Busy little bee

So, Miss K's personal library keeps growing. I found a bookshelf at Staples for $15. It fit perfect in her closet. So, Brian put it together last night. I decided to go ahead and get it in her closet and the books on it before we left for the weekend. Here is how it looks...

And here is how it looked 1 minute later...

Oh well. I am sure I am going to spend the rest of my life picking up after her.

Anyway...we are off to spend the weekend with my inlaws. This starts the week of our crazy traveling over the next month. We leave Thursday to drive to Nashville for Easter. Brian drives back on Tuesday and Kennedy and I fly back on Friday. Then we head straight to Brian's parents house again for the weekend. Then we are back in our apartment for 4 days and then back to Nashville for another week while Brian is in a workshop. Speaking of Brian and work....today is the last day that the plant in Spring Hill is operating. It will shut down today and they will start the teardown of the equipment to retool the plant for a new product. I have no idea when the plant will reopen. I think it will be at least a year.

Well...my child is crying. I am sure that she is tired. Doesn't help that she woke up this morning at 4ish. I woke up to her counting...1, 2, 3! She was WIDE awake and ready to play. Mommy. Not so much.

Blog ya later!

Good news and bad news

The good news is...my email is working again and I didn't lose anything. Yeah! The bad news...my cleaning people came LATE today. They usually come about 10:30. So, I scheduled Maxie and Betty Boop grooming appointments. Miss K and I headed to Hobby Lobby. It's a bit of a drive, but this week was a good sale. We get home about 1:45 and the cleaning people never showed up! Bummer! So I called the scheduler and she tells me that they don't guarentee a time, just a day. 2:59pm...5 minutes after I put Miss K down for a nap, they show up. CRUD! I only get the service every other week and I missed the last service becasue K wasn't feeling well and I didn't want to have to leave. So, they are going to try and reschedule for next week. Know what that means? I gotta clean. I have to scrub the toilets, showers and floors. Those are the things I totally dislike doing. I'm bummed. Bummed.

No photos. CF card is still missing in action. I have no idea where it could be. Luckily, I downloaded everything before I "lost" it. Gonna have to find it before we leave for Easter. Or buy a new one. Bummer. More $$ that I don't have.

Blog ya later.

Disaster

My email is gone. All my addresses are gone. All my stuff is GONE. Guess tomorrow Comcast is going to start rebuilding my email. I am bummed. I've lost email addresses of people I don't know how to get in touch with.

$100 Store, Baby Dreams, and Geese VS. Ducks

Do you ever go into the $1 Store to grab a few cheap things and walk out of there with you bank account $20 lighter? I always get suckered in at the $1 Store. Worst than the $1 Store is what I lovingly refer to as the $100 Store AKA Costco. Note to Hollye....you can not grocery shop at Costco for a family of 3! I mean, you can if you don't want to shop again for months. I mean...how long will it take us to eat 96 slices of cheese? I love Costco though. I get 90% of my photo printing done there. I also love their baby wipes. When Miss K was an infant, we used their formula. We love their muffins also. I buy them, we eat on them for a couple of days and then freeze the rest of them. The muffins are huge. Miss K and I share one for breakfast and Brian has one on the way to work in the mornings. One thing you can not beat at Costco is the snack bar. I mean seriously. You can eat there CHEAP. A hot dog and a coke for $1.50. And the hot dog is HUGE. I can't eat it all. Slice of pizza...$1.99. This HUGE chicken ceasar salad that can feed 2 people is $3.29. K and I had lunch there for $5.61 yesterday and we had about 2/3 of a hot dog left and 1/2 a salad. I was going to grab 2 more salads for dinner last night, but the line was long and the kid was grumpy. (My child is in a permnanat state of grumpy.)

So, K has not been sleeping well since oh...Thanksgiving. She wakes up in the middle of the night about 4 times a week and the only way she will go back to sleep is if she is in our bed. For those of you who really know me, you know how I feel about the whole kids sleeping with parents issue. Anyway...apparently she woke up this morning around 4. Brian brought her into our bed. She is dead alseep and all of a sudden it starts.....she's talking. Then she is laughing. The she starts singing. The tune was the ABC's, but she only knows the first 5 letters. I ws trying so hard not to laugh, but it was hard. Five minutes later Brian's alarm went off and she shot up like a rocket. So, our day started early.

Our apartment is situated infront of a pond. Up until last week, it was frozen. Monday afternoon, the ducks showed up. Tuesday the geese showed up. I heard them WAY before I saw them. They show up about 7 and honk so that everyone knows they have arrived. So, K and I have been watching them from our living room window. She screams when she sees them. Yesterday she was sitting on the coffee table while I was reading a book to her. All of a sudden she starts say 'hi' and waving. I notice a mom and her son outside feeding the ducks and geese. Duh....why didn't I think of that? K heard the word 'outside' and she was ready. We grabbed so old hamburger buns and went out to feed the fowl. I tried to engage the other mom in conversation, but she wasn't friendly at all. Oh well. I tried. Anyway...we were feeding the fowl. Well, we tried to feed them all. The geese kept honning in on the duck's territory, so the ducks hardly got anything. I felt bad for them. So, this afternoon the geese had gone and just the 2 ducks were out there. We grabbed our hot dog buns and went to feed them. The dang geese showed back up. Oh well. The ducks did get some, but they were diving for bugs I assumed and one of them came up with a frog in his mouth. K screamed. I was kinda startled. Do ducks eat frogs? He dropped the frog into the water, but picked it up again. I grabbed K and we headed toward the house. Bad frog eating duck.

Okay...no photos because I have LOST my CF card! Gotta find it tonight because we are headed to Canada tomorrow. Just to say we have been there. Plus...I wanna go to Hobby Lobby again! HA!

Blog ya later!

Leotard Lovely

As I mentioned before, Miss K is taking gymnatics. Well, not really gymnastics....we go to the training center and do some little activities. Some of the kids do rolls, but my child just wants to play with the pom poms. We did find the long trampoline today and she was singing "jump jump". That comes from the Jumpin' Judy episode of the Doodlebops. But, she looks really cute in her pink leotard. I took Brian's small camera today to class. Didn't want to carry the Rebel and chase Miss K around because she runs around like crazy when we are there.

It's not a great photo, but I wanted Brian to be able to see the "setting" of the gym. And please note the color of the pom poms in her hands. Those match her cheerleading outfit. Although, I think we are going to have to replace it when football season starts. I think it might be a little too short now.

New Goodies

I love new goodies. Here are a couple of the new things I've gotten in the past couple of days...

I won a gift card at the event on Friday night. It was for a cute little shop across from the scrapbook store. They carry my favorite bags...Vera Bradley. I've been eyeing the new Peacock pattern, so I ended up with this cutie!

We decided to go ahead and update our phones since Brian was having such a hard time getting good reception with his and mine was working fine in the same area. So, my hubby got me this!

Miss K even got some new goodies. In addition to the FOUR pair of shoes that her grandparents bought her while she was visiting, Mommy bought her a new car seat.We bought her a Britax Regent. It is referred to as the "King of all car seats." And let me tell you...this thing is HUGE. She will be using this thing for YEARS! I love it.

I also got a lot of new scrapbook goodies, but if I listed them all this blog entry would be very long. I got alot of the new Heidi Swapp stuff. As soon as Miss K goes down for her nap, I am going to work in the scrapbook/playroom. I need to get the table cleaned off and finally unpack all the boxes and get everything set up so we can start using the room for it's intended purpose. I am going to have to store all my supplies in the closet because Miss K thinks that she is suppose to eat the rubber stamps. Turkey!

Okay..off to clean. No cleaning people this week, so I need to clean the bathrooms and figure out why my child is having a meltdown.

Fabulous Weekend

I had such a wonderful weekend. I took my camera, but I didn't take hardly any photos. That seems to be one of my problems for ANY event that I go to. Oh well. I enjoyed myself.

As always...Jenni Bowlin was FABULOUS. I have been lucky enough to take classes from Jenni a number of times over the past 3 years. Love her and I LOVE her stuff. If you don't know who Jenni is (are you living under a pile of scrapbook supplies?), you can check out her blog. Also, she has an awesome kit club. Check it out. You will NOT be disappointed.

I have found my favorite new person. Alison Tyler Jones. This woman is AMAZING. I bought her book before we went and just glanced through it. We actually were sitting next to her in the lobby of the hotel and just started chatting with her. I know she thought we were nuts. We offered her a ride over to the store and she went with us. She said that she loves the South. So, before her lecture, I knew she was great, but I didn't realize how great until she started her presentation. OH. MY. WORD. I want this lady to be my neighbor! Too bad she lives in Arizona. I know that she does teach photography classes. I told Brian that I was going to look into her schedule. I've got a couple of free airline tickets. In the meantime, I am looking into a photography class here in Detroit.

All of the classes rocked. I really needed the break, but I was ready to get home. Brian and Miss K planned on meeting me in the baggage claim area of the airport to surprise me, but K went to sleep on the ride to the airport. So, she didn't even "see" me until about 15 minutes into the ride home. Then she just screamed when Brian left the car to go to work. She is all better now. She wouldn't say momma at all today. This evening she was getting a bath and I asked her if she was ready to get out and she started "singing" 'momma, momma, momma.' She's a hoot. Here is a way cute photo my MIL took of Miss K while she was outside playing in mud puddles. She LOVED it.

Overall, I had a great time. Thank you Kelli , JJ and Cathleen for the ride to Alabama. You ladies are so funny. Thank you Sherri and Michelle for letting me ride back to Nashville with you on Friday. It was good to get home early. Although, I do wish we had turned around and talked to the guy who was carrying the cross. He was on my mind all day today, But, I got to do a little cleaning and spend some time with my mom. Oh...and for those of you who knew my mom was getting chemo....she NEVER got sick. Praise God! We were so worried that she was goin g to get to get really sick. She has a great attitude about the whole thing. Just keep her in your prayers. She has 46 more weeks!

Okay...blog more about the event later!

Recipe, chemo, a trip and AWESOME weather!!

My friend Kennington had us over for dinner one night and she made the most awesome mac n' cheese. I asked her for the recipe and I thought I would share it. Brian and Miss K love it. I made it last night and they both cleaned their plates.

Homemade Mac n' Cheese

8 oz. elbow macaroni, cooked

8 oz. sharp Cheeder cheese, shredded.

1 can cream of mushroom soup

1/2 cup mayo

1/2 cup milk

Mix all together and pour into a slightly greased dish. Bake for 25 minutes @ 375 degrees.

So, tomorrow I am headed to Nashville. I can't wait. My mom was suppose to pick me up at the airport, but she got a call on Monday and she has to start her chemo on Wednesday. She is very nervous. I am very nervous. So please say a prayer for my mom if you think about it. She is going to need them.

Also, say a prayer for me, Miss K and my awesome mother in law. Brian and I are meeting the in laws tomorrow night for dinner. When we leave...Miss K is staying with them. This will be the first time that Miss K has stayed away from both of her parents at the same time. I am nervous. I know my MIL can take care of her, I worry about how Miss K will react to me and Brian not being there. She will be there Wednesday - Sunday. Brian is driving up Friday after work. I'll probably call a million times before the end of my trip.

So, I am flying out tomorrow night. Means I have to miss the results show of American Idol AND Lost. I'm a little upset about that. Guess I'll have to watch it online later next week. But, I get to spend the next couple of days hanging with my scrappy friends. And to be honest, I need a break from my little family. I was nasty to Brian atfer the whole laptop thing, so I figured it was time for a little break. I am nowhere near ready to go, but I am not worried about it. If I don't have everything I need, I am not going to stress. I just want to have a good time.

And let's talk about the weather here in Rochester, MI. B E A U T I F U L ! It is 73 degrees outside right now. And sunshine. Fabulous sunshine. I am loving it.

And since I promised photos more often...here is one of Miss K after a long crying bout the other night. She is getting her eye teeth and she is not handling it very well at all. I'm not either. The stinker won't go to sleep. She was up until almost 11 last night and woke up in the middle of the night and wouldn't go back to sleep in her bed. We had to bring her into our bed. It's killing me.

It's not so bad...

This weekend, the weather in our part of Michigan was beautiful. It got up into the 50's. People had on their flip flops and springy skirts. I saw a bunch of people in shorts. We were still bundled up though. But the main thing...SUNSHINE! It was so nice. We spend Saturday running some errands. Brian decided that we could upgrade our cell phones, so we went to look at phones. We also found a great shopping area and my all time favorite grcoery store, Trader Joes. We also stopped in at PBK and tried out the Anywhere Chair for Miss K. She has used it at a friend's house and I wanted Brian to see it. There were WAY too many distractions in that store for her. There was a baby stroller in there that she was crazy about. It was hard getting her out of the store without her pitching a fit. I also hit Gymboree to check out the sale stuff. Walked out with ANOTHER Gymbuck. I was going to use it to buy K's Easter dress, but the new line that is coming out is AWESOME, so I will probably spend it all on that! I love Gymboree!

So, I am attending Scrap Etc. Event this week. I can not wait!!! I am riding to Alabama with kellidarrsuperstar and the fabulous JJ, so I am excited about that. I need to spend the next two days getting my stuff together. I am WAY behind. So, instead of packing, what have I done? I made inspiration journals. They aren't beautiful or anything like that. I saw one in Paper Crafts and decided to make one similar to it. I didn't have all the stuff I needed and since I was making 4 of them, I wasn't going to go out and spend a lot of money. I made one for each of my roomies...Susan, Jamey and Kim. I hope they like them! I also need to pack Miss K's stuff because she is going for her first stay away from Mommy and Daddy. She is staying with Brian's parents Wednesday night and Thursday night. Brian will drive up on Friday and spend the weekend with them. I am VERY nervous. And it isn't that I think anything will happen or that my mother in law will do something I don't agree with. I am just nervous about being away from my munchkin for so long.

Oh...did I mention that my husband spilled his LARGE Coke from Wendy's all over my NEW laptop? I was BEYOND pissed at him. Sunday he took the entire thing apart and cleaned it with a Q-tip. Lucky for him, I had the lid shut when he was being a klutz.

Today is a busy day for us. It's LAUNDRY day. I need to get about 10 loads of laundry done, plus all the linens and that includes towels and rugs. So, I better get my rear in gear!

Blog ya later!

We are in Nashville!

It was a pretty easy trip, even with the delay. SWA lost my stroller. Luckily, I bought a cheap $10 umbrella stroller from Target this morning to take to the airport. Still irritates me that they lost it. They gave me a loaner until they find it. It's a pretty nice stroller.

Had some car drama before we got home. Brian got it fixed, but now it is leaking oil. His car HAS to make it until the end of the year. Lucky for us, we are only home a couple of days a month, so we are hoping we can "patch" her up and keep her around until the end of the year.

My house is a pig sty. Tomorrow morning I will be CLEANING. I've got a load of rugs in the washer right now. I am hoping it is nice enough outside tomorrow that we can open all the windows and air the house out. Smells musty. Ick. I am the world's worst house keeper.

So tomorrow I am having lunch with my favortie mommy of 4 boys...Sherri. And I am hitting Hobby Lobby for some retail therapy.

Okay...it is almost 11 Michigan time and I am BEAT. Miss K woke up at 6 this morning and took a very short nap.

Blog ya later...with photos!