My Childless Days

Now that my children are grown, branched out, starting their own, new lives I've found that I have lots and lots of time.  Some of this I adore, some of it I detest.  Even yet, I haven't quite found out what I really want to do with all this excess time.

We do still have two boys at home, our two youngest and they do make messes, more generally they're kitchen messes after I've gone to bed.  Maybe it's that way because I can't clean up after them after I'm in bed and so it gets out of hand.  But anyhow...

My mornings usually consist of a little cleaning, I still do dishes by hand.  I did invest in a dishwasher but it's never loaded since usually it's just Charles and I eating.  The boys will grab sandwiches during the day, and then they're not hungry for supper, or just plain, do not like eating a sensible dinner.  They are at this age, where, like I said last night, I can honestly understand why some animals eat their young.

So, after my morning ritual of vacuuming, cleaning the dishes that the boys dirtied during the night, wiping down counters, sweeping the floors and tidying up the bathroom I'm kind of like, well, what now?

I'd love to take up sewing, but right now, just do not have the incentive to do so. 

I love to crochet.  I actually should start showing off some of my creations of it, but right now I'm kind of blah on that too.

Seems like my computer is my daily friend for now.  Until I get out of this rut, at least.  But, it's not that terrible (except for the fact that I find myself putting on some extra uninvited pounds).  I do make a couple of dollars on the few sites that I stay on.   Financially, it would be very unstable, but it allows me some of the few things that I wouldn't be able to afford otherwise.

So far, just from my amazon, chacha and microworker sites I've made enough money to buy diapers for the grandbabies a couple of times, a GPS for the car, a fish finder for the husbands excursions while fishing, quite a few ebooks, quite a few of my crochet patterns and a few other things. 

Seems I need to fire up my camera (the one my daughter gave me (:  ) and get this blog to going.

And some words I could use myself.  These are the words of a very wise woman: "If you haven't good judgment you'll never make a good cook or anything else."
- Mary Mason Campbell, Kitchen Gardens

A difficult decision

So, Charles has a curfew in place for Jacob and Cory.  Some of you may say, "Now really, they're over 18, correct?"

Yes, both of them are over 18 and for them, I'm sure the curfew sucks.  But, to Charles (I say to Charles, because, honestly, I think the curfew could easily extend an hour, if not two), his curfew is to stick, because he wants them in bed early enough that they won't be sleeping until noon or later.  And I do see his point.

One of the things is that the boys are not working.  Cory isn't even trying.  Jacob has found a job with a temp agency, but because mom and dad were negligent about obtaining his birth certificate and social security card, he now has to wait for them to come in.  But, it's taken care of, that's all we're waiting on.  And Charles thinks they should be in at a decent time, in bed at a decent time, and definitely awake and trying to do something.

Charles's curfew is 10 PM.

One of their friends has been our couch sleeper for the last couple of weeks or so. And a big problem is that he and Jacob have been breaking the 10 PM curfew, coming in at midnight and later.  The friend is the one driving, so he has a bit of an upper hand, possibly, in the coming in so late.  While Jacob is sleeping the day away upstairs, Trenton is sleeping on the couch.  It's very aggravating.  Saturday, Charles told Trenton he had to find another place to stay.

This morning when Charles and I woke up, Trenton was on the couch asleep.  Charles sat him down and explained, it's not that we don't want him here, and we care about him, but breaking the rules has got to go.  Trenton explained he has no where else to go and he wouldn't break the rules again.

And that was this morning!!  Tonight at 11PM he and Jacob finally made it home.  Needless to say, Charles wasn't happy.  Neither was I for that fact.  We made Trenton leave again, though, I'm sure in a day or two we'll wake up to him being back on the couch.

Parenting teenagers and adults is an extremely difficult challenge.  It can be very satisfying when you watch the "adults" finally BECOME adults, but while they're in this stage....well, it makes me more understandable why some animals eat their young.

Good night!

Ok, first, the name of my blog, I'm A Mom, I'm A Granny, I'm Mary McKanney.  Sort of, I'm Mary McKinney, but, McKinney doesn't rhyme so, a little spelling difference, and I like saying it like that, sounds Irish, don't you think?

On top of being a mom and granny, I'm a wife to the love of my love, Charles.  Through thick and thin, smiles and quarrels we've been married for 25 years.  Sometimes it seems like LOONNNGGGG years, but you know what, I'm sure looking forward to 25 more with him!

Our children started out even before we were married.  Uh Oh, but no, not uh oh, I'm just not that type of gal, but we did already have 2 boys, his oldest.  Charles Matthew and Cody Wayne.  Then we started on our own boys.  Joshua Edward came next, then another boy, I was at a loss for names at this time so we combined them into Charles Jonathan Edward, poor baby....we call him John, then we got our baby girl, Casey Ellen, and two more baby boys, Cory Elliott and Jacob Errin.

We didn't have the pleasure of knowing much of Matt and Cody, they both have different moms, one mom lives in the same town as we do, but she was (Is) a, well, what is a nice way to put this, Witch without the W and replaced with a big fat B!  That is Matt's mom :)   Cody's mom, well, she and Charles had lots and lots of marital problems.  He will even tell you himself he was a SOB towards her.  Luckily that was a time I didn't know him, and though my husband can still be a sort of ass at times, I know this and can handle him, I can see how some women couldn't do it though.

Anyway, after their divorce she took the baby and moved back to her home state of Alaska.  We've struggled quite a bit in our daily financial life, so getting up there to see him often, or even at all, wasn't something we were able to do.  Charles missed him like crazy, I did too.  But his mom was incestant on keeping him away.  If she ever did bring him to KY she never let us know.  Her mom and sister still live here, so I'm sure she did bring him back a time or two.

When Matt turned 18 he came to live with Charles and I.  He stayed about 6 months, then went back to Moms, came back to us, went with friends.  Just a young man in a midst of turmoil.  We lost him in November, 1998.  The day we elected Bill Clinton to another term of presidency.

Our children grew, thrived, we had a few bouts of sickness, the most notable was when Joshua was diagnosed with B Cell Lymphoma.  A type of cancer.  He was 17.  He is now 24 and happy, healthy and handsome!  Thanks to good doctors, good medicine and above all a good God!

Our daughter had her first daughter when she was 17.  A fact I did not handle well at all.  BUT, when Cicilia was born I let go of the anger towards her, unfortunately I couldn't put the anger towards Cicilia's father aside, to be totally honest, I still can't stand the little SOB, but, I guess that's another story.  Casey and I fought a lot still during those first 2 years.  I should have understood better and done a whole lot of things differently, but the fact is, I didn't.  Cicilia went to live with her dad right after her 2nd birthday.  I'm not going to get into all of the details, but she is a happy, healthy, very loved little girl.  While I still loathe the man who made her, I do respect the fact that he is doing what he can, along with his wife to give her a good childhood.  And Casey is too.  She's still in Cicilia's life and struggling everyday to bring her back home.

Casey has gone on to have another wonderful son and beautiful daughter.  They all live with her fiance, their daddy.  They are absolutely wonderful parents.  They give those children everything and beyond.  Love, patience, a stable environment.

Josh and John have been out on their own for awhile too.  Josh and Dawn and John and Amber all share a home just a few miles from us.  We get to see them usually once a week, sometimes more often, very rarely less than that.

Cory and Jacob still live at home.  Making messes for mom to clean up.  Bugging dad for something.  ALL THE TIME.  But, it doesn't get any better than this.

I'll keep up my blogging, you guys send me love.  Let me know you're enjoying reading and I'll keep writing.

For now, I'll leave you with this