Rachel's Challenge

I know, it's been forever.  And I have several things I need to post about, such as Elayna's 2nd birthday!!  And I'll get to it, I promise, but first I wanted to post about Rachel's Challenge.

I got the chance to go to a Rachel's Challenge presentation, not one done at a school, but one for adults.  I'll be honest, I was slightly hesitant, worried it'd be the typical anti-bullying message that's everywhere nowadays, but it wasn't.  Was the end message about not bullying?  Kinda.  It was about so much more than that.

If you don't know, Rachel Joy Scott was the first student killed at Columbine High School on April 20, 1999.  After her death, her parents heard stories from many of her classmates about how Rachel had helped them, been their friend when they were friendless, stood up for them when they were being picked on, and had been an all-around great person.

They also read through her diaries and an essay on her values and ideals.  In them, she talks about how she wanted to impact the world, and that she believes a little kindness can make a huge difference.  She talked about starting a chain reaction to change the world.  They also discovered an outline of her hand prints on the back of her dresser in which she had written "These hands belong to Rachel Joy Scott and will someday touch millions of people's hearts."

So her dad decided to make Rachel's dreams a reality.  He started the non-profit group Rachel's Challenge which goes out to schools and talks to kids about having empathy and kindness for one another.  It's all about realizing that we're all human and we all have our own stories.  Give people a chance, don't judge them after one encounter, or because they don't dress like you, or because they're new, or because of all the shallow reasons we do judge one another.

My description doesn't come close to doing it justice.  It was an amazing story (although hard watching the images of the Columbine shooting again) and if you ever get the chance to attend a presentation, either in a school or out, I highly recommend you do.

Oh Comcast...

You thought I had problems with you before?  That was nothing. 

Call me crazy, but before you send an official job offer to someone, you better double-check that they're actually the correct person to extend a job offer to.  Otherwise you risk them putting in their two-weeks' notice at their current job and then telling them "oops, it was a mistake to send it to you." 

Call me crazy, but that's a whoops that should never be made.  Rest assured that I will be contacting Kenneth Carrig (VP of Human Resources at Comcast) as a start.  And I'm ready to go as far and as high as it takes to get answers.

I rarely think someone should be fired, but in this case I do think someone should be.  The hubs received a phone call letting him know that the job was his on Monday, August 27th.  He received the official written offer through email on Wednesday, August 29th.  His start date was to be Tuesday, September 4th, less than a week after he got the official offer.  So he put in his two weeks notice at his job and a bit later got an email letting him know he didn't get the job after all. 

The HR rep put our livelihoods in danger due to her carelessness and/or ineptness.

I'm also not a sue-happy person, but I wonder what legal recourse we have.  Right now we have the official formal offer letter sitting on our table.  Comcast has caused our family a real actual loss of income and I feel they should be held resposible.  I don't expect billions or for them to hire DH (since it turns out they didn't want him - their loss). 

I just don't even know how to end this post.  I truly can't put into words what I felt when this happened. It's one thing to be turned down for a job.  It's another to lose your current job because the job you're applying for sends you an offer and then retracts it.  I'm disgusted and angry and am not going to stop until I am satisfied with the answers Comcast gives me as to why this happened and what they've done to fix it.

How does this make sense?

Nick is going to stay with us during the school year!  We're very excited and think he's going to thrive in CCISD.  However, never having to deal with school registration before I didn't realize how ridiculous it is.

To register Nick, we had to provide:

Deed to our house (if we were renting, we would have had to provide the lease)
Electricity bill
Immunization record
Birth certificate
Social security card
Previous transcript

Which I know, doesn't really sound like a lot.  But if you're dealing with exes, it can be hard to come across paperwork.

But my problem is this.  If you are homeless or illegally in the country, guess what documents you have to provide:

None

Zero, zip, nada.  So are immunizations important or not?  Because if they're not, then don't require documents.  But if they are (and I think they are) require docs from everyone.  If birth certificate and ssn card aren't important, than don't require them of anyone.  But why do some have to jump through hoops and not others?  And if proof of residency is important because tax money goes to the school then everyone should have to provide them.

To me it comes down to this - if rules are important, everyone should follow them.  If some don't have to obey them, none should.  And I've yet to hear a reason why that's wrong.

Happy 22 months, Elayna!

Another month come and gone.  It feels like I'm updating every few days instead of every month.  Crazy how quickly time flies!

At 22 months, Elayna is:

Still in size 3 diapers
Wearing everything from 12 months to 24 month clothes
Won't sit in her highchair anymore :(  it's all big-girl chair now
Uses real silverware (when not using her hands, that is)
Obsessed with Dora.  Tries to imitate Swiper with the "oh, man!"
Hair is almost down to her butt.  She rarely lets me comb it but comes home with a cute 'do every day from daycare
Loves water.  Pool, bathtub, doesn't matter.
Jabbering up a storm, says lots of words - Dora, bye bye, Herro (Hello), Hi!, 'Layna, Bubba (brother, Nick) , Memma (Emma), Daddy, Mommy, Daynel (Daniel, mimicking me when I called Daniel), Nana, Papa, birds, moon, clouds, uh oh (this is her new favorite), hep (help), boppy, kiyyi cat... I know there are others I'm missing.
Very stubborn.  Shocking, I know.
Still in her crib.  I have no desire to get her to a big-girl bed, she's still so small she has growing room.
Still rear-facing in her car seat.
24 pounds
~30 inches tall (she's squirmy)

Daniel took a bunch of picture while I was at work but he's cleaned them off the camera to an unknown location :(  I will add once I find out where they are, he took some amazing pics!

Pinterest strikes again!

Above our fireplace the wall is longer than it is tall.  Which has made decorating up there challenging.  We couldn't put the painting we had in our old house up there, the dimensions were wrong. So I put the picture of our feet up there, and it was dwarfed by the space, but I wanted something, anything up there :)  Free-standing frames, candles, coasters, etc, were also added to the mantle.

On pinterest the other day I saw a beautifully done mantle that I want to replicate.  It had a large black and white photo of an adult holding a child's hand.  Layered in front of that was a smaller piece that just looked decorative, not a picture, and then a small medallion.  There were tall black candlesticks to balance it out.  I don't want to do exactly that, but pretty darn close.

So what to do with all the pictures that were collected on the mantle?  Put them up the stairwell, of course!

Before, boring white stairwell...

Using newspaper cutouts to arrange the pattern...

First photo goes up, our feet from above the fireplace...

All done...for now!

As I went to hang some of the photos, I realized not all of the frames were able to be hung.  But I love that I'll be able to add onto it as the years go by.  We can change out photos as needed or just hang more frames.  

Zumba!

So I went and did a zumba class today and it was so much fun!  I was worried about looking like a complete loon but I don't think anyone was paying attention to me.  It was a great workout and so much fun.  Wish I could do it more often!

It was also for a great cause, the instructors donated their time so all money raised is going to send a kid (hopefully more than one) with MS to camp.

Happy 21 months!

Holy cow, I can't believe Elayna's 21 months already!!  At 21 months she:

Has all her baby teeth (except two year molars)
Is saying a ton of words (mama, dada, Dora, off, bye bye, Hi, lizard, dog, cat, Emma, bubba, night night, boppy, poo poo, and Layna!)  I know there's more I'm just not thinking of right now.
About 23 pounds
Can open doors with the lever handle
Likes using real metal silverware
Loves the pool
Loves Dora the Explorer.  Slightly obsessed. I found the theme for her second birthday party
Likes purses and shoes
Still size 12 month - 18 month clothes
Size 3 diapers
Size 4 shoes moving up to size 5
Loves being outside
Her hair almost reaches down to her butt.  Almost.
Babbles a lot
Still rear-facing in the car seat

Warning, she was grumpy during these pictures because she didn't want to take her Dora pajamas off:

Holding her Dora pajamas.  

I know I say it over and over, but she just keeps getting better.  Elayna is so funny, smart, pretty, amazing, etc, and I just wish she's stay this way forever.  But I also know it keeps getting better every day.  I love you, Ellie belly!