NMC084 Round Rock Texas Bunk Bed

Daphine Mbithuka

NMC084th_Round_Rock_Texas_Bunk_Bed

Subject: Liveaboard spaces versus landlocked house spaces!

The subject of space, whether one is living on a boat or in a regular house, matters a lot. And if you have been following Rosa Linda Román for some time now, this is one of the topics she has extensive knowledge on i.e, how to turn small spaces into workable spaces.

In this week’s episode of New Mexi-Castaways, Rosa Linda shares the difference in space between living on a boat versus in a regular house. She also reveals how she managed to rent furniture for a short period of time and avoid being stuck with it once they got on the move again. Plus, how with her daughter, Ziva’s help, she managed to create a study nook using the bunk bed she got through Facebook Marketplace at an affordable price. As a traveling family, do you want to learn more about utilizing the space you have? Then this episode is exactly what you need. Enjoy!

P.S. If you liked this episode check out our most recent episode:

NMC083 Adjusting to Landlocked Life

Recorded: August 24, 2018

Location: Austin, Texas

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Episode Transcript:

Rosa Linda Román (00:28): Hello, and welcome to New Mexi-Castaways. I'm Rosa Linda Román and I am talking to you, I'm on my hands and knees in the garage at our new rental house in Austin, Texas. I'm scrubbing slats for a bunk bed table combo thing that I bought through Facebook, because most of our stuff here in the Austin house is rented, because we rented an empty house. And so we rented furniture. But there's a few pieces that I just, now that we've been living in the house, I guess, it's been about three weeks, I'm starting to find the things that, you know, we really need. We unpacked, let me back up for a second and introduce myself. First of all, if you're new to my channel, I'm Rosa Linda Román. I go by Rosa Linda, and my family and I lived on a sailing catamaran. And before that New Mexico, hence the name, New Mexi-Castaways. Rosa Linda Román (01:33): For the past two years, we were on that boat, and then we moved off the sailboat earlier this year, traveled full-time for several months, and then we came to Austin. My husband has a job opportunity here, my daughter, our 13-year-old daughter, Ahava, is a competitive gymnast, and she wanted to focus on training more consistently. Not a lot of great training options on beautiful remote tropical islands. So, we are in Austin. And my podcasts now are mostly just Rosa Linda's Ramblings, which is my take on whatever is going on in our lives. We still very much travel and do that, but right now for the current month, we are doing a very domestic, we're looking like a very domesticated family. And so I thought I would talk about some of the differences and the transition and how that has been for our family. Rosa Linda Román (02:36): But right now, I'm going to just give you the warning that I'm building this cabinet piece, actually, with my daughter, not cabinet, it's a a bunk bed, and then on the bottom, it's a table plus a futon. And I bought it, like I said, on Facebook. And the thing is brand new been and in boxes apparently for years. The gentleman that sold it posted just a picture of the outside box and described it as brand new. And I bought it for $250. And the reason I decided to buy it is I looked online, and I looked at this bunk bed, and it's like a $750 bunk bed. And so I was like if this is anything like what he says it is this is definitely a great deal and it's what I was looking for. So, basically, this house that we're renting in Austin has three bedrooms and two baths, and then it's got this front room that it basically has collected all the stuff that we couldn't figure out where it goes. Rosa Linda Román (03:42): It's surprising to me how much stuff we have considering we've been living on a boat for two years. But we do, we have more stuff than space to put it. Part of that is we have stuff from other stages in our lives, and you also accumulate stuff. Once you have a house, you start to get, like right in front of me, I see a lawnmower, which we just bought because that's part of the deal of living in this house, is we have to maintain the lawn. Hang on, let me turn these over. Let me finish the thought about this bunk bed first. So anyway, the guy had it obviously in his garage. I saw on the tag attached to these boxes, it was bought by him in 2010. And at the time of this recording, it's, you know, late 2018. So, it's been sitting in a garage. Rosa Linda Román (04:34): One of the boxes which had the slats for the bed, it's basically just the underside of the bed, that one had a tear in it and looked like it had some water damage. So, those boards don't look great. But they're totally usable. There's nothing, you know, terrible about it. They're intact. They're just not pretty. Well, the rest of the wood is gorgeous. It's a beautiful… it's described as cappuccino wood, whatever that is, but color. But the wood is solid and really pretty, and so I'm just taking my time. Luckily, the part that was affected and it did have like mold on these slats had some black mold, which of course, I'm paranoid about having lived on a boat. You never want mold, and it seems like it's the hardest thing to get rid of wherever you are. But anyway, so I'm cleaning these because other than this, the bed is in perfect condition. Rosa Linda Román (05:38): I mean, you know, we have to buy a mattress and stuff like that, but it's actually not going to be used for a bed most of the time. I'm trying to create the front room as a reading nook. My kids love to read and that is fantastic. But it's a relatively small house, and just like on the boat, you have to kind of find the appropriate space to do different activities. So, now that we're back in a set location for a while, we got our PlayStation again, and that is hooked up. We bought a TV and a TV stand, and so that's all set up in the living room. Well, that's not a great place to try to read a book. And a lot of times I don't like the kids hiding in their bedrooms. Rosa Linda Román (06:28): I mean, there's certainly a time and a place for that, but you know, we're a very involved family. We are very actively involved in each other's lives. And so I'm just not a fan of like putting on your headphones and blocking everyone out in your area. It's just not the way we do things. We like to be involved with each other. So, the kids know that they can read for a time in their room, but they can't just hide in there. And so, that's what the front room will be. It's going to be like a reading nook. And so that's what this bed is going to be for. I'm going to pause because my sweet Ziva just walked out. Say hello, Ziva (07:10): Hi. Rosa Linda Román (07:11): And I'm going to talk to her and then I'll talk to you some more. Please stand by. Ziva (07:15): [indiscernible 07:15]. Rosa Linda Román (07:15): Okay. For what? Ziva (07:18): So, you know how like when you're on computer [indiscernible 07:23]. Rosa Linda Román (07:27): Right. Ziva (07:28): Like, there's not a division sign or a bunch of the signs, there's no accent symbols, or a bunch of symbols, right? And you always just like, how the heck do I do this? I found a website that gives you the codes to all the symbols. And it's like you type control shift, you then type in the code, and then enter, and it pops up and it works. Rosa Linda Román (07:55): That's awesome. And [crosstalk 07:57] the code, the command works. Ziva (08:00): Yeah. Rosa Linda Román (08:00): Well, see, now that's interesting because I just got that Microsoft computer or whatever it is. Ziva (08:05): Yeah and- Rosa Linda Román (08:06): The Windows computer. And I was looking for that, because I couldn't find how to put the accent, I knew how to do it on a Mac. And back in the old days I used to use a PC and I knew how to do it on a PC, but I could not get to change it. And so I couldn't get it to write the accent on Román. So, I'll have to, you'll have to show me. Ziva (08:29): It's weird. Well, and it's like there's this other one for Word, it's like this weird thing, but I like… and it's like a chart, basically. It shows you the symbol you want and then it's just a bunch of different, like numbers, letters, a code, and it's super, I have to show you this. But I discovered it. Rosa Linda Román (08:46): That's awesome. And how's your school work going? Ziva (08:50): Well, I had to [indiscernible 08:51] that science thing, so I just was finishing up that. And then I'm going to do the pretest. And then I have to do one lesson in language arts, you know. Rosa Linda Román (09:04): And you're not activated yet or you haven't heard from the world history one, right? Ziva (09:11): No. Rosa Linda Román (09:12): Okay. Hey I'm almost done rinsing the, I'm going to rinse these and then let them just sit out and dry. Ziva (09:11): Yeah. Rosa Linda Román (09:12): And then I'll come in and when you're ready we'll do it. Ziva (09:22): Okay. Rosa Linda Román (09:12): All right. Rosa Linda Román (09:32): Okay. I'm back. And apparently, I didn't stop recording when she came out, so maybe you got to hear a little bit of Ziva sharing her excitement about a new tool she found to have some division symbols, I don't know. Anyway, it's always fun because my kids, so they've been boat schooling when we were on the boat. They boat schooled or world schooled as we traveled. And it's really fun when they start to figure out that they can do anything and figure out anything if they just set their minds to it. Obviously, there was a problem with one of her assignments and I'll talk about the school thing in a minute, but she just handled it and figured out a solution. So, that always warms a mama's heart. Rosa Linda Román (10:23): So, where was I? I was talking about this bed and the front room. Yeah, so I'm creating this reading nook in the front room because there's a little dining room, which is perfectly fine for us. I mean, our boat had a salon, we called it, which is the dining living area. It was a table combined with the living room couch. And you know, we had that as our gathering place or the outside deck. So, we don't need a huge dining room. And the one we have is perfectly fine. So, we have this front room that I had no idea what to do with it. So, I started brainstorming and looking at the stuff that never found a home, because surprisingly, like this house, there's a couple closets, there's a closet in each bedroom, but there's not a lot of like shelves and storage spots. And I don't want to rent a bunch of furniture that we don't need, necessarily. Rosa Linda Román (11:29): You can tell I just stepped outside because I'm going to hose off these things that I just washed. And anyway, so let me step back in here to finish my thought. So, what's surprising to me is that the house has a lot less storage options than the boat did. On a boat, every, like, seat that you sit on can be lifted and underneath is storage. Many boats, the steps that you walk up and down, those are storage, underneath your bed, like there's cabinets for storage, there's forward holds, there's a lot more storage on, at least our boat was a Lagoon 450. There's a lot more storage than you would think on a boat. So, after we took all that stuff off the boat, plus some other things that we had kept in other locations, and I'm realizing we have more stuff than place to put. Rosa Linda Román (12:32): And a big part of that for me is like art, and office supplies, and what else doesn't have a home? Oh, the games and toys. There's not a lot of space for that. There's a linen closet, but we kind of need that for towels, and sheets, and stuff. And there's a front closet that looks like it's like a coat closet, but we're using that for everything that we had boat related that we didn't get rid of. Like our paddleboards, our dive gear. I don't want to put it in the garage, because the garage is stinky and I see mouse droppings around here, and I think I mentioned in the past, on a past recording that I've seen cockroaches every time I've come out here to like empty the trash or whatever. There's like a big palmetto bug. So, it's not the place that I want to put anything that matters to me. Rosa Linda Román (13:25): I've got like the coolers out here, and fishing poles, and stuff like that, but mostly I don't want stuff here in the garage. So, anyway, my point to telling you all of this is, it's interesting going from the boat to a house, because some of the things you think you would have way more space and plenty of room to put things, you should, in theory, have a lot less stuff on a boat than you would in a house, but that doesn't always translate. I'm finding we've done the reverse going from our house in New Mexico, 2,500 square feet to the boat, which it was a huge undertaking. And we used a system called KonMari which you can go back to past episodes to learn about. And I did do that and that was a really freeing process to get rid of a lot of stuff. Rosa Linda Román (14:21): Now, I'm in the reverse of that, how to take stuff from the boat and move it into a house and also how to help yourself remember not to over buy and not to fill every space you have, because, I mean, now we have space, way more space than a boat, but I don't want to collect a bunch of junk and have a bunch of stuff we don't need. So, I'm trying to be mindful about each space, and what we need, and what furniture realistically we need. When we got here, Nathan had already ordered a bed for each room. So, Ahava's room has a queen size bed, Samuel and Ziva still share a room. And that's a bunk bed with… the bottom is a full, and the top is a twin. And then our room has, I think, a king size in it and then dressers, but oh, and then the living room has like a couch and a loveseat. Rosa Linda Román (15:20): But that's it. I mean, and again, those are rented. So, if and when we are finished here with this project, which allegedly is a six-month thing, then we will send back the rental furniture. And I don't want to be stuck with a bunch of stuff we don't want. So, but at the same time, I want to have things that we can use and enjoy while we're here. And that's where this bunk bed is coming into play. I'm creating a reading, studying nook, which on the top it is a bunk bed, but I'm going to have that be, I know it'll be a place that the girls and maybe Samuel will kind of go up there to get away and do their reading. It also can be, that room will be the place where we have everybody bring their electronics every night and charge it in one set place, because it really bothers me when we tell them to go to bed and they're on their iPad, or on some device, or something like that. Rosa Linda Román (16:24): So, we have a family policy that at the end of the day when we say it's time to go to bed, they take their electronics and put them in the charging station. So, that front room is going to have a space for that, it'll have a space for the printer, it'll basically be like the arts and crafts and reading nook. I'm calling it our quiet room. Whereas the living room is going to be where they do play their PlayStation Move games, and where we watch football, and TV, and stuff like that. So, it's been interesting to have that kind of space and it's especially, interesting to be in a neighborhood where there are people that we can interact with every day. Like right now I'm standing in the garage and I can see my neighbor's houses. And it's a very strange thing to know that, you know, I have to be aware and mindful that, you know, of how I behave and what I do, I'm stepping out now into the, into the air. So, I'm going to pause and I'll check in again after I finish this cleaning job. And by the way, it's 105 here in Austin, it's August and it's ridiculously hot. So, I'm going to put you on pause and go finish this job outside so I can quickly move inside and cool off. Rosa Linda Román (17:55): Okay, I'm back inside. And I took longer than I thought out there because I realized something. After I finished cleaning the slats for the bed, I noticed that it was time to water the lawn. Well, this morning there was a guy in our backyard and Nala was going nuts, which I was like, "Good girl." Because she barked at the appropriate time, which is so great. We've had dogs in the past who don't know when to bark and don't alert that there's a man in my house, that happened in New Mexico once. So, Nala got a treat and then I went out to check out what was the deal and it was the lawn maintenance, not the lawn maintenance guy because we're renting this place and the landlord says we have to maintain the lawn, but I guess they are still putting the fertilizer on. Rosa Linda Román (18:47): And he didn't knock or call. And so, he was out there, good thing my dog wasn't out there the way. I heard her kind of woof and bark, but I looked out and the gate was open, and he was back there, and I was like, "Oh my gosh. I am not used to this, just the whole, you know, people come and go in a neighborhood, they do their job, they move on. It's no big deal. But I'm just not, I guess, used to that. I'm used to our space. So anyway, the lawn guy was giving me some tips, because we're newbies to lawn maintenance. We've never had a lawn before. When we lived in New Mexico, our house was on 75 acres up against the forest, no lawn, some zero scaping, if you know what that is. Basically, you know, some landscaping with rocks and native plants that don't have not grass, not grass. Rosa Linda Román (19:41): In fact, I tried at one point to make a grassy area in our backyard in New Mexico, kind of the little hill around the playground. And it was a complete failure. Just not enough water I guess in New Mexico to, well, I'm sure there are brands and kinds of grass that would have survived, but it was a one-off project and it failed just like my attempts at growing crops failed except for summer squash and tomatoes in New Mexico. Because our home, by the way, is at 7,500 feet. So, a lot of things don't grow up there. And I'm not exactly a green thumb. So, this lawn maintenance guy who's putting fertilizer on and I'm like, "Is that going to hurt my dog or my kids?" And he's like, "No, we use organic whatever this or that." Rosa Linda Román (20:38): I was like, "okay I'm just going to keep them in for the day." Which is fine. But he said that one of the things that he noticed, we have like these brown patches on the lawn, and it's apparently, when you cut the grass, all of the stuff that the, what do you call it? Not scraps, but you know, the part that has been cut off. I'm sure that there's a name, that will come to me in a second. But all of that just kind of was on the lawn in piles. And that prevents the rest of the lawn, the grass seed from breathing, I guess, from the little tiny shoots from growing. So, he recommended this morning, he said, "yeah, I would…" I said, "Should I remove that?" Because I actually was starting an experiment when we watered and we mowed the lawn last weekend as a family. Rosa Linda Román (21:34): And I was like, Nathan thought, because he also grew up in Tucson, so he never had a lawn. And so, neither one of us knew what to do. And so, he said, "Well, I think we supposed to just leave it because then it kind of creates that mulchy, you know, good soil so that the grass can grow." I was like, "I don't know, I don't know if that's right." And so, I did an experiment and I raked one section of the grass, and took all the cuttings off of the area that we cut and that area is looking very alive and healthy. So, I was like, "Huh, I wonder." So, sure enough, the guy comes this morning and said, "Yeah, I recommend you take all that, the cuttings off of the lawn." Rosa Linda Román (22:19): So, all of this to say that's what took me so long to get back inside, I stopped to rake. There's this one section in our front lawn. The lawn looks pretty good, but there's this one section that is just brown. And I looked at it and sure enough there was like an entire carpet of grass cuttings. So, I just raked that. I'm covered in sweat and the sprinkler came on at that time. So, I'm covered in sprinkler, and sweat, and I just scrubbed off the mold off those slats, which I then hosed off, and also sprayed myself, which was very refreshing, because it is so hot outside. But now I'm inside, I'm looking at the layout of the bed that I have been building with Ziva. It is quite a process. It's a big project. It's very heavy. And now I can tell you the name of it, it's a Coaster bed. It's the name of the company is Coaster. And it's like a, let's see, Coaster company of America doesn't tell me specifically what it is, but yeah, so that is what I'm working on. I'm going to come in and work on that. And then later I'm going to go get Samuel from school. But I wanted to talk a little bit about some of the things that I've been doing now that we're in a neighborhood and that includes talking about school. So, let me check on Ziva and then I will be right back to continue the conversation. She's working on some assignments and I just need to make sure everything's getting done. Please stand by. Rosa Linda Román (23:58): Awesome. So, she was at a breaking point and so she is going to come and help me build the bed, because that's something that we're working on together and I'm really loving that and that is something I really want to talk to you about. The homeschool versus brick and mortar school drama that we've had in the past two weeks basically. So, I want to do that, but first I want to use the time, because she just took a break from her work and she's got time to work with me, and it's a two-person job really. So, I am going to be back, but I'm going to have to ask you to stand by once again so I can work with Ziva. Rosa Linda Román (24:46): Okay, I'm back. And we have two parts or the major parts of the bunk beds built and they are quite impressive. I will put a picture of the end result, the the middle, and the before middle and end result in my New Mexi-Castaways group. If you don't know about that, just check out my Facebook page on newmexicast.com. No, my Facebook page, it's Facebook/newmexicast. And just check it out. And there's a link that's, sorry, I'm trying to take a picture at the same time I'm talking. I cannot walk in chew gum at the same time, apparently. Anyway, so the Facebook group is where I share extra photos, and videos, and it's just a private group. I have a link in that group to a Google Photos album where I like to share some of our more personal pictures from our adventures. Rosa Linda Román (25:52): And you can find on the Facebook page, you can find the signup button for that private group. So, if you like these stories that I share, I try to always put some pictures up so that you can see what I'm talking about. Occasionally, I'll put video as well. But anyway, so Ziva and I have been making really amazing progress. I really am impressed with this little girl. It fits right in with what is on my mind right now, and that is specifically thinking about the homeschool factor. Ziva and Ahava decided to stick with the online school that they've been doing. It's FLVS, in case you're interested to know what that is. It's the Florida Virtual School. And it has been a good match for my kids and for our lifestyle. But when we moved to Austin, Samuel decided he did not want to do that anymore. Rosa Linda Román (26:54): He really wanted to go to a brick and mortar school, and that was totally fine. We had lots and lots and lots and lots and lots of discussions as a family to try to decide what each kid wanted to do the most. And at the time that school started, which is basically a week ago, yesterday, the girls decided they wanted to do Florida Virtual school, and Samuel wanted to go to the local elementary school. A big part of that for Ahava was she does her gymnastics and the way that it works, her school would've gotten… And we did, we went and toured the schools and it's a really good school district. There's a lot of really good schools here, so it was nothing against the local schools, but with her gymnastics schedule, her training schedule, she trains from 3:30 every day to 8:30 every night. So, five days a week, five hours at a time. And that's an incredible amount of training as you can imagine. Rosa Linda Román (28:03): And because of that, it's really, you know, we don't get to see her as much, that's number one. Number two, it's, sorry, I'm looking at things back on the bed trying to build it. So, it's a lot of training that she does. But the next issue was that school would be going from, I think she would leave here at like 7:30 in the morning and not get home until get out of school at 3:30 or 3:35. So, the way that the other gymnasts do it is they do something called off campus PE and instead of having to spend that hour during the school day doing PE they just do, you know, their gymnastics is their PE which makes total sense when you think about the fact that they are training 25 hours a week. Rosa Linda Román (28:59): Well, the problem is because we came in late, the school district said, "Sorry, we can't approve your request for homeschool." I mean not homeschool, "…for off-campus PE." So, there's no way for her to do that. And without the ability to do that, that really adds a layer of stress that we really just don't want to take on. We actually really like our kids and we like to see them, if we can, you know, after living on a boat, the idea that we would not see her at all except on weekends really not attractive to me. So, when she said, "Well, I don't want to do it unless I know I can do off-campus PE." You know, we supported that and as a result, I've gotten an endless sea of criticism from people who are close to us. Rosa Linda Román (30:00): And it's been a very stressful time because of that. Some were questioning why Ziva didn't go if Ahava didn't go, and Ziva really didn't want to go necessarily to the local public school. The main reason she wanted to go to a school school was because she wanted to go back to New Mexico to be with her best friend in middle school there. But since we are not going back to New Mexico, she wasn't chomping at the bit to, you know, go to the local school. But it really became a very stressful situation. There was a lot of chatting with my children in ways that made me feel that it was close to cyberbullying, telling my daughter that she was being brainwashed and that we, you know, were being irresponsible as parents, and that we were, basically, not letting Ziva make her own decisions. And it just spiraled really fast out of control. I think part of it is that Samuel decided to go to the local school. Yeah. Pause, please. Rosa Linda Román (31:26): Okay. That was a very long pause, because my… so what happened, and the reason I paused was Ziva was home with me and she was working on some schoolwork, and she was eavesdropping on my recording, and she rightfully said, "You know, who are you recording this for? And you know, you know, why are you saying that?" And so, she basically called me on what I was saying, and said, "You know, we don't want to hurt anybody and we don't want to say anything that would hurt someone else's feelings. And so maybe you shouldn't say that." Which is very true and I respect that my kids, always keep me, you know, I try to help them be their best selves while they do the same for me. Rosa Linda Román (32:24): And so, parenting is not a one-way street. What you just heard, right there was a school bus going by, because I am outside Samuel's school. This is a few days later after the original recording, and I'm sorry for the wind, I'm sure is very loud. I'll try to walk slowly, but I'm walking back from, I normally run back, but I'm going to walk back from Samuel's school. He skates every morning to school and I run with him with Nala. So, it's quite a sight me pulling Samuel and leading the dog or the dog leading me depending on how it's going. And so, then I jog home and it's about mile and a quarter, the distance from his school to our home. So, right now I'm on my way back. The girls are at home and I thought I would wrap up the recording. Rosa Linda Román (33:29): So, it's funny how sometimes you just need a kid to keep you, you know, remind you of who you are and who you want to be, right? Basically, the bottom line is I was starting to talk about the homeschool thing and we did get a lot of flak, and still, I think there are a lot of people who are angry at us that we're doing the homeschooling, but I don't need to throw anyone under the bus. The fact is, it's been a very difficult time, a tough decision. I still don't know if it was the right decision, but we have been reaching out to some homeschool groups and I'm looking forward to a few planned social activities that we hopefully will make some local friends. Gratefully, we landed in a neighborhood where everybody's very social and it's a little cul-de-sac and everybody gathers at the end of the day to just chit chat, and the kids, you know, ride a bike or play water guns. Rosa Linda Román (34:35): It's a hundred-plus out here in Austin still. So, mostly they try to not melt, but it's nice that we have a neighborhood, but there's no kids that are the girls' ages. Well, actually, there are boys, but they have not come out yet. All the boys have been of their age are always in on their tech. But the younger kids are always out. And Samuel made a friend who he just loves, which on a side note, I run with Nala, you know, with Samuel to school. And for the first several days I always had Nala come right up to the school with us. And then on, I don't know, the third or fourth day, the crossing guard said, "Ma'am, I need to let you know that you're not allowed to bring your dog up to the school." Rosa Linda Román (35:29): And I thought I didn't say anything. I said, "Okay." And Samuel was so heartbroken, because he liked me walking him all the way into the building. And so, I said, "It's okay, I'll just, you know, stay on this side, not go across the crosswalk, and basically just be across the street from the school with Nala." Because my first instinct was to just leave Nala at home and not do it at all. And I thought, you know, that's not fair to Nala. I don't know, my embarrassed, like, easily bruised ego side wanted to just stay home or leave Nala home. But this is like the one time she gets to go out and go for a run. So, I mean, occasionally, we'll take her out to the dog park and throw the ball and the kids will throw the ball with her in the backyard, but this is when she gets to get out and explore the neighborhood and, you know, all that. Rosa Linda Román (36:26): So, I said, "Well I'm just going to stay across the street." And that was on Friday was the first time we did that. Well it's Monday and it's still like, oh, you know, and part of me thinks it's just easier if I didn't bring her, because she's a big girl, right? She's a big German Shepherd. Actually, she's petite for a German shepherd, but she's a German Shepherd. Anyway, so I ended up bringing her again and I'm going to continue to do that, because it's good for all of us. But Samuel, right about a block from school, he said, "I'm so sad that you're not going to be able to walk me in today." And I said, "II's okay, we're going to do the same thing we did on Friday. I'll give you, you know, kisses right at the corner, and then…" Because he has to stop and change out of his skates anyway, because the crossing guard told us you can't go across the crosswalk on wheels, so everybody has to dismount their bikes, and skateboards, and stuff like that, scooters. Rosa Linda Román (37:18): So, I said, "Okay, well, you know, let's see, we'll stop here on this side of the crosswalk." Take his shoes off, and then we go on to go, I mean, you know, take his skates off, then he gets his shoes on, and then he goes to school. So anyway, I stayed on this side saying goodbye and he was all sad. And then his little best friend from our little cul-de-sac happened to walk upright at that time. He's in fourth grade, Liam, and Samuel was so happy because I had said, "Okay, when you get to the main part of the school, like when you get to the front door, you can wave and say goodbye." And he was so engrossed in conversation with Liam once he saw him. They went across the crosswalk and went into the school together. Rosa Linda Román (38:10): He didn't even turn and say goodbye, which it's funny how, like, one minute you're like so worried about them, and they're independent, and the next, you know, they've already moved on and you're forgotten. And that's as it should be, right? I mean, I don't want to be forgotten, forgotten and I don't think I ever will be, but you know, that's part of it is letting go. And sometimes the letting go is a small little letting go steps so that eventually when they grow up and leave the nest, they're hopefully ready and you're hopefully ready. I recently saw, somebody posted something on Facebook, oh, my mom sent me like a Comedy Central or something video that was so funny. This woman was talking about how her daughter when they were getting to be older like, I think, she said between her junior and senior year of high school, she said they turn into like just monsters. Rosa Linda Román (39:09): And because of that, she goes, "That's okay. It's God's way, because otherwise you'd never let them leave the nest. But because they turn into just so mean, mean girls at that age, by the time they graduate, you're like, 'Oh, I'm so glad you're leaving.'" Which is pretty funny. I'll try to find the clip and see if I can add that audio, a little clip of it because it was so funny. Anyway, all of this to say, I'm just working on figuring it out as best I can. You know, you juggle all these different things, all the balls are in motion and I'm doing the best I can. And I was grateful that Ziva keeps me honest. She told me, you know, that I didn't need to disparage anyone or talk too much about the negative. It makes me think about my favorite, all-time favorite podcast, the Manic Mommies. And they, two women, Erin and Kristen, the whole premise of their podcast and why everybody loved it was they shared like a girlfriend's perspective of what it was like, you know, just the ups and downs of raising kids. And they got to a point where their kids, all right, I have to pause. Rosa Linda Román (40:40): So, I accidentally hit some setting while I was juggling the dog and the backpack. And because I carry Samuel skates back with me and now my app, My Run keeps talking to me. And so, I have to keep pausing because it's telling me my distance, even though it's not, I didn't like hit a mile or anything, so I have to check what I did. But anyway, so the Manic Mommies, they would always, you know, do this, I think it was once a week that they did their episodes and they finally had to stop because their son, one of the kids, I can't remember, which was offended that his mom was talking about some of their issues, you know, and she wanted to respect his privacy. And so, she decided it was time to stop the podcast, which was a travesty, because so many people benefited from the, you know, just to know that we're not alone and that it's not easy to be a parent and just to commiserate. Rosa Linda Román (41:47): So, everybody really missed not only the podcast, but they always did this escape where the women that listened would gather at a different city. They'd have an event sponsored by Chevy and we would always go on a annual escape. And that was fantastic. And we all keep in touch on Facebook now and the women are always like, "When are we going to have another escape?" And lately, all of us are like, "We just need to find a hotel, and go, and just be there and, you know, just happen to be at this same hotel at the same time." Because everybody's feeling a little burnt out with the back-to-school time and all the hustle and bustle of parenting. Rosa Linda Román (42:39): Anyway, so I guess I'll wrap it up here and let you know you can find me on Facebook as New Mexicast. It's facebook.com/newmexicast. And there's also a button to sign up to become part of our private Facebook group where I share more of the behind-the-scenes, pictures, videos, that kind of stuff. So, if you're interested in that, please join. Thanks for listening and I will hopefully have better audio when I talk to you next because my wire and part of why I'm… I'm using like wired headphones right now, my wireless microphone, my headphones, rather, got left at Olive Garden by my daughter, because she was talking to my husband on them and they are gone. So, they weren't that great, anyway. So, I'm going to be looking at which microphone to get next for walking and talking, and movement, and hopefully, by the time you hear me next time it will be much better audio quality. All right, thanks for listening to New Mexi-Castaways, I'm Rosa Linda Román. Speaker 1 (43:38): I think that God allows this to happen and you little girls that your babies aren't this old, just listen to me. All right, one day they'll just turn on you, and you'll think, "Who in the world is this? Who's coming down the steps in the morning? We don't know who this is." I think that God allows that because he knows that you're about to let your baby go off to college or whatever they're going to do, and he knows that you're grieving, so he makes them just as mean as he can so that you can let them go. And I believe that.

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