Make Up & Fragrance Specials End Today (with free shipping!)

There are some great deals at Avon this week here.

First there is FREE SHIPPING direct to you today only.  Use COUPON CODE: TODAY SALE

Some good sales that I am taking advantage of that end today:

• True Color Eye Color Quads are $1.99 each!  I am ordering mine in Caribbean colors.  So pretty. 
• Perfumed Skin softeners are $1.66 each (Fragrance Bath & Body is 3 for $5 under their special offers).  I thought this was a good way to try out all the different fragrances they are offering on sale so I can see what I like. 
• The Fergie gift set is on sale for $9.99.  I've wanted to try to Fergie perfumes for a long time now. I'm going to grab them now while the set is on sale to try the different Fergie fragrances (Viva by Fergie, Outspoken by Fergie and Outspoken Intense by Fergie).

Those are the deals I am taking advantage of before this campaign ends today.  

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One Month

A month from now, child support will be done when my ss turns 18 - two more payments and it's over. At least that part will be over anyway.

Dealing with the BS will never be over. Hopefully the talk with hubby the other night will change something and we'll get back to how we used to be when dealing with them (united) IF we move back to their state (job interviews upcoming). Time will tell.  If we move, it will be MY house, MY rules and they will be expected to follow the rules and be respectful no matter how old they get.  We are raising our own four kids and our own kids will continue to have structure and responsibilities and expectations and if my stepkids are in my home, it will be the same for them. It may end up the stepkids follow those rules or it may end up they get ticked off at me (and then their dad).

At least we don't have to worry about the ex sending us bills for SS birth control like she did for my SD after she graduated.  LOL

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Enchantments

I just opened up a Kitsy Lane boutique (jewelry and more)! It's called Enchantments and includes oodles of jewelry and pretty scarves.

Since I love great coupons, I created one for anybody wanting to shop for some bling.  Right now, you can get $20 off a $45 purchase using coupon code TXHJL7GBKR.

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More of the SS Grad Weekend

We stayed with my mom during SS graduation weekend. She is 69 years old and was in pain (ended up being cellulitis).  Part of what ticked me off over that weekend had to do with what happened in her home every night, what I didn't finish when I posted about that weekend.

My stepkids came by each night we were there and stayed until well after midnight (the last night, it was after 2:00 a.m. when they left).  My mom is not feeling well and is in pain, she is sleeping on the couch because she refuses to allow us not to have a bed (and claims that's where she usually sleeps because she feels safer being able to see the back and front door in her big city).

She is falling asleep on the couch and they all have their butts planted in front of the TV watching ghost or zombie movies.  The first night, I give DH a look to let him know it's time (past time honestly) and he gets the TV turned off, they go home, and my mom is able to go to sleep. It's about midnight by that point. I figured DH would know the last night how things should be based on the first night, right? Apparently, not ticking off his kids is more important than not ticking off his wife or being rude in somebody else's home.

MY adult SD brought over half a dozen inappropriate movies to watch the last night.  DH informs me we may have to give her money for them since renting them is expensive. Um, no. We didn't ask for them, they aren't appropriate to watch with our younger kids, and they should have decency enough to know they can't be up all night at my mother's home watching crap. Then they start watching them.  My mom goes into her area in her living room to read and go to sleep and I go into where we are staying but can't fall asleep. I can hear the swearing every other word coming from the movies in the room I'm in.  Oh, so wonderful. I say something about the language but who am I? I'm nobody this weekend apparently. If I had somewhere to go, I would have left. I was so angry. My mother manages to go to sleep and I am awake and pissed off until about 3:00 a.m.  I am up by 6 a.m. because I just want to get everybody packed up and head home.

We left the next morning.  Like I said before, it was a long 4-1/2 hour ride home.  My DH doesn't seem to understand why I put him in the doghouse. Really? It was so BEYOND rude!! It wasn't our home. My mother is 69 years old and sick.  Your kids are thoughtless and inconsiderate and you let them be that way in my sick mother's home because you won't parent them anymore.  That doesn't make your behavior any better than theirs. Give me a fricken break.

If he wanted to spend all night with his kids, take them into the park across the street and talk.  Take them onto the beach at my mom's house and talk. Don't plant your butt in front of the TV each night for hours. Gawd. That can be done at home, not on vacation.

What the hell happened to us? We used to be united and what I thought or felt was taken into consideration. Not anymore.

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Don't Want To Do This Anymore

I realized something after seeing my stepkids and the ex last weekend.  I've been SO looking forward to when the legal ties to the ex would end, when child support would end, that I didn't fully consider the fact that they will still do things that are difficult to deal with, that there will be college graduations, weddings, babies (hopefully in that order), that "managing" that entire difficult situation will never go away.  I knew it on one level, obviously, but the reality of that was a smack in the face after last weekend. Yes, we'll get a bonus to our budget after three more child support payments are made but it won't make it better.

It's been so long since we dealt with my stepkids and ex on a regular basis that DH and I aren't in sync anymore like we used to. Any contact results in conflict between us the last few years. This past weekend wasn't any different.  I'm still ticked at him and it's been almost a week.  

I realized after that weekend that if this is how we are going to be while with them (and hubby is interviewing for a job back in our home state - so we'd see them more often), I don't want to do this anymore.  I thought when they both reached 18, it'd get better.  It won't. Unless DH and I can get back to being on the same side instead of me on one side, his kids/ex on the other, and him in the middle with his tail between his legs, it's not going to work. We are either united or we aren't together. 

He asked me, after last weekend, why I keep putting him in the dog house. I don't put him there.  He goes in all on his own.

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Sleepovers at Ex's House?

While we were in the stepkids' state for my ss graduation, sd asked if my oldest daughter could spend the night at her mom's house. After the VERY bad history (years of conflict) with the ex, there is no way we would say yes. I also would not have let my daughter drive an hour late at night with anybody else anyway, which was when she asked, to go to the ex's house...but spend the night at the ex's? I wouldn't give that woman ten minutes with any of my kids alone, let alone an entire night. 

Do your own kids spend the night at the ex's house? 

Wouldn't it be nice if for all those years, there was no hateful conflict and things could look so different now. 

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SS Graduation Over

The graduation is over. Now we wait until the 18th birthday and then the legal relationship with the ex ends. The child support bill stops.  Halle-fricken-lujah!

As usual when we have to deal with the stepkids and their mother, the hubby and I ended our "vacation" with me ready to smack him upside the head.  Made for a long 4-1/2 hours ride home.

Started out my stepdaughter showed up at my mom's house (where hubby, our kids, and I stayed) with little gifts for their siblings and dad. Nada for stepmom. OK, petty, whatever.  If you can hand out gifts to everybody else and ignore one person in the room, good for you. Glad your momma raised you so well. I will assume hubby was oblivious to the slight or else ignoring it and hoping I didn't notice.  I don't WANT gifts...it's the slight that irritated.

I didn't get any "family" picture with me and just my kids on the beach like I wanted. They always included my stepkids.  I have no issue with having family pictures with them.  I think we should have family pictures with them. I'd just like one of just my kids too.  My stepkids aren't MY kids. This was our only vacation this year. How the hell do you tell the stepkids to step out of the picture? I couldn't do that to my husband though I should have and let hubby deal with it. I end up dealing with the crap all the time...should have passed some of it onto him. I'll have to get one in our backyard or something.

There was the graduation picture with just my stepkids, my husband and the ex together. The fake family picture the ex wants at the graduations.  I'm sure she'll want one at baptisms and weddings too.  It makes for a discussion with our younger kids because they don't understand. They never see their half-siblings and the last time they saw the ex was two years ago and before that - several years. They don't know her. My younger ones wouldn't even recognize her. It confuses them to see their dad with another woman.  That's their dad and family and she is standing there with him posing for pictures instead of them and/or me. Doesn't give me warm fuzzies either though I understand my stepkids probably want pictures of their parents - and the other side of me (the one with the little devil on my shoulder) dislikes these pictures. They've NEVER been together as a four member family unit. We dealt with this two years ago with my stepdaughter's graduation here and here. It's uncomfortable and awkward.

Hubby thanks me afterwards for putting up with all the stress of the graduation weekend but ya know what? It doesn't have to be so damn stressful and it wouldn't be if he'd change HIS behavior a bit. I'm still ticked at him and we've been home for two days.

There was more...but I'm getting irritated.

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