A Load Off

This last week has been so productive for me, personally! On Tuesday night I stayed awake until 12:30am (Wednesday morning if you want to get technical) but I was on a roll finishing this project. And for me personally when I get on this kind of kick I just really have a hard time stopping. So, I did finish it. Yahoo for project #1!

Friday morning I went to my friend, Jonda's to look at her crafting room and check out her projects and brainstorm on some ideas for things. She got me thinking about another project that I've had looming over me and I spent Friday afternoon finishing that one up! Two projects in one week and I was EXCITED!

Last night I even managed a few scrapbook pages. Then I looked in my corner of the room (or one of several corners I've taken over) and saw a third project that was about 95% finished. So, I sat down and finished that one. That was another late night project, but that finishing bug got me again and I got to bed around 12:45am. But it's done too!!!!!

All three of these projects have been hanging over my head all summer. I practically OWN a book from the library; I've renewed it literally all summer long. I've actually had to bring it back to the library twice to renew it just to prove that I wasn't renewing it just because I lost it. But this book helped me complete one of the projects and I couldn't let it go.

Unfortunately I can't show you these projects yet. They are all gifts for various people...but, all projects are completed in advance and I'm not doing them the night before. (Not that that's ever happened! wink...wink....). But - I do have pictures of them, and I will post those after they've been given.

And now? I have a few others up my sleeves. With my mom's quilting machine living here I plan to finally finish some quilt tops I've had sitting around for almost two years. And I plan to remove all my stamps from their blocks and remount them and figure out better storage. Hopefully this energy keeps up!

Proud as a Peacock!

Yesterday was conferences for the kids. They have been in school for 28 days - though honestly it seems like far more. So we all headed back to school about five minutes after they got off the bus.

I'm pleased to report that both kids had stellar performances in class so far. This is Maddie's first year of actual grades (Letter grades...A, B, etc) and she is getting straight A's! Her teacher was very happy with her performance in school as were Mike and I! Jake's conference was just as impressive and his teacher said he was already accomplishing most of what he would need to know by the end of first grade in both reading and writing. She reported that his math was great and to this point he's been able to pass everything they've worked on with the pre-assessment tests so he won't have to retake those skills for the rest of the year.

So (as my chest swells out with pride!) we ended our day with McDonald's for a treat - our meals were completed with shakes! Pretty nice way to end the week!

Looking for the Bat Cave

Jake got his Halloween costume last night - my parents stopped by with a Batman costume they found at Joanne Fabrics (I think this is one of my mom's favorite stores). It is complete with costume, belt, cape, and quite frankly - a really nice mask. Not one of those yucky cheap ones that tear after five minutes.

This morning the kids were ready for school early. It was picture day and they had gotten up early to get ready. Mostly Maddie got ready - Jake had about 20 minutes to spare.

So, he donned his cape and mask and set off on a crusade around the house. At about 100 mph. He ran from room to room, then would suddenly stop and ask if I had seen him - he had been so fast he was sure I hadn't noticed him. This picture was taken during some "down time".

I was more afraid of two things - 1)Jake would have this mask on and it would leave an imprint on his face that would show up great in his pictures. 2) He would run into a wall and be bruised and bloodied for his pictures. The second option isn't really a stretch of the imagination. It's been accomplished in the past (many times) the day before or of pictures.

And, while most of you who know Jake are expecting me to write that he did do one of those two things, he didn't. The morning came to a close and I drove them to school where I volunteered to help with picture day all day long. It wasn't nearly as bad as I expected it to be and went surprisingly smooth.
Tonight the caped crusader was back at it - only this time it looks like he was getting his butt kicked by an incredibly cute wicked witch.

Back to Normal

Sunday night after listening to Jake cough, Mike made the colossal mistake of telling Jake, "it sounds like you won't be going to school tomorrow." Later that night as we were getting ready for bed I asked Jake to get his stuff ready for school the next day and he said, "but mom - dad said I wasn't going to school." I told him if he felt better in the morning than he definitely was. Then I went and knocked Mike over the head with a frying pan. No...of course I didn't, but I did tell him that seemed like a rookie error. He just thought it was funny.

But Monday morning came and Jake, though not wiped out, had a yucky cough that we didn't think would be good to send to school. So, we make-shifted the couch once again and started pumping him full of juice and turned on the t.v.

Jake had it way better than Maddie did in this area. 1) We are now the home for my parent's giant t.v. it's huge - it takes up a whole corner of our family room. 2) We also hooked up the HDTV (?) thing - that box converter - and so now we also get a ton of other channels, including the TPT kid's channel of cartoons 24/7.

You'll notice there are no pictures of Jake being sick like there was with Maddie. That's because I couldn't get Jake to sit still long enough to take one if I wanted. Once he realized he didn't get to play with his cars in his room all day like he thought and that he was relegated to the couch - staying home wasn't too appealing. I've never seen this kid throw so many things away or go to the bathroom as much as he did yesterday; all to be able to walk around. He was going stir-crazy. I did have to let him play me in Battleship to keep him in one place. Nap time only lasted one hour - and that's with Benadryl helping us out.

At 11am after answering that he couldn't play with his cars or trucks or trains for the 8th time, I told Jake that if he was feeling so great I could take him to school. He told me it was too late for that....like it was my punishment.

This morning I was only too happy to give them hugs and kisses goodbye and wish them a good day as they headed off to the bus stop.

More Shopping

We've really got things down pat when it comes to torturing our children. Saturday afternoon and evening we thrilled them with the news that we were going furniture looking! You can imagine how excited they were to hear this. They might have preferred yet another trip to Home Depot or Lowe's before hearing these dreaded words.

So, off we went to Schneiderman's to look at sectionals. There is a fantastic salesman there - Ron (the bald one, as he put it, since there are two of them) and he spent so much time with us and answered all our questions. He took us all around the store - a couple times, much to the kids "delight" - and answered all our questions. Not pushy, gave his opinion only when he thought we were wavering, and just was an all around good salesman that we were both super impressed with. We picked out a couch that we really really liked and did everything but sign the dotted line. We really are just looking and pricing at this point.

Then it was off to dinner. Since we were in Lakeville we decided to head to the Cracker Barrel. There is a good chance we were the youngest in the restaurant by about 40 years - Maddie and Jake the youngest by 60 years. It wasn't terrible until we left and the kids looked across the street to see HOM furniture and knew where we were headed next.

There we met with possibly the dullest salesman. He wasn't incompetent when it came to the furniture knowledge, but he wasn't far from it. To his credit, he did walk around with us, but the expertise and general interest in our sales just wasn't there beyond "what's my commission gonna be." He just wasn't Ron. His favorite reply to us was "I hear ya..." which he said quite often and we'll probably repeat when we need a good laugh. He took us to the most expensive furniture (which happened to be the only one we liked, of course) and wrote up the amounts. Thank goodness it turned out to be way more than Ron's quote because I wasn't going to be able to face that guy and tell him we had to go somewhere else for a better deal. I literally cheered in the car on the way home when I compared the quotes and realized we could skip the HOM stuff.

Maddie and Jake made the best of it at HOM though. I'm sure the people walking out thought we were some dumb tourists standing in the entryway to take this picture (which the kids actually requested I take...)

As a "gift" for going along and really being fairly well behaved in these stores for a couple hours we got them some dry-erase markers to use in their secret hideout. The jury is still out on whether this specially painted wall was worth it. It doesn't clean up so great so far. We'll see. But, it covered us for having killed their Saturday afternoon.

Home Sick

Thursday and Friday Maddie stayed home from school. When she arrived on our doorstep on Wednesday night from school she told me she thought she was getting a cold. Maddie isn't one of those people who say, "I'm not going to get sick..." and then they don't. She is more the type to just let it hit her. So, I wasn't surprised on Thursday morning when she could barely talk without coughing and quite frankly looked miserable.

She spent the day on the couch. You'd think this would be fun, but we try to take every bit of fun out of it. The goal is obviously to get better. To me this means drink lots of fluid, sleep lots, drink more fluid. Do nothing that is going to sap strength from getting better. So, she watched t.v. and read when that got boring. Coloring? Nope. Wouldn't let her. That involved sitting up, and for Maddie who really gets into coloring it involves a lot of thinking, planning, and constant movement to change markers. So, I announced there was no coloring. Yes, I got eye rolls, but did I mention the other side of the goal is to not make staying home fun so that the kids don't want to stay home?

But, I do try to make her comfortable and not isolated completely. So, we make-shift our big couch into a bed - layer on the blankets in case of any spills, then bring down pillows, and whatever animals or blankets the sick person wants from upstairs.

Maddie fell asleep for only about 45 minutes. I intended for her to fall asleep in her room where it's quiet. Instead when I wasn't looking she fell asleep on the couch and the first time the phone rang she was awake. This did not produce the restfulness I was trying to beg her to get. Later that night she spiked a bit of a fever and ended up staying home on Friday. I was a bit more vigilant during nap-time and got her moved upstairs to her room where she slept for about three hours. Much better.

Tonight we are listening to Jake cough and wondering if he's next. He's more the kid that says, "I'm not that sick..." and life goes on, so we'll see.

TA-DAAAAA!!!!!

Two posts in one day!


Now for the unveiling:


Why a picture of my foot??? I was so excited that I actually got to go into the basement barefoot! That's right! No more rescheduling! We have carpet! And lest you think I'm a little nutso, it was the first thing out of Maddie's mouth too! "Mom! We don't have to wear shoes to go in the basement!"


When Jake got home I opened the basement door and his eyes got wide. Then we went downstairs and very quietly he said, "Wow. When? How did you do this???" Then he actually reached down to touch it and got SO excited and sat right down and while ripping off his sock he said said, "Mom! This is the stuff you can squish your toes in!" Which is exactly what he proceeded to do. He's pretty excited because now he and his friends can run around down there to their hearts content without fear of tripping over a saw. NOT that we allowed friends down there with the opportunity to trip over a saw...friends were just never allowed down there.

So there you have it. Hopefully we can start putting together Mike's office very soon. I don't have church tonight so maybe we can even start tonight!