Assembly of Blog

I arrived in Indiana on July 2, after a 20-hour drive that included sleeping in my car. To be fair, the drive from Louisiana to Indiana is prettier and cheaper and slightly shorter than the drive from Texas to Indiana. However, it's not as populated - so you must stop where you can! Little Rock is like the biggest deal you pass through. I was 1.5 miles from Bill Clinton's childhood home (eating a Wendy's), but it didn't seem worth visiting.

My mom was in the hospital for a week with a kidney infection brought on by a kidney stone. Lots of pain. She was finally released and has regained some strength ... just to go into surgery tomorrow. Fun, right? Who wants to get old? She'll be off work for nearly a month when it's all said and done. Miserable, but necessary.

I have been away from the boys for a week and a half. It's nice to catch up on sleep and sit quietly and enjoy a book, but I miss them like crazy. Life's too easy (though, my mom is sometimes a demanding patient).

I am working on turning my online life over to a new email address. It's a slow-going process, but I appreciate that Gmail imports emails for 30 days from my old account. I am getting all the blogs switched over and hope to assemble them into one or two coherent blogs in the near future.

I picked up Made from Scratch: Discovering the Pleasures of a Handmade Life by Jenna Woginrich and can hardly put it down. I'm almost halfway through, and I've only had it a couple hours. I am currently OBSESSED with getting a chicken coop (and have selected Red Star chickens as my preferred breed - and my city does allow chicken coops in-town ... not sure my neighborhood does, but better to ask for forgiveness than permission). I also can't wait for a garden next year (I'm looking at you raised vegetable garden beds) and am starting to toy with the idea of beekeeping. I don't think we have the land to keep enough distance between our boys and the bees, though, SO I started looking at houses further out in the country. My poor husband.

So, that's that.

I am set to return to my boys this Thursday - it'll be very late or very early Friday. It's been great to be able to take care of my mom (thanks mostly to my husband taking time off work to watch the kiddos), but I am ready to get back. I've seen three of my oldest and dearest friends during my time up here - that's been great too (oh, and I got to meet two of their new babies - yeah!). I grilled for the first time - shrimp on kabobs and corn on the cob. AMAZING. Also eating lots of Jimmy Johns and Qdoba ... just because I can :)

Too Early

Starting on Sunday, May 9, my children decided to start getting up at 6:30 a.m. I tell them, no, it's too early and to go back to bed. What is so wrong with 7 a.m.? Just give me a half hour. They don't go back to bed, but Bean does return to his room and plays till I go get him. Moose paces in his crib and squawks a lot.

Last night was my last M&Ms meeting. We had a catered meal, and I got a present. I love presents! Our mentor mom gave a little talk about mothers and all the roles we play. It was a great meeting, filled with us "old" moms and few new visitors. That group saved my sanity on so many occasions - it's where I met many of my closest friends.

I have been saving for an SLR camera. I have a good chunk saved now (after many, many trips to the consignment shop and some eBay sales) and have started researching. My goodness, you can drop a lot of money on cameras. I started to think it might make more sense to use that money towards a new vehicle and just continue using my blue Sony Cypershot (which I am very fond of - I mean, it is blue, and we know how I feel about things that are a cute color).

Anyways, I am leaning towards the Nikon 5000 for now and investing in a lens or two and a photography class. If I end up LOVING photography, then I can upgrade my camera body later and still be able to use the lenses on the new body. So much to learn.

We head to our new place this weekend but will return. The movers will be here next week (exact date still unknown).

Also, my aunt's breast cancer is confined and has not spread. That is great news.

M&Ms Meeting

This morning, the steering team for the mommy group I'm in, M&Ms, had a planning meeting. It's our first meeting together in a while, and it felt great. We're bringing some new blood into the steering team, because our head gal is starting her grad school career and I, of course, will be moving.

Our February meeting is full of great things - it's love-themed and we're doing bridal shower decorations and games and bringing brunch food. Super-fun stuff! Who doesn't love making wedding dresses out of toilet paper?

I feel rejuvenated with the group - I don't know if it was the winter blahs or what, but I wasn't giving the group the time and attention that it deserved. Maybe I got nervous over the whole impending move ... I do tend to distance myself from things when I find out they're about to change (total child-of-divorce defense mechanism), but I'm going to try and not let that get the better of me. The facts are that I craved out a life here and will miss my friends dearly when I move. I will cry - maybe not in front of people, but I will. So, that's that. It's going to feel like hell whether I distance myself or not. One thing I've learned over the years, though, is that time does wonders. It is what it is.

I am, once again, hosting the M&Ms Easter Hunt at my home on Good Friday.

I have a newsletter to write (and have passed a few of the "find this" sections on to the new mom) and updates to make on our Yahoo! Group.

I'm really and genuinely excited.

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Picked up High on Arrival by Mackenzie Phillips. My husband said, "Is that about drugs?" Of course.

Stained Glass

I spent six hours today learning about and creating stained glass. Oh. My. Goodness.

I knew it wasn't going to be easy (umm, that's why I decided to take a class and not just teach myself), but I had NO idea how tedious it would be. The actual process is actually easier than I was expecting. The scoring and breaking is fun ... but the grinding! Oh, the grinding! I stood at the grinder for the better part of the day and kept thinking, "If this way paper, I could just trim it!"

I have HOMEWORK, people. Because I'm the third SLOWEST person in the class. There are two people slower than me ... and English is their second language. I very CLEARLY understand every word out of the instructors mouth, and I'm just flipping slow.

So, I am now copper-foiling all my pieces and will play with the sauder gun next Saturday. That's right, I'm learning about stained glass and did not even touch sauder today, because I am so slow.

It'll look fabulous when it's done. One day, when I have wide stretches of time and a real studio to work in I can see enjoying making stained glass projects and selling them (and I'm now well aware as to why stained glass pieces cost so much - the materials are expensive and the time involved in one piece is lots).

All in all, I love learning something new and artistic, but rubber stamps and ink remain my first loves.

Now that I think about: I once thought embossing was difficult and wasn't that impressed with the Cricut the first time I used it. You know, I've been wrong before. Stained glass might just win me over yet :)


The finished product will have a stained glass border as well and be framed out with hooks, so I can hide show it off.

Retreat

Yesterday morning, I arrived home from my very first scrapbooking retreat!

It was a last-minute decision to go, so I went alone ... into the deep, dark mountains of southern Oklahoma ... responding to an ad ... that I saw on Craig's List.

While Husband encouraged me to go, he did question if the retreat was legit. "Are you sure it's not just some people trying to lure you into the middle of nowhere and kill you," he asked. "Hmm, I don't know. I don't think so. They have a website," I told him.

Anyway, I arrived to the cabin and texted my husband. I texted him again the next morning and again. I thought it was strange that I hadn't heard from him. Saturday afternoon, one of the organizers asked if anyone knew this phone number. Apparently, someone had called the organizer's home number (where her husband answered) and now her husband was convinced that someone was coming out to the woods to kill a few dozen scrapbookers ...

As it turns out, I had no reception in the downstairs on the cabin and my texts hadn't gone through, and I wasn't receiving my husband's text. He found the ad on Craig's List and called the phone number and then refused to identify himself or me (because he didn't want to tell some strange guy that his wife was out in the middle of nowhere).

I used another girl's phone (AT&T got reception out there) to call Husband and let him know I was OK. The organizer called her husband to let him know that it was just " a husband" and not a killer who had a vendetta against paper crafters.

The retreat was great! About 30 women in a big cabin with all out supplies. I was the only one who arrived alone, but I quickly found plenty of people to talk to. I completed cards and layouts and border sets and lots of other fun stuff. They fed us meals and did our dishes (that alone was worth the registration fee). Aside from washing my own face and brushing my teeth, I wasn't responsible for anything other than crafting! I got to try out a fellow scrapper's ATG Gun (a sort of tape gun that was intended for profressional framers but has also gained a reputation for being PERFECT for paper crafters ... if you buy in bulk, a 300-foot refill is only $1, compared the $1.75 I pay for 30 feet for my current tape gun). The ATG Gun is awesome, and I can't wait till Christmas for one ... so I must get one immediately (only sold online)!

I would love to say that the time away recharged me, but I only slept for maybe 11 hours the entire weekend! It recharged me in other ways, but I was certainly tired Sunday night! I was up till 2 a.m. and 3 a.m. both nights (with several ladies, most of whom were much older than me). The last night, my 74-year-old table neighbor was up right there with me. I hope I'm still heading off to scrapbook retreats at 74! It was so cool to be in an environment where I could say things like "swap" and "Splitcoast" and "border set" and "emboss" and "Crystal Effects" and "ATG" and people knew was I was talking about! Oh, and some of the supplies these people hauled ... I look like an amature (and, if you've seen my ROOM FULL OF STUFF, you would know that I have lots). There were FIVE sets of mothers and daughters on the retreat, so I may just have to birth a girl and in 15 or so years, I can be one of those sets.

I received a lot of compliments on my work, so maybe I do have good taste (in crafting, at least) after all.

A new technique I discovered and have fallen in love with is embroidery on paper. I simply must head out and get some floss and needles and templates to do this with. I'm generally not a fan of sewing (but I sometimes forget and end up making things like curtains and costumes), so I never thought of trying it out ... but I love it! It's such a unique and custom look. Very special.

So, yes, I had a GREAT TIME! I was certainly ready to get home and see my boys, though, after two nights away.

I'm hoping to make it to the May retreat (they have one in May and one in November). Maybe I'll even have some friends to bring along? Any takers?

Happenings

Last Saturday, I had a planning meeting with the M&Ms group. (I'm on the steering committee. Oh, and M&Ms stands for Moms & Munchkins.) We planned out an entire year of meetings - themes, food, speakers, etc. It was actually ::not:: that bad. We've carried over some of our popular themes (finances, PJ night, Christmas Party) and added some new ones (marriage, which will have a bridal shower theme, and personalities, where will take a couple tests). I think it's going to be a fun year! We also decided on a regular play date and possibly introducing a quarterly Bunco night.

I also applied for my first design team! The four spots are open till August 15. I assume (though, I really have no idea) they'll have their decisions made by the end of the month. We'll see. I totally dig their stamps, and I would love, love to work with them!

Also, a few guys in my husband's "assignment year" (or something like that) got their assignments. Everyone got something good (probably their first or second choice, we would guess), so we're not sure if that's good or bad news. It could mean everyone is going to get their first or second choice. It could mean those first round of guys took all the "good" stuff. It could mean nothing. It probably means nothing. There are always rumors of this or that, but nothing can be confirmed. We can just be happy for the guys who got their assignments and be happy with whatever we get. My husband has done his best, so we'll just keep waiting.

Oh, and Cappie (our beta fish) died Monday. Yet another example of my inability to keep a small pet alive. The dumb thing lived through three weeks of my husband feeding it one pellet a day (he misunderstood what I said, to feed it one or two pellets twice a day), but I get home and clean its home and it ups and dies on me. Dumb fish.

Who Needs the Sears Repairman? Not Me! (And Happy Birthday to Myself)

So, I'm a year older today. Doesn't feel that different. Birthdays peak at 21. Perhaps 30 will prove more exciting. (I'm trying to talk my mom into a trip to Hawaii or maybe a resort vacation in Mexico. Her birthday is just a few days after mine, and she's also reaching a "milestone" birthday that year, so it'd be fun to do something together.)

It was a fabulous day, though. The kids were a bit ornery (yes, I used the word "ornery"). I was trying to get a load of stuff ready for the consignment shop and one was fussing and the other was bouncing off the walls, so I loaded them into the car and finished my work in the parking lot on base. I've discovered that I can legally tie them both up in the car and no one says a thing about it or even looks at me meanly. Tis a wonderful discovery :)

I got home and noticed my washing machine blinking. It did this once before. It took three weeks to get the Sears repairman out here. Let me tell you, having a young child, a mother-in-law coming to visit, and no working washing machine is not a great combination in the middle of the freaking summer. Anyway, so I waited for three weeks for a smelly guy to open up my machine and reveal a pair of my underwear that the washer ate. Luckily, I paid attention and attacked the machine myself this time around. It took an hour to take it apart and clean up all the water, but I fixed it all on my own. It was quite satisfying. I am also several baby wipes, a grommet, some lint, and 39 cents richer.

My friend E. sent me the best present in the whole world. She overnighted three pints of Spinach & Mushroom Etouffee from Yats, one of our favorite restaurants in college. Seriously, when I opened the package I felt like a little kid on Christmas Day. I was so happy. A few seconds later, though, the noise and demands from Bean and Moose brought me back to reality, but at least I got 30 seconds of pure bliss!

Husband got off work early and brought me lunch. (I saved the Yats for another day, so don't go thinking I'm a pig.) Then I got a couple hours to myself - got my toes done (blue, if you must know, with white flowers painted on the big toes) and wandered around Hobby Lobby. It was weird to be out in public alone, but it was much needed. We did pizza for dinner and then I open another great present ... he made me (yes, like from pieces of wood and nails) a shelf for all my stamp pads! The best news, my current stamp pads only take up about half the space ... so I have lots of room to grow.

I had a birthday brownie, which disappointed Bean. He seems to think a cake is completely necessary for a birthday.

Me: Today is my birthday!
Bean: No it not, Mama. You no have a cake!
Me: I don't have to have a cake. It's my birthday.
Bean: I have two birthdays, Mama.

Then he goes on to tell me about his Elmo party (for this third birthday) and his pirate party (which happened this year). All day I have tried to explain that you only get one birthday a year, but he insists that he has two. Exhausting!

We also discussed where Grand-Dad, Grandma, and Steffie live, where Grandma in the Blue House lives, and where we live. I need to get it on video and post it up here. It's pretty funny. "Teh-hiss. I live in Teh-hiss, Mama. Mama, you live in Teh-hiss?"

Also, people, enter my raffle a couple posts below! I feel totally unloved.

Time Alone (Almost)

Our friends invited us out to the lake with them. They rented a boat and a cabin, and I have to say that I was really looking forward to it. Ultimately, though, I decided to send Husband and Bean alone and stay home with Moose. I really needed some alone time.

Anyway, Husband and Bean headed south this morning. After some hassles with the boat, the boys and our friends got a couple hours on the boat. Unfortunately, no one caught a thing. They were grilling that last time we spoke ... and it's probably for the best I missed all the boat hassles. I don't handle things like that well.

Moose and I had a great day. We met some friends for lunch (seriously, he has a friend, she's about two weeks older than him) and then played at her house for a bit. Then I dragged him to the post office and Hobby Lobby (no big purchase, just picking up some cardstock for my friend's baby announcements). We came home, he napped and I cleaned, then we went for a walk down to another friend's house. He passed out around 9:30.

Husband has actually never spent a night away from Moose - except Moose's first night outside the womb.

This morning, Husband reported that Bean said, "Dada, [Moose] smiles like this." and proceeded to open his mouth very, very big. Ha ha. So true!

In other news, we watched Slumdog Millionaire last night. I can totally see how it won best picture. It was tough to watch - hard to watch that sort of poverty and know that it is, indeed, really going on in the world. That said, though, I think it's a great movie and well worth seeing.

Hallways are complicated creatures ...

Who knew that "the hallway" would present the biggest challenge in the world of interior painting. I suspect it's all the trim and tight corners. It's also an area where everyone must muster in and out all day, leading to bathrooms and bedrooms and back out to the main living area. It's narrow. Along with the trim, there's vents and lots of doors and the cabinets. It's cut in, all ugly wood is primed. So now it's time to roll the beige (ugh, I hate beige, but we have to think resale value ... I suspect no one would appreciate a home painted entirely Apple Green). After rolling, I'll finish off the trim. The cabinet doors will still be waiting for me.

Husband got the new lights up. I stuck one of our old fans on Freecycle, and the new owner claimed it yesterday. The other fan had to be hacked away and was, unfortunately, tossed in the trash. At least I kept one out of the landfill! He also got the curtain rods up in the boys' room and fixed the fridge door.

Oh, Saturday night, I went and got a pedicure with Mrs. House of Toys. We roamed the mall for a little bit and then ... we went to a bar. She never goes to bars. I haven't gone in, geez, nearly two years. So we sat and inhaled second-hand smoke. She asked for a lemonade and the waitress was flabbergasted and said they didn't have lemonade. When she asked, "Well, what do you have that is non-alcoholic?" The waitress didn't even know what to say. Seriously, she didn't even offer, "Soda." Mrs. House of Toys settled for water, and I enjoyed an ice-cold bottle of Bud Light (OK, a bottle and a half). We listened to live music, performed by some very grungy looking guys (we were thankful we were in another room and didn't have to look at them), and talked about things of yore. We smelled terrible when we left. I shampooed my hair three times before I went to bed. But it was a nice change of pace from the typical "lame stay-at-home-slob" agenda.

Moose is napping - has been since about 12:30!!!

I'm about two thirds of the way though Charmed Thirds (the third book in the Jessica Darling saga). I was devastated to learn that Perfect Fifths (the most recent JD book) won't be out till April 19! Stinks.

An odd thing I thought of today. My husband's birthday is on a 21st, my oldest son's is a 23rd - a difference of 2 days. My birthday is on a 2nd, my youngest son's is on a 4th, a difference of 2 days. Weird. These are the things I think about on my walk home from dropping Bean off at school. Perhaps this is why I'm better off surrounded by noise and chaos.

Sleeping Baby

I have a baby passed out in my lap, which I think says something about the type of mom I am. There are moms who obsess about getting their children in their own bed and sleeping through the night. There are nursing mothers who are not pacifiers and there are moms who don't even want to think about breastfeeding. There are moms on schedules and moms who homeschool (and moms who unschool). And, I can't help but think that there are plenty of other moms out there who are just surviving.

You want to sleep in my lap?

You're teething and want a boob to comfort you?

You don't want to put your coat away?

You want peach oatmeal and not strawberry.

FINE.