Fun FUN fun!! :D

It's always a blast when the circus Alicia comes to town!!  This morning we got up about 8:00 ish and putzed around a bit trying to get going KNOWING that at 9am Shawn and her family would be arriving to visit!!  We kept telling each other "We should REALLY go and get dressed...." but at 9 am as Shawn and the gang drove up we were all in somewhat of a shambolic state! :D  We covered it pretty well I think!! :D

Alicia made Apple Cake ( Gluten free no less! ) for breakfast using the apples she had brought along and assorted ingredients remaining in my pantry! ;D  I DID break down and have Rex buy some real sugar though.. apparently having powdered sugar in your tea is less than satisfactory and the poor woman, she does LOVE her tea when she visits!! :D  LOL!!

Shawn and family stayed for an hour or so and got to visit, they hadn't met Alicia before so it was nice for them to put a face to the name!  The kids then all played outside in the balmy 64 degree winter day!!   Then at about 1:30 Jessica A's mother came to pick her up, then Mary came to get Charlotte.  We begged Mary to stay longer and visit with us and the kids played and played some more!!

We managed to make potato soup for dinner which was SO good and then we played some games with the place mats...(!!) We have presidents and states place mats so we played guess the VP, name the capitols etc...!!    The kids played and played some more and more and the babies ate and ate!  Now everyone is winding down, Millie is sleeping, Jack is refusing to go to bed ( meaning I left it too late... uh oh!! ) and Jess and Anna are playing Rock Star or something or other!!!

Flylady's mission today is Family Fun Day and I think we have THAT covered!!! :D

Night all! 'D

OMG WHAT a busy day !!!

We got up at 6 this morning to take Jack to Omaha to get his ears tested....  the doc said his ears look good... he has minor hearing loss but it's not enough to worry about!  After the hearing test we had a quick visit with Michele to drop of something for her, a quick stop at the mall for Rex then back to Lincoln for Chipotle for lunch.  After lunch we headed home after dropping Rex off at work and I started to get ready for the Bayer / Hrdlicka bunch's arrival....  !!  Mary arrived with Charlotte for a visit and Charlotte decided she would like to stay too!  The Bayer bunch arrived and there was much excitement and joy!  We managed to make dinner with rice, carrots and broccoli. ( I say we, I mean Alicia!!  She's awesome!)  Then Jessica's friend Jessica (!) called and said she would like to stay the night too....!!  So tonight we have Me, Hubby, Jessie, Jack, Millie, Alicia, Daryl, Victoria, Anna, Jack, Alex, Fiona, Charlotte and Jessica sleeping over !!!  It's a full house but we love it !! :D

I can't really type though as I'm chatting at the same time!!! :D

Still have to clear off my dresser this evening in order to get my Flylady mission today... it may have to wait until tomorrow!!

Night all!!

Hey there! :D

OMG I'm going to have to type so fast!!!  What a busy day and I've still got a bunch to do and we have to leave early in the morning to go to Omaha for an appointment and then when we get back we have to get the house ready for Alicia and her gang ( HUZZAH!!  it's been so LONG!!!) to come and Mary and Charlotte are coming too and I think Charlotte's going to stay too and ....... breeeeeathe..........!!!

LOL!!

Got a good night's sleep last night....  5 hours... not too bad!!  It's no 9 hours, but I'll TAKE it !! :D  Had a lovely time with the kiddoes, played our geography game again with a cunning twist from Jessie!!  Both kids did their Kahn academy math, Jack worked more on his number recognition.  He did some physics on an iPad game, I chatted on the phone with dear Uncle Weldon for a while and also had a brief chat with me Ma...!!  I did a couple of loads of laundry, made bread rolls for lunch and made a pasta bake and a fruit cobbler for dessert STILL without having had to buy any extra ingredients!!!  ( We are now OUT of white sugar and butter....!) ...  Now the kids are ALL sleeping, my Flylady chores are done ( today's mission... clear off the bedside table... looks lovely now! ) the spare room is made up for the tribe, and Jack's, Millie's and my clothes are all laid out and ready for morning.  The kitchen is a disaster area though, so I'm going to go and clean that up, pick up Millie's blankets and then maybe sit for half an hour and fall asleep watch TV!!

G'night!!  

9 hours sleep doesn't buy you as much as it used to!

Oh boy!!  I got NINE HOURS of sleep last night!!!  Ok.. I didn't get nine hours, Millie did, but that translates to me getting EIGHT FULL HOURS SLEEP!!!!!!  Oh MY!!!!!!!   Honestly when I woke up and looked at the clock I was dumbfounded!!!!  I felt like Cinderella when she wakes up in the morning and the bluebirds are twittering around her head and it's all peaceful and Vivaldi is playing the four seasons and and and .....   SCREEECH.....!!  Cue the sound of a needle scratching over a record ( oh god....  the Young 'uns won't have a clue what I'm talking about......)  anyhow.... today started off awesome and quickly slipped into insanity.  I feel like I should be sat here chuckling and looking sideways at the wall whilst sucking my fingers....   This house CAN be a bit of a nut farm once in a while.  It starts out simply enough... I might state the intention to put a basket of laundry in the washing machine.  No biggie, I'll do it after breakfast.... only ... breakfast never comes.... somebody wants something, then someone else wants something else... the dog wants out, the phone rings, a kid needs help pouring milk, another kid needs help with math, the baby cries, the dog wants back in, the phone rings again, kid with milk now needs help with bridge building, kid with math needs more help with math.  Baby wants me to pick up her blocks so she can throw them again... PHONE RINGS.......  Good grief!!  Somedays, MOST days the phone doesn't ring at all and I'm totally OK with that... today it was ringing off the wall !!  I didn't get the laundry IN the machine until 4 pm.  I brought it down with me when I got up at 8.

The kids and I had a fun day....  More French... this time.... "Can you speak more slowly please?"  and "Where are we on this map?"  LOL!  I LOVE how all our phrases demonstrate a COMPLETE lack of faith in our capabilities!!! :D  We also played Land the Plane on our US map.  I can't tell you or comprehend WHY the kids love this game so much!!  Jessie was LITERALLY jumping off the ground  with excitement to play it.  Barmy kid.

Insanity!

Absolute lunacy.

Genius!

And Millie quietly looks on!!

  Jack plays a game on the iPad called Bridge Odyssey or some such where he has to construct bridges to carry animals across yawning chasms.  He really enjoys it so I thought it might be fun for him to construct a real bridge from Tinker Toys from a chair to the table! It was great fun and Jessie and I joined him in building.... it was very hard to stay out of it really!!  What I liked best though was when Jack opened up the iPad and turned on the game so we would have Theme Music for our building!!!

Donkey Kong tries out the bridge! 

I finally got Jack signed up on Kahn Academy for Math so he can have his own page and I can keep a good track of how he's doing.  He started it today and they worked on number recognition using blocks and so on.  He really enjoyed that and kept wanting to do more and more and more!

We decided, since it was a whopping 34 degrees and sunshiney out, that a nice walk to the post office would be a lovely treat.  I have barely been outdoors in weeks!  We bundled up a bit, got the lead on the dog, fielded yet ANOTHER phone call and headed out!!  Brr... brisk out....  walk fast.....   YIKES the wind is COLD walk faster.....  RUN KIDS!!  RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!!!!  SAVE YOUR SELVES!!!!..... Holy MOLY.  Next time I'll be sure to check the wind chill.....   Shudder.

We got home and warmed ourselves right back up with chocolate milk and a bit of Frasier....it was then that I got to the laundry and to putting on some rice for dinner!  We are STILL managing to eat from the pantry and had a really tasty dinner of rice with beans, onions and sausages !!!  Delicious!

The flylady task today was to clean off the tops of the door and windows in the bedroom!  Easy McPeasy.  Took me five minutes tops!  I like the quick ones!!  My friend April sent me a link to this app for the iPod called Carrot which is basically a To Do list with attitude!  I downloaded it and plugged in my chores.... so far I've made 100 points and I think I may have annoyed it! :D
We ended the day peacefully with me reading some of Treasure Island to Jack as he snuggled up in bed!

Yo Ho Ho.... mmm... RUM....!!! :D  Night all!!

Tuesday !! ;D ( sheesh, I had to write that three times!! Must be tired! )

So I changed the blog format.... you like?!!?

Today was excellent!  Started off screwy, I kept dropping things, I tried to make some folders on my iPad and was driven to the point of insanity by it...  I had Jessie help me... she rules!!

Later I had all the children sitting at the table trying to do school..... ahem...... Jessie was working on decimals through Khan academy, Jack and I were working on the iPad doing Math on the chalkboard app and Millie... well Millie was having a wonderful time throwing her toys, puking on things and squealing at the top of her lungs!!! ;D

Millie likes to eat the table.

Working hard!

Math master!

We did some more of our French language learning and all learned a new phrase... today's phrase was "Can you write it down for me please!!" ...  ( I see we have NO faith in our language abilities!)  and we played a game  about Europe to learn the countries.  Oh and we also learned a new card trick that wowed us no end.  We couldn't wait for Daddy to come home so we could show it to him!  We dramatically dealt out the cards, he picked his pile, we did all our hocus pocus....  drew out his card ....aaaaaaaand..... nope.  That wasn't it.  Shoot.  Tried again.... nope.  He was nonplussed.  Tsk.  Back to the computer and a recheck. Turns out I had stacked them wrong.  Doh!  Not so impressive that way!!  One more time and we got it right!  MUCH better!!!

I did all my Flylady chores PLUS I took down our bathroom curtains and washed, dried (IRONED) and put them back up! (I KNOW!!!!)  I did the Flylady mission which was to go through the sock drawer and weed out any that don't get used.  I did one better and went through my underwear, sock and nightwear drawer and threw out all sorts of unmentionables! :D  

For lunch we are still keeping to our using up the pantry plan so I made the kids white beans and bacon!  O. M. G.  it's sooo good!  I totally felt like a cowboy on the range or something but MAN that stuff is delicious! Filling too!!  For dessert I wanted to use up some canned organic pumpkin we have so I made pumpkin muffin donuts ( or something like that)  oh BOY they were good!  Once I made them I had to run to the bookmobile to return some movies and I instructed the kids not to even TOUCH them until I got back!  I had to race back home when it was discovered that I had forgotten to put a disk back in the box... so many times I have done that .....  Oh and when I was there, the library lady, Rebecca, told me that two of her stops were schools and of those two schools each had reported finding a dollar bill in their books!!!  (!!)  One lady said a little boy ( and I think they were kindergarden age) found a dollar.  His teacher is very sick and they have a collection fund for medical care for her.... he put his dollar in the collection!!!  I think that is freaking awesome!!!  I'm so thrilled that the little boy got a chance to pass it on....!  Wonderful wonderful!!  Aaaaaaanyhoooo.  I finally got home and we raced around to get everything set up... I put some laundry in to assuage any guilt, made a big cup of coffee, curled up on the couch with my baby and my muffin / donut thing and... yes.... an episode of Frasier!  What a treat!! :D

Oh!  And Millie slept for over 5 hours last night!!  Finally!!!  She had been consistently sleeping well for ages then suddenly she began waking every two hours or something.  I'd only need to nurse her for about 10 minutes or so, but still, waking up that frequently wasn't working for mama.   I couldn't think what was going on... I wasn't drinking caffeine... or alcohol...  just having one or two ( or SIX) dark chocolates every night before bed.  .....     oh.     yeah.    Dumb.

So, once I cut out the nightly chocs I got a good night's sleep.  TOTALLY WORTH IT !!!!

Fingers crossed for a repeat tonight!!

Oh oh oh and one MORE thing.... I got a call from the Funny Bone comedy club in Omaha today!  My name had been randomly pulled from their database to win four tickets to their comedy club this weekend to see Chris Rock's brother perform!!!  Hah!!!!  I told them we couldn't use them, but it was cool to win!!  :D

So...  yeah.... awesome day!!!

Monday..... Booooo!!! (now with PICTURES!)

***... sorry about all the alliteration!  Must be too much coffee.... though... it IS decaf....!!??***
****************************************************************************
Wow!  Mondays STINK!!  Even when I'm at home with the kids like every other day, for some reason, for us, Mondays are a big fat ppttthhhh.   Still!  Got lots done again!!!  Hee heee!!  I stripped my bed and washed the bedding... I didn't bother with Jack's this week as he is sleeping in a sleeping bag on top of his bed... don't ask... it's not an interesting story...!!  Jess decided she didn't want to wash her bedding.. so it was just mine and the wee one's!  Today's mission was to clean under the bed and since I'm a bit of a fuss pot about things being "UNDER" other things, there was nothing under our bed but piles of dust and hair.  Yum.  I got the vacuum out and took care of that tout suite!  I also did the usual Whole House cleaning stuff but just remembered I didn't do the windows.  Oh dear... !!  

We did lots of OTHER stuff today too!!   We learned some Fun French Frases... ( yes I know... PH, not F....)  The first one translates to "Does anyone here speak English?"!  It amuses me that this was the first phrase Jessie wanted to learn!! :D  We marched around the house chanting the phrase in rhythm!  It was a heap of fun!!!  ( Jack's phrase was "Where are the toilets?"  LOL!!! )  We learned a little about France, Jack drew the Eiffel Tower and the French Flag.  Jessie worked on Khan academy and editing her book.  Jack built a huge contraption out of Tinker Toys and did some phonics on a new program I downloaded for the iPad.  We watched some of the inauguration, learned a quote from Martin Luther King and watched Frasier over lunch! ( of course! )  

Oh... and it snowed.  Just an inch, but it looked pretty as it fell... lovely big fluffy flakes!  My favorite!! (alliteration alert!)

Oh and one more thing... I've decided to not buy any groceries this week and to only use food that is already in the house.  We have tons of stuff ( not tons LITERALLY, but A LOT ) that we seem to be storing...!  Dried beans, lentils, canned goods, rice... and yet week after week we buy in more food ( at great expense ) to add to the ever growing pile!!  NO MORE I say!!!  So today I made us beans and rice for lunch and cornbread to use up the cornmeal in the pantry!  The kids were ecstatic! Lunch was lovely and just what we needed with the snow and all!!

So anyway, I was in the mood to capture the moments so here ya go.... this happened today....

Cornbread on the couch! Comfy!

Tried to capture the big flakes... didn't....!

Jack's BIG contraption!

Nap time! :D 

Sunday..... renew your spirit day... ahhhhhhh!!!

That was a peaceful ahhhhhhh not a screaming AHHHHHHH!!!!

Today was lovely.  I had decided that in order to "renew my spirit" I was only going to do things For Me today.  Well of course and Millie.... I have to feed and change and play with and cuddle her, and of course for the kids, I have to make them lunch and pay some attention to them.... and of course for hubby, I have to make dinner and clean the kitchen and put Jack to bed but other than THAT I was only going to do things for me.  LOL!!!   Yeah.  I actually brought a book down to read today and realise now I haven't even cracked the spine!! ;D I still managed a fairly relaxed day though.  We lit a fire and watched a ton of Frasier, I played Words With Friends and took Jessie and Millie out to Michael's to buy new beads and string for Jessie to make bead things with.  We had a lovely dinner, ate a ton of chocolate, drank ample amounts of tea and coffee and generally just lazed about.  It was super. I sort of wish tomorrow was Sunday too!!  Even though we stay home and homeschool it does make a difference what day it is!  Hubby goes out to work, things need to get done in the house...  I can fight it all I like but I still have Things To Do!!

Anyway, I'm waffling on, so I'll go and spend a little more fireplace time before bed!!

See you tomorrow... where Flylady has us working in the Master Bedroom!  Oh boy! ;D

Saturday night's alright... I guess..!! :D

Today was lovely!  Charlotte had spent the night so the kids were up at the crack of dawn and playing. Well, the two BIG girls were anyway.  Jack slept in until 8:30 which is unheard of for him.  We had to go in and make sure he was still breathing.  Millie did her usual up and then sleeping and then up and sleeping some more...  I did my best to get some extra sleep this morning but it just didn't work out that way.  Hubby and I spent some time together looking at stuff online, Mary arrived to collect Charlotte and we conned her into staying for a cuppa and a chat!  After they left the boys went to play Wii and I made us some lunch  heated up some soup from a box.  !!  We sat in the living room and dozed in front of a fascinating show about Egyptian Pharaohs.  It was kind of neat to look back and recall when the kids and I were studying the Egyptians....  we built pyramids and a model of Egypt and the Nile... all that stuff!!  Jessie said she remembered some of it!! :D  It was pretty interesting!  After lunch we pretty much just putzed around!!  I folded some laundry... I remember taking it out of the drier and thinking "Oh!  I can watch an episode of Frasier and fold laundry!!"  LOL!!  Meh, I just folded it quick and took it upstairs  ( full disclosure, it's still in the basket....!! )

I made a breakfast casserole for dinner tonight... the same as the one I made on Christmas Morning.... but THIS time I remembered to put in the eggs.  All twelve of them.  Yeah.   They make a difference, those eggs.
Sigh.

We had a bit of drama where we thought we'd lost the cat.  We searched high and low and finally found him in our tornado shelter under the stairs.  I guess he must have gone in there yesterday because no one remembers opening the door today!  Crazy kitty.  I guess he'll be more careful next time..

My pretty kitty, Herman. 

Well I'm having a little drink of Bailey's as I type and I have to say I'm getting a nice warm feeling.  Think I'll stop now and go snooze watch TV for a while!

Toodles!!!  **insert finger wave**

OMG it's Friday again! What a fun day!

Busy fun and full day today... !  Started early enough ( not too early, just right! ) and I needed to get the house ready for company arriving at 11.  First problem arose when I stepped on the top step of the stairs to find the dog had puked on it.  I cleaned that up and manhandled the baby and a basket of dirty laundry down to the top of the basement stairs to find the CAT had puked on THAT one.  Sigh..  I cleaned that up, went into the kitchen and realised the dishwasher had not run last night.  Oh it was all ready to go, powder in etc, just no one pushed start.  And by no one, of course I mean ME.  Tsk.  So there ya have it.  Great start eh!?! :D   Ah well.  The day improved!!  My friend Michele was coming to vist with her kiddoes and a friend of hers.  The house was ready, cookies were baking, kettle was hot.... no Michele.  They said they'd be here at 11.....  11:30....... nope..... 12:00.... nope....12:30.... nope... Jack was sitting by the window asking me every 5 minutes where they were!!  Finally around one they arrived and we were all very pleased to see them!! The kids had lots of fun playing together and Michaela and I had a lot of fun trying to stop her little one from doing a header down the stairs.  Guess I'm not ready for a crawler yet!!  Uh oh!!!  Mary and Charlotte arrived about an hour after Michele so there was more fun, tea and cookies to be had.  Michele had to head back to Omaha after a short while but Mary stayed longer and Charlotte decided to spend the night!!  Dinner was easy and the kids are all busy doing something upstairs!  I'm about to go and get Jack into bed and get myself ready too.  Phew! Busy day!!  I DID do all my basic Flylady stuff BUT haven't yet cleaned the bathroom baseboards.  Won't take me a minute though so I'll do it when I go up to shower.  It's also Boogie Your Backpack, purse and car day today!  I didn't do that either, though it's one of my favorites!  My purse is in good shape and the car is pretty tidy.  I'd like to hoover it, but it's toooo cold for that.  It will be pretty in the summer time! ;D

Toodles y'all!!  Family Fun Day tomorrow!!! ;D

Thursday... Flipping good fun! :D

WOW it was FOGGY out this morning!!  I could barely see the house across the street... and of COURSE hubby had to go to Omaha at 6:30 am.....   yikes... I was a wreck until I knew he'd got there ok....  At 9:30 I had to pack the kids up and go out myself.... it was still horribly foggy so I drove as carefully as possible too.  We went to the homeschool co-op's registration day where we said hello to some old friends and met Mary and Charlotte who was also signing up for drama.  ( yes, the fact that I am PAYING MONEY for a drama class when I already HAVE a thirteen year old girl has NOT eluded me!! :D LOL!!  )  Anyhoo... after registration we made our way back home and Mary and Charlotte came too!  We got to drink tea and chat whilst the kids went bananas!!  There is always a lot of screaming and running around when Charlotte comes to play!!!  :D Whilst Mary looked after Millie for me I put a roast and veggies into the slow cooker for dinner.  I LOVE slow cookers....!!  They make life sooo much easier!! :D   This morning I had done all my Flylady stuff and after Mary left I did my mission which today was to inventory the things most used in the bathroom.  I made a list of everything we used regularly but we weren't out of anything so there was nothing else I needed to do.

I've been looking at some great blogs lately to help teach reading to kids.  Jack can read ( a lot more than he lets on I think....) but his reading level is not as high as we would like, so I had a scan over this blog this afternoon and decided to play a game with him....  The blog is called www.playdoughtoplato.com and it's excellent.  ( I may have previously mentioned it...!) The game we played was Flip the Eggs!  I made some "eggs" with paper and a yellow sharpie marker.  I wrote some words I'd like him to read on the eggs, got him some props and away we went...

He had a heap of fun!! :D   The neat thing about Jack is he really gets into games and playing with me so he will want MORE and MORE and MORE....!!  I like to end with him wanting more so always quit before he's had enough, that way he's super keen to play again another day!!  We also did some math using our Math U See manipulatives and some number cards.  He had to read the number on the card then "build" the number using the blocks.  After he'd done that a few times he then got to do some addition by building both numbers and adding the blocks.  Again he wanted more and more but I made him stop!! ;D  Jessie and I made up another game using the Periodic Table and scrabble tiles... we actually had quite a lot of fun playing it, naturally Jack wanted to play that too... and so he did!!  At one point today Millie was sleeping, Jessie was doing Math on Kahn Academy's website and Jack was playing a physics game on my iPad !!  I didn't say a WORD incase I ruined it!!!

Anyway, again all is quiet now... showers have been taken, kids are sleeping ( actually I think Jessie is in her room working on writing another book...) and I should go and sit with hubby for a while.  Catch you on the Flip side!!!!  ( get it?  Flip??  Eggs?!?!? LOL!!!)

Sheesh... it's Wednesday... I swear time is starting to go faster.....!!!

Is someone out there spinning the earth a bit faster these days?!? Time is WHIZZING by and needs to SLOW DOWN please!!  I looked at my TINY (Pah!) baby today.. ( well.. hang on,  I look at her all the time of course.. but I really NOTICED today ) and saw how HUGE she is getting!!  She just turned 5 months ( and if I was a GOOD mother I'd have pictures from her photo shoot to share...!! ) ... Oh look!!  What's this!!???  LOL!!

Anyway, yeah, time is going so fast....   yikes....

But... today.... Wednesday... a good day really!  Did my usual morning routine, a little slow starting but I've decided to not let that bother me.  Flylady is all about family and being nice to your kids and all that stuff... she wouldn't want me to get all het up because I haven't done my morning chores yet and allow that to get in the way of my parenting.  Oh no, that is not what she's all about.  So I took it easy on myself, got everything done, got a load of laundry done, got the mission done.. ( actually it turns out I accidentally did today's mission yesterday so I just did yesterday's mission today!!  See how flexible I can be?!? :D )   I got to chat on the phone for an hour with my Best Bud, sat and drank a coffee with my best big girl and watched Frasier and also managed to find time to meet Hubby in town over lunch.  Once I got home I made Leek and Potato soup for dinner!  I also sliced open my thumb with the bread knife and discovered that one of the cats had done something nasty on my bed... which soaked through to the down comforter.  Which meant more laundry.  yeahy.   LOL!!  Ah well..!!  Kids are again sleeping, dishwasher is ready to go, kitchen is clean, I'm showered and ready for bed.... ***contented sigh***  ..... ain't life grand?! :D

Hmmm... let's see.... Tuesday, right?!? :D

LOL!!  I honestly don't know what day it is most of the time!  The only reason I knew it was Tuesday was because I know the recycling guy came and picked up today!! LOL!!  Thank heavens for the recycle and the trash guys...  I'd NEVER know what day it was otherwise!! :D

Anyway, today I did my Flylady thang.  Today's mission was to wash off the fronts of the bathroom cabinets.  It didn't take me long to do, which is good, because I didn't FEEL like doing ANYTHING today!!  I did all the basic Flylady chores, make up on, dishwasher emptied, load of laundry washed, dried and put away yaddy yaddy yaddy, but didn't feel like doing much of anything else.

SO I got out the world map, US map and the Periodic Table of the Elements poster and the kids and I came up with some new games!! :D  We played three different games with the periodic table and two games with the US map before Millie got fractious and her noises started to freak me out a bit! We decided a little while on the couch with Frasier and some milk would sort her out... and it did!!

I began to get a sneaking feeling that hubby would be coming home early today and, sure enough, when I called him he was already on his way...!!  We did an emergency clear up and I'm amazed at how much got put away in so short a time!!!  I mean the place was a TIP!!!  It looked great when he got home!!  Jessie was a huge help, bless her!!!

Well, baby is calling...  apparently she's busy freaking out Daddy .... crying, laughing, yawning, crying, yawning, fussing.... bed time much?!? :D

Night all!!

Phew... another Monday over with!

Yow.  Why do Mondays stink so much?!!?  This one got off to a shaky start when we discovered it was FOUR degrees outside.  That coupled with the fact we had lit a fire last night and thus the flue was left open all night... as a consequence any heat that HAD been in the house was flying out the chimney at a rate of knots. It took a good while before I felt supple enough to move around the house it was so chilly!!  I eventually got moving and tackled the Whole House Clean (stripping and remaking the beds etc... )  I didn't get the windows washed but got just about everything else done.  The mission today was to clean the extractor fan in the bathroom.  I remember doing that a while back with Flylady so pretty much dreaded doing it today BUT to my surprise it was still in excellent shape.  A quick wipe off and it was clean.  I decided then, since I had extra time, to take the globes off the overhead lights in the bathroom and wash them AND to take apart the glass light fixture on the landing and wash that!!  It was amazing how much BRIGHTER the place looked with all that clean glass!! :D

The rest of the day was taken up with baby care, laundry ( laundry, laundry and some laundry ) a bit of Frasier here and then when I was nursing... oh.... and I made some more cookies.   We just needed some more cookies....!!

On a related note....   I decided to try and see what Millie weighed since we haven't taken her in to the PD for some time.  I stepped on the scale..........     yeah.   There's quite a lot more of Mama than there used to be!!!!!  Oy.

So.  The cookies.  Uh huh, I'll be leaving them for the children.  *hangs head.*   *sighs*

Sunday is renew your spirit day. I think I missed it.

Hmmm.  Went to bed too late last night.  Millie woke up a dozen  three times and Jack ended up in our bed around 3am.  He's 10 years old, BIG and wriggly.  It Does Not Work Well.  Hubby went out with his buddy around 9 and then every thing went downhill.  The fire would NOT start.  I got it going enough that I couldn't then shut the flue and be done with it so I had to sit there and basically watch all the heat in the house disappear up the chimney.  It was FREEEEZING today too.  I tried and tried with the fire, no luck.  Millie would NOT nap.  No sir.  5 minutes?  Sure.  Ten?  Nope.  That couple of hours I'd planned on.... hahahahahaaaaa  are you kidding me?!?  AaArrrgghh.  I had hoped to "Do Something for Myself" today....  Flylady suggests "read a book, take a hot bath, watch a favorite movie...."   Hah.  I had hoped to redo my nail polish on my toes ( TMI? ) and maybe henna my hair.  But noooo.  Millie said Noooooo.  LOL!!  ( well, I wasn't really laughing to be honest. )  Then the other two would occasionally spat with each other. Which I didn't take well.  At all.  It was basically a powder keg.  Then poor Rex got home.


BOOM.


Poor guy.

He wasn't entirely sure what hit him I think.   He DID get the fire going, first thing.  Then he made me a cup of tea since I had started making one about 3 hours ago and hadn't got beyond putting in the milk.  He made me lunch... The big kids had eaten thanks to Jessie...!!  I finally managed to get my nails and hair done but it was a struggle I tell ya.  That baby didn't sleep all dang day.  I finally knocked her out with some milk at 5 ish.  She woke for her 8:30 feed and then played for a while on the blanket.  She's SOOOO close to rolling over.. any day now!

It's now ten pm and I'm ready for this day to be over.  I've been a crotchety old bat all day long and I'm not proud of it at all.  Somehow I feel I am owed this day to myself and I'm just not going to get it at this time of my life!  Having Millie has thrown me for a curve... I couldn't love her more but I'd got used to sleeping through the night and being able to go out by myself once in a while....  it's still a culture shock to me and I'm taking a long time getting used to it!!  Ah well...she's worth it!!

Night all!

Saturday...Family day!

 Today was the day of the memorial service and funeral for my friend Alaina and so I'd been thinking about her since I woke up this morning.  I then got to thinking about baby Jacob, my Aunt B, my Grannie, my Grandpa, my family friend Derrick, our beloved dog Brecon.... and on and on.   It's scary and sad as you get older and you begin to experience people and pets dying.  And you hope it's when you get older, but tragically some people experience loss when they are only young...   oy, so very sad. At the hour of her service my sweet husband set a candle on the table and lit it for her.  Later we hung some bells and some bird food in our magnolia tree.  I can see it out of my kitchen window.  I was given the tree for Mother's Day some years back and it seemed a perfect place to put a memorial for Alaina.

We spent the rest of the day getting hair cuts, having burrito bowls at Chipotle ( oh boy! ), stopping in at Starbucks to visit hubby's photos which are hanging on the wall there, and sitting by the fire.  Baby is starting to get close to rolling over.  She's taking her sweet time WHICH IS FINE BY ME!!!  Gah.. I can't imagine how crazy it's going to be once that little girl can crawl!!!

Jessie was out at a sleep over last night and she came home whilst we were still out.  Luckily she knew where the key was and was able to let herself in the house.  She called once she got inside and we were only 5 minutes away from arriving home.  When it's only 17 degrees outside she needs to be able to get inside fast.  Yikes.  Glad we had a spare!

Anyway, once again the kiddoes are now sleeping.  The clock on the wall is tick tocking, the fire is crackling away and I can hear the murmur of the TV from the other room.  I think a nice warm something something sounds about right for tonight.  I'll raise my glass to Alaina and everyone else who has passed on.  I can imagine them as diaphanous beings floating just off the Earth's surface.  They are away to new things, new horizons, new beginnings.  I miss them and I wish them well....  Godspeed out there.  Godspeed.

Fun Friday! ;D

I'm getting the hang of this I think!!!  Again up and dressed... lah lah lah BUT I got up later this morning.  Baby slept in, hubby was sleeping in Jack's bed since Jack got up at 3, I'd been up with baby several times in the night and was exhausted and SO ON ....  tsk... BUT I didn't freak out that I wasn't up first, it didn't throw me off course, I just picked up where I was and got on with my tasks!!  (It's a big deal to me folks!!)

Jessie was going to a sleep over tonight and Mary, our lovely friend, was coming over to pick her up, so after a quick trip to Super Target we came home, I fling boogied the van and swept and mopped my floor (including under the fridge... good GOD does anyone look under their fridge?!?  HOW is there so much hair under there?!?!?!)  then we lit a fire again and I quickly baked some oatmeal and raisin cookies.  Mary arrived, we had lovely cup of tea and a chat then they were off... and I was alone....with Jack and the baby.  Hmmm... no problem.... I can handle this.... then.....   wwwwwhhhhhhaaaaaa......!!!    and that was just ME!!  LOL!!   Millie started to fuss.  She was hungry and it was "that time of night"  where she wants to constantly eat, then she sleeps a while, then she eats some more!!  I called Rex to check when he was coming home!!  I gave Millie some milk and she went right to sleep so I quickly picked up a bit and then started to think about dinner.  I knew we were having chicken, just not sure what I was going to do with it...  I got Jacques Pepin's cookbook in the mail today and he had a recipe for asparagus that looked good!   I just happened to have some asparagus in the fridge so we had chicken and asparagus with a mustard sauce...  yummy! Jack asked if we could sit at the table to eat ( I KNOW!!) and he ate every bit of his food!  Rex enjoyed it so much he asked afterward for the check!!  Hah hah!!  I got the kitchen all cleaned up, sink shiny and dishwasher loaded and ready to go.  Right now Jack and Millie are both sleeping and hubster is waiting for my company in front of a crackling fire...!!  So, friends, I bid you adieu!

Night all!!

(night night Jessie, if you are reading this....!! xx)

Rainy days and Thursdays!

Today was one of my favorite kinds of days!  Rainy, chilly and gloomy!!!  Whenever we get a day like that, I know it's a perfect day to stay indoors, sit by the fire and relax!  Today we did just that!!  I did do my Flylady mission of course, which was to wipe off all the counters in the kitchen.. Here's where having a teeny kitchen really helps!!  It took me all of 5 minutes to do!!  I did also wash, dry and fold a load of laundry but somehow when you fold it sitting in front of a fire, it doesn't seem so much work!!  I did have to go out for a moment to get some more milk this morning, and since I was out anyway I thought the kids might enjoy a donut... so we made some hot chocolate, took our donuts, sat by the fire and watched reruns of Frasier on Netflix!!  It was such a peaceful day!

In the afternoon I thought I would do a little "school" with Jack... ( Jessie had worked on some math in the morning on the Kahn academy website) so I tried this neat idea I'd seen on a website today.  I got a large piece of paper and drew a road on it with several parking spaces.  In the parking spaces I wrote words or numbers and then Jack had to drive his car into the right spots!  He LOVED this game and kept begging me to play more!  We'll play more tomorrow I expect!


As of right now we have had dinner, the counters are clean, dishwasher is loaded and MILLIE IS TRYING TO EAT MY ARM as I type!!  She's sucking  on it so hard I'm afraid she's going to leave a mark!!!  I guess I should get her some milk!!

Until tomorrow then!!!

:D

If not now, WHENsday!!

Today was anti procrastination day!!  I put it off as long as I could!!  Flylady said we should take care of those things we had been putting off... so.... I started to make a list of all the things I have been putting off!!! LOL!!!  I did get some things done though.  I wrote two letters to my friends to tell them how much I love them!!  I did a 27 fling boogie.... ( went through the house throwing away 27 things, then finding 27 things to donate...)  I did two loads of laundry, sorted out the junk drawer in the kitchen and the "Stuff" cupboard in the kitchen.  Made a yummy dinner and cleaned out the fridge!!! :D  

The kids and I took the dog for a quick walk... it was 50 flipping degrees today !!!  FIFTY!!  So naturally a walk was in order.  We weren't alone in our thinking!  Half the town passed by our house today I'm sure!!

It's been a lovely day, but feels like a long one... going to sit on the couch with hubs for a while before going to bed....

Night all!

Tuesday

Today was a looong day!  Woke up early to miss M chatting away, she fell asleep again but I got up and got ready for the day.  Mum was getting ready to go back to England this morning and much as we argue and fight sometimes when she is here, I knew I was also going to miss her terribly.  It's a crazy wheel she and I are on.  She is a HUGE help with the kids and really helps me with chores, laundry, dinner....  It's going to be a trick to keep things running smoothly with her not here....  :(    Anyhoo... Hubby came home around lunch time and took Mum to the airport.  We normally go too but Mum suggested that she just go alone this time, to dispose of the long goodbyes which are painful for us all but especially for her.  This way was more like a bandaid I think.  So off they went and I set to getting my chores done for the day.  Today's mission was to wash the cabinet doors in the kitchen.  Oh boy.  I HAVE done this in the past 10 years, but you wouldn't know it from looking at my doors!!!  It took me a bit more than the allotted 15 minutes to get them cleaned, but they look SO nice now!!  Today's Holiday Mission was to go through the Holiday Control Journal ( which I downloaded years ago! ) and to review Christmas with regard to any changes I might want to make or things to try again and so on.  I did actually get to do that tonight but I may also do some more tomorrow... I found an old Control Journal FROM 2002 !!  ... it needs updating!! ;D    Tuesday is Plan and Play day so I took sometime to make a menu for next week!!!  (HAH!!!) and am pretty happy about that!!  As for the Play part I took the kids for a walk this afternoon to the Bookmobile.  ... It was a balmy 41 degrees out but I think we may have dressed a little cooly for the  weather!!  It was a BRISK walk!  But then, of course, once we reached the van....

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Sorry... had to stop for a moment to clean up after a PUKING CAT.  What is WITH that damn cat?!?!
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..once we reached the van they had the heat on HIGH and there were other patrons in there too... it was SO hot and claustrophobic I had to leave pretty quick! I usually hang out and visit with Rebecca who runs the van but I couldn't stand it this time!!  We got a ton of books out though and hustled home through the thawing snow.

So, there ya have it!  An exciting day, right?!? :D  Mum has texted me from the airport... she's in Canada now....  good to know how she's getting along but BOY what a long day it will be for her.. She's still got to get to Heathrow, then to a bus to the town her car is in THEN hours of driving before she gets home.  It's hard to really relax until I know she's home safe and sound.

Anyhoo... time for me to shower and lay out my clothes for morning!  I've found that REALLY speeds things up for me... also to have Millie's stuff all laid out too... HUGE help with getting the day going!!

G'night all!! ;D

Monday Monday...!

Today was a good day..!  Flylady suggests today as Whole House Cleaning Day and back in the day I used to get my house cleaned in an hour... sheets stripped, washed and changed, trashcans emptied all through the house, vacuumed all through the house, windows and mirrors cleaned, papers purged, floor in kitchen washed... all in about an hour.  THAT was Before Miss Millie of course!!!  Today I made a good start, I strapped Millie into her sling and we set off!  We got the vacuuming done, I chose to strip the beds later in the week as Mum is leaving tomorrow and I'll do hers then too.  We cleaned the bathrooms and emptied the trash, I cleaned the mirrors and took out the recycling... then I worked on today's zone mission. This week's zone is the kitchen and the mission was to clean UP... any cobwebs on the ceiling, light fixtures and the top of the fridge.  Oh boy.  It's like I'd NEVER cleaned up there!!  The DUST was so thick!!!  I gave it a good clean though and I also took down our light fixture and cleaned it.  (I've NEVER done that!)  When hubs got home I told him I'd cleaned it, he shielded his eyes and flicked on the switch!  It's RIDICULOUS how much brighter the light shone !!!!

I also FINALLY got the trees out of the house.  I'd taken all the ornaments off a few days ago but left the trees with just their lights.  Today as it was so warm ( 43 degrees ) it felt like the day to get them out.  Both trees out, all needles swept up and away OH!  I also took my vacuum cleaner and washed the canister and filter today!! I'm shocked at how much filth we store in our carpets... how gross! : }

Anyway, yes, it was a busy day!  I couldn't have done it without help from Mum and Jessie though!!  Millie needs tons of attention and though she loves being in the sling, it was KILLING my back trying to clean the floor with her on my chest and taken down the tree would have been rather eye pokey!!

In other news... Papa Murphy's Thin Crust Pizza for dinner!!!  ( Hawaiian for me!! )

:D