Screw you – people pleasing problem!

On May 8, 2014May 8, 2014 By JillIn Mommy Musings, Uncategorized, What's Going On?1 Comment

I’ve been doing my research, talking to some peeps about my little problem, well soon to be NOT A PROBLEM! Ya know, the situation that I wrote about the other day…

People pleasing

I absolutely love my Mom’s advice – “Embrace your caring personality and on occasion feel free to tell a few people to go F themselves!” Ha – don’t you just love hearing your momma tell it like it is!

I hear it and I’m going to follow it… Since I wrote the post, and gosh, I apologize for these therapy type pieces… Sometime, late night, all comfy, cozy on my couch, with the lights dimly lit, I just write, let it out, and hit Publish.
I go to sleep, wake up, see comments from readers, and suddenly it hits me, ugh! I just wrote all this personal stuff and now everyone knows how crazy I am!

Then again, they already know!

So, like I was saying, since I wrote this post, I had a few friends reach out (love you) and give me some advice/thoughts… And I can honestly say I feel like I can tackle the world… I feel more free.

I still love to bake for people and do things for friends but I need to take a few minutes to stop and think, is this a good idea for me? for my family? and for the general flow of our daily life?

Let me explain this for a minute… I am impulsive (shocker!) and I love to create… For example, for Easter, I decided to make some treats.

An Easter Egg shaped cake, which should have been enough, but then I had to make something with chocolate, you know, for those that like chocolate…So had to get to the store, had to buy the little one treats, while buying baking items, to prevent meltdown in store ( long story- it had been a trying day – she doesn’t give me a tantrum every single time we go out… Just most times! ) So, there’s that, and then the entire next day, making these treats with the kids and all the chocolate the little one ate, and it took me ALL DAY… And so on and so forth- no need to bore you with the minutiae of my life and our candy debacles… But the fact that Ari doesn’t eat well rests a lot on my shoulders… She’s used to chocolate chips and the oven full of baked goodies….

I asked a few people recently about some incidents where I was concerned that I annoyed them. Last week I was two hours late to a birthday party. I had already called my friend and told her I was going to be late… But because of a few personal situations, we were super late. I was seriously speeding and kept thinking about how late we were and how terrible that is of me… So, I put my children’s safety at jeopardy and just lost two hours of my day fretting.

I decided to ask this friend exactly what she thought when I arrived at the party…

“A few things: 1. I honestly didn’t realize that you were 2 hours late as people were rolling in at various times 2. You already told me about swimming so I expected you to be late 3. I also read your blog regularly and know how challenging it can be with the girls so I was just happy that you guys made it.”

I also asked another friend what she would have thought if I came to her house empty handed! meaning wine for sure! but no cookies…

My exact message…

“For my own personal sanity knowledge…. Scenario : I walk in to your house without any baked goods… Do u think ” that lazy bitch” or “hi friend” !!!! Or secretly ‘where are my cookies?’ ”
She responded, “Are you serious? You’re a freak. Honestly I probably would just think how good it is to see you and how many glasses of wine we’ll drink.”

Third friend I asked about canceling on her sort of last minute for a play date and what she really thought…

She said, “Honestly, I thought nothing of it – I understand, even if you were just having an off day and didn’t feel like company, I seriously think nothing of it!”

So there you have it. I’m sure that’s how most people think and if they don’t, need to adopt Mom’s mantra- f them ! Because, I just need to get over this!

I love giving but if it’s not going to be good for us- you’re up shit’s creek – you don’t get my goodies!

Snickerdoodles

On March 6, 2014March 6, 2014 By JillIn Uncategorized3 Comments

Today we made Snickerdoodles.

Snicker ( no pun intended) and snort all you want about me…I’m baking again – don’t bash me folks- didn’t you read my previous post about Letting Go- No more no’s in my life! Nothing is off limits at this point, the sky is the limit, ready to try anything…

Ok you sickos, get your minds out of the pornos – I am not doing that or that – And to hubs, don’t get any crazy ideas.

I never made snickerdoodles before but Gia loves them so I figured I would try them. There was a time when I had never even heard of a snickerdoodle before- sounded like something with chocolate and nuts, until this annoying roommate I had years ago in Hoboken made them. Boy was she irritating- she would talk nonstop during funny sitcoms and eat her cereal really loud like crunching and munching and slurping away. It was enough to make you never want to pour a bowl of frosted flakes again- oh wait -did I say frosted flakes? I don’t know what made me say that- I spent my twenties choking down Fiber One and Kashi Good Friends in attempts to get things moving down below.

Did you ever see these cereal boxes for Good Friends, pretty hysterical with those smilng faces- Why is this cereal called Good Friends? Is it because you’re going to be a good friend once you get the poop out? Or perhaps the smelly presents you leave in the toilet are your good friends? A former male boss of mine who was also gay, once came back from a trip to the little boys room ( I hate that expression but if the shoe fits…) and said that he “took a shit and it felt great and that releasing your bowels felt just as good as an orgasm.” I think I must have turned as red as a tomato and was rendered speechless…

These days I don’t bother with the fiber- these kids have me running on fumes and I really don’t have time to visit the loo so that’s that.

Back to the snickerdoodles, yikes all that potty talk, and now back to scrumptious sweets baked with delicate hands. This seems like the perfect time to show you that my muffin did indeed wash her hands today…

wash — You can lick off these hands, they’re so clean!

When we were baking last week, Big D (remember him, my contractor) happened to sneak up on us while G was licking her fingers and going to town on the pink frosting we made…aww, snap – caught in the act!

Snickerdoodles are like the only thing that G wants in Target. Well, that and the Pizza Hut pizza they serve there- this is my mistake or wait- I think I’ll blame my Mom for this one- yup, grandma bought her this once in Target and you know what they say about addictions, it just takes one time. The thing is G doesn’t actually eat pizza, she takes all the cheese off and just eats the bread so the Pizza Hut personal pizza is a Godsend for little miss cheese-less. The small brown box contains a mushy, doughy, greasy, sink your teeth into some old school deliciousness and she’s in heaven.

Not going to be stealing the secrets of Pizza Hut and recreating pizza in my kitchen so I decided to make cookies. I always see foodie blogs where people show all the steps they took to make their delights so I figured I would be all professional and do the same.

Here’s the recipe I found on http://www.howsweeteats.com/

makes 16-20 cookies

1/2 cup butter, at room temperature

1 cup sugar

1 egg

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon

2 tablespoons milk

1/4 cup sugar + 1 tablespoon cinnamon for dipping

Preheat oven to 375.

Cream butter and sugar with an electric mixer until smooth. Add egg and vanilla, mixing well until combine, about 2 minutes. Stir in flour, baking powder, salt, and 1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon. Mix until dough comes together. Add in milk. If dough is still crumbly, add milk 1 tablespoon at a time until it comes together. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.

In a bowl combine remaining sugar and cinnamon. Remove dough from fridge and roll into big 1 1/2 inch balls. Dip in cinnamon sugar mixture and place on baking sheet. Lightly pressdown on dough to flatten it. Bake at 375 for 10-12 minutes.

dough dough — Delicious dough that almost didn’t make it.

The little one saw this, dragged her chair over, climbed up, and turned the bowl over so she could use as a drum- her music class is really inspiring her to make music in all the wrong places…

balls — Thank goodness she washed her hands!

cookie baked — The entire house smelled of sugar and cinnamon!

Poor Daddy never gets any treats by the time he comes home. We have either eaten them, given them away, or had children gobble them up during a playdate. We made a plate just for him.

Frustrated Stay at Home Mom

On February 13, 2014 By JillIn Uncategorized2 Comments

Just yesterday I was thinking to myself, you know what, being a stay at home mom is easy- I mean, truly, I don’t have any deadlines, I don’t have a boss breathing down my back, I don’t have annoying coworkers to deal with, I don’t have to commute, I don’t have the stress of having to bring home the bacon…

But after a day like today, I am in shock that I even had those thoughts…

The morning started out with a broken glass, shattered on the kitchen table and all over the tile- glass and liquid everywhere. I frantically tried to sweep it up, clearly disturbed, and Gia says to me, “But Mommy, your taking too long and I’m huuuungry!”

I looked at her with anger saying “Do you not see what I am doing? Cleaning up the glass that you broke so you don’t step on the slivers that will have us running to the hospital where you will have to get a needle so big….”

“Mom, you left the glass there so it’s your fault,” she retorted.

This statement so eloquently spoken by my daughter was the beginning of my day. We have a contractor here doing work and my daughter is petrified of any noise that he makes, whether it be banging on the walls , a drill sound, or just his mere presence causes her to scream and cry and run for Mommy- sounds cute doesn’t it but not while you are trying to get two girls dressed and fed and out the door and forget about brushing teeth!

After music class which was still very early in this long day – a 9:30 am class, I temporarily lost my keys- its freezing cold here in New Jersey, I have the two year old in my arms, and I can’t find my car keys anywhere, I am embarrassed to admit I started to tear up, AGAIN…It must be my hormones but I cried a little on the way to music class, Pink’s Just Give Me a Reason blaring in the car, which always makes me cry, just blubbering about how is this my morning over and over again- the rushing, the crying, the frustration, the TOO SMALL clothes- these kids are growing like weeds!

Thank goodness for my friend in music class who actually got out of her car to help me look and she said, “You need another set of eyes.” After searching high and low, she found them in my daughter’s winter coat pocket.

I must have absent mindedly put them in there while busy moaning about my life…

We had a few errands to run in the morning while Gia was at school and it was the usual temper tantrums and such …the day moved on with crying and hysterics on the garage floor, refusing to come inside because I un – snapped her myself.

At this point I was already pooped out but I was invited to a play date- someone I never had a play date with before so I couldn’t cancel on her- first impressions are the most important ones, right? Well, I screwed that one up or rather my two darlings did…get back to that in a second.

In the few hours that we had before heading over to new friend’s house, my daughter, who tortured us with non stop vomiting for a year and a half straight when putting her to bed, decided to revert back to her old ways and hurl the contents of every thing she ate all over my kitchen floor- the reason- I yelled at her, yup, I lost my temper on her, after she insisted on icing the cookies that I made for the play date herself- but the problem was that she was icing and then licking the spoon and the bowl and telling Arianna that she couldn’t help which resulted in major screaming and crying…just writing this is making my heartbeat faster! This is so hard! How do moms do this???

Oh right…they have their children in school for more than two days a week and only two and a half hours at that- I am the only Mom that I know who is basically home all day with these children, and by that I mean children of this age- I know that there are moms who are doing the home schooling thing but they must have some secret, or help, or a husband who comes home at a decent hour!

We cleaned up, Gia took a mega fast bath to clean off the puke- made it to the play date – the girls were terrible! Arianna screamed and cried when she didn’t get her way and Gia flat out hit me with her dress up magic wand when I said we had to leave…Arianna threw her typical kicking and screaming and thrashing of her legs when I tried to change her diaper, which is always fun at someone else’s house!

The day didn’t get much better and the icing on the cake was the call from my husband saying first he was going to be late and second, his car was dead at the train station.

I didn’t even feel like writing this post because I am tired, frustrated, and to be perfectly honest, sick of writing about these sort of days which seem to happen ever so frequently- I love these girls, I hate these situations.

Something has to change…