I am so proud

I had the first parent-teacher conference tonight for Makenneh. I have to admit that I was a bit nervous going into it. Basically bc the last one I had last year, while she was in Headstart, left me feeling like a huge heap of failure with tears down my face. They had told me that she would probably not be ready for Kindergarten and would have to do a junior kindy or whatever they called it.

Fast forward to tonight. Her teacher loves her (as did last year's, but still), she is a great student, respectful, eager to learn, diligent, happy, and so forth. She is doing quite well. In fact, in math, she should be at a .30 and she is at .45....so ahead of the schedule. She gets that from her daddy. Along with her attitude, i might add. She is slightly behind in reading readiness...she is at .24 and should be at .30. We have to work on that, but she has come a long ways. Teacher says she has made remarkable progress so far this school year. We have to continue to work on letter recognition and sounds and reading and rhyming. She does fairly well at these things, but not as well as she could. More practice and she will get it. She loves to learn and that is a huge plus. She also loves school. I mentioned to her teacher about what I was told last year and she was amazed. She couldn't believe it. I told her that I enrolled Makenneh in kindy, fully expecting her to have to repeat it. Her teacher said if she were to say right now, as it stands, she doesn't think that would be the case. I am just soooo proud of that girl and I let her know as much when I got home. I showered her in praise and hugs and kisses and "great job".

Sebastian, I just don't know about that boy. He is a sweet thing but he is a whiner. I can't stand it. Persistant little devil, though. It should pay off for him in the future. He is a new generation of video game addicts. He thinks that life revolves around such things. I have been drastically limiting his privelege. It is rough. ALL day long he is at my side, "I wanna play, I wanna play, MOOOOM, i wanna play...." until I want to run down the road until I collapse from heart failure (which wouldn't be too far, really). The new deal is, if they are good during the day, they are allowed 15 mins of electronic delight (makenneh likes to play on computer, he on the 360). Their behavior determines how long they actually get. If they do something amazingly great, we will add a few mins to their time. If they do something not so nice, time will be taken away or the privelege lost all together for that evening. The reward will come after dinner, just be wind down time for bed. It was easy to explain this to Makenneh and I think she gets it. She was super today. Sebastian doesn't understand reasoning so well right now, so I got him whining at my side all day. He did play for some time with his train set that I got back out today. It had been stowed away, so it was like getting a new toy. It takes all I have to stick to this plan because I seriously can't stand the whining. Just make it stop for pete's sake. Not to mention, it's not just me I have to worry about going insane from it....we live with my parents. They don't have as many patience for such things. They haven't had little kids in a long time. So, i try to keep things tolerable for them, beings that it is their house and all. At the same time, I can't give in to him because he seriously wants nothing to do with anything that isn't video games. I wanna smash the thing, but it's Jeremy's and well, that wouldn't make him too happy.

I am starting to feel less stressed about Christmas. I am actually okay with whatever works out. I look forward to buying what we can, enjoying what we get and just relishing the wonder of it all.

We are going up to my grandma's for Thanksgiving. Most of my family is leaving Wednesday and staying the night. We plan to just go up for the day Thursday. I have class wed night until 9pm and I want to go shopping Friday, so would have to be home thurs pm. I haven't completely broken this news to my mom yet. She will come up with a million reasons why we need to just ride with them up there. I seriously look forward to the overnight time alone. I love my parents dearly, but this living arrangement is not working out at all for me. I have been having anxiety attacks for weeks now. They get so bad that I feel like my heart is going to explode if i don't suffocate first. On more than one occasion, I have had to go lay down and do relaxation therapy to calm down. My mom is very negative and very critical of stupid stuff. I dont' know how to exactly explain it. I have thought about posting about this for some time now, because Lord knows I need to vent. I haven't, for fear of her somehow finding it and reading it. I would hate to think that I hurt her feelings. But, the truth is, I need a way to release this stress before it kills me. She and I are like day and night as far as our coping skills. Where I see light, she seems doom and gloom. Where I am thankful for what little I do have, she is worrying about what she doesn't have. My glass is half full, hers is well, damn near empty. Just ask her. It's dragging me down. I have to fight so hard to avoid the depression anymore. I feel it creeping up on me and I have to work hard to stay one step ahead of it. She has started going to church with my dad, hit and miss. I really hope that something touches her and she realizes that she has so much to be thankful for and that life is about those we love and it's important to be thankful for what we have rather than want what we don't. I just don't know. I do know that I am ready to have my own place and be able to relax.

On that note, my uncle says that he has a job offer in a neighboring area and if he gets it/takes it, they will be moving and he still has several months left on his lease of his apartment..ew could live there. We have already been looking into moving to that complex because with Jeremy having been earning cash at his last job, there is no proof of employment or anything and the landlady at this complex doesn't worry about. And, my uncle takes care of the maintenance and leasing. So, it is really our only option if we want out any time soon. getting his place would just give us a larger home, nicer yard. Otherwise, we have to go with the only available unit and it's smaller/not as nice. So, I am hoping his deal works out so that we can go that route. I guess the business proposition gives him 30 days to make a decision, so we shall know by the end of the year. say a prayer!

Well, I am going to head to bed. I know, nothing like cutting htoughts short, but Jeremy just came in here nad I wanna chat with him a bit before going to bed.

Take care