The meltdown zone.

I have always thought of myself as a strong women. Growing up I have always heard God only gives you what you can handle and no more. That with his help you can accompolish anything. Might not be exactly what you would have thought the result should be but what he feels that it needs to be. This year we have set certain goals for us as a family and also as a business. We wanted to expand the outside kennels to give the puppies plenty of room to roam. We wanted to redo our floor downstairs. Well for some reason my hubby has decided that we would do everything at one time. So I currently have partial finished kennels outside and a kitchen that is barely usable. On top of this is baseball season in which I am home maybe one night a week. Jacob is doing karate and now has decided to start back up with his guitar lessons. Because of the numerous calls/emails we decided that it was time to up the litters that we are having. This is on top of both of us working a 40 hour week. Well my business recently had layoffs. I am lucky that my job was not eliminated but the workload that I have now is almost unbearable. I personally feel that I have reached the melt down zone. Friday was my 41st birthday. My birthday present to myself was a day of nothing. No work, no running kids nothing. I watched a little tv, layed in bed reading a book. I did go out with my parents to eat. I can honestly say it was the best birthday I have had. Do I feel guilty that I took 1 day of the whole year to be selfish. Yes but also know that I needed it.

I feel alittle recharged so that now I can start yet another week of running and worrying and working. I know that at the end of the summer not only will I look back and ask where did it go, but I will also look back and the many goals that we have reached this year. It will be just between us that the many goals were reached at almost the same time. I know normaly people would do one at a time. but hey who has ever said I am normal. So now off to my upside down kitchen overlooking my partial kennels. washing the baseball uniform for next week. I love my life

Start over. . . .

January 1 is the beginning of the calendar year. I know you are saying tell me something that I do not know. Well I have decided that March 19 is going to be the beginning of the year for Melissa. Over the past several years, I have put things before things for me.

Recently I have become a facebook junkie. I have connected with friends from my past. Some are friends some are old boyfriends. This reconnection has brought a new understanding in my life that I on my birthday I will be 41 years old. It is time for me. It is time for being a little selfish.

I have also decided that from now on, I am going to let the people that are in my life know how they fit into my life, how much they mean to me and how much they are loved. God brings people into your life for a reason. That people do not come back into your life with a reason.

So today I have decided that I am starting over the year and beginning a new. Lets see what the new year brings

March 14th

I can not believe that it has been this long since I have been on the blog. I guess that is why I called the blog the wonderful crazy life of me. Josh's baseball season started about the same time that my blogging stopped. I wonder if it was a coinsidence?? Of course. This is the time of the year that everything starts to be sacrificed. Laundry goes from look at what I have hung up in my closet to what do I have to wash to get something to wear and would it really cause a problem if I wash these togther. The house work goes from maintaining a sense of cleanliness to I hope no one knocks on my door. My average day starts at 530 am that is when the alarm goes off for the first time, then by 550 to 600 I finally drag myself out of bed. Please do not be like my husband who says you know if you would not set the alarm for 530 it would be better for you. He actually gets death threats from me. Hence the bloggs from previously. Sometimes my morning starts earlier if we have a 530 game. he plays an hour from home and has to be there an hour before the game starts. So I go in at 6 to get my 8 hours in before getting him to the game. Go to work, usually leave somewhere between 3 and 6 depending on the baseball schedule. We are constantly running and most nights I will run in to take care of the dogs and then leave. Usually get home about 9 or 10 that night and then off to bed. Usually hit the hay around 1130 or 1200 so do the math about 4 or 5 hours of sleep. So that is the reason no blog for me.

What's new. . . I have become an addict to facebook. I love it. I have family all over and now it is like they are here in the state with me. Especially a member that is currently over seas in the military. We are thinking about you Brandon and love you. I have also connected with some friends from school and add some of my friends that I have established since school. I love facebook because on the family you can see pics of them instead of waiting for the family reunion that happens once a year.

No here comes the big thing. We are starting to the mass remodeling of our downstairs. This start date for this part of the remodeling is May. This is the second part of a three part process. First part was about 2 years ago when we tore down a wall. As Ben says because I was sitting on the couch one day and eating popcorn and said what if we move that wall. A phone call to dad Collins in Fl and say hey come up and that happened. Well the wall came down and a temporary floor was put down. Now starts phase 2. The bar will be moved with a sink added and tile flooring put down. Phase 3 will be in about 2 years with granite counter tops and tile back splash. Sometime in there will be new appliances. So somewhere in between my wild and crazy life I will try to find sleep. Thank goodness for Dad Collins he will be bringing mom up to help in May. Now we are saving every penny we can find to get the money to do it right. Will publish pics when done.

The monster that is me. . . .

In 96 I had a severe car wreck on HWY 66. It would be a couple of years before I realize the extent that this wreck would have on my body. I started experiencing severe pain throughout my body. After many test, I was diagnosed has having fibromyalgia. I was diagnosed sometime in 97 with this. If you are familiar with fibromyalgia, being put under for surgery really does weird things with it and really messes you up. Between my c-section with my 2nd son and the two other abdominal surgeries that I have had, needless to say I have really having problems lately. I have always had the mind frame that I would not take the meds because of the side effects that it would cause and how this may effect me being a mom to my boys. Ben lovingly pointed out that me not take my meds has really effected the way I am a mom to the boys. Before I would be the mom on the go now I just want to find a hole and crawl in it.

I went to the dr last week and he put me on a new med. The list of side effects are crazy. It is one of those meds that you have to gradually go on till you reach full strength. Today is Day 5 of my transformation into this med. I say transformation because the one major side effect is nervousness and being anxious. As my husband said he is walking on egg shells around me because of the Dr Jekle Mrs Hyde that I have become. He really enjoyed the trip down I40 last night going to the "game". I politely told people what they could do as far as getting out of my way. Ben said that it is really scarry since I drive the Pathfinder that I can run over most of the people. Coming home, he and J. T. decided that the best thing for the family is to take the keys away from me and make me be a passenger. I do not do passenger very well. I get car sick. So as I was closing my eyes trying to talk my self out of being sick, I used that time to talk with God. To ask him to help me in my transformation. Well it seems to have worked. This morning I woke up feeling better and do not seem to be on such a roller coaster.

I strongly believe that God has helped me realize the monster that is me and how I need to change. I at one point last night told JT that I understood how some animal mother's eat their young. He just kind of grinned at me but also moved away. Hee hee. Well please say a prayer for me and my family because on Friday will be the 8th day at this dosage and then I get to double it. I feel that my family will be hiding again for a week.

Monday strikes again . . . .

As you are quite aware, I hate Mondays. Well today would be just another Monday in the book. First started off with the fact that because of Gatlinburg being in our school system, and they got snow, we did not have school. So we decided to let the boys stay home especially Josh to get rested for his first game. Well a miracle happened around 630. You know the one where you can not get your child up in the morning but the time where there is no school, they can get up without any problem. So we left them at home. Two boys ages 14 and 10 left alone with the refrigerator is never a good thing. Then I get a call at work from the oldest saying it is an emergency. Your mind goes into overdrive think someone is bleeding, the house is burning. No the emergency is that he can not find his sliding shorts for baseball. The sliding shorts that his cup goes into. I assured him that it is not lost but in the great beyond of his room and if he cleaned it up, he would find it. I called three hours later and no sliding shorts. So my lunch is used to run to the Kmart to get sliding shorts for him to wear tonight. The whole day, I was clicking back and forth checking my personal email to see what the status of the game is. No email. If you have a brain, you will know where this is going. I rush home to get everything together so that my mom could take the 10 year old to karate and try to eat something. We leave at 530 making the mad dash to the baseball field. I might add that the baseball field is off of Northshore in Knoxville. We fought the rush hour traffic to get there.

Normally the trip to Knoxville would be not to bad except for the fact that last week the doctor changed my meds trying to find something that will ease the pain that I have been in with my fibromyalgia. The drug that he put me own causes me to be a little anxious or in other words, things get on my nerves. So the rush to Knoxville and the fight of traffic on I40 had pushed me over the edge. Will my 14 year old decided keep asking change the station turn the radio up. I finally make it to the field Guess what no one is there. Game cancelled. No one contacted us.

Well we made it home and now things are calm. So maybe things will get better on Tuesday.

Friend me.

My husband grew up in Michigan. So this weekend he stepped unto the vast unknown of Facebook to find some of his friends. He have found some of his friends. Thru some talking about it and I guess a little courisity, I decided to check it out and see what it is all about. Well I started up an account and so far so good I guess. I can tell my age because I really do not know exactly what I am suppose to do at all. Now I am getting request to be peoples friend. These are people that I know of so I do not have a problem being friends. The problem is, I do not know exactly what am I suppose to do with this. Do I communicate with this friend on a normal basis?

It is March 2nd, snow on ground and baseball time?

This morning as I lay in bed hearing that Sevier County Schools are closed because it snowed in Gatlinburg, I came to the realization. . . . J.T. first game is tonight. I love baseball and normally I am on pins and needles waiting for the first game. It is very difficult to do that when there is snow on the ground and it is so cold. His game does not start till 7:30 tonight so I have so many blankets, gloves and hats. I will go and hope to keep from freezing to death. So here's to the SMS middle school baseball team. Go Bears!!!