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Monday, May 24, 2010

Thought for the day:

This morning, the city-wide "alarm" went off.

Not the tornado alarm - the fire alarm.

This always sends a small chill through me. It can mean a fire or an accident - just that the trucks are needed.

I recalled something that I had heard a long time ago, that I've passed on to my children: anytime you hear that alarm or pass an ambulance, cross yourself and say a quick prayer for the safety of the people going to help and for those that need the help.

You never know what that prayer may do for that person, at that particular moment in time!!

Saturday, May 22, 2010

End-of-school

Ah, you can tell that it's the end of the school year. The kids are tired of school "stuff" as am I!

It's time to get the pool up, usually we wait until the last day of school - but the forecast predicts 90+ for tomorrow and the next few days, so Hubby and the kids are putting it up today.

I have been having a fun time (honestly, I like a clean house!) getting the house back in order after last semester. We are getting rid of bags and bags of "stuff" for the garage sale, so it feels great to be purging too.

Went to stamp club today - it was great to get out, have some fun and get some new card ideas - all without children....wow, I felt like "me" again!

I made some adorable "pillowcase dresses" for the two little girls yesterday and today - be sure to check Moneyless Momma's next week for instructions AND pictures! Last night I also whipped up 2 pairs of shorts and a pillowcase dress for my cousin's kid's birthday presents. As I was working on all of the dresses, it was sentimental to me -- the material I was using was "scraps" that my mother-in-law had given me before she passed....so each dress has a little "grandma love" in them!

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Mother's Day

Mother's Day this year was a great day. Hubby had taken the two older children to Mass on Saturday night, so the middle girl and I went to Mass ALONE on Sunday morning. Father had a special blessing for all mom's and a coin and medal to give.

Of course, we had purchased the exercise equipment for both Mother's and Father's Day gifts, but Hubby also got me a professional grade Salad Shooter - we received one from his sister for our wedding gift, but a few years back, it died on us. We hadn't replaced it because whenever we would decide that we could afford to, it would be "out of season" and not available - well, no more! I am VERY pleased to have one again - it shreds cheese like a hot knife thru butter and don't even get me started on how quickly I can make homemade hashbrowns now!


Hubby went to his mom's grave with the oldest daughter and added soil (some of the bulbs were showing) and weeded.


I hung out three loads of laundry and on my way back in with them, broke my toe. Yep, I BROKE MY TOE ON MOTHER'S DAY! What a day. No, I did not go in to have it x-ray - it is the "little" toe on my left foot. It hurt like the dickens (and after walking on it all day today for eldest daughter's field trip, it hurts!!), but there is not much that they will do for broken toes that haven't broken the skin. It is, however, a lovely shade of purple.....edging toward black-ish today. :)  Such is my life.


Still waiting on final grades....I am sure that I made the Dean's List, I would just like to know my exact GPA. I am waiting on scholarship information too. Hubby and I have chatted about the possibility of getting an SLR Digital Canon if I do -- wooohooo!

Saturday, May 8, 2010

The closet....

....in OUR bedroom is done, clean....wahooo!! Thank you, Lord for the time off to get this accomplished. This may not sound like anything to some, but this last semester has been pretty hard on the house and lots of things have "gone by the wayside" so-to-speak (seeing as how I am pulling straight A's in two science classes - 4 credits each - it was either let the house go a little or have a breakdown!). Well NO MORE!! My goal for the next 4 weeks is to get this house back in ship-shape order! Why four weeks? Well, my brother and sister-in-law are having a garage sale and that's when it is - so I want all of this stuff gone.

Out of the closet: 2 bags of garbage (and mind you, this is NOT just little Wal-mart grocery bags - these were big, black garbage bags!! One bag of clothes - all mine. One bag of misc. "stuff" - including sheets, covers for chairs and couches, tablecloths (yeah, those of you that know me can laugh at that one) and also a bed-rail to keep kids from falling out of bed and a hand-held shampoo-er (which is moving to the garage - should work great on the vans). Oh, and did I mention that we aren't really flat sheet people? Well, we aren't - don't be shocked, we just love our blankies and the flat (top) sheet gets in the way! Anyway, tell me why I am storing these unnecessarily? NO MORE!! I am shipping them to my mom's house and she will be re-purposing them into winter jammies for the kids (they are flannel sheets - it's all we sleep on, so comfy.)

We ordered out from the "corner bar" last night, as our reward for getting so much accomplished. It was sooo yummy, fried curds, fish fry.....yep, today I'll be working out BIG TIME.....oh oh, I forgot to mention: I stopped in at a friend's house to drop off a few things for her and tried her eliptical and exercise bike and LOVED them - so much that I came home and asked hubby about getting one of each! He was so convinced after seeing how excited I was about them  - and, of course, when we weighed the options (Y membership is over $500 for the family, plus the drive there - "Snap" is $300 a year, plus the drive there, plus day care, etc....) we figured that it was the best choice for us. Last night the Son road the bike for EIGHT MILES!! Good exercise for the whole family - and me, I can ride bike while reading, which was why I was so excited.

Oh yes, so on about Friday: we ordered out - but first we had called Father (I had mistakenly thought that he did rounds at the hospital on fridays) and thought he might want to meet us at Pizza Hut - he had just eaten, so we went to plan number two: the bar.  Around 6:30 though, Father calls and asks for Hubby - they went down for a few hours and a few drinks :) I laugh to think that MY hubby (having been raised baptist) is practically bff with a priest - (maybe a conversion is in the works!). Hubby came home and said he only had to buy one drink and Father had to buy NONE - drinks were all bought for them!! Yes, the niceties of living in a small town.

We have instituted Friday's as Family Pizza and a Movie Night - for about 2-3 weeks now. Since we didn't do it last night, the children are begging for it tonight. I guess that I can live with that! I make my own crusts (or purchase them at the grocery store when they are cheap) and then freeze them - so when rounded out with apples and carrots, this makes a quick and easy supper for me to prepare - not to mention, one that the children adore.

Thursday, May 6, 2010

I have an obsession...

I have an obsession with - well, ok, I am obsessive about more than a few things, but I'll only go into one thing today.....exclamation points!! I use them all of the time - one, two and even three sometimes! It really is insane. I notice this in my online writing and I try to stop to make it NOT look like I'm hopped up on some new drug.

I don't know when this obsession started, only that it is. Problem is, it is extremely annoying - TO ME!! Too much of anything is never good and the same goes for punctuation. You don't know how many times I backspace to take an exclamation off and put a period there instead! Pure insanity.

I know someone who randomly splatters (lol)'s all over the place. I compare this to my exclamation point obsession. Weird, random and overused!

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

Busy week!

Another busy week down - wow!

I currently have only 1 day left of classes - yay!

The children are counting down their days of school as well - but they are more excited for summer, swim lessons and our many little "day-cations" that we have planned!

The new puppy is adapting well - Oreo still is not sure of her, but he seems to be adjusting ok. He is getting more brave and will go near her now for short periods of time. The kids keep trying to tell him she's his wife, but so far, he's not buying it!

Friday night Son and Hubby went to Father Jerome's house to see if he has ever been fishing - he had, but hadn't gotten his new license yet - so they took a walk to the gas station and picked up licenses and then down to the local pond to check it out - they could literally HEAR the fish jumping out of the water!!  Father asked them to meet at 6 a.m. - he had a funeral and then meetings in the afternoon and that would get him some good fishing time.

So, on Saturday morning, all the kiddos got up and went fishing (well, except for baby!) They had a great time, but we kidded that Father must have blessed the worms, because he was the only one who caught any fish! :)  Everyone did have a great time though!

Daughter #3 had a birthday party to go to for a classmate, so we made sure she made it out there and went back to pick her up - in-between times, a good friend and her son came to visit. It was a wonderful time and provided a good break to the "normal!"

Hubby went to The Highgrounds and saw a "Helicopter expo" - they also had many Vietnam planes, vehicles, etc there. We had called his dad the week before (he's a Vietnam Vet), so they met there. Hubby said that it was a fun time and took lots of pictures.

Sunday was another pretty busy day. Father called at 8 and asked if we were coming to 8:30 Mass as normal. I said yes....he was having printer problems and couldn't print his homily (this has happened a couple of times, usually on a Saturday night though!) but, alas, while we were chatting, the printer worked! During his homily, I leaned over and told Hubby that Father should have an iPad so that he could just bring that up to the pulpit instead of the papers - he wouldn't even have to print!! LOL I'm on a mission to win one - we'll see how that goes! :)

In the afternoon, Hubby took the girls to their piano recital. I was unable to go this time, as baby hadn't had a nap in TWO DAYS and was extremely exhausted - so I stayed home so she could have her nap. They did very well and got lots of compliments. While they were gone, Father called and wanted to go fishing - since Hubby wasn't here, he said that he would go down and to send him down when he got home. I invited him over for a fire around suppertime - fires in the pit in the summer are our favorite activity! We made the fish on the tri-pod (which Father LOVED and decided that he needed one for when HE had guests - oh, he loved the fish too!) We did the fish with onions, garlic/onion salt and butter -- YUMMY!!

Anyway - I have delayed posting this for 3 days now because I am only working on it in bits and pieces, so this will have to do, if I ever want to post it!