Getting Distracted

Story of my LIFE.

You walk into a room to do something important, see something else that needs to get done, and never get back around to doing the original thing that needed to be done!

OR you sit down to reply to an email, start checking your other email account, then Facebook, Pinterest, Etsy, etc. and never reply back to the email!

OR you have a plan to get ahead during the week because you know you have to go out of town on the weekend and can't get any work done, but every little thing that comes up takes away your attention and it just doesn't happen!

So the latest snafu just happened, just this minute when we finally arrived home from the weekend. We had a great time, traveling to stay with my BFFL from high school (and daughter's Godmother) at her mom's house for the nuptial ceremonies of another friend of ours from high school. Eric was in the wedding so we were present for the rehearsal and dinner, wedding day, the whole shebang! Then we stopped by my Grandmom's house for a birthday dinner for my Dad. On the way home we had to stop by a Booster parent's house to check on some marching band props for the show before finally heading home.

We get home and start unloading the baby (who had a dirty diaper of course!), then all the luggage, when I hear Eric "Aw CRAP"-ing from the garage. We had forgotten to drop off the tux on the way home from Grandmom's....the store is a solid 30 minutes away from the house.

AAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!

It's time's like these when there just aren't enough words in the American English language to describe one's frustration. Screaming out loud doesn't do any good because you feel immature and awful for letting your child hear you acting their age. Cursing does feel better for the moment, but at some point very soon, my daughter will be picking up words faster than I can think of them, and I will need to completely eradicate these from my vocabulary.

So after being away all weekend, traveling what felt like all day, having very limited time left to prepare for a week of teaching and meetings and rehearsals and competitions, and trying to spread our mula out until payday, Eric went back out to the tux store to avoid any large fines. Now let's just cross our fingers he got all the pieces of the suit back in the garment bag.........

Well at least we looked good.

Things we do well...

So I don't want it to seem like we completely "suck at life," even though I proclaim so on a daily basis. But we are good at a few choice things.

1. We are really good partners. I think this partly comes from being together so long (we were high school sweethearts after all), but we are in a relationship that goes two ways, and we work hard to communicate well. We also just enjoy each other's company no matter what the activity, and love to make each other laugh.

2. I think we are good parents. You can tell by how happy our daughter is (most of the time) that she knows she is loved and that she trusts her old Mom and Dad. Now, what happens when she starts talking and the real parenting has to begin, I don't know. But we love her with everything that we have, and for now, that seems to be working.

3. I think we are good at our jobs. We spend a lot of time investing in opportunities for our students and we make a good collegial team. We care about what we do and for whom we do it, and I think for the students that stick with us through tough rehearsals and hard work, it makes a difference. Sometimes we let the paperwork part of our job fall by the wayside, but that's only because we believe that the most important thing is the interaction with our students.

So dear readers, we hope that we will be remembered for what we do well!

Open Your Mail!

And then actually read it, and then figure out how to organize it!

So Eric and I have this way of putting in so much time and energy at work, that when we finally get home at whatever ungodly hour of the evening, we just crash. This was especially true the closer we got to Baby Girl's due date back in December, 2010. I was so physically wiped out, coupled with the fact that we were just so ready and anxious for her to get here, we just pretty much had a "heck with everything else" attitude.

I'm pretty sure we almost defaulted on one or two of Eric's student loans. I let my license and registration lapse (that came back to bite me in March when I was finally out driving my car around and got pulled). So yea we were just pretty much pathetic. Really great for soon-to-be parents, right?

So since then we've at least been opening our mail. Now to just get a filing system that works!!

PS. People. I know it's not that hard to just get the sh*t together, but for some reason...it IS hard for us.
I like to think of myself as an educated and sensible individual, but I told my students once, "The inside of my head is organized, but not all this physical space around me."

No Financial Smarts....

I'm really not sure how people do it. How are those financially savvy people able to put money away in one million different places? I feel like I'm supposed to have a just-in-case fund for cars, health, and household appliances, on top of the equally as necessary college fund, retirement fund, vacation fund, and savings fund.

We do not have any of these! Well, not really. The one good thing I feel like we have is a tax-sheltered annuity inside of our life insurance policy. Don't ask me what this means because I don't even know that! I just have heard it can be a good thing to have.

We are definitely going to have to start a college fund for the offspring ASAP. Oh, and add a braces fund to that!

And what if you ever want to remodel your home? Or buy a new mattress? Not gonna happen for us. Almost every dollar of our checks is spoken for, and what's not goes to gas and groceries. Oy.

So what this means for us is that when the car needs something major done, or crazy neighbors come a-knockin' for mula, or Eric has to go to the ER with a stupid high fever, then we start accruing even more monthly bills and debt. Darn you, vicious cycle!!

Please comment if you have tips!

Mistakes of a Young Married Couple

My husband and I have a long history together. We met as sixth graders in middle school, "went out" for a month in the seventh grade (i.e. held hands at school), then started really dating just before the start of our tenth grade year. We "took a break" after a year and a half, but remained very close friends. After reuniting at the start of our senior year, we have been together ever since. He is my best friend and partner in crime. We do everything together, even share an office at our school where I teach chorus and he teaches band. Gagging yet? =) And now we have a beautiful little girl, born December 10, 2010.

During this long history, we have somehow made many monumental life mistakes (being together NOT being one of them!) that I feel we should share with you, lest you yourself be doomed to repeat these blunders.

We did everything that one is "supposed" to do in entering adulthood. We graduated high school with honors, went to college, became teachers, got married, bought a house; we were "living the dream." But dreams can sometimes take unexpected turns, and if this blogs helps someone else to avoid our comedy of errors, then I will be able to rest in peace.

So, reader, beware: herein will not lie the "answers" to life's hardest questions, but simply a list of methods to steer clear of along your journey. These methods are tried and failed.

Homebuying Part I: Choose your neighborhood wisely...

Disclaimer: We love our neighborhood. It is very nice and has many friendly, caring people and some young children too! It even has four cul de sacs, which are really good for kids riding their bikes, etc. But this story is about the one negative that we have encountered.

We actually bought our house just before we got married, knowing that we were going to be staying in the area for a while after we signed our job contracts. There will be another post about not buying at the top of your range, but that's another story.

The point of this blog is:

If the previous owner will still be in the neighborhood, don't buy the house! Even if they are nice! They will never truly let go of "their home," and you always wonder what they're thinking about what you've done to the house.



The Problem:

In addition, they will want to leave furniture in the house that they do not plan to take so that they won't have to deal with selling it or whatever. The previous owner of our house had been so nice, seeming to really want to help out a brand new married couple. She had asked if we would like to keep an upholstered chair, a bamboo chest, and a dinner table and matching chairs. When we said "Sure, we'd like to have them," BOOM! She dropped the hammer: "Well I think about $500 would be about right." Uh....m'scusey? So being naive and feeling unable to somehow back out of this corner, we had agreed to pay when we could, after a couple of paychecks.

Well, wedding week comes, and the cookin' of the pig for our rehearsal dinner barbecue took place at our place. The air conditioning was turned down really low to keep the cooks cool. After our wedding, Eric and I spent two nights in a bed-n-breakfast in Siler City. We came home to a broken A/C unit. Happy wedding. All of our wedding cash, gone to an A/C unit part. So I'm guessing this is where we lost sight of having to pay for the furniture. We've been financially behind ever since!

Fast-forward three years, we have a baby, one master's degree each, and more bills to pay than we know what to do with. We come home one Saturday to a note written on a grocery list pad in our mailbox...asking for the money that we "owed" after moving into "their" house. Shoot me in the face.



The Solution:

I was literally shaking after reading the note, and had no bearing in my usual environment of good communication skills. Eric wanted to just cart the furniture over to leave in their front yard. But we knew we had been in the wrong, and at least needed to do as close to the right thing as possible for my own conscience. I called my mother, who of course had exactly the words I needed to say to the previous owner to begin rectifying the situation. I called, and stated that we were so sorry that we had forgotten about this, that I wished we had put something in writing, and that this in no way should reflect on how grateful we had been at the time for their generosity (paying all closing costs!). I did mention that I thought we had said $400 at the time. "(Laugh)...We said $500, Kathleen, but $400 will be fine."

Well, that was humbling. So...luckily Eric gets paid for two weeks of marching band camp in the summer on top of our September paycheck. We truly needed to be allocating that money elsewhere, but I really wanted to be done with this. We wrote a $400 check as soon as we could and delivered it. I have since then documented all of the correspondence, and printed out a copy of the scanned in check from the bank showing it had been deposited.

I can't say that it was $400 well spent, or that I feel good about the situation at all. It's probably just my own paranoia, but I still feel like we are being watched and I hate that. Hopefully this will wear off soon and I will be able to feel good about my neighborhood again.