We Have A Binky Situation

Emery is attached to her binky (aka pacifier). Like really really attached. As some of you know she just turned two. So, my husband and I decided that it was time to get rid of the binky. We don't want to be the parents with a child still attached to her binky as she enters kindergarten. At first, it seemed like she was doing okay. The babysitter helped us out and stopped giving it to her during the day. At home she would only asks for it when she was ready for a nap. At night she usually falls asleep and takes it out herself so I figured it was okay to allow her to have it at bedtime too. We went a few weeks like this so she would slowly get used to the idea of not having it around as much before we tried taking it away completely.

 Well, it finally came time for us to take it away at night. And it’s not working out exactly as planned. To say she gets mad is a HUGE understatement. She starts crying, screaming, and kicking if we don’t give it to her. And to be quite honest, there’s only so much of the tantrum that we can take before we end up giving the binky back to her. Now you might think that we “give in” too easily, or we’re just a big pair of "push overs". But we don’t and we aren’t. We had originally set out thinking that she would just end up crying herself to sleep. A few tears, a little bit of a tantrum, and then she’d be out. And then we assumed that she’d eventually just learn that she wasn’t going to get it back. Ha! We were so very very wrong. Her last episode lasted 45 minutes, before she started gasping for air. Did you read that?? 45 MINUTES! Her hair was soaked in tears; her face was all red and blotchy. She had been screaming/crying with only a few breaks in between. And that was one of her short fits. 

I do have to hand it to her though. She’s a persistent little one, that’s for sure. Takes after her dad mom in the stubborn department. So now, I have to figure out another approach. Any one out there have any ideas? I’m running out of them pretty fast. I’ve tried snipping the ends, hiding them, and pretending like I threw them away. Nothing seems to work. And this mom needs wants sleep. So having to listen to her cry and scream for over thirty minutes after lights out is completely out of the question. Call me selfish.

Please Pray for Piper

This family needs some major prayers. Or good vibes, if your not into prayer. Please? 

Thank you.

Here We Go Again

Before we took our vacation in January, my husband was having problems at work. His old supervisor had quit around October of last year and his new supervisor did not like him. Maybe it was my husband’s tattoos? Maybe it was my husband’s “California style”? Or maybe he just didn’t click with my husband? Either way, it showed. It reflected in his treatment of my husband.

After coming back from our vacation we found some things out. Some things in regard to wages and positions. We didn’t ask to be let in on what had happened, someone just thought it was unfair, and that we should know. It bothered my husband, but after talking about it we decided to just let it go. Fast-foreword to four weeks ago, and my husband asked about a raise. He’s been there for over a year, and he wanted to know if there would be evaluations of some kind, or if he would be entitled to some kind of a raise. He was told, by his supervisor, that he’d get a 10¢ raise. My husband told him to not worry about it because that would hardly effect his pay check. The supervisor became offended.

Since then, some major drama has unfolded. There have been random drug tests, docks in pay, terminations, searching of employee's vehicles without permission, drastic hour cuts, and some people have been demoted. A whole group were dropped back down to minimum wage, my husband included. So last Friday, after much discussion, we finally came to a decision. He quit his job.

I spent the entire weekend in shock. Here we go again, down to being a one income family. I remember how this used to feel. Living pay check to pay check. Barely having enough money to get by. It wasn’t fun. It was hard, and I spent a lot of time feeling like a failure for not being able to get things for my daughter without help. Thankfully, this time my father has offered to get my husband hired on at his workplace as soon as they start opening up for positions. The downside to this is that it could be anywhere from 3-10 weeks before he can do this. Still, I’m counting my blessing. Last time we went through this, we had no money saved up. This time we do. It will at least hold us over until he can find another job. So for that, I am thankful.

But now, comes the part where we buckle down, and budget right down to the penny. No movies, no books, no eating out, no weekend outings, and no extra trips to the grocery store. I've also decided to cut down our TV programing, and a lot of other things we don’t really need, in order to trim off some of our monthly expenses. 

So, here we go...again.