Crabby & Uninspired

I'm tired.

I have no energy.

It's rainy.

I injured my toe and it still hurts to wear any shoes except tennis shoes.

I have a ton to do today at work and home.

I have to go on work-related errands in the rain.

We have to take the boys to swimming lessons and miss our favorite shows tonight.

I am crabby.

Blah.

“Small” Living

So, I was reading this article http://realestate.msn.com/buying/Article2.aspx?cp-documentid=6803386&GT1=35000 online this morning, and I found it interesting, because we are one of those families of 4 living in a 1,000 sq. foot home. It is a house, not an apartment, but there are times I’ve definitely felt like even an apartment these days would be bigger than our house. I like to read about what others do in a small space for storage and organization because this is something I really struggle with. What to do with everything when there just isn’t anymore space. (and I feel like I’m constantly getting rid of stuff too, but apparently not enough).

Another thing I find interesting in this article is that they mention that the reason most people choose to live in a small house or apartment is because it’s worth it to be in a good neighborhood, or near a good school, or close to transportation, close to things etc. So, I guess they are focusing on small living in a city or suburban type setting. We are the opposite. We are living in a small house because we wanted land, and to GET AWAY FROM neighborhoods, stores, traffic, etc. lol And as a bonus, we have cheaper monthly house payments too than most people. Sure, it can be annoying sometimes having all of the kids’ activities be 20 minutes away, or suddenly running out of milk and having to decide which is worse, driving in to get some milk or listen to your milk-loving 3-yr-old ask a million times for milk when there is none. But overall we really enjoy where we are.

I love our setting, being on 10 wooded acres is just awesome. I wish we had a little more room in the house, but I would not want to live in a city to get that. (And we are pretty good at "making do" in many areas of our lives).

I love it that our boys can go outside to play and have a lot of room to run around and explore, without worrying about neighbors or busy streets.
I love it that I don’t have to worry about nosy neighbors or other people’s kids in my yard/on the street/etc.
I love it that we see more deer and birds and frogs and turtles than we do cars or streetlights.
I love it that if we’re in the mood to play in the creek or walk on a trail, we can just go in our yard, walk on our trail through our woods to our part of the creek.
I love it that we can have bonfires, roast hotdogs, make smores, sit around the fire and drink beer, or whatever else we want in our own yard.

Well, I could go on and on, but you get the point. I do have complaints about our house itself, but I love our setting. Anyone else out there live in a small house like us, or am I the only cramped one? lol Would love to hear any tips on organization and storage for small living if you have any.

Can it be?!

Wow, 5 weeks from today will be Brendan's last day of school already! Can that be?! Seems like the school year just started. Then just a little over 4 weeks after that is our vacation! Yikes! I'm excited for the vacation, but this is a vacation that I will pretty much be in a swimsuit 24/7, due to the indoor and outdoor water parks at our resort. Now, I know I am now back to a healthy weight for my height, but man do I have some toning to do before I will feel good in a swimsuit again. I better get busy, that time will fly, I know! So, keep on me about getting my body toned back up, or I will be depressed on my vacation if I don't look fabulous in a swimsuit. LOL (Okay, so I know I won't look fabulous, but even "good" would work okay I suppose.)

Crazy Hair Fun

So, after the boys had their baths and got jammies on Sunday night, we somehow got into a crazy hair night. The boys had fun with us putting their wet hair into various crazy styles. They were giggling and I got out the camera :)

Adam sporting the "fauxhawk"

Brendan ready for the Whoville council

It's Back

Yes, it's that time again, swimming lessons are back. Both boys started back up Tuesday night.

Brendan is in level 3 again, we thought he could use the review since it's been several months since he's been swimming.

Adam is just starting on his own in Level 1. He took a parent-child class last summer, but now he is old enough to start Level 1. (he's the one the instructor is helping in the pic).

Lessons were almost over and they suddenly blew the whistle really loud and had everyone get out fast. Turns out some kid had puked in the pool. So, they had to end early. But it is a GOOD thing that happened, because as soon as we walked into the family changing room and into the stall, Brendan threw up too! Thank goodness there was a toilet right there and he made it in it. So, I guess he caught what Adam had Sunday. And since another kid threw up in the pool, I'm assuming this must be going around.

But, now both boys are fine, they both feel better, and both went back to school today. We have swimming lessons again tonight...hopefully they will be less eventful this time!

I also got Brendan signed up for most of his summer camps yesterday. Over $700, ouch! And that doesn't include Boy Scout camp or Campfire USA camp yet either. Or our family vacation in June. Yikes!

Happy 92nd Birthday!

Is it really April 1st? Wow! No April Fools pranks from me, so no worries there. Adam has actually been sick the last couple days :( He threw up Sunday night, and I had a migraine so I wasn't feeling well either and stayed home with him. He seemed to be completely better, but then last night he had other issues, I'll spare the details. So, Joe is staying home w/ him for part of today, and then I will have to take off a little early and go take over so he can go into work for a little while too.

That aside, we've actually been pretty good. I cannot tell you how NICE it was last week to not have all of Brendan's activities every night of the week. This week, however, swimming lessons start up again for both boys, and Brendan has a scout meeting. Still not too bad, at least a couple of the other activities have ended.

Mario & Luigi (the kittens) are doing fine, they really can't be called "kittens" anymore, they are getting too big.

Last night, we got together at my sister's house with her family, my dad & his wife, and my grandma (we call her Granny) for cake & ice cream. Granny is turning 92 yrs old this Saturday, April 5th. HAPPY BIRTHDAY GRANNY!!!!

Pictured from L to R: Joe, Me, Granny, Jill (my sis), and Tim (her hubby)

Granny with great-grandsons

Our Easter Weekend

Hope everyone had a nice Easter weekend. We did. Brendan was off school Friday, so he and I went to a yard sale that morning and we got a few shirts for the boys, a Dr. Seuss book, and there was this Spiderman electric guitar that Brendan wanted really bad, so we got that too. Both boys are into Rock n' Roll already. lol "Old Time Rock 'n Roll" is both of their favorite song, and they always ask me to play that song numerous times every time we are in the car. Anyway, both boys had fun "rockin' out" on the guitar...

Friday night we met up with my sister and one of her sons at a nearby indoor family play center. The boys all had fun. Then on Saturday Brendan had his last basketball game of the season, and my mom and her boyfriend drove about 2 hours to come see him play. After the game the coaches took the team out for pizza. That night we watched Enchanted, since we had missed doing our family pizza and movie night that we usually do on Friday nights. I thought the movie was pretty good, even though I'm not into girly fairytale type stuff in general. The boys seemed to enjoy it too, although they let out with the occassional "EWWWWW" on any kissy or love parts. lol Oh, we also made some Easter cupcakes, that turned out really cute, I think, but they were not a big hit with the grown-ups. I wish I would have thought to make these earlier in the week for Adam to take to preschool, the kids would have loved them...

Easter Sunday we did our little egg/candy hunt for the boys and they got their Easter baskets of goodies.

And I remembered to have Joe take a picture of me and the boys. Since I am usually the one taking all the pictures, I rarely appear in them, but once in a great while we remember to include me...

Later in the afternoon we went to visit Joe's side of the family at a get-together at his sister's house. They did a candy egg hunt for the boys there too, so the boys are overloaded on sugar for sure. Joe's brother & his wife brought our newest nephew, William, by too, so we got to see him again. Brendan and Adam love that baby, especially Adam. Adam is always mentioning his "new baby cousin" and he was so excited to see him. Both boys got to hold him too.

It snowed while we were there too...SNOW, on Easter, now that was a strange feeling. There were huge fluffy flakes coming down hard- almost looked like a blizzard at times.

Now it's Monday again. Brendan is off school again today, it is his last day of Spring Break. So, we are home cleaning. He even picked up in his room a little, while I worked on the living room, which has been overrun with toys again.

It's hard to believe that March is almost over! April is right around the corner. Next week swimming lessons start back up and we have to register Brendan up for his summer daycamps already. Time just flies by, whether you're having fun or not!

Happy Easter!

ALL I NEED TO KNOW ABOUT LIFE I LEARNED FROM THE EASTER BUNNY

Don't put all of your eggs in one basket

Walk softly and carry a big carrot

Everyone needs a friend who is all ears

There's no such thing as too much candy

All work and no play can make you a basket case

A cute little tail attracts a lot of attention

Everyone is entitled to a bad hare day

Let happy thoughts multiply like rabbits

Some body parts should be floppy

Keep your paws off other people's jellybeans

Good things come in small sugarcoated packages

The grass is always greener in someone else's basket

An Easter bonnet can tame even the wildest hare

To show your true colors you have to come out of your shell

The best things in life are still sweet and gooey.

-author unknown

HAPPY EASTER!!!

Horton, Possum, Spring Break & Easter

Thanks for the happy birthday comments! My birthday itself was fine, the movie was pretty cute. The weekend did not go as I had pictured and hoped, but oh well, it usually doesn't. Life goes on.

Oh, and look what Joe found living under our canoe...

Ewwww, possums are just the ugliest things. It was not happy w/ Joe either, he was hissing and showing his teeth. This one must think he's our pet though, we catch him up on our porch eating the cat food all the time. Guess he had it made...a nice place under the shelter of the canoe, and food served 24/7 on the porch.

This week is Brendan's spring break. He had to go to school yesterday and today for snow make up days, but he's off Wed, Thurs, Fri and next Monday. The problem is neither Joe or I have enough time to take off the whole time with him, especially since we will be going on a week long vacation in June. So, he will get to go to work with Joe on Wednesday (at least for part of the day), and to work with me on Thursday. Then I will take off with him Fri & Mon. Saturday will be the last basketball game, and Sunday we're going to Joe's sister's house to celebrate Easter. I'm thinking we should try to take the boys to the Zoo this weekend too, get it in before it gets hot and crowded over the summer. Not sure if we will or not.

Brendan has become burnt out on Tae Kwon Do, so we did not sign him up for the new session that starts tonight. He had gotten to the point where he was begging not to go the last few weeks. Between basketball practices & games, Tae Kwon Do twice a week, and all the Cub Scout meetings & activities, I have become burnt out on taking him places almost every night of the week too. So, now that basketball is ending and he's taking a break from Tae Kwon Do, things should be a little less hectic for a couple weeks. Whew! But, not for long, swimming lessons for both boys starts up again the first week of April, and that will be 2 nights a week, and we still have scouts. But at least I'll get a few of my evenings back temporarily.

Happy Birthday to Me :)

Today is my birthday :) The agenda is work, then off to see Horton Hears a Who with the family, then to the Chinese buffet, and hopefully lots of productive work around the house over the weekend. Everyone go out and have a drink to celebrate...there's your excuse :)

How Many of Me?

This is kinda interesting. You can type in your name and it tells you how many others there are in the US with your name. It appears I am probably the only one with my first & last name combination. However, there are 159,401 people in the U.S. with my first name.

HowManyOfMe.com

There are 0 people with my name in the U.S.A. How many have your name?

Almost birthday time...

We had fun at the comedy show last Friday. The comedians were pretty good. Eric O'Shea had us laughing so hard in the first 5 minutes of his part of the show that we could hardly breathe and my stomach muscles hurt from laughing. Luckily his whole act wasn't *that* funny so I did get a chance to breathe and drink my beer. Don't get me wrong, he was funny the whole time, just not as intensely funny throughout. He gave us a few breaks to breathe here and there.
And of course, we were seated at the front and center of the stage, thank goodness neither of the comedians that night picked on the front row people like some do.

The rest of the weekend went fine. We survived the basketball game, Pinewood Derby and school carnival. This was Brendan's first Pinewood Derby, we learned a lot. We will do better next year. lol At the school carnival we won an unlimited ride one-day ticket to an indoor family fun center that is located about an hour or so from our house, so that will be a fun little day trip some day soon.

This week I am gearing up for turning 32. My birthday is Friday (the 14th). Usually I am super excited about my birthday, this year I just don't have that excited anticipation anymore. Haven't decided what all I want to do yet. I'm leaning towards just having all of us go see Horton Hears a Who as a family, and maybe go eat at the Chinese buffet or something easy like that. The boys are still young enough that it makes doing anything a potential disaster if they do not behave. So, I figure as kid-friendly as possible will save me some stress over if they are being noisy or annoying to other people. Plus, I have to admit I have a soft spot for certain Dr. Seuss books, Horton Hears a Who being one of them. I have fond memories of my mom reading them to me over and over when I was a kid. Sometimes she would get so tickled over parts of the stories (in particular in the Grinch, the line "and he puzzled and puzzled til his puzzler was sore" would get her tickled frequently). So, even though it is a kid movie, I wouldn't mind us seeing it as a family for my b-day.

Then over my birthday weekend I'm hoping that Joe will be my handy man and work on some things *I* want done around the house. They always seem to take a backseat to his woodcutting and truck & chainsaw fixing (and cartoon watching and Bookworm Adventures playing, and book reading, etc). heehee.

I was supposed to be going to someone's house for a Bunco night on Saturday, but it got canceled because she couldn't get enough players. I've never played Bunco before, but I have been wanting to learn and thought it would be fun to get together with some ladies once a month, but oh well.

Except for Brendan's basketball game on Saturday morning, we don't have any other obligations of places we have to be, so I'm hoping for a productive weekend at home...and a clean house (hint, hint if you're reading Joe! lol)

If I don't make it back online before then, hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

Friday Fun!

It's finally Friday! Things have been crazy this week, and will be crazy today, but I'm really looking forward to tonight. We are dropping the boys off at a local gymnastics place where they have a 4-hour drop-off time and the kids get to play in the foam pit, the big in-floor trampoline, and other equipment. They play games, do obstacle courses, free play, and have a ton of fun. Meanwhile, Joe and I get to GO OUT without children! Woohoo! We are going to grab something to eat and then head out to a comedy show at the local comedy club. In a way this is my birthday celebration too, even though my actual birthday is not until next Friday. But, we had to take the child care opportunity when we could get it. I have been completely frazzled, stressed out and in a horrible bitchy mood lately, so a few laughs and a few drinks tonight are just what I need!

Unfortunately the rest of the weekend will be back to busy obligations, rushing from basketball game to den meeting and pinewood derby to school carvinal, and so on. All kinda fun things I guess, but too many all at once when I'm already frazzled.

But tonight...that I am really looking forward to :)

Warm Weekend!

It's WARM!!! After so cold for so long, this weekend has been in the upper 60's/low 70's!!! What a great feeling it is to walk outside and not have a gust of bitter cold wind freeze my skin! I hear it is supposed to snow again tomorrow though, ugh! I wish it would just make up its mind.

Well, I'm happy to announce that Adam is FINALLY potty trained! I think I can safely say that now. He's been wearing "big boy" underwear for over 3 weeks now, but I was afraid to say anything just in case. But, he has been doing great for those 3 weeks, so I'm declaring him officially potty trained. Since he is my youngest, that means we are forever diaper-free now! WOOHOO!!!

This weekend we actually didn't have anywhere we *had* to be. I did a lot of cleaning and laundry yesterday. Joe bought a new chainsaw. He has 2 old ones that were hand-me-downs, but every time he's going to cut wood, he ends up spending 1/2 the day trying to fix the latest problem and get one of the chainsaws to function. It is a horrible waste of time and effort. He has milked those 2 chainsaws for all they are worth for a very long time. He finally just went and bought a new one, and he is very happy that he can just cut wood and not have it be a huge ordeal. Joe and Brendan also worked on the pinewood derby car a little too.

Today I went into work for a little while, to try to catch up with some things in my office. The rest of the day will be spent cleaning more, helping Brendan with his book reports, and spending time outside while it is warm!

Hope everyone is having a wonderful weekend. I'll close with a pic I took of Adam chilling out in his jammies on the couch this morning watching cartoons with daddy and one of the cats.

Weekend Movie, Dancing and Snow

We had a pretty good weekend. On Friday night I went to see Definitely, Maybe with a friend from the moms' group, Lisa. It was our monthly Mom's Night Out, but only Lisa and I made it this month. The movie was cute.

Saturday we went to a wedding & reception for one of Joe's co-workers. We brought the boys to both, which was risky, but turned out okay. They were not perfectly behaved, but they could have been a lot worse. The boys had fun dancing...

And they liked to literally spin Mommy around on the dance floor too, haha...

The little girl in the picture above tried to dance with Adam a couple times, (Adam is behind me so you can't see him in this pic) but he was totally oblivious (or maybe he was just ignoring her, who knows. lol)

Brendan was quite the little dancing machine. He danced to a lot of songs, and was doing all sorts of footwork stuff that I've never seen him do before. At home he is really silly and does this little "butt dance" thing, and a song came on that would have been perfect for his butt dance, but he wouldn't do it. I can't get him to stop doing it at home, but at the reception he wouldn't even do it once. Go figure.

Sunday morning we woke up to a little more snow! The boys (with daddy's help) made a cute little snowman shortly before the snow melted...

And that, in a nutshell, was our weekend.

Our Newest Nephew!

Our new little nephew was born last night (well, officially I guess this morning) at 3 minutes after midnight. He almost made it as a Valentine's baby, but just a few minutes too late. They named him William Aloysius, and he was 8 lbs 10 oz. After nearly 2 hours of pushing with no success, they tried the vacuum, but no luck, so she ended up having a c-section. We were there at the hospital from 7:45pm until 1:45am, but we did finally get to see our new little nephew. Our boys were excited waiting to see their new cousin, but they didn't quite make it...they fell asleep in the waiting room before he was born. We thought she might go faster than that since this is her 3rd kid (she also has a 15 yr old boy and an 11 yr old boy) and she went fast with the first two, so we were afraid to leave to take the boys to my dad's house nearby (and we live 2 hours away, so there was no way to take the boys home to our house). We did eventually go to my dad's house to sleep for a few hours after it was all over, and then drove back home this morning.



Here's the pic I took of our new nephew around 1:00am this morning, when he was almost an hour old...

Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy Valentines Day to you all!

We actually had our Valentine's celebration last night, since today is a busy day and evening. Joe stopped by my office yesterday afternoon with some of THIS yumminess, and these tulilps...

Then, thanks to Deanna watching our kids for us, we were able to go out for a little while. We started at our favorite place for hot wings and beer, and got there in time for the happy hour specials (bonus!). And then we went to a movie. I was kinda wanting to see Untraceable, (I like thriller/on-the-edge-of-your-seat type movies), but we were a little too late for it, and Joe had heard that Juno was good, so we saw that instead. I was leary of it, I thought it was going to be too much of a "teen movie", but it wasn't. I was pleasantly surprised. We had a nice time, and a much needed little break. THANKS AGAIN DEANNA!

Today both boys have their Valentine parties at school. Then, as soon as we get home we are booking it to the hospital (about 2 hours away) to see our new niece or nephew! Yes, they are having that baby TODAY!!!! A Valentine baby :) I'm so excited for them, and I can't wait to find out if it's a boy or a girl and see him/her.

Hope everyone has a wonderful Valentine's Day today!

What We've Been Up To

Catching back up a little here...on Feb 1st Brendan had the Blue & Gold Banquet for Cub Scouts, where he was awarded his Tiger Cub badge and some beads for his electives.






He's also been having basketball games every Saturday morning, basketball practice every Monday night, Tae Kwon Do on Tuesdays & Thursdays, and Cub Scout den meetings twice per month.



On Thursday evening we had a parent-teacher conference. He's been acting up again. He's in this phase where he is just really silly. He likes to act silly and try to make his friends laugh. It is becoming a problem at school because he doesn't know when to quit. He's been disruptive and while he's acting silly he is not listening to directions or learning what he needs to. She said that right now he is ahead of the others anyway, and can do the work without hearing/learning how, but she's concerned that if he continues this, then eventually it is going to affect his learning. The gym teacher also came in, and she is worried about his safety and others in gym class. She said he is very disruptive and will do things like roll on the floor and other "silly" behavior. Last year the problem was that he wouldn't participate and would get upset if he couldn't do things just perfect, this year he is participating, just being disruptive. Maybe by 4th or 5th grade he will finally just participate, listen AND act correctly?!



Anyway, on to the kitties. They are growing, that's for sure! Here's the latest picture of them napping on the couch together...almost looks like a heart shape, awwww how cute...


If you've been reading the last couple "Tackle it Tuesday" posts below, you know what else I've been up to...cleaning and organizing the boys' room! (see pics in previous 2 posts of progress).



And guess what we're doing tonight?! We're actually going on a DATE! It's been awhile. One of Joe's co-workers offered to watch the boys for us so that we could go out. The boys are SO excited, they love having babysitters (and it doesn't happen very often). And we are excited to have a few hours out. THANK YOU DEANNA!

Tackle It Tuesday: Putting in Bunk Beds!

Wow, I guess I didn't post all week, because here it is Tackle it Tuesday again already! lol

This week our "tackle" was getting the boys' beds out, and putting in bunk beds! A friend of mine from the local moms group told me her mom was getting rid of some bunk beds that her little brother had had, and she gave them to us! (Thank you Kathleen!!!!)

Bunk beds just make so much sense for their room because it is small and they share a room, and floor space is severely lacking as it is. And the boys LOVE having bunk beds!

This was "before" with the 2 beds in there. (Minus the comforters, they had animal print comforter that I had already thrown in the wash before I took the pic)...

Then under both beds was a TON of stuff! Ugh! Toys and junk everywhere that the boys and I cleaned up before the bunk beds could go in...

Now the "after" with the bunk beds! I still need to get some new sheets and comforters for them though, so this isn't really the finished product. We are turning the room into dinosaur theme now. (It was a jungle theme).

The boys LOVE their new bunk beds!!!...

Tackle it Tuesday: The Boys' Closet

(I'm posting this on Monday night because I don't know if I'll have access

to the internet tomorrow.)

Still waiting on hubby to do some things before the basement progress can continue, so this week's tackle was the boys' closet. As embarrassing as the "before" pics are, I must admit it actually even looked worse in person! Ugh! Anyway, I completely emptied it and now it is the most organized area in the whole house.

BEFORE...

And now AFTER...

One step closer to getting the whole house organized in 2008!