I am going so crazy with getting everything ready for my yard sale and packing and cleaning and all that, so please pardon a lack of real posts.

Snowbaby: Pawpaw, I saw ET.

Me: Is ET a boy or a girl?

Snowbaby: A boy.

Me: Or is he a monster?

Meredith: No, he’s not a monster. He’s an Indian.

*****

(4 AM) Geo: Elle, why don’t you go to sleep? Your face is all crinkled up and you look slightly pathetic. What do you want? Are you constipated? You look kind of constipated. Why do you keep screaming? What do you want to communicate? Your mom said that when you scream you are trying to tell us something. But I don’t know what you are trying to say. You are kind of driving me crazy. But your mom says you aren’t purposefully being bad. I would like to go to sleep. Are you too cold? Do you want this blanket? It is a nice blanket. Ok, so you don’t want it. Daddy is real tired.

I have tickets to the 7/13 Cubs game vs the Giants at Wrigley for sale. Email me at baggageandbug@yahoo.com if you are interested.

Me: Did you say anything crazy to your therapist?

Callie: No, why?

Me: Because, Susan, the social worker called, and she was acting like she was all worried about you because of something you said.

Callie: No, I just told her that I got mad and destroyed my room and wanted to quit my job and I hate life and everyone.

Me: Oh, ok. So nothing unusual?

Callie: Right, just the same stuff I always say.

******

(My bra is sitting on a chair. Geo sits down on top of it to put on his shoes.)

Snowbaby: Hey! Thats Mommy’s boobs! Dad! You on Mommy’s boobs.

(tries to pull bra out from under him)

Snowbaby: Mommy! Daddy will not get off your boobs!

******

Meredith: No! She is not your real mom. Mommy Sarah is your real mom. You have a real mom and another mom and a real dad and Daddy Geo and real grandparents and PawPaw and Nana and real sisters and then kids who just live here. Right Mom?

Me: Well, some kids have more than one Mommy and Daddy. There are lots of ways to make a family.

Bubba: You my Mommy, Mommy. Mommy Sarah my Mom, and you my Mommy. I know because you love me.

******

Meredith: Mommy! Mommy! Guess what???

Me: What?

Meredith: Bug gave me this broken umbrella! And all I had to do was give her my twenty dollars! And she said I could keep the umbrella forever!

The bidding is now closed! Thanks!! I will email the winners in the morning!

So the sellers actually weren’t big jerks and came down a lot and so I’m stuck with the 3500 but that isn’t too bad considering that was actually going to be my closing costs which were going to be financed with the loan, but now aren’t.  Because of all this nonsense, I am actually getting the house for less money than I originally was, so good.

And we probably aren’t going to be able to close until Tuesday or Wednesday of next week at the earliest, so I’ll have a few more days.

I really appreciate everyone who is bidding on my silent auction. I am going to keep it open until 10 pm EST today (Monday) so please bid away! Geo was quite impressed by my auction. I said I might run a second one if I find stuff to sell and he said that he would sell his socks and underwear and a shirt that smells like him. While I think there is a market for that, I’m not sure that this blog is the place. Hehe. Although he smells good.

(Wow, you are a homeowner! How did you pull that off? Oh, my fiance sold his underwear.)

Meanwhile, I’ve started packing. The last couple of times that I’ve moved, I’ve done a horrible job packing. I’m really trying to do a good job this time, and really go through things and keep them organized. I’m also trying to get rid of a bunch of stuff that we don’t use/don’t like/don’t need.

But it is proving to be difficult. The first problem came when I cleaned out Bug’s room and realized that 99% of her wardrobe does not fit. Seriously, I wiped out her entire wardrobe.

Bubba and Snowbaby are pretty confused about the move. I’ve driven them past the house several times (and Snowbaby has gone inside) and I’ve explained that we are ALL going to live there..Mommy and Daddy and Callie and Bug and Meredith and Elle and Snowbaby and Bubba and all of our stuff.

But Bubba is getting worried about it. When I pack stuff, he takes it out of boxes. He says he wants to keep it. I tell him that he is keeping it, we are just moving it to the new house. He keeps asking if he gets to go to the new house, if Daddy gets to go, if his dinosaur gets to go, if this ripped piece of crayon wrapper gets to go.  Snowbaby just likes to dump out boxes because she thinks it is funny.

And then Meredith thinks it is funny to pick on Bubba about stuff, so she’ll say, “Bubba your dinosaur doesn’t get to come to the new house” and then Bubba will fling himself on the floor and scream for thirty minutes. But Meredith is a little insecure about it too, asking if I was really going to let her come to the new house and if she could really decorate her side of the her room.

So I’ve got a lot of work to do, and I’m not even going to think that my mom is coming to visit me soon, or that we are all going to a Cubs game soon and I need to plan for that or that my wedding is less than two months away.

I’m just going to focus on the fact that I’m not sure I can get out of my bedroom right now, because of the pile of stuff between the computer and the door. Wish me luck. And thanks again for all your bids.

I’ve decided to have a silent auction for the things I’ve got to sell.

I’m going to make a list and if you are interested, leave a comment with the item you want to bid on and how much you are bidding. I will run the silent auction until Monday night, and then announce the winners.

Here’s what I have so far:

Item One: Sex and the City: The Movie hardback book. Brand new, slight scuff mark on bottom front cover. This is a beautiful coffee table type book full of insights and pictures from the Sex and the City movie. Shipping will be $3.

Item Two: Sephora: The Ultimate Guide to makeup, skin, and hair from the beauty authority. Brand new hardback book. Chock full of all kinds of advice to make you look awesome. Shipping will be $3.

Item Three: THREE $25 giftcards ($75 total) which can be used at GAP, Banana Republic or Old Navy. Free shipping.

Item Four: A Hot Pink Polaroid i733 digital camera. The finish on the back left hand side is slightly messed up from where it came in contact with some mosquito spray. But other than that, it works great. It takes still pictures and video clips. It is 7.0 mega pixels, 3X optical zoom lens, and 2.5′’ color LTPS LCD display. I really like this camera, but I never use it anymore since I have the Iphone and the Flip camera. Shipping $6

Item Five: A white, pink and brown floral hotsling. Size 2. Really cute, in great condition. My babies are just getting too big for it. Shipping $2

Item Six: Paperback copy of Naptime is the New Happy Hour by Stefanie Wilder-Taylor. Shipping $2.

Item Seven: Paperback copy of Mothers Need Time-Outs Too by Susan Callahan, Anne Nolen and Katrin Schumann. Shipping $2.

Item Eight: Paperback copy of The Tao of Fertility by Daoshing Ni and Dana Herko. Shipping $2.

Item Nine: Perfect for your tween! I’ve got a pink and gray High School Musical hoodie from Macy’s. Says High School Musical on the front in gold letters. On the back it says High School Musical Staff in gold letters. Very cute. Also included are a white Hannah Montana tshirt, a blue High School Musical tshirt, a pair of High School Musical 2 pink pajamas (pants and shirt) and a pair of white size 5 High School Musical shoes. All gently worn by Bug. Shipping $8.

Item Ten: Size 2T Gymboree skirt. It is pink with red cherries. I believe it is from the July 2006 Gymboree Cherry Pie line. In perfect condition. Shipping $2.

Item Eleven: Size 6-12 months Gymboree dress. I tried to find a picture of it, but no luck so far. It is a little sun dress, a pretty pale yellow. There is a light blue ribbon at the waist and two at the bottom of the dress. Has flowers at the very top and bottom. Really pretty. It was only worn once by Snowbaby. Shipping $2

Item Twelve: Size 10 Reg Women’s American Eagle Jeans. Hipster Fit. Light blue color. Super condition. Shipping $5.50

Item Thirteen: Hardback copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Excellent condition. Shipping $3

Item Fourteen: Long term readers will recognize Item Fourteen: The infamous pink iPod. I purchased this ipod towards the end of 2004. It is a pink ipod mini. It works good. The outside does have some issues, sort of like if someone had taken it and passed it around the fifth grade. (Which is exactly what happened.) The biggest issue is a scratch along the right side. There are also a few scratches on the front and on the bottom part of the screen. None of these things affect the performance of the ipod though. If you are concerned with how it looks, they do sell covers that you could put on it to make it look cuter. But really, it doesn’t look that bad for being four years old. But even better than getting to own this “famous” pink ipod, is that it comes loaded with 369 songs and four audiobooks!! I paid 99 cents for almost all of these songs, so that makes this ipod worth something! The songs vary from Broadway stuff, country, pop, rock, some rap, a little bit of everything. You get all the songs from Wicked, most of the Legally Blonde stuff, Avenue Q, some Rent, some Fiddler. The three audio books are Just like Heaven, Devil Wears Prada and Man of my Dreams. With the ipod you get the belt clip, the usb cable and the charger. I do not have the earphones, since Snowbaby tried to eat them, but you can pick up a new set for a few bucks. One note, there are a few songs that have explicit lyrics so if you would be offended by that or are giving this to a child, you would want to delete them. I could make a list of the songs that you would need to delete if that is necessary. Of course, you can delete any songs you want and add your own songs. I think it hold 1000 songs total.

Item 15: EIGHT pairs of Buglegs baby/toddler leg warmers. You will get one pair of grey/black skull, one pair of red/black skull, one pair of gray/white/blue argyle, one pair of black/white/blue skull, one pair of rainbow stripe, one pair of yellow with green dots, one pair of whales and one pair of robots. Eight brand new pairs!

Item 16: A new with tags corduroy Aeropostale messenger bag. It is dark gray with lighter gray trim. I bought it on sale for $19.99 and never got a chance to use it.

Item 17: 4 long panels of Jungle Baby fabric. I’m not sure the exact measurements, but there is a lot of fabric. I used four panels of this material to make curtains for two pretty big windows. I was going to make another four panels to make the curtains thicker but I um..didn’t.  I’ve also got the baby quilt. All you need to do is put the blanket binding around the edges and you’ve got a baby quilt. I am throwing in the blanket binding as well as some matching thread. I’ve also got a yard of coordinating fabric..same animals, just a little bigger. I was going to make a pillow out of this, but again..I didn’t. You can see what the fabric looks like here. So you get four panels of fabric, the baby quilt, the yard of fabric, a roll of matching thread and the blanket binding.

Ok, that’s what I’ve got for now. Happy bidding! I’ll add more as I find it. Oh, and I’ll be happy to combine shipping if you win more than one thing. All this stuff must go, so I’ll take any bids.

So the sellers dropped the price, the agent dropped her commission and now I am down to needing 3500.

Which makes me feel somewhat better, because that is not a HUGE amount of money standing between me and the house. We are hoping to close this Friday.

I probably will have enough, or close to enough, money on Friday. Only problem is, it will be all the money I have, which will leave me no money for..um..living. Or you know, feeding the kids, or turning on the electricity or any of that silly stuff.

No biggie, right?

But man, to go all Broadway on you..I feel so much better..than before!

Of course, I’m still not sure how I’m going to take care of six kids, pack the entire house, move the entire house, clean the old house and all that without having my helper girl, but I will try not to panic.

Seriously. I’m trying.

I have some things that I think are much better suited to a virtual yard sale, than an actual yard sale in my hick town, so stay tuned.

and stomp on it, why dontcha??

This has seriously been one of the most emotionally trying days I’ve ever had.

I kind of want to puke right now.

So my day started out pretty good. I dropped the kids off at their summer program, stopped by a yard sale, and came home to eat breakfast.

Then my helper girl quit. Which was really upsetting because I really liked her and she was really..um..helping.

But then I discovered an entire box of summer clothes which I had thought I had lost, but really had packaged up with Christmas stuff. (Don’t ask me why.) So I thought that my day was turning around.

And then I had to take one of the kids to an appointment that was a pretty emotionally trying thing. And then the SW tells me that they are planning on moving the kids. And then I have to go supervise a visit. And while I am supervising the visit, I get an email from my mortgage dude, who says that despite his best efforts, he can get not get the house to appraise for what we needed.

And really, I sort of expected this. Because I live in the middle of nowhere, it is very hard to find comparable properties.

And there are other issues too, because I am buying a bunch of their furniture and my closing costs are included in my loan and anyway, none of that really matters right now. The point is that we are 7300 dollars from where we need to be.

After some long conversations, it is pretty necessary that the sellers come down to the appraised value if not lower. But because the furniture is included, we might have to negotiate some.

But it seems like I will have to come up with at least 3500, which would really be my closing costs, which were going to be included in my loan but now..aren’t.

And because I just got two new kids and I had to buy a ton of stuff for them, and I had to pay that 900 extra a couple weeks ago, and I just put money down on my wedding and all this, I don’t have an extra 3500 laying around. On top of that, I know I’m going to have expenses with moving..I’m switching electric companies, and all this so I’ll need to put down deposits, and you know how it goes.

So now I am just waiting to see how much the sellers are willing to come down and how much I am going to have to come up with for my closing costs. The sellers are kind of jerks and they are sort of pissed that they are selling the house for what they were, but oh well. They are going to have to deal. I am not going to pay more of the house than what it appraised for.

Meanwhile, I about lost my shit involving the kids. My initial reaction was to just say fine. Fine. Take them. I’m done. Callie, Snowbaby and Bubba are very close to not having to leave. I don’t want to start back at the beginning. I don’t need to lose a kid. I don’t want this anymore. Screw foster care. But..

I’m not going to elaborate on this more, but there is a somewhat more than normal chance that at least the baby would go to TPR. Which is why I took the kids in the first place.

And the reasons behind moving the kids were justified and weren’t my fault. It wasn’t like they were just moving them for the hell of it.

But I got on the phone and we talked about it, and by the end of the talk, the worker agreed that the girls should be able to stay. That is if things stay the way they are. If the reasons why they were considering the move get worse, then I will have to have them moved.

Is this all very confusing?

I feel very confused.

So to recap: I don’t have a helper anymore, I get to keep the girls for now, and I need to sell my kidney so I can get into my new house.

Any takers?

(P.S., you are all very sweet with the donating money thing. But I don’t want to have to do that. I would rather you buy my kidney. Maybe it is time for another virtual yard sale? I’m going to have a real yard sale too. Maybe a bake sale? How about selling raffle tickets to spend a day with Bubba?)

Also, why is it that whenever I go to my new friend’s house, one of my children either pee or poop on her floor?

but before I do, please check out my review of My Fruit Rollups which is seriously one of the coolest things ever. And if you go check it out, you can win your very own box of personalized fruit rollups. Trust me. It is way cool.

In order to get the house, I am going to have to come up with $7300 or the sellers are going to have to come down that much or some combination.

It may as well be a million. I am so upset.