Countdown to Mission: Bleeding Ears

The other day I drafted a pretty good "woe is me" post. I'd been feeling like crap for two weeks - down on my luck and ready for a pity party. I opted not to publish the post and decided to see how I felt this week. So here I am and I do admit that I'm feeling a little bit better. I'm still kinda pissed off at the world, but that's ok. I'll get over it.

So, what are we up to this week you ask? Well, even if you didn't ask, I'm gonna tell ya anyways because I'm pretty stoked about it! We're embarking on Mission: Bleeding Ears...

This week, my husband and I are spending the latter part of the week in Milwaukee. For Christmas, I purchased tickets to the Black Label Bash, headlined by Black Label Society (BLS). For those of you unfamiliar, BLS' front man is none other than Zakk Wylde who has been playing with Ozzy Osbourne for ages. He's a swearing, drinking viking of a man and I'm pretty sure my husband has some sort of man-crush on him. I've seen pics of Zakk in his earlier days and as long as he keeps his facial hair (I really am NOT attracted to baby-faced men, sorry), I'll even admit to my own crush on him.

Anyhoo... we're seeing BLS, Sevendust, Dope & Infinite Staircase at the Rave/Eagles Ballroom on Friday. Still not familiar? If you're not a fan of heavy metal, don't bother... otherwise, google them and tell me what you think. I'm not familiar with Dope & I.S, but this will be my second time seeing Sevendust and I'm pretty excited to see them again! Four bands, small venue - yep, I'm sure Mission: Bleeding Ears will be a succesful one. Hopefully, upon my return I'll have some cool pics to share with ya!

SDMF!

Happy Birthday Baby Boy!

Others will tell me that you're hardly a baby anymore! I miss the days that you called me "Mommy", now it's stictly "Mom". You used to rush up and give me hugs and kisses every chance you got, but these days you're quick to assess the witnesses around first, to make sure none of your classmates are watching. I'll learn to survive, just know that you'll always be MY baby boy!

I'm sorry that you're sick today and even sorrier that you won't be able to celebrate with your classmates until you return to school on Thursday. A diagnosis of Fifth's Disease sure seems like a kick in the pants on today of all days, but you're tough like me and along with the rest of your loving family, we'll make sure we celebrate extra tonight!

Happy 10th Birthday, Punkin!

Love,

Mommy :)

A Decade of Joy

Ten years ago today, I was enjoying my last days as a "free" woman. I was a young mother-to-be, anxiously anticipating my baby boy's grand entrance into the world. I was so bloated that my wedding rings had been cut from my fingers because I couldn't get them off. I was on ordered bedrest. I was mean and cranky, I'm sure. I was also terrifed.

I'm the oldest of four children and one of the oldest among a gaggle of cousins, so I'd been around a baby more than once and was always the number one choice for babysitter among my aunts and uncles. This, however, was entirely different. I knew that I wanted to be a great mom, but had no idea how much work that would be. I'm not talking about 2am feedings, or sick babies that somehow manage to sneeze, puke and poop all at the same time... I'm talking about how difficult it would be to become selfless, and I admit that I did a pretty crappy job for most of it. I'm still learning every single day what it takes to be a "good" mom.

Somehow, amid all of the chaos of the last five years, my son has turned into a charming, shy, smart-as-a-whip little mini-man. He has a great sense of humor, is compassionate, and has a good temper on him. He doesn't throw huge tantrums, but he'll argue his case like Johnny Cochran used to. He's this great combination of his mother's stubbornness and his father's laid-back attitude. He's protective and won't be bullied. He likes to be the leader, though he's not yet the first to step up to the challenge. He's reserved and cautious with strangers, but he's a hoot once he warms up to ya. He makes me laugh out loud over things like "where did the word 'nincompoop' come from, mom?". He's a pokemon-playing, country song-singing, basketball-throwing miracle of mine.

Tonight, we're celebrating his birthday with family. He gets to continue the celebration over the weekend with his school friends, and finish it off on Monday night with dinner of his choice. His request? Pizza! See how great he is?! I don't even have to cook! ;)

P.S. The picture above is from his 8th birthday, but it was all I had on my work laptop for some reason... I'm going to work to put together a slideshow of his first decade over the weekend (and yes, I'm the kind of mom that will make sure all of his school friends see it, ha!)

A Great Day!

I awoke this morning to the most beautiful day. The birds were chirping and not a flake of snow in sight! The temperature is 54 degrees at 10:00 in the morning. I had almost forgotten what anything about 32 degrees felt like.

To top it off, I completed my inventory reconciliation at work two days ahead of schedule. To best even that, my total variance for the entire company (four plants plus corporate headquarters) was less than $90!! Mind you, when I took this position about nine months ago, the variance was over $1,000,000 (yep, I said MILLION).

The cherry on top of this morning? I scored a 98% for final grade in my Health & Wellness course. I started pre-reading for my next class, a survey of the New Testament, and am surprisingly extremely intrigued so far! I was raised in a Christian family, but we didn't really go to church - I was just brought up to believe without any of the real lessons from the Bible. So it's interesting to me to finally look at all of it in a historical context.

I think I'm going home early today to enjoy the sunshine rest, because I'm sick of being inside and cold suddenly feeling under the weather ;)