detour.

oh, aren't all i high and mighty saying i'd rather be broke and spending time with my kids? because not more than a few hours after i wrote that, a client called with a rush project and could i do it by monday?

the little person on one shoulder says: "NO! you promised your kids, Husband and yourself to take this time. to breathe in your kids like the sweet smell of mini-donuts at the state fair. you promised. your email response said you were gone. you left. you checked out. NO. broke is fine, remember? no regrets, remember? say no...."

the little peson on the other shoulder says: "are you friggin' nuts to say no? it's a rush project, due monday. and the client ok'd paying your rush fee. and need i remind you that your line of credit kicked in?? get Husband (who has yet to crack a book to study for his exam) here this weekend to watch the kids and git' er done and continue your lame little adventure next week... DUH!" say YES".

i said yes. i'm entrusting my kids to my totally-insane father-in-law this morning. like, he's crazy. in a bad way. thinks that "a little peanut butter" won't hurt my peanut-allergic kids. says things like "our kids grew up eating peanut butter on crackers! i don't know what is wrong with kids these days!" um, yeah....

Husband is heading up to my in-laws' place today for his 20 year reunion and to be on kid duty. while he's with the kids, i'm planning to hit all the coffee shops in big city and try to pull off my best "she looks writerly" look. with some luck and lots of coffee i'll crank this weekend, send husband back home and try to pick up our journey where we left off yesterday... a road trip without detours just isn't a road trip, right?

no regrets.

it's thursday. the twins and i are at my in-laws and i'm on the World's Oldest Computer. i have pictures but no way to upload. our line of credit has kicked in. great weather, though, despite lightening hitting a tree 20 feet from the cabin -- for real -- on sunday. pretty sure i peed my pants a little when that hit. family from alaska was there too. kids learned about pokemon from them. my mom and her boyfriend visited the cabin as well. my mom and the boyfriend's names are in decals on the back of their mega-motorcycle. had a chipmunk in our room at the cabin... so, we left the cabin. am doing laundry and then heading out somewhere. maybe further up north? maybe big city? not sure. sounds like Husband may head our way to go to his 20 year high school reunion this weekend, which is great because we'll get to see him, but sort of locks us in to staying closer...

yesterday, during a beach birthday party that just happened to be not anywhere near where we were, but went anyway, one of the moms looked at all the kids, playing in the sand, and said "these are the days that you want to remember". she is right. and i'm determined -- as i've been since i decided to quit my full-time job to stay home -- to make the most of "these days". i want to remember it all. and i never want to say "i wish i would have spent more time with my kids..." which makes me realize, that's why we're broke of course. but it's a choice we're making. i'll take broke and frugal and time with my kids over having more cash flow and regrets. no regrets, i say. and with that, we're off.

3 people, 2 weeks, 1 van and 0 dollars.

I'm off! I'm meeting Husband, Twin A and Twin B up at The Cabin today. He's coming back home to study for some green-architecture exam (LEED for those in the green loop) and I'm homeless for about two weeks. Husband took the kids up yesterday so I could mentally prepare.

My goal for this time is to soak up my kids before sending them into the big bad world of school/get so tired them I disco dance my way out of the parking lot on the first day of school (as compared to crying). Either will work. My guess it will be combo of both. Dance. Cry. Dance. Cry. And so it goes when you're nuts. 

Because of the "0 dollars" factor, we'll be staying at The Cabin, at my in-laws, at a friend's loft in Big City and basically wherever else we can hang for free. I had a tent and sleeping bags packed thinking I'd venture further out of my comfort zone, but camping gear takes up a ton of space -- space that I needed for a huge tote of food. Yes, away from home with kids with food allergies presents an interesting challenge. Sure, I could drag my kids into unfamiliar grocery stores and bribe them with all kinds of crap while I find what we're looking for, read labels and hope they have the kids' favorites, but I choose to stock up over the past couple of weeks, hoping that we're saving on stress and money...

Sadly, I have some great pics of me and the boys in our van, heading out, but they are on the camera, which is in the van, which is at The Cabin, (which is the house the Jack built). I'm fully intending to blog while we're gone. Like I'm fully intending to use all the food I packed. 

Little Garden of Happiness and Horrors

Thanks to everyone who has given me tips and tricks for keeping the rabbits away since The Garlic Incident -- an incident that reminds me, no matter how much I dress the part, I'm no Master Gardener. Another reminder of that: I've been nurturing sunflowers as though they were my cucumbers and  and calling the cucumbers green beans. And yes, I do talk to them. No wonder the weird renter across the street robbed us (that's my guess) -- they always hear me outside, muttering to myself. Crazy lady = easy target!

Anyway, check out these tomatoes. They are out of control and I'm convinced they are going to take over the whole house (maybe they tried to take the DVD player and camera and stole the checkbook??). They have taken over the raised bed, which I'm in my first year with. A bed that I thought would be plenty big for everything, but is clearly not. This pic was taken this morning -- with some rain and some sun, they've exploded once again. The sweet corn is desperately competing for space in the back row, and in the front are peppers, also begging for sunlight. I've pruned the tomatoes multiple times and they just won't quit. That said, while I'm horrified when I go back there, afraid they are going to eat me, I'm equally as giddy since many of them were grown with love from seeds in my office and done all organically.

About the picture: I grabbed Twin B's rain boots for some perspective. The black thing is a 55 gallon rain barrel (nice and full!) and of course, there are the weeds, marigolds and sunflowers who are voluntarily growing nearby too.

The Price is NOT right

Husband reminded me to get the oil changed in the BAV (Big Ass Van) today and to have the brakes checked since I'm heading out for a two-week long mini road trip with Twin A and Twin B, starting tomorrow.

So, I head to the VW dealer, tell them to change the oil and could they check the brakes, too? They told me that's not part of the oil change (I really thought it was) and that there was an additional fee. I agree. While I'm in the waiting area, making small talk to others about gas prices and how we think Drew Carey is doing as the host of the Price Is Right, the service man tells me a brake light is out and should he replace it? I say yes. Of course. Git 'er done!

The cashier called my name she presented me with the invoice.

$113.00???? 

FOR AN OIL CHANGE?? 

I feel sick reviewing the receipt: $42 to check the brakes (with no report as to if they are OK or not); $36 to replace a bulb; and the remaining amount for the oil change. I call Husband after I left the lot and mentioned the bill seemed a bit high. He screamed in the phone "we were robbed!!!" No, I point out, we were really were robbed two weeks ago, to which he found NO humor. He proceeds to tell me that many places include a quick brake check as part of the oil change and that he could buy a bulb for two bucks and put it in. He was livid and told me he was calling them to complain. About what? That they did exactly as your wife asked??? 

Turns out, he knew information that I didn't know about how they do service and oil changes and something about getting our tires there, and our car, and this and that in the end scored us two free oil changes (which HE will be taking the cars to, thank you very much) so it'll probably all balance out. But still.

This made a good financial point for us though: we each need to do the things we do best. I'm waaay better at grocery shopping and he's much better and car stuff. That kind of thing. Stereotypical, yes. But cheaper, too. 

Oh, and with that surprise bill, we are officially scraping the bottom of the account... 

Semi-Sane?

You know how there are moments in your life that you just know are "one of those moments"? Some are good. Some are bad. None are able to be predicted? I had one of those moments a few weeks ago during a staff/board retreat for my nonprofit job in a town a few hours away...

We started Day Two of the retreat with a tour of a large nonprofit. I knew what they did, but hadn't really thought much of it. Before our tour, about 30 of us crammed into a makeshift conference room and the marketing director gave us an overview. Her comments went something like this:

"Welcome to our great nonprofit. We are a organization that provides jobs to people with disabilities of various types. Keep in mind as you walk through that some of these people working here don't have to be what you might envision as a severely disabled person. They have many abilities and disabilities. These people could be your uncle. You know  -- that one uncle in your family? They could be your neighbor. They could be your child. A child with autism. A child with aspergers. These people could be your son..."

And, with her soothing, sincere voice -- one that only comes from her being a parent of a child with special needs -- I lost it. This was a truck I didn't see coming when I sat down oh-so happy to get be wear my "professional hat" for the day. There were no headlights in the distance. There were no sounds. No far-off horns. Hot tears poured down my face. Being that I was in the middle of the group, leaving would have drawn too much attention, so I kept it all in, quiet tears soaking the shirt of my collar.

When she was done, I told someone that I was going to pass on the tour and I got in my rental car and had my first ever full blown panic attack. I couldn't breathe. Like for real. For about two minutes I thought I was going to die in -- what the hell town was I in again? What she said beyond what I wrote is beyond me -- I felt like I really had been hit by a truck. 

Not once had I mentally placed our Twin B, our spectrum sweetie, working in a place "like that." Which I put in quotes because that's what people say. And now I was thinking it. And I know better. This entire concept of his future -- his real, live, actual future -- never occurred to me. I never associated "autism" and "disability". Here I was still trying to process that he needs to have a "helper" in his kindergarten classroom, but now, without my choosing to take this mental trip, there I was, forced to face the future among some of people I respect most in this world. 

I calmed myself down. I found a coffee shop and asked what was bigger than "grande". I survived the rest of the retreat, with only one kind and wonderful board member coming up to me toward the end of the day, confessing that she has a grandson with autism. 

I was angry and embarrassed at my reaction and still am. I know Twin B is going to do great things. And I will always cheer him on and be over-the-top proud. And if is lucky enough to get to be a client at one of "those places" and work with the kind of people that I do, he'll be in great hands. This I know. And sure, no need to be embarrassed at crying over something like this, right? Yes, but... but still. There are times in life when you just need to keep it together and be professional on every level and that was one of them. 

Big sigh. I've sort of blocked it out, thinking we'll cross that bridge when we come to it, and maybe it's a road we'll never have to take. In the meantime, my eyes are a little more open. Maybe I can't see all the moments coming, but I'm paying attention just in case. 

But I drilled her on this...

Ok, so she didn't exactly screw me over, but I feel a bit like she did. "She" would be our (former) financial planner  -- the one I had several meetings with, and finally started the long process of rolling over an old-job retirement account to a higher-earning IRA. Please note: the fact that I could even construct a sentence using financial terms is nothing short of stunning. 

Anyway, Husband and I met with her and then I met with her (and wrote about it here) and wrote her a check for $40 to get the money rolling. During the meeting I asked her point blank "what if you leave? does my money follow you or your company?" (Looking back, she answered the question a bit weird, but I shrugged it off, simply so pleased with myself for doing something so responsible. And it was there that I began the pain-in-the-ass process of having my paperwork notarized (thanks, Danyell!) mailed to my former employer for signatures, then back to the main company, and then back to the financial planner. But fortunately for me, I'm lazy with this stuff, because one week after I met with her I got a letter from the company saying nothing more than "she had left the firm". That's it. I know I asked a lot of questions, but had I pushed her over the edge? 

I called and asked for my $40 back since the account hadn't technically been set up yet. Of course, she didn't do anything wrong, it's just that after so many years of not dealing with this stuff, I felt like I was finally starting to form a relationship with her. I desperately wanted to have someone who knew us financially and would work with people as pathetic as us. She knew about our adoption goals and never once wagged her finger and told us that, financially, it was a bad choice for us. She knew all our financial-lameness. All of it. She had started accounts for the kids' college. She told me about mutual funds in a way that I could understand. Granted, it took a white board and it to be compared to a swimming pool, but it worked for me and I appreciated her time. 

So, for her to up and leave makes me wonder how to truly find someone you really can trust and work with on all this larger financial stuff? Sure there are tons of people out there who do this, but I liked that she was a woman, I liked that she had a young child, I like that she didn't make me feel stupid, and I liked that she never pushed anything on us. So, I'm back to the beginning. I hope the next people we choose to trust with our small amounts of money won't mind, but I'll be drilling them too - and hoping they don't screw us over.