Am I really ready for summer?

If you are here because I told you I left something for you on my site, it's at the bottom. Feel free to read the whole post anyway...but your award is near the bottom.

The answer to that question above is NO. Absolutely not.

I hate this week. Every year. Every year I hate this same week. It is a week that signifies chaos and disobedience and sheer craziness in our home. It's the last week of school. And it is NOT my friend. Most of my kids handle change well. One of them, specifically Kaleb, does not accept change. He resists and fights it EVERY.STEP.OF.THE.WAY. School ending (just like school beginning) is a really rough transition in our household. Most families relish it and get excited about the potential summer brings. Not us.

Like some of you, my husband and I both work outside the home full-time. Summer is equally stressful for us, as we have the added problem of "What on earth will we do with our kids?" I haven't had a chance to try to enroll the older three in summer school yet. Even if I can get them in still (I'm hoping to go over there on Friday), there's the issue of Olivia. So our summer will look like this, with at least one kid home at all times. Monday/Thursday I will go into the office and TRY to put in 10 hour days. TRY being the key word there...Tuesday/Wednesday/Friday I will TRY to put in another 20 hours from home. We simply cannot afford to pay someone to watch all of our kids, no matter how good they typically are for other people! We priced it and compared that to the amount of money we will lose from my income if I only manage to get in 30 (instead of 40) hours each week. We'll lose less money with Kris and I alternating days working from home than if we pay someone. It wouldn't be nearly as big of a deal if their school tuition had not gone up by about $300 a month. That's a car payment! A car payment that we don't have. I so want to put them in public school just for the financial ease, but that is the ONLY reason. And it is not reason enough. We love having our kids in private school, both for the education they receive and the Biblical guidance and support. It's worth the money...it's just really hard when every penny is budgeted already and we just don't have $300 lying around. We don't even have enough 'needless' expenses to get rid of to come up with that amount.

All of that aside...my kids have just been CRAZY this week. Not crazy as in super silly either. Crazy as in emotional, mean, snotty, disrespectful. Especially the one that hates change of any kind. We've had a really rough time getting any kind of calm and respectful ANYTHING from Kaleb. Here's to hoping we can quickly find a summer routine. It will be hard to be consistent when Kris will be home 2 days and I will be home 3. We're going to try to have a set schedule during the day but seeing as how that is one of our biggest failures (a schedule) it will be interesting. It wouldn't be nearly as dreadful if I wasn't having to put in 40 hours of work each week in addition.

I didn't start this with the intent to express all of that, but sometimes that is just how it happens, you know?

In other news, I was given the Trendy Treehouse Trendy Blog Award! I guess that means I'm trendy. But because I don't really know what that means, I'm going to have to "Google" it!

I think that I will pick the most unlikely definition and assume that is why I got the award. :-) From the Urban dictionary, here is what I found:

Trendy (a noun)

"A sheep. A person without any self-identification or thoughts of her own. A person who does what the crowd is doing, out of insecurity and immaturity. A person who looks like everyone else because of an immature fear of being himself."

Robyn at The Journey bestowed this insulting AWESOME award on me...Robyn, what are you trying to say???? ;-) Another definition and probably an extremely arrogant, though more fitting one is this:

"Items that come on the market and everyone 'must' have one."

So I think what Robyn is truly saying is that my blog is just SOOO cool that EVERYONE MUST READ IT!!! Thanks Robyn!!! I'll take the award as a compliment, as I am sure it was intended.

With any blog award, there are rules. If your name appears below, assume that I am giving this to you based on the SECOND definition, and not the first! You've got to then give the award to 10 other bloggers you think are 'trendy', post about the award and let those ten know you gave them the award. You get the idea right?

Is it OK that I am going to include some of my favorite new giveaway blogs? Because I am. I think they are trendy too. And it's my blog and I can think, say and do what I want. Plus I think some of the product reviewers out there are by definition trendy (the SECOND definition), in that they are reviewing new products on the market, or products that are trending at the moment.

1. I have to start with My life with rats and more - This one is at the top of the list because this is where I won my first (and only, so far) giveaway!

2. The Life of a Sippy Cup Mom - I really connected with this wonderful new friend on Twitter while LOST was finale-ing (like my new made up word?) Sunday night. And the best part? We live in the same town! So not only have I made a new blogging friend, we can actually get together. How cool is that?!?

3. Slice o' Heaven - another great giveaway site

4. Mom's The Glue - Really cute blog and I got to help her out with some button designs recently. It was super fun for me! She's got some great ideas and themes during the week that you may really enjoy.

Side note: I'm really getting into this whole graphic design thing. My husband said I should have charged her when he found out I volunteered to help her...for free! I told him if I wanted to build up a portfolio I needed to do some free work. Then he asked me to design a logo for him for his side business. I told him it would cost him $50/hour. I'm pretty sure he was quite proud of me for that!

5. Little Yaya's - more giveaways!

6. Life with the Lebedas - recipes, giveaways, great non-giveaway posts (by the way, Jennifer, I hate ants too-they're really bad this year for us too)

7. Hearts Make Families - I just love this blog. It's sincere and heart-felt...check it out.

8. Four Chickens - awesome site for gluten-free recipes and other helpful info. I'm hoping to try one or two recipes from this blog tomorrow night!

9. Aubut Life - who doesn't love giveaways?

10. KludgyMom - a fun blog to read

So there you have it! It's time to do my devo and catch up on some shows!