So.  I got myself a new purse about two weeks ago.  I knew that with Little League starting I would need a bigger purse because I stuff snacks, and clothes, and other random things like a 5 year olds "cup" when he doesn't wanna wear it inside my bag. 

Here is my new bag, it's a SakRoots bag and I just love the shit out of this purse. 

When I first picked up this purse it was all, "Hey look at me, I have pockets all over me, and inside pockets, and my handle drop length is soooo sexy." Obviously I had to buy the smooth talking little sucker after all that. 

Let's look inside shall we.

To start off, the first one of you who comments on my lip gloss problem is getting bonked in the head. Missing from the photo is my beloved iPhone which I obviously had to use to take the pictures.

We have:

Keys to my moms house, my office, my grandmas house, and a good friends house.

Gum.

Two pill boxes.  One for vitamins and iron pills, and one for the good pills.

KCCO stickers because you never know when you need to tell slap a Chive on sticker on something to tell people to calm the fuck down.

A change purse.

Tattoo business cards from my tattoo artist because I brag about him often.  

A sticker from the tattoo shop that they gave me because it was Raiders colors.

A match book they gave me, that I keep always.

Two Easter toys a lady at the gym gave me.  I have yet to give them to my kids.

Pens & Sharpies.  I HATE using black ink, and I HATE using other peoples pens.  I need my pen with it's fine tip and bright colors.  Plus you can always always use a sharpie.

A lock for my gym locker.

A plastic spoon because my son always loses his yogurt spoon. 

A case for my glasses because after 10 years of wearing them I figure a case might help me to NOT scratch them beyond repair when I throw them in my purse. 

My car keys, house keys, work keys, and strange key chains.

6 Varieties of lip gloss.  Yet to find one I love.

My beloved apple Chapstick.  I love that shit.

Two checkbooks, a work one and a personal one.

A notebook, because I'm always writing shit down.

Apple hand cream that smells like fresh cut apples.

The cutest little tissue holder.

My brand new handgun.

My wallet (let's not open that because zomg mess)

Headphones for the gym

Two small bags

What is in those two bags? Why don't we look.

Toothbrush and toothpaste, because seriously I'm weird about my teeth. I just ran out of floss and I'm deeply saddened by this.

Deodorant for emergencies.  Emergencies are usually something like, shit I went to the spa and now I want to go to dinner but I forgot to pack stuff, good thing I have deodorant in my purse.

Another chapstick.  SHUT UP

A lemon smelly perfume stick that I NEVER use but will NOT take out of my purse.

Childrens Tylenol.

Benadryl for Brandons peanut allergy.

Epi pen to save my sons life, (if I don't inject it into my own thumb instead)

How about bag number two.

Again with the lip gloss. Okay so these are actually the two that I love.  The first is MAC Purrr which they discontinued so I ration this and only use it on very very special occasions.  Special occasions include: wooing a waiter for free drinks, wooing the guy selling me something at the Apple store for free stuff….and just wooing men to get what I want in general.  The other one is Philosophy S'mores.  I have trouble finding it so I ration the shit out of it.

More pens.  Yes.  I have this many pens in my purse, but honestly I'm a real jerk about pens.  I only have the black pen in there on the off chance I have to sign something official, like a drivers license or something that has to be signed in black in.  That usually pisses me off.  Black ink pisses me off.  People who require black ink are all assholes!

A second tube of apple Chapstick.  I got this stuff at Blogher in 2011 and fell in love.  I could not find it for another year.  I rationed that tube forever.  I now have one in two places in my purse, my desk, my coffee table, a kitchen drawer, my car, my night stand….you get the point. I like apple shit and I love this Chapstick.

More gum.  I don't like this flavor as much but sometimes I'm not feeling minty so I grab this.

A lighter.  I use this thing all the time.  Catering, or candles or sterilizing something.  This little lighter has been with me for a long time.

And finally a Tide pen.  That I have never, not one single time used.  I keep it in case though.  I haven't used it not because I don't get stains, because y'all I am a walking stain, I haven't used it because not once have I remembered I had it in my purse. Normally I just spill spaghetti sauce down my shirt, look down and think, "aww hell not again."  I'm so used to it by now that treating the stain NEVER crosses my mind.

My wallet is a whole other issue.  I'm sorry but I am just not opening that up today because if I took anything out of it I'm not even sure I could get it all back in there.  I've had that wallet for about three years now and I just love it.  It's Lucky Brand and it's just so pretty.  You can clearly tell I like bags also. I have many small bags. At trinket/gift shops I cannot resist two things, tiny bags and notebooks.  Someday I will show you my notebook collection.  But maybe not, because if I did you guys would probably hang up fliers around the US banning people from selling to me anymore.  I clearly have a lip gloss problem also.  But hey, it gets me free stuff and it gets me many many kisses from my husband.  I maybe have a pen problem too but…well I don't have an excuse for that.  

Your turn, what's in your purse?

Yesterday was one of those days when I should have just…gotten right back into bed and not left until the sun went down. I started the morning telling myself I was going to run.  Before anyone else woke up I was going to take time for me and run.  I grabbed the leash and took the dog and set off on my way.  I got about 14 feet into the run before I twisted my ankle.  I kept going though.  The dog was a menace, he chased birds, bushes, shadows and air.  It was ridiculous.  I looked like a total knucklehead running with that dog.  Then exactly .50 miles into the run the dog stopped right in front of a bus load of people to take a shit.  He was taking a while so I took my phone out of my sports bra to pause my time so it didn’t slow me down.  He finished and I restarted my time.  I put my phone back in and went back to my run.  14 seconds later I heard, “your run is complete.”  Somehow my boob had pushed the button on my phone stopping the time.  It also managed to post to Facebook that I had only run a half a mile.  I was so pissed.  I started a new run and headed home.  Halfway my shoes came untied.  I had to stop again and retie my damn shoe.   I was so mad.  I eventually made it home with two separate posts in my exercise tracker looking like a fool.  

After the running mess I came home and made an incredible breakfast for the kids.  Then my husband wanted to clean the garage.  That was fine.

But then, THEN, it was time to work in the garden. I wanted to hook up the drip system to my roses. I got out the hose and climbed into my scary ass green house filled with spider webs to hook up the hose.  I turned it on and water shot out everywhere.  The hose had a crack in it.   I walked over to work and grabbed another hose and headed back to my house.  This time the hose had no holes in it but it happened to be the hose my grandpa had “fixed” so water came shooting out of the end where you hooked it up.  I grabbed a third hose and this time when I bent down to hook it up I cracked my head on this metal rod that is supposed to hold the hoses.

You guys it hurt bad.  But I was a woman on a mission so I continued on.  This time when the water turned on and the hose worked but the mother fucking drip hose had a ginormous hole in it and water started spewing everywhere.  I stomped back to the hose bib and bent down to turn off the water again.  This time when I stood up and cracked my head into the pole it was bad. Like…tears in my eyes bad.  My husband was watching and instead of running over to check on me he just said, “you okay, you bleeding?” I was so fucking pissed.  I said “NO IT HURTS.”

His response.

His actual response was, “You don’t have to be mean.”

I wanted to ill him. My head was probably cracked open and he is telling me not to be mean.  

I finally finished fixing the drip line when I realized that meant it was time to go hand dig the up the garden.  You see my husband and I decided we didn’t want to pay for a rotatiller so instead we took shovels and dug up every inch of the garden turning over the dirt to get it ready to plant.  My legs are so so so sore from all that manual labor.  

After that I had a hair appointment so I ran in, cleaned up and headed to get my hair cut. That was all fun until she started drying my hair and poking my head right in my giant goose egg on my head.  Y’all it was HUGE.  And it HURT.  

My husband trying to be nice invited me to dinner.  I picked the place.  I picked wrong.  Dinner was awful.

AWFUL. 

I figured the day was a bust.

Thankfully a friend invited me to her house for a play date so the night ended really well. So well in fact my kids passed out before I put the car in park and slept right through the night.  I wore their asses out this morning.

The problem though, is that this morning I woke up with a pounding headache.  You guys my head hurts bad.  I made it to the gym fine but it hurt.  While at the gym with my new mom friend we made a stupid deal that I would give up chips and pretzels and she would give up candy.  The first person to lose buys dinner.

CHIPS.

I’M SUPPOSED TO GIVE UP CHIPS.

Basically I am now going to die because you guys potato chips are my world.

Stupid bet 

Either way, I am currently sitting on the couch with an ice pack on my head trying not to cry and talking myself out of going to the hospital because dammit only sissies go to the hospital.

So to sum it up, my ankle hurts from twisting it, my boobs can text, my legs hurt from shoveling, my arms hurt from my friends shenanigans at the gym and if my head still hurts tomorrow I might even consider urgent care, no matter how big of a sissy that makes me.

Next time….I’m hiding in bed from the world, 

When I was little my favorite game to play was mom.  I had babies, I carried a diaper bag loaded with every single thing, hell I even nursed my cabbage patches.  When I was pregnant I read every single book on babies.  When I had the kids I like to think I was a pretty good mom.  My husband used to use the word amazing.  I still read, I am still a good mom, but…I think I'm finally becoming a great mom.

When Brandon started real school I never paid much attention to the other moms.  I made a couple friends and we had a few play dates but…honestly I really didn't want to get to know anyone new.  I don't like people.  Or…I didn't used to.  I recently made friends with one of the moms and she wasn't the most liked mom of the bunch.  I listened to all her trash about the other moms and told myself I was right to not make friends with all of these people.  But then one day, it was as if a light bulb just went off.  I had one of those Oprah "Aha" moments.  I needed to make friends.  I wanted to go on play dates.  I wanted my kids to be able to call their friends.  

I slowly started talking to the other moms.  Honestly I kinda just forced my way into their morning talks.  When one of the moms had a baby I made sure I got invited to the shower and I made sure to be friendly and what I thought was funny and pleasant.  I even sewed her a baby blanket.

It's not the best, but it was my first try and she loved it.  I started staying a little late after dropping the kids off to talk to the moms.  I started volunteering for things, like working at the school fair.  Then Brandon had a sweetheart dance in February. I made the family go.  I even got out there and danced with the boys the whole time.  Normally I wouldn't have even gone, but we went and it was so fun.  We even ran into Brandons best friend. 

Finally I got invited to the weekly park play date this week.  I was over the moon.  I went and met new moms and Brandon got to play for hours at the park with all of his friends.  He was so happy.  I even got Codi out of preschool early so he could go.  Today was huge though, I got invited to three separate play dates.  I texted my husband that I finally felt like I was part of the "cool crowd."  I combined two of the play dates into one date at the park.  One of the moms picked up Brandon after school as a surprise (he asked her the password first and she knew it so he was allowed to leave the school with her) and the other mom met us at the park. I picked up Codi and when I showed up I had two blankets, and a super healthy snack of carrots, celery, cherry tomatoes, cheese, string cheese, greek yogurt portables, grapes and pirates booty.  The kids and parents were happy because no one had thought to bring food, or a place for the adults to sit.  We had the best park date.  Us moms hung out and chatted for almost 3 hours on the blanket while snacking on healthy foods.  The kids played soccer, basketball and other outdoor games while running back and forth for snacks.  At that moment I really felt like I had this mom thing down.  I had done something for my kids that I would have normally been uncomfortable doing (socializing with other people) and it turned out great.

Not only that but I met other moms and I got invited on more play dates.  One of the kids is on our baseball team and his mom actually likes me enough that she even asked if some days her son could just come home with me and then ride to baseball.  She doesn't trust her son with anyone.  When we got cold we decided to drive over to a McDonalds play place.  All of the kids wanted to ride with me so we put up the third row seats, got all of the necessary booster seats and away we went.  The other moms pitched in and got us all an ice cream cone and then we spent another hour sitting inside McDonalds chatting while the kids ran around and played more.  Later we are going to a pizza place to meet other moms and do a kids karaoke night.  

I've made other changes too.  I've been making extra sure to cook a veggie at night. I even have Brandon craving my roasted cauliflower and butternut squash.  I've been packing better snacks for them.  For Brandon I do fun different things, like send him with a hard boiled egg, some sliced cheese and sliced turkey.  He's allowed one thing on his desk in class, so I fit as much stuff in one bag as I can so I make sure he stays full and can focus in class.  Sometimes he gets two mini muffins, a portable greek yogurt and a cheese, sometimes there are bananas, grapes and some sliced ham.  I try and change it up.  Whatever I can cram in one bag I do.  I've also started packing his lunch bag with an extra snack so that when I pick him up from school he can eat snack right away.  I used to pick him up and he would tell me he was hungry and I would end up driving through a fast food place.  Now he opens his lunch box and there is usually a greek yogurt and spoon, some apple sauce and chips.  Once a week I will put a little treat like two cookies or fruit snacks in there also.  It makes everyones life easier.  I don't have to listen to him whine about being hungry, I don't have to stop or leave work to get him food and I don't make fast unhealthy decisions.

I've also been spending more time getting to know my husband again.  We went through a rough patch, and while most  people would regret that, I don't.  Because it brought us so much closer.  It has been amazing.  We spend so much time together now and are really making an effort to do stuff together and for each other.  If I get off work early I try and make sure the dishwasher is unloaded and the dishes are done.  That's a chore he does, and I've happily let him do it for year's but lately I've been trying to do that.  In the morning he makes my coffee before I even come down the stairs.  We went for a run together this weekend and then walked to breakfast together. It was so nice being together.  We've been cuddling more, holding hands more and just being in love more.

I signed up for a run in June also to force myself to start running again.  I think these are all good changes.  I am making a really big effort to better myself and my family.  I hope things continue to get better from here.  I want to be that mom I always dreamt I would be when I was a little girl dreaming of my future.  

The other day my husband came to the bottom of the stairs and yelled, 

"Brandon, what did you do to the toilet paper?"

Brandon obviously replied nothing.  My husband pushed farther, 

"Why is it wet then? Where did you drop it?"

Brandon continued to play dumb.  I wandered off thinking Brandon had somehow dropped the roll of toilet paper into the toilet then put it back on the little holder thingy all wet. 

I forgot all about it until much later I heard a discussion about not spraying stuff and that stuff not being safe.  Intrigued I asked my husband what on earth they were talking about.  That is when he explained that Brandon decided he wanted his butt to be extra clean after going poop so he sprayed the entire roll of toilet paper with Lysol.  He soaked the whole thing with Lysol so his butt would be clean. 

Ladies and gentlemen, my child sprayed Vanilla Lysol all over the toilet paper and then wiped his ass with it.

I want a maternity test.

I've never been to Napa.  I think I would like to go, but I can't be sure.  I only like certain types of wine.  Everyone says it's the best place ever though, and I feel like it's one of those adult type things I should do sometime soon.

I am so so cranky lately.  I hate this time of year.  It's my least favorite time of year.  I always fall into a depression and it's the worst one of all the ones I have all year round.  Everyone is an asshole, I'm an asshole and EVERY. SINGLE. THING. bugs the ever living shit out of me.  Everyone bugs me.  I'm just not nice.

I was thinking the other day about things that people say to a person without realizing….the pressure that puts on them.  I've had numerous people tell me they want a marriage like mine.  Or that they want to model their marriage and parenting techniques after mine.  That my marriage is their dream marriage.  That is a lot of pressure on a person.  What if my husband and I don't work out. Then their whole image of marriage becomes shattered?  Do I become I failure then because I didn't live up to these insane expectations that people have of my marriage?  Marriage is hard shit.  I'm a difficult person who loves to destroy anything good in my life.  There is always a huge possibility I will destroy my marriage just out of habit.  My husband and I have had problems.  I'm lucky enough that it's all stuff we have talked through and worked out, but there for a while when separation was an option all I kept thinking was, "well shit, how am I going to tell so in so who bases her whole marriage on mine, that it is ending?"  The whole thing is hard.  When you mention to people that you are even considering a separation the immediately jump to blame you.  Or tell you maybe you didn't try hard enough, or you need to try harder.  Does it really not occur to people that perhaps two people have just run their course?  That people can part but remain friends and be absolutely okay with that choice?  I would say the hardest part of working through everything with my husband wasn't even the problems with us, it was the asshole things that came out of peoples mouth.  As if it was their life, their business, their choice.  It's not.  It's mine, and it is his and it is no one elses.  As of now we are still together, and honestly happier then we have been in years, but should issues ever arise again, I know now there is only one person I can ever talk to about it because everyone else just spews rude shit out of their mouth.

That one person is Ginger.  I'm so fortunate to have had a best friend like her for my whole life.  You guys can't imagine what this girl is to me.  She's my calm during a storm.  She never judges me.  Never says the wrong thing.  She never blames me.   She never asks what I did wrong.  She just lets me ramble, and talk, and repeat myself until I eventually work it all out myself.  It helps that we often do this at the spa.  She is the only person I would drive hours across the state to visit because I know that I can go to her house, and she will feed me food, with butter and calories, and ice cream, and wine and love.  She will spend a whole entire day doing nothing but watching ridiculous TV and listen to me grumble about commercials.  I can guarantee my favorite raspberry ice cream will be in the freezer, and that I can eat right out of the container, with a spoon for breakfast if I want.  My husbands often jokes that if she were a man I would leave him for her.  He's probably right. I would leave almost anyone for her.  I can't wait for my next trip to her town. Only next time I request much less snow.

My kids are growing way too fast.  It's scary.  Brandon is reading, and spelling and being a huge smart ass.  Codi is saying words that are far too big for his vocabulary and developing the funniest personality.  Brandon is clearly turning into me which is to say he's a sensitive, emotional, food loving weirdo.  But he can sing Waylon and point out Johnny Cashes voice one verse into a song.  He can actually sing the words to a lot of my favorite songs, even Credence.  It's refreshing since my husband doesn't even know what a Credence Clearwater is and I was worried my kids would grow up knowing shit about music like their dad.  But luckily I play music often enough, and loud enough that they have at least a tiny history of what music was before auto tune and computers.  Codi starts kindergarten this year.  I don't even know what to do with that.  Two kids in real live school.  I'm sorry but when did I become a 40 year old soccer mom?  Both of the boys are doing baseball again.  I will be dugout mom.  That means I am accepting donations now for Costco sized bottles of vodka to deal with those little turds.  I'm pretty sure that I will be fine as long as no one ends up in the trash this year and none of the coaches get spit on.  

Let's see, what else.  Oh yeah. I got more ink.

This one is a Pearl Jam song.  Only two people know what it's about and it's going to stay that way.  But I love it. 

And this is Lucille.  While I was getting the Just Breathe tattoo I asked my most favorite tattoo guy to come up with something for my arm.  I had no idea what I wanted.  Immediately he suggest a Giants pinup girl and I was hooked.  He gave her bubble gum like Pablo Sandoval and made her a pitcher like my favorite players Wilson and Lincecum instead of having her hold a bat like all the other tattoos usually do.  I fucking love her orange Giants stripes and her eye make up and her boobs.   It is probably my favorite tattoo of the thirteen (I think that's the right number) that I have.  He does exceptional line work.  I named her Lucille after the Giants mascott Lou the Seal.  She makes me happy every time I look at her.  

So that's what is in my head now.  I will try and come back when I'm feeling like less of an asshole.  Wait, who am I kidding, I am always an asshole.