It took a large bottle of ice water and my mp3 player to get me through bed time routines tonight.  When I'm hot, sweaty, and tired I have zero patience, and it took Charlotte a lot of convincing to finally settle down and go to sleep.  Julia is still awake and seriously, if she comes out her room one more time my head will blow off.

After the girls went to bed, It took me 45 minutes to fold diapers, tidy up the living room, kitchen, and family room and I still have  four loads of laundry to fold and dishes to wash.  Jack's been at work since dawn and he should be home in about an hour; a 16 hour day for him.  A loooong day for both of us.

Now, the news about school and my poor little 'puter.  The highlights, in bullet form:

* Because I can't officially graduate until after I write the CMRE (in May or September), I have been given an extension until that time.  

*So technically, I have until May or September to finish my grad requirements, although I still have to finish each course one year after I started it.  

* I have until February 16/09 to finish Herbology and Midwifery Support Skills (which is one year after I started them), but I only have until September 7/08 to finish Complications and Breastfeeding.  

* Considering all of my work for my Complications research paper was lost, I have two weeks or so to do it all, from start to finish.  Yay.

* There may be another class I have to do, but they are looking into this.  I'm hoping they don't change their original decision to waive it for me :-/

* Dell is going to send me a new hard drive free of charge because my laptop is still under warranty.  I can either install it myself or get someone else to do it.  

* I need to find out how much the computer place would charge me to install it, and hopefully I'll have my laptop back in working order in a couple of weeks *happy dance*

* I am still going to look into data recovery because I neeeeeeed most of that stuff on the old hard drive :-(

When I needed to do my IV starts, I asked two local EMT friends to help me and they willingly offered their supplies, their arms, and their time to help me - twice.  To thank them, I bought them each a box of bandaids (Curious George and My Little Pony ones to be exact), and a subway gift card to treat them to lunch.  I wrapped  their bandaids and gift cards together with sparkly ribbon and left them on the EMT office desk; they'll be so surprised, and amused :-)

After buying Subway cards yesterday and then seeing

darlingmiette

* Requested final exams for Breastfeeding and Herbology.  Hope to write them early next week.

* contacted my Herbology instructor to ask about my grades for the first two sections of that course.  They received them at the school in April, and I have no record of my grades - not in my school email, not in my online academic report, and not in my personal email.  I'm sure it's just an oversight, but I want to be sure that they were received and graded!

* Emailed school president about asking for an extension for my graduation.  Will talk with her tomorrow.

* copied clinical paperwork from the work I did with Liz, to send to school

* copied IV Skills paperwork, to send to school

* copied preceptor forms from the EMT(s) I did the IV's with, to send to school

* checked the dates for the May CMRE:  
Exam date is May 21, 2009
Deadline to register is March 30, 2009
Cost is $750

* emailed Alberta registrar about appealing the decision about not being accepted into PLEA.  If I can appeal it and be officially accepted, I can write the CMRE in May, otherwise I have to wait until October 2009?

* checked Manitoba PLEA information.  I would have to apply by the end of March 2009 and would write the CMRE in September only?  If I choose to apply to the Bridging Program, I will find out if I'm accepted by the end of January 2009.  I guess if I don't get into the Bridging Program, I can apply to PLEA by the end of March.

* checked Briding Program information.  
Application deadline is October 14, 2008.  
Application form won't be available until September!  
Application fee is $300, and an additional $500 for the Accelerated Option.  
The program is 7 months long and starts in March 2009.  
If I get into the Accelerated Option, I can write the CMRE in May.
"Important Dates" and information available here, for my fellow Canadian students.

* looked up contact information for midwives in Calgary and Red Deer to ask about a clinical placement.  I need to keep doing clinical work and I need to increase my "numbers" for registration!

* researched regulations about reporting fetal deaths in Saskatchewan, as an assignment for Midwifery Support Skills.  Yay fun.

* drank too much caffeine too late at night, and so I'm still awake at 1:55 a.m.  I'm going to pay for this tomorrow.

Summer is unofficially going to end soon, as the girls go back to school at the end of the month.  This week I will focus on getting their school supplies organized and labelled, and we'll be enforcing bed times and morning routines to get them adjusted before the first day of school.  Who will give me more grief - Kim or Julia? 

It's hot today, it's going to be even hotter tomorrow.  I don't like the heat, I feel very drained and grouchy when it's this hot.  I look forward to moderately warm days when I can enjoy being outside, and I can get things done in the house without feeling sweaty and sticky.  With our short summer season, I should enjoy it more but I just don't.  In a future home, I'd like to have a covered or shaded deck in the back yard, and maybe even central a/c.  Our backyard is almost completely without shade and faces south/south east so the sun just beats down from late morning to evening.

Julia is outside with some garage sale dishes, making mud pies with a friend.  She is Bored almost all of the time, and so miserable, snotty, and disrespectful that I have been tempted to take her to the hospital or police station and leave her there.  Ok, I wouldn't really do that, but I sure hope that the next Child Counsellor/Psychologist/Psychiatrist we see can give us some real answers and some REAL solutions.  If one more person tells me how intelligent Julia is without giving me practical ways to manage her behavior....bad things will happen.

I have dug out a Baby Einstein DVD and some toys from the bottom of the tickle trunk to amuse Charlotte for a few minutes.  She's cranky  too, not sleeping well, kicking and screaming when I change her diaper....toddlers are edible, aren't they?

I am missing my laptop :-(  I went through my school work to see if there is anything I can do on my desk top (without having to start over completely) and I found one long assignment that I can continue on paper.  What?  Pen to paper?  Unheard of.

I was looking through Kim and Julia's scrapbooks this morning, trying to remind myself that we have had a lot of good times together as a family.  I'm two and half years behind in Kim's album, and only slightly further ahead in Julia's.  Charlotte's has only a few pages done and there is still a lot of work to do in Abby's.  I think once I am done school, I will be spending all of my time either studying for the CMRE, or working on my scrapbooks.  I really want to get them caught up, preferably before I'm in practice full time.

Once in a while I go into my "picture" file on the computer and sorf the digital pictures so that when I am ready to print and scrapbook for each daughter, the pictures are sorted and ready to go.   

Charlotte has lost interest in everything except the cordless phone and the swing top garbage can beside my desk, so off I go; back on Mom Duty.

In our local cemetery, the rows of graves in the new section are arranged in double rows with walking/driving space between them.  So the row that Abby is in has a walking/driving space at the 'head' of those graves and then there would be someone else buried very close to the 'foot' of the graves in the next row.  We bought two plots beside Abby for Jack and myself so we knew that we'd always have room to walk, sit, and visit at the 'head' of her grave and beside her, but I always hated the idea that someone would be buried very close to the 'foot' of her grave.

I called the Town Office a few weeks ago to find out how much it would cost to buy the empty available plot at her feet.  When they told me how much it would cost, I was disappointed because it was a lot more than I expected and I didn't think I could justify spending that much money for no good reason.  Jack told me to buy it, he didn't care what it cost, but it just seemed like a lot of money.  I was still bothered by the thought of someone being buried so close to Abby and when we went out to the cemetery the other day, I saw that there was a fresh grave at the foot of where Jack will someday be buried and I knew that it wouldn't be long at all before the space near Abby was taken as well.

So I phoned the Town Office again this morning and asked if that spot was still available.  It was, but it was also the very next plot that would be sold if someone died, so I bought it.  I'm glad that we will always have that space around Abby.  Maybe someday we'll sell that spot, or maybe my mom will want to buried there, but for now it's nice to know that it's ours and we won't have to walk around a stranger's grave to get to Abby.

Call me  crazy.  When it comes to Abby, I am.

I know that you don't have Ketchup chips down there, but do you have dill pickle?