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12月30日 Compromise moreThat's my answer. Compromise more. I'm not giving up, because it is important to me that the kids learn the self discipline needed for tidy surroundings. I'm not going to try much harder because it is making me resentful.
Colleen was sent in to clean up her room before bedtime tonight and she came back and reported it "mostly clean" after a few minutes. "Mostly clean" meant 10-15 minutes of me straightening up with her before tucking her in, which meant we ran out of time for me to read her a second bedtime story. I once again found all of her hair bows and head bands in one of her desk drawers. That was the compromise that inspired my entry title. We talked and came to realize that I wanted her hair things to all be in one place to make getting ready in the morning faster. She wanted all of her hair things in her desk drawer because she is using her desk like a vanity and it makes sense to her to have them there. We agreed that as long as the desk drawer was only used for hair things (no markers, scraps of paper, Beanie Babies, etc.), then we'd leave it that way. We both get what we want.
What I couldn't compromise on was her mini Barbies and Disney Princesses. They are the size of Polly Pockets and they have the tiniest shoes and jewelry and little tea cups and what nots. They have to stay in their plastic organizer bin when she is not playing with them, otherwise pieces will get lost (I will turn the house inside out looking for lost pieces, it's not a pretty sight). So I emptied out the desk drawer she put them in and after making sure everything was there I put the bin back up in her closet. She has to ask Shawn or I to get it down for her.
While I was doing that we had a talk about her desk drawers and what would go in each one. The lap drawer is for hair things. The top drawer on the left is for her papers and her one pencil (no markers or crayons allowed in her room, she can be trusted but Wesley can't). The middle drawer is for her electronics and her treasures - her Ariel "cd" player, two Barbie cell phones, 2 pretend cameras, her bag of "jewels" (polished rocks) and, for now, her little drawstring bag of lip glosses. The bottom drawer is empty for now. She wants to use the bottom drawer for make up, unfortunately make up is another thing I can't trust Wesley with. Colleen's a different story, she applies it better than I do. She is, however, only 5 years old and it is going to be a few years before she is allowed anything more than lip gloss.
I need to take pictures of the kid's rooms, they look so much bigger now that I've reorganized them. Colleen has room to dance around and Wesley has room to spread out all of his cars and drive them on his rug with roads printed on it. All I took out of Colleen's room was her 3 story Barbie house and all I took out of Wesley's was his train table. Both were relocated to the Family/TV room, the Barbie house is now on top of the train table. Two birds with one stone, LOL.
Love, Jen 12月29日 Give up or try harder?The kids got lots of new toys and things for Christmas this year. That, combined with being snowbound, has inspired me to whip my house into shape (i.e. reorganize everything). It's been one step forward, two steps back since I've started.
I spent several hours last night redoing the kids' play area down in the Family / TV Room. All of the 30+ Barbies have their original outfits back on, all of the little pieces (shoes, household accessories, pets, etc.) are in a separate bin that is put up so that I control when the little bits are scattered to the four winds. I am proud of myself that I resisted the urge to further separate the stuff into baggies - shoes, hairbrushes, purses, kitchen items, bathroom items. You see? I thought about it, but I didn't do it. There was no need to go to that level and I didn't! (This is progress)
Santa brought the kids a new kitchen, very nice of him, their old hand-me-down was literally falling apart. I used the emptied-out-of-Barbie-things plastic organizer for the kitchen things. Top drawer was the apron, chef's hat, kitchen towels, pot holders and play money. Second drawer was utensils and cooking implements. Third drawer was pots, pans, plates, cups, etc. Bottom drawer was food. Notice how I said "was"? 5 minutes after they went down there to play today it was all heaped up on their kiddie table and scattered around on the floor. I am going to have them come down with me and show them how to clean it up. Kids aren't born knowing how to, I know that. It's still discouraging, though.
We got the 2nd box of Christmas things from my parents today, among the goodies are a jade tree of my grandfathers that I wanted for my living room (totally matches the late 60's / early 70's vibe I'm going with), a Lighting McQueen lightswitch cover for Wesley's room (he really needed one and this one matches perfectly), and a big bag of candy for each of the kids. I tried to hide the candy, but my mom told Colleen about it and lickety split, the kids were on a raging sugar high and were chasing each other in a circle: living room - kitchen - dining room - living room. It wasn't long before Wesley stopped, grabbed his mouth and barfed up every bit of the candy (he ALWAYS throws up when he eats too much candy, especially if he runs around afterwards). Thank goodness he managed to do it on his Spiderman flip out couch / bed thingy and not the carpet. I HATE cleaning up barf and the Spiderman couch thingy doesn't make it easy. And now it's put me off candy. Boo!
I'm not sure if it is because I am on this organizing kick, or because the New Year is coming up and I always try to Begin as I Mean To Go On, but I'm writing up lists of projects left and right... and actually accomplishing some of them! I've just unpacked and hung 3 pictures and 1 shelf. Yippee! Only 7 to go... now to figure out where to hang them!
OK I feel better now that I have wrote this and I am not upset about the play kitchen stuff any more. I knew when I was doing it that they would get into it. I specifically wanted their play area to look inviting and accessable and for Pete's sake, they are only 3 and 5 years old. I need to loosen up a little. :)
Love, Jen 12月26日 Merry Christmas!I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday full of love and laughter. We had a white Christmas, which we especially enjoyed. It's been a while since we've experienced one of those.
Since Spaces is all weird about how they handle photos now, if you want to see the full album, send me a private message and I'll send you the link to our personal photo website where they are published at. I'm not going to end the wonderful Christmas I"ve had frustrated with stupid Spaces changes. :P
Love, Jen
 12月23日 Lord help meSomeone, some kind soul, leave me a comment with the Serenity Prayer. I must be saying it wrong because it isn't working.
Wesley has started using the word "hairball" as a curse word. As in "What in the hairball?!?!" It was cute the first 400 times but it has gotten old and I do believe I feel a couple hairs go grey every time I hear it. Hairball! Why?
Methinks we have gone snow crazy!
Love, Jen Lazy DayHello! It's been snowing like the Dickens up here lately, which we hear is very unusual for the area. We have plenty of food and fire wood, we are snug as bugs in rugs with no plans to go anywhere for the duration.
We've been having very low key days hanging out together as a family. We didn't even turn the TV on for two days (it would have been 3, but I let the kids watch a DVD tonight, they chose a Disney Halloween sing along LOL).
Today was warmer, I'd say mid to upper 30's, and nary a new snowflake in sight, so we bundled up to go play in the snow. The first order of business was to build a snowman. It was a first for the kids as well as myself. Shawn did a good job of teaching us, although Wes took over as engineer fairly quickly. I'd be amazed at how quickly he caught on and flabergasted at how he just seemed to "know" things, but this is Wes we are talking about and since he surprises me like this fairly regularly I am coming to expect it from him.
The kids got bored with the snow man after the 3 main balls were in place and went off on their own to play, leaving Shawn and I to finish filling in weak spots and rounding out the curves. Our snow man doesn't have eyes, nose, mouth, hat, or buttons, but it does have the first scarf I'd ever knitted (Wes claimed it for his, but generously donated to the snow man) and I added a sprig from a fallen pine branch for hair. It has some rather long branches for arms, which looks funny! I'll take a picture tomorrow, I didn't bring the camera out today because I knew I was going to play in the snow and I didn't want to get it wet. Colleen declared that we should name him Frosty The Snowman in the most serious voice and I burst out laughing. She didn't see what was so funny.
Meanwhile, Wesley went out into the street to make a snow angel, he was just finishing it when our neighbor's car pulled onto the street. He ran back over to the safety of our yard and we all watched as our neighbor rolled right over it. Bummer!
Then we decided to walk over to the mailbox (it's on the street you turn off of to get on our street). One Christmas card from my cousin Michael and his wife Kelli. One junk mail for Shawn (Verizon - save your postage!), two things for the people who lived here before us. I may take pity on the cruise company and call them to tell them their (obviously) beloved customer has moved, heck she hasn't been here in 10 months! The son gets lots of religious magazines and bulletins, I take it that he is involved in a youth ministry or something of the sort. Again, hasn't lived here in 10 months. I would assume that they placed mail forward orders with the post office, but if so, why do we still get their mail?
None of us were chilled, nor were we ready to go back in (we have been getting kind of stir crazy and needed to burn off some energy). So we walked up to the neighborhood park (one of the big selling points for us when we were deciding on which house to buy). It was beautiful. I was longing for my camera, although I don't know how many pictures I can take of ancient snow covered evergreens before they all start looking alike! The sky was this luxurious grey color and the dark green of the trees and the bright, pure white of the snow was a sight to behold. Shawn and I stopped and stared as the kids plodded ahead of us, intent on the swings and the slides.
Colleen's been eating snow despite our reminding her repeatedly not to. I'm not sure what came over us, but Shawn and I both said "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" and scooped up some snow of our own and began chowing down. Wes looked at us like we were nuts. I believe he was thinking "don't you know you're supposed to be THROWING that at people?"
I played on the swing for a while, Wesley climbed the jungle gym and after much encouragement I got him to go down the slide (I'm not sure why the snow made him afraid). Colleen went to check out a fairly tall snow man that had been built before we arrived. This one had a proper carrot for a nose and I only considered swiping it for ours for a brief second (of course I didn't take it! That's STEALING! LOL). Someone also built a pretty cool snow ball fight fort out of snow bricks and we had a parents versus kids snow ball fight for a few minutes. It was pretty fun!
By that time Wes was getting visibly tired (and he smelled... suspicious). We headed back home, but we took the long way. The snow was very deep in some places, I'd say 12 inches worth. At one point I fell, landing hard on my right hip. It was a little sore, so I was favoring it as we kept walking. Then I almost fell and while flailing about I twisted my right knee. That side of me is protesting even as I type this, 7 hours later! One of our neighbors built an awesome Igloo in their front yard, the amount of time and snow that went into making it was considerable. I'll take a picture of it tomorrow, too.
There were some kids playing in the back of two pickup trucks who's beds were facing eachother. Each side had a shovel and they appeared to be flinging snow at each other out of the bed of the truck with the shovel. Wesley challenged them to a "snow fight" but they ignored him. Colleen saw a little boy from her school and said hi to him and he also ignored her and scampered off with his sled. Poor kids! :) We saw an older couple walking together in the snow towards us and began warning Wes not to throw a snow ball at them. He didn't, but he wanted to. He did challenge them to a "snow fight" and told them that his snow ball would hit them and kill them. Thank goodness they didn't understand him!
After we got home Wes fell asleep and Colleen played quietly by herself and Shawn and I played games on our computers. Shawn braved the roads around 4pm to go to the grocery store, our neighbor wanted some chicken noodle soup. She is just about the sweetest woman. We lucked out in the neighbors department. Shawn got us more goodies while he was there, we've been eating the most worthless junk food since the storm hit. We've agreed - weight watchers in the new year! So we're going to have fun and not worry about it now... and buckle down and get serious in, what? less than two weeks? It'll be yummy while it lasts. :)
We are all so excited for Christmas and for Santa, only two more days! Colleen keeps getting Christmas and Easter confused and telling Wes that this is when Jesus died. We're straightening her out. The five nativity scenes that I have out should serve as a reminder for her! :) Wesley is DYING to open his presents under the tree. All we have under there is what other people have sent us and the ornaments that I get every year to build their collections. He is convinced that one of them in particular is a car (and it is, but not one he can play with - it's an ornament!). I'm not sure that these presents are going to make it till Christmas Eve. My plan is to have the kids open their new ornaments, two books that are special to me, and their matching PJs on Christmas Eve. That will be all that they get from us. Santa will bring the rest.
Well, our poor little red-cheeked Wes is crying his "my gosh I am so tired and I refuse to admit it, please some one put me out of my misery and tuck me in bed" cry. I had better go tend to the little man.
Love, Jen
12月19日 It's Finished!I have officially finished Colleen's Desk (I think).
I ran into an issue while sealing it today. Turns out the clear coat works great for painted wood... but not so great for rub on decals. The decals bubbled all over, hundreds of tiny bubbles, and a couple of them bubbled pretty badly, with the edges peeling up. While the sealant was still wet I rubbed the curling edges back down and that seemed to hold OK (although you can see my finger prints if you look closely), but the big bubbles I left alone. I am going to pretend that I meant to do that cool 3D Look all along.
Spaces changed the way they do pictures now, so I would have to either upload them one at a time to this blog entry, or I could upload them all at once to an album. Spaces folks must have figured that we'd only want to insert ONE picture per entry (grrr). So.... check out the cuteness at the Colleen's Desk album!
Love, Jen
PS I had to rearrange her room somewhat to accomodate the desk, I took pictures of the changes best I could. Wesley is still doing his "I'm running around in nothing but what I was born wearing" thing (it's growing tiresome), so I couldn't take a picture of the whole room, he kept running into the shots and I've got blurry Wesley butt in all of the whole room shots. (Lord help me)
PPS STUPID FLIPPING SPACES CHANGES! I can't for the life of me figure out how to make the pictures of Colleen's Desk go into the album folder called Colleen's Desk. So they're in a folder called Blog Images or some crap like that. grrrrr 12月15日 Kids!I wouldn't be who I am, or where I'm at, today without my kids. At the moment I am not sure if that would be such a bad thing. ARG! I am upset with them!
Last Valentine's day I had their portraits made with them dressed up as cupids. I loved how the photos turned out and I spent hours upon hours making one of the most beautiful scrapbooks using just those pictures.
Colleen just brought me a somewhat crumpled piece of paper and asked me "Don't I look so pretty?" I was a little distracted at the time and barely glanced over before saying "Yes, you are beautiful". I thought it was one of her drawings... Nope. A page from the scrapbook. The scrapbook was on the dining room table, under two small boxes of fragile items, which they knocked over to get to the scrapbook, and then it looks like they tried to pull the plastic page protector out (the top hole is stretched out) and when that didn't work they figured out how to pull the page out of the protector.
I'm so angry I have heart burn! I feel like I can't have any nice things because all they will do is mess it up somehow. Britney Spears says her life feels like Groundhog Day... I don't feel sorry for her! At least she has people that clean up after her kids! I clean up a mess, go on to clean up the next mess, just to come back and clean up the first mess again.
I need a hug. And maybe a full time nanny. 12月14日 It snowed!Pictures in a new album on my space.
I have lots more pictures, if I know you in real life and you want to see the rest, send me an email and I will send you the link.
Love, Jen 12月13日 Holy CowJust got back from shipping the Christmas presents. The line at the post office was pretty bad, but the kids were good during the wait.
There was no line at the Pony shipping place (I had to UPS my parent's box, too big for the post office).
I shipped 11 packages (3 of them manilia envelopes) for a total of $96.92. Say it with me folks... GOOD LORD!
Merry Christmas!
Love, Jen Desk UpdateI've been hard at work on the desk. Since Colleen was with me when I got it, and I was running out of time to pick her up at school, I decided to just leave it out instead of trying to drag it back to the garage with just the primer on it.
She is excited about the desk, I told her it is my Christmas present to her. She has the drawers all planned out. One for her make up (Hah! What makeup?!), one for my make up, one for crayons and paper and one for markers and paper.
I have the first coat of paint on it, except for the top. I am still debating over what color the top should be. I just took some pictures but just realized I forgot to take some of the drawers. I can't put the drawers in yet, I think the paint is not dry enough yet. With any luck, I will finish the desk tomorrow. Yippee!
Love, Jen
  12月12日 Holding myself accountableColleen's big Christmas gift this year is a computer (a hand-me-down, my old PC). I found a $15 desk on CraigsList that fit the bill perfectly, on the small side, a couple of drawers, and finish in bad shape. The finish had to be in bad shape because I intended to paint it and if the finish was good I'd have a hard time justifying painting it.
After procrastinating for over a month, I have finally gotten started on the desk. It is a lot of work, but it is going quickly so far. I've taken the drawers out, removed the handles, used Goo Gone and a straight razor to scrape off the stickers, cleaned off the Goo Gone, sanded the rest of the finish so that the primer would adhere, used the tack cloth on it, and primed it.
The primer I am using is a quick dry. I have two and a half hours before it is time to pick Colleen up from school. I am hoping it is enough time to get the first coat of paint on it.
I am writing this blog to hold myself accountable for finishing this project. I am going to use at least two coats of paint, maybe 3. Then I got these fairy and flowers glitter rub ons that I am considering using because I can't pretty things for the life of me. After all of that I will seal it. I've not decided yet if I will keep the original handles or try to find some new ones. I figure the answer will become clear the further along the desk gets.
I will post some "before" pictures of the desk. I think I have figured out how to get photos to add to a blog entry. If there are no photos here, check my albums. I will also post "after" pictures when I am finished.
Love, Jen
  Overheard in the computer roomShawn, speaking to one of his WoW guildmates:
"Nothing's dropped for me today. Not my gloves, not my pants - "
Since my mind resides in the gutter, I burst out laughing and that was all I heard. He meant that they've killed lots of bosses and the loot that they get for killing the bosses hasn't been anything he was hoping for. But still... to overhear your husband telling someone on the internet that his pants hadn't dropped today... that just tickles my funny bone. 12月6日 MemoriesThis morning after the kids got their stockings from St. Nick, Wesley gathered up all the candy canes and put them in his doll stroller, put on Shawn's light up Santa-Hat-With-Goofy-Ears, then pushed the stroller around the house bellowing "Ho, Ho, Ho!" and handing out the candy canes to Shawn, Colleen, and I as if he were Santa Claus.
Shawn doesn't want to forget how Wesley was dancing in circles, spinning around and around, till he fell down from dizziness (I missed it - was at the grocery store getting doughnuts and cookies for the Thock Party).
Last night at dinner, Colleen told us that a little boy named Mitchell in her Kindergarten class was kicking her in the legs, but that it was OK because it didn't hurt. Why does he kick her in the legs? Well, he only does it when she goes up to him, batts her eyelashes, and says in her sweetest sing-song voice "I love you, Mitchell". I'm pretty sure she is only doing it to get the attention of him chasing her and kicking her, but still... I thought I had a few years before I had to figure this one out!
Pickles! Not a single picture from this morning turned out decent. Guess I had better read the manual for that camera, huh?
Love, Jen
12月4日 Catch it like the fluThis short article is interesting and confirms what I have felt to be true all along: Your happiness helps make me happy.
Since high school I've been told by a handful of people that I am "too happy". One even wrote in my yearbook that she hoped I had a miserable life because no one deserves to be as happy as me. I took it as a joke at the time, flattered that she thought I was a happy person. Now I just hope that she has had a wonderful life because everyone deserves happiness.
As I have gotten older I have tried to mitigate my happiness, feeling perhaps that expressing it fully would be rubbing it in or showing off to those who aren't as happy as I am, which would only make them feel worse. This article turned an idea light bulb on over my head. I'm not dimming my happiness any more. Will it annoy some people? I'm sure it will. I know I've annoyed every single person that has told me I am too happy over the years. It may even make someone feeling bad feel worse out of envy or resentment. Frankly, the potential to increase the happiness of a friend of a friend means more to me than the possible downsides and reading that my happiness gives my immediate friends a 25% increased chance of feeling happy themselves makes it worth it to me.
Things I am happy about today:
Colleen wearing her "rock star" outfit to school today. It looks adorable on her!
Wesley wearing pants most of the day and not having an accident yet (knock on wood)
Remembering to start the Crock Pot Chili
Getting 3 loads of laundry done
Finally cleaning the roasting pan from the Turkey (yeah, it's gross that I left it that long, but it's done now and I feel so much better for it!)
Figuring out the best way to wrap a styrofoam ball with ribbon for a uniform look (and it only took 3 tries!)
Shawn telling me my hair looked pretty yesterday
And most of all: Lauren getting her first real Christmas Tree!
Let's see if we can spread the happiness around more... leave me a comment with why you are happy today!
Love, Jen Christmas Ornament PicturesI couldn't get the ornaments from www.theornamentgirl.com out of my head, so I decided to try my hand at something similiar. I found instructions for how to make a "quilted" ornament online, but I was intimidated by them. So instead I covered mine with ribbon and embellished them.
I'm still not used to this new camera and I am seriously considering having our old Olympus fixed (again, for the same issue as last time!) because I was used to it and I could get better pictures out of it. The ornaments are much nicer in person, and I apologize for the blurry pics, but this will at least give you an idea of what I have been up to the past two days.
Love, Jen
PS Stupid new spaces update put my pictures in a new album instead of in this entry. You'll have to check out the album (if you can get to it!) Sorry! 12月2日 Range of EmotionsI'm over being angry at coupon cheaters, then I moved on to dazed, and then happy when I was out at Target getting my Thock Party present, and now I am kind of sad.
I sat down to fill out the application for Wesley to go to preschool through our public school district. They usually only take 4 year olds into the "Ready Start" program (which is for kids who do not qualify for the Head Start program because they don't meet financial or disability requirements). However, Colleen's teacher said that Wes really ought to be in school (Wes is ready, more ready than many of the kindergarteners in Coco's class IMHO) and her teacher said that he would nominate (I think that was the word he used) Wesley to get into the program early.
The application is the same for both Head Start and Ready Start and some of the questions just break my heart. For example:
We are homeless. (This means your family is staying in a car, park, campground or hotel, emergency shelter, or transitional housing or your family is living with another family temporarily): No Yes Do you have any special concerns for your child? No Yes, please check all that apply Behavior Speech or Hearing Dental Health Physical Impairment Learn English Vision Playing with Others Physical Health Learning Difficulties Do you have any special concerns for your family? No Yes, please check all that apply Homeless Health Issues Learning Difficulties Teen Parent Job Food Legal Issues Dental Issues Drug/Alcohol Issues Family Violence Learn English Housing Transportation Military Deployment Immigration __________There are also lots of questions about what kinds of government assistance your family receives with instructions to provide case numbers and the like. I am often able to sincerely say that I am lucky and that our family enjoys a very blessed situation, but it's times like this, when I get to check "No" on all those heartbreaking questions that the point is really driven home.
I'm a very very lucky girl indeed. I love my life and I wouldn't trade it for the world.
Love, Jen 12月1日 All fired upSo I'm ordering dinner on Pizza Hut's website and the meal deal for the pasta and pizza combo is not listed any more. Bummer, right? So I decide to search the coupon websites to see if the promo code is still out in cyberspace somewhere so that I can enter it and see if it will still work. I come across a coupon website where people can write in their own coupons and codes and several of the posts were "shopping tips" that were outright stealing!
One said that Pizza Hut employees don't know their own coupons and that she always just calls in her order and says she has a coupon for a couple dollars less than the regular price and that they always just take her word for it and give her the discount, no questions asked.
Another said that she takes advantage of the 20% off your first time online order by creating a new account with a bogus email address every time. A person commented on this one to the effect that this is not being thrifty it is being CHEAP and at least 5 other people made fun of the person calling them on their behavior, and excusing their own unethical actions by saying that maybe the people taking advantage really needed the money off, etc. BULLSHIT! If you need a couple bucks off a Pizza Hut pizza so badly that you are willing to lie for it, then maybe you need to either buy a cheaper pizza (Little Ceasar's or Cici's, perhaps?) or maybe you need to not be eating out at all. I'd rather eat Mac n Cheese than steal!
I am furious right now. No wonder Pizza Hut has been taking their coupons off their website. If people were stealing from me I'd take my coupons down too.
Assholes ought to be kicked out of society.
PS: I paid full price for our Chicken Alfredo Pasta and our Medium One Topping Pizza and it's going to taste damn good knowing that I didn't CHEAT to EAT. grrr Sunday NightMost. Original. Blog. Title. Ever! LOL
Today was a lot of fun, but also a lazy day for me. I didn't do a thing productive and although I feel a tad guilty, mostly I just feel like it is OK to have a non-productive day once in a while.
Shawn let me sleep in this morning, he got up with the kids at 8 and didn't come wake me up till about 11:00 and I didn't get out of bed till about 11:40 (when Wes came in and started horse playing on the bed). It was very nice of him to let me sleep in, I was up very late last night organizing my big plastic bin of pictures.
(Backstory: I've not had my OCD medicine for about a week now, long story short our insurance switched website providers and I couldn't reorder till I got a security passcode to create my account on the new website which took an unacceptable TWO weeks! I've been doing OK, but I can feel my grip on myself loosening and organizing the pictures is an example of it. I don't have the time or inclination to put the photos in albums or scrapbooks right now and there was no reason for me to spend 6+ hours last night sorting hundreds and hundreds of photos into categories and making each category (and subcategories!) their own bags to keep them organized till I am ready to do something with them. Now the lid won't close on my plastic bin that I keep them in and it is all in the middle of the computer room floor where Wesley is sure to get into them and undo all of my work. I *knew* when I started the project that it wasn't a good use of time and I kept telling myself throughout that I should stop and put it away, but I couldn't help myself. And now I suppose I am glad that it is done, and maybe I will start putting them in albums one category at a time or something, I don't know. Oh well, what is done is done, right?)
Anyways... back to today...
After getting out of bed I took a quick shower and then we took the kids out for a "date". We had lunch at a mexican restaurant (and Wesley ate! For like the 3rd meal in a row! Perhaps his not-eating phase is coming to an end?). We stopped at PetSmart to kill time, Colleen fell in love with the Guinea Pigs. Then we went and saw the movie Bolt. I fell asleep in the beginning, but I didn't miss much. It was a pretty cute movie. The kids behaved VERY well, minimal fidgeting and the movie held their attention almost the entire time. There were quite a few times when the adults were laughing and the kids had no idea why. One of those times the little boy behind me asked in a very loud voice "What is so funny?" and that made all of us adults laugh even harder. Afterwards we stopped at 7-11 and got slushies, then I realized how late it was (I had Demery's Body Shop party to get to!) so we stopped at McDonalds to pick up dinner on the way home.
After quickly scarfing down my hamburger and some fries I got the kids settled in with a dvd (today was movie day for our kids, I guess!) and I was off for the party. I had one doozy of a headache and I was having a hard time concentrating because of it, but I had a very nice time and I got to meet Demery's family (yay!). I just emailed a friend and said that I came home smelling like a victim of a perfume factory explosion, I am tickled to death by my own cleverness at coming up with that description. Everything smelled so good that I was having trouble choosing which scent I wanted to get, so I kept putting more and more on to try to help me decide. I think Shawn could smell me before I was even in the front door! I got lost on the way home and naturally my cell phone was dead and my charger was not in the car. I was up in Snohomish (sp?) county and the exit I took was for another highway-type road (I can't remember which exit it was now). Somehow I found Woodinville-Snohomish Road and I figured if I stayed on it long enough it would lead to Woodinville and I could find my way home from there, and eventually I did!
We had left over Thanksgiving food for dinner last night and I saw when I got home after the party that I forgot to pack the turkey back away after dinner last night. BUMMER! So cross with myself! I left it out after packing everything else away because I wanted to cut it all off the bones and store it in a different container (instead of having the entire breast on a syran-wrapped plate). ARG! What a waste!
Where did the time go? All of a sudden it is a quarter past midnight. I need to go to bed soon, tomorrow is a school day and even though I don't have school, I still have to be bright-eyed and busy-tailed to get Colleen ready and over there in time. She loves school and she is starting to make friends. Well, actually, she is starting to invite classmates over to the house to play! She still talks about her best friend from North Carolina every day (Megan), but at least she is also starting to talk about Tommy, Twila, JayJay, Kyle, Sage, Erin, and Erica as well. Tommy, Twila, and JayJay are the ones that she speaks of the most.
Hope everyone had a fun and relaxing Thanksgiving break. Love, Jen |
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