Now that it is almost October, the deadline for payment is looming near. We have to have this cruise paid for by Christmas, and once paid for, we can start to schedule reservations for restaurants and shore excursions. We are halfway there!!!!! In two and a half months, it will be paid for!!!!
In honor of our halfway there payment this week....I made a countdown ticker.....
Vacation Countdown Clock Generator
Pretty soon I will be making a few more Disney themed treats for the kiddos and a couple more fish extender gifts. Caleb is really excited. Jansen is excited, but Caleb talks about it more. I know that once we get on the ship both their little minds will be blown!!! For sure mine will.
Happy Halfway Point!
Time for craftiness. I have been so miserable with my back problems that for the past 6 months at least, I have been unwilling and unable to do much of anything. My house got out of control, the laundry was mounting, I couldn't stand or sit long enough to craft anything...my life was just boring and painful.
After having my nerve block, each day has gotten better and better. Each day I wake up, I feel just that much more like ME! My house is pretty clean and it is time to get back to some crafting...especially in preparation for the best part of the year...THE HOLIDAY SEASON!!!!!
So today, I made a quick new wreath for the front door...
$3.25 total! The dollar store is the BOMB! I got all the supplies there and didn't even need to whip out my glue gun.
I love it. The exposed grapevine is the rustic look I wanted and the colors of the flowers are just perfect for Fall. How easy was this??? You can make one too...just stick a bunch of flowers into the wreath and you are done.
The extra flowers look really cute in my cloche...
And a few artificial pumpkins took the place of the candles on the candlesticks on my bar...
I also filled various containers around the house with leaves, acorns, pine cones, Fall fruit, and mini pumpkins.
I will probably fix up my front porch a little more, but that is the extent of my Fall decor. Christmas is the time to bust out all the decor and go crazy!!!
Cool air...come our way!!!
Oh Fall...I love you. I am sad that I won't see you until November (probably) as our crazy Gulf Coast weather only has three variations: Hot, Hotter, and Center of the Sun Hot.
Every year, I wait for the moment when my internal clock feels differently...when I wake up and FEEL the change inside my head. Today, I felt it.
It was less than 90 degrees today! All day!
There was just the tiniest of Fall smells in the air, it was stunningly gorgeous outside, and there was a soft breeze drifting around my face. This is it, my friends. This is the turning point. Later on, it may still return to 95 degrees, but there is no turning back on Fall.
Last year, I wasn't really feeling it, and why, I will never know. But this year....welcome Fall. I am so happy to see you. Give me a hug!
I got out a few decorations from storage to begin the season....
That is as far as I have gotten, but there shall be more....maybe tomorrow!
Picture it, Richwood...2012....3:06pm (any day...every day....)
My kids are 9 and 7, and are arriving back from their 2 block walk from the school.
Jansen walks in, throws his backpack on the couch, and then takes his shoes and shorts off and leave everything in the living room as he screams, "I have to go to the bathroom!"
Exactly 2 minutes later Caleb comes in yelling, "Tatum, get back. Get back Tatum. Tatum, get back!" He has the door cracked and won't walk in, as the dog sits barking at him, waiting for him to just walk in.
By this time, Jansen has come back into the room as I am yelling for Caleb to just WALK IN! I tell Jansen to put up his shorts and shoes, and reach for his backpack. Caleb throws his backpack on top of Jansen's as I am lifting it off the couch. I yelp, and tell him to hang it on the hook and I will go through his in a minute.
He screams that he has to go to the bathroom. Do our public schools not have bathrooms or something? Where do they think we pee? On the lawn?
Jansen yells at Caleb for running into him coming back out of his room. I walk to the site of the incident and smell a strong urine smell coming from the guest bathroom. I JUST CLEANED THAT BATHROOM! Now I have two boys and for some reason, no matter what I do, it smells like a family of cats have been living in that tiny bathroom for 3 years. Did I mention that I was just on my hands and knees with vinegar and baking soda, followed by a fine mist of bleach all over the toilet, the seat, the floor, the baseboards?
I walk in.....pee all over the seat. I scream, "I JUST CLEANED THIS TOILET! GET A RAG AND THE SPRAY BOTTLE!"
Then all hell breaks loose. Jansen is crying, "I didn't do it, Caleb did it." Caleb is screaming, "I haven't even gone yet!" I am screaming, "I don't care, both of you clean it up!"
I turn to walk out of the bathroom to go back to the backpacks and trip over the shoe that Jansen was supposed to put in his room.
I hear more screaming from the bathroom as Jansen is soaking his brother in lysol as Caleb is actively using the toilet, and then I watch as Caleb turns to yell at him mid-stream and pees all over my shower curtain.
Slowly I turn...and walk out of the bathroom clenching my teeth so hard I am sure a molar will be crushed. Both back packs are still on the couch and I start pulling out crammed papers, half zipped lunch boxes, and packed folders. As I pull each one out and organize everything into piles, Jansen comes back in the room.
"Momma, I am hungry". Every day. Every day! EVERY DAY! Why must my kids eat every day! And why must they announce their hunger to me Every Day?! I say the exact same thing I say EVERY DAY...."Look in the snack bin in the pantry." We have a snack bin that has prepackaged granola, fruit snacks, crackers, goldfish etc that the boys can get into any time they wish.
"Momma, I am thirsty." Again, why must you tell me? Get a drink out of the fridge!
Caleb comes back in, full of anxious energy. "Jansen that was my granola!" Although he has failed to look in the bin to see that there are 14 more in there waiting for him. Jansen and Caleb exchange death glares, followed by some shoves, and I almost shove them both.
"Can you two just spend 2 minutes getting your own things in quiet so I can figure out what all we have to do tonight for homework?"
"He's LOOKING AT ME!"
"Caleb go in the living room, Jansen stay in the kitchen." Caleb whines, "I am thiiiiiiiiiirsty!" "GET YOUR OWN DRINK OUT OF THE FRIDGE!"
I figure out what needs to be done, have everything piles with pencils and erasers ready for the boys to work on this evening and notice Caleb is pouring milk from the jug into a cup that he has in the fridge instead of on the counter. Milk spills all over the inside of the fridge and trickles onto the floor. Less than half of an inch of milk made it into the cup.
"Why? Why would you put the cup in the fridge, balancing on the bunch of grapes to pour the milk?"
"I don't know!"
At this point, I abandon all hope of cleaning anything at all during the day, getting anything organized, or maintaining any semblance of sanity and we are only 8 minutes out of school. I walk into the living room, slump on the couch, and fade out for a whole minute. Jansen comes in.
"Momma, I am hungry. What time is dinner?"
Today is the day! I am finally going to have a nerve block this afternoon for my back. It doesn't work for everyone....But I am hoping to be in the minority that it works for. It doesn't have to be pain free, but I really need to have some kind of relief!
If I am standing at my sink, washing dishes...I can't even make it through one load without having a shooting pain radiating down my back, hips, and legs. It really is a quality of life issue at this point.
We have already determined that if this doesn't help...I am going to try some alternative therapies...chiropractic care, accupuncture, massage.
On the positive side (very tongue in cheek) my mom found out that she has the gene for hereditary arthritis....which explains why she, my grandmother, and all my aunts and uncles, and now me all have crazy messed up backs. Bonus!!!
Here is a quick update on my return to college. Just for grins, let's call it College 2.0 :)
This term, I am taking Medical Terminology and I actually really love it. It is definitely a learning curve trying to remember study habits, note taking, class expectations etc, but I am settling in nicely.
Mid two weeks in to College 2.0, I have taken 2 tests. We have weekly lectures, outlines, reading, and tests over 2 chapters. I couldn't be happier with my first two test grades of 100 and 98. My goal is to get the highest grades possible to make my application into nursing school just a little prettier.
I am honestly a little surprised as to how much studying I have to do for this one class...about 3 hours a day. But, I am a stay at home mom and I have pockets of study time throughout the day. If that is what it takes to make really high grades, then so be it.
Let's keep up the momentum!
PS. The word of the day is: ESOPHAGOGASTRODUODENOSCOPY. Use it in a sentence today, won't you?
My friend, Carmela had a milestone birthday last week, and we celebrated by singing crazy karaoke.
Seriously, who doesn't love to either sing karaoke, or watch others sing it?
Juli and I hosted a little get together at Spotlight Karaoke in Houston over the weekend to help her celebrate her entrance into a brand new decade...a decade I have been in for 2 years, kicking and screaming.
This was a chance for my husband and I to get out and have a fun date as well, so we booked a free night at a hotel in Houston (Thanks Priority Club Reward Points!) and packed up the car with decorations and goodies.
Her theme was candy...and dang it, the club wouldn't let you use tape or hang anything on the walls. I had dreams of having an adorable backdrop in front of a giant candy bar table with banners....um, no. But we still made it cute anyway!
Juli provided the yummy goodies....fruit kabobs, candy, mini quiches. Honestly, I ate a ton of those quiches. Why is bite sized food so extra specially yummy??? She made everyone goody bags packed with candy, which unfortunately, I didn't get any of. I brought two bags home and my husband ate it all. Curses!
I made the decorations and bought the cake from a mutual friend of ours. I made some giant lollipops from plastic plates, dowel rods, and cellophane and also made some giant candies from balloons wrapped in cellophane. Boy how I wanted to link these and hang them across the walls...Double curses.
One of my fave decorations was a giant cupcake pinata. It was so cute, I just couldn't pass it up in Hobby Lobby.
The cake was made by Jenny Wright and was strawberry with cream cheese icing and fondant accents. Trust me...it was so nerve racking to drive an hour in traffic with a cake and then all the little pieces in a separate box. By the time I got to the club and started assembling the cake, I was so relieved that none of the pieces were broken. Delicious!
We also ordered a photobooth for an hour. OMG, hilariousness!!!!!
All in all, a super fun night sharing a birthday with a super special friend. I am glad we were able to host and hope she had a great time celebrating!
