Ranting, raving, gnashing of teeth.

**Disclaimer: This post is kind of a rant, kind of a vent and kind of a whiny self realization kind of post. No photos, just ranting and venting. Read at your own risk.**

I am not having a good day. I seem to be having a string of wickedly bad days where I feel so completely defeated by everything. Especially in the mothering department. That is the worst of all.

Why was today bad? Well, if I'm being honest, this morning wasn't bad at all. It was kind of nice. Both kids were at school, I had a quiet house to myself to catch up on some things, shower in peace, even got to (gasp!) blowdry my hair! At noon I picked Lia up from school and thought she'd love to go with me to get her favorite strawberry salad for lunch. A lunch date with mom. She's usually so excited about it. We waited in line and she was great. We ordered and sat outside and she was great. Our food came and she saw my sandwich came with chips. I told her she could have 4 chips and then she had to eat some salad. That's when the ground caved in beneath our table and the most embarrassing screaming tantrum erupted from her. Seriously folks, screaming, kicking, me doing my best not to get upset and angry but to try to calm her down without giving in to her wanting chips. And truly, young professionals at the table next to me, your disgusted stares were really appropriate and helpful. Thanks for that. Oh and the comments from you old lady at the table across form us? Definitely constructive and compassionate.

I couldn't calm her down or get her to stop and I could feel myself start to boil. So I threw everything in a to-go box and took her home and put her to bed. She's probably hungry and tired and the tantrum was probably a result of that. Plus, she's stubborn so I'm sure that had to do with it, too. But she wouldn't even tell me why she was crying. She wouldn't even hold still to get her seatbelt on.

And there is the parenting fail. Again.

Why was Tuesday bad? We have a rule that the kids can not start talking or making noise in the morning until either I come in and get them up (on a school day) or the clock in their room starts with 7. They know this rule. We've enforced this rule. And yet they still decide to do whatever they want. So at 5:30 I was woken up by Lia who was crying because she said she was hungry and Max saying he had an accident in his bed and the Lia deciding she would have an accident in her bed and both kids screaming and me yelling and by 6:15 I was ready to run away. And things did not get better throughout the day.

And again, parenting fail.

Why was Wednesday bad? For the most part it was okay. But that night we were watching a neighbor boy for a few hours and Max was out of control. I kept asking him to calm down, stop running, stop jumping off the couch, stop jumping on the couch, stop yelling, stop hitting people with the sword, STOP RUNNING. The only thing he would do is respond, "I AM" in a very rude voice and walk away and continue to act insane. I started out with trying to nicely ask him until it escalated into me shouting, SHOUTING, that if he didn't stop I was going to throw his toys away.

FAIL.

I'm just... I don't know. I'm just feeling so lost about what to do lately. I hate the kind of mom I've been for the past little while -- always angry, always yelling, always upset. I don't enjoy my kids. I don't enjoy being home with them. I don't enjoy any of it. I sit here, every night, thinking about all the ways I completely screwed up my children that day and thinking about all the ways they'll hate me when they are grown. I sit and think that I'm obviously not cut out to be a mom. I'm just not. And how horrible of a person I am for bringing these sweet innocent little beings into this world when they could have been born to a mother who knows how to take care of them and make them happy. My kids are unhappy. I'm unhappy. I have no clue what I'm doing and I can't shake the feeling that I'm failing at every single turn. And I'm not saying this because I don't want to be doing this, to be a mom. I've wanted to be a mom since I understood what a doll was, what a baby was. But maybe I'm just not cut out for the job. I'm positive my kids would be happier and turn out to be better people if they had a different mom.

Max is moody and whiny. Lia is defiant and stubborn. They are both rude and don't follow the rules we put forth in our house. They don't listen when we ask them to do things the first time or the second time or the third time and barely listen when we are yelling and shouting at them. And these things can't be their fault. I'm their mom. I'm the person they spend the most time with out of anyone else. It's obviously me. It's obviously because I have no idea what I'm doing.

So there you have it... that's how I'm feeling lately. Like I'm ruining two little lives who will one day grow up and look back on their childhood and resent everything I ever did. When they are teenagers they will pull away from me and then I'll lose them for good. I just truly don't know what to do anymore. I don't know how to make them happy. I have absolutely no clue what I'm doing anymore. When they were babies things were easy. You feed them, you bathe them, you clothe them. And now that I'm having to mold these little babies into people I'm having a panic attack about it. Because heaven forbid they turn out anything like me. Truly one of my biggest fears.

So there. I'm not sure what to do anymore. I'm not sure how to correct their behavior. I'm not sure how to correct mine. I'm not sure how about much of anything except that I'm just not a good mom. I'm just not. I want them to happy and feel loved and feel safe and feel supported and feel like anything they need in life they can come to me for. Anything. And all I can think about is how miserably I'll have failed at that and how miserably I am failing at that now and how I have no idea how to even do that.

Life in Instagram

I'm definitely obsessed with this app. So here's a glimpse into our life lately via my iPhone and Instagram. If you are interested in keeping up with my stream and don't have Instagram or an iPhone I started another little blog. Click HERE.

So proud of that tower she built.

Celebrating Chinese New Year.

Hats at Target.

 

Waiting for her brother to get out of school.

 

Max and our neighbor Calvin like to be pen pals.

Sick little girl. But happy as can be.

 

Sleeping in.

 

Best score EVER for me! I'm pretty dang proud.

 

Baking cookies with the kids on a rainy afternoon.

 

 

Lia shared some fried sweet rice with me.

All the important things.

Lia gave up her pacis and as a reward got to pick this out at the toy store. She put it on and said, quite seriously, "You can call me "YOUR MAJESTY" now."

Self portraits by the kids.

 

Max made "Cheerio Man."

Hey, it's me! Taking selfies is hard.

Max eating BBQ beef. By choice. His choice. He came up to me and asked what smelled so good and said he wanted to try it and then said he wanted it for dinner. Best. Night. Ever.

Me and the sweetie pie -- her request for a picture with me.

Max had the day off but Lia had preschool so we got to hang out together just the two of us. We went to the aquarium and got a treat at Starbucks. Love this boy and I realized how much I miss him.

 

Pretend Doctor Dr. Seibert

I call him that because as a medical student he is kind of pretending to be a doctor. They let him do things like cut sutures and hand the surgeon tools (oh and wake up at 3 am to pre-round on the patients all in the name of education!) But he has earned the title Dr. Seibert with that well deserved PhD.

Even so, I still can't help but giggle when I see him all dressed up like this.

Also, as a side note, sometimes this is all we get to see of him in a given week. Awesome.

Impromptu

I'm a planner. I like to have things planned out. I don't even have to be the one doing the planning. I just need things to be planned. BUT... I am learning to kind of go with it more. At least I think I am. Tyler and I decided that since he had a Saturday off we had better try to take advantage of it so we had ourselves a little impromptu date (thanks to our last minute babysitter for coming to the rescue!! Cameron, you are the BEST).

We tried out a new Mexican place that opened up in downtown La Jolla. And it was AMAZING. Seriously, if you haven't tried Puesto, do it now. Tonight. In fact, that might be where we'll be eating! Their food is authentic, healthy (not greasy AT ALL), fresh and unique. I'm serious. GO eat there. And try the Huitlacoche tacos. They are completely unique and unreal.

 

One of the owners (I think she was an owner) thought Tyler's choice of toppings on his tacos was awesome and insisted on snapping a few pictures. I think the jicama on top threw them off. In a good way. His choice was DELICIOUS.

Anyway... after a fabulous dinner (did I mention they have an awesome selection of sodas, too? Cream soda is heaven) we headed out to a movie. Yes, my friends, we saw "The Vow". And quite honestly I was a little creeped out by the story. I think if it had been an actual Nicholas Sparks novel instead of a true story I would have been okay with it's cheesy nature and slightly disturbing story line, but because it was a true story, I just kind of watched uncomfortably the whole time. Plus, I know I'm going against most women and teenage girls when I say this, but I'm not sure what everyone freaks out about when looking at Channing Tatum.

Despite the movie, it was nice to sit next to Tyler for over an hour just holding his hand. It had been way too long.

My Valentines

I think I have 3 of the best Valentines there are. I'm pretty lucky. I used to not take Valentine's Day that seriously. But the kids have so much fun with it that I like to play it up for them. And, it was Max's first time getting to hand out real Valentine's at school (he did it in preschool but it wasn't quite the same).

This is what we ended up with. They were SUPER easy and surprisingly I didn't see any others like them (the idea had been floating around Pinterest for awhile so I was worried we'd see a lot of the same).

Max signed every one -- 30 of them. Lia mostly just watched and looked cute.

That night I had planned a special "red" dinner but Max requested pork chops with rice and when he requests a dinner outside of his usual rotation I jump on it. So pork chops, rice, corn and a few treats to go with it. The kids were pretty bummed that Tyler had to work late. I was, too. He did make up for it the next day by bringing Lia and I flowers and Max some Mentos (one of his favorites).

 

 

Max claimed it was his best Valentine's Day ever. I win!