Between my seemingly impossible task of finding babysitters, plus my family being pretty much all old and dying, we need some kind of safety net for the family. You know, in case an emergency happens…a group of people that I can call that have kids and won’t whip out bongs or meth pipes in front of the little ones.

Naturally, I think of churches. They’re like families…heck, some of them are like small towns they have so many members. Simple law of numbers tells me the bigger the church, the more people in it that will be okay without being crazy-scary, right?

New Year’s Eve was the first night we went to church. We went to the Family Christian Center in Munster, IN. I’d been there once years ago and they had horses on stage, so it left a really favorable impression on me. Who doesn’t love horses?

The only problem was that the music was so loud that my ears were ringing about ten minutes into the service. Add to that the music was so repetitive I felt like I was in a propaganda film for Jesus. I’m in a church, really, I don’t need a hard-sell on God or I wouldn’t be here. Plus, saying “He’s my savior” about ten times made me wonder if we weren’t all being a little selfish. I mean…isn’t it more of an “our” kind of thing?

Plus people screamed as opposed to just raising their voices in praise and got so into the whole thing I was scared for them. I fully expected someone to drop to the floor at any moment and begin rolling in the aisle. (I’ve seen it happen before, and would never like to see it again if I can help it.) Plus we heard no less than ten times that we should never expect to talk to the numero uno pastor because the church is so big (over 10k members) that he couldn’t possibly have time for everyone individually. Uh…you want my money but won’t give me personal attention, like, ever? Not even to say hello…just once…I don’t think so.

But I digress.

It wasn’t bad, but it was loud. There was a woman across the aisle from me that brought a tambourine and by the third song I wanted to throttle her with it. I’m not into the ching-ching noise of a tambourine all night, even though it’s really very practical so you don’t have to clap and make your hands red all night. Because clapping is required. Well, not required…no one will tell you to clap…but if you’re a When in Rome kind of person, you’re going to be clapping your hands off.

This last Sunday we went to Family Harvest Church in Tinley Park, IL and I have to admit we were a little scared. We pass by it on the expressway fairly often and we always make jokes about soul harvesting and how the church harvests your family and eats them and all kinds of other totally inappropriate jokes.

But you have to admit, it’s a funny name.

The creepy-cult factor of this church was way lower, and would have been a zero except for the “hug the people around you” portion of the sermon. You know I hate touching strangers. But my body language was mostly listened to and we did a lot of hand shaking. Still mildly icky for me personally, but at least I’m not hugging people. I gave it an 8 for boundary-respecting.

Plus the pastors made fun of each other onstage. I love when I can laugh at church and not have to hide the laughter or pretend I’m crying so I don’t offend anyone.

The sermon lost its way a few times and Dr. Robb kind of rambled his way through it - making small points but not really connecting them all together in a cohesive way (I was amazed when he asked the congregation if they understood and they replied, “Yes!” very enthusiastically. Either they were all lying, or they figured the “gist” was all they needed to get.) but he had heart, and didn’t go all crazy-overkill on the message. It lived in between a normal Catholic service and the Family Christian Center’s Spinal Tap Worthy “Dial it to 11″ setting.

The kids were in their age-appropriate classrooms and Sadie had the best time ever. She got a necklace for being new and there were puppets - Promiseland Puppets no less - and coloring and musical chairs. And they learned about love. All around, I’m thrilled to take her back.

Abby, on the other hand, said the other kids wouldn’t play with her and she had to sit alone and read a book. We emailed the supervisor of the group (because they have that information readily available and with one supervisor to three kids in the play group rooms there is a full report on each child available upon parent’s request!!) to find out what happened and what we could do to fix the situation.

Overall Randy and I really liked it. We aren’t into boring, so it’s an evangelical church, but we’re also into funny…and the church theme song (they play it in the beginning and at the end of the service) sounded a heck of a lot more like indie -rock than it did gospel, so that was double-plus good.

If we can fix the issue with Abby and if I can keep myself from laughing like a mad hyena when people talk in the spirit … it may be the perfect church for us.

It looks like we’re going to be okay.

The kind of okay that even if we don’t get a tax return (doing the taxes in advance is a goal for 2009) but every time I try to hire the most amazing bookkeeper in the universe (according to me AND my accountant) something happens that makes that an impossibility. Like the very idea of me hiring a bookkeeper jinxes me. Or something.

We didn’t make any New Year’s Resolutions because we did all our planning for the year the couple of weeks before January 1st. When the clock struck midnight, we smiled and said our usual, “Happy New Year! Happy Anniversary!”

That was pretty much that.

We had friends over, and played games, and enjoyed ourselves.

While we aren’t going to be able to throw any lavish parties anytime soon (and New Years was far from lavish) it’s okay. I’d rather be frugal and feeling good about it.

That and I find a special kind of joy every time I make a new recipe by steaming something in the rice cooker. Crock Pot - back to your cabinet - I’m choosing a healthier, less stew-y option!

The thing is, the 20lb. bag of rice we just bought needs to be stored somewhere. We never think of this while we’re at the store, and once we get home - well - it’s been a while but the last time we left it in the bag and that didn’t work out so well.

So I’m searching for bulk storage and it seems that whenever I do I keep running across these survivalist websites where they talk about storing like 100lbs. of grains.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m learning a lot, but man…people are really sure the end of days is about to happen and they want to have oatmeal for breakfast if it does.

We’re also thinking it would be great to try and do the whole locavore thing. Except for our rice imported from Japan or California, because I don’t think there is a great Chicago-based rice company…although I could be wrong….I haven’t researched it.

But we have a butcher and we are going to ask him tomorrow (if the butcher store is open) where the animals come from. If none are local we may be talking to farms in rural IL or IN to see how they butcher and what the minimum order is. We have a freezer separate from our refrigerator so we could store a quarter cow if necessary.

Ultimately we’re still trying to lower the grocery bill as much as possible using three methods:

• Going local. Not paying for transit should be a factor, but even if it isn’t, if all things are the same local means less chemical processing in many cases.
• Buying in bulk. From meat to grains, buying in bulk where we can saves money.
• Buying vegetables. Sure people think fruits and veggies are expensive, but really you don’t have to cook with the pretty colored peppers that cost $2.50 each (even though they do taste divine, don’t they? Yum.) But compared to many other countries, veggies are inexpensive. Even if they are expensive, if you take the total meal cost and you’re cooking a big ol’ turkey you can use for turkey dinner, turkey sandwiches, turkey salad, and turkey soup, you’re looking at a total meal cost of veggies-only for all but one of those (the original meal.)

Also on the veggie front we are going to grow our garden again this year and Randy did everything he needed to do to prep the existing garden grounds to help them ferment (or whatever dirt does to revitalize itself) through winter so we will have better crops next spring than we did this spring and this spring/summer was great for a few different veggies. 

Ok, I’m going back to check out the survivalists websites again. They may be over-the-moon prepared, but if I want to know something down to the last detail…I’m always going to ask a zealot. Paranoia makes you thorough!

Also, if you’re going to a Japanese Mall on January 1st thinking there won’t be a lot of people…it’s the Chinese that celebrate on a different day. There will be droves of people at the mall on January 1st. Including a sloppy looking girl in black, grungy sweats wearing a phallic, iridescent dragon tail.

They were probably all laughing at us for looking so utterly suburban and better homes and gardens. All we were missing was .5 of a kid and a dog and the white picket fence. But we had a shopping cart…that might count.

Here’s the weird part: I’m pretty sure we’re going to be just fine.

But the logic of knowing that does not stop my pulse from racing when I look at my legal pad and think, "I need to get the numbers down on paper to see what’s going on." I get panicky when I think about updating my budget. I feel a little faint when I click that start button on my PC to scroll and open a program when I see the Excel icon from the corner of my eye. Add all that fear and weirdness to the fact that we’re not even a full month behind on any one bill and you have a totally messed up situation I’ve created exclusively in my mind. 

If you had asked me a month ago if I could go back to sticking my head in the sand and just not paying attention to my finances after being so meticulous all year I would have laughed at you. Of course I wouldn’t abandon my habits and focus so quickly after one bad thing happening, right?

Uh huh….sure.

But today is the day that ends. I’m going to take a pen and my legal pad and I’m going to figure it out. I want to know what is going on in my own life, in my bank account, on my budget.

Because the alternative is to ignore it forever, and that won’t get us anywhere but straight back to broke. I’m not going back there. You can bet on it.

I just wish it would be January already so I could do my taxes and know how much of a refund we’ll be getting. It would make budgeting much easier and less stressful…but procrastination doesn’t get me anywhere but disappointed so I’m going to do it now and revamp when tax time comes.

If an emergency happens do you hide from your budget? Or are you a total rock star that powers through the problem and just gets to the other side?

But I started already and so did Randy. We’re on track to finishing this and having next week to basically chill out and plan for 2009.

It’s going to be a good week. I can feel it in mah bones!

Oh, I was also cyberbullied this past week. A family member (because no one hates like family) decided to slander/libel my happy butt on the Tribune page - because don’t think of why I would do a story for the newspaper or anything..just hate me for being on the front page.

It’s okay - at first I was angry because I knew who it was (they weren’t smart enough to know that the Trib reads your ip address when you post and it tells the town you’re in, DUH) and then I was confused because I know their secrets and it would be silly to be so ignorant to me online when I know what the FBI would like to…

…and then I realized that if they were so mad and hateful and spiteful they disregarded all the ways I could ruin their lives (crappy as they may be) to call me white trash (among other things) online…well…they’re doing even worse than I thought.

They can drag tidbits of my life out into the comments section of the Trib completely disregarding context all they want, because I’m going to go back to doing what I was doing before they came on my radar….

…which is not think about them at all. What’s the point? We’re doing better than them even with Randy getting laid off. No shopaholics in this family, no coke addicts, no weed dealers, no alcoholics, no codependent Lifetime movies waiting to happen.

At least I’m classy enough to keep my stepdaughter’s life off of the Internet. Too bad they don’t have the same respect for family and privacy that I do that they would use her as a weapon against me.

The irony is that she is the one who stopped talking to me. After being infertile for a few years and being "unable to look at my kids because they made her sad" she got pregnant. With twins. I went to the hospital with her when she had light bleeding because no one else would….

…come 14 weeks and her second trimester she disappeared. All her real friends (that didn’t want to listen to her talk about her infertility ad nauseam like I was willing to) now wanted to hear about her pregnancy. So she ditched me and never called again…

I was mad at first - but then realized there would come a time when she wished she was still my friend and family member. Since most of the comments on the Trib site were made at 10pm on Christmas Day I would say that day has come and gone.  Because guilt makes you more hateful than any other emotion. It eats you up inside until you need to turn around and lash out.

While she was writing hateful things on Christmas night, I was laying on my grandma nana’s daybed with my legs on her and she was petting the tops of my feet and telling Sadie to stick stickers on the tops of my feet and we were laughing.

I don’t need to retaliate - I win by having a great life every day.

When he’s up…I’m up.

This morning little Abby woke up making awful retching sounds.

It is going to be an interesting day with Randy and Abby sick.

Me? I’m not sick but Randy kept waking me up unintentionally and when he didn’t the thunderstorm of freaking doom did. Simultaneous thunder and lightning both loud enough and bright enough to wake me up from a sound sleep.

So…the kids will be having peanut butter cookies for breakfast. I’m too tired to throw together real food and they’ll be excited because it’s a treat.

On the bright side J & D came over last night for an impromptu board game night. It was really fun!

Update: I hit “Publish” on this post and heard more awful retching noises from the living room. Guess Sadie is sick too. It’s going to be a VERY interesting day. *sigh*

The rushing and getting ready is over and you’re driving to your destination.

In those moments everything is perfect. The ham hasn’t been burned, none of the family has had too much to drink, and everyone is happy. The moments of driving are the perfection of anticipation. The pause in the space-time continuum where everything could be perfect. The perfect Christmas really and truly could happen.

Realizing this at the beginning of our drive to gramma’s let me enjoy the trip that much more because I chose not to think about what would be at grandmother’s house once we got there and everything started on its inevitable course. 

Really, that drive was perfect. Filled with all of us singing carols and laughing. Seriously joyful.

Once there I forgot to eat anything because I spent all evening with my great-grandmother. Feeding her, keeping her from breaking things she would try to push out of the way to get to a hallucination she was trying to grab…the orgy of present opening that always makes my nana-gramma mad because she wants everyone to have a gift and then open them one by one so everyone can ooh and aah over each individual gift. (It takes HOURS)

The coffee the pie the relaxing the laughing.

It was a lovely holiday - there will never be another like it - because I’m pretty sure we’ll have one less member of the family come next Christmas…but it was as good as it could possibly be this year and for that I am happy and thankful and thrilled.

….and tired and exhausted and so glad its over.

Isn’t that how it’s supposed to be?

I’m not going to be afraid of the next thing that could happen.

I am a really lucky woman and need to stop having the biggest pity party ever just because some things didn’t go my way.

Because Christmas isn’t about presents or money or stuff at all.

It’s about hope and love and family - all of which I have in abundance. I don’t need a big family, I have a functional family that spent the evening frosting cookies in different colors…and they look fantastic if I do say so myself. *grin*

Christmas Day we will go spend it with my crazy off-the-wall daytime drama of a family that calls itself dysfunctional but is more functional than 90% of the middle to upper class families I’ve been part of or visited. Because we have love.

I’ve had money and I’ve been poor (Heck, I’ve been homeless LOL) and fortunes change fast and things happen quickly and I’ll be ready for them. As ready as I can be.

My sixth wedding anniversary is coming up and I can’t imagine being married to anyone else. We argue and bicker - but there is so much love it’s really kind of nauseating.

As long as I have love in my life, I will have hope in my heart, and as long as I have hope in my heart and a brain in my head…there will always, eventually, be money again.

Merry Christmas. I’m done being a whiner. WooHOO!

Because in case you haven’t noticed, I’ve felt just a wee bit put upon over the last couple weeks.

I fought it, and I had a few great talks including one where I was asked if I was a coach.

I’ll wait for you to stop laughing.

But yeah, it got a little dark in my head for a little bit. It’s not light and bright by any means…but it’s not so bad. I smiled today, and that’s a start.

Then Pandora came though and played a song I haven’t heard in years and years and was like a band aid on my brain…or my heart…whatever.

You’ve got so much to do and only so many hours in a day
But you know that when the truth is told..
That you can get what you want or you just get old
You’re gonna kick off before you even get halfway through
When will you realize, Vienna waits for you?

Slow down, you’re doing fine
You can’t be everything you want to be before your time
Although it’s so romantic on the borderline tonight

Too bad but it’s the life you lead
you’re so ahead of yourself that you forgot what you need
Though you can see when you’re wrong, you know
You can’t always see when you’re right.

You’ve got your passion, you’ve got your pride
but don’t you know that only fools are satisfied?
Dream on, but don’t imagine they’ll all come true
When will you realize, Vienna waits for you?

Slow down, you crazy child 
take the phone off the hook and disappear for awhile
it’s all right, you can afford to lose a day or two
When will you realize, Vienna waits for you?

You can make fun of Billy Joel until the cows come home, but I think this excerpt is a prime example of why I love his music. Especially the early stuff like Captain Jack and The Entertainer and, of course, Vienna.

So I’m a little less sad and a little more healed.

It’s a hell of a start.

Oh, and I highly recommend all you workaholics and overstressed divas out there give this song a listen. It’s really worth it. You can probably find it on last.fm. As a matter of fact, you can hear it there if you click this link.

Unless you hate Billy Joel songs, in which case, I’m sure you will hate this one too, because it has a lot of ooh-ing in it. That’s quintessential Billy Joel.

I also actually got some work done. Because guess what? Not only does being in a dark place completely fritz my brain out and make me avoid friends and family….it makes me incapable of doing work. Which, you know, is a totally perfect response to my husband getting laid off. *laugh*

But I worked, so that stress of needing to work and being unable to has passed. It was a bigger hurdle than I’d like to admit.

I promise my next entry won’t suck. …as much…

When I called the assignment desk at 10:30am they hadn’t scheduled anyone yet and put me on the schedule for 2pm.

Doesn’t seem like a big deal until you take into consideration Randy and I spent the morning arguing over what was the most important thing to clean. The kids, the kitchen, me, or him.

We all got done at 10:01am so were kind of flustered when we managed to be ready but they weren’t.

By 2pm I was back in my non-matching pajamas (still in makeup, I looked adorable) the kids were in various states of half-dress and Randy…well…he was still ready. I answered the door and immediately ushered the kids back to the bedroom to get re-dressed and put myself together.

We did the shoot and laughed a lot and the kids made friends with Jason the amazingly low-key, mellow photographer. After he was done taking pictures we talked about the state of the Chicago Tribune, great reads, and his trip to Africa to visit a super-secret American military base.

Because let me tell you, listening to a professional photographer telling you the story of seeing the door-to-door recruiters for Al Qaeda (and how the American military didn’t notice them) in Africa while sitting on a chair in my living room is a surreal feeling. I mean, there are now molecules from Africa in my house. So cool.

I was sorry I didn’t ask for a business card or some way to keep in touch, but other than him being phenomenally interesting and me being, well, me….what would I contact him for?

It’s a shame because I think my husband and I liked him as much as the kids did. That’s saying a lot.

Also, I think the Tribune needs to hire me to do a weekly column, stat. That impartial journalism stuff is boring and I think I could help give the Chicago Tribune the kick in the pants it needs to keep people entertained and get a different perspective on people and their experiences.

It would be a hit.

Chicago Tribune, if you’re reading, email me. I’m serious. I’d be a great columnist.