Super Secret Crush Time

I visited with my dad and my stepmother and all my siblings in Borrego Springs, CA over Christmas. We had a nice time, dining, drinking, and playing outside in the beautiful weather in their golf course-facing home.

While I was outside with Rev on our first day there, I overheard their neighbor's son mentioning that he had just flown in from Portland, OR. I'll admit, I gave him the once over: he was my age, cute, and seemed pretty smart. We chit chatted for a few minutes at a time over the next couple of days.

I really really wanted to ask him for his number, but I totally chickened out. I'm not feeling so hot lately - I could stand to lose some weight and my skin was all fugly from my monthly visitor, so I wasn't going to put myself out there. Besides, I haven't really dated at all since Nos and I split up, barring the kinds of guys who look cute with beer goggles on, but are to be avoided in the light of sobriety.

Fast forward to Monday, and my stepmom sent me a text message asking if I remembered neighbor boy. Why yes, of course I did. And apparently he wants to get in touch. Wow! I haven't really felt attracted to someone in a while, so it's nice to know my spidey-senses aren't totally decayed after all. I told her it was all right to pass his mom my number to give to him. Over the last two days, I've been trying not to check my phone too much, but I caved and asked her last night if she'd sent him my info yet. And she hasn't. Aarg! The anticipation is KILLING ME.

At least I can stop fantasizing about cute boy if I know if I'm interested or not! So, psst, call me!

Antibi-argh-tics

I got prescribed some icky antibiotics by my doctor today. Side effects include seizures, vomiting, and other such pleasant things. Lucky, lucky me!
I can't drink even a sip of alcohol for the next ten days. Apparently I can't even, you know, SMELL it, as hairspray or perfume will result in copious amounts of vomit just as well as a half-bottle of Jager. On the bright side, my New Year's resolution to drink less just got much easier! My poor half-drunk bottle of red wine in the cupboard will have to be donated to my roommate. Waah!

Hug?

We did the IKEA trip yesterday, and let's just say WOW. I literally just wrote a huge long post about it, inclding body-surfing toddlers and mad dashes for the exit, but it just died. I think I must have hit some weird combination of tab and delete at the same time or something, because this auto-save feature that blogger is supposed to have is absolute crap apparently. It was WOW in a scary way though. Rev was completely past meltdown stage by the time we finally took the trip home, and I'm actually really impressed with myself that I kept it together.
After a 30-min wait in line, I had to maneuver her, a stroller, and a handcart carrying over 80lbs of product on it. My car was at the very furthest corner of the parking lot. I ended up seating her on the cart, folding the stroller up, and covering her legs with my coat, which for her equals blanket, and 'don't move'. It worked. But then I had to move her darn seat. The only way was to keep her still - and thank goodness for a messy car, because I found a baggie full of dried blueberries to keep her occupied - and slide the seat over with her in it. Then I could collapse the other seat and fit her new mattress in. There was no way I could fit the box on the car, in it's 33" by 63" dimensions, so I had to unpack the bedframe right there in the parking lot.
Success!
She cried on the way home then finally fell asleep. I carried all the various peices up before disturbing her, and then brought her straight to bed. She slept for two hours. I did too! When Rev woke up, I put her bed together, and she's done every single sleep in it since then. Last night, her nap today, and tonight!
Not a complete success, since she'd obsessed with HUG right now. It's a fail-safe attention getter, since who could say no? She did really well last night, since I was willing to lay down with her for quite some time, and fantastically with her nap today. She's very proud of sleeping in a bed instead of a crib. Tonight, however, she had a late nap, and I put her to bed at her normal time. I think she was up about 15 times. Always with the excuse of needing a hug. Sometimes she even brought her favorite puppy and bear out, and cuddled in on the couch, pretending to sleep. We even had a cute giggle together when she asked for a hug in bed, and then held my head hostage. One of those amazing laughs where you just feed off of the other person. Otherwise, every time I left the room she dissolved in tears because I would't lay down with her or have one more hug. Finally after putting her to bed at seven, she fell asleep at nine. And now, it's MY bedtime!

When is it time for a toddler bed?

I'm moving in May, and I would love to have Rev out of her crib by then. I've already had to dismantle and reassemble it three times, and this last time, the rail won't even lower anymore. At the same time, despite a recent raise, I'm cheap as hell, and want to keep the purchase under $100. I looked all over the web tonight, and came up with a few ideas.

http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/S39836495

http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.do?product_id=5148127

http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.do?product_id=5303842

Seriously, I never thought I'd be a Walmart shopper, and I've only actually ever been inside one of their stores once, but they had the best deals going. I'll have to order online and wait, but I'm all about instant gratification. My tax refund check was quite nice this year, and a bed for her is a necessary expense, so Ikea may be my destination tomorrow. I've never been there, either! We only just got one this past summer. Hopefully Rev's awful cold will be not quite so gross tomorrow. It looked like a slug was crawling out of her nose this evening. Eew!

Other big purchases on my list are a bed for ME since I'm sleeping on a twin since I left Nos, and a nice TV. I'm currently using one that I bought from a friend at work for $25. The nice one I bought with Nos I'm still paying off, even though he has it. Go figure. Same for some of our furniture, sigh...

Mom's Worst Nightmare

This past Monday through Thursday, Nos was at. my. house. Since he moved to Bend, he'd only seen Rev once in January. He took her Thursday night, and was staying with a local friend down here. I loved that idea, since with the weather we'd been having, I had nightmares of her being stuck on the other side of the pass, and me having to drive over four hours in my 4WD (which I don't know how to drive in snow) to get her. I guess this "friend" he'd been staying with ended up having romantic ideas, so Sunday night, at around 12:30am he bundled my daughter into his car, left the house (and one of Rev's shoes, GRR) and called me.

Finally, when I answered, I let him in, we played with Rev for a while, and went to bed - him on the floor with her in her room, because he insisted, even though she has a perfectly good crib. The picture I'm attaching is sad. I can't even let her wear those pajamas any more, because I can't bear it. She was wearing those the next morning...

Now please understand, I ALWAYS lock my door. Rev is going to be two in May, but she's tall, and my door handles are LOW. I think they're only about 2.5 feet off the ground, because I'm 5'2" and they're not even to my waist. Anyway, on that particular morning, he was going to stay home with her for an extra bonus day, and I went to work as usual.

I'm sure by now you can see where this is going.

I left my key on the mantle, kicked him awake, told him where it was, and left. With the door unlocked, because I didn't have the key. When I called at about 9:30, he reported she wasn't awake yet. Sometime between then and 10:30, they were both up, he fell back to sleep on the couch, and then she opened the front door, went down the stairs, and out into my apartment complex.

Let me pause for a moment to show you just how far it is from the couch to the door. Mind you, this is on a darn cell phone, so there's no fancy panoramic view in effect here. And also, he and I have talked about the fact that she can open the door. I'm almost tempted to demand that my apartment puts in knobs instead of handles, because there's no easy baby-proofing solution to the handles.

He didn't wake up until after a good samaritan had collected her off the road and returned her to my apartment office. It was a patrol car looping around the community doing that "whoop, whoop" siren noise that finally woke him up. In his defense, he's horrified. I can't imagine being the one to wake up with the door wide open and the knowledge that my child was gone. He still can't sleep at night. I got the call from him after Rev had been recovered at the office.

Need more horror? Check out the stairs. I don't even let her out of my arms when I'm with her outside the door because I'm terrified she'll fall down them.

DHS stopped by my house yesterday. How humiliating. I am a really good mom. Really. I left Nos to be in a better place with her, and she and I do just fine. He's in a much better place too. I leave for my first vacation since I found out I was pregnant this coming Wednesday, and he' scoming here to stay with Rev again. He's going to put my coffee table in front of the door, no kidding around. He's more scared than I am. Anyway, the very nice-seeming gal from DHS is going to stop by Thursday afternoon and interview him and her, and I'll make arrangements to have her stop by the following week. Since she only works during normal business hours, I'll have to grab Rev from daycare and bring her here for a couple of hours so she can see both of us.
Please understand that I know this is a huge, huge, deal. I'm a bit detached from it since I'm not the one who experinced the absolute visceral horror that Nos must have felt, but it still affects me greatly.

Thank God I move in two months. I'm ready.

Hello stranger!

Well, oh well, oh well... what a busy season we've had?
Gosh, has it REALLY been three months? Jeez, so much for blogging in November. Or December. Or January. Ahem. Whoops!
Let's collect ourselves...
At the same job?
CHECK
Child still living, breathing, and as cute as ever?
CHECK
Paperwork filed to officially divorce my husband?
er... no... reasons to follow.
Ex-husband still taking daughter once a week?
er... no... again, reasons to follow.
Ex-husband still employed?
NO
Ex-husband still living nearby?
NO
Oh, jeez, look what happened? Since I last posted, did my ex have kidney failure (probably from drinking paint solvent because he had an open can at his work station), get fired, and move to Bend, OR?
Why, yes!
Cuz now it's totally ok for me to file final divorce proceedings, ha ha ha.
Can you see how much easier my life is?
You know, I totally had this single mom thing easy. Honestly, I got one or two nights off a week. That's a lot, since I've suddenly gone cold turkey for the last month. I can't really sell him short. He HAS wanted to see her recently, but the weather (and his flashy glamour car - WHICH IS ATTACHED TO MY!!! BANK ACCOUNT) won't let him go anywhere.
He's also behind on the "child support" OK... I ask for $800/mo. BUT WAIT. $500 of that is the car payment attached to MY bank account... which means when he is late, it comes out anyway. That's totally awesome for my stress levels, by the way. Let's just say he's been late about 40% of the time. The other $300.... 1/2 her daycare, 1/2 her health insurance, and his freakin' cell phone, which he also can't pay. So yeah, let's just say I'm not asking for much.
So that's it.
Oh, and my daughter actually had pigtails today after daycare. Which rocks. I heart her pigtails. They were so cute!
I stole her rubber bands and I'm wearing them now, ha ha!

Halloween Retrospective

Halloween was a pretty low-key affair. Rev and I went to my mom's house, where we ate some chili n' cheese. Mmm, mmm, mmm. Lucky me - I've still got some leftovers in my fridge for dinner tonight. Rev was an absolute peach, and allowed me to wrangle her into her pink flamingo costume without a fuss. She even kept her hood on all night too.
We played it safe, and only stopped at three neighbors' houses. At our first stop, right next door, she knocked on the door. When it was opened, instead of remaining politely on the doorstep, she ran inside and proceeded to try to escape up their staircase. These were old family friends, so they just chuckled and let me chase after her.
There was no candy-eating for Rev in the evening, because she'd been two-fisted into the treats given by her daycare's cul-de-sac romp earlier in the day. Her poor little tummy was upset and she had that rashy stealth diarrhea twice in the evening! I did get a couple of great pics courtesy of grandma.

Separation!

I moved out of the house I shared with Nos last weekend. Rev and I relocated to an apartment near work, and I think Nos will take her a couple of times a week. It's very freeing, actually. I'm surprised how little I'm freaking out about the whole thing. Just goes to show how emotionally distant I was already.

Drumroll, please...

Today is my last day at work!
I gave my notice at the coffee place last week, and I have four very promising interviews/offers to pick from this week. Or I might just do the pub thing. Decisions, decisions...