Okay, so just to follow up, I did call the billing department again and basically said "I got a bill, the lady was useless so I called the PT department and Melody double checked everything and said you're all wrong and I owe nothing, so I want this bill removed." {seriously, that's pretty much what I said} The lady who answered said "ummm... oh... okay, hold on..." got put on hold for awhile {really, they could use some better on-hold music} and then she came back and said "okay, I talked to [I couldn't understand her] and we're going to go ahead and get rid of that bill." Yeah, thought you'd say that.
We went grocery shopping today, before M went to school. Monday shopping is fun because it's usually mostly older people who are much more understanding of our kids yelling across the store "mum. MUUUUMMMYYYYY. Wook at the apples, they're WED!" We take two carts, with P and J in the seats and M walks with us, "helping". Anyways, we split up every now and then, and twice CJ had someone come up to him and ask if both the kids he had were his {since P was with me}, accompanied with a look of incredulity. Huh? Is it because it's a man with two kids? Or has two children suddenly become a rarity in society? Most couples we know have two or more kids, but then again, we're Mormon, it's expected. Maybe we just don't notice these things...

Okay, nuff of that. Pictures, anyone?

Seriously?

Let me start this by saying I'm still ticked about this, despite talking to CJ, mum, and various friends. So excuse the sarcasm with a hint of venom.

We got a letter in the mail from Sierra Vista Regional, where J gets his PT sessions. Hm, okay... open it, and it's a bill telling us we owe $40 for a September visit. Huh? We pay our copay after every visit, on our way out the door. And yeah, it's $40 a pop. Every appointment. Ouch.

Anyways, I can't find my paper where I have the list of J's appointment dates, so I call the PT office and lovely Melody gives me a list of when he was seen. I look up on our banking website to see when we paid, looks caught up. I call and the billing department can be considered less than helpful in my books. Half an hour of being on the phone and on hold, they can't give me the specific date that I supposedly missed paying, yet insist that I missed a payment. Color me angry, I get snarky and say "forget it, it sounds like the PT department has it more together than the billing, so I'm just going to deal with them from now on, thanks." and hang up. Seriously, they expected me to just say "oh, I missed it somewhere, but you're not sure where? Okay, let me pull $40 out of the air and send it off, thank youuuu!" {there's that snarkasm coming out, sorry.} So I call back to the PT office and stutter off what's going on {stutter because by this time I'm completely flustered and my words are choosing to not come out properly} and Melody, yet again, rocks the vote. She says this happens sometimes, don't stress, I'll go through your appointments and compare them to the receipt records we have. So she's going to get back to me about this tomorrow, and I'm finally chilling out a bit. Thank heavens for sane people sometimes.

This might not be such a huge deal to some, but we've been having medical billing problems all over the place this year, and I'm just done with it. Really, I'm sick of having to sit on the phone and repeat myself over and over about billing and coding and incorrect blah blah blah, and just feeling like it's falling on deaf ears. I'm frustrated because we've shelled out a good amount of money so far this year for therapies and such, and while I love the therapists we've been blessed to have for J, the money part just sucks. SUCKS. And I know there are people who have much heavier payments and get treated worse, but that doesn't make it easier for me, know what I mean? Especially seeing as I'm Canadian. I know the medical system up there isn't perfect, but from the crap I've encountered this year, I'd rather be up there right now. Sigh.

Okay, going to snuggle my expensive but so completely worth it baby boy. {but he better have d@mn straight teeth, because he's used up his braces money.}

Meandering Minds

So I really thought that I'd posted on Friday, but apparently it was Wednesday. Ooooops. Yet another sign that kids kill brain cells. {in a good way, of course}
Another sign? Totally turned the alarm off for Church. Shake your heads at me now. Shame shame. Woke up at 8:40 and said "well, there goes that good idea." It might not have been such a bad thing, since CJ got home from work at 3, so he would have got 4 hours of sleep, and that makes one grumpy man. So we took the kids to the "big park", which they appreciated, poor things needed to burn some energy. Other than little man J, who pooped out on the way to the park and slept through most of it. Went home and piddled about til CJ went to work. I took the kids to the park behind our house, and then we decided to go for a walk, since they're levelling some roads since they're building more houses. M had a blast running on the dirt, and P did too, til he biffed it. Then he thought walking with me and holding onto the stroller was a good idea. I'm glad I brought the blanket for J, it got nippy!! Anyways, a nice calm Sunday.
M's picking up some.... special... sayings. My favorite is she went up to CJ and said "I need twenty five dollars." CJ kind of looks at her funny and says "um, why do you need twenty five dollars?" She replies "I want to buy candy, so I need quarters." Good law, that child remembers too much. Our mall has candy machines everywhere, so when we go we always talk about whether we have quarters or not. Why she wanted twenty five dollars worth of quarters... well, the girl loves her candy.
I should mention, she's completely day trained now!! Whoop whoop! Both number one and number two. Niiiice. Apparently waiting til she cued us was the right choice, even if it meant waiting til she was 4. And pull ups are of the debbul, if you ask me. Those things are just the diaper industry's way of trying to suck as much money out of you for as long as it can. Jerks. I shake my fist at you, Huggies. {and ask for more coupons please. I still have two in diapers, after all. You'll be getting money out of me for awhile.}
M's off school this week... pray for my mind, dear people. One day down, four to go. We're going to make her run around the park a bunch of times, maybe help the roofers who are working on the new houses in our development, go chase the cows in the field next to our development... just kidding. {watch, someone's going to go CPS on my butt now.} We're going to go to Apple Annies on Saturday, anyone want to join us, oh local ladies? Other than that, not a big planned out week. Some crafts, some Disney {yep, I'm a bad tv watching mum}, some park.... so on so forth. Oh, and some trips to Target I'm sure.
So here's my latest grrrr-session. COSTUMES. M has hers, she's Cinderella {not my choice, but unfortunately doesn't bow to my whims anymore} , but P and J, nothing yet. They were all going to be a character from Toy Story 2, but M had to go and get an opinion on me. So then I thought we could dress P up as Gus Gus and J as a pumpkin, and they'd still be theme-y. But do you know how hard it is to find a mouse costume that A) isn't ugly and B) doesn't have the word "Mickey" in front of "Mouse"? So we asked P what he wants to be. Finally he says he wants to be a dinosaur. So we sit down in front of the computer and google "toddler dinosaur costumes" and find the freaking COOLEST costume. It's a Triceratops, it looks great and is reasonably priced {I hate cheap looking costumes, if I'm blowing money on something it better be worth it} and it's completely sold out. Like I can't find it anywhere. ANY. WHERE. What the deuce am I supposed to do?! I ended up finding two on eBay, one in J's size and one in P's size, so we'll see if they stay reasonably priced. If not.... you may just hear me ranting and raving about it some more. Sorry, my blog my rules!
And on that note, The Duggars show is almost over, and hark, I hear my bed calling my name.

*someday I'll post new pics of the kids.... someday.*

Shmoopy time, anyone?

I fully admit two things. 1) I listen to some country music. Really, I listen to whatever catches my ear, I'm not picky. 2) I have a shmoopy streak. What's shmoopy? Shmoopy is cheesy love songs, over the top romantic gestures, PDA, all that stuff we all gag at publicly but secretly kinda wish it was us.
The problem is, CJ is not shmoopy. He just doesn't thought-process like that, which is so fine. It's obviously not a deal breaker for me, I mean, I obviously married him anyways. And he does have his moments, like when I turned 20. He'd just left on his mission (as in *just* left, 13 days earlier) and I was feeling so sorry for myself. I walked into the house and there, sitting on the kitchen table, was a vase filled with 20 beautiful, perfect white roses. He'd ordered them before he left, and I had no idea.
We're a great example of how opposites attract. I love hanging out with other people and doing things as a group, CJ could be alone in the mountains for weeks and be perfectly fine. He loves sports, I didn't until we got married. CJ falls asleep early, I'm a nightowl. I love working with computers and programs, CJ... well, he's not good at it. He loves horror movies, I do NOT. Point taken? But we work, dunno why.
We didn't have an easy courtship for a bunch of factors that I won't get all long winded about plus I don't need them floating around the internet. We started dating almost 10 years ago, before his mission. I knew two months in to dating him that I wanted to marry him, but I really didn't think it would happen. How often do people date before missions and swear they're going to get married when the guy comes back, and they don't, for whatever reason? Ask Jesse or Mandy, I was sure it would never work out. I moved back to Canada, he went on his mission, I taught at a summer camp in Maine, I moved to Scotland... life happened. I even stopped writing him, for a variety of reasons that had nothing to do with him. He came back from his mission, and I was playing on the internet with some friends while in Scotland, and found him listed at BYU. Shock to the system. I ended up writing him a letter apologizing for how things happened, and I felt at peace with whatever happened. And then I got a phone call, asking me if I knew who it was. Like I could forget his voice. We long-distance dated until I flew home in March and he came to visit me at my parents house, and it was all over. We got engaged in May and married in August. Haven't looked back since.
Back to my confessions. I was listening to the top music songs on iTunes and "Love Story" by Taylor Swift came up. It's at the bottom of my music playlist in my sidebar, to the left. I fell in love with it. I love the lyrics, it makes me think of some of the things that CJ and I have been through in the times we've been together, some of them I've never told most people about. Especially the line "this love is difficult, but it's real. don't be afraid, we'll make it out of this mess. it's a love story, baby just say yes". I just love well written songs, no matter what genre they fit into. Anyways, I finally opened up my PhotoShop and did a page about it, I don't think I've ever scrapped about CJ and how I feel. It usually has to do with the kids and him. Excuse me if it's too shmoopy for you, trust me, I could have gotten even more shmoopy on you.

So here's to my unRomeo. I'm so very glad I said yes.

Youth is Wasted on the Young.

I'm 29 today. Well, tonight, at 9:36 PM to be exact, I believe. But that's not my point. I always pshawed when people would talk about what a downer turning 29 was, but now that I'm here, I see their point. "Pish tosh, young one!" some of you may be saying. Well, I'm hormonal, so suck it up, princesses, you get to read my age related rambling.

I woke up this morning feeling very sorry for myself, but there's really no good reason, other than another birthday bites the dust. No big celebrations, that's one of the side effects of having a birthday that always falls on General Conference whenever I get lucky enough to have it on the weekend. Plus let's be real, what would I do even if it weren't General Conference? I've cheered up as the day's gone on, especially when I got a call from my in laws singing Happy Birthday to me, and then another one from my mum singing too. Plus some nice emails, and of course who doesn't appreciate happy birthday wishes on Facebook? Whoop! (Sorry, MaryBeth, no cake today. But swing by tomorrow, I'm so going to get me a big fat cake from Safeway) Life ain't so bad, I guess. Plus I just had M come in half nekkid and shake her butt at me and then run away giggling, who wouldn't crack a smile at a good mooning? Reminds me of my uncle Neil... that's a story for another day.

I should make a list of 29 things I want to do before I turn 30... no, that requires motivation. I don't have much of that. Although I did dust the ceiling fan off today, that was gross. That's what I get for having it on for most of the summer, I suppose. But now that it's fall, and the weather is freaking perfect, we have the AC off and the windows open, and it's heeeeeaven. (And nice on the pocketbook too) That's one thing I love about my birthday, fall is my favorite season. If we were east coast, it'd be even better. I love the changing colors, the leaves crunching underfoot, going apple picking... here, well, cactus don't really change colors. Or have leaves, come to think of it.

See, there goes the rambling. How many trains of thought did I hit up there?

MaryBeth was kind enough to tag me too (what a great birthday present! Better than any expensive bag or perfume)

I was tagged! Six weird and random things about me! (like that's hard.)

The rules are:
*Link to the person who tagged you (MaryBeth)
*Post the rules on your blog
*Write six random things/unspectacular quirks about yourself
*Tag six people at the end of your post and link to them
*Let each person you have tagged know by leaving a comment on their blog
*Let the tagger know when your entry is posted

So, here they are...
1. I still have a huge crush on Joey from New Kids On The Block. Huuuuge crush. He's totally gotten better with age. I still love their songs too.
2. I cry really easily, even at cheesy, stupid commercials that I'll make fun of while crying.
3. I have pack rat tendencies, which clash with CJ's cleaning overdrive.
4. I love surfing Etsy and finding all sorts of random stuff.
5. I'm a crunchy wannabe.
6. I secretly love teaching my kids bad things to say.


I tag Amber, Mary Lynn, De Ana, Melanie, Renee, and Staci.

An addiction

Okay, I love bags. Diaper bags mostly, at least right now, but I'll admit to drooling over some Coach bags and the likes. Anyways, there's a new site launching, Handbag Planet, and to celebrate the October 15 launch they're giving away a free handbag every hour for 24 hours on the day of the launch. I signed up. You should too. Do it. C'mon, do it.

Because, Just Because.

Okay, I'm a follower. Mary Beth did one, so I am too. Here's my results, scroll down for my opinion on the quiz. Don't pretend like you don't want to know.

You Belong in 1955

You're fun loving, romantic, and more than a little innocent. See you at the drive in!

What Year Do You Belong In?

Well... about half right. I definitely love fun, and have romantic tendecies, but not really innocent. Anyways, here's the quiz, my thoughts/comments/sarcastic drippings are in red. Enjooooooy!

What TV show are you most likely to veg out to?
Family Ties
I Love Lucy
Mork & Mindy
The Brady Bunch
90210
Come on. These are great shows, but the only one you can really veg to, I mean really just completely veg, is 90210. Mork & Mindy and I Love Lucy are too freaking hilarious, Family Ties too sitcom classic, and The Brady Bunch too mind-numbingly... well, mind numbing. (sorry to all the Marsha fans.)

When you think of a classically beautiful woman, you would have to choose:
Marilyn Monroe
Cheryl Tiegs
Cindy Crawford
Twiggy
Christy Brinkley
Freak. These are all classically beautiful women! (Except I'll admit I'm not really sure who Cheryl Tiegs is...) Anyone could pick any of these women, age regardless.

And the coolest guy?
Dennis Hopper
John Travolta
Cary Grant
Brad Pitt
David Hasselhoff
Who wouldn't pick The Hoff? He's a shoe in. (or is it shoo in...)

What's your pet cause?
Fair trade
Women's rights
The environment
Peace
Hygiene
Save the whales. And then wash your face, you dirty bird.

Favorite movie?
The Godfather
Casablanca
Say Anything
The Graduate
Forrest Gump
Why is High School Musical not an option...

What type of music do you prefer?
Swing
Alternative
Pop
Oldies
Classic Rock
Where does Imagination Movers and Ralph's World fall in here. Alternative? Because they're an alternative choice, right? I prefer broadway, just for the record.

What's your ideal first date?
Hanging out at the latest dance club, all dressed up
Skipping the date and going straight to the hookup
Dinner and a movie - dutch
Taking off to a rock festival
Sharing a milkshake and fries at a diner
Straight to the hookup. No problem answering this one. Wait, I mean--

You're cruising down a costal highway... what car are you driving?
A b!tchin' Camero
A classic Caddy
A convertible BMW
A new model VW Beetle
A sweet cherry red Mustang
Again, my actual preference is missing. Give me the big red car, please. Wiggles optional. If they're up for it, come on down. As long as they sing. I doubt the big red car has a radio.

What's your favorite comfort food?
Meatloaf
Pop Tarts
Mac N Cheese
Red bull and vodka
Fondue
All of the above? Check! (minus the vodka. no thanks)

Finally, how was this quiz?
All that and a bag a chips
What a trip!
Awesome
Far out!
A total blast
What about "totally tubular, dude! Rock on!"


Peace out, homies.