours

finished 2 books

watched The Manchurian Candidate

did some herb research to try to formulate some more products

kept two sick kids home today

spent almost an hour trying to get my three youngest kids to nap today (I got to fall asleep just in time for some of my other kids to come home from school and ring the doorbell)

started tutoring a 14 year old son of some friends

have had my back hurting in the same spot where it blew out a year ago and had me in bed for 2 weeks in terrible pain

been thinking to myself "Losing 8 pounds is nice, but it would have probably been at least 12 if you had worked out!!!"

Spent one hour at a training session at the school for Leap Pad items, and decided that they look like a poor and expensive substitute for a parent to just sit down and read to a kid

Had my 2 oldest kids check out a lame book sent home with my 1st grader and say, "It's no wonder kids think reading is boring when the schools just give them stupid books like these..." Indeed!

Made $150 selling stuff on ebay

Sold my first bottle of No-Lice to someone who wanted it so bad that she didn't want to wait for the nice bottles and labels

That about wraps it up for today. Tune in tomorrow for silence or boredom.....not sure which one it will be.

Zowee!

I lost **8** pounds in January! Ha! YAY!

Poor, old Bessie. She's been through a lot in her long life. I bid thee, well, faithful friend! May you run happily forevermore in that great junkyard in the sky! 

Our new ride. (Now all we have to do is figure out how to pay for it!)

Greetings from the waiting room at the car repair place!

You know the world is getting better when you can actually get on the 'net while waiting for a car repair to be completed.

Never fear, it's not a big repair. We bought a Suburban to fit the whole gang in, and it needed a little thing fixed on it, so we stopped by to get it done today.

Yes, we've forsaken our tacky ride days to join the crowd of greedy, environmentally unconcerned Americans who drive gas guzzling SUVs. Sorry, folks, but there isn't much to choose from when you have 8 people to transport around the world. The Firecrapper was loathe to go cruising around in a big 15 passenger van. Apparently it would be quite a deathblow to his maleness. (good thing we found this out before we had too many kids for a Suburban!) Seeing as how I wanted him to be able to keep all his masculinity, we went for the Big Blue Burb. It's big! It's tough! It's cool! It's bigger than your car! (unless you drive an 18-wheeler) So, you better watch out. DollyMama has a Mommobile that can CRUSH YOU if you don't play nice.

Alright, I'm just kidding. I won't crush you. But, our Burb rocks. Trust me on that.

Air conditioning that actually works, leather seats, rust-free....even a tush heater! Me and my butt are so spoiled now.

I had a stroke of serendipity as we came on over here to get our Burb taken care of. We went past a place that manufactures labels. Now, for those of you that don't know, I decided to market my No-Lice Hair Spray that I told you about long ago. Right now I'm in the process of getting the containers, brochures, web site, and labels to start ridding the world of head lice, and making myself wealthy (or at least able to pay for my new ride!) all at once. I've really been having trouble with the label, first finding horrible high prices, and then not really being able to figure out how to format it, not having a logo yet, and so on.

SO, I stopped in at this label place and found out that they have very good prices, PLUS they have an art staff. They will be able to sit down with me and come up with a label design, a logo...the works! And at a great price. I am SO psyched! This is going to be so much better than trying to limp along on my own and order from some faceless web site.

In a couple weeks I should be all ready to run around to all the schools handing out my brochures and helping people avoid the scourge of the earth. I'll become a beloved local legend! Patron saint of the liceless! And when they interview me in a decade and ask, "Did you ever think you'd become a millionaire by selling No-Lice Hair Spray?" I'll laugh and say, "YES!" Start with the end in mind, right?

Other than that I'm trying to sell off my old van, stuff I've had piled up in my closet waiting to be listed on ebay, and in general pay my bills and clear the way for the attempt to sell my product far and wide. No flies on me!