Feeling Stressed

I'm feeling a little stressed out lately. Why, you ask... I think I would reply to you with "Well, why the heck not?!"

This has been my busiest year yet for my bridal business, and August has been my busiest month ever. And in the past month, I have dealt with some of the most... ahem... difficult brides! I have a very elaborate wedding to coordinate this coming Saturday, then I have TWO weddings on next Saturday, and then I finally get a little break for a couple of weeks. I hate to sound like I am complaining because I really love what I do for my brides, but I'm ready for a break from some of the bridezillas I've had to deal with lately!

I'm also starting to stress out about the fact that I haven't had any job offers as of yet. I have applied for more than a dozen job postings online, and I have applied in person at three businesses here. I've had one interview, but I'm still waiting for their decision. I spoke to the manager this morning, and she told me that they hope to have selected the new staff by next week. So I am trying to remain hopeful about that one. I've also been promised an interview at a different location, but as of an hour ago they still haven't started scheduling interviews. I've never been in this position before... in the past I have been hired almost immediately for any job that I applied for. So this waiting game is starting to drive me crazy! Plus, my sister Anna is packing up her life and moving here to help us by being Reagan's nanny. She will be here in two weeks... so I need to find a job so that she can actually be the nanny!

Speaking of my sister Anna, that is another subject that is causing me some stress right now. Well, not her exactly... it's more that her dog Theo is the cause of my stress! She has a 17 week old black lab puppy that she wants to bring with her when she moves up her with us. The only problem with that... we have a 6 year old yorkshire terrior who does NOT do well with other dogs. Plus, Ryan is extremely allergic to dogs who shed, so it just wouldn't work for us to have her dog at our house. I've asked all of our neighbors, as well as all of our friends, if anyone would like to "dog sit" Anna's dog for the next year or so. Even though I am offering that Anna would pay for the dog's food and vet bills, no one is interested in keeping Theo at their house. We thought we had the whole situation worked out perfectly with one of our neighbors across the street, especially because then Anna would still be able to see Theo every day and take him for walks and stuff. But those plans fell through. I know how much Anna wants to bring her dog... I can't even leave our dog behind when we go for a week's vacation, much less a year long adventure! I'm still trying to find a temporary home for him, but I feel like I'm running out of time and options. I just want Anna to be happy while she is here...

As if all of that weren't enough to stress me out, Reagan has decided in the last couple of weeks that she is some kind of spawn from the devil demon child. Seriously, the kid is going through some kind of phase where she is just defiant about EVERYTHING. That's part of the reason that I have neglected this blog so much lately... I've been trying everything I can think of to keep her calm, happy, entertained, and occupied during the day so that she doesn't "lose it" quite so often. I'm sure that I'm just receiving some kind of karmic payback for all of the grief that I gave my own parents as I was growing up. What scares me is that Reagan is only THREE... I was expecting the kind of attitude that I am getting from her to come at closer to age THIRTEEN! The last few days have actually been much better in that regard, so hopefully we are in the final stages of whatever phase this is.

I can't write a post about stress without telling you about what happened this past Monday. This story may sound silly to some of you, but let me assure you that this was and still is serious business in this house. Reagan nearly caused me to have a nervous breakdown... SHE CUT HER OWN HAIR! Now y'all all know from previous posts how particular I am about her hair. She has had the most beautiful little head of hair... until Monday that is. We had been playing with artwork most all of Monday morning, and I had been really working with her as she was mastering using her artsy kid-safe scissors. By that afternoon, she was properly cutting out shapes and using those shapes along with stickers, glue, glitter and pipe cleaners to make some quite crafty gifts for me. She was so proud of herself, and I was quite proud of her too! She told me that she wanted to use her glitter make-up to use for a final big surprise. I said sure. She took her scissors and her paper into the bathroom and halfway shut the door. I assumed that she was going to use the glitter to decorate the construction paper, and that then she would cut out the shapes she wanted and give it to me. I started unloading the dishwasher, and a few minutes later she came out of the bathroom and said, "TADA! How do you like my hair, mommy?" My natural response before I even turned to look at her was, "Oh it's beautiful baby!" But as the words were coming out of my mouth, I actually took a closer look. My first thought was that she must have smeared a lot of that glittery lotion mess into her hair because it looked like it was all matted up against her head. And then I clued in to what was really going on. I ran across the room screaming,

"NO! NO! NO! NO! Please baby NO! What have you done to your hair? OH NO! OH NO! OH NO! Not your hair, please not your beautiful hair..."

Yes, I slightly over-reacted. Yes, I completely freaked her out. As I am kneeling in the bathroom on the now hair-covered floor, she comes in crying saying, "I'm so sorry Mommy. I wanted to surprise you." Then she runs upstairs and locks herself in her bedroom. (Gee, I wonder where she gets her drama queen issues from?!) I continue to cry in the downstairs bathroom, and then I phone my hair salon to get her an appointment to get it fixed. I went and sat with her in her bedroom, and we both cried. By the time Ryan came home from work, I had calmed down completely. Reagan on the other hand freaked out even worse and started crying even harder and saying that she didn't want her Daddy to see her ugly hair. She finally settled down a while later, but she wouldn't leave the house even to just play in the backyard or to take Dixie for a walk around the block without wearing a hat.

She scalped it in the front. There are sections of her bangs that are not much more than stubble at this point. She chopped it up really good along the top and the sides, and she even managed to somehow take a chuck out of the back. What breaks my heart the most is that she was SO VERY PROUD of what she had done. And then I broke her heart with my reaction.

Thankfully the girls at my salon were able to somewhat salvage what was left without cutting her hair down to a super short boy cut. They taught us how to style it in a way that will help to camouflage the damage, and they gave Reagan a LLOOOONNNNNGGGGGGGG lecture about cutting her own hair. For obvious reasons, Reagan wouldn't let me take a picture of her before we got it fixed. But she is back to herself now that she has been assured over and over again that she is just as gorgeous as ever, and she's posing for the camera like always! I am starting to wonder if I have created a beauty queen monster already at her tender young age...
So that's what's up in my life. Now I'm off to continue trying to catch up on what seems like the 1,000,000 posts from all of you that I have neglected the last couple of weeks. I was up pretty late last night getting caught up, and I hope to be completely caught up by the time I go to bed tonight!