Tackle It Tuesday: The Beds

Anyone who has ever read my blog, old one and this one, knows that there has been an ongoing battle with the bedroom space in our little house. I went back and counted at least six different posts about different bedroom changes in the just over two years I have been blogging.


And yet, here's another. But I think (or at least, hope) that this may be the last one for quite awhile. Noah had been asking for a desk in his room for quite a long time but his room was way too tiny. The room upstairs is huge and runs the length of the house but for reasons I will not go into here, he will NOT sleep upstairs, so we couldn't move him up there. So a few weeks ago, Steve and I came up with the idea for a loft bed for him. Here is the set up of his bed before....a top of a bunk bed from my parents, which we love, but had lots of unused space underneath for such a small bedroom.

Knowing it was quite impossible to do himself, he enlisted the help of Ron, Deb's husband. Although he was not a willing participant at the beginning, you could tell after they got going that they found their stride.
The day became a flurry of activity, and not always in such a nice way.

As soon as we got home from church and lunch was done, the boys and I set to work with the initial preparation, which included moving ALL toys out of Noah's room and upstairs to Aaron's, which was already a MASSIVE pig sty. It became clear that rather than sorting through toys, it would be necessary to spill EVERY toy that we owned into a huge pile in the middle of the room and start from scratch.


At least one room was completely cleared.














Now let me just say that I have started having really bad PMS for the last few months lately(which I will be addressing at my annual in a couple of months) and this Saturday was the peak of this month. The poor kids didn't know what was coming :(

Add on top of that two little boys who really didn't want to spend the day cleaning their room. There was indeed screaming, crying, toy throwing, and other unpleasantness happening. But four hours later, Aaron's room was complete, with his new bed (Noah's old top bunk) in place.





Then, it was time to go see how progress was going on the actual construction of Noah's new loft.

It was pretty cold outside so I changed my mind about wanting Noah to be involved in some of the construction but that didn't stop the boys from wanting to go outside and watch a little of the construction before I brought them in to settle in for a movie after the trauma of cleaning we had endured.

After a pizza break for dinner, the big boys were finally ready to bring the pieces inside to begin to put it all together in the bedroom.

From that point on, it seemed as if things went pretty fast. Actually, to me, I felt that they cooked along at a pretty good pace all day.

Due to the time change, bed time came earlier than anyone expected and by 7:30 I was rounding kids up for bed, but having a small dilemma of where to put everyone to sleep. Aaron was SOOOO excited to go to bed in his new bed but Noah's loft was still a shell standing in his room.



So I put him to bed in our bed, knowing full well that it was pretty unlikely that he would be able to fall asleep with the drill going strong next to him and the saw going outside. And I'm still not sure if he actually fell asleep or not. But around 9:30 PM, about 7 hours after they started with a pile of wood and a sketch on paper, it was done! I still can't believe they got the whole thing done in seven hours.

And it is very sturdy. It even held me :)

And after waking (?) Noah up and moving him into his new bed, I waited for him to fall asleep before beginning the process of moving shelves, toys, etc, back into his room. It took Minnie (the cat) about 30 seconds to settle into a new home under the bed since she could no longer go lay next to her buddy anymore.

The next morning, both boys had to take turns posing from atop the bed. And Monday night, as I understand it, the boys were actually excited to go to bed in their new beds. One of the things that made me happy was that BOTH boys got new beds of sorts and Aaron loves his bed so much that he goes up during the day just to lie in it.














Of course, now MY part of the job starts. It will probably take me at least a month to sand it all down, fill in the screw holes with wood putty, and stain it, but I think I will wait until it gets warmer so I can have the windows open. Which means, folks, that there will most likely be even more posts in the future about this bed.

Wondering if anyone made it to the end of this post, but I'm at least glad that I have the event documented. Now to get off the computer and head out to buy balloons to stick on hubby's car to surprise him for his birthday today. See you all later :)

Just Stuff

Wow, the comment mill was definitely rolling last week. I must have touched a nerve (in a good way, I think) with my potty post. It is very clear that this is a topic that everyone deals with. It is equally clear that I am not the only one whose kids are completely different from each other in this, as well as so many other aspects. Your suggestions were so varied and great. We haven't made any changes yet, but I think we have a plan in the works. I'll let you know.


We had a pretty lazy weekend. Didn't really do much at all. We returned to the church we visited last week for a second visit yesterday. I am still not quite sure what to do about Aaron and the Sunday school class since it seems that there is some sort of issue there. I think I will walk him back next week at the start of Sunday school to see what we can work out. Noah is a little concerned when we told him that we are going to visit a lot of churches, not just settle for this one. The main pastor did the sermon this week. It was very long, but I really liked how he interspersed different scriptures throughout the entire sermon, and also put each one up on the projector screen so we could read them along while he was speaking about them. Afterward, we stayed for the fellowship time this week and the pastor and his wife came over to speak to us, and even offered to give us a tour of the entire facility. If we can just figure out this issues with Aaron, I don't think we would really have any complaints. We'll see what happens next week.


I had Steve bring our Wii upstairs and put it in our living room and I think I will be much more consistent about exercising with it upstairs. Our basement is not heated and it was very difficult to get motivated to go down there. We spent some time as a family trying out some of the new games on the Wii Fit plus and it was fun, except for the bird flying game that got Steve quite angry. Sometimes I feel like I have three kids in the house when he gets all emotional about something like a video game. As angry as he was, it was still extremely funny watching him try to flap his "wings" and still not get anywhere.


The strange thing is that Aaron is like his daddy in that way. When a game gets challenging or doesn't go his way, Aaron has a tendency to throw whatever is in his hand, scream, and stomp out of the room crying. And that's what happened numerous times throughout our Wii session yesterday. I know it's because he hasn't learned yet how to control those intense emotions. I also know that this intensity will serve him well in the distant future. But for now this is definitely something we need to keep working on with him. His teacher said that it doesn't show itself in school much, which is good. But it is the one reason that I am still glad he ins in Young Fives, instead of Kindergarten, even though I second guess that decision on a regular basis.

Aaron has the day off today for a records day so I have an appendage for all of my regular Monday duties; laundry, recycling, cleaning, etc. Probably not the most fun day for him and I imagine he will be thrilled to return to school tomorrow.

Dryer just dinged...gotta go fold load #2 and start loads #3 and 4.

Have a great week.

Weekend Top Five 1/11/10

Yeah, I'm bringing it back. I realized last week while I was reading through my old blog posts, both here and at the old site, that I like reading the weekend top fives to remember the things we had done as a family. Unfortunately, the Weekend Top Five does not come with pictures this week, since my camera got injured sometime this weekend and I am now without a picture maker. A blogger without a camera...not a good thing. I'm so sad. We also started out church search this weekend, but I will be writing a separate post about that later this week.

Moving right along. It was an okay weekend. Much needed after a very long first week back to school last week and lots of new extra curricular activities to boot. Here is what we were up to this weekend.

5. Scouts
Noah started cub scouts last week. Apparently, cub scouts is going to require a full family participation, and quite a large pocket book as well. In order to get started, he needed a $25 shirt, handbook, and several patches. I spent much of the weekend trying to learn how to sew patches on the shirt in a straight-ish pattern. Friday night was also a parent meeting for upcoming events. We have three weeks to build Noah a car for the pinewood derby, give up another Friday night in a few weeks to literally build a ceremonial bridge, and two Saturday field trips, in addition to the regular Tuesday scout meetings. Wow!

4. Movie Night- Stuart Little
When we got home, I rewarded the boys for a great week at school with movie night. We watched Stuart Little. It was really a cute movie, but Steve and I were both dismayed that they had to have the wild cats use several words of profanity. Why do they do that? These movies would be just as entertaining without using swear words that we have to worry about the kids picking up on. Luckily, the only one the kids noticed was "stupid" which is by far NOT the one that caused worry to us.

3. Concerto Competition
Saturday morning a piano student of mine auditioned for the symphony piano concerto competition. It was quite an ordeal since she had to learn and memorize a 14 minute piece and I had to learn to play an orchestral reduction on another piano with her. She had some struggles and it was very nerve wrecking with the Grand Rapids Symphony Orchestra conductor standing right there while we were playing. She made some mistakes and most likely will not win, but it was a good experience for her (as well as myself). I am just glad it's over. The music was more difficult than anything I played in college and I generally do not like to perform.

2. Chuck E Cheese
After Aaron's birthday party in October, we still had a pile of tokens left over. Steve had a concert with his singing ensemble Saturday night so the boys and I headed out for a couple of hours to Chuck E Cheese. It's kind of interesting. When we go as a family, it usually costs us upwards of $30 to go so we don't go very often. When I took the boys alone, we got away with one small cheese pizza and a drink for me (bringing juice boxes for the kids) and we ended up only spending $12 for our entire visit, using the money I received as payment for the piano competition above.


1. Skating
Steve's dad was singing in a barbershop quartet at a local nursing home Sunday afternoon and Steve was required to go. I knew that it wouldn't go well to take all of us, so Steve took Aaron, the more artsy of our two children, and the one more likely to sit and listen. I decided that Noah and I had to go do something, so I took him to open skate at the local roller skating rink. We had only been there twice for birthday parties and it was definitely different going just on our own. It was VERY crowded, but Noah is little skating machine and was thrilled. At one point, they cleared the floor for "races". I called Noah off the floor but he insisted that he wanted to race. So he went and lined up for the 7 and under race. He came in 6th out of 7 but was so proud for his race that he talked about it for the rest of the day. He also tried some "tricks" by jumping up and landing and attempting one foot skating. Too cute.

The Week Ahead:
I'm having lunch with someone from our old church today. I have my first chorus rehearsal tonight that I am a little nervous for. It's going to be another busy week for the kids as well, but we'll just take it a day at a time and get through each challenge as it arises. That's the Wheelz way.

Have a good week.

Wweekend Top Five 11/2/09

Yup, I'm bringing it back this week. We kept pretty busy this weekend, even though as I sit here, I have no idea what we did. Several of these I will be elaborating on later, but here's our weekend in a nutshell:





5. Aaron Class Party
After much work (and more cash than comfortable), I planned a pretty good little party for Aaron's class. They don't wear costumes at his school, and dub it a "Harvest Party", but we all know what we really were doing. I had the class do two crafts, decorate cookies, and had also made a little Bingo game. Then they had their treats and it was time to go.

Everyone had a good time, but a strange phenonmenon happened. While all the other kids were hyped on sugar getting ready to go, Aaron went the opposite way. He got VERY sullen and grumpy, refusing to even look at the camera for pictures. The teachers were both completely shocked, saying they had never seen him like that. It opened my eyes up to the possibility of having food issues of some sort with Aaron as well. We'll definitely be keeping an eye on it as time goes on. He actually stayed grumpy the entire remainder of the weekend, though, so who knows.


4. Friday Night Out
Steve had his long driving day so I knew it would just be me and the boys for the afternoon and evening. We came home from school and played for awhile, then decided to go out to Noodles for dinner (our favorite eatery, even though there is something in the pasta that makes the kids go psycho shortly thereafter). Afterward, I took them to Toys R Us to get a head start on their Christmas lists.

I wanted to know what to plan ahead for as I was searching the ads. I was glad I did though, because especially Noah became focused on one kind of lego toy he wanted, and now I won't have to guess. I was a fun night out but both boys were happy at bedtime when I told them that Daddy would be home on Saturday and we could have a full family day.





3. Saturday Halloween
Since it was supposed to rain, and our neighborhood sees fewer and fewer houses offering treats each year, we decided to forgo neighborhood trick or treating and take the kids to the mall instead. The crowd was bigger than they had ever had before. I am actually going to post about it later this week, since I got some fun pictures. Afterward, we took the boys out for dinner (kids ate free for Halloween) at a local burrito place, and were treated to smoke inhalation as the fans in the restaurant were broken. Hubby still has a headache from it as I write this Sunday night.

We came home just as kids started trick or treating and the kids were thrilled to be handing out candy. I was happy to be getting rid of all of the candy that we had just acquired at the mall anyway.




2. Sunday Time Change
I was pretty excited about the chance at an extra hour of sleep on Sunday morning. But, alas, it was not to be. Noah, my usually good sleeper, was up at 5:00 using the bathroom, and proceeded to visit that room several times again over the next couple of hours, and nobody (except Steve) went back to sleep. However, both boys were in bed and asleep before 7:30 on Sunday night, so I guess it will be a good thing after all.






1. Sunday Afternoon in the Leaves
I am so weird. I actually enjoy raking leaves. It is one of those jobs that you work your tail off, and you can actually see an obvious result when you're done. Like so many years in the past, I failed to take a before picture. I have a fun little post written about it later this week so I won't share too many pictures of our acventure. I love that the boys are able to help with the task now, even though it took some coaxing after jumping in the huge piles for awhile.

I know we will probably have to rake one more time, but while we were working, apparently the other families around us got motivated as well and we had four houses all out raking and cleaning up their yards for the winter together.






Thwe Week Ahead:
We're still waiting for the flu to hit, as I'm sure it has to, since it's hit everyone else we know. I decided against the H1N1 vaccine for the boys last week at the doctor, and I'm hoping that I'm not sorry. This week will be a short week, since Noah has a three day week of school and Aaron a four day, due to conferences. I am starting to worry about Noah's conference on Thursday, since he seems to be slipping lately in behvaior both at home and school.

Hope you had a great weekend and I look forward to visiting you and seeing your Halloween pictures too.

A Great Weekend

I decided that I have to bring back the Weekend Top Five this week. It was just such a busy and fun filled weekend. Here were the things that we will remember from the weekend





5. Birthday with my Mom and Grandma
Aaron's birthday is in two weeks, but with my mom visiting my grandma about an hour away, we went to visit her on Saturday. She had brought a little cake for Aaron so they could celebrate with him and also a couple of gifts for both boys.














4. Annual Wyoming Pumpkin Path
Saturday night was the annual Pumpkin Path in the city where we live. Local businesses all line up along the sidewalk in the park and hand out candy for the kids (and coupons for the grownups). Costumes are optional but it gave the boys their first chance to try out the Halloween costumes this year.













We have gone almost every year since it started (the year I was pregnant for Aaron) but this was by far the coldest of all. We had layered the boys' clothes up, but failed to think of gloves and by the time we were almost done, Aaron had started whining that he wanted to go since he was cold. Since we were almost done, we decided to actually FINISH the path for the first year ever and Aaron warmed his hands by keeping them in Daddy's hands while I carried the treat bag.




3. Family Birthday Party
With six adult kids (almost all married) and eleven (soon to be twelve) cousins, birthdays are hard to remember. So a few years ago, my parents started their quarterly birthday parties. We get together every few months and celebrate all of the birthdays within that vicinity. Yesterday was our next chance. We celebrated Aaron (who will be five in tow weeks), Cousin Jamie (also five in a few weeks), Cousin Piper (seven on Saturday) and my brother Matt (the Big 4-0)




I was so honored to have been asked to host the shindig and I worked all week to get the house ready. It made me feel good that everyone was comfortable enough with my little house to have it here. For being a small house, the kids (and I think the adults) all had a great time celebrating, eating and opening presents together.







Aaron got a bean bag chair from Grandma and Grandpa and has played on it non-stop ever since. As a matter of fact, it's two weeks before his birthday and he has gotten quite a few gifts that he loves. He is having a great birthday already and at least one more celebration to go. Lucky Kid!







2. Apple Picking
For quite a few years now, we have managed to put together an extended family trip to the pumpkin patch and it is always a fun time. The place we usually go to is closed on Sunday, so I searched for another one to go to this year. I found one that I thought was the one that Steve and I take the kids to every year and gave everyone the address, which ended up being incorrect. But nevertheless, we had a great time at Steffens Orchard. This was the first time we have ever been able to take the full group apple picking.


After a ride out on a wagon pulled by a tractor, we were able to give each of the boys a little bag to fill with apples. Although there were several varieties, my boys love golden delicious, so that is what we came home with.









The biggest thrill for hubby (and a little for me I must admit) was his phone. I know it sounds strange. But about five minutes after we arrived at the apple orchard, my camera battery died and I was VERY sad. So Steve whipped out his new phone and started taking pictures, which I didn't really put much faith in. But much to my chagrin, Steve loaded them into the computer when we got home and I still can't believe how great the pictures turned out. Now we actually even have pictures of ME during a family outing. Kind of cool.


1. The Green Monster
We are not the kind of peoplee that believe in giving a present to the other kid when it's someone's birthday. This weekend, the green monster showed up in Noah. We have never had this problem before with either of the boys, so it was a surprise to both hubby and myself when it happened. I also think it may be because of the grounding last week (which I will be posting about later this week). I think Noah was feeling left out and acted out on it.

I think the other issue is that Aaron is now old enough to be getting presents that would be great for either boy and Noah is noticing that he likes the things that Aaron is getting.

So after watching his brother get a lot of cool stuff all weekend long, Noah didn't handle it well at all. He commandeered both of the Lego sets that Aaron had gotten ("to make them for Aaron") and then started a major battle at bedtime about the bean bag chair.

Up until now, we pretty much have had the rule of "all toys are every one's to be shared". But this weekend is making me think that maybe that isn't such a fair rule after all. SO we had a very long discussion Sunday night before bed about the changes we are going to make. I think we will do more thinking on this matter and I may have more posts to write about it in the future. For now, Noah is going to have to turn the green monster off while Aaron celebrates his birthday again in a couple of weeks.


The Week Ahead:
Not really much going this week, which is a relief. It's supposed to be cold, which I thought I was ready for, but I guess not. I ate like a mad woman this weekend, so I will be Wii Fitting much longer than the last couple of weeks. As a matter of fact, I need to get off the computer and head downstairs right now. Have a good week.

Weekend Top Five 7/24/09

Like happens so often on the weekends, our plans changed a few times. We were planning to go spend the day with my MIL and some of the cousins, but it got cancelled first thing in the morning when one of my nieces ended up with strep throat. Unfortunately, It left Aaron asking ALL DAY why we weren't going to his grandparent's house.

The weekend was unseasonably cold, which was a welcome change for me. I was ready for cooler weather to tell you the truth.

Here's what kept us busy this weekend.

5. Robot Boy
Like I mentioned above, we were supposed to go north for the day on Friday. When that got cancelled, we were kind of scrounging for something fun to do. Noah figured out something in his own anyway.

Earlier in the week I had to buy a new booster seat, since my MIL drive back home with ours in her car when she visited. The box had been hanging around in the car ever since. Noah went out to bring it in to turn it into a robot.

Sometimes this kid amazes me. He found scissors and all by himself, cut out arms and face. He spent all day Friday, and most of the rest of the weekend "modifying" it, to include silver duct tape, extra holes in front and side to pass things through, drawings for buttons, and trying to figure out a way to attach a paper tube to the top for an antenna.

He even took legos and duct tape to make a mask.






The funniest part was that he was determined to have Aaron play with him. So I went and found another box in the basement in order to make one for Aaron. Although Aaron played a little bit, he really wasn't nearly as Gung Ho and Noah spent much of his weekend BEGGING Aaron to put his robot on and play.

Even when they weren't being worn, much of the weekend was spent in the boys speaking "robot talk"




4. Bowling
We got a flyer on our door advertising $1.00 bowling this weekend and 50 cent food and shoe rental at a local alley. So Saturday we decided to go.

I like bowling, but I can't stand bowling alleys most of the time because of the cigarette smoke. I end up feeling so gross when I leave, both from the smell and the general icky feeling. (I'm sorry for offending any of you out there...it's just a personal opinion) That's the reason we usually don't go. But I decided that maybe if we got there right when they opened, it might be okay. Which is what we did.

It ended up being a pretty nice little place. We bowled the first game with all four of us having our own game.

After stopping in the middle for some hot dogs to eat, we decided that the kids weren't up for another full four game set, so we teamed up the second time around.

Aaron and I played one and Steve and Noah played the other. Kids threw the first ball of each frame and parents threw the second. I think it was the most fun bowling we have ever had with the kids. The game went MUCH faster and the kids got to throw balls much more often. Definitely the way we'll play from now on.

Side Note: After playing Wii bowling so often, the real thing seemed much harder than it used to.











3. Baking a Cake
I will be writing an entire post about this later this week because it was very memorable. But in short, when we got home from the bowling alley, Noah decided that he wanted to bake a cake "all by himself". After sending Steve to the store for a couple of ingredients, we spent the majority of the day mixing, measuring, pouring, baking, frosting, and finally eating the cake. That which takes me about 20 minutes was an all day affair, but I think it was a great learning experience for Noah (and actually Aaron and myself as well)

As I sit here writing, there is still a lot of cake left and also about ten pounds of frosting in the refrigerator that I don't know what to do with. I guess we'll deal with that "problem" later :)






2. Hair Cuts
I have never known two little boys to LOVE hair cut as much as my two do. If you look at the picture above of Noah with the cake, you can see just how badly they were needed. I had been holding off since Noah's school pictures aren't until the end of September and I wanted to be sure it didn't grow back. But by the time we put them to bed Saturday night, I knew I wasn't going to make it. So after church on Sunday, we headed out to get the cuts before coming home for the afternoon.


I never got around to taking pictures of the cuts after we got home. So I decided that I still needed them for illustration, so the poor kids got subjected to pictures after they fell asleep. At least they're cute when they're sleeping :)

Can you believe how much my handsome little boys look alike when they sleep?





1. Game Night
It was so funny how all week long, the kids couldn't stop talking about Game Night. They actually looked forward to it all week.

While Deb and I were out wandering through stores on Friday night, I picked up a couple more games, as well as the one I had gotten through amazon with a gift card, resulting in three new games for Game Night Week 2.

Noah and I really like Apples To Apples. It was recommended by Deb and her family, and it is a great game. The only problem was that Aaron can't play it since he can't read, and Steve kept getting frustrated because he couldn't make good connections.

I also bought another game of Chutes and Ladders. I was sure we had it already, but couldn't find it anywhere and Noah had been asking for it.

The favorite of the night was an I Spy game I found at Meijers. This game is right up Aaron's alley. Each player gets an I Spy board and a card and has to find things from the card on the board. Surprisingly enough, a four year old, seven year, a mom and a dad seemed to be extremely evenly matched. Aaron actually beat all the rest of us in a lot of the rounds.

Yup, I'd say Game night Week 2 was a rousing success.



The Week Ahead
Steve is badly in need of some vacation time. So he has taken Thursday, Friday and Saturday off from work this week. We are hoping to figure out a way to get away for an overnight as a last hurrah for the summer. I guess I will have to let you know if that actually materializes or not. Other than that, only two weeks left until school starts, so we'll try to make the most of it. I started a new incentive chart, to keep the boys helping around the house, and to keep Steve and me more honest about keeping up with allowance. I hope it works.

Happy Monday!

Weekend Top Five 8/10/09

No pictures this weekend.

Very out of character, I didn't take a SINGLE picture this weekend. We also didn't do a whole lot worth of taking pictures, which is actually okay.




5. Yard Sale
Deb and I held the second half of our annual yard sale on Friday. I don't have a whole lot left to sell, so I didn't make much money at all. I have pretty much sold everything else on Craig's List as I needed money and we have nothing left of value. Pretty sad.

But it was actually a pretty relaxing day, even with all five kids in the house all day. Noah and Hannah stayed glued to the TV all day, Aaron spent over two hours amusing himself in the little blow up pool in the back, and Deb's other two girls spent the day pretty much wandering around. Luckily, the energy level was subdued and it was a good day overall.



4. Christmas Shopping Begun
Crazy, I know. But last year, finances were just as dire as they are this year and I had a hard time justifying buying presents as I went. So we got to a few weeks before Christmas and I didn't have a whole lot for the boys for Christmas. Luckily, I don't think they noticed, but I am hoping to be a little more prepared this year. I am going to try to stick with the three gifts from us rule, but I am hoping Santa can be a little more generous this year. Which means I need to start now and buy a little bit at a time with each paycheck, rather than trying to do it at once.

So after the kids went to bed Friday night, I took the Great Big Profit I made ($29) from the yard sale and headed off to Target to get Noah the scooter he wants as one of his big presents for this year. It was on sale and I was glad to be able to use the garage sale money for it. Now the only problem is keeping it hidden for four months.


3. Chuck E Cheese
We spent most of the Saturday doing yet more cleaning, including taking apart one of the cabinets in our kitchen and dumping it, hoping to get rid of a yucky odor that seems to be permeating the kitchen (it worked). During the process, we moved all of our movies to the basement and cleared out our entry way (which still needs to be patched and painted at some point).

Since the kids were even more grumpy than usual after this adventure, we decided to take the piles of coupons we had building up in my email inbox and take them to Chuck E Cheese for dinner. Thanks to the coupons, we were able to enjoy the fun for under $20 and the kids LOVE the little styrofoam planes they got as prizes.

Next time I think it would be cheaper to go to the dollar store and buy the silly planes, but oh well..live and learn. Don't think we'll go there again for quite awhile.


2. Headache
I battled a pretty nasty headache all weekend, and tried VERY HARD to not let it damper our plans. It started centered behind my left eye on Friday, followed by moving into the back of my head and neck on Saturday, and just sort of lingering on Sunday. I was able to work my way down to much less ibuprofen by the end of the week and I think it may be on its way out. My brother and SIL were sick at the end of last week also, and all of our kids had the same Fifth Disease last week so I am wondering if it stemmed from that virus.




I have to admit, being sick has me a little concerned about the H1N1 virus that is supposed to take hold once school starts. But that's a story for another time.

1. Beach Trip
WOW!!! Knowing it was supposed to be a 95 degree heat index on Sunday, we decided to head to Grand Haven to Lake Michigan Sunday afternoon. Apparently, the rest of West Michigan had the same idea. It took FOREVER to get to the beach, where we then had to wait another half hour at the entrance until parking spaces opened up.

But once we finally got in, it was WAY worth the wait. The waves were 6-7 feet, and Steve and Noah spent over an hour out in them. Aaron had fun too, but much to my relief, even he succumbed to the waves and decided it would be better to stay closer to shore.

On our way home, a MAJOR storm blew in right on the beach we were just at, uprooting huge trees, knocking down power lines, and knocking out power. We were lucky we left when we did and not an hour later, or we would have been caught in it all coming home.

The week ahead:
I'm getting a little stressed about summer vacation ending. I fear that I haven't made the most of the time with the kids. It seems as if I spent the majority of the summer refereeing fights between two young headstrong boys. Now I am panicking that we haven't played enough and school is starting soon. So now I feel like I'm in "Hurry up and have fun!" mode. In addition to the usual piano lessons and bell rehearsal this week, my SIL is coming with her kids for the second half of the week so I really hope we will have some time together to play.

I am also REALLY REALLY REALLY hoping to hear from the school to which I sent a resume last week. If I don't hear from them by Friday, I will plan to call next week. I really want that job. It would solve a lot of problems right now.

Have a good Monday and let me know if you posted your weekend so I can come visit.

Weekend Top Five 7/20/09

Weekend top Five participation seems to be down. I finally figured out how to get Mr. Linky going again. Please sign below if you post about your weekend.

Here's my Top Five:




5. Harry Potter
I managed to make my friend's husband angry this weekend. On purpose you may ask? Well, not ENTIRELY.

I had to go grocery shopping Friday night and I invited Deb to come with me. They were also have in $1 root beer floats at our local Culver's and they're my favorite dessert of all time. While we were eating our desserts, we remembered that we needed to take my frozen groceries home. As we were driving home, I mentioned casually, "Hey, since we're out anyway, let's go see 'Harry Potter' " We kind of laughed it off, but then while I was unloading the groceries, I mentioned it a little more seriously, and sure enough, after a unpleasant call to Deb's husband, we were headed out.

Now, I am usually in bed at the time when the movie started (10:30), but I am still glad we went. For those of you who haven't seen it yet, I wont spoil it too much. But of all six, it may go down as one of my favorites. I found myself giggling more during this one, even though it was sadder than any of the previous ones. I had re-read the book a few days earlier, and I was glad I had.

4. Cinderella-itis
Please don't read this and think of me being a COMPLETE slob. We have a pretty yucky kitchen floor that doesn't come clean, even when I mop it. In addition, there were quite a few big spots where paint had dripped last fall when I painted that I could never get to come up.

I have been feeling mighty restless about my house lately (as you can tell from all the painting I've been doing) so Saturday morning while the kids were playing I'd had enough if the floor.









I took extremes and got the Comet powder cleaner and started out cleaning each individual 3 inch square of the floor. After 90 minutes, only HALF of the floor was clean, and it made me realize just how badly it had needed it.















I managed to get rid of ALL of the green paint splotches, and even some of the floor varnish that spilled back when we first moved into the house. The worst part is how paranoid I am about dirt dropping on the floor now. I am wondering if now that I did a deep cleaning, if the regular weekly mopping will make a better difference.

Once can only hope.





3. Children's Museum
I know this is on my list a lot of weekends, but this weekend actually had a bit of a variety.

As I briefly mentioned last week, we are really struggling with Aaron's behavior. He seems to be really happy or really nasty, with no in between. The NASTY seems to be around more often than not. While we were in Wisconsin a few weeks ago, I ended up having to take him to the car while Noah and our friends spent more time at the zoo.

So this Saturday at the museum, his nastiness came around again. After several time outs, he still insisted on screaming at me, calling me nasty names, and all around horrid behavior and I had had enough. So we headed out and sat in the car for an hour and a half while Steve and Noah enjoyed the museum.

But that NOT where the story ends.

I found a parking spot right in front of the museum and my friend Deb, who was there with her kids as well, called me on the phone so we could visit while the rest of the kids were playing.

Hubby decided to entertain me while I was stuck in the car. It was a riot!! He grabbed several puppets from the farm exhibit that is there, and proceeded to perform fun little puppet shows for me through the window, while Deb and I were continuing our conversation as well.




I don't know what we are going to do about Aaron at the moment, but I think there are going to be quite a few more experiences that Aaron and I are going to miss until we get this under wraps. At least now that my hormones are finally starting to even out, I am better equipped to deal with them and I am handling the outbursts MUCH more positively than I have been for the last few weeks.



2. Saturday Night Camp Out

Hubby is an Eagle Scout and grew up camping every weekend with his family. I, on the other hand, have NEVER been camping in my life (other than music camp in cabins when I was young).
Steve has been itching to go camping since we first met fifteen years ago, and is now determined to get the kids to like it.

So he borrowed a neighbor's tent and pitched it in the backyard. The boys had more fun playing in it all day on Saturday.












Then Noah begged to sleep in it that night. Saturday was an unusually cool day for the middle of July, but I decided that if Steve was willing to sleep out there with him, it was okay. So Steve set up beds for him and Noah and then brought out a little TV to watch a movie. (Yeah, REAL camping ). I predicted that they would be inside by 11:00. By quarter after 11, I decided that they may actually make it through the night and I headed to bed.




In all actuality, they made it until around 4 AM when I heard noises. Noah went straight to his bed and bundled up since he was so cold. BUT, Steve was unable to head to bed.

Guess why?

Little Brother Aaron who was not allowed to sleep outside wanted a sleepover with Mommy. Poor Steve! There was no room left in the bed for him and he spent the remainder of the night ON THE COUCH.










1. VBS Preparation
This will be my 9th year preparing the music for our church's VBS program. (It would be my 10th, but I sat out the year that Noah was born since it was only two weeks after). Three years ago, I revamped the program and decided to make youth lead the music, with me in the back leading them. I think kids enjoy following other kids better, and it gives another level of energy to the music worship time.

For the last few years, I have "made" all of the leaders shirts, which included printing, cutting out, and ironing logos on up to 30 shirts. This year, the kids decided they wanted to tie dye instead.

So after church on Sunday, we headed outside to dye the shirts. As luck would have, it started to RAIN, increasingly intensely, as the activity went on, but the kids still had fun.They each wrapped their shirt individually in a grocery bag and I brought them home to rinse and dry Sunday night.














After taking off all of the rubber bands and throwing in them into the washer, I can see the way they turned out. I think they are going to look great. At least better than my hands do after three washings :(

I will be doing more tomorrow, and probably a few more each day with the kids who come for the first time and by Thursday they should all have them.





The Week Ahead:
VBS, VBS, VBS! Pretty much it.