Hate.

I am mentally drained.

Potty training sucks.  And latex gloves are my best friend.  But Lexi is getting it...it's just taking forever.

DH started the 30 Day Shred again yesterday.  He told me last night he forgot how hard it kicks his a**.  Lol.

Aspergers.  I hate it.  I hate the overwhelming, yet lacking, amount of information that is (or isn't) out there.  I hate that, being the mom, I'm the one responsible for finding solutions.  (Not that DH isn't involved...he's more of the "tell me what I can/need to do" kind of guy.  Yeah, I think we need to work on that.)  I hate reading "symptoms" and thinking, "But she does the opposite!".  I hate strongly dislike her clingy friends who think Tay should be there to help them with their teeny tiny problems when she is struggling herself.  Most of all, I hate seeing it.  Tay will post a simple and sometimes funny status update on FB and it NEVER fails, one particularly clingy friend will post, "R u there?", meaning she wants to chat.  And she'll keep posting it.  Or this friend will criticize herself on Tay's status comments.  She's looking for attention.  I feel sorry for her, I really do.  I know that she is lonely, but I also know she has issues her mom (dad is MIA) needs to address.  We had an incident over the summer that resulted in DH and I calling 911 over this friend.  She was looking for Tay and we think she faked an attack.  We called 911 to be on the safe side.  She has issues and it's driving me 10 different kids of crazy that she clings to Tay all.the.time looking for her counsel.  Not friendship.  Attention, advice, adoration, etc.  She can be very draining and short of advising Tay to lengthen the cord a bit, there isn't much I can do about it.  The school is aware of the situation, especially the teachers that work with Tay on her social skills.  She's drawn to the one who need love, help, etc.  Then they suck her dry.  Ugh.

My treadmill misses me I'm sure.

That sounds so bad, like I've been sitting on my butt all.the.live.long.day and not doing a thing, lol.  In reality I have been doing a lot!  It's just not standard workout material. 

At the beginning of the summer, I had 3 big goals:

• Build a patio below our deck
• Clean out our little shed and put shelves in to organize things
• Empty our sandbox, lay down landscape fabric (to stop weeds), refill with sand (and more sand!).

I am very happy to say that all 3 of those things actually happened!  The only one that is totally complete is the sandbox.  The shed is cleaned out with shelves in it and we can get our bikes in and out without a hassle, whoo-hoo! We still need to get rid of the broken junk that had gotten tossed in there though.  Right now it's in an unattractive pile in front of the shed. 

As for that patio....what a pain!  I wanted a larger entertaining area to place our portable fire pit and our deck was getting crowded with a swing, grill, kids picnic table, water/sand table and our table and chairs on top of that firepit.  All summer it kept getting delayed and last Friday I up and decided to get going on it.  By Monday night everything had been dug, the landscaping fabric had been laid, the sand had been spread/leveled and the block had been laid.  Now we just need some more sand to fill the cracks, dirt packed around the edge, and general cleanup around the deck area.  Another big bonus is that I finally found a new swing for our swing frame!  Our cats destroyed our previous swing by shredding the cushioned seats and it's been 2 years since we've been able to use it.  The new swing arrived this morning, I assembled it and it's up:)

So, lots and lots of activity (and blisters!).  My treadmill will see me again...just after the yardwork is done:)