Bit of a Rant. . . Sorry.

Okay, so I did not make it back on later that day or even the next (or the next) to finish up. I know. . . just start a blog and then leave it. This cold weather has about done me in! I have a muscle that, when it tenses up, spasms and the spasms pinch a nerve. I've had the nerve burned off, I've had steroids and anesthetics injected into the muscle and nerve, but nothing seems to work. Finally I got tired of paying for procedures every two weeks (my insurance said my co-pay for EACH was the same as a new surgery, so at $250 a pop, I couldn't do it), I just decided to deal with the pain and do what I could to alleviate it. It's not so bad during warm weather, unless I do a lot of work where I bend over or twist around. It's funny when I work in the garden and flower beds - I sit down in the dirt and work to save my back. But when it's cold outside, that muscle seizes up and doesn't stop until it hits about 65 degrees outside. And when it spasms and pinches that nerve, it shoots fire-hot jolts of pain down my hip and leg, and across my lower back. There have been many times when I have lost feeling in my leg or even my arm if it gets bad enough. So, long digression aside, the recent cold weather has left me sore and tired! All I want to do in cold weather is cuddle up under lots of warm blankets and sleep. Even now, while J is playing a bit before we do his "school" for the day, I'm back under the covers on my bed in my long johns. I'm considering doing J's lessons right here from the bed.

What else. . . let's see. Well, we spent yesterday with the in-laws. All in all, not a bad day. You never can tell with them how it's going to go. Some days nothing is good enough for them. Yesterday, though, we watched Hancock and I transferred music and movies from my laptop to theirs. (Just before Christmas, my mother-in-law purchased herself an iPod, and then called me and said, "Can you come over here and show me how to use this and put stuff on it." I get over there to find out she has NOTHING on her computer to put on it, so I had to load it from mine. Now she can use her own! YAY!) Then we went to Cracker Barrel to eat. A long day, but not a bad day.

I'll go off on a tangent here about my in-laws:
We have not always gotten along. In fact, it is only recently that we have begun to get along. We had been married for about a year when we decided we wanted to buy a house. It was going to be a first home for both of us, and we wanted the boys (J would have been a couple of months old, C would have been 6) to have a yard and room to play. My employer at the time wanted to help us out, and he arranged with the bank to co-sign a loan for us to get us a great interest rate. My parents, having not had to pay for a wedding, helped out considerably with the down payment. We had a bit saved up, and were confident that we could find something that we liked without having to be in debt forever. We looked for a couple of months before we found the one that we both loved - it was older, built in the 1940s. It was large, 3 bedrooms, 1 1/2 baths, dining room, living room, and, what really sold us - a HUGE kitchen. It also had original hard wood floors in all but two rooms. The lot was also large, nearly 1 acre. Just past the city limits, so only county taxes. There was a full attic, partially finished (but large enough to be two rooms when finished), and a full barn with it's own storage room and full attic. We fell in love, seeing the potential for a house like that. We knew it would involve a lot of work, but all that work would just make it more ours. We talked to the listing agent; it was listed at $85000, but the sellers, after hearing it would be a first home for a young family, lowered the price to $82500, and agreed to pay for a septic treatment and termite inspection/treatment. We went to the bank. They agreed to finance the loan at $85000, just to lower the down payment amount for us. We were $1000 short of the down payment (keeping in mind that we would need appliances and paint and whatnot. . . it was the full down payment or a refrigerator). Talked to the in-laws; they would buy D's truck from us for $1200, but didn't want to give or loan us the money because they were keeping it in order to pay for the divorce. (Honest, that's what they told D.)
Well, we love our house. And we've certainly made it our own. We purchased our appliances and had the bill paid off by my employer as a house warming gift. We've done thousands of dollars worth of work to the outside. We've done just as much to the inside. Each year brings a new project.
Anyway, I'm rambling - back to the issue at hand. The other thing that has really kept that wedge between me and my in-laws is how they view their grandsons. C was the first grandchild. He lived with them for a while before D and I got married. I get that they love him. But telling us that they need to see him because it's been almost a week is absurd. Worse is telling me that they should sue for custody of C because they are the "only fit parents he has." (I got that in a voice mail while I was pregnant.) Then J comes along. J was born early, and we had just had our last baby shower. Curiously enough, it was the shower for D's family. My mother's church friends did one shower, and that was the shower that my family was invited to. Since the church showers are rather large and I had two friends wanting to give me a shower, I divided the two families up. D's cousin was flying in from Texas and was so excited about going to the shower. She brought a gift and everything. D's mom had taken the afternoon off of work (she does tax prep that time of year). Turns out, she had taken the afternoon off to take the cousin shopping. NONE of D's family came to the shower. I was upset. D's cousin was angry. We didn't get baby gifts from anyone except D's cousin. His sister said that it wasn't "proper" to have a shower or get gifts for the second child. Hello? It was MY first!
This set the tone for all gift-giving events. Every Christmas it's the same. C will get about 10-15 toys (because they refuse to give clothes or anything useful). J will get maybe 2-3. I mean, seriously, this past year, J started opening after C did, finished opening, threw away his trash, and was playing with toys that had been taken out of packages, and C was still not done opening. Last year, on their birthdays, (J's is the 31st, C's is the 2nd) we had a dinner and present opening with each family. At the in-laws', J got a book, a bucket with flower seeds and sunglasses, and a baseball tee designed for ages 2-3. He was turning 4 and already playing ball (and being pitched to, not hitting on the tee. . . by HIS choice). C got 7 books, $200 worth of art supplies (I know - I had given him most of the same things. . . and told them when they asked what he was getting), a movie, an MP3 player, and a $250 art table (price tag still on it). This was when D really began to see that I was not crazy when I had been telling him about this for years. Every other year, we had done a larger party and had both families and our own gifts in the mix, so it wasn't as obvious.
When his mother goes shopping and finds stuff for the kids, she'll get C 4-5 shirts or pants, a toy or two, and usually not get J anything. She'll say, when J asks where his is, that she didn't know what he liked or what size he wore. D finally had enough one day and told her that she has TWO grandsons and if she can't be equal to them then she didn't need to bring things over for just one of them. That solved the problem of bringing it all over. . . now they keep it in C's bedroom at their house. Yes, he has his own bedroom there. With more toys than we have in the whole playroom here. J has a box downstairs next to the tv with the broken Happy Meal toys and a few Matchbox cars that C doesn't play with anymore. J honestly plays with the dog's toys more than anything when we're there.
And they wonder why we don't let J go over there and stay without us! I told D that I refuse for them to do to J what they've done to C. They have made him feel entitled to whatever he wants, and have zero responsibility. I'll be damned before I let that happen to J.
J is the first of Mom's grandkids that she has been around from Day One. She was super involved in the pregnancy, she was at the hospital when he was born. And he's the baby. He spends more time at Mom and Dad's than the other two grandkids combined. Other than getting more food per year than the others, he is treated exactly the same as they are. They get roughly the same amount at Christmas and birthdays. But that's where he spends the night if he's not with me. That's where he goes to play during the weekend. He LOVES spending time over there. When they have a project, he "has to go help Grandpa." If I didn't have them to balance out D's family, I think I'd go crazy. I had a similar problem growing up. I was always the "forgotten" grandchild. I wasn't the oldest on one side, so I didn't get noticed, and I wasn't the closest geographically, so I wasn't noticed on the other. My great-grandmother doted on me, which made up for it, since most of the other grandkids didn't like to spend their time with her, seeing as she was so much older and "less fun." I know how I felt though, and I don't want that for J. No parent wants that for their child.
Okay, I think I've ranted and rambled enough for one day. I need to go work on reading and math. And then I have a coloring date. :-)